Have His Carcase (65 page)

his beautiful frankness, he shut everybody out of his confidence, including his

mother and me, adopted an impenetrable frivolity of manner and a dilettante

pose, and became, in fact, the complete comedian. He was wealthy and could

do as he chose, and it gave me a certain amount of sardonic entertainment to

watch the efforts of post-war feminine London to capture him. ‘It can’t,’ said

one solicitous matron, ‘be good for poor Peter to live like a hermit.’ ‘Madam,’

said I, ‘if he did, it wouldn’t be.’ No; from that point of view he gave me no

anxiety. But I could not but think it dangerous that a man of his ability should

have no job to occupy his mind, and I told him so.

In 1921 came the business of the Attenbury Emeralds. That affair has never

been written up, but it made a good deal of noise, even at that noisiest of

periods. The trial of the thief was a series of red-hot sensations, and the biggest

sensation of the bunch was when Lord Peter Wimsey walked into the witness-

box as chief witness for the prosecution.

That was notoriety with a vengeance. Actualy, to an experienced inteligence

officer, I don’t suppose the investigation had offered any great difficulties; but a

‘noble sleuth’ was something new in thrils. Denver was furious; personaly, I

didn’t mind what Peter did, provided he did something. I thought he seemed

happier for the work, and I liked the Scotland Yard man he had picked up

during the run of the case. Charles Parker is a quiet, sensible, wel-bred felow,

and has been a good friend and brother-in-law to Peter. He has the valuable

quality of being fond of people without wanting to turn them inside out.

The only trouble about Peter’s new hobby was that it had to be more than a

hobby, if it was to be any hobby for a gentleman. You cannot get murderers

hanged for your private entertainment. Peter’s intelect puled him one way and

his nerves another, til I began to be afraid they would pul him to pieces. At the

end of every case we had the old nightmares and shel-shock over again. And

then Denver, of al people – Denver, the crashing great booby, in the middle of

his fulminations against Peter’s degrading and notorious police activities, must

needs get himself indicted on a murder charge and stand his trial in the House of

Lords, amid a blaze of publicity which made al Peter’s efforts in that direction

look like damp squibs.

Peter puled his brother out of that mess, and, to my relief, was human

enough to get drunk on the strength of it. He now admits that his ‘hobby’ is his

legitimate work for society, and has developed sufficient interest in public affairs

to undertake smal diplomatic jobs from time to time under the Foreign Office.

Of late he has become a little more ready to show his feelings, and a little less

terrified of having any to show.

His latest eccentricity has been to fal in love with that girl whom he cleared

of the charge of poisoning her lover. She refused to marry him, as any woman

of character would. Gratitude and a humiliating inferiority complex are no

foundation for matrimony; the position was false from the start. Peter had the

sense, this time, to take my advice. ‘My boy,’ said I, ‘what was wrong for you

twenty years back is right now. It’s not the innocent young things that need

gentle handling – it’s the ones that have been frightened and hurt. Begin again

from the beginning – but I warn you that you wil need al the self-discipline you

have ever learnt.’

Wel, he has tried. I don’t think I have ever seen such patience. The girl has

brains and character and honesty; but he has got to teach her how to take

which is far more difficult than learning to give. I think they wil find one another,

if they can keep their passions from running ahead of their wils. He does

realise, I know, that in this case there can be no consent but free consent.

Peter is forty-five now, it is realy time he was settled. As you wil see, I have

been one of the important formative influences in his career, and, on the whole,

I feel he does me credit. He is a Delagardie, with little of the Wimseys about

him except (I must be fair) that underlying sense of social responsibility which

prevents the English landed gentry from being a total loss, spiritualy speaking.

Detective or no detective, he is a scholar and a gentleman; it wil amuse me to

see what sort of shot he makes at being a husband and father. I am getting to

be an old man, and have no son of my own (that I know of); I should be glad to

see Peter happy. But as his mother says, ‘Peter has always had everything

except the things he realy wanted,’ and I suppose he is luckier than most.

Paul Austin Delagardie.