The Case Of William Smith (10 page)

Miss Silver knitted thoughtfully. Then she said,

‘He has lost his memory — he does not know who he was before the war. But you believe that you met him at a party at the Luxe in ’39, and your cousin Mrs. Darcy, who was also present, informs you that he married the girl to whom he was then engaged. You knew him only as Bill, and you do not remember the girl’s name at all. Mrs. Darcy remembers too many names, and is not sure about any of them. You are of the opinion that his life has recently been attempted.’

Frank said, ‘An admirable summing-up.’

Miss Silver coughed.

‘As to your two uncomfortable points — have you toid him that you consider the attack you witnessed was an attempt at murder?’

He said, ‘No.’

‘And you are wondering if you should put him on his guard.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘And you are also wondering whether you should pass on Mrs. Darcy’s information as to his marriage.’

Frank lifted a hand and let it fall again.

‘Correct on both counts. But what is there to say? I can tell him that the chap who hit him once was going to hit him again. It doesn’t prove anything — does it? I rather blench at telling him that my cousin Mildred says he is a married man, because — well, you used the word information, but anything Mildred produces is entirely without form and void. I told you she had an inconsequent mind. That’s putting it much too mildly. When it comes to anything like evidence, she hasn’t really got a mind at all — she just dives into a sort of lumber-room and brings out odds and ends. If you put them together they make something, but nobody — least of all Mildred herself — can do more than guess at whether the result bears any relation to fact. I think she really does remember that Bill did marry the girl in the gold dress, but I can’t be sure, and I don’t see that I’m justified in passing it on unless I am sure. On the other hand, if I did pass it on it might be a clue to his identity, or it might give his memory a jog, so I don’t see that I am justified in keeping it to myself. I am in fact exhibiting extreme infirmity of purpose, and as I usually don’t find any difficulty in making up my mind I don’t like it.’

Miss Silver knitted briskly.

‘There are interesting possibilities. On the other hand your cousin may be mistaken, and the attack you witnessed have been a mere sporadic act of violence, the initial purpose robbery, with the brutal instinct to strike a second time overpowering reason. This has been, and is, a factor in many crimes.’

‘I agree. But I am left with my impression. Would you like to discourse on the interesting possibilities?’

Miss Silver turned the pale blue leggings, which had now assumed a definite shape. She said,

‘You recognized him. Someone else may have done so.’

‘Yes.’

‘After seven or eight years a return from the grave would not always be welcome. On the purely material side, it might be inconvenient, or even disastrous. You have, I suppose, no idea of this young man’s circumstances?’

‘You mean when he was Bill? Well, no. The Latimers — Mildred said it was their party — well, they were in a fairly moneyed set. His father made a pile in soap. Most of their friends would be well-to-do. But’ — he laughed — ‘well, I was there! Bill may have been on the same footing. His girl looked expensive. But there again — you can’t tell with girls. My cousin Rachel who hasn’t a bean turns out looking like a million dollars, and I know women who spend hundreds and miss the bus every time. Bill’s girl may have made her own dress, or Aunt Sophy may have given it to her — or any of the other old ladies whom Mildred reeled off. There was a Cousin Barbara, I remember, queer and rather rich. Mildred’s mother had a whole tribe of relations, and they are all dead, so it’s no good saying go and ask them what about it. The whole thing could hardly be vaguer — could it? What I can’t account for is the fact that it has left me with these impressions, which are not vague at all, but quite definite and sharp. Do you know what it reminds me of? Looking up at a lighted window out of a dark street and seeing someone or something or watching a train go past and getting a glimpse of a face you can’t forget.’

Miss Sliver had a Victorian habit of quotation. She employed it now. The late Lord Tennyson was her favourite poet, but on this occasion it was Longfellow who came aptly to her lips:

‘Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing…

So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another.’

Katharine woke with the night turning towards day. It was the hour when even a great city is quiet — a still hour, but not dark, because the sky was clear. Somewhere behind all those houses the moon was going down. From where she lay she could see the tracery of leafless trees above the roof-line over the way. The trees were in the garden of Rasselas House. They were old, and tall, and beautiful. She looked at them now and was at peace. The window was open and a soft air came in. She turned a little. On the other side of Carol’s wide, low bed William was very deeply asleep. One of his hands was tucked under the pillow, the other lay across his chest. She had to listen to catch the quiet, even breathing. If she put out her own hand it would touch him. But her thought could not reach him at all. Or could it? She wondered. When you loved someone as much as this it didn’t seem possible that he could go where you couldn’t reach him. All through time — all through space—. The thought broke off. Time and space were frightening things — cold, far, endless. No, not that, because time must come to an end. There was a verse about it in the Bible — the angel standing upon the sea and upon the earth and lifting up his hand to swear that there should be time no longer. A little shiver went over her. Time and space were cold and far away. She and William were here. This was their hour. Her thought swung back again. His body was here. William was somewhere else — perhaps in the very deep places of sleep where they say there are no dreams. How do they know? All they can really tell is that you don’t remember what you dream in those deep places. Perhaps William was there.

