THE HOUSE OF LIVING ALONE MOVES AWAY
When Sarah Brown and Richard, followed by the Dog David, reached the
Mitten Island Ferry, after travelling slowly by moonlight, they were
surprised to see a great crowd of people banked up on the Island, and
one man in the uniform of a policeman, standing alone on the mainland.
About ten yards from land the ferryman sat in his boat, rowing gently to
keep himself stationary in the current.
"You'll 'ave to come to shore now," said the policeman, in the tone of
one exhausted by long argument. "'Ere's some more parties wanting to
cross." He turned to Richard. "Look 'ere, mate," he said. "I'm 'ere in
the discharge of my dooty, and this ferryman is obstructin' me."
"Deah, deah," said Richard.
The ferryman said: "If the King of England--why, if the two ghosts of
Queen Victoria and Albert the Good--was waiting to cross now, I
wouldn't come in for them, not if it was going to give you a chance to
set foot on Mitten Island."
The crowd across the river, divining that a climax of defiance was being
reached, shouted: "Yah, yah," in unison.
"Is either of you parties an 'ouse'older on Mitten Island?" asked the
policeman of Sarah Brown and Richard.
"I am," said Richard, to his companion's surprise.
"Can you give me any information regarding the whereabouts of a
cherecter known under any of these names: Iris 'Yde, T.B. Watkins,
Hangela the Witch, possibly a male in female disguise, believed to
conduct a general shop and boardin' 'ouse on Mitten Island?"
"There is only one shop on Mitten Island," said Richard. "And one
boarding house. All in one. I own it. I can recite you the prospectus if
you like. I have a superintendent there. I have known her all my life. I
did not know she was believed to be a male in female disguise. I did not
know she had any name at all, let alone half-a-dozen."
The policeman seemed to be troubled all the time by mosquitoes. He
slapped his face and his ears and the back of his neck. He succeeded in
killing one insect upon the bridge of his nose, and left it there by
mistake, a strangely ignoble corpse. Sarah Brown suspected Richard of
some responsibility for this untimely persecution.
"That party is charged with an offence against the Defence of the Realm
Act," said the policeman,--"with being, although a civilian, in
possession of a flying machine, and--er--obstructin' 'Is Majesty's
enemies in the performance of their dooty."
"Oh deah, deah," said Richard. "Deah, deah, deah...."
"Do either of you know the present whereabouts of the party?" persisted
the policeman. Attacked on every side by insects, he was becoming rather
pathetic in his discomfort and indignity. His small eyes, set in red
fat, stared with uncomprehending protest; his fat busy hands were not
agile enough to defend him. He felt unsuccessful and foolish, and very
near the ground. He wished quite disproportionately to be at home with
his admiring wife in Acton.
Sarah Brown shook her head in reply, and Richard could say nothing but
"Oh deah, deah...."
"May I take your name and 'ome address, and regimental number, please,
young man," said the policeman, after a baffled pause.
"Now my address," said Richard, with genuine shame, "is a thing I
honestly can never remember. I know I've heard it; I've tried and tried
to learn it at my mother's knee. It begins with an H, I think. That's
the worst of not being able to read or write. I can describe the place
to you exactly, a house with a lot of windows, that sees a long way. If
you turn your back on the Marble Arch, and go on till you get to a big
poster saying Eat Less Meat, and then turn to your right--(pointing to
the left)--or again, if you go by air as the crow flies--or rather as
the witch flies----"
"You shall 'ear of this foolery, my fine feller," said the distressed
policeman, almost with a break in his voice. "Seein' as 'ow you refuse
information, an' this ferryman thinks fit to defy the law, I 'ave no
course open but to whistle for my mate, and leave 'im 'ere while I
telephone for a police-boat."
He raised his whistle to his lips, but before he could blow it, the
climax of this the least successful evening of his life, overwhelmed
him. A shadow swept over the party, a large flying substance caught him
full on the back of the neck and knocked him off the landing-stage into
the river.
The witch on Harold her Broomstick landed on the spot vacated by the
policeman.
