THE ARRIVAL
From Axminster to Combe Regis the line runs through country as
attractive as any that can be found in the island, and the train, as if
in appreciation of this fact, does not hurry over the journey. It was
late afternoon by the time we reached our destination.
The arrangements for the carrying of luggage at Combe Regis border on
the primitive. Boxes are left on the platform, and later, when he
thinks of it, a carrier looks in and conveys them into the valley and
up the hill on the opposite side to the address written on the labels.
The owner walks. Combe Regis is not a place for the halt and maimed.
Ukridge led us in the direction of the farm, which lay across the
valley, looking through woods to the sea. The place was visible from
the station, from which, indeed, standing as it did on the top of a
hill, the view was extensive.
Half-way up the slope on the other side of the valley we left the road
and made our way across a spongy field, Ukridge explaining that this
was a short cut. We climbed through a hedge, crossed a stream and
another field, and after negotiating a difficult bank, topped with
barbed wire, found ourselves in a garden.
Ukridge mopped his forehead, and restored his pince-nez to their
original position from which the passage of the barbed wire had
dislodged them.
"This is the place," he said. "We've come in by the back way. Saves
time. Tired, Millie?"
"A little, dear. I should like some tea."
"Same here," I agreed.
"That'll be all right," said Ukridge. "A most competent man of the name
of Beale and his wife are in charge at present. I wrote to them telling
them that we were coming to-day. They will be ready for us. That's the
way to do things, Garny old horse. Quiet efficiency. Perfect
organisation."
We were at the front door by this time. Ukridge rang the bell. The
noise echoed through the house, but there was no answering footsteps.
He rang again. There is no mistaking the note of a bell in an empty
house. It was plain that the competent man and his wife were out.
"Now what?" I said.
Mrs. Ukridge looked at her husband with calm confidence.
"This," said Ukridge, leaning against the door and endeavouring to
button his collar at the back, "reminds me of an afternoon in the
Argentine. Two other cheery sportsmen and myself tried for
three-quarters of an hour to get into an empty house where there looked
as if there might be something to drink, and we'd just got the door
open when the owner turned up from behind a tree with a shot-gun. It
was a little difficult to explain. As a matter of fact, we never did
what you might call really thresh the matter out thoroughly in all its
aspects, and you'd be surprised what a devil of a time it takes to pick
buck-shot out of a fellow. There was a dog, too."
He broke off, musing dreamily on the happy past, and at this moment
history partially repeated itself. From the other side of the door came
a dissatisfied whine, followed by a short bark.
"Hullo," said Ukridge, "Beale has a dog." He frowned, annoyed. "What
right," he added in an aggrieved tone, "has a beastly mongrel,
belonging to a man I employ, to keep me out of my own house? It's a
little hard. Here am I, slaving day and night to support Beale, and
when I try to get into my own house his infernal dog barks at me. Upon
my Sam it's hard!" He brooded for a moment on the injustice of things.
"Here, let me get to the keyhole. I'll reason with the brute."
He put his mouth to the keyhole and roared "Goo' dog!" through it.
Instantly the door shook as some heavy object hurled itself against it.
The barking rang through the house.
"Come round to the back," said Ukridge, giving up the idea of
conciliation, "we'll get in through the kitchen window."
The kitchen window proved to be insecurely latched. Ukridge threw it
open and we climbed in. The dog, hearing the noise, raced back along
the passage and flung himself at the door, scratching at the panels.
Ukridge listened with growing indignation.
"Millie, you know how to light a fire. Garnet and I will be collecting
cups and things. When that scoundrel Beale arrives I shall tear him
limb from limb. Deserting us like this! The man must be a thorough
fraud. He told me he was an old soldier. If that's the sort of
discipline they used to keep in his regiment, thank God, we've got a
Navy! Damn, I've broken a plate. How's the fire getting on, Millie?
I'll chop Beale into little bits. What's that you've got there, Garny
old horse? Tea? Good. Where's the bread? There goes another plate.
Where's Mrs. Beale, too? By Jove, that woman wants killing as much as
her blackguard of a husband. Whoever heard of a cook deliberately
leaving her post on the day when her master and mistress were expected
back? The abandoned woman. Look here, I'll give that dog three minutes,
and if it doesn't stop scratching that door by then, I'll take a
rolling pin and go out and have a heart-to-heart talk with it. It's a
little hard. My own house, and the first thing I find when I arrive is
somebody else's beastly dog scratching holes in the doors and ruining
the expensive paint. Stop it, you brute!"
The dog's reply was to continue his operations with immense vigour.
Ukridge's eyes gleamed behind their glasses.
"Give me a good large jug, laddie," he said with ominous calm.
He took the largest of the jugs from the dresser and strode with it
into the scullery, whence came a sound of running water. He returned
carrying the jug with both hands, his mien that of a general who sees
his way to a masterstroke of strategy.
"Garny, old horse," he said, "freeze onto the handle of the door, and,
when I give the word, fling wide the gates. Then watch that animal get
the surprise of a lifetime."
I attached myself to the handle as directed. Ukridge gave the word. We
had a momentary vision of an excited dog of the mongrel class framed in
the open doorway, all eyes and teeth; then the passage was occupied by
a spreading pool, and indignant barks from the distance told that the
enemy was thinking the thing over in some safe retreat.
"Settled _his_ hash," said Ukridge complacently. "Nothing like
resource, Garny my boy. Some men would have gone on letting a good door
be ruined."
