‘Resemblance to
whom?’

‘To me? To me, as I am?’

‘But even, my dear fellow (forgive my dull old brains! ), even if there
was just the faintest superficial suggestion of—of that; what then?’

‘Why,’ said Lawford, ‘he’s buried in Widderstone.’

‘Buried in Widderstone?’ The keen childlike blue eyes looked almost
stealthily up across the book; the old man sat without speaking, so
still that it might even be supposed he himself was listening for a
quiet distant footfall. ‘He is buried in the grave beside which I fell asleep,’ said Lawford;
‘all green and still and broken,’ he added faintly. ‘You remember,’ he
went on in a repressed voice—‘you remember you asked me if there was
anybody else in sight, any eavesdropper? You don’t think—him?’

Mr. Bethany pushed the book a few inches away from him. ‘Who, did you
say—who was it you said put the thing into your head? A queer friend
surely?’ he paused helplessly. ‘And how, pray, do you know,’ he began
again more firmly, ‘even if there is a Sabathier buried at Widderstone,
how do you know it is this Sabathier? It’s not, I think,’ he added
boldly, ‘a very uncommon name; with two _b_’s at any rate. Whereabouts
is the grave?’

‘Quite down at the bottom, under the trees. And the little seat I told
you of is there, too, where I fell asleep. You see,’ he explained, ‘the
grave’s almost isolated; I suppose because he killed himself.’

Mr Bethany clasped his knuckled fingers on the tablecloth. ‘It’s no
good,’ he concluded after a long pause; ‘the fellow’s got up into my
head. I can’t think him out. We must thrash it out quietly in the
morning with the blessed sun at the window; not this farthing dip. To
me the whole idea is as revolting as it is incredible. Why, above a
century—no, no! And on the other hand, how easily one’s fancy builds! A
few straws and there’s a nest and squawking fledglings, all complete. Is that why—is that why that good, practical wife of yours and all your
faithful household have absconded? Does it’—he threw up his head as if
towards the house above them—‘does it _reek_ with him?’

Lawford shook his head. ‘She hasn’t seen him: not—not apart. I haven’t
told her.’

Mr Bethany tossed the hugger-mugger of pamphlets across the table. ‘Then, for simple sanity’s sake, don’t. Hide it; burn it; put the thing
completely out of your mind. A friend! Who, where is this wonderful
friend?’

‘Not very far from Widderstone. He lives—practically alone.’

‘And all that stumbling and muttering on the stairs?’ he leant forward
almost threateningly. ‘There isn’t anybody here, Lawford?’

‘Oh, no,’ said Lawford. ‘We are practically alone with this, you know,’
he pointed to the book, and smiled frankly, however faintly. Again Mr Bethany sank into a fixed yet uneasy reverie, and again shook
himself and raised his eyes. ‘Well then,’ he said, in a voice all but morose in its fretfullness,
‘what I suggest is that first you keep quiet here; and next, that you
write and get your wife back. You say you are better. I think you said
she herself noticed a slight improvement. Isn’t it just exactly as I
foresaw? And yet she’s gone! But that’s not our business. Get her back. And don’t for a single instant waste a thought on the other; not for a
single instant, I implore you, Lawford. And in a week the whole thing
will be no more than a dreary, preposterous dream.... You don’t
_answer_ me!’ he cried impulsively. ‘But can one so easily forget a dream like this?’

‘You don’t speak out, Lawford; you mean _she_ won’t.’

‘It must at least seem to have been in part of my own seeking, or
contriving; or at any rate—she said it—of my own hereditary or
unconscious deserving.’

‘She said that!’ Mr Bethany sat back. ‘I see, I see,’ he said. ‘I’m
nothing but a fumbling old meddler. And there was I, not ten minutes
ago, preaching for all I was worth on a text I knew nothing about. God
bless me, Lawford, how long we take a-learning. I’ll say no more. But
what an illusion. To think this—this—he laid a long lean hand at arm’s
length flat upon the table towards his friend—‘to think this is our old
jog-trot Arthur Lawford! From henceforth I throw you over, you old wolf
in sheep’s wool. I wash my hands of you. And now where am I going to
sleep?’

He covered up his age and weariness for an instant with a small crooked
hand. Lawford took a deep breath. ‘You’re going, old friend, to sleep at
home. And I—I’m going to give you my arm to the Vicarage gate. Here I
am, immeasurably relieved, fitter than I’ve been since I was a dolt of
a schoolboy. On my word of honour: I can’t say why, but I am. I don’t
care _that_, vicar, honestly—puffed up with spiritual pride. If a man
can’t sleep with pride for a bed-fellow, well, he’d better try
elsewhere. It’s no good; I’m as stubborn as a mule; that’s at least a
relic of the old Adam. I care no more,’ he raised his voice firmly and
gravely—‘I don’t care a jot for solitude, not a jot for all the ghosts
of all the catacombs!’

Mr. Bethany listened, grimly pursed up his lips. ‘Not a jot for all the
ghosts of all the catechisms!’ he muttered. ‘Nor the devil himself, I
suppose?’ He turned once more to glance sharply in the direction of the
face he could so dimly—and of set purpose—discern; and without a word
trotted off into the hall. Lawford followed with the candle. ‘’Pon my word, you haven’t had a mouthful of supper. Let me forage;
just a quarter of an hour, eh?’

‘Not me,’ said Mr Bethany; ‘if you won’t have me, home I go. I refuse
to encourage this miserable grass-widowering. What _would_ they say? What would the busybodies say? Ghouls and graves and shocking
mysteries—Selina! Sister Anne! Come on.’

He shuffled on his hat and caught firm hold of his knobbed umbrella. ‘Better not leave a candle,’ he said. Lawford blew out the candle. ‘What? What?’ called the old man suddenly. But no voice had spoken. A thin trickle of light from the lamp in the street stuck up through
the fanlight as, with a smile that could be described neither as
mischievous, saturnine, nor vindictive, and was yet faintly suggestive
of all three, Lawford quietly opened the drawing-room door and put down
the candlestick on the floor within. ‘What on earth, my good man, are you fumbling after now?’ came the
almost fretful question from under the echoing porch. ‘Coming, coming,’ said Lawford, and slammed the door behind them. CHAPTER SIXTEEN


The first faint streaks of dawn were silvering across the stars when
Lawford again let himself into his deserted house. He stumbled down to
the pantry and cut himself a crust of bread and cheese, and ate it,
sitting on the table, watching the leafy eastern sky through the
painted bars of the area window. He munched on, hungry and tired. His
night walk had cooled head and heart. Having obstinately refused Mr
Bethany’s invitation to sleep at the Vicarage, he had sat down on an
old low wall, and watched until his light had shone out at his bedroom
window.