"Oh, look what I've done, look what I've done ..." she exclaimed in an
ecstasy of vexation. There was no need to tell anybody to look. Five
hundred odd people were already doing so with enthusiasm. "Oh, what a
dreadfully bad landing! Oh, Harold, how could you be so careless?"
She took the cringing Harold by the mane and slapped him violently once
or twice. Richard stretched out his riding-crop to the splashing
policeman, murmuring: "Oh deah, deah...."
"Don't be frightened," said the witch to the policeman. "We'll soon get
you out, and the water's so shallow you can't sink. Talking of sinking,
Richard, there's a question that puzzles me rather. If a rat got on to a
submarine, how would it behave? A submarine, you see, is a sinking ship,
and rats pride themselves so on knowing when to----"
Sarah Brown seized the witch by the shoulder. "Go away, witch," she
said.
"How d'you mean--go away?" asked the witch. "I've only just this minute
come."
"Go away, go away," was all that Sarah Brown could manage to repeat.
"Oh, very well," said the witch in her offended grown-up voice. "I can
take a hint, I suppose, as well as anybody. I'm going."
She seated herself with an irritable flouncing movement on Harold's
saddle, and flew away.
The policeman climbed out of the water, looking like an enraged seal.
Peals of laughter from the other side of the moonlit river robbed him of
adequate words.
"Not ser fast, my fine feller," he roared, seeing Richard kissing the
Horse Vivian on the nose, preparatory to riding away. "Don't you think
for a minute I don't know 'oo's at the bottom of this."
"You don't know how tired I am of loud noises," said Richard, lifting
one foot with dignity to the stirrup. "You don't know how bitterly I
long to be still and hear things very far off ... but always there is an
angry voice or the angry noise of guns in the way...."
He twined one finger negligently into the mane on the Horse Vivian's
neck, and pulled himself slowly into the saddle. The policeman stood
mysteriously impotent. Water dripped loudly from his clothes and
punctuated Richard's quiet speech.
"Dear policeman," continued Richard. "I believe you have talked so much
to-night that you haven't heard what a quiet night it is. You are
smaller than a star, and yet you make more noise than all the stars
together. You are not so cold as the moon, and yet your teeth chatter
more loudly than hers. The heat of your wrath is less than the heat of
the sun, and yet, while he is silent and departed, you fill the air with
clamour, and--if I may say so--seem to be outstaying your welcome. Oh,
dear policeman, listen.... Do you know, if there were no London on this
side and no War on that, the silence would be deep enough to fill all
the seas of all the worlds...."
He shook the reins, and the Horse Vivian moved, treading quietly on the
strip of grass that borders the path to the ferry.
"I am going to talk to my True Love now," said Richard, his voice fading
away as he rode. "My True Love's voice is the only voice that is a
little more beautiful to me than silence...."
For a moment he looked every inch a wizard. Every button on his uniform
and every buckle on the Horse Vivian's harness caught the moonlight, and
changed into faery spangles as he turned and waved his hand before
disappearing.
The policeman seemed quieted, as he looked at Sarah Brown sitting, white
and haggard with pain, on the river bank, with her arm round the
shivering David.
"In a minute, in a minute, my One," she was saying to David. "We are
nearly home now. We shall soon be quiet now."
There was always something startlingly inoffensive about Sarah Brown's
appearance.
"I'd like to know 'oo was responsible for this houtrage, all the same,"
said the policeman.
Sarah Brown did not hear him, but she said: "Oh, I am so very sorry it
happened. It was a pure accident, of course, but it is so terrible to
see any one have an accident to his dignity. You must forget it quickly,
you must run and find someone who knows you at your best, you must tell
her a fine revised version of the incident, and then you will feel
better."
The ferryman shouted: "I don't mind coming in now to fetch this young
woman. You can come too now if you like, Mr. Pompous-in-the-Pond, for
the party you're looking for is not at home, and I've no doubt but what
that crowd over there will give you a gay welcome."
"I'll look into the metter to-morrer," said the policeman. "You 'aven't
'eard the last of this, none of you 'aven't, not by a long chalk. I've a
good mind to get the Mayor to read the Riot Act at you."
