Late and Cold (Timothy Herring) Page 4

  “Very well,” said Miss Jones. “Just you say.” She followed him down the rough, steep path which led through the woods to the bridge.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Mr. X. and Madam Y.

  The lock on the gate to the bridge had been well oiled and the key turned easily. Cattle were grazing quietly in the meadow beyond the river. A young bull, which Timothy hoped his companion would not notice, snorted at their approach but, content to be among the cows, remained tractable, but Timothy could not help wondering whether the gift to him of a key to the bridge had been made sardonically. Not many people like bulls.

  The three-storey house, which was fronted by a flight of steps, and whose severely classical doorway, together with a symmetrical arrangement of rectangular windows, gave it an expression of slightly disparaging surprise, was of the period to which Timothy had assigned it. It was an uncompromising and daunting edifice with a noticeably pronounced stringcourse above the ground-floor windows, flat pilaster strips as decoration, and a steeply-pitched roof. Its solid chimney-stacks also helped to identify it as a Caroline conception, possibly that of Hugh May, a follower of Inigo Jones.

  So much Timothy noticed as he and his companion approached the outer door. It was opened by the tweed-suited woman, beyond whom hovered the monkishly-garbed man.

  “So our defences are down,” she said.

  “You gave me the key to them,” said Timothy, displaying it with a propitiatory smile.

  “Since you have chosen to visit us, come in. Is this your wife?” she asked, ushering them into the house.

  “No. My name is Herring. This is Miss Jones. We are paying no casual visit. We come on a business matter.”

  “Indeed?” She closed the door behind them. The monkish man had melted away. “We had better go in here.”

  The room into which she led them had high, narrow windows on two sides and was furnished with deep armchairs, a refectory table, and some modern bookcases. The fireplace retained its original character and the ceiling was decorated with some surprisingly fine plasterwork for a house built so far from any fashionable locality.

  “I see,” said the trousered woman, when she had seated the visitors, “that you are admiring the ceiling, Mr. Herring. By the man who did Dunsland, in the shire of Devon, I have been told. You say you come on business. Are you making us an offer for this house? Much as you may admire it, it is not for sale. We had better get that clear.”

  “I’m relieved to hear you say so. It is the last thing Miss Jones would wish,” said Timothy. “As a matter of fact . . .”

  “Let her speak for herself, if she is the interested party. Jones is an ubiquitous name. Cannot we embellish it before she begins?” The woman stared suspiciously at the second of the visitors, whom plainly she did not like. Miss Jones spoke up.

  “My name is Marion Jones. I am the first cousin of Pembroke Pritchard Jones, the painter. I believe he is the owner of this property, or, at least, that he does own some of it. He gave it to me on condition that I lived here—well, here, or in the castle. I’m not sure which.”

  “An amazing assertion! Are you proposing to dispossess me? I doubt whether you have the right! Perhaps the Father would know.” She went to the door, opened it, and shouted, “Needed!” The next moment the robed man had joined them. “Naughty to listen at keyholes,” said the woman, in a tone of indulgent rebuke. “Come in, shut the door, and sit down. We are confronted with something uncommonly like an ultimatum. What do you say to having Marion Jones turn you out of house and home?”

  The robed man brushed back his thin brown hair with a thin brown hand. He smiled at Miss Jones with baffling sweetness.

  “It had to come at some time,” he said. “What reason does she give for casting me into outer darkness, I wonder? We have done all that was asked—kept the place sufficiently in repair, paid the rates, looked after the gardens, and milked the cows.”

  “Well,” said the woman, “I do hope, Marion Jones, that you have a truthful story to unfold. You have an honest face. Has she not an honest face, Mr. Herring?”

  “I hadn’t thought about it,” said Timothy, “but I am sure you will be interested to hear what else she has to say. So shall I,” he added, significantly, “for, although I have heard some of her story, I doubt very much whether I have heard it all.”

