The Moving Finger Read online

  Megan’s face lit up.

  “I’ve been thinking about that, and I think I know the answer. It was because that awful old father of theirs always insisted on such a lot of sucking up. When you’ve always got to be saying thank you and how kind and all the rest of it, it would make you go a bit rotten and queer inside, and you’d just long to be able to be beastly for a change—and when you got the chance, you’d probably find it went to your head and you’d go too far. Old Lear was pretty awful, wasn’t he? I mean, he did deserve the snub Cordelia gave him.”

  “I can see,” I said, “that we are going to have many interesting discussions about Shakespeare.”

  “I can see you two are going to be very highbrow,” said Joanna. “I’m afraid I always find Shakespeare terribly dreary. All those long scenes where everybody is drunk and it’s supposed to be funny.”

  “Talking of drink,” I said turning to Megan. “How are you feeling?”

  “Quite all right, thank you.”

  “Not at all giddy? You don’t see two of Joanna or anything like that?”

  “No. I just feel as though I’d like to talk rather a lot.”

  “Splendid,” I said. “Obviously you are one of our natural drinkers. That is to say, if that really was your first cocktail.”

  “Oh, it was.”

  “A good strong head is an asset to any human being,” I said.

  Joanna took Megan upstairs to unpack.

  Partridge came in, looking sour, and said she had made two cup custards for lunch and what should she do about it?

  Six

  I

  The inquest was held three days later. It was all done as decorously as possible, but there was a large attendance and, as Joanna observed, the beady bonnets were wagging.

  The time of Mrs. Symmington’s death was put at between three and four o’clock. She was alone in the house, Symmington was at his office, the maids were having their day out, Elsie Holland and the children were out walking and Megan had gone for a bicycle ride.

  The letter must have come by the afternoon post. Mrs. Symmington must have taken it out of the box, read it—and then in a state of agitation she had gone to the potting shed, fetched some of the cyanide kept there for taking wasps’ nests, dissolved it in water and drunk it after writing those last agitated words, “I can’t go on….”

  Owen Griffith gave medical evidence and stressed the view he had outlined to us of Mrs. Symmington’s nervous condition and poor stamina. The coroner was suave and discreet. He spoke with bitter condemnation of people who write those despicable things, anonymous letters. Whoever had written that wicked and lying letter was morally guilty of murder, he said. He hoped the police would soon discover the culprit and take action against him or her. Such a dastardly and malicious piece of spite deserved to be punished with the utmost rigour of the law. Directed by him, the jury brought in the inevitable verdict. Suicide whilst temporarily insane.

  The coroner had done his best—Owen Griffith also, but afterwards, jammed in the crowd of eager village women, I heard the same hateful sibilant whisper I had begun to know so well, “No smoke without fire, that’s what I say!” “Must ’a been something in it for certain sure. She wouldn’t never have done it otherwise….”

  Just for a moment I hated Lymstock and its narrow boundaries, and its gossiping whispering women.

  II

  It is difficult to remember things in their exact chronological order. The next landmark of importance, of course, was Superintendent Nash’s visit. But it was before that, I think, that we received calls from various members of the community, each of which was interesting in its way and shed some light on the characters and personalities of the people involved.

  Aimée Griffith came on the morning after the inquest. She was looking, as always, radiant with health and vigour and succeeded, also as usual, in putting my back up almost immediately. Joanna and Megan were out, so I did the honours.

  “Good morning,” said Miss Griffith. “I hear you’ve got Megan Hunter here?”

  “We have.”

  “Very good of you, I’m sure. It must be rather a nuisance to you. I came up to say she can come to us if you like. I dare say I can find ways of making her useful about the house.”

  I looked at Aimée Griffith with a good deal of distaste.

  “How kind of you,” I said. “But we like having her. She potters about quite happily.”

  “I dare say. Much too fond of pottering, that child. Still, I suppose she can’t help it, being practically half-witted.”

