The Gap in the Curtain
Page 23
Chapter 7
I went down to Wirlesdon for the wedding, which was to be in the village church. Charles had gone for an early morning swim in the lake, and I met him coming up with his hair damp and a towel over his shoulder. I had motored from London and had The Times in my hand, but he never glanced at it. Half an hour later I saw him at breakfast, but he had not raided the pile of newspapers on the side table.
It was a gorgeous June morning, and presently I found Pamela in the garden, busy among the midsummer flowers—a taller and paler Pamela, with the wonderful pure complexion of one who has been down into the shades.
“It’s all there,” she whispered to me, so that her sister Dollie should not hear. “Exactly as he saw it . . . We shall have a lot of questions to answer today . . . I showed it to Charles, but he scarcely glanced at it. It doesn’t interest him. I believe he has forgotten all about it.”
“A queer business, wasn’t it?” Charles told me in the autumn. “Oh yes, it was all explained. There was an old boy of my name, a sort of third cousin of my great-grandfather. I had never heard of him. He had been in the Scots Guards, and had retired as a captain about fifty years ago. Well, he died in a London hotel on June ninth. He was a bachelor, and had no near relations, so his servant sent the notice of his death to The Times. The man’s handwriting was not very clear, and the newspaper people read the age as thirty-six instead of eighty-six . . . Also, the old chap always spoke of his regiment as the Scots Fusilier Guards, and the servant, not being well up in military history, confused it with the Scots Fusiliers . . . He lived in a villa at Cheltenham, which he had christened Marlcote, after the family place.”
THE END
About the Author
Author of the iconic novel The Thirty-Nine Steps, John Buchan filled many roles including barrister, colonial administrator, publisher, Director of Intelligence, and Member of Parliament. The Thirty-Nine Steps, first in the Richard Hannay series , is widely regarded as the starting point for espionage fiction and was written to pass time while Buchan recovered from an illness. During the outbreak of the First World War, Buchan wrote propaganda for the British war effort, combining his skills as author and politician. In 1935 Buchan was appointed the 15th Governor General of Canada and established the Governor General’s Literacy Award. Buchan was enthusiastic about literacy and the evolution of Canadian culture. He died in 1940 and received a state funeral in Canada before his ashes were returned to the United Kingdom.
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HarperPerennial Classics
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EPub Edition October 2014 ISBN: 9781443440929
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