Thus admonished, Claud disclosed that Ted put the gun in his workshop, to be safe; and the whole party at once trooped out into the narrow strip of garden at the rear of the cottage. At the end of this was a wooden shed, which, Mrs. Ditchling proudly informed Hemingway, Ted had erected with his own hands. But as the door into it was locked, and the key—if not mislaid, or taken away in a moment of aberration by Ted—was in the absent Reg's possession, Claud's statement could not be verified. A suggestion put forward by Alfie, who wanted action, that the lock should be forced, was vetoed by the Chief Inspector. He issued instructions that Reg was to bring the Vicar's rifle to the police-station in Bellingham on his way to work on the following morning, refused the offer of a cup of tea and left the premises. He was accompanied to the door by the entire family, who saw him off in the friendliest way, the two boys begging him to come to see them again, and Jackerleen not only saying goodbye to him on her own behalf, but adding by proxy, and in a squeaky voice, the plush rabbit's farewell.
This scene so much astonished Constable Melkinthorpe that instead of showing his efficiency by starting his engine, and opening the door for Hemingway to get into the car, he sat staring with his mouth open.
“Yes, you didn't know I was their long-lost uncle, did you?” said Hemingway. “For the lord's sake, start her up, and look as if you were going to drive me to Bellingham, or we shall have Claud and Alfie trying to storm the car!”
“Where am I to drive you, sir?” asked Melkinthorpe.
“To the end of the row. I'm going to call on Ladislas, but I don't want that gang flattening their noses against the window.”
Fortunately the ruse succeeded, and by the time the car had reached the end of the row the Ditchlings had retired again indoors. Hemingway got out of the car, and walked back to Mrs. Dockray's cottage.
It was by this time nearly six o'clock, and Ladislas had returned from work. Ushered into the front sitting-room, by Mrs. Dockray, who eyed him with considerable hostility, the Chief Inspector found that Ladislas was entertaining two unexpected visitors. Mavis Warrenby, attired from head to foot in funeral black, and Abby Dearham, had called to see him, on their way back, by country omnibus, from Bellingham. It did not seem to Hemingway that their visit was affording Ladislas any pleasure. He was a handsome young man, with dark and romantically waving locks, and brown eyes, as shy as a fawn's. He was plainly frightened of the Chief Inspector, and lost no time in telling him, in very good English, that the ladies had just looked in on their way home. Miss Warrenby enlarged on this, saying in her earnest way: “Mr. Zamagoryski is a great friend of mine, and I felt I must show him that I utterly believe in him, and know he had nothing to do with my poor uncle's death.”
Looking anything but grateful for this testimony, Ladislas said: “It is so kind!”
Bestowing a smile of quiet understanding on him, Miss Warrenby took his hand, and pressed it in a speaking way. “You must have faith, Laddy,” she said gently. “And shut your ears to gossip, as I do. I often think how much better the world would be if people would only remember the monkeys.”
“But what good shall it do to remember monkeys?” cried Ladislas, recovering possession of his hand. “Pardon! This is not sensible, to talk of monkeys!”
“You don't understand. Three little monkeys, illustrating what I always feel is a maxim we ought to try to—”
“I get it!” interrupted Abby triumphantly. “See no evil, Hear no evil, Speak no evil! It's all right, Ladislas: it's only a saying, or something. Come on, Mavis! If the Chief Inspector wants to talk to Ladislas, we'd better clear out!”
Ladislas looked uncertainly from Hemingway to the ladies. Mavis said that perhaps he would prefer her to remain, her voice conveying so strong a suggestion that there existed between them a beautiful understanding that he looked more frightened than ever, and made haste to disclaim any desire for her support. So Mavis began reluctantly to collect her numerous parcels, and the Chief Inspector, retrieving from under the table a paper carrier, handed it to her, saying that she seemed to have been doing a lot of shopping.
“Only mourning,” Mavis replied reverently, and with a slightly reproachful inflection. “I know it's out of date to go into mourning, but I think myself it is a mark of respect. So I asked Miss Dearham if she would go into Bellingham with me, because I didn't quite feel I could go alone—though I know I must get used to being alone now.”
As she spoke, she turned her eyes towards Ladislas, who avoided her gaze, looking instead, and with considerable trepidation, at Hemingway.
“Quite so,” said Hemingway. “Did you respect your uncle, miss?”
This direct question made her blink at him. “What an extraordinary thing to ask me!” she said. “Of course I did!”
“Do you mean really, or because he's dead?” asked Abby, unable to suppress her curiosity.
“Abby, I know you don't mean it, but I do so hate that cynical sort of talk! I was very, very fond of Uncle Sampson, and naturally I respected him.”
“Well, that interests me very much,” said Hemingway. “Because, if you don't mind my saying so, miss, you seem to be about the only person I've met who did respect him.”
“Perhaps,” she suggested, “I knew him better than anyone else did.”
“Just what I was thinking,” agreed Hemingway. “So perhaps you can tell me why he managed to get himself disliked. Now, don't say he wasn't disliked, because I know he was and you must have known it too!”
If he had hoped to startle her out of her self-possession by these bludgeon-like tactics, he was destined to be disappointed. She only looked at him in a soulful way, and said: “I always think it's such a pity to judge by exteriors, don't you? My dear uncle had lots of little foibles, but under them he had a heart of gold. People just didn't know him. Of course, he wasn't perfect—everyone has some faults, haven't they? But it's like that beautiful little verse I learned when I was at school, and made up my mind I'd try to live up to.” She signed, smiled and, to the acute discomfort of Miss Abigail Dearham, recited in a rapt tone: “"There is so much good in the worst of us. And so much bad in the best of us, That it hardly becomes any of us To talk about the rest of us."”
“Gosh!” uttered Abby, revolted. “Did they really make you learn rancid things like that at your school? Mine was much better! We used to learn really good things, like "Fair stood the wind for France", and "Edward, Edward", and "Lord Randal, my son". There was some sense in that! Come on, we must go!”
The Chief Inspector raising no objection, she then hustled Mavis out of the room, and was heard adjuring her, in the passage, not to talk such ghastly tripe, because it made everyone want to be sick.
The Chief Inspector was left confronting Ladislas, who appeared to believe that he had fallen into the hands of the Gestapo. “I can tell you nothing!” he declared, standing with his back to the wall. “It does not matter what you do to me, I can tell you nothing, for I know nothing!”
“Well, if that's so it wouldn't be any use doing anything to you,” remarked Hemingway. “Not that I was going to. I don't know what antics they get up to in Poland, but in England you don't have to be afraid of the police. Are you and Miss Warrenby going to get married, may I ask?”
“No! A thousand times no!”
“All right, all right, there's no need to get excited about it! Just a friend of yours?”
“She is most kind,” said Ladislas, more quietly, but watching him suspiciously. “I do not have many friends here. When I am presented to her, I am pleased, for she is sympathetic, she asks me about my own country, and she herself is not happy, for that one, her uncle, is a tyrant, and, like me, she does not have friends. I do not think of marriage. I swear it!”
“Her uncle was unkind to Miss Warrenby, was he?”