by Saki
THE QUINCE TREE
“I’ve just been to see old Betsy Mullen,” announced Vera to her aunt,Mrs. Bebberly Cumble; “she seems in rather a bad way about her rent. Sheowes about fifteen weeks of it, and says she doesn’t know where any of itis to come from.”
“Betsy Mullen always is in difficulties with her rent, and the morepeople help her with it the less she troubles about it,” said the aunt.“I certainly am not going to assist her any more. The fact is, she willhave to go into a smaller and cheaper cottage; there are several to behad at the other end of the village for half the rent that she is paying,or supposed to be paying, now. I told her a year ago that she ought tomove.”
“But she wouldn’t get such a nice garden anywhere else,” protested Vera,“and there’s such a jolly quince tree in the corner. I don’t supposethere’s another quince tree in the whole parish. And she never makes anyquince jam; I think to have a quince tree and not to make quince jamshows such strength of character. Oh, she can’t possibly move away fromthat garden.”
“When one is sixteen,” said Mrs. Bebberly Cumble severely, “one talks ofthings being impossible which are merely uncongenial. It is not onlypossible but it is desirable that Betsy Mullen should move into smallerquarters; she has scarcely enough furniture to fill that big cottage.”
“As far as value goes,” said Vera after a short pause, “there is more inBetsy’s cottage than in any other house for miles round.”
“Nonsense,” said the aunt; “she parted with whatever old china ware shehad long ago.”
“I’m not talking about anything that belongs to Betsy herself,” said Veradarkly; “but, of course, you don’t know what I know, and I don’t supposeI ought to tell you.”
“You must tell me at once,” exclaimed the aunt, her senses leaping intoalertness like those of a terrier suddenly exchanging a bored drowsinessfor the lively anticipation of an immediate rat hunt.
“I’m perfectly certain that I oughtn’t to tell you anything about it,”said Vera, “but, then, I often do things that I oughtn’t to do.”
“I should be the last person to suggest that you should do anything thatyou ought not to do to—” began Mrs. Bebberly Cumble impressively.
“And I am always swayed by the last person who speaks to me,” admittedVera, “so I’ll do what I ought not to do and tell you.”
Mrs. Bebberley Cumble thrust a very pardonable sense of exasperation intothe background of her mind and demanded impatiently:
“What is there in Betsy Mullen’s cottage that you are making such a fussabout?”
“It’s hardly fair to say that _I’ve_ made a fuss about it,” said Vera;“this is the first time I’ve mentioned the matter, but there’s been noend of trouble and mystery and newspaper speculation about it. It’srather amusing to think of the columns of conjecture in the Press and thepolice and detectives hunting about everywhere at home and abroad, andall the while that innocent-looking little cottage has held the secret.”
“You don’t mean to say it’s the Louvre picture, La Something or other,the woman with the smile, that disappeared about two years ago?”exclaimed the aunt with rising excitement.
“Oh no, not that,” said Vera, “but something quite as important and justas mysterious—if anything, rather more scandalous.”
“Not the Dublin—?”
Vera nodded.
“The whole jolly lot of them.”
“In Betsy’s cottage? Incredible!”
“Of course Betsy hasn’t an idea as to what they are,” said Vera; “shejust knows that they are something valuable and that she must keep quietabout them. I found out quite by accident what they were and how theycame to be there. You see, the people who had them were at their wits’end to know where to stow them away for safe keeping, and some one whowas motoring through the village was struck by the snug loneliness of thecottage and thought it would be just the thing. Mrs. Lamper arranged thematter with Betsy and smuggled the things in.”
“Mrs. Lamper?”
“Yes; she does a lot of district visiting, you know.”
“I am quite aware that she takes soup and flannel and improvingliterature to the poorer cottagers,” said Mrs. Bebberly Cumble, “but thatis hardly the same sort of thing as disposing of stolen goods, and shemust have known something about their history; anyone who reads thepapers, even casually, must have been aware of the theft, and I shouldthink the things were not hard to recognise. Mrs. Lamper has always hadthe reputation of being a very conscientious woman.”
“Of course she was screening some one else,” said Vera. “A remarkablefeature of the affair is the extraordinary number of quite respectablepeople who have involved themselves in its meshes by trying to shieldothers. You would be really astonished if you knew some of the names ofthe individuals mixed up in it, and I don’t suppose a tithe of them knowwho the original culprits were; and now I’ve got you entangled in themess by letting you into the secret of the cottage.”
“You most certainly have not entangled me,” said Mrs. Bebberly Cumbleindignantly. “I have no intention of shielding anybody. The police mustknow about it at once; a theft is a theft, whoever is involved. Ifrespectable people choose to turn themselves into receivers and disposersof stolen goods, well, they’ve ceased to be respectable, that’s all. Ishall telephone immediately—”
“Oh, aunt,” said Vera reproachfully, “it would break the poor Canon’sheart if Cuthbert were to be involved in a scandal of this sort. Youknow it would.”
“Cuthbert involved! How can you say such things when you know how muchwe all think of him?”
“Of course I know you think a lot of him, and that he’s engaged to marryBeatrice, and that it will be a frightfully good match, and that he’syour ideal of what a son-in-law ought to be. All the same, it wasCuthbert’s idea to stow the things away in the cottage, and it was hismotor that brought them. He was only doing it to help his friendPegginson, you know—the Quaker man, who is always agitating for a smallerNavy. I forget how he got involved in it. I warned you that there werelots of quite respectable people mixed up in it, didn’t I? That’s what Imeant when I said it would be impossible for old Betsy to leave thecottage; the things take up a good bit of room, and she couldn’t gocarrying them about with her other goods and chattels without attractingnotice. Of course if she were to fall ill and die it would be equallyunfortunate. Her mother lived to be over ninety, she tells me, so withdue care and an absence of worry she ought to last for another dozenyears at least. By that time perhaps some other arrangements will havebeen made for disposing of the wretched things.”
“I shall speak to Cuthbert about it—after the wedding,” said Mrs.Bebberly Cumble.
“The wedding isn’t till next year,” said Vera, in recounting the story toher best girl friend, “and meanwhile old Betsy is living rent free, withsoup twice a week and my aunt’s doctor to see her whenever she has afinger ache.”
“But how on earth did you get to know about it all?” asked her friend, inadmiring wonder.
“It was a mystery—” said Vera.
“Of course it was a mystery, a mystery that baffled everybody. Whatbeats me is how you found out—”
“Oh, about the jewels? I invented that part,” explained Vera; “I meanthe mystery was where old Betsy’s arrears of rent were to come from; andshe would have hated leaving that jolly quince tree.”