They stood watching him in fascinated horror as he vanished inside the front door, followed by Jumble.
Inside the sitting-room were Mrs Brown, Robert and Miss Taverton. The faces of Mrs Brown and Robert wore expressions of blank bewilderment. Miss Taverton’s face wore its usual expression of vague benignity. She had flashed a woolly smile at William on his entrance.
“You were expecting me, of course?” she was saying to Robert.
“Well—er—” began Robert, but she went on without waiting for him to finish.
“I think I put the situation quite clearly in my letter. I can’t remember whether I did or not because my memory is a little uncertain. I mean, so often I think I’ve remembered things and then find out that really I’ve forgotten them. But I’ll go over the whole situation again to make it quite clear in case there was any ambiguity . . . You see, this friend of mine from America was very much impressed by some plays she saw performed by children at certain schools in England and wanted to do what she could to encourage the art of acting among English children. So, when she went back to America—she’s a wealthy woman—she left me this sum of money to use at my own discretion to further the art of acting among English children. A sort of international gesture if you understand what I mean.”
“Well, as you know, I put a tentative advertisement in a newspaper and you answered it.” Robert opened his mouth to protest but she waved aside the protest before he could make it. “You said that you had a flourishing little troupe of child actors and I agreed to come over and see them. I wrote and told you the time I should arrive.” Again Robert’s mouth opened and shut silently as she plunged on with her recital. “So you can imagine my pleasure when I found four of your little troupe of child actors at the station to meet me. You had told me in your letter that they hoped to make a children’s theatre in a sort of outhouse in the village and they took me straight to it. It was a sort of barn in a field—and there they acted a most delightful little sketch for me, making me the chief character, which I thought a most original idea. I was the kidnapped and they the kidnappers. I don’t know which of them had written it but they all remembered their lines and spoke them with great expression and spirit.”
“Then they left me alone for a time to prepare their next little “turn” and I made a thorough inspection of the place. I don’t think it’s really suitable for a theatre. It isn’t weather proof and I don’t think it could be made so. Such a pity! While I was inspecting it a delightful stray dog joined me.” She threw a vague smile at Jumble who was sitting at her feet, looking up at her, following her recital, as it seemed, with rapt interest. “There he is! The dear fellow. He shared my lunch, which I’d forgotten to eat on the train, and then the children returned—the whole troupe this time—to do their second and last little performance for me. They acted a tournament on imaginary horses with sticks for lances. One side came up to the barn and the other stayed in the road and then they charged each other and held the tournament. It was a really splendid piece of acting on the part of the little men.”
“This little man”—she beamed fondly at William—“simply surpassed himself and he’d been excellent in the kidnapping scene. I’ve had a most interesting and enjoyable day and,”—she turned an earnest gaze on Robert—“I do congratulate you on the junior section of your dramatic society. You must have worked hard indeed to train them to such a fine pitch of perfection.”
There was a short silence, but Robert was too dazed to take advantage of it. He stared at her dumbly.
“So I really think,“ went on Miss Taverton, “that I couldn’t do better than use my friend’s gift to encourage the work you are doing here among these little people.” She turned to Mrs Brown. “This is your mother, I think you said? You know”—she gave a deprecating little laugh—“I’ve got such a hopeless memory that I’ve forgotten your name. I’d forgotten your address too, so it was a good thing I ran into your son so providentially at the gate—Actually, I’m afraid I’ve lost the letter you sent me. I could have sworn that I put it in my bag, but I’ve been hunting for it ever since and can’t find it.” She opened her bag, plunged her hand into it and gave a little laugh of triumph. “Ah, here it is! It had slipped through a hole in the lining.” She took out a letter and examined it. “Rushton-Smythe! Of course that’s your name!” She turned again to Mrs Brown. “Now Mrs Rushton-Smythe—”
“My name’s Brown,” said Mrs Brown faintly.
Miss Taverton gazed at her.
“Are you sure?” she said.
“Yes,” said Mrs Brown.
“But your son signs his name “Rushton-Smythe”.”
“No,” said Robert. “Mine’s Brown, too.”