William came up into the shallows where dreams begin. The dream that met him there was the one he knew, only this time it was different. Always before it had begun in the street. He would be walking up the steps and going into the house. The last time he had had the dream was when he was hit over the head and he couldn’t get into the house because someone was holding the door against him. That hadn’t ever happened before, and it worried him. This time was quite different, because he was not only in the house, but he was right up at the top of the stairs. As a rule, that was when he woke. Always in the dream someone was waiting for him, and when he got to the top, or nearly to the top, he woke up.

This time it was different. He stood at the top of the stairs and looked down. He could see all the way down the stairs into the hall. There was plenty of light — but not daylight — there wasn’t ever daylight in his dream. Everything was all right. And then quite suddenly it wasn’t. The dream took a slant, the way dreams sometimes do. The newel-posts which were carved with the four Evangelists went queer. He was standing at the head of the stairs between the eagle and the man, looking down to the lion and the ox at the foot, and all at once they were different. The eagle had changed into a Boomalong Bird, and the man was Mr. Tattlecombe, looking indignant, as well he might, with his grey hair standing up and his eyes very blue. And down there on either side of the bottom step there was a Wurzel Dog and a Crummocky Cow. He came down the stairs into the hall, and someone knocked three times on the door. They wanted to get in, but the door was barred. Then they came through the door — just like that — the door didn’t open, they came through it with their arms linked — three of them, with the woman in the middle. He knew her at once. She was Miss Jones, the secretary who had told him that Eversleys wouldn’t be interested in the Wurzel toys. He knew her, but he didn’t know the men, because there wasn’t anything to know. They were just trousers and coats, and faces painted smooth and featureless with the paint they used in the workshop for undercoating the toys. It was a horrid pinkish colour and it glistened. The faces had no eyes and no features. They were just paint. They came towards him. He called out, ‘No — no — no! and the dream broke up. He opened his eyes on the room, the glimmering square of the window, the light air coming in.

Katharine slipped her arm under his head and drew it to her shoulder.

‘What is it? You called out.’

‘What did I say?’

‘You said, “No — no — no!” ’

He said, ‘I was dreaming.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Well, it’s rather odd. It’s a dream I have sometimes, about going up three steps into a house. There’s an old door — oak, with nails in it — and I go through into a hall with a staircase going up on the right. The hall has panelling — it goes all the way up the stairs too. There are pictures let into it. There’s a girl in a pink dress. The stair goes up on the right, and the newel-posts are carved with the four Evangelists — a lion and an ox at the bottom, and an eagle and a man at the top — ’ He broke off suddenly. ‘Katharine, I’ve never remembered that before. It’s been in the dream, but I haven’t remembered it when I was awake — not till now. That’s funny, isn’t it?’

‘I don’t know — ’

‘I’ve never remembered it before, but it was there. I used to remember going up the steps and into the house, and that I was coming home. Do you think it’s something real and I remember it when I’m asleep?’

She felt his rough fair hair under her cheek. She said,

‘Does it feel like that?’

‘I don’t know — I don’t know what it would feel like. It’s always felt good — until tonight. ’

‘What happened tonight?’

‘Well, as a rule I come in and I go upstairs, and then I wake up. It doesn’t sound much, but it feels good. Tonight it all went queer. Three of the Evangelists turned into Wurzel toys, and the man was Mr. Tattlecombe. And then it all got horrid. Three people came through the door — I mean really right through it, when it was shut. Two of them were men, with their faces all smoothed out with undercoating paint — no features or anything — but the one in the middle was that Miss Jones I saw when I went to Eversleys.’

Katharine drew a sharp breath.

He said, ‘What’s that for?’

‘It was rather horrid.’

‘Yes. But I woke up — don’t let’s bother about it any more. I love you.’

‘Do you?’

‘Yes. I feel as if I’d loved you always.’

They went back to the shop on Monday morning, and received the acid congratulations of Miss Cole.

‘So very sudden. Quite unexpected, if I may say so. But Mrs. Bastable tells me she saw you married. And Mrs. Salt there too! Really I had no idea at all, though I naturally thought it very strange when you and Miss Eversley both took the afternoon off. If there had been a rush of business, I don’t know how I should have managed.’

