I may mention, by the way,
that shortly after you saw me I succeeded to a small income. An uncle
died, and proved unexpectedly generous.' 'Ah, I see. That must have been convenient.' 'It was pleasant--undeniably pleasant. I have always considered it in
the light of an endowment of my researches. I told you I was a man of
letters; it would, perhaps, be more correct to describe myself as a man
of science.' 'Dear me, Dyson, you have really changed very much in the last few
years. I had a notion, don't you know, that you were a sort of idler
about town, the kind of man one might meet on the north side of
Piccadilly every day from May to July.' 'Exactly. I was even then forming myself, though all unconsciously. You
know my poor father could not afford to send me to the University. I
used to grumble in my ignorance at not having completed my education. That was the folly of youth, Salisbury; my University was Piccadilly. There I began to study the great science which still occupies me.' 'What science do you mean?' 'The science of the great city; the physiology of London; literally and
metaphysically the greatest subject that the mind of man can conceive. What an admirable _salmi_ this is; undoubtedly the final end of the
pheasant. Yet I feel sometimes positively overwhelmed with the thought
of the vastness and complexity of London. Paris a man may get to
understand thoroughly with a reasonable amount of study; but London is
always a mystery. In Paris you may say: "Here live the actresses, here
the Bohemians, and the _Ratés_"; but it is different in London. You may
point out a street, correctly enough, as the abode of washerwomen; but,
in that second floor, a man may be studying Chaldee roots, and in the
garret over the way a forgotten artist is dying by inches.' 'I see you are Dyson, unchanged and unchangeable,' said Salisbury,
slowly sipping his Chianti. 'I think you are misled by a too fervid
imagination; the mystery of London exists only in your fancy. It seems
to me a dull place enough. We seldom hear of a really artistic crime in
London, whereas I believe Paris abounds in that sort of thing.' 'Give me some more wine. Thanks. You are mistaken, my dear fellow, you
are really mistaken. London has nothing to be ashamed of in the way of
crime. Where we fail is for want of Homers, not Agamemnons. _Carent quia
vate sacro_, you know.' 'I recall the quotation. But I don't think I quite follow you.' 'Well, in plain language, we have no good writers in London who make a
speciality of that kind of thing. Our common reporter is a dull dog;
every story that he has to tell is spoilt in the telling. His idea of
horror and of what excites horror is so lamentably deficient. Nothing
will content the fellow but blood, vulgar red blood, and when he can get
it he lays it on thick, and considers that he has produced a telling
article. It's a poor notion. And, by some curious fatality, it is the
most commonplace and brutal murders which always attract the most
attention and get written up the most. For instance, I dare say that
you never heard of the Harlesden case?' 'No; no, I don't remember anything about it.' 'Of course not. And yet the story is a curious one. I will tell it you
over our coffee. Harlesden, you know, or I expect you don't know, is
quite on the out-quarters of London; something curiously different from
your fine old crusted suburb like Norwood or Hampstead, different as
each of these is from the other. Hampstead, I mean, is where you look
for the head of your great China house with his three acres of land and
pine-houses, though of late there is the artistic substratum; while
Norwood is the home of the prosperous middle-class family who took the
house "because it was near the Palace," and sickened of the Palace six
months afterwards; but Harlesden is a place of no character. It's too
new to have any character as yet. There are the rows of red houses and
the rows of white houses and the bright green Venetians, and the
blistering doorways, and the little backyards they call gardens, and a
few feeble shops, and then, just as you think you're going to grasp the
physiognomy of the settlement, it all melts away.' 'How the dickens is that? the houses don't tumble down before one's
eyes, I suppose!' 'Well, no, not exactly that. But Harlesden as an entity disappears. Your
street turns into a quiet lane, and your staring houses into elm trees,
and the back-gardens into green meadows. You pass instantly from town to
country; there is no transition as in a small country town, no soft
gradations of wider lawns and orchards, with houses gradually becoming
less dense, but a dead stop. I believe the people who live there mostly
go into the City. I have seen once or twice a laden 'bus bound
thitherwards. But however that may be, I can't conceive a greater
loneliness in a desert at midnight than there is there at midday. It is
like a city of the dead; the streets are glaring and desolate, and as
you pass it suddenly strikes you that this too is part of London. Well,
a year or two ago there was a doctor living there; he had set up his
brass plate and his red lamp at the very end of one of those shining
streets, and from the back of the house, the fields stretched away to
the north. I don't know what his reason was in settling down in such an
out-of-the-way place, perhaps Dr. Black, as we will call him, was a
far-seeing man and looked ahead. His relations, so it appeared
afterwards, had lost sight of him for many years and didn't even know he
was a doctor, much less where he lived. However, there he was settled in
Harlesden, with some fragments of a practice, and an uncommonly pretty
wife. People used to see them walking out together in the summer
evenings soon after they came to Harlesden, and, so far as could be
observed, they seemed a very affectionate couple. These walks went on
through the autumn, and then ceased; but, of course, as the days grew
dark and the weather cold, the lanes near Harlesden might be expected to
lose many of their attractions. All through the winter nobody saw
anything of Mrs. Black; the doctor used to reply to his patients'
inquiries that she was a "little out of sorts, would be better, no
doubt, in the spring." But the spring came, and the summer, and no Mrs.
Black appeared, and at last people began to rumour and talk amongst
themselves, and all sorts of queer things were said at "high teas,"
which you may possibly have heard are the only form of entertainment
known in such suburbs. Dr. Black began to surprise some very odd looks
cast in his direction, and the practice, such as it was, fell off before
his eyes. In short, when the neighbours whispered about the matter, they
whispered that Mrs. Black was dead, and that the doctor had made away
with her. But this wasn't the case; Mrs. Black was seen alive in June.