They climbed up a second flight. 'And this one is all yours,' she said. 'Here's your room. I do hope you'll like it.' She took him into a small but charming front bedroom, switching on the light as she went in.
'The morning sun comes right in the window, Mr Perkins. It Is Mr Perkins, isn't it?'
'No,' he said. 'It's 'Weaver.'
'Mr Weaver. How nice. I've put a waterbottle between the sheets to air them out, Mr Weaver. It's such a comfort to have a hot water-bottle in a strange bed with clean sheets, don't you agree? And you may light the gas fire at any time if you feel chilly.'
'Thank you,' Billy said. 'Thank you ever so much.' He noticed that the bedspread had been taken off the bed, and that the bedclothes had been neatly turned back on one side, all ready for someone to get in.
'I'm so glad you appeared,' she said, looking earnestly into his face. 'I was beginning to get worried.'
'That's all right,' Billy answered brightly. 'You mustn't worry about me.' He put his suitcase on the chair and started to open it.
'And what about supper, my dear? Did you manage to get anything to eat before you came here?'
'I'm not a bit hungry, thank you,' he said. 'I think I'll just go to bed as soon as possible because tomorrow I've got to get up rather early and report to the office.'
'Very well, then. I'll leave you now so that you can unpack. But before you go to bed, would you be kind enough to pop into the sitting-room on the ground floor and sign the book? Everyone has to do that because it's the law of the land, and we don't want to go breaking any laws at this stage in the proceedings, do we?' She gave him a little wave of the hand and went quickly out of the room and closed the door.
Now, the fact that his landlady appeared to be slightly off her rocker didn't worry Billy in the least. After all, she was not only harmless-there was no question about that-but she was also quite obviously a kind and generous soul. He guessed that she had probably lost a son in the war, or something like that, and had never got over it.
So a few minutes later, after unpacking his suitcase and washing his hands, he trotted downstairs to the ground floor and entered the living-room. His landlady wasn't there, but the fire was glowing in the hearth, and the little dachshund was still sleeping in front of it. The room was wonderfully warm and cosy. I'm a lucky fellow, he thought, rubbing his hands. This is a bit of all right.
He found the guest-book lying open on the piano, so he took out his pen and wrote down his name and address. There were only two other entries above his on the page, and, as one always does with guest-books, he started to read them. One was a Christopher Mulholland from Cardiff. The other was Gregory W. Temple from Bristol.
That's funny, he thought suddenly. Christopher Mu; holland. It rings a bell.
Now where on earth had he heard that rather unusual name before?
Was he a boy at school? No. Was it one of his sister's numerous young men, perhaps, or a friend of his father's? No, no, it wasn't any of those. He glanced down again at the book.
Christopher Mulholland
231 Cathedral Road, Cardiff
Gregory W. Temple
27 Sycamore Drive, Bristol
As a matter of fact, now he came to think of it, he wasn't at all sure that the second name didn't have almost as much of a familiar ring about it as the first.
'Gregory Temple?' he said aloud, searching his memory. 'Christopher Mulholland?
'Such charming boys,' a voice behind him answered, and he turned and saw his landlady sailing into the room with a large silver tea-tray in her hands. She was holding it well out in front of her, and rather high up, as though the tray were a pair of reins on a frisky horse.
'They sound somehow familiar,' he said.
'They do? How interesting.'
'I'm almost positive I've heard those names before somewhere. Isn't that queer? Maybe it was in the newspapers. They weren't famous in any way, were they? I mean famous cricketers or footballers or something like that?'
'Famous,' she said, setting the tea-tray down on the low table in front of the sofa. 'Oh no, I don't think they were famous. But they were extraordinarily handsome, both of them, I can promise you that. They were tall and young and handsome, my dear, just exactly like you.'
Once more, Billy glanced down at the book.
'Look here, he said, noticing the dates. This last entry is over two years old.'
'It is?'
'Yes, indeed. And Christopher Mulholland's is nearly a year before that-more than three Years ago.'
'Dear me,' she said, shaking her head and heaving a dainty little sigh. 'I would never have thought it. How time does fly away from us all, doesn't it, Mr Wilkins?'
'It's Weaver,' Billy said. 'W-e-a-v-e-r.'
'Oh, of course it is!' she cried, sitting down on the sofa. 'How silly of me. I do apologize. In one ear and out the other, that's me, Mr Weaver.'
'You know something?' Billy said. 'Something that's really quite extraordinary about all this?'
'No, dear, I don't.'
'Well, you see both of these names, Mulholland and Temple, I not only seem to remember each of them separately, so to speak, but somehow or other, in some peculiar way, they both appear to be sort of connected together as well. As though they were both famous for the same sort of thing, if you see what I mean-like-like Dempsey and Tunney, for example, or Churchill and Roosevelt.'
'How amusing,' she said. 'But come over here now, dear, and sit down beside me on the sofa and I'll give you a nice cup of tea and a ginger biscuit before you go to bed.'
'You really shouldn't bother,' Billy said. 'I didn't mean you to do anything like that.' He stood by the piano, watching her as she fussed about with the cups and saucers. He noticed that she had small, white, quickly moving hands, and red finger-nails.
'I'm almost positive it was in the newspapers I saw them,' Billy said. 'I'll think of it in a second. I'm sure I will.'
There is nothing more tantalizing than a thing like this which lingers just outside the borders of one's memory. He hated to give up.
'Now wait a minute,' he said. 'Wait just a minute. Muiholland…Christopher Muiholland…wasn't that the name of the Eton schoolboy who was on a walking-tour through the West Country, and then all of a sudden 'Milk?' she said. 'And sugar?'
'Yes, please. And then all of a sudden ' Eton schoolboy?' she said. 'Oh no, my dear, that can't possibly be right because my Mr Muiholland was certainly not an Eton schoolboy when he came to me. He was a Cambridge undergraduate. Come over here now and sit next to me and warm yourself in front of this lovely fire. Come on. Your tea's all ready for you.' She patted the empty place beside her on the sofa, and she sat there smiling at Billy and waiting for him to come over.
He crossed the room slowly, and sat down on the edge of the sofa. She placed his teacup on the table in front of him.
'There we are,' she said. 'How nice and cosy this is, isn't it?'
Billy started sipping his tea. She did the same. For half a minute or so, neither of them spoke. But Billy knew that she was looking at him. Her body was half-turned towards him, and he could feel her eyes resting on his face, watching him over the rim of her teacup. Now and again, he caught a whiff of a peculiar smell that seemed to emanate directly from her person. It was not it, the least unpleasant, and it reminded him well, he wasn't quite sure what it reminded him of Pickled walnuts? New leather? Or was it the corridors of a hospital?
'Mr Mulholland was a great one for his tea,' she said at length. 'Never in my life have I seen anyone drink as much tea as dear, sweet Mr Muiholland.'
'I suppose he left fairly recently,' Billy said. He was still puzzling his head about the two names. He was positive now that he had seen them in the newspapers in the headlines.
'Left?' she said, arching her brows. 'But my dear boy, he never left. He's still here. Mr Temple is also here. They're on the third floor, both of them together.'
Billy set down his cup slowly on the table, and stared at his landlady. She smiled back at him, and then she
