‘I’ll take your word for it,’ said Charles. ‘And here’s a second way for you to look at it: It is just possible that there is another entrance to the Priory which we don’t know anything about.’
Five
THE IMMEDIATE EFFECT OF THE VISIT TO CONSTABLE Flinders was a visit to the Priory paid by that worthy individual the very next day. Celia received him with a flattering display of relief, and the constable, a shy man, flushed very red indeed when she told him she was sure everything would be cleared up now that he had taken the matter in hand. However, he knew that she spoke no less than the truth, and said as much. He then requested her to show him the priest’s hole.
‘I will, of course,’ she said, ‘but I wish my husband or my brother were in, because I can hardly bear to open that ghastly panel.’
Following her delicately up the stairs Mr Flinders said that he could quite understand that. When she had succeeded in locating the rosette which worked the panel, and had twisted it round, he peered inside the dark recess almost as fearfully as Celia herself. There was nothing there, but it smelted strongly of Lysol. After deliberating for a while, the constable announced his intention of climbing into the hole. He succeeded in doing this, not without inflicting several scratches on the panelling, and once inside he very carefully inspected the walls. Celia watched him hopefully, and wondered whether the scratches could be got rid of.
Mr Flinders climbed out again, and picked up his helmet from the floor where he had placed it. ‘Nothing there, madam,’ he said.
‘What were you looking for?’ inquired Celia.
‘There might have been a way in,’ explained Mr Flinders. ‘Not that I think so meself,’ he added, ‘but the police have to follow everything up, you see.’
‘Oh!’ said Celia, a little doubtfully. She closed the panel again. ‘Is there anything else you’d like to see upstairs?’
Mr Flinders thought that he ought to make a reconnaissance of the whole house. He seemed depressed at being unable to explore Mrs Bosanquet’s room, but when he learned that that lady was enjoying her afternoon rest he said that he quite understood.
A thorough examination of the other rooms took considerable time, and Celia grew frankly bored. Beyond remarking that the wall-cupboards were a queer set-out, and no mistake; that a thin man might conceivably get down the great chimney in the chief bedroom; and that a burglar wouldn’t make much trouble over getting in at any one of the windows, Mr Flinders produced no theories. On the way downstairs, however, he volunteered the information that he wouldn’t sleep a night in the house, not if he was paid to. This was not reassuring, and Celia at once asked him whether he knew anything about the Priory hauntings. Mr Flinders drew a deep breath, and told her various stories of things heard on the premises after dark. After this he went all over the sitting-rooms, and asked to be conducted to the secret entrance to the cellars.
‘I’ll tell Bowers to take you down,’ said Celia. ‘He knows, because he helped seal it up.’
In the kitchen she left him in charge of Mrs Bowers, a formidable woman who eyed him with complete disfavour. An attempt on his part to submit her kitchen to an exhaustive search was grimly frustrated. ‘I don’t hold with bobbies poking their noses where they’re not wanted, and never did,’ she said. ‘It ’ud take a better burglar than any I ever heard of to get into my kitchen, and if I find one here I shall know what to do without sending for you.’
Mr Flinders, again very red about the ears, said huskily that he had to do his duty, and meant no offence.
‘That’s right,’ said Mrs Bowers, ‘you get on and do your duty, and I’ll do mine, only don’t you go opening my cupboards and turning things over with your great clumsy hands, or out you go, double-quick. Nice time I should have clearing up after you’d pulled everything about.’
‘I’m sure the place does you credit,’ said Mr Flinders feebly, with a vague idea of propitiating her. ‘What I thought was, there might be a way in at the back of that great dresser.’
‘Well, there isn’t,’ she replied uncompromisingly, and began to roll and bang a lump of pastry with an energy that spoke well for her muscular powers.
‘I suppose,’ said Mr Flinders, shifting his feet uneasily, ‘I suppose you wouldn’t mind me taking a look inside the copper? I have heard of a man hiding in one of them things.’
‘Not in this house, you haven’t,’ responded Mrs Bowers. ‘And if you think I’m going to have you prying into the week’s washing you’re mistaken. The idea!’
