“ ‘Honi soit qui mal y pense,’ you mean?” I suggested, by way of finishing the conversation. But she only shrieked louder than ever. A most extraordinary woman. Sincere, in her way, of course.
“Then I suppose that even murder—” I began, when the air was still again. I had not the slightest idea of how I was going to finish the sentence. My object was to change the subject of conversation. I never like people to know that they have worsted me in an argument. I feel that I owe it to the cloth to keep my end up and the Anglican flag flying.
“Oh, murder!” said Mrs. Bradley, fastening on to the word with grim relish. She wagged her head at me. “Murder is a queer crime, young man. If it
“Of course it’s a crime,” I said. “It’s a sin, too,” I added, buttoning the black jacket and composing the countenance into ecclesiastical lines.
“Rubbish, child,” retorted the Bradley, with spirit. “Murder is a general heading for a whole list of actions, most of which ought to be judged merely as misdemeanours. The second division ought to be the special preserve of murderers.”
“It would be, wouldn’t it?” I said. She waved aside the shaft of wit.
“Look at Crippen,” she said. As I have always looked upon the little thug as one of the hottest exhibits in the Chamber of Horrors, this suggestion fell flat so far as I was concerned.
“What about him?” I said. “The victim of an illicit passion, that’s all.”
“The victim of an inferiority complex,” returned Mrs. Bradley. I chewed the thought.
“Hm!” I said. These psychologists frighten me. I don’t talk their argot, of course, and that puts one at a disadvantage.
“Besides,” said Mrs. Bradley, warming to it, “most murderers are insane at the time of committing the murder. Take Patrick Mahon.”
“Oh, but that was frightfully nasty,” I said.
“You are confusing the two acts of the unfortunate man when you say so,” responded Mrs. Bradley.
“But he dismembered the body!” I protested. I mean, hang it all!
“Yes, that’s what I am saying,” she said. I blinked.
“If a man laid an entirely false trail for the police, misled them, hoodwinked them, drew red herrings across the track and dived and doubled in order to escape them, you wouldn’t say that he was any more of a villain than if he took no steps to secure himself from arrest, would you?” she asked. I thought it over, and replied, cautiously, in the negative.
“Well, a man who dismembers a body and hides the head is only trying to secure himself against arrest,” said Mrs. Bradley. “You should try to think clearly, child.”
“But murderers who are found to be insane are lodged in Broadmoor,” I said, adroitly side-stepping once more.
“Ah, Broadmoor,” said Mrs. Bradley. “What a waste of public money! A painless death would be far the better method. There’s a great deal of rubbish talked about death, young man. Mind you, there must be none of that dreadful period of waiting for the execution morning that obtains under our present inhuman and disgraceful system. I do not say abolish the death penalty, but, instead of a penalty, let it be a release. We must always have the moral courage to release from life those who are not fitted to bear life’s burdens. Social morality, consisting, as it so largely does, in refraining from action, is to some minds an unachievable ideal, and to others simply nonsense.”
“Ah, but the duty of the church—” I interrupted. Then I stopped short, because, of course, the church is not primarily concerned with morals. At least, it ought not to be, for morals are not even the A.B.C. of religion. I doubt whether, at most, they are more than the pothooks and hangers of our spiritual life.
“Priests are but men,” I said, lamely, of course.
“Not always,” retorted the Bradley, with her frightful cackle. My trouble is that I never know when the woman is serious, but I found myself thinking of Mrs. Coutts with her murky mind. Beside her, this queer little reptilian was like a rainbow or an iridescent shell of pearl. Mind you, you couldn’t exactly guarantee what you would find underneath the shell, but I felt that while it would be possible to imagine the Archangel Gabriel blowing his trumpet in Mrs. Bradley’s ear, it would be impossible for Mrs. Coutts even to recognise the Archangel and the sound of his trumpet on the last great day. There was something about the Bradley. I should be the last person to deny it. One felt, in the words of the rather Nonconformist hymn, that she was on the Lord’s side. Curious.
She clapped me on the shoulder. It was quite a welcome change, of course, to being poked in the ribs.
“And now, to the question of the hour,” she said. “Talking about murderers, let us include our own.” She paused a moment, and then added, “Oh, by the way, do you know which train is best from Wyemouth Harbour if one wishes to arrive in London in time for dinner and a theatre?”
“Oh, yes. The 3.30 is easily the best,” I said. “For one thing, it doesn’t stop anywhere until it gets into Waterloo, and for another, it has a restaurant car.”
“Ah, thank you, my dear,” she said. “The 3.30.”
She wrote it down.
“And now, dear child,” she said, “this murder of the girl Tosstick. A queer affair, you know.” And, arguing, I suppose, from the general to the particular, she began to talk about Bob Candy, which was what I had been trying to urge her to do.
“I want you to go and see Bob,” she said. “And I want you to ask him some questions about what happened on August Bank Holiday.”
“But his lawyers,” I began, “are surely the people—”
“Yes, yes,” said the little old woman. She began to stroke the sleeve of her orange and black dinner frock as she talked. “But I want
