Adders on the Heath

'Why does not Clive go back to school, if that's what he wants?'

'I thought I had mentioned that. He is very delicate and very highly strung.'

'A very old-fashioned boy,' said Dame Beatrice. At this moment Clive flung the door open and appeared as dramatically as an amateur actor making an over-played entrance.

'I burnt them! I burnt them!' he yelled. Dame Beatrice regarded him with benign interest. He stared at her for a moment and then cast himself into her arms.

'Well, really, Clive!' said his mother. Dame Beatrice pushed him, kindly but without emotion, on to the sofa.

'Did you, now?' she said. 'Well, you read them before you burnt them. Did they add to the total of the world's knowledge?'

'They were a lot of damned lies,' sobbed the child.

'So much is obvious. Be specific,' said Dame Beatrice.

'What's that?' He sat up, master of himself again.

'You know!' retorted Dame Beatrice, who had learned this cliche from her secretary.

They said he...well, you know!' said Clive, adroitly turning the tables.

'And you know that this was not true?'

'That string-bean!'

'Really, Clive!' protested his mother.

'He does not lack stamina,' said Dame Beatrice; but whether she referred to Richardson or to Clive, neither the boy nor his mother could tell. Dame Beatrice did not beat about the bush. 'How well do you know some people named Campden-Towne?' she enquired of the woman. Her tone was abrupt and compelling. Mrs Maidston glanced at Clive. His eyes were venomous.

'Campden-Towne? Oh, well, yes, I suppose you might call them acquaintances of ours,' she said weakly. Clive made a very rude noise. She ignored it. 'Why do you ask?'

'There is some slight evidence that they may be able to shed a little light on Mr Richardson's activities when he discovered that a dead man had been placed in his tent. You have read about that, I am sure.'

'Well, I don't see what it has to do with us.'

'Yes, you do,' said Clive. 'You sacked Mr Richardson. That's what she's here about. She just wants to know why. It wasn't the letters, whatever you may say. You didn't have to believe the letters. They were phoney, and you jolly well know they were. You said yourself, a minute ago-'

'Be quiet, Clive! You weren't in the room-'

'No, but I listened outside the door,' observed the repellent but pathetic child. 'You ought to know me by now.'

'Indeed?' said his mother, very coldly, but with a terrified glance at Dame Beatrice. 'You are an untruthful, nasty-minded little boy and had better go to your room.'

The boy put out his tongue at her and accepted this advice. Left by themselves, the two women faced one another squarely.

Clive's mother fidgeted with a bracelet.

'He's such a little snooper,' she said.

'Well, now, why was Mr Richardson dismissed?' demanded Dame Beatrice. 'You are not going to tell me that you or your husband would jeopardise a young man's future because of some anonymous comments on his character?-comments which you yourself describe as filthy.'

'Well, of course, it wasn't only the letters. He was unsatisfactory,' said Mrs Maidston, hedging.

'As a tutor?'

'Oh, in other ways, too. He was quite disinclined to exert himself in any way which did not take his fancy.'

'Such as...?'

'Well, there seemed no reason why he should not have done a little secretarial work for my husband in the evenings, but would he help him?'

'I presume that he would not. Was it agreed beforehand that he should do so?'

'It couldn't have been, could it? Otherwise my husband would have insisted. One would have thought, though, that Mr Richardson might have stretched a point in order to help out. My husband is a very busy man.'

'How did Mr Richardson spend his evenings?'

'In his own room, mostly, using the electric light and the electric fire. Sometimes he switched on his wireless set.'

'His own property?'

'Oh, yes, but our electricity. It wasn't a battery set, you see. That young man had plenty of perks here.'

'How did he and your son get on together?'