“How odd of you to sign your letter “Marmaduke Rushton-Smythe”, then! Perhaps it’s a sort of pen name.”
“No,” said Robert. He appeared to be fighting his way slowly and painfully through swirling mists of stupefaction. “I never signed . . . I never . . . ” He looked at the letter that she held in her hand. “I never wrote that letter.”
“How very odd!” said Miss Taverton. “I can’t understand it. You wrote a letter to me and signed it “Marmaduke Rushton-Smythe” and now you say you’re called Brown and never wrote it.”
“Excuse me,” said Robert, taking the letter from her hand.
He studied it for a moment. “I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place. You’ve come to Hadley and the letter was written from Hedley. Right up in the north.”
“Oh, dear!” said Miss Taverton with a rueful smile. “What a foolish mistake! I simply haven’t the brain of a flea.”
“Oh, I’m sure you have,” said Mrs Brown, politely reassuring.
“So you aren’t getting up a children’s play, after all?”
“No,” said Robert. “We are getting up a play, but there’s only one part for a boy in it.”
“And this fine little actor will be playing the part, I take it?” said Miss Taverton, waving a hand in William’s direction.
William, finding himself under discussion, assumed his wooden glassy-eyed expression again.
“Well, no,” said Robert.
“Indeed? And who will be playing it, then?”
“A boy called Hubert Lane.”
“Now which was that? I remember hearing some of the names. It wasn’t the fat one, was it?”
“Well, yes,” said Robert.
“Oh, not that one!” said Miss Taverton, clasping her hands earnestly. “He was such a poor actor. He put no expression or spirit into his part at all. No, no, this little man must have it.” Again her hand waved vaguely in William’s direction. “He was splendid both in the kidnapping scene and in the tournament.”
“Well, you see,” began Robert and, summoning his scattered forces, gave her a brief summary of the situation.
“Oh, but I’m sure that can be adjusted,” said Miss Taverton. “I’m sure that my friend would wish me to extricate you from your difficulties in order to give this little man his chance. He has real talent, you know, and real talent is so rare. My friend left the matter entirely to my discretion. I’ll give you a cheque that will set you on your feet if this little man can have the part—I can get into touch later with these other people who live at—Hedbury, isn’t it?”
“Hedley.”
“Oh, yes—and see what can be done about them, but I must put you on your feet first for this little man’s sake.” Bewilderment again submerged Robert. He struggled out of it as best he could. “Well—er—yes that’s very kind of you.”
He looked round for William, but William had vanished. “Let me make you a cup of tea,” said Mrs Brown, feeling that, after a cup of tea, the whole situation might seem less fantastic.
“How very kind of you!” said Miss Taverton. She, too, looked round for William. “And where’s our little man? Ah, his heart is too full for words. He has gone to be alone with his emotion. A shy and retiring nature, like all true artists.”
William was upstai
rs in his bedroom, stretched out on his stomach on the carpet (his favourite position for creative work) busily writing with a blunt pencil in a tattered exercise book. Jumble lay beside him, wearing Hubert’s good conduct badge on his collar, as a pledge and token that the Hubert Laneites feud was still at its height, and occasionally thumping his tail on the ground in encouragement.
William was re-writing his part in Robert’s play—making it that of spaceman, detective. Red Indian, explorer, kidnapper and victor in a thousand tournaments.
Chapter 3 - William Among the Chimney-pots
It wasn’t often that William approved of Robert’s girl friends, but he approved of Rowena.
Rowena and her father had recently come to live in Ilfracombe Terrace—a row of much-gabled Victorian houses on the outskirts of Marleigh—and Robert had lost no time in scraping acquaintance with her. Rowena was young and glamorous, and Robert was an expert at scraping acquaintance with the young and glamorous. As secretary of the Tennis Club, he could call to ask them to join the Tennis Club; as secretary of the Amateur Dramatic Society, he could call to ask them to join the Amateur Dramatic Society; as owner of a highly temperamental motor cycle, he could stage a breakdown at the beloved’s gate and ask to use her telephone to ring up the garage. Failing all these, he could assume the expression of a traveller lost in the wilds and call at her house to ask his way, or, should she own a dog, smile on it benignly and profess a passionate interest in its breed.
