‘Thank you,’ said Wimsey. ‘I may be everything you say – patronising, interfering, conceited, intolerable and all the rest of it. But do give me credit for a little intelligence. Do you think I don’t know all that? Do you think it’s pleasant for any man who feels about a woman as I do about you, to have to fight his way along under this detestable burden of gratitude? Damn it, do you think I don’t know perfectly well that I’d have a better chance if I was deaf, blind, maimed, starving, drunken or dissolute, so that you could have the fun of being magnanimous? Why do you suppose I treat my own sincerest feelings like something out of a comic opera, if it isn’t to save myself the bitter humiliation of seeing you try not to be utterly nauseated by them? Can’t you understand that this damned dirty trick of fate has robbed me of the common man’s right to be serious about his own passions? Is that a position for any man to be proud of?’
‘Don’t talk like that.’
‘I wouldn’t, if you didn’t force me. And you might have the justice to remember that you can hurt me a damned sight more than I can possibly hurt you.’
‘I know I’m being horribly ungrateful –’
‘Hell!’
All endurance has its limits, and Wimsey had reached his.
‘Grateful! Good God! Am I never to get away from the bleat of that filthy adjective? I don’t want gratitude. I don’t want kindness. I don’t want sentimentality. I don’t even want love – I could make you give me that – of a sort. I want common honesty.’
‘Do you? But that’s what I’ve always wanted – I don’t think it’s to be got.’
‘Listen, Harriet. I do understand. I know you don’t want either to give or to take. You’ve tried being the giver, and you’ve found that the giver is always fooled. And you won’t be the taker, because that’s very difficult, and because you know that the taker always ends by hating the giver. You don’t want ever again to have to depend for happiness on another person.’
‘That’s true. That’s the truest thing you ever said.’
‘All right. I can respect that. Only you’ve got to play the game. Don’t force an emotional situation and then blame me for it.’
‘But I don’t want any situation. I want to be left in peace.’
‘Oh! but you are not a peaceful person. You’ll always make trouble. Why not fight it out on equal terms and enjoy it? Like Alan Breck, I’m a bonny fighter.’
‘And you think you’re sure to win.’
‘Not with my hands tied.’
‘Oh! – well, all right. But it all sounds so dreary and exhausting,’ said Harriet, and burst idiotically into tears.
‘Good Heavens!’ said Wimsey, aghast. ‘Harriet! darling! angel! beast! vixen! don’t say that.’ He flung himself on his knees in a frenzy of remorse and agitation. ‘Call me anything you like, but not dreary! Not one of those things you find in clubs! Have this one, darling, it’s much larger and quite clean. Say you didn’t mean it! Great Scott! Have I been boring you interminably for eighteen months on end? A thing any right-minded woman would shudder at. I know you once said that if anybody ever married me it would be for the sake of hearing me piffle on, but I expect that kind of thing palls after a bit. I’m babbling – I know I’m babbling. What on earth am I to do about it?’
‘Ass! Oh, it’s not fair. You always make me laugh. I can’t fight – I’m so tired. You don’t seem to know what being tired is. Stop. Let go. I won’t be bullied. Thank God! there’s the telephone.’
‘Damn the telephone!’
‘It’s probably something very important.’
She got up and went to the instrument, leaving Wimsey on his knees, looking, and feeling, sufficiently absurd.
‘It’s you. Somebody wants you over at the Bellevue.’
‘Let him want.’
‘Somebody come in answer to the thing in the Morning Star.’
‘Good lord!’
Wimsey shot across the room and snatched the receiver.
‘That you, Wimsey? Thought I’d know where to get you. This is Sally Hardy. There’s a fellow here claiming the reward. Hurry up! He won’t come across without you, and I’ve got my story to think of. I’ve got him here in your sitting-room.’
‘Who is he, and where’s he come from?’
‘Seahampton. Says his name’s Bright.’
‘Bright? By jove, yes, I’ll come along right away. Hear that, my child? The man Bright has materialised! See you this afternoon at 3.30.’