  “Well, we have plenty of time,” said the woman. “Tea will be at five.” She placed a hand on each trousered knee, leaned forward, stuck out her chin, and added, “Fire away, Marion Jones. Keep it clean, for the Father’s sake, and spare no detail, however trivial. I will be Sherlock Holmes to Mr. Herring’s Doctor Watson.”

  “No, the other way about,” said Timothy. He produced one of Phisbe’s official visiting-cards. “This is my interest in the matter.”

  “Aha! Buildings of historic interest!” said the woman. “Would it really come off, do you think?”

  “Would what come off?”

  “The repair and upkeep of this building. We are finding it increasingly expensive.”

  “The repair and upkeep of this building are beside the point,” said Timothy, “at the moment. I think you were prepared to listen to Miss Jones’s story. Now, Marion, fire away.”

  “I haven’t met my cousin Pembroke,” said Miss Jones, addressing herself solely to Timothy and ignoring the rest of her audience, “since I was a child. I suppose I would have been about eight years old when I saw him last. That was many years ago. He was the son of the eldest son. My father was the son of the third son. So, as you can see, our branch of the family has never been very well off. I went to London University and took a degree in economics . . .”

  “Ah, I thought it wasn’t in English,” murmured Timothy.

  “. . . and then I got a job. When I left college I was engaged to be married. Then my brother and his wife were killed in a smash and I made myself responsible for their children. My fiancé couldn’t accept the situation. For this, of course, I can’t blame him, so we ended our engagement, and I had to find somewhere cheap to live. To keep yourself and two children on a young teacher’s salary isn’t all that easy. I found a couple of rooms and got them cheap because the landlady—who’s a prize bitch, anyway—wouldn’t have coloured people in the house, and let us have the rooms cheap to keep them in use. Things didn’t seem too bad until Miranda was wished on me. She was not much more than a baby, and, to keep my job, I had to pay for her to be looked after during the day, and she’s proved, poor mite, an expensive addition to my household. Anyway, the plan was that, if I’d keep her with me, Nanradoc was mine if I’d repair it and promise to live in it and, of course, it sounded to me like heaven except . . .” she glanced at him, “. . . I hadn’t any money for repairs, and, in any case, I had no idea of what the repairs would amount to. I struggled on, and then, one day, I read about your marvellous Society.”

  “Ah!” said the woman. “I take it that you ascertained whether the property is Mr. Jones’s own, and, even if it is, whether he is empowered to give it away?”

  “That’s just the point,” said Timothy, before Marion could speak. “That is the reason—one of the reasons—for our being here.”

  “I see no reason why I should assist you to dabble in Mr. Jones’s affairs. You find me in possession of Nanradoc House, and possession, so they say, is nine-tenths of the law. In this case you may find it is ten-tenths.” She spoke sharply. The monk nodded and clicked his tongue.

  “I see,” said Timothy. “You mean that Nanradoc is not in Pembroke Jones’s gift. He sold out his half-share some time ago to you and—er—”

  “Father Ignatius,” said the ascetic.

  “And Father Ignatius. If that is so, a cruel hoax has been wished on Marion here.”

  “That,” said the woman, “is no affair of ours, and may or may not be true. However, as Miss Jones has made a journey to come and visit us, no doubt she will like to inspect what she must have hoped might become her property.”

  “Oh, really, no, I cou
ldn’t think of troubling you,” said Marion, distressed. “I’m very sorry if we’re here under false pretences.”

  “But, if you are telling the truth, and are not concerned (with Mr. Herring) in an impudent attempt at fraudulent misrepresentation, you are not here under false pretences, and I insist upon showing you round. But, first, do you know of any other members of your family besides Pembroke Jones?”

  “He has a much younger sister named Olwen, but I don’t think I ever saw her.”

  “Then she can mean nothing to you. Ah, well, come with me. There is no need for you to trouble to accompany us, Mr. Herring. You can stay and keep the Father company. He has esoteric interests.”

  Timothy behaved as though he had not heard this. He liked old houses, and had no intention of being denied the opportunity to inspect this one. He said nothing, but followed Marion and the trouser-suit out of the room. The robed man half-rose as though to prevent him, but then dropped back into his chair, produced a string of brightly-coloured beads, and began to mumble. Timothy gathered that he was reciting the multiplication table, although, of course, it might have been his prayers.

