‘And why is Mr. Verdew suspected?’
‘Why, sir, the servants said he was in the castle all night and must have been, because the bridge was drawed. But how do they know he had to use the bridge? Anyhow, George Wiscombe swears he saw him going through Nape’s Spinney the night poor old Tom was done in. And Mr. Verdew has always been cruel fond of animals, that’s another reason.’
How easy it is, thought Jimmy, to lose one’s reputation in the country!
‘Tell me,’ he said, ‘how does Mr. Verdew satisfy his conscience when he eats animals and chickens, and when he has slugs and snails killed in the garden?’
‘Ah, there you’ve hit it,’ said the old man, not at all nonplussed. ‘But they say Mr. Rollo Verdew has helped him to make a mighty great list of what may be killed and what mayn’t, according as it’s useful-like to human beings. And anybody kills anything, they persuade him it’s harmful and down it goes on the black list. And if he don’t see the thing done with his own eyes, or the chap isn’t hauled up before the Bench, he doesn’t take on about it. And in a week or less it’s all gone from his mind. Jack and Tom were both killed within a few days of what they’d done becoming known; so was the collie dog what was found here a fortnight back.’
‘Here?’ asked Jimmy.
‘Close by where you’re standing. Poor beast, it won’t chase those b——y cats no more. It was a mess. But, as I said, if what you’ve done’s a week old, you’re safe, in a manner of speaking.’
‘But why, if he’s really dangerous,’ said Jimmy, impressed in spite of himself by the old man’s tacit assumption of Randolph’s guilt, ‘doesn’t Mr. Rollo Verdew get him shut up?’ This simple question evoked the longest and most pregnant of his interlocutor’s pauses. Surely, thought Jimmy, it will produce a monstrous birth, something to make suspicion itself turn pale.
‘Now don’t you tell nothing of what I’m saying to you,’ said the old man at length. ‘But it’s my belief that Mr. Rollo don’t want his brother shut up; no, nor thought to be mad. And why? Because if people know he’s mad, and he goes and does another murder, they’ll just pop him in the lunatic asylum and all his money will go to government and charity. But if he does a murder like you or me might, and the circumstances are circumstantial, he’ll be hanged for it, and all the money and the castle and the coal-mine will go into the pockets of Mr. Rollo.’
‘I see,’ said Jimmy. ‘It sounds very simple.’
‘I’m not swearing there’s anything of the sort in Mr. Rollo’s mind,’ said the old man. ‘But that’s the way I should look at it if I was him. Now I must be getting along. Good-night, sir.’
‘Good-night.’
Of course it wasn’t really night, only tea-time, five o’clock; but he and his acquaintance would meet no more that day, so perhaps the man was right to say good-night. Jimmy’s thoughts, as he worked his way up the castle mound, were unclear and rather painful. He didn’t believe a tithe of what the old man said. It was not even a distortion of the truth; it was ignorant and vulgar slander, and had no relation to the truth except by a kind of contiguity. But it infected his mood and gave a disagreeable direction to his thoughts. He was lonely; Randolph had not appeared at lunch, and he missed Rollo, and even more he missed (though this surprised him) Rollo’s wife. He hadn’t seen much of them, but suddenly he felt the need of their company. But goodness knows where they are, thought Jimmy; I can’t even telephone to them. In the midst of these uneasy reflections he reached his bedroom door. Walking in, he could not for a moment understand why the place looked so strange. Then he realized; it was empty. All his things had been cleared out of it.
‘Evidently,’ thought Jimmy, ‘they’ve mistaken the day I was going away, and packed me!’ An extraordinary sensation of relief surged up into his heart. Since his luggage was nowhere to be seen, it must have been stacked in the hall, ready for his departure by the evening train. Picturing himself at the booking-office of Verdew Grove station buying a ticket for London, Jimmy started for the hall.
William cut short his search.
‘Were you looking for your things, sir?’ he asked, with a slight smile. ‘Because they’re in the Onyx Room. We’ve moved you, sir.’
‘Oh,’ said Jimmy, following in the footman’s wake. ‘Why?’
‘It was Mr. Verdew’s orders, sir. I told him the light was faulty in your bedroom, so he said to move you into the Onyx Room.
