Three

I
That afternoon we went to tea with Mr. Pye.

Mr. Pye was an extremely ladylike plump little man, devoted to his petitpoint chairs, his Dresden shepherdesses and his collection of bric-à-brac.

He lived at Prior’s Lodge in the grounds of which were the ruins of the oldPriory.

Prior’s Lodge was certainly a very exquisite house and under Mr. Pye’sloving care it showed to its best advantage. Every piece of furniture waspolished and set in the exact place most suited to it. The curtains and cush-ions were of exquisite tone and colour, and of the most expensive silks.

It was hardly a man’s house, and it did strike me that to live there wouldbe rather like taking up one’s abode in a period room at a museum. Mr.

Pye’s principal enjoyment in life was taking people round his house. Eventhose completely insensitive to their surroundings could not escape. Evenif you were so hardened as to consider the essentials of living a radio, acocktail bar, a bath and a bed surrounded by the necessary walls. Mr. Pyedid not despair of leading you to better things.

His small plump hands quivered with sensibility as he described histreasures, and his voice rose to a falsetto squeak as he narrated the excit-ing circumstances under which he had brought his Italian bedstead homefrom Verona.

Joanna and I being both fond of antiquities and of period furniture, metwith approval.

“It is really a pleasure, a great pleasure, to have such an acquisition toour little community. The dear good people down here, you know, so pain-fully bucolic—not to say provincial. They don’t know anything. Vandals—absolute vandals! And the inside of their houses — it would make youweep, dear lady, I assure you it would make you weep. Perhaps it hasdone so?”

Joanna said that she hadn’t gone quite as far as that.

“But you see what I mean? They mix things so terribly! I’ve seen withmy own eyes a most delightful little Sheraton piece—delicate, perfect—acollector’s piece, absolutely—and next to it a Victorian occasional table, orquite possibly a fumed oak revolving bookcase—yes, even that—fumedoak.”

He shuddered—and murmured plaintively:

“Why are people so blind? You agree—I’m sure you agree, that beauty isthe only thing worth living for.”

Hypnotized by his earnestness, Joanna said, yes, yes, that was so.

“Then why,” demanded Mr. Pye, “do people surround themselves withugliness?”

Joanna said it was very odd.

“Odd? It’s criminal! That’s what I call it—criminal! And the excuses theygive! They say something is comfortable. Or that it is quaint. Quaint! Such ahorrible word.”

“The house you have taken,” went on Mr. Pye, “Miss Emily Barton’shouse. Now that is charming, and she has some quite nice pieces. Quitenice. One or two of them are really first class. And she has taste, too—al-though I’m not quite so sure of that as I was. Sometimes, I am afraid, Ithink it’s really sentiment. She likes to keep things as they were—but notfor le bon motif—not because of the resultant harmony—but because it isthe way her mother had them.”

He transferred his attention to me, and his voice changed. It alteredfrom that of the rapt artist to that of the born gossip.

“You didn’t know the family at all? No, quite so—yes, through houseagents. But, my dears, you ought to have known that family! When I camehere the old mother was still alive. An incredible person—quite incred-ible! A monster, if you know what I mean. Positively a monster. The old-fashioned Victorian monster, devouring her young. Yes, that’s what itamounted to. She was monumental, you know, must have weighed seven-teen stone, and all the five daughters revolved round her. ‘The girls’!

That’s how she always spoke of them. The girls! And the eldest was wellover sixty then. ‘Those stupid girls!’ she used to call them sometimes.

Black slaves, that’s all they were, fetching and carrying and agreeing withher. Ten o’clock they had to go to bed and they weren’t allowed a fire intheir bedroom, and as for asking their own friends to the house, thatwould have been unheard of. She despised them, you know, for not get-ting married, and yet so arranged their lives that it was practically impos-sible for them to meet anybody. I believe Emily, or perhaps it was Agnes,did have some kind of affair with a curate. But his family wasn’t goodenough and Mamma soon put a stop to that!”

“It sounds like a novel,” said Joanna.

“Oh, my dear, it was. And then the dreadful old woman died, but ofcourse it was far too late then. They just went on living there and talkingin hushed voices about what poor Mamma would have wished. Even repa-pering her bedroom they felt to be quite sacrilegious. Still they did enjoythemselves in the parish in a quiet way… But none of them had muchstamina, and they just died off one by one. Influenza took off Edith, andMinnie had an operation and didn’t recover and poor Mabel had a stroke—Emily looked after her in the most devoted manner. Really that poor wo-man has done nothing but nursing for the last ten years. A charmingcreature, don’t you think? Like a piece of Dresden. So sad for her havingfinancial anxieties—but of course all investments have depreciated.”

“We feel rather awful being in her house,” said Joanna.