This from Miss Cole who had steadily refused to have help in the shop. She hoped they would be happy in tones which suggested that she feared the worst. They escaped thankfully to the workshop.

At eleven o’clock Mrs. Salt rang up to say that Mr. Tattlecombe would be coming home that afternoon. She made no explanation, merely remarking that she had ordered a taxi for half-past three, and that she would of course accompany her brother. This diverted Miss Cole’s attention, and sent Mrs. Bastable into a perfect fever of preparation.

Mr. Tattlecombe arrived triumphantly at four o’clock. He kissed his sister and thanked her for all she had done for him, but he did not press her to stay. William helped him upstairs, gave him a footstool and a rug, and attended to his frank opinion of Emily Salt.

‘Listens at doors,’ said Abel, looking exactly like he had looked in William’s dream — hair sticking up on end and blue indignant eyes. ‘I always thought she did, and now I’ve caught her. Last night it was, after Abigail got back from chapel. I got talking to her about you getting married, and natural enough we got on to my leaving you the business.’

William began, ‘I hope Mrs. Salt — ’ but Mr. Tattlecombe put up a hand to stop him.

‘Abby’s agreeable. I told you she was when we talked about it before. The one that isn’t is Emily Salt.’ Two bright patches came up into his cheeks. ‘Emily Salt, if you please, that’s no more relation to me than she is to you! “Don’t talk about it in front of Emily,” my sister says. Well, that’s what I’ve never done, and so I told her. “Well,” she said, “Emily knows, and it’s upset her.” “What’s it got to do with her for her to be upset about it?” I said. “I’ll thank her to mind her own business — she’s no call to upset herself about mine. What does she know about it anyway?” Abby didn’t say anything, so I told her straight out. “She listens at doors,” I said.’

Abel had quite obviously enjoyed himself. He had wanted to say what he thought about Emily Salt for a long time. Well, now he had said it. And Abby had just sat there looking down into her lap. She hadn’t said anything because she couldn’t say anything. He explained this to William with a good deal of satisfaction.

‘Doctor came Saturday, and said I’d got to use my leg, so I got up out of the chair and tried it. Wasn’t too good, and wasn’t too bad. What I was aiming at was getting near the door, for there’s a stair that creaks, and I’d heard it. Abby’s a bit hard of hearing, but I’m not, thank the Lord. I’d heard that stair, but I hadn’t heard the one that goes on up, so I’d a pretty good idea where Emily was. I began talking about you again, and I raised my voice a bit, thinking it would be a pity for her to miss anything. I said I wondered if it would ever come out who you were. And that’s when I got to the door and pulled it open. I tell you I nearly had her in on top of me.’

‘Emily Salt?’

Abel nodded emphatically.

‘Right up against the door, with her hand on the knob, listening. Good thing for my leg she didn’t fall right on the top of me.’

William kept a straight face.

‘What did you do, sir?’

‘I said, “You’ll hear more comfortably if you come inside, Emily Salt.” She stared the way she does and said she was just coming in. So I told her what I thought about that. “Listening at the door,” I told her — “that’s what you were doing, and not the first time either. And I’ll thank you to keep your hands off my affairs, Miss Salt.” Abby came along then to get me back to my chair. “Now, Emily,” she says, and Emily flew right off the handle. I never heard anything like it — screamed like a wild cat and said I was doing Abby out of her rights. “And what’s it got to do with you if I am? ’ I said — and I could have said a whole lot more if my leg had been different. As soon as I got back to my chair Abby took Emily away. I could hear her screaming and going on all the way down the stairs.’

‘Mr. Tattlecombe — ’

Abel put up an imperious hand.

‘If it’s anything about my will, you can keep it to yourself. I’m agreeable, and Abby’s agreeable. And as for Emily Salt, she ought to be in a home, and so I told Abby when she came back. We didn’t have words about it, but we might have done if I’d stayed on,so I said I’d come home… That picture over the mantelpiece isn’t straight, and those two photograph albums have got changed over. The one with the gilt corners goes at the back of the table.’

He looked about him with a critical pleasure as William made these adjustments. None of the furniture was as handsome as Abigail Salt’s. The Brussels carpet was a good deal worn, the upholstery of the chairs was dingy. But it was his own place. The picture over the mantelpiece was an enlargement of the photograph taken of himself and Mary on their wedding-day — an earnest young man in an ill-cut suit, and a plain, sweet-faced young woman in balloon sleeves and a dreadful hat. The furniture was what they had bought together. He nodded approvingly, and said,

‘There’s no place like your own, William.’