‘The room next his?’
‘That’s right, sir.’
‘Couldn’t the fuse be mended?’
‘I don’t think it was the fuse, sir.’
‘Oh, I thought you said it was.’
So this was the Onyx Room—the room, Jimmy suddenly remembered, that Rollo had meant him to have in the beginning. Certainly its colours were dark and lustrous and laid on in layers, but Jimmy didn’t care for them. Even the ceiling was parti-coloured. Someone must have been given a free hand here; perhaps Vera had done the decoration. The most beautiful thing in the room was the Chinese screen masking the door that communicated, he supposed, with Randolph’s bedroom. What a clatter it would make if it fell, thought Jimmy, studying the heavy, dark, dully-shining panels of the screen. The door opening would knock it over. He heard the footman’s voice.
‘Is it for one night or more, sir? I’ve packed up some of your things.’
‘I’m not sure yet,’ said Jimmy. ‘William, will this screen move?’
The footman took hold of the screen with both hands and telescoped it against his chest. There was revealed an ordinary-looking door covered with green baize. Jimmy could see the point of a key-head, so the door was probably not very thick.
‘This used to be the dressing-room,’ William volunteered, as though making a contribution to Jimmy’s unspoken thoughts.
‘Thank you,’ said Jimmy, ‘and would you mind putting the screen back?... And, William!’
The footman stopped.
‘There’s still time to send a telegram?’
‘Oh yes, sir. There’s a form here.’
All through his solitary tea Jimmy debated with himself as to whether he should send the telegram—a telegram of recall, of course, it would be. The message presented no difficulty. ‘Wire if Croxford case opens Tuesday.’ He knew that it did, but his attendance was not at all necessary. He was undoubtedly suffering from a slight attack of nerves; and nowadays one didn’t defy nerves, one yielded to them gracefully. ‘I know that if I stay I shall have a bad night,’ he thought; ‘I might as well spend it in the train.’ But of course he hadn’t meant to go at all; he had even promised Rollo to stay. He had wanted to stay. To leave abruptly to-night would be doubly rude: rude to Randolph, rude to Rollo. Only Vera would be pleased. Vera, whose clumsy attempt to lure him to London he had so easily seen through. Vera, whose ‘I shall be furious if you don’t come’ rankled whenever he thought of it. Every moment added its quota to the incubus of indecision that paralysed his mind. Manners, duty, wishes, fears, all were contradictory, all pulled in different directions. A gust of apprehension sent him hot-foot to the writing-table. The telegram was ready written when, equally strong, an access of self-respect came and made him tear it up. At last he had an idea. At six o’clock he would send the telegram; the office might still be open. There might still be time to get a reply. If, in spite of his twofold obstacle he had an answer, he would take it as the voice of fate, and leave that night. . . .
At half-past seven William came in to draw the curtains; he also brought a message. Mr. Verdew begged Mr. Rintoul to excuse him, but he felt a little unwell, and was dining in his own room. He hoped to see Mr. Rintoul to-morrow to say good-bye. ‘You are going, then, sir?’ added the footman.
Jimmy blindfolded his will, and took an answer at random from among the tablets of his mind.
‘Yes. And—William!’ he called out.
‘Sir?’
‘I suppose it’s too late now for me to get an answer to my telegram?’
‘I’m afraid so, sir.
’
For a second Jimmy sunned himself in a warm flow of recovered self-esteem. Luck had saved him from a humiliating flight. Now his one regret was that his nerves had cheated him of those few extra days at Verdew. ‘If there had been a bolt on my side of the green door,’ he said to himself, ‘I should never have sent that telegram.’
How like in some ways, was the last evening to the first. As bedtime approached, he became acutely conscious of his surroundings—of the stone floors, the vaulted passages, the moat, the drawbridge—all those concrete signs which seemed to recall the past and substitute it for the present. He was completely isolated and immured; he could scarcely believe he would be back in the real, living world to-morrow. Another glass of whisky would bring the centuries better into line. It did; and, emboldened by its heady fumes, he inspected, with the aid of his candle (for the ground-floor lights had been turned out) the defences of door and window, and marvelled anew at their parade of clumsy strength. Why all these precautions when the moat remained, a flawless girdle of protection?