  “I think she’s rather an intelligent girl,” I said.

  Aimée Griffith gave me a hard stare.

  “First time I’ve ever heard anyone say that of her,” she remarked. “Why, when you talk to her, she looks through you as though she doesn’t understand what you are saying!”

  “She probably just isn’t interested,” I said.

  “If so, she’s extremely rude,” said Aimée Griffith.

  “That may be. But not half-witted.”

  Miss Griffith declared sharply:

  “At best, it’s woolgathering. What Megan needs is good hard work—something to give her an interest in life. You’ve no idea what a difference that makes to a girl. I know a lot about girls. You’d be surprised at the difference even becoming a Guide makes to a girl. Megan’s much too old to spend her time lounging about and doing nothing.”

  “It’s been rather difficult for her to do anything else so far,” I said. “Mrs. Symmington always seemed under the impression that Megan was about twelve years old.”

  Miss Griffith snorted.

  “I know. I had no patience with that attitude of hers. Of course she’s dead now, poor woman, so one doesn’t want to say much, but she was a perfect example of what I call the unintelligent domestic type. Bridge and gossip and her children—and even there that Holland girl did all the looking after them. I’m afraid I never thought very much of Mrs. Symmington, although of course I never suspected the truth.”

  “The truth?” I said sharply.

  Miss Griffith flushed.

  “I was terribly sorry for Dick Symmington, its all having to come out as it did at the inquest,” she said. “It was awful for him.”

  “But surely you heard him say that there was not a word of truth in that letter—that he was quite sure of that?”

  “Of course he said so. Quite right. A man’s got to stick up for his wife. Dick would.” She paused and then explained: “You see, I’ve known Dick Symmington a long time.”

  I was a little surprised.

  “Really?” I said. “I understood from your brother that he only bought this practice a few years ago.”

  “Oh yes, but Dick Symmington used to come and stay in our part of the world up north. I’ve known him for years.”

  Women jump to conclusions that men do not. Nevertheless, the suddenly softened tone of Aimée Griffith’s voice put, as our old nurse would have expressed it, ideas into my head.

  I looked at Aimée curiously. She went on—still in that softened tone:

  “I know Dick very well… He’s a proud man, and very reserved. But he’s the sort of man who could be very jealous.”

  “That would explain,” I said deliberately, “why Mrs. Symmington was afraid to show him or tell him about the letter. She was afraid that, being a jealous man, he might not believe her denials.”

  Miss Griffith looked at me angrily and scornfully.

  “Good Lord,” she said, “do you think any woman would go and swallow a lot of cyanide of potassium for an accusation that wasn’t true?”

  “The coroner seemed to think it was possible. Your brother, too—”

  Aimée interrupted me.

  “Men are all alike. All for preserving the decencies. But you don’t catch me believing that stuff. If an innocent woman gets some foul anonymous letter, she laughs and chucks it away. That’s what I—” she paused suddenly, and then finished, “would do.”

  But I h
ad noticed the pause. I was almost sure that what she had been about to say was “That’s what I did.”

  I decided to take the war into the enemy’s country.

  “I see,” I said pleasantly, “so you’ve had one, too?”

  Aimée Griffith was the type of woman who scorns to lie. She paused a minute—flushed, then said:

  “Well, yes. But I didn’t let it worry me!”

  “Nasty?” I inquired sympathetically, as a fellow sufferer.

  “Naturally. These things always are. The ravings of a lunatic. I read a few words of it, realized what it was and chucked it straight into the wastepaper basket.”

  “You didn’t think of taking it to the police?”

  “Not then. Least said soonest mended—that’s what I felt.”

  An urge came over me to say solemnly: “No smoke without fire!” but I restrained myself. To avoid temptation I reverted to Megan.

  “Have you any idea of Megan’s financial position?” I asked. “It’s not idle curiosity on my part. I wondered if it would actually be necessary for her to earn her living.”

