The Nine Tailors lpw-11 Read online

  Beyond the churchyard wall lay a green field, and in the middle of the field there was a slight hollow. She knew that hollow well. It had been there now for over three hundred years. Time had made it shallower, and in three hundred years more it might disappear altogether, but there it still was — the mark left by the great pit dug for the founding of Tailor Paul.

  Jack Godfrey spoke close beside her.

  “Time I was getting along now, Miss Hilary.”

  “Oh, yes. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. Are you ringing a peal to-morrow?”

  “Yes, Miss Hilary. We’re going to have a try at Stedman’s. They’re difficult to ring, are Stedman’s, but very fine music when you get them going proper. Mind your head. Miss Hilary. A full peal of 5,040 we’re going to give them — that’s three hours. It’s a fortnit thing as Will Thoday’s all right again, because neither Tom Tebbutt nor young George Wilderspin is what you might call reliable in Stedman’s, and of course, Wally Pratt’s no good at all. Excuse me one minute. Miss Hilary, while I gathers up my traps. But to my mind, there’s more interest, as you might say, in Stedman’s than in any other method, though it takes a bit of thinking about to keep it all clear in one’s head. Old Hezekiah don’t so much care about it, of course, because he likes the tenor rung in. Triples ain’t much fun for him, he says, and it ain’t to be wondered at. Still, he’s an old man now, and you couldn’t hardly expect him to learn Stedman’s at his age, and what’s more, if he could, you’d never get him to leave Tailor Paul. Just a moment, Miss Hilary, while I lock up this here counterpoise. But give me a nice peal of Stedman’s and I ask no better. We never had no Stedman’s till Rector come, and it took him a powerful long time to learn us to ring them. Well I mind the trouble we had with them. Old John Thoday — that’s Will’s father, he’s dead and gone now — he used to say, ‘Boys,’ he said, ‘it’s my belief the Devil himself couldn’t get no sense out of this dratted method.’ And Rector fined him sixpence for swearing, like it says in they old rules. Mind you don’t slip on the stair. Miss Hilary, it’s terrible worn. But we learned Stedman to rights, none the more for that, and to my mind it’s a very pretty method of ringing. Well, good morning to you. Miss Hilary.”;

  * * *

  The peal of 5,040 Stedman’s Triples was duly rung on Easter Sunday morning. Hilary Thorpe heard it from the Red House, sitting beside the great old four-poster bed, as she had sat on New Year’s morning to hear the peal of Treble Bob Major. Then the noise of the bells had come full and clear; to-day, it reached her only in distant bursts, when the wind, rollicking away with it eastward, bated for a moment or veered round a little to the south.

  “Hilary!”

  “Yes, Dad.”

  “I’m afraid — if I go west this time — I’ll be leaving you rottenly badly off, old girl.”

  “I don’t care a dash about that, old thing. Not that you are going west. But if you did, I should be quite all right.”

  “There’ll be enough to send you to Oxford, I dare say. Girls don’t seem to cost much there — your uncle will see to it.”

  “Yes — and I’m going to get a scholarship, anyway. And I don’t want money. I’d rather make my own living. Miss Bowler says she doesn’t think anything of a woman who can’t be independent.” (Miss Bowler was the English mistress and the idol of the moment.) “I’m going to be a writer, Dad. Miss Bowler says she wouldn’t wonder if I’d got it in me.”

  “Oh? What are you going to write? Poetry?”

  “Well, perhaps But I don’t suppose that pays very well. I’ll write novels, test-sellers. The sort that everybody goes potty over. Not just bosh ones, but like The Constant Nymph.”

  “You’ll want a bit of experience before you can write novels, old girl.”

  “Rot, Daddy. You don’t want experience for writing novels. People write them at Oxford and they sell like billy-ho. All about how awful everything was at school.”

  “I see. And when you leave Oxford, you write one about how awful everything was at college.”

  “That’s the idea. I can do that on my head.”

  “Well, dear, I hope it’ll work. But all the same, I feel a damned failure, leaving you so little. If only that rotten necklace had turned up! I was a fool to pay that Wilbraham woman for it, but she as good as accused the old Governor of being an accessory, and I—”

  “Oh, Dad, please—please don’t go on about that silly necklace. Of course you couldn’t do anything else about it. And I don’t want the beastly money. And anyhow, you’re not going to peg out yet.”

  But the specialist, arriving on Tuesday, looked grave and, taking Dr. Baines aside, said to him kindly:

  “You have done all you could. Even if you had called me in earlier, it could have made no possible difference.”

  And to Hilary, still kindly;

  “We must never give up hope, you know. Miss Thorpe. I can’t disguise from you that your father’s condition is serious, but Nature has marvellous powers of recuperation…”

  Which is the medical man’s way of saving that, short of miraculous intervention, you may as well order the coffin.

  * * *

  On the following Monday afternoon, Mr. Venables was just leaving the cottage of a cantankerous and venomous-tongued old lady on the extreme outskirts of the parish, when a deep, booming sound smote his ear from afar. He stood still with his hand upon the gate.

