Faintley Speaking

‘I do know, and thereby hangs a useful bit of evidence.’

‘As how?’

‘As nothing. Children should be seen and not heard, and most of their questions studiously although not unkindly ignored,’ replied Mrs Bradley serenely. ‘However, you leave the court without a stain on your character.’

‘But nobody ever does who’s been brought to court, you know.’

‘I do know. But never mind. Better a live donkey than a dead lion.’

‘I don’t agree at all. I’d willingly die if I could die a lion instead of a donkey.’

‘Some are born great, others achieve greatness —’

‘I say, I wonder if some day you’d read a bit of my stuff? I mean, I don’t think it’s all that bad.’

‘I shall be honoured.’

‘You’re pulling my leg.’

‘Which is not my wont. I am unalterably serious-minded. I wonder whether there was a fern in your parcel, too?’

‘What makes you think there might have been?’

‘The answer to that is only for the police, and I don’t know enough yet to confide in them.’

They parted at Mrs Deaks’ house and the smooth car pulled up to take Mrs Bradley home. She leered kindly at Mandsell out of the near-side window, and reached Wandles Parva somewhat ahead of Laura, who brought with her the shy Mr Bannister.

‘Ah!’ said Mrs Bradley, peering at him as though he were some dubious piece of meat which she suspected of being horse-flesh. ‘What have we here?’

‘This is Mr Bannister,’ said Laura. ‘Maths and all that, and took me out to lunch, you know. I phoned you.’

Mrs Bradley gazed snake-like upon Bannister, a proceeding which did not appear to disconcert him. In fact, her extraordinary appearance, clad as she was in cherry-red and faint purple, gave him confidence. He stretched out a flexible hand.

‘This is great,’ he said sincerely. ‘I’ve always wanted to meet you.’

‘Clever boy!’ said Laura, returning Mrs Bradley’s basilisk gaze with an impudent smile. ‘When do we eat, O Egypt?’

The meal was a great success. Bannister proved to be an authority upon French cooking and was personally introduced to Henri, who rated him, forthwith, as the enviable possessor of an intelligence unusual and profound, with a knowledge of the French tongue unsurpassed even by Frenchmen.

‘He is still English,’ said Henri’s wife Celestine, with a scowl (this in the privacy of the kitchen quarters), ‘and it is well understood that all the English are barbarians.’

‘But Madame is English, too!’

‘Madame is not of this world,’ said Gelestine austerely. ‘She is of another state of being. One cannot doubt it.’

‘Nevertheless, this gentleman understands that I am a cook in a thousand, and has said so in beautiful French. A cook in a thousand! Remember that!’

‘Fish-fry in heaven! And who is to pay?’

‘The English Government,’ said Henri, gurgling with laughter. Celestine tossed her head and picked up the tray of coffee. She affected to despise her spouse, but would have died for him. ‘They are here a nation of the Welfare State,’ Henri added. ‘The poor have inherited the earth.’

‘Blasphemy!’ said Celestine sourly. She took in the coffee and set it down gently on a table at Mrs Bradley’s right elbow. ‘Madame is served!’

‘And, in return, will give you a reliable recipe for poisoning Henri,’ said her employer. Celestine tossed her head, as usual.

‘Although a pig and a louse, he is still the husband my good parents found for me,’ she said austerely. ‘The good offices of madame are wasted on such as he!’

‘Is she really such a tartar?’ asked Bannister, who found himself at home in the household. Laura laughed.

‘You’d be surprised,’ she said. ‘Now, Mrs Croc. let’s pump him.’

Mrs Bradley regarded Bannister benevolently. She saw a tall, angular, dark-faced man, obviously shy but with honest eyes and a mouth which she thought could be grim.

‘I hope you won’t need to pump me,’ he said. ‘What about?’

‘About the late Faintley, of course,’ said Laura encouragingly. ‘You can’t tell us too much about her.’

‘As for that,’ said Bannister. He stopped, and looked to Mrs Bradley for guidance. ‘As for that,’ he repeated, ‘well, I didn’t really know much about her.’

‘Perhaps not, but you were good enough to warn my secretary, Laura here, against picking up parcels at Hagford railway junction,’ Mrs Bradley observed.

‘I know,’ said Bannister. ‘The point is that… oh, well, I expect Miss Menzies has told you.’

‘Whatever Miss Menzies has told me would be more valuable if I could have it at first hand… and that is all you can do to help us?’ Mrs Bradley added, when Bannister had repeated his story of having seen Miss Faintley enter Tomson’s shop, and of what he had witnessed there.