He bolted out like a cat that hears the cry of ‘Meat, meat!’
‘Oh! what a fool I am,’ said Harriet. ‘What an utter, drivelling fool! And I haven’t done a stroke of work since Wednesday.’
She pulled out the manuscript of The Fountain-Pen Mystery, unscrewed her own pen, and sank into an idle reverie.
XIV
THE EVIDENCE OF THE THIRD BARBER
‘Not for him
Blooms my dark Nightshade, nor doth Hemlock brew
Murder for cups within her cavernous root.
Not him is the metal blessed to kill,
Nor lets the poppy her leaves fall for him.
To heroes such are sacred. He may live,
As long as ’tis the Gout and Dropsy’s pleasure.
He wished to play at suicide.’
Death’s Jest-Book
Tuesday, 23 June
On the doorstep of the Hotel Bellevue, Wimsey encountered Bunter.
‘The person that was asking for your lordship is in your lordship’s sitting-room,’ said Bunter. ‘I had the opportunity of observing him when he was inquiring for your lordship at the reception-counter, but I did not introduce myself to his notice.’
‘You didn’t, eh?’
‘No, my lord. I contented myself with privately informing Mr Hardy of his presence. Mr Hardy is with him at present, my lord.’
‘You always have a good reason for your actions, Bunter. May I ask why you have adopted this policy of modest self-effacement?’
‘In case of your lordship’s subsequently desiring to have the person placed under surveillance,’ suggested Bunter, ‘it appeared to me to be preferable that he should not be in a position to recognise me.’
‘Oh!’ said Wimsey. ‘Am I to infer that the person presents a suspicious appearance? Or is this merely your native caution breaking out in an acute form? Well, perhaps you’re right. I’d better go up and interview the bloke. How about the police, by the way? We can’t very well keep this from them, can we?’
He reflected for a moment.
‘Better hear the story first. If I want you, I’ll ’phone down to the office. Have any drinks gone up?’
‘I fancy not, my lord.’
‘Strange self-restraint on Mr Hardy’s part. Tell them to bring up a bottle of Scotch and a siphon and some beer, for malt does more than Milton can to justify God’s ways to man. At the moment there seem to be a good many things that call for justification, but perhaps I shall feel better about them when I’ve heard what Mr Bright has to tell me. Have at it!’
The moment Wimsey’s eyes fell upon the visitor in his sitting-room he felt an interior conviction that his hopes were in a fair way to be realised. Whatever the result, he had, at any rate, been upon the right track in the matter of the razor. Here were the sandy hair, the small stature, the indefinite crookedness of shoulder so graphically described by the Seahampton hairdresser. The man was dressed in a shabby reach-me-down suit of blue serge, and held in his hands a limp felt hat, considerably the worse for wear. Wimsey noticed the soft skin and well-kept finger-nails, and the general air of poverty-stricken gentility.
‘Well, Mr Bright,’ said Hardy, as Wimsey entered, ‘here is the gentleman you want to see. Mr Bright won’t come across with his story to anybody but you, Wimsey, though, as I have explained to him, if he’s thinking of claiming the Morning Star reward, he’ll have to let me in on it.’
Mr Bright glanced nervously from one man to the other, and passed the tip of his tongue once or twice across hi
s pallid lips.
‘I suppose that’s only fair,’ he said, in a subdued tone, ‘and I can assure you that the money is a consideration. But I am in a painful position, though I haven’t done any wilful harm. I’m sure if I had ever thought what the poor gentleman was going to do with the razor –’
‘Suppose we begin from the beginning,’ said Wimsey, throwing his hat upon a table and himself into a chair. ‘Come in! Oh, yes, drinks. What will you take, Mr Bright?’
‘It is very kind of your lordship,’ murmured Mr Bright, with humility, ‘but I’m afraid I – the fact is, when I saw that piece in the paper I came away rather hurriedly. In fact, without my breakfast. I – that is to say – I am rather sensitive to alcohol taken upon an empty stomach.’