But was it flawless? Lying in bed, staring at the painted ceiling, with its squares and triangles and riot of geometrical designs, Jimmy smiled to remember how Rollo had once told him of a secret entrance, known only to him. He had promised to show it to Jimmy, but he had forgotten. A nice fellow Rollo, but he didn’t believe they would ever know each other much better. When dissimilar natures come together, the friendship blossoms quickly, and as quickly fades. Rollo and Jimmy just tolerated each other—they didn’t share their lives, their secrets, their secret passages. . . .
Jimmy was lying on his back, his head sunk on the brightly lit pillow, his mind drowsier than his digestion. To his departing consciousness the ceiling looked like a great five of diamonds spread over his head; the scarlet lozenges moved on hinges, he knew that quite well, and as they moved they gave a glimpse of black and let in a draught. Soon there would be a head poking through them all, instead of through this near comer one, and that would be more symmetrical. But if I stand on the bed I can shut them; they will close with a click. If only this one wasn’t such a weight and didn’t stick so. . . .
Jimmy awoke in a sweat, still staring at the ceiling. It heaved and writhed like a half-dead moth on the setting-board. But the walls stood still, so that there was something more than whisky at the back of it. And yet, when he looked again, the ceiling did not budge.
The dream was right; he could touch the ceiling by standing on the bed. But only with the tips of his fingers. What he needed was a bar of some kind with which to prise it open. He looked round the room, and could see nothing suitable but a towel-horse. But there were plenty of walking-sticks downstairs. To light his candle and put on his dressing-gown and slippers was the work of a moment. He reached the door in less time than it takes to tell. But he got no further, because the door was locked.
Jimmy’s heart began to beat violently. Panic bubbled up in him like water in a syphon. He took a wild look around the room, ran to the bed-head, and pressed the bell-button as though he meant to flatten it in its socket. Relief stole in his heart. Already he heard in imagination the quick patter of feet in the corridor, the hurried, whispered explanations, the man’s reassuring voice: ‘I’ll be with you in a moment, sir.’ Already he felt slightly ashamed of his precipitate summons, and began to wonder how he should explain it away. The minutes passed, and nothing happened. He need not worry yet; it would take William some time to dress, and no doubt he had a long way to come. But Jimmy’s returning anxiety cried out for some distraction, so he left the edge of the bed where he had been sitting, fetched the towel-horse, and, balancing unsteadily on the mattress, began to prod the ceiling. Down came little flakes and pellets of painted plaster; they littered the sheets, and would be very uncomfortable to sleep on. . . . Jimmy stooped to flick them away, and saw from the tail of his eye that since he rang five minutes had gone by. He resumed the muffled tattoo on the ceiling. Suddenly it gave; the red diamond shot upwards and fell back, revealing a patch of black and letting in a rush of cool air.
As, stupefied, Jimmy lowered his eyes, they fell upon the screen. It was moving stealthily outwards, toppling into the room. Already he could see a thin strip of the green door. The screen swayed, paused, seemed to hang by a hair. Then, its leaves collapsing inwards upon each other, it fell with a great crash upon the floor. In the opening stood Randolph, fully dressed; he had a revolver in his right hand, and there was a knife between his teeth. It was curved and shining, and he looked as though he were taking a bite out of the new moon.
The shot missed Jimmy’s swaying legs, the knife only grazed his ankle, and he was safe in the darkness of the attic, with the bolt of the trap-door securely shut. He ran trembling in the direction the draught came from, and was rewarded first by a sense of decreasing darkness, and then by a glimpse, through a framed opening in the roof, of the stars and the night sky.
The opening was low down, and to climb out was easy. He found himself in a leaden gully, bounded on one side by a shallow parapet two feet high, and on the other, as it seemed, by the slope of the roof. Finding his way along the gully, he was brought up sharp against an octagonal turret, that clearly marked the end of the building. The moat was directly below him. Turning to the left, he encountered another similar turret, and turning to the left again he found himself up against a wall surmounted by tall chimneys. This wall appeared to be scored with projections and indentations—soot-doors he guessed them to be; he hoped to be able to use them to climb the wall, but they were awkwardly spaced, close to the parapet, and if he missed his footing he ran the risk of falling over its edge.