‘I didn’t know you’d got the washing in it,’ apologised Mr Flinders.
‘No, I expect you thought I kept goldfish there,’ retorted the lady.
This crushing rejoinder quite cowed the constable. He coughed, and after waiting a minute asked whether she would show him the cellars. ‘Which I’ve been asked to inspect,’ he added boldly.
‘I’ve got something better to do than to waste my time trapesing round nasty damp cellars at this hour,’ she said. ‘If you want to go down I’m sure I’ve no objection. You won’t find anything except rats, and if you can put those great muddy boots of yours on one instead of dirtying my clean floor with them you’ll be more use than ever I expected. Bowers!’
In reply to this shrill call her husband emerged presently from the pantry, where it seemed probable that he had been enjoying a brief siesta. Mrs Bowers pointed the rolling-pin at Mr Flinders. ‘You’ve got to take this young fellow down to the cellars and show him the place where the master made all that mess with the cement yesterday,’ she said. ‘And don’t bring him back here. I’ve never been in the habit of having bobbies in my kitchen and I’m not going to start at my time of life.’
Both men withdrew rather hastily. ‘You mustn’t mind my missus,’ Bowers said. ‘It’s only her way. She doesn’t hold with ghosts, and things, but I can tell you I’m glad to see you here. Awful, this place is. You wouldn’t believe the things I’ve heard.’
By the time they had explored the dank, tomb-like cellars, and twice scared themselves by holding the lamp in such a way that their own shadows were cast in weird elongated shapes on the wall, Bowers and the constable were more than ready to confirm a sudden but deep friendship in a suitable quantity of beer. They retired to the pantry, and regaled themselves with this comforting beverage until Bowers found that it was time for him to carry the tea-tray into the library. Upon which Constable Flinders bethought himself of his duty, and took his departure by the garden-door, thus avoiding any fresh encounter with the dragon in the kitchen.
It was at about the same moment that Margaret, returning from a brisk tramp over the fields, emerged on to the right-of-way, and made her way past the ruined chapel towards the house. The sight of someone kneeling by one of the half-buried tombs apparently engaged in trying to decipher the inscription, made her stop and look more closely. Her feet had made no sound on the turf, but the kneeling figure looked round quickly, and she saw that it was Michael Strange.
She came slowly towards him, an eyebrow raised in rather puzzled inquiry. ‘Hullo!’ she said. ‘Are you interested in old monuments?’
Strange rose, brushing a cake of half-dry mud from his ancient flannel trousers. ‘I am rather,’ he said. ‘Do you mind my having a look round?’
‘Not at all,’ Margaret said. ‘But I’m afraid you won’t find much of interest.’ She sat down on the tomb, and dug her hands into the pockets of her Burberry. ‘I didn’t know you were keen on this sort of thing.’
‘I know very little about it,’ he said, ‘but I’ve always been interested in ruins. It’s a pity this has been allowed to go. There’s some fine Norman work.’
She agreed, but seemed to be more interested in the contemplation of one of her own shoes. ‘Are you staying here long?’ she asked.
‘Only for another week or so,’ he replied. ‘I’m on holiday, you know.’
‘Yes, you told me so.’ She looked up, smiling. ‘By the way, what do you do, if it isn’t a rude question?’
r /> ‘I fish mostly.’
‘I meant in town.’
‘Oh, I see. I have my work, and I manage to get some golf over the week-ends. Do you play?’
‘Very badly,’ Margaret answered, feeling baulked. She tried again. ‘What sort of work do you do?’
‘Mostly office-stuff, and very dull,’ he said.
Margaret decided that further questioning would sound impertinent, and started a fresh topic. ‘If you’re interested in old buildings,’ she said, ‘you ought to go over the Priory itself. It’s the most weird place, full of nooks and crannies, and rooms leading out of one another.’
‘I noticed some very fine panelling when I took you home the other night,’ he said. ‘Have you any records of the place, I wonder?’
