Charles Palliser (144 page)

“Don’t ask me, Great-aunt. I have withdrawn my prohibition but I have not said that I approve.”

“Very well, then you and I, John, will do our best alone. First of all, please explain exactly what happened when you and your poor friend tried to open the hiding-place.”

Henrietta looked at me sharply and I blushed. Miss Lydia realized what she had revealed and glanced timidly at her great-niece. There was nothing for it and Henrietta had to hear the whole story. When we had done, she said nothing but looked thoughtful.

So now I began to describe the design of the “quincunx of quincunxes” on 660 THE

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the entablature of the chimney-piece which Mr Digweed and I had discovered was a lock, while all the time Henrietta sat with a book in her lap, glancing towards us occasionally. As I went over our actions that night, Miss Lydia found a large sheet of paper and a pen and, sitting at the little round-table, I drew the design of twenty-five quatre-foils.

“There appear to be twenty-five bolts,” I explained, “each representing the bud of one of the quatre-foils of the design. We found that each bolt may be drawn out several inches, for we did this to all of them. But nothing happened, and it seems that only certain of the bolts must be withdrawn. I suspect that if any superfluous ones are moved, they serve actually to lock the slab of marble more firmly in place.”

“Or do worse than that!” Miss Lydia said and I nodded, not understanding what she meant but anxious to continue.

“So I believe,” I went on, “that the solution lies in establishing precisely which combination of bolts should be drawn out.”

“The quincunx of roses,” said Miss Lydia, “is the device of both the Huffams and the Mompessons, but I am not sure that I have ever seen such an arrangement as this quincunx of quincunxes, as you aptly called it. Though it seems familiar.”

“I know the quincunx, too,” Henrietta said, looking up from her book; “for it appears on some worthless pieces of china that I inherited from my parents. (Everything of any value was sold before I knew anything of it.) So I suppose it must have been on the Palphramond coat-of-arms, too.”

“I believe,” Miss Lydia said, “that all the families descended from Sir Henry Huffam

— the Palphramond and even the Maliphant families — adopted variants of the quincunx. I have even heard, John, that the Clothiers took it for their blazon when Nicholas changed his name from Abraham and applied for a grant of arms.”

“Then this design,” I said, indicating my drawing, “appears to me to be a kind of monstrous assertion of the triumph of the Mompesson branch of the family over the rest of it.”

Miss Lydia seemed about to speak but Henrietta said, laying down her book: “There is a difference, however. For although it seems that the design of the different quincunxes in each of the family’s devices is identical, the colours are not the same, are they?”

“Colours?” Miss Lydia exclaimed. “The correct term is ‘tinctures’.”

Seeing that Henrietta’s point was important, I said : “In the Huffam version of the device — which is surely the original and which I have seen on the family vault in Melthorpe church-yard — the four quatre-foils at the corners have white petals and a black bud, while the arrangement of tinctures of the central quatre-foil is precisely reversed: black petals and a white bud.”

As I spoke I took the quill and inked in the appropriate parts of the first figure of the design.

“And,” Miss Lydia said, “the Mompesson design is precisely the same except that the central quatre-foil has red petals — ‘gules’ in the language of heraldry. (Black is ‘sable’, you know, and white is ‘argent’.)”

She likewise inked in the next figure, blacking the buds of the four quatre-foils at the corners as I had done, and then covering with dots the petals of the central one to represent red.

“I remember my father telling me,” she went on, “that the original device of MARRIAGE DESIGNS

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the Mompessons was the
crab gules.
He made up a new device by combining the Huffam blazon with it. So our shield has a crab and the quincunx of quatre-foils like the Huffam design, except that the central one is in gules to distinguish — or ‘difference’ —

it. But you know, John, the quincunx of quincunxes represents not the triumph of the Mompessons over the other branches, but the union of the two founding families.”

Before I could answer this, Henrietta said : “The tinctures of the Palphramond design are the same as those of the Mompesson one.”

“And I believe the Maliphant design is identical t* the Huffam,” Miss Lydia said.

Henrietta came across to the table and looked over my shoulder: “Then I believe that we are beginning to solve the puzzle.”

“Why do you say that?” I asked.

“Because I suspect that the answer to the question of which of the bolts should be withdrawn lies in the different tinctures.”

“Yes,” I exclaimed. “I believe you may be right.”

“I’m only a very foolish old woman,” said Miss Lydia smiling, “so I do not understand unless you explain it to me very slowly.”

“Well,” Henrietta began, “it seems that the petals of every quatre-foil may be black or white or red. But notice that in both designs the bud is always black or white, never red.

What I’m suggesting is that this choice may correspond to the possible positions of each bolt: if black it should be withdrawn, if white left in position.”

“Or, of course, vice versa,” I said.

“Yes, that is true, I’m afraid,” Henrietta said. “It must be quite arbitrary.”

“I begin to see,” Miss Lydia said. “And this is exactly the kind of puzzle that my father used to love, for he had a passion for designs and conundrums and heraldry, and I believe it must have been he who devised this pattern in order to celebrate the alliance of the two families. (Indeed, I’m certain I once saw a memento of the wedding that looked like this.) So if I have understood you, the choice of which part of the design should be which tincture depends on how the three tinctures of the Huffam and Mompesson quincunxes have been incorporated to form this larger design?”