‘Bring up some sandwiches,’ said Wimsey to the waiter. ‘It is very good of you, Mr Bright, to have put yourself to so much inconvenience in the interests of justice.’
‘Justice?’
‘I mean, in order to help us with this inquiry. And of course, you must allow us to refund your expenses.’
‘Thank you, my lord. I won’t say no. In fact, I am not in a position to refuse. I won’t disguise that my means are very limited. As a matter of fact,’ went on Mr Bright, with more frankness in the absence of the waiter, ‘as a matter of fact, I had to go without any food in order to pay for my ticket. I don’t like making this confession. It’s very humiliating for a man who once had a flourishing business of his own. I hope you won’t think, gentlemen, that I have been accustomed to this kind of thing.’
‘Of course not,’ said Wimsey. ‘Bad times may happen to anybody. Nobody thinks anything of that nowadays. Now, about this razor. By the way, your full name is –?’
‘William Bright, my lord. I’m a hairdresser by profession. I used to have a business up Manchester way. But I lost money by an unfortunate speculation –’
‘Whereabouts in Manchester?’ put in Salcombe Hardy.
‘In Massingbird Street. But it’s all been pulled down now. I don’t know if anybody would remember about it, I’m sure. It was before the War.’
‘Any War record?’ asked Hardy.
‘No.’ The hairdresser blushed painfully. ‘I’m not a robust man. I couldn’t get passed for active service.’
‘All right,’ said Wimsey. ‘About the razor. What are you doing now?’
‘Well, my lord, I am, as you might say, an itinerant hairdresser. I go from one place to the other, especially seaside towns during the season, and take temporary posts.’
‘Where did you work last?’
The man glanced up at him with his hunted eyes.
‘I haven’t had anything, really, for a long time. I tried to get work in Seahampton. In fact, I’m still trying. I went back there last Wednesday after trying Wilvercombe and Lesston Hoe. I had a week’s employment in Lesston Hoe. Ramage’s is the name of the place. I had to leave there –’
‘What for?’ Hardy was brusque.
‘There was trouble with a customer –’
‘Theft?’
‘Certainly not. He was a very quick-tempered gentleman. I had the misfortune to cut him slightly.’
‘Drunk and incompetent, eh?’ said Hardy.
The small man seemed to shrink together.
‘They said so, but on my word of honour –’
‘What name were you going by there?’
‘Walters.’
‘Is Bright your real name?’
Under the lash of Hardy’s brutality, the story came out in all its sordid triviality. Alias after alias. A week’s trial here and there, and then dismissal on the same humiliating grounds. Not his fault. A glass of spirits affected him more than it did the ordinary person. Simpson was his real name, but he had used a great many since then. But to each name, the same reputation had stuck. It was his sad weakness, which he had tried hard to overcome.
Hardy poured himself out a second glass of whisky, and carelessly left the bottle on the window-sill, out of Mr Bright’s reach.
‘In the matter of the razor,’ said Wimsey, patiently.
‘Yes, my lord. I got that razor in Seahampton, from the place where I tried to get work. Merryweather, the name was. I needed a new razor, and he was willing to sell this one cheap.’
‘You’d better describe the razor,’ suggested Hardy.
‘Yes, sir. It was a Sheffeld blade with a white handle, and it came originally from a retailer in Jermyn Street. It was a good razor, but a bit worn. I came on to Wilvercombe, but there was nothing doing here, except that Moreton, down on the Esplanade, said he might be requiring help later on. Then I went to Lesston Hoe. I told you about that. After trying one or two other places there, I came back here and tried Moreton again, but he had just engaged somebody. He would tell you about it if you asked him. There was nothing doing anywhere else. I grew very low in my spirits.’
Mr Bright paused and licked his lips again.