‘No, funnily enough we haven’t,’ she answered. ‘You’d think there ought to be something, and as far as I know my uncle didn’t take anything out of the house when Aunt Flora died, but we can’t find anything.’
‘Nothing amongst the books?’
‘There aren’t many, you know. No, nothing. Celia was awfully disappointed, because she thought there was bound to be a history, or something. And we should rather like to find out whether there’s any foundation for the story of the haunting.’
Strange sat down beside her on the tomb. ‘How much store do you set by that tale?’ he asked. ‘Do you really believe in it?’
‘I don’t really know,’ she said, wrinkling her brow. ‘I haven’t seen the famous Monk, and until I do – I’ll reserve judgment.’
‘Very wise,’ he approved. ‘And if you do see it I wish you’d tell me. I should like to have first-hand evidence of a real ghost.’ He chanced to glance up as he spoke, and his eyes narrowed. ‘Oh!’ he said, in rather a curt voice. ‘So you did call in the police after all?’
Margaret looked quickly in the same direction. Mr Flinders was tramping down one of the paths, very obviously on his way from the house back to the village. Without quite knowing why, she felt slightly guilty. ‘Yes. We – we thought we’d try and get to the bottom of our ghost.’
He turned his head, and looked directly at her. ‘You’ve made up your minds to keep whatever you’ve seen, or heard, to yourselves,’ he said abruptly. ‘You’re scared of this place, aren’t you?’
She was startled. ‘Well, really, I – yes, a bit, perhaps. It’s not surprising considering what tales they tell about it round here.’
‘You’ll think me impertinent,’ he said, ‘but I wish you’d leave it.’
It was her turn now to look at him, surprised, rather grave. ‘Why?’ she said quietly.
‘Because if the place is haunted, and you saw anything, it might give you a really bad fright. Where’s the sense in staying in a house that gives you the creeps?’
‘You’re very solicitous about me, Mr Strange. I don’t quite see why.’
‘I don’t suppose you do,’ he said, prodding the ground between his feet with his walking stick. ‘And I daresay I’ve no right to be – solicitous about you. All the same, I am.’
She found it hard to say anything after this, but managed after a short pause to remark that a ghost couldn’t hurt her.
He made no answer, but continued to prod the ground, and with a nervous little laugh, she said: ‘You look as though you thought it could.’
‘No, I’m not as foolish as that,’ he replied. ‘But it could scare you badly.’
‘I didn’t think you believed in the Monk. You know, you’re being rather mysterious.’
‘I believe in quite a number of odd things,’ he said. ‘Sorry if I sounded mysterious.’
She pulled up a blade of grass, and began to play with it. ‘Mr Strange.’
He smiled. ‘Miss Fortescue?’
‘It isn’t what you sound,’ she said, carefully inspecting her blade of grass. ‘It’s – things you do.’
There was an infinitesimal pause. ‘What have I done?’ Strange asked lightly.
She abandoned the grass, and turned towards him. ‘Last night, at about one o’clock when we had summer lightning, I – it woke me.’
‘Did it? But what has that got to do with my mysterious behaviour?’
She looked into his eyes, and saw them faintly amused. ‘Mr Strange, I got up to close my window, in case it came on to rain. I saw you in one of the flashes.’
‘You saw me?’ he repeated.
‘Yes, by the big rose bush just under my window. I saw you quite clearly. I didn’t say anything about it to the others.’
‘Why not?’ he said.
She flushed. ‘I don’t quite know. Partly because I didn’t want to frighten Celia.’
‘Is that the only reason?’
She was silent.
‘I was in the Priory garden last night,’ he said. ‘I can’t tell you why, but I hope you’ll believe that whatever I was doing there – I’d – I’d chuck it up sooner than harm you in any way, or – or even give you a fright.’ He paused, but she still said nothing. ‘I don’t know why you should trust me, but you seem to have done so, and I’m — jolly grateful. Can you go on trusting me enough to keep this to yourself ?’
She raised troubled eyes. ‘I ought not to. I ought to tell my brother. You see, I – I don’t really know anything about you, and – you must admit – it’s rather odd of you to be in our grounds at that hour. I suppose you can’t tell me anything more?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I can’t. I wish I could.’
