To Say Nothing of the Dog (54 page)

“Reverend Chichester,” I said. “I believe I’ve heard of him. Young, unmarried, dark mustache?”

“Reverend Chichester?” the Reverend Arbitage said. “Good heavens, no. Ninety, if he’s a day. Rather afflicted with palsy, I’m afraid, but still active in good works. And very interested in the Other Side.”

“I shouldn’t wonder,” Colonel Mering muttered from the depths of his newspaper. “He’s already got one foot over the line.”

“The Final Judgment may be but a step away for all of us,” the Reverend Arbitage said, pursing his lips. “ ‘Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come.’ Revelation chapter fourteen, verse seven.”

He truly was a toad. Prissy, self-righteous, humorless. The perfect mate for Tossie. And there didn’t seem to be any other takers.

“Arbitage,” I said. “Is that your full name?”

“I beg your pardon,” he said.

“So many people have multiple names these days,” I said. “Edward Burne-Jones, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Edward Bulwer-Lytton. I thought perhaps Arbitage was short for Arbitage-Culpepper or Arbitage-Chutney.”

“Arbitage is my full name,” he said, drawing himself up. “Eustace Hieronymous Arbitage.”

“And no pet names, I suppose, not for a man in your line of work,” I said. “In childhood, though? My sisters’ pet name for me was Curls, because of my baby locks. Did you have curly hair?”

“I believe,” the Reverend Mr. Arbitage said, “I was quite bald until the age of three.”

“Ah,” I said. “Chuckles, perhaps? Or Chubby?”

“Mr.
Hen
ry,” Mrs. Mering said, “Mr. Arbitage is trying to tell us the results of the fête.”

“Yes, well,” the Reverend Mr. Arbitage said, pulling a leather notebook from his pocket, “after expenses the receipts came to eighteen pounds, four shillings and eight pence, more than enough to paint over the wall murals and put in a new pulpit. We may even have enough to purchase an oil painting for the lady chapel. Perhaps a Holman-Hunt.

“What do you think the purpose of art is, Mr. Arbitage?” Tossie asked abruptly.

“To edify and instruct,” he said promptly. “All art should point a moral.”

“Like
The Light of the World,”
she said.

“Indeed,” he said. “ ‘For behold, I stand at the door and knock. . . .’ Revelation chapter three, verse twenty.” He turned to Mrs. Mering. “So may I tell the Reverend Mr. Chichester he can count on your assistance?”

“I’m afraid not,” Mrs. Mering said. “We are leaving for Torquay the day after tomorrow.”

Verity looked up, stricken, and the Colonel lowered his paper.

“My nerves,” Mrs. Mering said, looking hard at Professor Peddick. “So many unsettling things have happened in the last few days. I feel the need to consult with Dr. Fawleigh. Perhaps you’ve heard of him. He’s an expert in spiritism. Ectoplasm. And from there, we shall journey to Kent to meet Mr. St. Trewes’s parents and make arrangements for the wedding.”

“Ah,” Mr. Arbitage said. “But you will be back by August, I do hope. Our summer fête was such a success I’ve decided we should have a St. Bartholomew’s Day Fair, and we will of course want to have a fortuneteller. And a jumble sale. Mrs. Chattisbourne wanted to have a whist drive instead, but I told her the jumble sale was destined to become a
tradition.
And all thanks to you. I have already been collecting items for it. Miss Stiggins donated a boot rack, and my great-aunt is sending me an etching of
The Battle of Naseby!”

“Ah, yes, Naseby!” Professor Peddick said. “Prince Rupert’s cavalry charge. A classic example of how one can be within a hairsbreadth of success, only to see it turn into defeat, and all because of not using forethought.”

There was some more discussion of the perils of acting without thinking, and then the Reverend Mr. Arbitage delivered a benediction and took his leave.

Tossie scarcely seemed to notice. “I am rather tired,” she said as soon as Baine had shown him out. She kissed her father and then her mother.

“You’re looking pale,” Mrs. Mering said. “The sea air will do you good.”

“Yes, Mama,” she said as though she were thinking of something else. “Good night,” and went upstairs.

“It is time we all retired,” Mrs. Mering said, standing up. “It has been a long—” she fixed Professor Peddick with a gimlet eye, “—and
eventful
day for all of us, and, Mesiel, you will need to be up early to accompany Professor Peddick on his journey.”