As Sarah Brown landed on Mitten Island she could not distinguish the
faces of the waiting crowd, but she heard sharp anxious voices.
"They ain't goin' to get 'er, not if I knows it."
"She never speaks but kindness, the dear lamb."
"She's more of a saint than any in the Calendar."
"She gave my Danny a room in 'er house, and put 'eart into 'im after 'e
lost 'is sight in the War."
"She's the good fairy of the Island."
"She grew all them Sweet Williams in my garden in one night, when I
first come 'ere and was 'omesick for Devon."
"The law's always after saints and fairies, always 'as bin."
"But the law can't catch 'er."
"The law has driven her away," said Sarah Brown. "There is no magic now
on Mitten Island."
She staggered through the open door of the Shop. "This is Richard's
house," she said to herself as she entered, and felt doubly alone
because Richard was far away, riding to his True Love. She struck her
last match, lit the lantern, and looked round. There was no sound in the
house of Living Alone, she thought there would never again be any magic
sound there to penetrate to her imprisoned hearing. The aprons hanging
from the ceiling near the door flapped in the cold wind, and she thought
they were like grey bats in a cave. The breeze blew out the open
lantern. Ah, how desolate, how desolate....
A piece of paper was impaled upon the counter by means of a headless
hatpin. There was something very largely and badly written on it. Sarah
Brown read: "Well Soup it looks like my Night's come and what dyou think
Sherry's come too. Im an me as gone off to a place e knows that's a fine
place for such a boy as Elbert to be born in so no more at present from
your true Peony."
Sarah Brown climbed up the short stairway, painful step by painful step,
to her cell. She sat on her bed holding her throbbing side, and
breathing with fearful caution. She looked at the empty grate. She put a
cigarette in her mouth, the unconscious and futile answer of the Dweller
Alone to that blind hunger for comfort. But she had no matches, and
presently, dimly conscious that her groping for comfort had lacked
result, she absently put another cigarette into her mouth, and then felt
a fool.
She stared at the cold window. The sky seemed to be nailed carelessly to
it by means of a crooked star or two.
These are the terrible nights of Living Alone, when you have fever and
sometimes think that your beloved stands in the doorway to bring you
comfort, and sometimes think that you have no beloved, and that there is
no one left in all the world, no word, no warmth, nor ever a kindly
candle to be lighted in that spotted darkness that walls up your hot
sight. Again on those nights you dream that you have already done those
genial things your body cries for, or perhaps That Other has done them.
The fire is built and alight at last, a cup of something cool and
beautifully sour stands ready to your hand, you can hear the delicious
rattle of china on a tray in the passage--someone coming with food you
would love to look at, and presently perhaps to eat ... when you feel
better. But again and again your eyes open on the cold dumb darkness,
and there is nothing but the wind and strange sinister emptiness
creaking on the stair.
These are the terrible nights of Living Alone, yet no real lover of that
house and of that state would ever exchange one of those haunted and
desert nights for a night spent watched, in soft warm places.
Sarah Brown was not long left alone that night to look at the strip of
moonlight on the cold ashes of her fireplace. The Shop below shook
suddenly with many footfalls, and the metallic officious barking of the
Dog David rent the still air of her cell.
A man's voice at the foot of the stairs said: "I can hear a dog
barking." And a woman's voice followed it: "Angela, dear, is that you?"
Sarah Brown was only aware of a vague and irksome disturbance. She
groped to her door, opened it, and shouted miserably: "Go away,
policeman, go away. She is not here."
Lady Arabel came up, flashing an electric torch.
"My dear, you look dretfully ill. Why look, you are trembling. Why look,
your little dog is making your counterpane muddy. Don't be afraid for
Angela, we are all here to try and help her."
"All here?"
"Yes, Meta and the Mayor and Mr. Tovey and Mr. Frere. Let me help you
into bed, and then you shall tell me what you know of her. You have had
a dretfully trying time."
"I am well," said Sarah Brown ungraciously. "You are none of you going
to help the witch without me."