  “That’s Tailor Paul,” said the Rector to himself. Three solemn notes, and a pause.

  “Man or woman?”

  Three notes, and then three more.

  “Man,” said the Rector. He still stood listening. “I wonder if poor old Merryweather has gone at last. I hope it isn’t that boy of Hensman’s.” He counted twelve strokes, and waited. But the bell tolled on, and the Rector breathed a sigh of relief. Hensman’s boy, at least, was safe. He hastily reckoned up the weaklings of his flock. Twenty strokes, thirty strokes — a man of full age. “Heaven send,” thought the Rector, “it isn’t Sir Henry. He seemed better when I saw him yesterday.” Forty strokes, forty-one, forty-two. Surely it must be old Merryweather — a happy release for him, poor old man. Forty-three, forty-four, forty-five, forty-six. Now it must go on — it could not stop at that fatal number. Old Merryweather was eighty-four. The Rector strained his ears. He must have missed the next stroke — the wind was pretty strong, and his hearing was perhaps not as good as it had been.

  But he waited full thirty seconds before Tailor Paul spoke again; and after that there was silence for another thirty seconds.

  The cantankerous old lady, astonished to see the Rector stand so long bare-headed at her gate, came hobbling down the garden path to know what it was all about.

  “It’s the passing-bell,” said Mr. Venables, “they have rung the nine tailors and forty-six strokes, and I’m afraid it must be for Sir Henry.”

  “Oh, dear,” said the cantankerous old woman. “that’s bad. Terrible bad, that is.” A peevish kind of pity came into her eyes. “What’s to become of Miss Hilary now, with her mother and father gone so quick, and her only fifteen, and nobody to keep her in check? I don’t hold with girls being left to look arter themselves. They’re troublesome at the best and they didn’t ought to have their parents took away from them.”

  “We mustn’t question the ways of Providence,” said the Rector.

  “Providence?” said the old woman. “Don’t yew talk to me about Providence. I’ve had enough o’ Providence. First he took my husband, and then he took my ’taters, but there’s One above as’ll teach him to mend his manners, if he don’t look out.”

  The Rector was too much distressed to challenge this remarkable piece of theology.

  “We can but trust in God, Mrs. Giddings,” he said, and pulled up the starting-handle with a jerk.

  * * *

  Sir Henry’s funeral was fixed for the Friday afternoon. This was an occasion of mournful importance to at least four persons in Fenchurch St. Paul. There was Mr. Russell, the undertaker, who w
as a cousin of that same Mary Russell who had married William Thoday. He was determined to excel himself in the matter of polished oak and brass plates, and his hammer and plane had been keeping up a dismal little harmony of their own during the early part of the week. His, also, was the delicate task of selecting the six bearers so that they might be well-matched in height and step. Mr. Hezekiah Lavender and Mr. Jack Godfrey went into conference about the proper ringing of a muffled peal — Mr. Godfrey’s business being to provide and adjust the leather buffets about the clappers of the bells, and Mr. Lavender’s to arrange and conduct the ringing. And Mr. Gotobed, the sexton, was concerned with the grave — so much concerned that he had declined to take part in the peal, preferring to give his whole mind to the graveside ceremonies, although his son, Dick, who assisted him with the spadework, considered himself quite capable of carrying on on his own. There was not, indeed, very much to do in the way of digging. Rather to Mr. Gotobed’s disappointment, Sir Henry had expressed a wish to be buried in the same grave with his wife, so that there was little opportunity for any fine work in the way of shaping, measuring and smoothing the sides of the grave. They had only to cast out the earth — scarcely yet firm after three rainy months — make all neat and tidy and line the grave with fresh greenery. Nevertheless, liking to be well beforehand with his work, Mr. Gotobed took measures to carry this out on the Thursday afternoon.

  The Rector had just come in from a round of visits, and was about to sit down to his tea, when Emily appeared at the sitting-room door.

  “If you please, sir, could Harry Gotobed speak to you for a moment?”

  “Yes, certainly. Where is he?”

  “At the back door, sir. He wouldn’t come in on account of his boots being dirty.”

  Mr. Venables made his way to the back door; Mr. Gotobed stood awkwardly on the step, twirling his cap in his hands.

  “Well, Harry, what’s the trouble?”

  “Well, sir, it’s about this here grave. I thought I better come and see you, being as it’s a church matter, like. You see, when Dick and me come to open it up, we found a corpus a-laying inside of it, and Dick says to me—”

  “A corpse? Well, of course there’s a corpse. Lady Thorpe is buried there. You buried her yourself.”

  “Yes, sir, but this here corpus ain’t Lady Thorpe’s corpus. It’s a man’s corpus, that’s what it is, and it du seem as though it didn’t have no right to be there. So I says to Dick—”

  “A man’s corpse! What do you mean? Is it in a coffin?”

