Gaudy Night (50 page)

She took up the loose-leaf book, which was still wrapped in its paper and string and sealed all over with the Wimsey crest. “As my Whimsy takes me”—Peter’s whimsies had taken him into a certain amount of trouble. She broke the seals impatiently; but the result was disappointing. He had marked nothing—presumably he had copied out anything he wanted. She turned the pages, trying to piece some sort of solution together, but too tired to think coherently. And then—yes; here was his writing, sure enough, but not on a page of the dossier. This was the unfinished sonnet—and of all the idiotic things to do, to leave half-finished sonnets mixed up with one’s detective work for other people to see! A schoolgirl trick, enough to make anybody blush. Particularly since, from what she remembered of the sonnet, its sentiments had become remarkably inappropriate to the state of her feelings.

But here it was: and in the interval it had taken to itself a sestet and stood, looking a little unbalanced, with her own sprawling hand above and Peter’s deceptively neat script below, like a large top on a small spindle.

Here then at home, by no more storms distrest,
Folding laborious hands we sit, wings furled;
Here in close perfume lies the rose-leaf curled,
Here the sun stands and knows not east nor west,
Here no tide runs; we have come, last and best,
From the wide zone in dizzying circles hurled
To that still centre where the spinning world;
Sleeps on its axis, to the heart of rest.

Lay on thy whips, O Love, that we upright,
Poised on the perilous point, in no lax bed
May sleep, as tension at the verberant core
Of music sleeps; for, if thou spare to smite,
Staggering, we stoop, stooping, fall dumb and dead,
And, dying so, sleep our sweet sleep no more.

Having achieved this, the poet appeared to have lost countenance; for he had added the comment:

“A very conceited, metaphysical conclusion!”

So. So there was the turn she had vainly sought for the sestet! Her beautiful, big, peaceful humming-top turned to a whip-top, and sleeping, as it were, upon compulsion. (And, damn him! how dared he pick up her word “sleep” and use it four times in as many lines, and each time in a different foot, as though juggling with the accent-shift were child’s play? And drag out the last half-line with those great, heavy, drugged, drowsy monosyllables contradicting the sense so as to deny their own contradiction? It was not one of the world’s great sestets, but it was considerably better than her own octave: which was monstrous of it.)

But if she wanted an answer to her questions about Peter, there it was, quite appallingly plain. He did not want to forget, or to be quiet, or to be spared things, or to stay put. All he wanted was some kind of central stability, and he was apparently ready to take anything that came along, so long as it stimulated him to keep that precarious balance. And of course, if he really felt like that, everything he had ever said or done, as far as she was concerned, was perfectly consistent. “Mine is only a balance of opposing forces.”... “What does it matter if it hurts like hell, so long as it makes a good book?”... “What is the use of making mistakes if you don’t make use of them?”... “Feeling like Judas is part of the job.”... “The first thing a principle does is to kill somebody.”... If that was his attitude, it was clearly ridiculous to urge him, in kindly tones, to stand aside for fear he might get a rap over the shins.

He had tried standing aside. “I have been running away from myself for twenty years, and it doesn’t work.” He no longer believed that the Ethiopian could change his skin to rhinoceros hide. Even in the five years or so that she had known him, Harriet had seen him strip off his protections, layer by layer, till there was uncommonly little left but the naked truth.

That, then, was what he wanted her for. For some reason, obscure to herself and probably also to him, she had the power to force him outside his defences. Perhaps, seeing her struggling in a trap of circumstance, he had walked out deliberately to her assistance. Or perhaps the sight of her struggles had warned him what might happen to him, if he remained in a trap of his own making.

Yet with all this, he seemed willing to let her run back behind the barriers of the mind, provided—yes, he was consistent after all—provided she would make her own way of escape through her work. He was, in fact, offering her the choice between himself and Wilfrid. He did recognise that she had an outlet which he had not.

And that, she supposed, was why he was so morbidly sensitive about his own part in the comedy. His own needs were (as he saw the matter) getting between her and her legitimate way of escape. They involved her in difficulties which he could not share, because she had consistently refused him the right to share them. He had nothing of his nephew’s cheerful readiness to take and have. Careless, selfish little beast, thought Harriet (meaning the viscount), can’t he leave his uncle alone?