Robert was no Don Juan. He was earnest and simple-minded, and each specimen of youthful glamour for which he fell was to him the One Great Love of his Life. Roxana Lytton had been the last One Great Love of his Life, but Roxana had become engaged to an air pilot with a handle-bar moustache (as soon as Robert saw the handle-bar moustache, he had known it would be fatal to him) and the post was temporarily vacant.
Actually very little finesse was needed to scrape acquaintance with Rowena. Robert met her at a party in Marleigh, saw her home, asked her to tea on the next Sunday and made “dates” for a cinema on the following Saturday and a Young Conservatives’ dance at the end of the month. Though earnest and simple-minded, Robert was a quick worker.
When she came to tea on Sunday, William had been prepared to treat her with the aloofness and contempt with which he usually treated the One Great Loves of Robert’s Life. But there was no doubt that Rowena was different. She played with Jumble, throwing his rubber bone for him and working him up into an ecstasy of delight. She talked to William and showed an intelligent interest in his plans for making a lagoon from the stream in the wood, building a cable railway up the sides of the old quarry, with a rope, a pulley, and a wooden box, and organising a circus with Jumble as the star turn.
This did not, of course, commend itself to Robert but the beloved generally had some weakness, and William was a weakness that could easily be dealt with. Robert dealt with him by the simple method of taking him by the collar and throwing him out of the room.
“Go and play with your scruffy little friends,” he said as he shut the door on him.
William didn’t go to play with his scruffy little friends. He liked Rowena and thought he would stay on the premises to see how the affair progressed.
He went to the bottom of the garden and occupied himself by climbing on the roof of the tool shed and “gliding” from it to the ground below.
But he was hovering in the background when Robert accompanied Rowena to the gate and took his farewell of her. He heard Rowena say: “I wish I could ask you to tea, Robert. I’ll try to get round Daddy, but he’s very difficult. He’s terribly sweet but terribly difficult. You see, he hates people—especially young men.”
Robert watched her out of sight, his lips curved into a fond smile, which vanished abruptly when he turned to confront William.
“What are you hanging about for?” he said irritably. “Good Lord! What a sight you look!” William’s gliding exploits had landed him—more often than not—in a heap of potting soil, prepared by Mr Brown, that lay at the foot of the shed, and his person bore ample traces of it.
“What’s wrong with me?” said William indignantly, smoothing back his hair with both hands and sending a shower of potting soil down his neck. “I look all right. I look same as I always do. I—”
“You look revolting,” said Robert. “Thank heaven Rowena didn’t see you!”
“I bet she wouldn’t have minded,” said William. “I bet—” But Robert cut him short by an impatient snort and went indoors to the sitting-room, where Mrs Brown was ensconced in an arm-chair, darning his football jersey.
“Isn’t she marvellous. Mother?” said Robert.
“She’s very nice,” said Mrs Brown. “You know, dear, you really will have to get a new one. It’s just held together by darns.”
“Nice!” echoed, Robert. “What a word! She’s marvellous! And I wouldn’t be seen dead in a new one.” He eyed the faded, washed-out, much darned garment affectionately. “Good Heavens! No one has new football jerseys. It just isn’t done.” The fond smile returned to his lips. “Hasn’t she got a wonderful smile?”
“I can’t get the right red for the red stripes,” said Mrs Brown. “It makes it look so odd.”
“I like it odd,” said Robert. He heaved a deep sigh. “It’s her father who’s the difficulty.”
“Oh, yes . . . Professor Mayfield. He writes books on some obscure subject, doesn’t he?”
“Economics,” said Robert reverently. “But Rowena says he writes other books under another name.”
“What sort of books . . . ? Robert, look at this hole!”
“Just pull it together anyway,” said Robert carelessly. “As long as there are enough threads to make it stay on me, that’s all that matters. I don’t know what sort of other books. Rowena says he keeps it a dead secret. She says he enjoys writing these other books far more than his books on economics, but he’s ashamed of writing them so he doesn’t let anyone know about them.”