She got up. ‘I shan’t say anything about having seen you. But I warn you – you may be found out, another time. You want to get us out of the Priory – and we aren’t going. So – so it’s no use trying to frighten us away. I – I expect you know what I mean.’
He did not answer, but continued to watch her rather closely. She held out her hand. ‘I must go, or I shall be too late for tea. Good-bye.’
‘Good-bye,’ Strange said, taking her hand for a moment in his strong clasp. ‘And thank you.’
The rest of the family noticed that Margaret was rather silent at tea-time, and Mrs Bosanquet asked her if she were tired. She roused herself at that, disclaimed, and, banishing Strange from her thoughts for a while, gave her attention to Celia, who was recounting the proceedings of Constable Henry Flinders.
‘And as far as I can see,’ Celia said, ‘there those scratches will remain.’
‘You would have him,’ Charles reminded her. ‘You despised our efforts, and now that you’ve got a trained sleuth on to the job you’re no better pleased.’
‘What I’d really like,’ Celia said, ‘and what I always had in mind was a detective, not an ordinary policeman.’
‘You don’t appreciate friend Flinders,’ Peter told her. ‘He may not be quick, but he’s thorough. Why, he even inspected the bathroom, didn’t he?’
‘That’s right,’ said Charles. ‘Dogged does it is Henry’s watchword. He won’t leave a mouse-hole undisturbed. You wait till he comes down our chimney one night to see if it can be done, before you judge him.’
But during the next two days, as fresh evidence of the constable’s devotion to duty was continually forthcoming, he became even less popular. On the first day of his watch, Jane, the housemaid, was with difficulty persuaded to rescind her ‘notice,’ which she promptly gave on discerning the constable crouched under a rhododendron bush. She was on her way home, soon after sundown, and this unnerving sight induced her to give way to a strong fit of hysterics under the drawing-room window. Celia and Peter rushed out in time to witness the aghast constable endeavouring to reassure Jane, while Mrs Bowers, first upon the scene, divided her attention between scolding the distraught damsel, and predicting the future that awaited those who could find nothing better to do than to frighten silly girls out of their wits.
When Constable Flinders had stumbled over a cucumber-frame in the dark, and smashed two panes of glass with the maximum noise, got himself locked in the gardener’s shed by mistake, and arrested Charles on his return from a game of billiards
with Colonel Ackerley, it was unanimously agreed that his energy should be gently but firmly diverted. In spite of his incorrigible habit of doing the wrong thing they had all of them developed quite an affection for the constable, and it was with great tact that Peter suggested that a watch on the Priory was useless, and that Mr Flinders would do well to turn his attention to the possible suspects.
The constable, whom only the strongest sense of duty induced to patrol the dread Priory after dark, was not at all hurt, but on the contrary much relieved at being dismissed from his heroic task, and thereafter the Priory saw him no more. Celia, who had been the bitterest in denunciation of his folly, even confessed to missing him. During his guard he had been quite useful in giving her horticultural advice and he had very kindly weeded three of the flower-beds for her, incidentally rooting up a cherished cutting of hydrangea, which he assured her would never flourish in such a spot.
It was not long, however, before they heard of Mr Flinders’ new activities, for Charles encountered Mr Titmarsh in the village street, and Mr Titmarsh, catching sight of the constable some way off, remarked fretfully that he did not know what had come over the fellow.
With a wonderful air of blandness Charles inquired the reason of this sudden remark. Mr Titmarsh said with asperity that the constable was apparently running after his parlour-maid, since he was forever stumbling over him, either waiting by the gate or prowling round the house. ‘And apparently,’ said Mr Titmarsh, ‘he thinks it necessary to enlist my sympathy by exhibiting a wholly untutored interest in my hobby. He has taken to bringing me common specimens for my opinion, and last night when I was out with my net I found the man following me. Most irritating performance, and I fear I spoke a little roughly to him. However, it seems he is genuinely anxious to observe the methods I employ, and really it is of no use to lose one’s temper with such a simple fellow.’