“No, no, my dear young lady. You mustn’t feel that way. Her dear goodFlorence is devoted to her and she told me herself how happy she was tohave got such nice tenants.” Here Mr. Pye made a little bow. “She told meshe thought she had been most fortunate.”

“The house,” I said, “has a very soothing atmosphere.”

Mr. Pye darted a quick glance at me.

“Really? You feel that? Now, that’s very interesting. I wondered, youknow. Yes, I wondered.”

“What do you mean, Mr. Pye?” asked Joanna.

My Pye spread out his plump hands.

“Nothing, nothing. One wondered, that is all. I do believe in atmosphere,you know. People’s thoughts and feelings. They give their impression tothe walls and the furniture.”

I did not speak for a moment or two. I was looking round me and won-dering how I would describe the atmosphere of Prior’s Lodge. It seemed tome that the curious thing was that it hadn’t any atmosphere! That wasreally very remarkable.

I reflected on this point so long that I heard nothing of the conversationgoing on between Joanna and her host. I was recalled to myself, however,by hearing Joanna uttering farewell preliminaries. I came out of mydream and added my quota.

We all went out into the hall. As we came towards the front door a lettercame through the box and fell on the mat.

“Afternoon post,” murmured Mr. Pye as he picked it up. “Now, my dearyoung people, you will come again, won’t you? Such a pleasure to meetsome broader minds, if you understand me. Someone with an appreci-ation of Art. Really you know, these dear good people down here, if youmention the Ballet, it conveys to them pirouetting toes, and tulle skirts andold gentlemen with opera glasses in the Naughty Nineties. It does indeed.

Fifty years behind the times—that’s what I put them down, as. A wonder-ful country, England. It has pockets. Lymstock is one of them. Interestingfrom a collector’s point of view—I always feel I have voluntarily put my-self under a glass shade when I am here. The peaceful backwater wherenothing ever happens.”

Shaking hands with us twice over, he helped me with exaggerated careinto the car. Joanna took the wheel, she negotiated with some care the cir-cular sweep round a plot of unblemished grass, then with a straight driveahead, she raised a hand to wave goodbye to our host where he stood onthe steps of the house. I leaned forward to do the same.

But our gesture of farewell went unheeded. Mr. Pye had opened hismail.

He was standing staring down at the open sheet in his hand.

Joanna had described him once as a plump pink cherub. He was stillplump, but he was not looking like a cherub now. His face was a dark con-gested purple, contorted with rage and surprise.

And at that moment I realized that there had been something familiarabout the look of that envelope. I had not realized it at the time—indeed ithad been one of those things that you note unconsciously without know-ing that you do note them.

“Goodness,” said Joanna. “What’s bitten the poor pet?”

“I rather fancy,” I said, “that it’s the Hidden Hand again.”

She turned an astonished face towards me and the car swerved.

“Careful, wench,” I said.

Joanna refixed her attention on the road. She was frowning.

“You mean a letter like the one you got?”

“That’s my guess.”

“What is this place?” asked Joanna. “It looks the most innocent sleepyharmless little bit of England you can imagine—”

“Where to quote Mr. Pye, nothing ever happens,” I cut in. “He chose thewrong minute to say that. Something has happened.”

“But who writes these things, Jerry?”

I shrugged my shoulders.

“My dear girl, how should I know? Some local nitwit with a screw loose,I suppose.”

“But why? It seems so idiotic.”

“You must read Freud and Jung and that lot to find out. Or ask our Dr.

Owen.”

Joanna tossed her head.

“Dr. Owen doesn’t like me.”

“He’s hardly seen you.”

“He’s seen quite enough, apparently, to make him cross over if he seesme coming along the High Street.”

“A most unusual reaction,” I said sympathetically. “And one you’re notused to.”

Joanna was frowning again.

“No, but seriously, Jerry, why do people write anonymous letters?”

“As I say, they’ve got a screw loose. It satisfies some urge, I suppose. Ifyou’ve been snubbed, or ignored, or frustrated, and your life’s pretty draband empty, I suppose you get a sense of power from stabbing in the darkat people who are happy and enjoying themselves.”

Joanna shivered. “Not nice.”

“No, not nice. I should imagine the people in these country places tendto be inbred—and so you would get a fair amount of queers.”

“Somebody, I suppose, quite uneducated and inarticulate? With bettereducation—”

Joanna did not finish her sentence, and I said nothing. I have never beenable to accept the easy belief that education is a panacea for every ill.

As we drove through the town before climbing up the hill road, I lookedcuriously at the few figures abroad in the High Street. Was one of thosesturdy countrywomen going about with a load of spite and malice behindher placid brow, planning perhaps even now a further outpouring of vin-dictive spleen?

But I still did not take the thing seriously.