Angela was far more enthusiastic than her husband over the proposed ambush. “You see, Brinky can’t really be a very nice man, or he wouldn’t have been listening at our keyhole. Just think, I might have been ticking you off about your table manners or something. No, if he will go and hide in the arras he must take what he gets, like Polonius. And, after all, if he does come to you afterward, and wants to sob on your bosom, you can always refuse to promise secrecy. The world would be such a much happier place if people wouldn’t make promises.”
“None at all?”
“Don’t be soppy. You aren’t in the lovers’ lane now. Meanwhile, I think it would be a good thing if you overcame your natural bonhomie, and had a talk with Mr. Simmonds tomorrow. The more necessary, since you only seem to have brought three hankies here, and it’s you for the haberdasher’s in any case.”
“All right; but you mustn’t come. You cramp my style in shops. Too much of the I-want-a-handkerchief-for-this-young-gentleman business about you.”
“Then I shall console myself by talking to the barmaid, and finding out if she’s capable of saying anything except ‘Raight-ho.’ Of course I knew she had a young man all the time.”
“Rot! How could you tell?”
“My dear Miles, no girl ever waits so badly as that, or tosses her head like that, unless she’s meaning to chuck up her job almost immediately. I deduced a young man.”
“I wonder you haven’t wormed yourself into her confidence already.”
“Wasn’t interested in her. But tonight, at supper, she was jumpy—even you must have noticed it. She almost dropped the soup-plates, and the ‘shape’ was quivering like a guilty thing surprised.”
“That was your dressing for dinner.”
“Bunkum! You must have seen that she was all on edge. Anyhow, we’re going to have a heart-to-heart talk.”
“All right. Don’t bully the wretched girl, though.”
“Miles! You really mustn’t go running after every woman you meet like this. I shall deal with her with all my well-known delicacy and tact. Look how I managed them at supper! I should have cried, I think, if I’d found it was Edward who smoked the Callipoli. Do you think Leyland has still got his knife into Simmonds? Or do you think he wants to arrest Brinky, and is only using Simmonds as a blind?”
“He was excited enough when we met Simmonds in the lane. No, I think he’s out to arrest everybody at the moment; Simmonds for doing the murder, and Brinkman for persuading him or helping him to do it. He’s got ’em both shadowed, anyhow, he says—I hope not by the Chilthorpe police, who look to me too substantial to be mistaken for shadows. But I’m sure I’m right, I’m sure I’m right.”
“Of course you are. Though, mind you, it looks to me as if Mottram had only just managed to commit suicide in time to avoid being murdered. The trouble about Leyland’s Simmonds theory is that it makes the little man too clever. I don’t believe Leyland could ever catch a criminal unless he were a superhumanly clever criminal, and of course so few of them are. They go and make one rotten little mistake, and so get caught out.”
“You’re getting too clever. It’s quite time you went to bed.”
“ ‘Raight-ho,’ as your friend the barmaid says. No, don’t stamp about and pretend to be a caveman. Go downstairs like a good boy, and help Leyland incriminate the oldest inhabitant. He’ll be getting to that soon.”
XIII
A Morning with the Haberdasher
The sun rose bright the next morning, as if it had heard there was a funeral in contemplation and was determined to be there. The party at the Load of Mischief rose considerably later, and more or less coincided at the breakfast table. “I am afraid we shall be losing you,” said Mr. Pulteney to Angela. “A fortunate crime privileged us with your presence; when the mortal remains of it have been put away I suppose that your husband’s work here is done? Unless, of course, Mrs. Davis’s eggs and bacon have determined you to stay on here as a holiday.”
“I really don’t know what we are doing, Mr. Pulteney. My husband, of course, will have to write a report for those tiresome people at the office, and that will take a little time. Why do men always take a whole day to write a report? I don’t suppose we shall be leaving till tomorrow in any case. Perhaps you will have caught a fish by then.”
“If you would only consent to stay till that happens we should all congratulate ourselves. But, seriously, it will be a deprivation. I came to this hotel feeling that I was foredoomed to solitude, or the company, now and again, of a stray bagman. Instead, I have found the place a feast of reason; and I shall regret the change.”
“You’ll still have Mr. Brinkman.”
“What is Brinkman? A man who cannot tell beer from cider with his eyes shut—Ah, here he is! I have been lamenting the loss Mr. and Mrs. Bredon will be to our desert island. But you too, I suppose, will be for Pullford again before the funeral bake-meats are cold?”
“Me? Oh, I don’t know. … My plans are rather vague. The house at Pullford is almost shut up, everybody except the housekeeper away. I daresay I shall stay on a bit. And then, I suppose, go to London to look for another job.”
“With better auspices, I hope. Well, you deserve a rest before you settle down to the collar again. Talking of collars” (he addressed himself to the barmaid, who had just come in with more eggs and bacon), “I wonder if you could represent to Mrs. Davis the desirability of sending some of my clothes to the wash?”
“Raight-ho,” said the barmaid, unconcernedly.
“I thank you;
