said, an interesting child. Certainly Connie’s ill-humour, which had been most marked since the advent of the Tidsons, seemed to have disappeared. Miss Carmody commented on this, and added that she was very fond of Connie.
‘She is my cousin’s child. I took her for his sake, but I keep her now for my own,’ she said with apparent sincerity.
Mrs Bradley understood from this that Miss Carmody supported Connie, and she was surprised that so independent-seeming a girl should be content to live on an aunt past middle age.
‘She is technically illegitimate,’ said Miss Carmody, as though she were explaining away Mrs Bradley’s uncharitable thoughts. ‘A very sad case. My cousin – Arthur Preece-Harvard, you know – was very deeply in love with Connie’s mother. There was no dishonour attached. They intended to marry. Connie is the first-fruits of impatience.’
‘And the mother?’ Mrs Bradley enquired, perceiving that Miss Carmody wished to develop the conversation.
‘A sweet, sweet girl,’ said Miss Carmody. ‘She died, I am sorry to say, in giving birth to Connie. Arthur was broken-hearted for a time, and, of course, the whole thing has made life hard for the child. I wish she got on with Edris better. They dislike one another very much. It
‘I see,’ said Mrs Bradley; and the thoughts engendered by this conversation lasted her all the time that she was dressing.
The party met for cocktails at half-past six, and spent a pleasant time until dinner, which was at seven. Mr Tidson, who, from his own account, had spent a delightful afternoon in roving all over the town from the Westgate to the river bridge, and from Hyde Abbey gateway to the farthest boundary of St Mary’s College, invited Mrs Bradley to sit at their table for the meal, but she pleaded that there were papers she proposed to study during dinner, and produced an impressive brief-case which did, indeed, contain papers of a sort, although not anything of immediate or first-rate importance.
Mr Tidson led the way into the dining-room, made a pleasant remark to the waitress, pulled Mrs Bradley’s chair out for her and even, rather officiously, cleared a space beside her plate for her documents. Then he saw his own party seated, flipped open his table napkin, said ‘Ha! Oxtail soup!’ and called boisterously for the wine list. There was no doubt that he was in great holiday spirits, and there was no doubt, either, thought Mrs Bradley, that the wine would appear in due course on Miss Carmody’s bill.
‘You are enjoying Winchester, sir?’ asked the waitress, when she came to bring the bottle and change the plates.
‘Winchester,’ declared Mr Tidson, ‘is the queen of cities. And you, my dear, are the queen of Winchester.’
‘My home’s in Southampton,’ said the girl, registering a theory that Mr Tidson was an old sport but would bear watching. Anecdotes about Southampton, Liverpool and Bristol, from all of which his banana boats had sailed, then lasted Mr Tidson until coffee, and the waitress decided that she was wrong, and that the poor old bloke was harmless after all, thus confirming her first impression of him.
‘I shall hope,’ he said, changing the conversation when all five of them were seated in the lounge after dinner, ‘to have your company, Mrs Bradley, in my exploration of the city and its environs. I am, as you may imagine, a little out of touch with details of English architecture after so long a sojourn abroad. Would you care to accompany me tomorrow, perhaps, or the next day?’
‘It would give me great pleasure,’ Mrs Bradley replied. ‘Shall we say to-morrow afternoon? And where would you like to go?’
‘I should like to go to Alresford,’ Mr Tidson replied, ‘but as my nymph is not there I shall postpone my visit in her honour, and we will walk as far as Shawford, if you are willing.’
‘Alresford?’ said Connie, startled. ‘Oh, but you can’t go there!’
‘That is what I said,’ replied Mr Tidson. ‘Moreover, I did not address the remark to you!’
Chapter Three
* * *
JAMES WOODFORDE, Vol. 3, 1788–1792.
Edited by JOHN BERESFORD.
AS IT happened, Mrs Bradley spent only two days in Winchester, or, rather, two parts of days, for she was recalled by telegram on the Tuesday afternoon to attend an ex-seaman who had been ordered psychiatric treatment for shock following some bad burns.
Mr Tidson, therefore, continued his tour of Winchester and the neighbourhood alone, for his wife still declared that she preferred a chair in the sun-lounge to walking or sightseeing, and Miss Carmody and Connie refused to have anything to do with fishing.
Mr Tidson had announced himself to be a devoted and persistent angler, and argued that, besides this, the troutrod in his hand would cloak the gravity of his true quest, his search for the naiad, for it gave a screen, and seemed to provide a reason, for his wadings and mud-larkings across water-meadows intersected by ditches, brooks, tributary streams and carriers, and for his getting dirty and wet.
A wet and muddy angler was almost an object of nature, he observed, but a naiad-hunter in similar plight might have been regarded askance, particularly as the quickest way back to the hotel lay across the Cathedral Close. He therefore purchased a green-heart rod and some tackle, and set about acquiring tickets for the local waters.
His first action after lunch was to see Mrs Bradley off. His second was to walk to the offices of the County newspaper and enquire whether anything more had been added to the first report of the naiad. Rather to his annoyance, Miss Carmody insisted upon going there with him. Connie, whom he had attempted to persuade, refused to be seen about with him, an announcement which she made in the most offensive tone of which she was capable. She then went off to the bus station and left Mr Tidson and Miss Carmody to walk to the office of the newspaper.
The staff could tell them no more. They cast polite doubts upon the authenticity of the letter and also declared that it was unusual for ladies to bathe in the open river so near the Cathedral precincts. The story of the naiad, they thought, had been invented to provide a silly-season sensation, or possibly to provoke a newspaper correspondence. It had not appeared in any of the local papers, although a local resident had sent them a cutting.
They had not, however, troubled to get in touch with the sender of the letter. They thought that he must have been someone staying in Winchester on holiday who had found the place quiet – some people did – and had tried to create a diversion in the form of a stupid hoax.
Miss Carmody listened with critical attention, putting in a word here and there. She confided to Connie, upon her return to the