  “I don’t think it’s strictly necessary. Her grandmother, her father’s mother, left her a small income, I believe. And in any case Dick Symmington would always give her a home and provide for her, even if her mother hasn’t left her anything outright. No, it’s the principle of the thing.”

  “What principle?”

  “Work, Mr. Burton. There’s nothing like work, for men and women. The one unforgivable sin is idleness.”

  “Sir Edward Grey,” I said, “afterwards our foreign minister, was sent down from Oxford for incorrigible idleness. The Duke of Wellington, I have heard, was both dull and inattentive at his books. And has it ever occurred to you, Miss Griffith, that you would probably not be able to take a good express train to London if little Georgie Stephenson had been out with his youth movement instead of lolling about, bored, in his mother’s kitchen until the curious behaviour of the kettle lid attracted the attention of his idle mind?”

  Aimée merely snorted.

  “It is a theory of mine,” I said, warming to my theme, “that we owe most of our great inventions and most of the achievements of genius to idleness—either enforced or voluntary. The human mind prefers to be spoon-fed with the thoughts of others, but deprived of such nourishment it will, reluctantly, begin to think for itself—and such thinking, remember, is original thinking and may have valuable results.

  “Besides,” I went on, before Aimée could get in another sniff, “there is the artistic side.”

  I got up and took from my desk where it always accompanied me a photograph of my favourite Chinese picture. It represents an old man sitting beneath a tree playing cat’s cradle with a piece of string on his fingers and toes.

  “It was in the Chinese exhibition,” I said. “It fascinated me. Allow me to introduce you. It is called ‘Old Man enjoying the Pleasure of Idleness.’”

  Aimée Griffith was unimpressed by my lovely picture. She said: “Oh well, we all know what the Chinese are like!”

  “It doesn’t appeal to you?” I asked.

  “Frankly, no. I’m not very interested in art, I’m afraid. Your attitude, Mr. Burton, is typical of that of most men. You dislike the idea of women working—of their competing—”

  I was taken aback, I had come up against the Feminist. Aimée was well away, her cheeks flushed.

  “It is incredible to you that women should want a career. It was incredible to my parents. I was anxious to study for a doctor. They would not hear of paying the fees. But they paid them readily for Owen. Yet I should have made a better doctor than my brother.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” I said. “It was tough on you. If one wants to do a thing—”

  She went on quickly:

  “Oh, I’ve got over it now. I’ve plenty of willpower. My life is busy and active. I’m one of the happiest people in Lymstock. Plenty to do. But I do go up in arms against the silly old-fashioned prejudice that women’s place is always the home.”

  “I’m sorry if I offended you,” I said. “And that wasn’t really my point. I don’t see Megan in a domestic role at all.”

  “No, poor child. She’ll be a misfit anywhere, I’m afraid.” Aimée had calmed down. She was speaking quite normally again. “Her father, you know—”

  She paused and I said bluntly: “I don’t know. Everyone says ‘her father’ and drops their voice, and that is that. What did the man do? Is he alive still?”

  “I really don’t know. And I’m rather vague myself, I’m afraid. But he was definitely a bad lot. Prison, I believe. And a streak of very strong abnormality. That’s why it wouldn’t surprise me if Megan was a bit ‘wanting.’”

  “Megan,” I said, “is in full possession of her senses, and as I said before, I consider her an intelligent girl. My sister thinks so too. Joanna is very fond of her.”

  Aimée said:

  “I’m afraid your sister must find it very dull down here.”

  And as she said it, I learnt something else. Aimée Griffith disliked my sister. It was there in the smooth conventional tones of her voice.

  “We’ve all wondered how you could both bear to bury yourselves in such an out-of-the-way spot.”

  It was a question and I answered it.

  “Doctor’s orders. I was to come somewhere very quiet where nothing ever happened.” I paused and added, “Not quite true of Lymstock now.”

  “No, no, indeed.”