"Ah, this is all very dretful," sighed Lady Arabel. "Most foolish of us
to come here all together like this, after the policeman took our names
and addresses, and was dretfully impertinent and suspicious. But Meta
insisted. I quite expect to spend the next twenty-four hours in gaol, or
else to be shot for Offence of the Realm. In fact, speaking as a
ratepayer, I think the police ought to have done it before. Still, Meta
thought we might perhaps be able to help Angela.... Meta has many
friends who seem influential ... but _so_ talkative, my dear."
She led the way downstairs. Mr. Tovey and the Mayor were talking at the
foot of the stairs, Mr. Frere was listening sardonically. As Sarah Brown
went past them into the Shop, she smelt the unflower-like scent that
always denoted the presence of Miss Ford. Sarah Brown herself was
accompanied by nothing more seductive than a faint smell of gasoline,
showing that her clothes had lately been home-cleaned. In the darkness
of the Shop she saw Miss Ford stooping, trying to shut the big difficult
drawer in which the witch kept her magic.
"It is frightfully explosive," said Sarah Brown.
Miss Ford started and straightened her back. "Ah, Miss Brown.... I was
just looking about...."
Sarah Brown sat gasping on the counter, and the rest of the party
re-entered the Shop, bringing the lantern.
"How very absurd all this is," said Miss Ford nervously,--"taking such a
great deal of trouble about a necessitous case."
"America is in my mind," said Lady Arabel. "If we could get her there.
Anybody who has done anything silly goes to America. Indeed, if I
remember rightly, America is entirely populated with fugitives from
somewhere else. So dretfully confusing for the Red Indians. They say the
story of the Tower of Babel was only a prophecy about the Woolworth
Building--"
"You couldn't get a passport," said Mr. Darnby Frere, who was the only
person present really conscious of sanity. "Only a miracle could produce
a passport in these days, especially for a fugitive from justice."
"Only a miracle--or magic," said Sarah Brown.
Miss Ford moved instinctively behind the counter towards the open drawer
full of ingredients for happiness.
"We must remember," added Mr. Frere, "that, after all, she did break the
law. In fact I cannot for the life of me imagine why on earth we are
all--"
"Oh, Darnby, do be sensible," said Miss Ford. "Of course we know it is
wrong to break the law, but in this case--well, I myself should be the
last to blame her."
"No, not the last," said Sarah Brown.
"What do you mean?"
"Certainly not the last. Probably not even the penultimate one. You
flatter yourself."
"Why, surely some of you ladies, movin' in the 'ighest circles, knows of
gentlemen in the Foreign Office that would do a little shut-eye job, for
old times' sake," suggested the Mayor.
This was a challenge to Miss Ford. She ceased to gaze haughtily on Sarah
Brown. "Men from three departments of the Foreign Office are fairly
regular Wednesday friends of mine," she said. "But I could hardly
trouble any of them on--er--so trivial a matter."
There was silence, while Miss Ford toyed gingerly with one of the paper
packets out of the witch's drawer. Presently she said: "What about
Richard?"
Lady Arabel showed sudden irritation. "There you go again, Meta; I have
spoken to you of it again and again. It's Rrchud this and Rrchud that
whenever anything in the least tahsome or out of the way happens. One
would think you considered the poor boy a wizard."
"You needn't lose your temper, Arabel," said Miss Ford coldly. "I only
meant that Richard might be useful, having so many friends, and such
skill in ... chemistry...." As if unconsciously she tore off one corner
of the packet of magic she held before adding: "And besides, as I have
often told you, I believe Richard to have real Occult Power, which would
give him a special interest in this case."
Sarah Brown, who was burying her face in her hands and missing much of
the conversation, caught the name of Richard, and said: "Richard has
gone to his True Love."
A tempest of restrained embarrassment arose.
"She's feverish," murmured Miss Ford, turning scarlet.
"My dear Sarah," said Lady Arabel tartly. "You are quite mistaken, and I
must beg of you to be careful how you repeat idle gossip about my son.
Rrchud is at his office. You know it is only open at night--one of
Rrchud's quaint fancies."
"I will ring up his office," said Miss Ford, deciding to ignore Sarah
Brown both now and in future. "Where is the telephone?"
"There is none," replied Sarah Brown. "This is the House of Living
Alone."
