Part 16 (1/2)

”My dear,” he said, ”business is hardly a word to apply to murder. That within the last twenty-four hours there was the intention of fighting a duel, I don't deny. But something has decidedly happened which has averted that deplorable calamity. Peace and reconciliation is the result of it, and I have never seen two men so unaffectedly friendly.”

Diva got up and whirled round the table to get the port for the Padre, so pleased was she at a fresh idea coming to her while still dear Elizabeth was resting. She attributed it to the crab.

”We've all been on a false scent,” she said. ”Peace and reconciliation happened before they went out to the sand-dunes at all. It happened at the station. They met at the station, you know. It is proved that Major Flint went there. Major wouldn't send portmanteau off alone. And it's proved that Captain Puffin went there too, because the note which his housemaid found on the table before she saw the challenge from the Major, which was on the chimney-piece, said that he had been called away very suddenly. No: they both went to catch the early train in order to go away before they could be stopped, and kill each other. But why didn't they go? What happened? Don't suppose the outside porter showed them how wicked they were, confirmation-cla.s.s or no confirmation-cla.s.s.

Stumps me. Almost wish Elizabeth was here. She's good at guessing.”

The Padre's eye brightened. Reaction after the perils of the morning, crab and port combined to make a man of him.

”Eh, 'tis a bonny wee drappie of port whatever, Mistress Plaistow,” he said. ”And I dinna ken that ye're far wrang in jaloosing that Mistress Mapp might have a wee bitty word to say aboot it a', 'gin she had the mind.”

”She was wrong about the portmanteau,” said Diva. ”Confessed she was wrong.”

”Hoots! I'm not mindin' the bit pochmantie,” said the Padre.

”What else does she know?” asked Diva feverishly.

There was no doubt that the Padre had the fullest attention of the two ladies again, and there was no need to talk Scotch any more.

”Begin at the beginning,” he said. ”What do we suppose was the cause of the quarrel?”

”Anything,” said Diva. ”Golf, tiger-skins, coal-strike, summer-time.”

He shook his head.

”I grant you words may pa.s.s on such subjects,” he said. ”We feel keenly, I know, about summer-time in Tilling, though we shall all be reconciled over that next Sunday, when real time, G.o.d's time, as I am venturing to call it in my sermon, comes in again.”

Diva had to bite her tongue to prevent herself bolting off on this new scent. After all, she had invested in crab to learn about duelling, not about summer-time.

”Well?” she said.

”We may have had words on that subject,” said the Padre, booming as if he was in the pulpit already, ”but we should, I hope, none of us go so far as to catch the earliest train with pistols, in defence of our conviction about summer-time. No, Mrs. Plaistow, if you are right, and there is something to be said for your view, in thinking that they both went to such lengths as to be in time for the early train, in order to fight a duel undisturbed, you must look for a more solid cause than that.”

Diva vainly racked her brains to think of anything more worthy of the highest pitches of emotion than this. If it had been she and Miss Mapp who had been embroiled, h.o.a.rding and dress would have occurred to her.

But as it was, no one in his senses could dream that the Captain and the Major were sartorial rivals, unless they had quarrelled over the question as to which of them wore the snuffiest old clothes.

”Give it up,” she said. ”What did they quarrel about?”

”Pa.s.sion!” said the Padre, in those full, deep tones in which next Sunday he would allude to G.o.d's time. ”I do not mean anger, but the flame that exalts man to heaven or--or does exactly the opposite!”

”But whomever for?” asked Diva, quite thrown off her bearings. Such a thing had never occurred to her, for, as far as she was aware, pa.s.sion, except in the sense of temper, did not exist in Tilling. Tilling was far too respectable.

The Padre considered this a moment.

”I am betraying no confidence,” he said, ”because no one has confided in me. But there certainly is a lady in this town--I do not allude to Miss Irene--who has long enjoyed the Major's particular esteem. May not some deprecating remark----”

Wee wifie gave a much louder squeal than usual.

”He means poor Elizabeth,” she said in a high, tremulous voice. ”Fancy, Kenneth!”

Diva, a few seconds before, had seen no reason why the Padre should drink the rest of her port, and was now in the act of drinking some of that unusual beverage herself. She tried to swallow it, but it was too late, and next moment all the openings in her face were fountains of that delicious wine. She choked and she gurgled, until the last drop had left her windpipe--under the persuasion of pattings on the back from the others--and then she gave herself up to loud, hoa.r.s.e laughter, through which there shrilled the staccato squeaks of wee wifie. Nothing, even if you are being laughed at yourself, is so infectious as prolonged laughter, and the Padre felt himself forced to join it. When one of them got a little better, a relapse ensued by reason of infection from the others, and it was not till exhaustion set in, that this triple volcano became quiescent again.

”Only fancy!” said Evie faintly. ”How did such an idea get into your head, Kenneth?”

His voice shook as he answered.