“Accompany Professor Peddick?” Colonel Mering said, stammering. “Can’t leave my red-spotted silver tancho.”

“I am certain you would wish to ensure that Professor Peddick does not drop from sight,” Mrs. Mering said firmly. “I am certain you would not wish to be responsible for leaving a second family uninformed and bereft.”

“No, of course not,” Colonel Mering said, defeated. “Glad to see you home, Professor Peddick.”

While they consulted with Baine about train times, I went over to Verity and whispered, “I’ll report in in the morning when I take Cyril out to the stable.”

She nodded numbly. “All right.” She took one last look round, as if she hoped Mr. C might still appear. “Good night,” she said and went upstairs.

“Come, Cyril,” Terence said, looking meaningfully at me. “Time for you to go out to the stable,” but I wasn’t paying any attention.

I was looking at the writing table, where Tossie had left her diary.

“I’ll be up in a moment,” I said, sidling over in front of it. “I just want to find a book to read.”

“Books!” Mrs. Mering said. “Entirely too many people read books these days,” and swept from the room.

“Come along, Cyril,” Terence said. Cyril staggered to his feet. “Still raining outside, Baine?”

“I’m afraid so, sir,” Baine said and went to open the front door for them.

“Pickett’s Charge!” Professor Peddick said to Colonel Mering. “At the American battle of Gettysburg. Another excellent example of acting without thinking! How would Overforce account for Pickett’s Charge?” and they went out together.

I shut the parlor door behind them and hurried over to the writing desk. The diary was open, with the pen and the carnation penwiper covering the bottom two-thirds of the page. At the top was written, in a ruffly hand, “June the fifteenth,” and below it, “Today we went to Cov—”

I lifted the penwiper. “—entry,” it read, the “y” trailing off into blankness. Whatever she’d recorded for posterity about the great day, she hadn’t done it yet, but there might be clues to Mr. C in earlier entries.

I shut the diary, grabbed Gibbon’s
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
Vols. One and Two, off the shelf behind, sandwiched the diary between them, and turned round with the books in my hands.

Baine was standing there. “I shall be glad to take Miss Mering’s diary up to her so that you are not inconvenienced, sir,” he said.

“Excellent,” I said, and extricated it from between the Gibbon. “I was just taking it up to her.”

“As you wish, sir!”

“No, that’s all right,” I said. “You take it up. I think I shall take a walk before bed.” A patently ridiculous remark with the rain beating against the French doors, and one he didn’t believe any more than he believed I was taking Tossie’s diary up to her. But he only said, “As you wish, sir,” again.

“Did anyone come to the door tonight?” I said. “Besides the Reverend Mr. Arbitage?”

“No, sir,”

“Or to the kitchen door? A peddler? Or someone seeking shelter from the storm?”

“No, sir. Will that be all, sir?”

Yes, that would be all. And in a few years, what? The Luftwaffe would finish off the RAF and commence landing at Dover, and Tossie and Terence’s grandchildren would fight them on the beaches and in the ditches and in Christ Church Meadow and at Iffley, to no avail. They would hang Nazi banners from Buckingham Palace’s balconies and goose-step through Muchings End and Oxford and Coventry. Well, at least Coventry wouldn’t burn down. Only the Houses of Parliament. And civilization.

And the space-time continuum would correct itself eventually. Unless Hitler’s scientists discovered time travel.

“Will that be all, sir?” Baine said again.

“Yes,” I said, “that will be all,” and turned to open the door.

Rain blew in, and getting wet and cold seemed somehow fitting. I started out.

“I have taken the liberty of putting Mr. St. Trewes’s friend in your room, sir,” Baine said.

“Thank you,” I said gratefully. I shut the door, turned, and started past him up the stairs.

“Mr. Henry,” he said.

“Yes?” I said, but whatever he intended to say, he must have thought better of it.

“An excellent book,” he said.
“The Decline and Fall.”

“Edifying and instructive,” I said, and went up to bed.

“And kiss me, Kate! We will be married a Sunday.”

Petruchio

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y - T W O

Inherent Optimism of Time Travel—An Early Departure—A Problem—Gladys and Gladys—Finch Is Missing—Anecdotes of Cats’ Maternal Resourcefulness—A Delayed Departure—Eavesdropping—Cabbages—Verity Is Missing—Baine Quotes Shakespeare—Illiteracy Laws Proposed—The Mystery of the Waterlogged Diary Solved—A Premature Departure

I felt better in the morning. When I came down with Cyril at six, the rain had stopped, the sky was blue, and the wet grass glittered like diamonds.

