The Complete Father Brown Mysteries [Annotated, With Introduction, Rare Additional Material] (127 page)

‘
Well,
there it is. He denounces her day and night as a painted adventuress; a sort of
barmaid with gilt hair. I tell him she’s not; you’ve met her yourself, and you know
she’s not. But he won’t even meet her. He won’t even see her in the street or
look at her out of a window. An actress would pollute his house and even his holy
presence. If he is called a Puritan he says he’s proud to be a Puritan.’

‘
Your
father,’ said Father Brown, ‘is entitled to have his views respected, whatever they
are; they are not views I understand very well myself. But I agree he is not
entitled to lay down the law about a lady he has never seen and then refuse even
to look at her, to see if he is right. That is illogical.’

‘
That’s
his very stiffest point,’ replied the youth. ‘Not even one momentary meeting. Of
course, he thunders against my other theatrical tastes as well.’

Father
Brown swiftly followed up the new opening, and learnt much that he wanted to know.
The alleged poetry, which was such a blot on the young man’s character, was
almost entirely dramatic poetry. He had written tragedies in verse which had
been admired by good judges. He was no mere stage-struck fool; indeed he was no
fool of any kind. He had some really original ideas about acting Shakespeare;
it was easy to understand his having been dazzled and delighted by finding the
brilliant lady at the Grange. And even the priest’s intellectual sympathy so
far mellowed the rebel of Potter’s Pond that at their parting he actually smiled.

It
was that smile which suddenly revealed to Father Brown that the young man was really
miserable. So long as he frowned, it might well have been only sulks; but when
he smiled it was somehow a more real revelation of sorrow.

Something
continued to haunt the priest about that interview with the poet. An inner instinct
certified that the sturdy young man was eaten from within, by some grief
greater even than the conventional story of conventional parents being obstacles
to the course of true love. It was all the more so, because there were not any
obvious alternative causes. The boy was already rather a literary and dramatic
success; his books might be said to be booming. Nor did he drink or dissipate
his well-earned wealth. His notorious revels at the Blue Lion reduced
themselves to one glass of light ale; and he seemed to be rather careful with
his money. Father Brown thought of another possible complication in connection
with Hurrel’s large resources and small expenditure; and his brow darkened.

The
conversation of Miss Carstairs-Carew, on whom he called next, was certainly calculated
to paint the parson’s son in the darkest colours. But as it was devoted to
blasting him with all the special vices which Father Brown was quite certain
the young man did not exhibit, he put it down to a common combination of
Puritanism and gossip. The lady, though lofty, was quite gracious, however, and
offered the visitor a small glass of port-wine and a slice of seed-cake, in the
manner of everybody’s most ancient great-aunts, before he managed to escape from
a sermon on the general decay of morals and manners.

His
next port of call was very much of a contrast; for he disappeared down a dark and
dirty alley, where Miss Carstairs-Carew would have refused to follow him even
in thought; and then into a narrow tenement made noisier by a high and declamatory
voice in an attic . . . From this he re-emerged, with a rather dazed
expression, pursued on to the pavement by a very excited man with a blue chin
and a black frock-coat faded to bottle-green, who was shouting argumentatively:
‘He did not disappear! Maltravers never disappeared! He appeared: he appeared
dead and I’ve appeared alive. But where’s all the rest of the company? Where’s
that man, that monster, who deliberately stole my lines, crabbed my best scenes
and ruined my career? I was the finest Tubal that ever trod the boards. He
acted Shylock — he didn’t need to act much for that! And so with the greatest
opportunity of my whole career. I could show you press-cuttings on my
renderings of Fortinbras — ’

‘
I’m
quite sure they were splendid and very well-deserved,’ gasped the little priest.
‘I understood the company had left the village before Maltravers died. But it’s
all right. It’s quite all right.’ And he began to hurry down the street again.

‘
He
was to act Polonius,’ continued the unquenchable orator behind him. Father Brown
suddenly stopped dead.

‘
Oh,’
he said very slowly, ‘he was to act Polonius.’

