Barbara and Basil sat in the orangery after luncheon. The smoke from Basil’s cigar hung on the humid air, a blue line of cloud, motionless, breast-high between the paved floor and the exotic foliage overhead. He was reading aloud to his sister.
“So much for the supply services,” he said, laying down the last sheet of manuscript. The book had prospered during the past week.
Barbara awoke, so gently that she might never have been asleep. “Very good,” she said. “First-class.”
“It ought to wake them up,” said Basil.
“It ought,” said Barbara, on whom the work had so different an effect. Then she added irrelevantly, “I hear they’ve dug the way through to North Grappling this morning.”
“There was providence in that fall of snow. It’s let the Connollies and the Harknesses get properly to grips. Otherwise, I feel, one or other side might have despaired.”
“I daresay we shall hear something of the Harknesses shortly.”
And immediately, as though they were on the stage, Benson came to the door and announced that Mr. Harkness was in the little parlour.
“I must see him,” said Barbara.
“Certainly not,” said Basil “This is my war effort,” and followed Benson into the house.
He had expected some change in Mr. Harkness but not so marked a change as he now saw. The man was barely recognizable. It was as though the crust of tropical respectability that had survived below the homespun and tiering surface had been crushed to powder; the man was abject. The clothes were the same. It must be imagination which gave that trim beard a raffish look, imagination fired by the haunted look in the man’s eyes.
Basil on his travels had once visited a prison in Trans-Jordan where an ingenious system of punishment had been devised. The institution served the double purpose of penitentiary and lunatic asylum. One of the madmen was a tough old Arab of peculiar ferocity who could be subdued by one thing only the steady gaze of the human eye. Bat an eyelid, and he was at you. Refractory convicts were taken to this man’s cell and shut in with him for periods of anything up to forty-eight hours according to the gravity of their offences. Day and night the madman lurked in his corner with his eyes fixed, fascinated, on those of the delinquent. The heat of midday was his best opportunity; then even the wariest convict sometimes allowed his weary eyelids to droop and in that moment he was across the floor, tooth and nail, in a savage attack. Basil had seen a gigantic felon led out after a two days’ session. There was something in Mr. Harkness’ eyes that brought the scene back vividly to him.
“I am afraid my sister’s away,” said Basil. Whatever hope had ever been in Mr. Harkness’ breast died when he saw his old enemy. “You are Mrs. Sothill’s brother?”
“Yes; we are thought rather alike. I’m helping her here now that my brother-in-law’s away. Is there anything I can do?”
“No,” he said brokenly. “No. It doesn’t matter. I’d hoped to see Mrs. Sothill. When will she be back?”
“You can never tell,” said Basil. “Most irresponsible in some ways. Goes off for months at a time. But this time she has me to watch out for her. Was it about your evacués you wanted to see her? She was very glad to hear they had been happily settled. It meant she could go away with a
clear conscience. That particular family had been something of an anxiety, if you understand me.”
Mr. Harkness sat down uninvited. He sat on a gilt chair in that bright little room like a figure of death. He seemed disposed neither to speak nor to move.
“Mrs. Harkness well?” said Basil affably.
“Prostrate.”
“And your paying guest?”
“She left this morning as soon as the road was cleared. Our two maids went with her.”
“I hope Doris is making herself useful about the house.”
At the mention of that name Mr. Harkness broke. He came clean. “Mr. Seal, I can’t stand it. We neither of us can. We’ve come to the end. You must take those children away.”
“You surely wouldn’t suggest sending them back to Birmingham to be bombed?”
This was an argument which Barbara often employed with good effect. As soon as Basil spoke he realized it was a false step. Suffering had purged Mr. Harkness of all hypocrisy. For the first time something like a smile twisted his lips.
“There is nothing would delight me more,” he said.
“Tut, tut. You do yourself an injustice. Anyway it is against the law. I should like to help you. What can you suggest?”
“I thought of giving them weed-killer,” said Mr. Harkness wistfully.
“Yes,” said Basil, “that would be one way. Do you think Marlene could keep it down?”
“Or hanging.”
“Come, come, Mr. Harkness, this is mere wishful thinking. We must be more practical.”
“Everything I’ve thought of has had death in it; ours or theirs.”
“I’m sure there must be a way,” said Basil, and then, delicately, watching Mr. Harkness while he spoke for any expression of distrust or resentment, he outlined a scheme which had come to him, vaguely, when he first saw the Connollies, and had grown more precise during the past week. “The difficulty about billeting on the poor,” he said, “is that the allowance barely covers what the children eat. Of course where they are nice, affectionate children people are often glad enough to have them. But one wouldn’t call the Connollies nice or affectionate ” Mr. Harkness groaned. “They are destructive, too. Well I needn’t tell you that. The fact is that it would be inflicting a very considerable hardship a financial hardship to put them in a cottage. Now if the meagre allowance paid by the Government were supplemented do you follow me?”
“You mean I might pay someone to take them. Of course I will, anything at least almost anything. How much shall I offer? How shall I set about it?”
“Leave it to me,” said Basil, suddenly dropping his urbane manner. “What’s it worth to you to have those children moved?”
Mr. Harkness hesitated; with the quickening of hope came a stir of self-possession. One does not work in the East without acquiring a nose for a deal. “I should think a pound a week would make all the difference to a poor family,” he said.
“How about a lump sum? People poor people that is will often be dazzled by the offer of a lump sum who wouldn’t consider an allowance.”
“Twenty-five pounds.”
“Come, Mr. Harkness, that’s what you proposed paying over six months. The war is going to last longer than that.”
“Thirty. I can’t go higher than thirty.”
He was not a rich man, Basil reflected; very likely thirty was all he could afford. “I daresay I could find someone to take them for that,” he said. “Of course you realize that this is all highly irregular.”
“Oh, I realize that.” Did he? Basil wondered; perhaps he did. “Will you fetch those children to-day?”
“Today?”
“Without fail.” Mr. Harkness seemed to be dictating terms now. “The cheque will be waiting for you. I will make it out to bearer.”
“What a long time you’ve been,” said Barbara. “Have you pacified him?”
“I’ve got to find a new home for the Connollies.”
“Basil, you’ve let him off!”
“He was so pathetic. I softened.”
“Basil, how very unlike you.”
“I must get to work with that address book again. We shall have to have the Connollies here for the night. I’ll find them a new home in the morning.”
He drove over to North Grappling in the twilight. On either side of the lane the new-dug snow was heaped high, leaving a narrow, passable track. The three Connollies were standing outside the apple-green door waiting for him. “The man with the beard said to give you this,” said Doris. It was an envelope containing a cheque; nothing more. Neither Harkness appeared to see them off.