  She sounded worried and got up to go. She said then:

  “You know—it’s got to be put a stop to—all this beastliness! We can’t have it going on.”

  “Aren’t the police doing anything?”

  “I suppose so. But I think we ought to take it in hand ourselves.”

  “We’re not as well equipped as they are.”

  “Nonsense! We probably have far more sense and intelligence! A little determination is all that is needed.”

  She said goodbye abruptly and went away.

  When Joanna and Megan came back from their walk I showed Megan my Chinese picture. Her face lighted up. She said, “It’s heavenly, isn’t it?”

  “That is rather my opinion.”

  Her forehead was crinkling in the way I knew so well.

  “But it would be difficult, wouldn’t it?”

  “To be idle?”

  “No, not to be idle—but to enjoy the pleasures of it. You’d have to be very old—”

  She paused. I said: “He is an old man.”

  “I don’t mean old that way. Not age. I mean old in—in….”

  “You mean,” I said, “that one would have to attain a very high state of civilization for the thing to present itself to you in that way—a fine point of sophistication? I think I shall complete your education, Megan, by reading to you one hundred poems translated from the Chinese.”

  III

  I met Symmington in the town later in the day.

  “Is it quite all right for Megan to stay on with us for a bit?” I asked. “It’s company for Joanna—she’s rather lonely sometimes with none of her own friends.”

  “Oh—er— Megan? Oh yes, very good of you.”

  I took a dislike to Symmington then which I never quite overcame. He had so obviously forgotten all about Megan. I wouldn’t have minded if he had actively disliked the girl—a man may sometimes be jealous of a first husband’s child—but he didn’t dislike her, he just hardly noticed her. He felt towards her much as a man who doesn’t care much for dogs would feel about a dog in the house. You notice it when you fall over it and swear at it, and you give it a vague pat sometimes when it presents itself to be patted. Symmington’s complete indifference to his stepdaughter annoyed me very much.

  I said, “What are you planning to do with her?”

  “With Megan?” He seemed rather startled. “Well, she’ll go on living at home. I mean, naturally, it is her home.”

  My grandmother, of whom I had been very fond, used to
sing old-fashioned songs to her guitar. One of them, I remembered, ended thus:

  “Oh maid, most dear, I am not here

  I have no place, no part,

  No dwelling more, by sea nor shore,

  But only in your heart.”

  I went home humming it.

  IV

  Emily Barton came just after tea had been cleared away.

  She wanted to talk about the garden. We talked garden for about half an hour. Then we turned back towards the house.

  It was then that lowering her voice, she murmured:

  “I do hope that that child—that she hasn’t been too much upset by all this dreadful business?”

  “Her mother’s death, you mean?”

  “That, of course. But I really meant, the—the unpleasantness behind it.”

  I was curious. I wanted Miss Barton’s reaction.

  “What do you think about that? Was it true?”

  “Oh, no, no, surely not. I’m quite sure that Mrs. Symmington never—that he wasn’t”—little Emily Barton was pink and confused—“I mean it’s quite untrue—although of course it may have been a judgment.”

  “A judgment?” I said, staring.

  Emily Barton was very pink, very Dresden china shepherdess-like.

  “I cannot help feeling that all these dreadful letters, all the sorrow and pain they have caused, may have been sent for a purpose.”

  “They were sent for a purpose, certainly,” I said grimly.

  “No, no, Mr. Burton, you misunderstood me. I’m not talking of the misguided creature who wrote them—someone quite abandoned that must be. I mean that they have been permitted—by Providence! To awaken us to a sense of our shortcomings.”

  “Surely,” I said, “the Almighty could choose a less unsavoury weapon.”

  Miss Emily murmured that God moved in a mysterious way.

  “No,” I said. “There’s too much tendency to attribute to God the evils that man does of his own free will. I might concede you the Devil. God doesn’t really need to punish us, Miss Barton. We’re so very busy punishing ourselves.”

  “What I can’t make out is why should anyone want to do such a thing?”