... It was just conceivable, by the way, that Peter was quite plainly and simply and humanly jealous of his nephew—not, of course, of his relations with Harriet (which would be disgusting and ridiculous), but of the careless young egotism which made those relations possible.

And, after all, Peter had been right. It was difficult to account for Lord Saint-George’s impertinence without allowing people to assume that she was on terms with Peter which would explain that kind of thing. It had undoubtedly made an awkwardness. It was easy to say, “Oh, yes. I knew him slightly and went to see him when he was laid up after a motor accident.” She did not really very much mind if Miss Hillyard supposed that with a person of her dubious reputation all and any liberties might be taken. But she did mind the corollary that might be drawn about Peter. That after five years’ patient friendship he should have acquired only the right to look on while his nephew romped in public went near to making him look a fool. But anything else would not be true. She had placed him in exactly that imbecile position, and she admitted that that was not very pretty conduct.

She went to bed thinking more about another person than about herself. This goes to prove that even minor poetry may have its practical uses.

On the following night, a strange and sinister thing happened.

Harriet had gone, by appointment, to dine with her Somerville friend, and to meet a distinguished writer on the mid-Victorian period, from whom she expected to gain some useful information about Le Fanu. She was sitting in the friend’s room, where about half a dozen people were gathered to do honour to the distinguished writer, when the telephone rang.

“Oh, Miss Vane,” said her hostess. “Somebody wants you from Shrewsbury.”

Harriet excused herself to the distinguished guest, and went out into the small lobby in which the telephone was placed. A voice which she could not quite recognise answered her “Hullo!”

“Is that Miss Vane?”

“Yes—who’s that speaking?”

“This is Shrewsbury College. Could you please come round quickly. There’s been another disturbance.”

“Good heavens! What’s happened? Who is speaking, please?”

“I’m speaking for the Warden. Could you please—?”

“Is that Miss Parsons?”

“No, miss. This is Dr. Baring’s maid.”

“But what has happened?”

“I don’t know, miss. The Warden said I was to ask you to come at once.”

“Very well. I’ll be there in about ten or fifteen minutes. I haven’t got the car. I’ll be there about eleven.”

“Very good, miss. Thank you.”

The connection was severed. Harriet hurriedly got hold of her friend, explained that she had been called away suddenly, said her good-byes and hurried out.

She had crossed the Garden Quad and was just passing between the Old Hall and the Maitland Buildings, when she was visited with an absurd recollection. She remembered Peter’s saying to her one day:

“The heroines of thrillers deserve all they get. When a mysterious voice rings them up and says it is Scotland Yard, they never think of ringing back to verify the call. Hence the prevalence of kidnapping.”

She knew where Somerville kept its public call-box; presumably she could get a call from there. She went in; tried it; found that it was through to the exchange; dialled the Shrewsbury number, and on getting it asked to be put through to the Warden’s Lodgings.

A voice answered her; not the same person’s that had rung her up before. “Is that Dr. Baring’s maid?”

“Yes, madam. Who is speaking, please?”

(“Madam”—the other voice had said “miss.” Harriet knew now why she had felt vaguely uneasy about the call. She had subconsciously remembered that the Warden’s maid said “Madam.”)

“This is Miss Harriet Vane, speaking from Somerville. Was it you who rang me up just now?”

“No, madam.”

“Somebody rang me up, speaking for the Warden. Was it Cook or anybody else in the house?”

“I don’t think anybody has telephoned from here, madam.”

(Some mistake. Perhaps the Warden had sent her message from somewhere in College and she had misunderstood the speaker or the speaker her.

“Could I speak to the Warden?”

“The Warden isn’t in College, madam. She went out to the theatre with Miss Martin. I’m expecting them back any minute.”

“Oh, thank you. Never mind. There must have been some mistake. Would you please put me back to the Lodge?”

When she heard Padgett’s voice again she asked for Miss Edwards, and while the connection was being made, she thought fast.

It was beginning to look very much like a bogus call. But why, in Heaven’s name? What would have happened if she had gone back to Shrewsbury straight away? Since she had not the car with her, she would have gone in by the private gate, past the thick bushes by the Fellows’ Garden—the Fellows’ Garden, where people walked by night—

“Miss Edwards isn’t in her room, Miss Vane.”