‘
That
villain Hankin!’ shrieked the actor. ‘Follow his trail. Follow him to the ends of
the earth! Of course he’d left the village; trust him for that. Follow him — find
him; and may the curses — ’ But the priest was again hurrying away down the
street.

Two
much more prosaic and perhaps more practical interviews followed this melodramatic
scene. First the priest went into the bank, where he was closeted for ten
minutes with the manager; and then paid a very proper call on the aged and
amiable clergyman. Here again all seemed very much as described, unaltered and
seemingly unalterable; a touch or two of devotion from more austere traditions,
in the narrow crucifix on the wall, the big Bible on the bookstand and the old
gentleman’s opening lament over the increasing disregard of Sunday; but all
with a flavour of gentility that was not without its little refinements and
faded luxuries.

The
clergyman also gave his guest a glass of port; but accompanied by an ancient British
biscuit instead of seedcake. The priest had again the weird feeling that
everything was almost too perfect, and that he was living a century before his
time. Only on one point the amiable old parson refused to melt into any further
amiability; he meekly but firmly maintained that his conscience would not allow
him to meet a stage player. However, Father Brown put down his glass of port
with expressions of appreciation and thanks; and went off to meet his friend
the doctor by appointment at the corner of the street; whence they were to go
together to the offices of Mr Carver, the solicitor.

‘
I
suppose you’ve gone the dreary round,’ began the doctor, ‘and found it a very dull
village.’

Father
Brown’s reply was sharp and almost shrill. ‘Don’t call your village dull. I assure
you it’s a very extraordinary village indeed.’

‘
I’ve
been dealing with the only extraordinary thing that ever happened here, I should
think,’ observed Dr Mulborough. ‘And even that happened to somebody from outside.
I may tell you they managed the exhumation quietly last night; and I did the
autopsy this morning. In plain words we’ve been digging up a corpse that’s
simply stuffed with poison.’

‘
A
corpse stuffed with poison,’ repeated Father Brown rather absently. ‘Believe me,
your village contains something much more extraordinary than that.’

There
was abrupt silence, followed by the equally abrupt pulling of the antiquated bell-pull
in the porch of the solicitor’s house; and they were soon brought into the
presence of that legal gentleman, who presented them in turn to a white-haired,
yellow-faced gentleman with a scar, who appeared to be the Admiral.

By
this time the atmosphere of the village had sunk almost into the subconsciousness
of the little priest; but he was conscious that the lawyer was indeed the sort
of lawyer to be the adviser of people like Miss Carstairs-Carew. But though he
was an archaic old bird, he seemed something more than a fossil. Perhaps it was
the uniformity of the background; but the priest had again the curious feeling
that he himself was transplanted back into the early nineteenth century, rather
than that the solicitor had survived into the early twentieth. His collar and
cravat contrived to look almost like a stock as he settled his long chin into
them; but they were clean as well as clean-cut; and there was even something
about him of a very dry old dandy. In short, he was what is called well
preserved, even if partly by being petrified.

The
lawyer and the Admiral, and even the doctor, showed some surprise on finding that
Father Brown was rather disposed to defend the parson’s son against the local
lamentations on behalf of the parson.

‘
I
thought our young friend rather attractive, myself,’ he said. ‘He’s a good talker
and I should guess a good poet; and Mrs Maltravers, who is serious about that
at least, says he’s quite a good actor.’

‘
Indeed,’
said the lawyer. ‘Potter’s Pond, outside Mrs Maltravers, is rather more inclined
to ask if he is a good son.’

‘
He
is a good son,’ said Father Brown. ‘That’s the extraordinary thing.’

‘
Damn
it all,’ said the Admiral. ‘Do you mean he’s really fond of his father?’

The
priest hesitated. Then he said, ‘I’m not quite so sure about that. That’s the other
extraordinary thing.’

‘
What
the devil do you mean?’ demanded the sailor with nautical profanity.

