evening when I went out to post a letter. It was just after Prince had sent one of their fellows off, and silly like, I went out without him. It was only a step to the pillar box, see? A mistake though. They made a mess of me, but I got a good look at them. They told me I'd get the same again if I went to the police. But I rang the boys in blue right up, and told them the lot. It was a blond young brute who slashed my arm and my evidence got him six months,' he said with satisfaction. 'After that I was careful not to move a step without Prince, and they've never got near enough to have another go at me.'
'How about the other victims?' I asked.
'Same as me,' he said. 'Three or four of them were beaten up and slashed with knives. After I'd got them dogs I persuaded some of them to tell the police. They'd had the worst of it by then, I thought, but they were still scared of giving evidence in court. The gang have never actually killed anyone, as far as I know. It wouldn't be sense, anyhow, would it? A man can't pay up if he's dead.'
'No,' I said, thoughtfully. 'I suppose he can't. They might reckon that one death would bring everyone else to heel, though.'
'You needn't think I haven't that in my mind all the time,' he said sombrely, 'but there's a deal of difference between six months for assault and a life sentence or a hanging, and I expect that's what has stopped 'em. This isn't Chicago after all, though you'd wonder sometimes.'
I said, 'I suppose if they can't get money from their old victims, the gang try protecting people who don't know about your systems and your dogs-'
The innkeeper interrupted, 'We've got a system for that, too. We put an advertisement in the Brighton paper every week telling anyone who has been threatened with Protection to write to a Box number and they will get help. It works a treat, I can tell you.'
Kate and I looked at him with genuine admiration.
'They should have made you a general,' I said, 'not a sergeant-major.'
'I've planned a few incidents in my time,' he said modestly. 'Those young lieutenants in the war, straight out of civvy street and rushed through an officer course, they were glad enough now and then for a suggestion from a regular.' He stirred. 'Well, how about a drink now?'
But Kate and I thanked him and excused ourselves, as it was already eight o'clock. Thomkins and I promised to let each other know how we fared in battle, and we parted on the best of terms. But I didn't attempt to pat Prince.
Aunt Deb sat in the drawing-room tapping her foot. Kate apologized very prettily for our lateness, and Aunt Deb thawed. She and Kate were clearly deeply attached to each other.
During dinner it was to Uncle George that Kate addressed most of the account of our afternoon's adventures. She told him amusingly and lightly about the wandering horse-box and made a rude joke about the Pavilion Plaza's paste sandwiches, which drew a mild reproof from Aunt Deb to the effect that the Pavilion Plaza was the most hospitable of the Brighton hotels. I gave a fleeting thought to the flighty Mavis, whom I had suspected, perhaps unjustly, of dispensing her own brand of hospitality on the upper floors.
'And then we had a drink in a darling little pub called The Blue Duck,' said Kate, leaving out the telephone box and our walk through the Lanes. 'I cut my hand there-' she held it out complete with bandage, '-but not very badly of course, and we went into the kitchen to wash the blood off, and that's what made us late. They had the most terrifying Alsatian there that I'd ever seen in my life. He snarled a couple of times at Alan and made him shiver in his shoes like a jelly-' She paused to eat a mouthful of roast lamb.
'Do you care for dogs, Mr York?' said Aunt Deb, with a touch of disdain. She was devoted to her dachshund.
'It depends,' I said.
Kate said, 'You don't exactly fall in love with Prince. I expect they call him Prince because he's black. The
Black Prince. Anyway, he's useful if any dog is. If I told you two dears what the man who keeps The Blue Duck told Alan and me about the skulduggery that goes on in respectable little old Brighton, you wouldn't sleep sound in your beds.'
'Then please don't tell us, Kate dear?' said Aunt Deb. 'I have enough trouble with insomnia as it is.'
I looked at Uncle George to see how he liked being deprived of the end of the story, and saw him push his half- filled plate away with a gesture of revulsion, as if he were suddenly about to vomit.
He noticed I was watching, and with a wry smile said, 'Indigestion, I'm afraid. Another of the boring nuisances of old age. We're a couple of old crocks now, you know.'
He tried to raise a chuckle, but it was a poor affair. There was a tinge of grey in the pink cheeks, and fine beads of sweat had appeared on the already moist-looking skin. Something was deeply wrong in Uncle George's world.
Aunt Deb looked very concerned about it, and as sheltering her from unpleasant realities was for him so old and ingrained a habit, he made a great effort to rally his resources. He took a sip of water and blotted his mouth on his napkin, and I saw the tremor in his chubby hands. But there was steel in the man under all that fat, and he cleared his throat and spoke normally enough.
He said, 'It quite slipped my mind, Kate my dear, but while you were out Gregory rang up to talk to you about Heavens Above. I asked him how the horse was doing and he said it had something wrong with its leg and won't be able to run on Thursday at Bristol as you planned.'
Kate looked disappointed. 'Is he lame?' she asked.
Uncle George said, 'I could swear Gregory said the horse had thrown out a splint. He hadn't broken any bones though, has he? Most peculiar.' He was mystified, and so, I saw, was Kate.
'Horses' leg-bones sometimes grow knobs all of a sudden, and that is what a splint is,' I said. 'The leg is hot and tender while the splint is forming, but it usually lasts only two or three weeks. Heavens Above will be sound again after that.'
'What a pest,' said Kate. 'I was so looking forward to Thursday. Will you be going to Bristol, Alan, now that my horse isn't running?'
'Yes,' I said. 'I'm riding Palindrome there. Do try and come Kate, it would be lovely to see you.' I spoke enthusiastically, which made Aunt Deb straighten her back and bend on me a look of renewed disapproval.
'It is not good for a young gel's reputation for her to be seen too often in the company of jockeys,' she said.
At eleven o'clock, when Uncle George had locked the study door on his collection of trophies, and when Aunt Deb had swallowed her nightly quota of sleeping pills, Kate and I went out of the house to put her car away in the garage. We had left it in the drive in our haste before dinner.
The lights of the house, muted by curtains, took the blackness out of the night, so that I could still see Kate's face as she walked beside me.
I opened the car door for her, but she paused before stepping in.
'They're getting old,' she said, in a sad voice, 'and I don't know what I'd do without them.'
'They'll live for years yet,' I said.
'I hope so- Aunt Deb looks very tired sometimes, and Uncle George used to have so much more bounce. I think he's worried about something now- and I'm afraid it's Aunt Deb's heart, though they haven't said- They'd never tell me if there was anything wrong with them.' She shivered.
I put my arms round her and kissed her. She smiled.
'You're a kind person, Alan.'
I didn't feel kind. I wanted to throw her in the car and drive off with her at once to some wild and lonely hollow on the Downs for a purpose of which the cave men would thoroughly have approved. It was an effort for me to hold her lightly, and yet essential.
'I love you, Kate,' I said, and I controlled even my breathing.
'No,' she said, 'Don't say it. Please don't say it.' She traced my eyebrows with her finger. The dim light was reflected in her eyes as she looked at me, her body leaning gently against mine, her head held back.
'Why not?'
'Because I don't know- I'm not sure- I've liked you kissing me and I like being with you. But love is so big a word. It's too important. I'm- I'm not- ready-'
And there it was. Kate the beautiful, the brave, the friendly, was also Kate the unawakened. She was not aware yet of the fire that I perceived in her at every turn. It had been battened down from childhood by her