“Improper love stories, probably,” said Mrs Brown placidly. “Some of the modern ones are simply shocking. I can’t think how printers can bring themselves to print them.”
“They may be, of course,” said Robert. “It’s a nice thought but he seems an odd kind of man altogether. He’s sweet to Rowena, but he hates people. He can’t bear them. He won’t let her ask anyone to the house. Miss Burnham, who lives next door, has tried hard to be neighbourly and so has little Mr Lupton, who lives next door to Miss Burnham, but he won’t have anything to do with them. Miss Burnham’s got a friend staying with her who’s crazy to meet him because she once saw his name in a newspaper, and he just said “No, thank you” when she asked him to tea.”
“How very strange!” said Mrs Brown. “The black stripes are easier, of course, but even so new black looks quite a different black from old black.”
“It makes it difficult for Rowena . . . It makes it difficult for me, too. I mean, when one likes a girl, one does like to be invited to her home. I mean, it means something to be invited to her home. I mean, it means that—well, it means something.”
“I’m sure she likes you, dear,” said Mrs Brown, as she drew out a strand of new red darning wool and laid it doubtfully against a discoloured gaping stripe of Robert’s jersey.
Robert’s tense expression relaxed again into the fond smile.
“Do you really think she likes me. Mother?” he said.
“Yes, dear, of course,” said Mrs Brown. “I can’t think why they have them in stripes. It would be much simpler if they were all one colour.”
Robert“s smile had clouded over.
“Of course, there’s Oswald . . .”
“Oswald?”
“Oswald Franks.” Robert gave a bitter laugh. “You’d think with all the other girls there are in the world he could leave just one alone, wouldn’t you? But—oh, no! He’s got to fix on Rowena. Taking her out in his car, buying her chocolates and ridiculous armfuls of flowers. It’s—it’s ludicrous. He was summoned for o
bstruction only last month, too. You wouldn’t have thought she would want to be seen about with a—a common criminal like that.”
“P’r’aps she wants to be a common crim’nal too,” said William. “I saw a film about a girl crim’nal once an’ she was jolly nice. She had a jolly intelligent dog, too. It smelt the house was on fire an’ pushed her out of a window.”
William had intended to remain silent during the conversation so as not to attract notice to himself, but it was beyond William’s power to remain silent during any conversation.
Mrs Brown turned her attention from Robert’s football jersey to her younger son.
“William!” she gasped. “You look dreadful. What have you been doing?”
“Me?” said William, opening his eyes wide. “Nothin’. I’ve jus’ been havin’ a nice quiet game by myself in the garden.”
“You’re filthy. And look at your stockings. Right down over your shoes. Where are your garters?”
“Garters . . .” said William blankly. “Garters . . .” His mind went back over the day to a game he had played with Ginger in the morning. Ginger had been a gangster and William a policeman. William had captured him, and the garters had figured in the scene as handcuffs. He didn’t know what had happened to them after that.
“Garters . . .” he said again, the blankness of his expression now verging on imbecility. “Garters . . . did I have garters on?”
“Oh course you did, William,” said Mrs Brown. “You had them on when you went out after breakfast. You looked perfectly neat and tidy.”
“That surpasses belief,” put in Robert.
“Where are your garters, William?” said Mrs Brown.
William knit his brows and assumed an expression of deep thought.
“Garters . . .” he said again meditatively. “I’m tryin’ to think what I did this mornin’. I do diff’rent things diff’rent mornings. What day is it today?”
“William, what’s—happened—to—your—garters?”
“They may’ve worn out,” said William with the air of one who wrestles with an almost insoluble problem and edging towards the door as he spoke. “Things do wear out . . . They may’ve worn out suddenly an’ fell into pieces an’ jus’ dropped off . . . or some thief may’ve taken them off me when I wasn’t lookin’. A sort of cat burglar, p’r’aps, that wanted them for himself. He may’ve drugged me while he did it. He—”
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