“Oh! The scouts are all in bed, I suppose.”

“Yes, miss. Shall I ask Mrs. Padgett to see if she can find her?”

“No—see if you can get Miss Lydgate.”

Another pause. Was Miss Lydgate also out of her room? Was every reliable don in College out, or out of her room? Yes—Miss Lydgate was out, too; and then it occurred to Harriet that, of course, they were dutifully patrolling the College before turning in to bed. However, there was Padgett. She explained matters as well as she could to him.

“Very good, miss,” said Padgett, comfortingly. “Yes, miss—I can leave Mrs. Padgett on the Lodge. I’ll get down to the private gate and have a look round. Don’t you worry, miss. If there’s anybody a-laying in wait for you, miss, I’m sorry for ’em, that’s all. No, miss, there ain’t been no disturbance tonight as I knows on; but if I catches anybody a-laying in wait, miss, then the disturbance will proceed according to schedule, miss, trust me.”

“Yes, Padgett; but don’t make a row about it. Slip down quietly and see if there’s anybody hanging round—but don’t let them see you. If anybody attacks me when I come in, you can come to the rescue; but if not, keep out of sight.”

“Very good, miss.”

Harriet hung up again and stepped out of the call-box. A centre light burned dimly in the entrance-hall. She looked at the clock. Seven minutes to eleven. She would be late. However, the assailant, if there was one, would wait for her. She knew where the trap would be—must be. Nobody would start a riot just outside the Infirmary or the Warden’s Lodgings, where people might overhear and come out. Nor would anyone hide under or behind the walls on that side of the path. The only reasonable lurking-place was the bushes in the Fellows’ Garden, near the gate, on the right side of the path as you went up.

One would be prepared, and that was an advantage; and Padgett would be somewhere at hand; but there would be a nasty moment when one had to turn one’s back and lock the private gate from the inside. Harriet thought of the bread-knife in the dummy, and shuddered.

If she bungled it and got killed—melodramatic, but possible, when people weren’t quite sane—Peter would have something to say about it. Perhaps it would be only decent to apologise beforehand, in case. She found somebody’s notebook astray on a window-seat, borrowed a sheet of it, scribbled half a dozen words with the pencil from her bag, folded the note, addressed it and put it away with the pencil. If anything happened, it would be found.

The Somerville porter let her out into the Woodstock Road. She took the quickest way: by St. Giles’ Church, Blackball Road, Museum Road, South parks Road, Mansfield Road, walking briskly, almost running. When she turned into Jowett Walk, she slowed down. She wanted her breath and her wits.

She turned the corner into St. Cross Road, reached the gate and took out her key. Her heart was thumping.

And then, the whole melodrama dissipated itself into polite comedy. A car drew up behind her; the Dean deposited the Warden and drove on round to the tradesmen’s entrance to garage her Austin, and Dr. Baring said pleasantly:

“Ah! it’s you, Miss Vane? Now I shan’t have to look for my key. Did you have an interesting evening? The Dean and I have been indulging in a little dissipation. We suddenly made up our minds after dinner...”

She walked on up the path with Harriet, chatting with great amiability about the play she had seen. Harriet left her at her own gate, refusing an invitation to come in and have coffee and sandwiches. Had she, or had she not, heard something stir behind the bushes? At any rate, the opportunity was by now lost. She had offered herself as the cheese, but, owing to the slight delay in setting the trap, the Warden had innocently sprung it.

Harriet stepped into the Fellows’ Garden, switched on her torch and looked round. The garden was empty. She suddenly felt a complete fool. Yet, when all was said and done, there must have been some reason for that telephone call.

She made her way towards the St. Cross Lodge. In the New Quad she met Padgett.

“Ah!” said Padgett, cautiously. “She was there right enough, miss.” His right hand moved at his side, and Harriet fancied it held something suspiciously like a cosh. “Sittin’ on the bench be’ind them laurels near the gate. I crep’ along careful, like it was a night reconnaissance, miss, and ’id be’ind them centre shrubs. She didn’t tumble to me, miss. But when you an’ Dr. Baring come through the gate a-talking, she was up and orf like a shot.”