Miss Ford was pouring a grain or two of the magic into her palm. "How
very credulous people are," she said with a self-conscious smile. "If
Thelma Bennett Watkins were here she would credit this powder with--"
She stopped, for an astonishing sharp smell filled the Shop. Almost
immediately a curious wheezy sound, punctuated by taps, proceeded from
the corner. It was Mr. Bernard Tovey trying to sing, "Mon coeur s'ouvr'
à ta voix," and beating time by swinging his heels against the counter
on which he sat.
Sarah Brown felt suddenly well. She trembled but was well. She jumped
off the counter. "I will run across, if you like," she said, "and ring
up Richard from the ferryman's house. He may have left his True Love
now. I am not deaf on the telephone, and the ferryman won't admit
strangers."
As she left, the smell of magic was getting stronger and stronger. Mr.
Tovey, still impersonating Delilah in the corner, was approaching the
more excitable passages of the song. Miss Ford was saying, "Really,
Bernard...." Sarah Brown felt a slight misgiving.
A warm and rather dramatic-looking light was shining behind the red
curtain of the ferryman's lattice window, as Sarah Brown crossed the
moonlit road. She delighted, after her recent black hours, to think of
all those people in the world who were sitting stuffily and pleasantly
in little ugly rooms that they loved, doing quiet careful things that
pleased them. And she told herself that the thought of Richard's little
office, alone and alight in the deserted City every night, would comfort
her often in the darkness.
The ferryman opened his door, and invited her genially to his telephone.
He had been sitting at his table, surrounded by the snakes that for him
took the place of a family. On the table was a bowl of milk from which a
large bull-snake, in a gay Turkey-carpet design, was drinking. A yellow
and black python lay coiled in several figures of eight in the armchair,
and an intelligent-looking small dust-coloured snake with a broad nose
and an active tongue leaned out of the ferryman's breast pocket.
"Aren't they beautiful?" he said, with shy and paternal pride, as Sarah
Brown tried to find a place on which the python would like to be tickled
or scratched. Somehow the python has a barren figure, from a caresser's
point of view. The ferryman went on: "There is something about the grip
and spring in a snake's body that makes me feel giddy with pleasure.
Snakes to me, you know, are just a drug, sold by the yard instead of in
bottles. My brain is getting every day colder and quieter, and all
through loving snakes so."
Sarah Brown rang up Richard's office, and the over-refined voice of a
young gentleman clerk answered her.
Mr. Higgins was not in the office.
Mr. Higgins had left particular word that if any one wanted him they
were to be told that he had--er--gone to his True Love.
But any minor business matter connected with magic could be attended to
in his absence. Mr. Higgins spending so much of his time on the
battlefield at present, a good deal of the routine work had to be done
in any case by the speaker, his confidential clerk.
Passports to America? Perfectly simple. The office had simply to issue
blank sheets treated in a certain way, and every official to whom the
sheet should be presented would read upon it what he would want. But
Mr. Higgins would have to affix his mark and seal. Mr. Higgins would be
in the office sometime to-night, probably within the hour.
How many passports?
"Two," said Sarah Brown. "One for my friend and one for me. A dog
doesn't need one, does he--a British dog? I will book the berths
to-morrow. I can pawn my--or rather, I can sell my War Loan."
As she hung up the receiver, the ferryman asked: "Are you having a party
up at the Shop, in the superintendent's absence?"
"Not intentionally," replied Sarah Brown. "Why?"
"Well, I just wondered. There's a noise like a thousand mad gramophones
playing backwards, coming from there."
Sarah Brown's misgivings returned like a clap of thunder. She rushed
back to the Shop.
The lantern was standing in the middle of the floor, its glass was
shattered, and out of each of its eight panels streamed a great flame
six or seven feet high, like the petal of an enormous flower. Facing
these flames stood Miss Ford and Mr. Tovey, hand in hand, each singing a
different song very earnestly. Lady Arabel had found somewhere a patent
fire extinguisher, and was putting on her glasses in order to read the
directions. Mr. Frere was hesitating in the background with a leaking
biscuit tin full of water. The Mayor was gone.