  Nanradoc House was not a large one, after all. As they were being shown round, it seemed to Timothy a smaller Coleshill, although thirty years later in date. A double staircase rose from the entrance hall, and the large salon of Coleshill was replaced at Nanradoc by the dining-room into which they had been shown. Timothy had noticed that from it a flight of steps led down to a garden at the side of the house. As the hall floor was, in effect, the first floor, two state bedrooms, opening from a corridor which divided the hall from the dining-room, were positioned much as they were at the Berkshire mansion, with drawing-room and parlour symmetrically forming the opposite wing of the building.

  This floor of the house was in reasonable repair, although the plasterwork in the principal bedroom and on the drawing-room ceiling was badly stained in places with damp. It was on the next floor, however, that the beginnings of decay were really apparent. Here, it was obvious, nothing had been done to stay the fell hand of time.

  “Oh, dear!” said Marion, gazing about her in dismay. “It does want doing up, doesn’t it?”

  The trousered woman made no reply to this, as no reply was necessary. She asked,

  “Do you wish to go any higher? We do not use this floor or the one above, which is in a state of even worse repair.”

  “Oh, we may as well see all that there is to be seen,” said Timothy.

  “Not unless your Society is prepared to carry out the necessary work,” said the woman tartly.

  “I am sure you will understand that I can commit my Society to nothing. All I can do is to put each case before my committee, and, to do that, I must have all the information I can get, and that involves seeing all that there is to be seen.”

  “Very well, then.” As she led the way, the staircase and its carved banisters changed in character. The treads became narrower, and a handrail, which gave no more than fingerhold, protruded from the wall. “Of course, these were none other than the servants’ quarters,” their guide went on. “One could not expect much up here.”

  “Neither does one get much,” said Timothy, gazing at damp-stained walls, floors deep in dust, and windows festooned with the cobwebs of generations of busy spiders. “Well, Marion,” he used her name with deliberate intention and effect, “what do you think?”

  “It’s a house,” she said uncertainly, “but, of course . . .”

  “I must consult the Father,” said the woman, “and (mind how you go on these stairs) take his advice, but, if he agrees, I am prepared to come to terms with you. If Mr. Herring’s Society will put this whole house in repair, I am prepared to cede you one floor—the second floor—as a reward for having introduced his Society to my notice. What do you say to that, Miss Marion Jones?”

  “I don’t think my claim should rest upon your charity,” said Marion. “Either my cousin has this property in his gift, or else he hasn’t. I don’t know who you are—I don’t even know your name—but I couldn’t live here on a sort of sufferance. Either I have rights or I have not. There are no other ways of looking at it.”

  They found the Father waiting for them in the hall.

  “Well,” he said eagerly, “and what conclusion have we come to?”

  “No conclusion,” said Timothy, before Marion could speak, “except that this—er—”

  “Miss Olwen Jones?” the Father asked quickly.

  “Oh,” said Timothy, “so this is Miss Olwen Jones? Any—er—any relation to Pembroke?”

  “Do you doubt it?” she enquired frostily.

  “Of course not, no.”

  “Never mind about that,” said the monk. “Are your people prepared to put this house to rights?”

  “I can commit my Society to nothing, but I think they might be prepared to help you in return for being given the ruins of Nanradoc Castle.”

  “Oh, but, look here, Tim,” said Marion, “whatever the verdict about my right to the house may be, Nanradoc Castle is most certainly mine. Surely there’s no question of their giving it away? Pembroke definitely said in his letter . . .”

  “Ah, yes, Pembroke!” put in the trousered woman. “Are you sure, though, that he has the castle in his gift? You would do well to make certain of that, before putting in your claim.”

  “All the same,” said the monk, “we should be prepared to make concessions, if your Society—what did you say the name of it was?—I did not read the visiting-card you showed my Sister in Charity here.” He indicated the trousered woman and smiled.