And time travel is inherently hopeful. Failing to fix it once, you get innumerable other chances, or at least somebody does, and a week from now, or a year, when the forensics expert finally managed to decipher the diary, Carruthers or Warder or some addled new recruit could come back on the fifteenth and see to it that Mr. C made his entrance on cue.

We hadn’t succeeded, but at this very moment they might have solved the Mystery of Waterloo and self-correction. At this very moment T.J. and Mr. Dunworthy might be sending someone through to intercept me on my way to Oxford’s railway station and keep me from meeting Terence and mucking up his love life. Or to separate Professor Peddick and Professor Overforce. Or to stop Verity from wading into the Thames and rescuing Princess Arjumand in the first place. Or to send me to World War I to recover from my time-lag.

The cat would swim to shore, Terence would meet Maud, and the Luftwaffe would bomb London. And I would never meet Verity. Small price to pay for saving the universe. Well worth the sacrifice.

And I wouldn’t feel any loss because I wouldn’t ever have met her. I wondered suddenly if Terence did, if he knew on some level that he hadn’t met his true love. And if he did, what did he feel? Mawkish sorrow, like one of his Victorian poems? Or a gnawing of some need unsatisfied? Or just a grayness to everything?

I took Cyril out to the stable. Princess Arjumand had come down with us, and she stalked ahead across the wet grass, her tail in the air, coming back periodically to wind herself around Cyril’s hind legs and my ankles. There was a sound over by the stable, and the big doors began to creak open.

“Hide,” I said, scooping up Princess Arjumand and ducking back into the shelter of the kitchen door. The groom, looking like he’d just been awakened, pushed the doors open, and the driver led two horses, hitched to the carriage, out. The carriage to take Professor Peddick and Colonel Mering to the station.

I looked toward the house. Baine was bringing out the luggage and setting it on the front steps. Professor Peddick stood behind him in his academic gown and mortarboard, holding his kettle of fish against his stomach and talking to Terence.

“Come along,” I whispered to Cyril and started toward the side of the stable. Princess Arjumand wriggled wildly in my arms, trying to get free, and I let her down. She took off like a shot across the lawn. I led Cyril in the groom’s door.

“Make it look like you’ve been here all night,” I said, and Cyril promptly went over to his burlap sacking, turned round three times, flopped down, and began to snore loudly.

“Good boy,” I said, and let myself out of the stable. And collided with Terence.

“Have you got Cyril?” he said.

“I just brought him down,” I said. “Why? Is something wrong? Did Mrs. Mering see me?”

He shook his head. “Baine came and knocked me up this morning and said Colonel Mering was ill and would I accompany Professor Peddick to Oxford. Seems he caught a chill yesterday fishing for trout, and Mrs. Mering wants to make certain Professor Peddick makes it home. Good idea, actually. He’s likely to spot a hill that reminds him of the Battle of Hastings or something and get off the train. I thought I’d take Cyril. Thought it would be a bit of a holiday for him from—” he stopped and started again, “—especially as he didn’t get to go to Coventry yesterday. Is he in the stable?”

“Next to the hay bales,” I said, but when he opened the groom’s door, Cyril was standing just inside, wagging his pudgy body.

“Would you like to take a journey by rail, old man?” Terence said, and the two of them set off happily for the house.

I waited till the carriage had set off and Baine had gone back into the house and then legged it out to the laburnum arbor before the groom came yawning back to the stables, and then went out through the herbaceous border and across the croquet lawn to the gazebo.

There was someone in it. I circled round the weeping willow and came up behind the lilacs. A dark figure was sitting hunched on one of the side benches. Who would be sitting out here at this hour? Mrs. Mering, hunting for ghosts? Baine, catching up on his reading?

I parted the lilac branches so I could see better, sending a shower of water over my blazer and flannels. Whoever it was, they had a cloak wrapped around them and a hood pulled up over their head. Tossie? Waiting for a rendezvous with her life-changing lover? Or the mysterious Mr. C himself?

I couldn’t see the figure’s face from there. I needed to be on the other side of the gazebo. I carefully let go of the branches, dousing myself again, and stepped back squarely on Princess Arjumand.

“Mrowrrrr!” she yowled, and the figure darted up, clutching the cloak. The hood fell back.