Dorothy Sayers - Busman’s Honeymoon

‘At a guess,’ he replied, ‘I should say-Polly Mason.’

‘Well, there!’ exclaimed the Superintendent. ‘Just as I was all set to catch you again! Polly Mason it was, and she wasn’t half scared to see me, neether. “Now, my girl,” I said to her, “I don’t like to see you here,” I says. “What’s all this?” And Crutchley says, “No business of yours, you stupid cop. She’s over the age of consent” “Maybe,” I said, “but she’s got a mother,” I said, “as brought her up decent; and, what’s more,” I said, “it’s breaking and entering, and that’s a civil trespass, and Mr Moffatt’ll have something to say, about it.” So there was more words passed, and I said to the girl. “You ’and over that key, which you ain’t got no right to, and if you’ve got any sense or feeling,” I said, “you’ll come along home with me.” And the end of it was, I brought her back-and a lot of sauce she gave me, the young piece. As for me lord, I left him to twiddle his thumbs-I beg your pardon, my lord-no offence intended.’

Peter finished his crown and put it on.

‘It’s an odd thing,’ he observed, ‘that men like Crutchley, with quantities of large white teeth, are practically always gay Lotharios.’

‘Not frivolously gay, either,’ said Harriet. ‘Two strings to the bow for use and one for pleasure.’

‘Frank Crutchley,’ said Kirk, ‘has got too much o’ what the cat cleans ’er paws with. Stupid cop, indeed-I’ll cop ’im, the cheeky ’ound, one o’ these days.’

‘There is a certain lack of the finer feelings,’ said Peter. ‘Euphelia serves to grace my measure but Chloe is my real flame, no doubt. But to get Euphelia’s father to cut the key for Chloe is-tactless.’

‘ Tain’t my business to run a Sunday school,’ said the Superintendent, ‘but that Polly Mason’s asking for trouble. “The banns is going up next Sunday,” says she, bold as brass. “Are they?” says I, “Well, if I was you, my girl, I’d run round to parson with ’em myself, straight away, before your young man changes his mind. If you and him’s walking out in a proper way, there’s no need to have keys to other folks’ barns.” I didn’t say anything about the young lady in London, because that’s over and done with, but where there’s one there might be two.’

‘There were two,’ said Harriet, resolutely; ‘and the other one was here, in Pagford.’

‘What’s that?’ said Kirk.

Harriet told her story for the second time that evening.

‘Well, I’m bothered!’ exclaimed Mr Kirk, laughing heartily. ‘Poor old Aggie Twitterton! Kissing Frank Crutchley in the churchyard. That’s a good ‘un!’

Neither of the other two made any comment. Presently, Kirk’s mirth subsided and he showed signs of being once more in a state of mental gestation. His eyes became fixed and his lips moved silently.’

’Alf a moment, ’alf a moment,’ said Kirk while they watched him breathlessly; ‘Aggie Twitterton, eh? And young Crutchley? Now, that’s made me think of something, that has… Now, don’t you tell me… There! I knew I’d get it!’

‘I thought you would,’ said Peter, only half aloud.

•Twelfth Night!’ cried Mr Kirk, exultantly. ‘Orsino, that’s it! “Too old, by heaven. Let still the woman take An elder than herself”-I knew there was something in Shakespeare.’ He fell silent again. ‘Hullo!’ he said, in a changed tone, ‘that’s all right, but see here! If Aggie Twitterton wanted the money for Frank Crutchley and had the keys to the house, what was to prevent her-eh?’

‘Nothing whatever,’ said Peter. ‘Only you’ve got to prove it, you know.’

‘I’ve had my eye on Aggie Twitterton all along,’ said the Superintendent. ‘After all, you can’t get over them things she said. And her knowing about the will and all. And, come to look at it, whoever did it had to get into the house, now, hadn’t they?’

‘Why?’ demanded Peter. ‘How do you know Noakes didn’t come out and get killed in the garden?’

‘No,’ said Kirk, ‘that’s the one thing he couldn’t, and you know that as well as I do; and for why? There wasn’t no earth nor gravel on his shoes nor yet on his coat where he fell on it. And this time of the year, and with the rain we had last week there would a-been. No, my lord, springes to catch woodcocks! You don’t catch me that way.’

‘Hamlet,’ said Peter, meekly. ‘Very well. Now we’d better tell you all the ways we’ve thought of for getting into the house.’

After nearly an hour, the Superintendent was shaken, but not convinced. ‘See here, my lord,’ he said at last. ‘I see your point, and you’re quite right. It’s no good saying. He might or She might, because there’d always be a clever counsel to say, might ain’t necessarily right. And I see I been a bit hasty, overlooking that window and the trap-door and about something having been thrown at the deceased. Better late than never. I’ll be round again in the morning, and we’ll go into all them points. And here’s another thing. I’ll bring Joe Sellon with me, and you can try for yourself about him gettin’ through them-mullions, d’you call them? Because, not to put too fine a point upon it, he’d make two of you, my lord-and what’s more, it’s my belief you could get through pretty well almost anything, including a judge and jury, if you’ll pardon me saying so… No, don’t you mistake me. I ain’t out to put nothing on Aggie Twitterton-I’m out to find who killed deceased, and prove it. And I will prove it, if I have to go through the place with a tooth-comb.’

‘Then,’ said Peter, ‘you have to be up pretty early in the morning, to stop our London friends from carrying away the furniture, lock, stock and barrel.’

‘I’ll see they don’t take the trap-door,’ retorted the Superintendent. ‘Nor yet the doors and windows. And now I’ll be getting off home, and I’m very sorry for keeping you and her ladyship up like this.’

‘Not at all,’ said Peter. ‘Parting is such sweet sorrow-we’ve had quite a Shakespearean evening, haven’t we?’

‘Well,’ said Harriet, as her lord returned from seeing the Superintendent to the door, ‘he wasn’t unreasonable, after all. But oh! I do hope there won’t be any more people tonight.’

‘Nous menons une vie assez mouvementé. I’ve never known such a day. Bunter looks quite haggard-I have sent him to bed. As for me, I don’t feel like the same person I was before breakfast.’

‘I don’t even feel the same person I was before dinner. Peter-about that. It’s frightened me rather. I’ve always so loathed and dreaded any sort of possessiveness. You know how I’ve always run away from it.’

‘I’ve reason to know.’ He made a wry face. ‘You ran like the Red Queen.’

‘I know I did. And now-I start it, of all people! I simply can’t think what came over me. It’s frightful. Is that sort of thing always going to happen to me?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said, lightly. ‘I can’t imagine. In an experience of women extending, like the good Dr Watson’s, over many nations, and three separate continents-’

‘Why separate? Do ordinary continents come blended, like teas?’

‘I don’t know. That’s what it says in the book. Three separate continents. In all my experience, you are completely unprecedented. I never met anybody like you.’

‘Why? Possessiveness isn’t unprecedented.’

‘On the contrary-it’s as common as mud. But to recognise it in one’s self and chuck it overboard is-unusual. If you want to be a normal person, my girl, you should let it rip and give yourself and everybody else hell with it. And you should call it something eke-devotion or self-sacrifice and that sort of thing. If you go on behaving with all this reason and generosity, everybody will think we don’t give a damn for one another.’