  “The Society for the Preservation of Buildings of Historic Interest,” said Timothy. He added the address of the Society’s London headquarters. “Perhaps you would be kind enough to get in touch with us there if you have any concrete offers to make.”

  “This is a very beautiful and desirable house,” said the woman. “It would be worth your while to preserve it, don’t you think?”

  “No doubt, but there are a good many beautiful and desirable houses of the same period, some of them finer than this one. The ruined castle, however, is of interest. I notice, incidentally, that the chapel has been roughly and, I would say, recently repaired.”

  “One must have a place of worship,” said the monk, with a negligent wave of his hand. “I am in Orders, as you see.”

  “Quite.”

  “For the rest, one must always remember that the shoes, with their tongues, sing carols, and that, with their little eyelet-holes, they can see what is going on.” He leered malevolently at Marion.

  “You are pleased to be fanciful, Father,” said the trousered woman in a tone of sharp rebuke. “Well, Mr. Herring and Miss Marion Jones, we shall be pleased to hear from you at some future date if you intend to proceed with your rather unconvincing claim, but the strictest investigation will be necessary.”

  “Of course,” said Timothy. “Well, Marion, I think we had better go. Thank you for your courtesy, Miss Olwen Jones, in showing us over the house. If you would care to contact my Society—in writing, I need hardly say—I will put your case for the repair of this house before my committee, but on the clear understanding that I can commit them to nothing.”

  “Oh, surely, surely,” agreed the monk. No further mention was made of tea, and Timothy and Marion were about to take their leave when he added, “No lawyers, though. ‘A fox may steal your hens, sir, a whore your health and pence, sir, a thief your goods and plate; it ever was decreed, sir, if lawyer’s hand is fee’d, sir, he steals your whole estate.’ Good afternoon, and thank you so much for coming to see us.”

  “Is that woman insane?” asked Marion, as they crossed the meadow and walked towards the bridge.

  “I don’t know. If his shoes sing carols the man may be,” said Timothy, grinning. “Incidentally, he came across with the name of Olwen Jones readily enough, didn’t he? I may have a suspicious mind, but you have the clear enunciation which carries a teacher’s voice to the furthest
recesses of the classroom and warns the skulkers in the back row that Nemesis is on their track.”

  “You mean he heard me mention Olwen Jones? He’d have known her name anyway, wouldn’t he? You know, Tim, I’m beginning to wish I’d never heard from Pembroke about Nanradoc. It’s hopeless to think I can ever get the house away from people like that. As they pointed out, they are in possession.”

  “I know, and there’s no doubt they’ll put up a fight to have it stay that way, I’m afraid.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  A Visit in Retrospect

  “Well,” Timothy went on, as they sat over tea at the hotel, “what did you really think of them?”

  “Well, what did you?”

  “I asked you first.”

  “I don’t think I stand much chance, as I said before.”

  “Of getting Nanradoc House? I suppose you’ve still got your cousin’s letter?”

  “I enclosed it with mine to your Society, didn’t I?”

  “Categorically, no.”

  “Oh, but, Tim, I must have done!”

  “Well, you didn’t. If you had, it would have been forwarded to me by Coningsby.”

  “And it wasn’t?”

  “Definitely not.”

  “Then it must still be at your Society’s office.”

  “Not very likely. Coningsby is a most meticulous youth. If you had sent it to us, he would have sent it on.”

  “Even Jove nods.”

  “Yes, but Coningsby doesn’t claim to be Jove. You’d better have another look for it, you know.”

  “But, Tim, I sent it. It’s just got to be found! It’s the only proof I’ve got that I can show to those two horrible people. You’ll have to see this Mr. Coningsby and tell him to find it.”

  Timothy said nothing. He passed his cup for more tea. He knew Coningsby, that sea-green incorruptible. If a letter had been enclosed with Marion’s application for help, that letter would have been forwarded. He paid the bill at the hotel, and anticipated a silent drive back to Shrewsbury. Marion, however, decided to prattle. She spoke of her school, of the precocious intelligence of the twins, of Miranda’s sweetness and quaint sayings.