"And spoiled the dog for a ha'porth of water," I said.
At this moment Mrs. Ukridge announced that the kettle was boiling. Over
a cup of tea Ukridge became the man of business.
"I wonder when those fowls are going to arrive. They should have been
here to-day. It's a little hard. Here am I, all eagerness and anxiety,
waiting to start an up-to-date chicken farm, and no fowls! I can't run
a chicken farm without fowls. If they don't come to-morrow, I shall get
after those people with a hatchet. There must be no slackness. They
must bustle about. After tea I'll show you the garden, and we'll choose
a place for a fowl-run. To-morrow we must buckle to. Serious work will
begin immediately after breakfast."
"Suppose," I said, "the fowls arrive before we're ready for them?"
"Why, then they must wait."
"But you can't keep fowls cooped up indefinitely in a crate."
"Oh, that'll be all right. There's a basement to this house. We'll let
'em run about there till we're ready for them. There's always a way of
doing things if you look for it. Organisation, my boy. That's the
watchword. Quiet efficiency."
"I hope you are going to let the hens hatch some of the eggs, dear,"
said Mrs. Ukridge. "I should love to have some little chickens."
"Of course. By all means. My idea," said Ukridge, "was this. These
people will send us fifty fowls of sorts. That means--call it
forty-five eggs a day. Let 'em ... Well, I'm hanged! There's that dog
again. Where's the jug?"
But this time an unforeseen interruption prevented the manoeuvre being
the success it had been before. I had turned the handle and was about
to pull the door open, while Ukridge, looking like some modern and
dilapidated version of the _Discobolus_, stood beside me with his jug
poised, when a voice spoke from the window.
"Stand still!" said the voice, "or I'll corpse you!"
I dropped the handle. Ukridge dropped the jug. Mrs. Ukridge dropped her
tea-cup. At the window, with a double-barrelled gun in his hands, stood
a short, square, red-headed man. The muzzle of his gun, which rested on
the sill, was pointing in a straight line at the third button of my
waistcoat.
Ukridge emitted a roar like that of a hungry lion.
"Beale! You scoundrelly, unprincipled, demon! What the devil are you
doing with that gun? Why were you out? What have you been doing? Why
did you shout like that? Look what you've made me do."
He pointed to the floor. The very old pair of tennis shoes which he
wore were by this time generously soaked with the spilled water.
"Lor, Mr. Ukridge, sir, is that you?" said the red-headed man calmly.
"I thought you was burglars."
A short bark from the other side of the kitchen door, followed by a
renewal of the scratching, drew Mr. Beale's attention to his faithful
hound.
"That's Bob," he said.
"I don't know what you call the brute," said Ukridge. "Come in and tie
him up. And mind what you're doing with that gun. After you've finished
with the dog, I should like a brief chat with you, laddie, if you can
spare the time and have no other engagements."
Mr. Beale, having carefully deposited the gun against the wall and
dropped a pair of very limp rabbits on the floor, proceeded to climb in
through the window. This operation concluded, he stood to one side
while the besieged garrison passed out by the same route.
"You will find me in the garden," said Ukridge coldly. "I've one or two
little things to say to you."
Mr. Beale grinned affably. He seemed to be a man of equable temperament.
The cool air of the garden was grateful after the warmth of the
kitchen. It was a pretty garden, or would have been if it had not been
so neglected. I seemed to see myself sitting in a deck-chair on the
lawn, smoking and looking through the trees at the harbour below. It
was a spot, I felt, in which it would be an easy and a pleasant task to
shape the plot of my novel. I was glad I had come. About now, outside
my lodgings in town, a particularly foul barrel-organ would be settling
down to work.
"Oh, there you are, Beale," said Ukridge, as the servitor appeared.
"Now then, what have you to say?"
The hired man looked thoughtful for a moment, then said that it was a
fine evening.
"Fine evening?" shouted Ukridge. "What on earth has that got to do with
it? I want to know why you and Mrs. Beale were out when we arrived."
"The missus went to Axminster, Mr. Ukridge, sir."
"She had no right to go to Axminster. It isn't part of her duties to go
gadding about to Axminster. I don't pay her enormous sums to go to
Axminster. You knew I was coming this evening."
"No, sir."
"What!"
"No, sir."
"Beale," said Ukridge with studied calm, the strong man repressing
himself. "One of us two is a fool."
"Yes, sir."
"Let us sift this matter to the bottom. You got my letter?"
"No, sir."
"My letter saying that I should arrive to-day. You didn't get it?"
"No, sir."
"Now, look here, Beale, this is absurd. I am certain that that letter
was posted. I remember placing it in my pocket for that purpose. It is
not there now. See. These are all the contents of my--well, I'm hanged."
He stood looking at the envelope which he had produced from his
breast-pocket. A soft smile played over Mr. Beale's wooden face. He
coughed.
"Beale," said Ukridge, "you--er--there seems to have been a mistake."
"Yes, sir."
"You are not so much to blame as I thought."
"No, sir."
There was a silence.
"Anyhow," said Ukridge in inspired tones, "I'll go and slay that
infernal dog. I'll teach him to tear my door to pieces. Where's your
gun, Beale?"
But better counsels prevailed, and the proceedings closed with a cold
but pleasant little dinner, at which the spared mongrel came out
unexpectedly strong with ingenious and diverting tricks.