‘This was last Monday week, gentlemen. On the Tuesday night, I went down to the sea – just over there, at the end of the town, and sat on a seat to think things over. It was getting on for midnight.’ The words were coming more fluently now, the glass of whisky having no doubt done its work. ‘I looked at the sea and I felt the razor in my pocket and I wondered whether it was worth while struggling on. I was terribly depressed. I had come quite to the end of my resources. There was the sea, and there was the razor. You might think that the use of a razor would come natural to a hairdresser, but I can assure you gentlemen that the idea of using it for that purpose seems just as horrible to us as it would to you. But the sea – washing up against the wall of the Esplanade – it seemed to call me, if you can understand what I mean. It sounded as if it was saying: “Chuck it, chuck it, chuck it up, Bill Simpson.” Fascinating and frightening at the same time, as you might say. All the same, I’ve always had a horror of drowning. Helpless and choking, and the green water in your eyes – we all have our special night-mares, and that one’s mine. Well, I’d sat there for a bit, trying to make up my mind, when I heard somebody walking along, and presently this young fellow came and sat down on the seat beside me. He was in evening dress, I remember, with an overcoat and a soft hat. He had a black beard – that was about the first thing I noticed, because it’s not very usual on a young man in this country, except he might be an artist, perhaps. Well, we got into conversation – I think he started it by offering me a cigarette. It was one of those Russian ones, with a paper tube to it. He spoke friendly, and, I don’t know how it was, I found myself telling him all about the fix I was in. You know how it is, my lord. Sometimes you’ll get talking to a stranger where you wouldn’t to anybody you knew. It struck me he didn’t feel so very happy himself, and we had a long talk about the general damnableness of life. He said he was a Russian and an exile and told me about the hard times he’d had as a kid, and a lot of stuff about “Holy Russia” and the Soviet. Seems as if he took it to heart a lot. And women and all that – seemed as though he’d had some trouble with his best girl. And then he said he only wished his difficulties could be solved as easy as mine, and how I ought to pull myself together and make a fresh start. “You give me that razor,” he said, “and go away and think it over.” So I said the razor was my livelihood, such as it was, and he laughed and said, “In the mood you’re in, it’s more likely to be your deathlihood.” A funny way he had of talking, quick and sort of poetic, you know. So he gave me some money – five pounds it was, in Treasury notes – and I gave him the razor. “What’ll you do with that, sir?” I said, “it’s no good to you.” “I’ll find a use for it,” he said, “never you fear.” And he laughed and put it away in his pocket. Then he got up and said, “Funny we should drop across one another tonight,” and something about “two minds with but a single thought”. And he clapped me on the shoulder and told me to buck up and gave me a pleasant nod and away he went, and that’s the last I saw of him. I wish I’d known what he wanted with the razor, or I wouldn’t have given it to him, but there!
how was I to know, I ask you, gentlemen?’
‘Sounds like Paul Alexis, right enough,’ said Wimsey, thoughtfully.
‘He didn’t actually say who he was, I suppose?’ suggested Hardy.
‘No, he didn’t; but he said he was a professional dancing-partner at one of the hotels, and wasn’t it one hell of a life for a man that ought to be a prince in his own country – making love to ugly old women at twopence-halfpenny a time. Very bitter he sounded.’
‘Well,’ said Wimsey, ‘we’re very much obliged to you, Mr Bright. That seems to clear the whole thing up quite satisfactorily. I think you’ll have to let the police know about it.’
Mr Bright looked uneasy at the mention of the police.
‘Better come along now and get it over,’ said Wimsey, jumping to his feet. ‘You can’t very well get out of it, and, hang it all, man! there’s nothing in it for anybody to worry you about.’
The hairdresser agreed, reluctantly, and fastened his pale eyes on Sally Hardy.
‘It all sounds O.K. to me,’ said the latter, ‘but we’ll have to check up on your story, you know, old man. You might have invented it. But if the cops can prove what you say about yourself – it’s their business, really – then there’ll be a good, fat cheque for you, that ought to keep you going for some time, if you’ll steer clear of that – er – little weakness of yours. The great thing,’ added Sally, reaching for the whisky, ‘is never to let weaknesses interfere with business.’
He poured himself out a stiff peg and, as an afterthought, mixed another for the hairdresser.
Superintendent Glaisher was delighted with Bright’s story, and so was Inspector Umpelty, who had clung to the suicide theory all along.