‘
I
mean,’ said Father Brown, ‘that the son still speaks of his father in a hard unforgiving
way; but he seems after all to have done more than his duty by him. I had a
talk with the bank manager, and as we were inquiring in confidence into a
serious crime, under authority from the police, he told me the facts. The old clergyman
has retired from parish work; indeed, this was never actually his parish. Such
of the populace, which is pretty pagan, as goes to church at all, goes to
Dutton-Abbot, not a mile away. The old man has no private means, but his son is
earning good money; and the old man is well looked after. He gave me some port
of absolutely first-class vintage; I saw rows of dusty old bottles of it; and I
left him sitting down to a little lunch quite recherche in an old-fashioned
style. It must be done on the young man’s money.’

‘
Quite
a model son,’ said Carver with a slight sneer.

Father
Brown nodded, frowning, as if revolving a riddle of his own; and then said: ‘A model
son. But rather a mechanical model.’

At
this moment a clerk brought in an unstamped letter for the lawyer; a letter which
the lawyer tore impatiently across after a single glance. As it fell apart, the
priest saw a spidery, crazy crowded sort of handwriting and the signature of
‘Phoenix Fitzgerald’; and made a guess which the other curtly confirmed.

‘
It’s
that melodramatic actor that’s always pestering us,’ he said. ‘He’s got some fixed
feud with some dead and gone fellow mummer of his, which can’t have anything to
do with the case. We all refuse to see him, except the doctor, who did see him;
and the doctor says he’s mad.’

‘
Yes,’
said Father Brown, pursing his lips thoughtfully. ‘I should say he’s mad. But of
course there can’t be any doubt that he’s right.’

‘
Right?’
cried Carver sharply. ‘Right about what?’

‘
About
this being connected with the old theatrical company,’ said Father Brown. ‘Do you
know the first thing that stumped me about this story? It was that notion that
Maltravers was killed by villagers because he insulted their village. It’s extraordinary
what coroners can get jurymen to believe; and journalists, of course, are quite
incredibly credulous. They can’t know much about English rustics. I’m an
English rustic myself; at least I was grown, with other turnips, in Essex. Can
you imagine an English agricultural labourer idealizing and personifying his
village, like the citizen of an old Greek city state; drawing the sword for its
sacred banner, like a man in the tiny medieval republic of an Italian town? Can
you hear a jolly old gaffer saying, “Blood alone can wipe out one spot on the
escutcheon of Potter’s Pond”? By St George and the Dragon, I only wish they
would! But, as a matter of fact, I have a more practical argument for the other
notion.’

He
paused for a moment, as if collecting his thoughts, and then went on: ‘They misunderstood
the meaning of those few last words poor Maltravers was heard to say. He wasn’t
telling the villagers that the village was only a hamlet. He was talking to an
actor; they were going to put on a performance in which Fitzgerald was to be
Fortinbras, the unknown Hankin to be Polonius, and Maltravers, no doubt, the
Prince of Denmark. Perhaps somebody else wanted the part or had views on the
part; and Maltravers said angrily, “You’d be a miserable little Hamlet”; that’s
all.’

Dr
Mulborough was staring; he seemed to be digesting the suggestion slowly but without
difficulty. At last he said, before the others could speak: ‘And what do you
suggest that we should do now?’

Father
Brown arose rather abruptly; but he spoke civilly enough. ‘If these gentlemen will
excuse us for a moment, I propose that you and I, doctor, should go round at
once to the Horners. I know the parson and his son will both be there just now.
And what I want to do, doctor, is this. Nobody in the village knows yet, I think,
about your autopsy and its result. I want you simply to tell both the clergyman
and his son, while they are there together, the exact fact of the case; that
Maltravers died by poison and not by a blow.’

Dr
Mulborough had reason to reconsider his incredulity when told that it was an extraordinary
village. The scene which ensued, when he actually carried out the priest’s
programme, was certainly of the sort in which a man, as the saying is, can
hardly believe his eyes.

The
Rev. Samuel Horner was standing in his black cassock, which threw up the silver
of his venerable head; his hand rested at the moment on the lectern at which he
often stood to study the Scripture, now possibly by accident only; but it gave him
a greater look of authority. And opposite to him his mutinous son was sitting
asprawl in a chair, smoking a cheap cigarette with an exceptionally heavy
scowl; a lively picture of youthful impiety.