  “No, sir, no coffin. Just an ordinary suit o’ clothes, and he du look as though he’s a-been a-laying there a goodish while. So Dick says, ‘Dad,’ he says, ‘this looks like a police matter to me. Shall I send for Jack Priest?’ he says. And I says, ‘No,’ I says, ‘this here is church property, this is, and Rector did ought to be told about it. That’s only right and respectful,’ I says. ‘Throw a bit o’ summat over it,’ I says, ‘while I goes and fetches Rector, and don’t let any o they boys come into the churchyard.’ So I puts on my coat and comes over, because we don’t rightly know what to do about it.”

  “But what an extraordinary thing, Harry!” exclaimed the Rector, helplessly. “I really — I never — who is this man? Do you know him?”

  “It’s my belief, sir, his own mother wouldn’t know him. Perhaps you’d like to step across and take a look at him?”

  “Why, yes, of course, I’d better do that. Dear me, dear me! how very perplexing. Emily! Emily! have you seen my hat anywhere? Ah, thank you. Now, Harry. Oh, Emily, please tell Mrs. Venables that I am unexpectedly detained, and not to wait tea for me. Yes, Harry, I’m quite ready now.”

  Dick Gotobed had spread a tarpaulin over the half-open grave, but he lifted this as the Rector approached. The good gentleman gave one look and averted his eyes rather hastily. Dick replaced the tarpaulin.

  “This is a very terrible thing,” said Mr. Venables. He had removed his clerical felt in reverence for the horrid thing under the tarpaulin, and stood bewildered, his thin grey hair ruffled by the wind. “We must certainly send for the constable — and — and”—here his face brightened a little—“and for Dr. Baines, of course. Yes, yes — Dr. Baines will be the man. And, Harry, I think I have read that it is better in these cases to disturb things as little as possible. Er — I wonder who this poor fellow can possibly be. It’s nobody belonging to the village, that’s certain, because if anybody was missing we should have heard about it. I cannot imagine how he can have come here.”

  “No more can’t we, sir. Looks like he was a proper stranger. Excuse me, sir, but didn’t we ought to inform the coroner of this here?”

  “The coroner? Oh, dear! yes, naturally; I suppose there will have to be an inquest. What a dreadful business this is! Why, we haven’t had an inquest in the village since Mrs. Venables and I came to the Rectory, and that’s close on twenty years. This will be a very shocking blow for Miss Thorpe, poor child. Her parents’ grave — such a fearful desecration. Still, it can’t be hushed up, of course. The inquest — well, well, we must try to keep our wits about us. I think, Dick, you had better run up to the post-office and get a call put through to Dr. Baines and ask him to come over at once and you had better ring through to St. Peter and get someone to send a message to Jack Priest. And you, Harry, had better stay here and keep an eye on — on the grave. And I will go up to the Red House myself and break the shocking news to Miss Thorpe, for fear she should hear it in an abrupt and painful way from somebody else. Yes, I think that is what I had better do. Or perhaps it would be more suitable if Mrs. Venables were to go round. I must consult her. Yes, yes, I must consult Mrs. Venables. Now, Dick, off you go, and be sure you don’t say a word about this to anybody till the constable comes.”

  There is no doubt that Dick Gotobed did his best in the matter, but, since the post-office telephone lived in the post-mistress’s sitting-room, it was not altogether easy to keep any message confidential. At any rate, by the time that P.C. Priest arrived, rather blown, upon his push-cycle, a small knot of men and women had gathered in and about the churchyard, including Hezekiah Lavender, who had run as fast as his ancient legs could carry him from his cottage-garden, and was very indignant with Harry Gotobed for not letting him lift the tarpaulin.

  “’Ere!” said the constable, running his machine adroitly into the midst of a bunch of children clustered round the lych-gate and tipping himself off bodily sideways. “’Ere! what’s all this? You run along home to yer mothers, see? And don’t let me catch you here again. ’Afternoon, Mr. Venables, sir. What’s the trouble here?”

  There’s been a body found in the churchyard,” said Mr. Venables.

  “Body, eh?” said the constable. “Well, it’s come to the right place, ain’t it? What have you done with it? Oh, you’ve left it where you found it. Quite right, sir. And where might that be? Oh, ’ere. I see. All right; let’s have a look at him. Oh! Ah! that’s it, is it? Why, Harry, whatever have you been a-doing of? Tryin’ to bury him?”

  The Rector began to explain, but the constable stopped him with an upraised hand.

  “One moment, sir. We’ll take this here matter in the proper and correct order. Just a moment while I gets out my notebook. Now, then. Date. Call received 5.15 pee hem. Proceeded to the churchyard, arriving 5.30 pee hem. Now, who found this here body?”

  “Dick and me.”

  “Name?” said the constable.

  “Go on, Jack. You knows me well enough.”

  “That don’t matter. I’ve got to do it in the proper way. Name?”

  “Harry Gotobed.”

  “Hoccupation?”

  “Sexton. “

  “Righto, Harry. Go ahead.”