"Great Scott!" said Sarah Brown. You'll burn the place down. Look at
that row of petticoats up there, catching fire already. What have you
done with the Mayor?"
"We made him invisible by mistake," whispered Mr. Tovey. "But sh--sh, he
doesn't know it yet."
"Nothing matters," said Miss Ford. "We are all going to America." And
she continued her song, which was an extempore one about the sea.
"But that's no reason why you should burn the house down," said Sarah
Brown.
"That's what I thought," agreed Mr. Frere. "But water won't put out that
flame."
The singers fell silent. Only the voice of the invisible Mayor could be
heard, singing, "If those lips could only speak," in a loud tremulous
voice, to the accompaniment of his own unseen stamping feet.
"You've been putting magic into that flame," said Sarah Brown
distractedly. "I told you it was dangerous. Nothing will put magic out,
except more magic. What will the witch say?"
"It doesn't matter what anybody says," said Miss Ford. "We are all going
to America. No place and no person matters when I am not there. There
are no places and no people existing where I am not. I have suspected it
before, and now I am sure that everything is all a pretence, except me.
Look how easy it was to dismiss that gross grocer from sight. He was
just a bit of background. I have painted him out."
The drapery department on the ceiling was ablaze now, and flakes of ashy
petticoat, and the metal frames of buttons, showered to the floor.
"I will go and get help," said Sarah Brown, and hurried out of doors,
followed feverishly by David, who was not a very brave dog in moments
of crisis, and yet liked to appear busy and helpful. It was to the
ferryman's telephone that they returned. Sarah Brown knew that the fire
was a magic fire, and that an appeal to the L.C.C. Fire Brigade would
only bring defeat and unnecessary bewilderment upon a deserving
organisation.
Sarah Brown rang up Richard's office, and Richard, who had a heroic and
almost cinematic gift for being on hand at the right moments, answered
her himself.
"Come at once," said Sarah Brown. "The House of Living Alone is on fire.
Someone has been tampering with the magic drawer."
"Oh deah, deah," said Richard. "And this is such a busy night at the
office too. Do you think it is really important? It is my house, you
know."
"Well, I don't see what is to prevent Mitten Island from being burnt to
the water's edge. In fact I don't see why, being a magic fire, it should
stop at the water's edge. Not to mention that the Mayor----"
"Very well, I'll come," said Richard.
As she stepped out of the door he arrived.
"I came by flash of lightning," he explained, smoothing his hair and
readjusting his Bill Sykes service cap, in the manner of one who has
moved swiftly. "The lightning service is getting very bad. I was held up
for quite three-quarters of a second over Whitehall. There was some
wireless war-news coming in, and the lightning had to let it pass. Now,
what's all this fuss about, Sarah Brown?"
There was a crowd of delirious Mitten Islanders round the House of
Living Alone. While Sarah Brown and Richard were about fifty yards away,
a many-forked and enormous white flame suddenly wrapped the house about,
like a hand clutching and crushing it.
"The faggots round the stake are lighted," said Richard. "But the witch
has fled."
It seemed that the stars were devoured by the flame, so far did it
outshine them. The flame shrank in upon itself and collapsed. There was
no more House of Living Alone.
"Oh, Richard," said Sarah Brown. "Your mother and Miss Ford and----"
"Was mother in there?" asked Richard placidly. "Wonders will never
cease. Well, well, it is fortunate that no magic of any sort could ever
touch mother."
And indeed, as they pushed through the crowd, they saw all the recent
occupants of the Shop arguing at the front gate.
"I didn't blow it," Mr. Tovey was saying in an aggrieved voice. "I was
singing, not blowing."
"Well, all I know is that while you were on that high note something
seemed to scatter the flames, and the drawer full of explosives caught
fire," said Mr. Darnby Frere aggressively, flourishing his empty biscuit
tin.
"It doesn't matter," said Miss Ford calmly. "We are all going across the
sea to-morrow." She roused herself a little, and said to Mr. Frere with
a smile: "You know, I inherit the sea tradition. My father commanded
H.M.S. _Indigestible_ in '84."