He now felt a curious lightheadedness, as though he had shuffled off every responsibility: responsibility towards his pyjamas, which were torn and dirty, towards his foot, which was bleeding, towards trains, letters, engagements—all the petty and important demands of life. Cold, but not unhappy, he sat down to await daybreak.
The clock had just chimed three-quarters, which three-quarters he did not know, when he heard a scraping sound that seemed to come from the corresponding parapet across the roof. He listened, crouching in the angle between the chimney wall and the battlement. His fears told him that the sound was following the track by which he had come; the shuffling grew indistinct, and then, the first turret passed, began to draw nearer. It could only be Randolph, who clearly had some means of access to the roof other than the trap-door in Jimmy’s bedroom. He must have, or he could not have reached it to spy on his victim while he was asleep. Now he was turning the last corner. Jimmy acted quickly and with the courage of desperation. At the corner where he crouched there projected above the battlement three sides of an octagonal turret, repeating the design of the true turrets at the end. Grasping the stone as well as he could, he lowered himself into space. It was a terrible moment, but the cautious shuffle of Randolph’s approach deadened his fear. His arms almost at their full stretch, he felt the dripstone underneath his feet. It seemed about six inches wide, with a downward curve, but it sufficed. He changed his grip from the plain stone band of the parapet to the pierced masonry beneath it, which afforded a better purchase, and held his breath. Randolph could not find him unless he leant right over the balustrade. This he did not do. He muttered to himself; he climbed up to the apex of the roof; he examined the flue-doors, or whatever they were. All this Jimmy could clearly see through the quatrefoil to which he was clinging. Randolph muttered, ‘I shall find him when the light comes,’ and then he disappeared. The clock struck four, four-fifteen, four-thirty, and then a diffused pallor began to show itself in the eastern sky.
The numbness that had taken hold of Jimmy’s body began to invade his mind, which grew dull and sleepy under the effort of compelling his tired hands to retain their hold. His back curved outwards, his head sank upon his breast; the changes of which his cramped position admitted were too slight to afford his body relief. So that he could not at once look round when he heard close above his head the sound of an opening
door and the sharp rattle of falling mortar. He recognized the figure as it passed him—Rollo’s.
Jimmy restrained his impulse to call out. Why had Rollo come back? Why was he swaggering over the roofs of Verdew Castle at daybreak looking as though he owned it? It was not his yet. Rollo turned, and in the same leisurely fashion walked back towards Jimmy’s corner. His face was set and pale, but there was triumph in his eyes, and cruelty, and the marks of many passions which his everyday exterior had concealed. Then his eyebrows went up, his chin quivered, and his underlip shot out and seemed to stretch across his face. ‘Just five minutes more, five minutes more; I’ll give him another five minutes,’ he kept muttering to himself. He leaned back against the wall, Jimmy could have touched the laces of his shoes, which were untied and dirty. ‘Poor old Jimmy, poor old James!’ Rollo suddenly chanted, in a voice that was very distinct, but quite unlike his own. To Jimmy’s confused mind he seemed to be speaking of two different people, neither of whom was connected with himself. ‘Never mind, Jimmy,’ Rollo added in the conciliatory tone of one who, overcome by his better nature, at last gives up teasing. ‘Anyhow, it’s ten to one against.’ He stumbled down the gully and round the bend.
Jimmy never knew how he summoned strength to climb over the parapet. He found himself sprawling in the gully, panting and faint. But he had caught sight of a gaping hole like a buttery hatch amid the tangle of soot-doors, and he began to crawl towards it. He was trying to bring his stiff knee up to his good one when from close by his left ear he heard a terrible scream. It went shooting up, and seemed to make a glittering arc of sound in the half-lit sky. He also thought he heard the words, ‘Oh, God, Randolph, it’s me!’ but of this he was never certain. But through all the windings of Rollo’s bolt-hole, until it discharged itself at the base of a ruined newel-staircase among the outbuildings, he still heard the agonized gasping, spasmodic, yet with a horrible rhythm of its own, that followed Rollo’s scream. He locked the cracked, paintless door with the key that Rollo had left, and found himself among the lanes.
The Complete Short Stories of L.P. Hartley Page 33