"I wonder what put out the flame so suddenly?" asked Mr. Tovey, who was
still dreamily beating time to imaginary music with one hand.
"I put it out," said Richard.
"I wonder whose house it is?" added Mr. Tovey, turning vaguely to face
Richard.
"It is my house," said Richard.
They all discovered his presence.
"Your house, dear Rrchud?" exclaimed Lady Arabel. "Are you sure? I
didn't know the Higginses had any house property on Mitten Island."
"They haven't now," replied Richard. "But never mind. It has always
seemed to me that there were too many houses in the world. Most houses
are traps into which everything enters, and out of which nothing comes.
It always grieves me to see tradesmen pouring sustenance in at the back
door, and no result or justification coming out of the front door. I
often think that only the houses that men's bodies have deserted are
really inhabited."
"It was I who burnt your house down, Richard," said Miss Ford. "But it
doesn't matter. It wasn't a real house."
"You are right," said Richard. "To such as you, dear Meta, it was not a
real house. It was the House of Living Alone, and only to people who
live alone was it real. It is dark and deserted now, and levelled with
the cold ground; it is as though it were a tent, being moved from its
position to follow the fortunes of those dwellers alone who wander
continually in silence up and down the world...."
He looked at Sarah Brown.
"Talking of wandering," said Miss Ford. "We are all going to America,
Richard. Can you get us passports?"
"Certainly," agreed Richard. "To America, eh? A nice little trip for you
all. America, you know, would be entirely magic, if it weren't for the
Americans...."
"I have quite a circle of friends in New York," said Miss Ford, who
seemed to be recovering from her nerve-storm.
"Beware," said Richard, "lest you all forget the magic of to-night, and
change from adventurers to tourists."
"I am not going to America," said Lady Arabel. "I am going home. I never
heard such dretful nonsense. I was only in fun when I agreed to the
plan."
"I never agreed to the plan at all," said Mr. Frere. "I shall be truly
thankful to get to bed, and wake up to-morrow sober. I will never go out
to tea in Kensington again if this is the result."
"I am going to America," said Mr. Tovey, fixing his innocent eyes,
obscured by hair, upon Miss Ford.
"I am going to America," echoed the unseen Mayor from an unexpected
direction. Nobody had yet dared to tell him of the misfortune that had
overtaken him. "I'll give up this Mayor job to-morrer. Catch me stayin'
be'ind if--oh, by the way, that reminds me----"
"I didn't need reminding," interrupted Sarah Brown. "It seems to me that
everybody has forgotten why they came here. Please, Richard, do you know
of a spell to find a missing person?"
"Yes, several," answered Richard, who was always as eager as a
travelling salesman to recommend his wares. "There is an awfully
ingenious little spell I can show you, if you happen to have a
telephone book and a compass and a toad's heart and a hair from a black
goat's beard about you. Or again, if you stand on a sea-beach at low
tide on Christmas night with the moon at your back and a wax candle in
your left hand, and write upon the sand the name--by the way, who is it
you want to find?"
"The witch," answered Sarah Brown.
Richard's face fell. "Oh, only the witch?" he said. "I can tell you
where she is without any spell at all. She's with my True Love at
Higgins Farm, helping--oh, by the way, mother, I forgot to tell you. You
are a grandmother."
"RRCHUD!" said Lady Arabel. She sat down suddenly on the smooth grass
slope between the road and the garden hedge. "Ah, it is too cruel," she
cried, burying her face in her hands. "It is too cruel. Is this my son?
I meant so well, and all my life I did the things that other people did,
the natural things. Except just once. And for that once, I am so cruelly
punished.... I am given a son who is no son to me, who says only things
I mustn't understand ... who does only things I mustn't see...." She
paused, and, taking her hands from her face, looked round aghast at
Richard, who was sitting beside her on the bank, stroking her arm. "_A
faery son_ ..." she added in a terrified whisper, and then broke out
again crying: "Ah, it is too cruel...."
Richard continued to stroke her arm without comprehension. "Yes, mother,
and Peony, my True Love, insists on calling him Elbert," he said.
"Mother, listen, Elbert your faery grandson...."
But Lady Arabel still sobbed.