“That is so,” I said. “But is there any way we can work that out or is it entirely arbitrary and at hazard?”

“From what I recall of what my father told me, it is a principle of heraldry,” Miss Lydia said, “that nothing should be arbitrary. For one thing, the design should be …

What’s the word? Like the reflection in a looking-glass?”

“Symmetrical!” Henrietta exclaimed.

“Yes!” I cried. “That is a great help. For the other two designs are merely replicas of the first two. So let me draw them in and let us see what results.”

I began to do so but Miss Lydia cried: “Don’t make those directly opposite mirror each other. Make the diagonals do so. That is much more like true heraldry.”

Seeing that she was right, I added to the design before us so that the first and fifth quincunxes and the second and third reflected each other.

“The difficulty with that,” Henrietta pointed out, “is that we have quite arbitrarily assumed that the first quincunx is the Huffam crest and the second is the Mompesson version of it. It might easily be the other way around.”

“Surely not,” I protested, “for the Huffam crest is the original motif and 662 THE

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that family is the more ancient, so that it might fairly be assumed to be the point of departure.”

“On the other hand, since it was a Mompesson who devised it,” Miss Lydia suggested rather tartly, “one might expect that my family’s version of the quincunx would be not the first but the central one.”

“Or the Huffams’!” I objected.

“I had no intention of provoking another round in the feud,” Henrietta said, smiling, and Miss Lydia and I laughed uneasily. “But if we are right that the other four designs reflect each other, then the central one must surely be different from them in order to maintain the logic of the pattern. And in that case, whether the Huffam or the Mompesson is the first makes no odds, for the tinctures of the buds are white in each case and it is only the petals that differ.”

“Yes,” I said in excitement. “And that suggests that it is those four central bolts that should be withdrawn.”

“Or,” Henrietta said teazingly, “that it is they which should not be withdrawn.”

I had to admit that she was right.

“In that case,” I said, “I could pull out all the ‘white’ bolts except the central one and then pull that one out. And if that didn’t work, try it the other way around.”

“No!” the old lady cried, looking at me in alarm. “For there is a rumour that the lock incorporates a device of the kind which the French call a
machine-infernale.
A booby-trap. It was added after your attempt.”

“Do you mean it would be triggered if someone tried to force it?” I asked.

“Or,” she answered, “if the wrong bolts were withdrawn.”

“I see,” I said. “And what would be the consequence?”

“I have heard that there is a spring-gun inside which has been adapted from a gamekeeper’s man-trap.”

I recalled what Harry had told me of the fate of his and Sukey’s father, and shuddered.

“But I have also been told,” Miss Lydia went on, “that it is only an alarm-bell that is released.”

“Then we must decide if the central bolt is white like the others or black, so that I know at least whether the bolt should be in the same position as them or not.”

“I think it must be black,” Henrietta said. “For if it were white then the design of the central figure would be the same as the Mompesson and Palphramond designs which would surely not be right. It will only be different if it is black.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “But in order to be sure, we need to know how the two original designs are merged in that one.”

“I should be able to work that out,” Miss Lydia said, laughing, “for I am myself the sole living result of the alliance between the Huffams and the Mompessons. My father had many books and papers concerned with genealogy and heraldry which must still be in the Library. I will hunt through them and try to find a clew.”

“But even if we could work it out,” Henrietta asked, apparently having quite forgotten her original disclaimer of interest; “how will you manage to get into the Great Parlour?”

“If necessary, I could pick the lock of the door (provided that my friend, Joey, brings me the tool I need), but that might take a long time so it would MARRIAGE DESIGNS

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be better to get the keys. But there is a difficulty in stealing them from the nightwatchman …”

“Because he hides them!” Miss Lydia exclaimed.

“Precisely,” I said. “However, I believe I may be able to secure them, for I have a suspicion about them. But the real difficulty lies in getting out of the house afterwards. I cannot pick the locks of either the back-door or the street-door, and the first-floor windows are now barred.”

“But surely if you have the keys you can escape through either door ! “ Henrietta exclaimed.

“No, for the street-door has a second lock, the key to which is not held by the nightwatchman but only by members of the family.”

“That, too, was added after the burglary,” Miss Lydia put in.

“And unlocking the back-door would only get me as far as the yard,” I continued. “To get into the mews I would have to go through the coach-house and stables which are themselves securely locked at night and, moreover, the coachman and grooms sleep there.”

“Then there is no way out?” Henrietta asked.

“By night, no. Therefore if I can find them, I will use the keys to get into the Great Parlour, return them, and wait until the nightwatchman unlocks the back-door to let the laundry-maid in. About two hours after that the coachman unlocks the coach-house and then I can escape.”

Henrietta shivered : “You mean you will be waiting inside the house with the will in your possession and the knowledge that at any moment the opening of the hiding-place might be discovered?”

“Yes, it will not be pleasant. But there is little likelihood of its happening at that early hour.”

“Why do you believe you will succeed in finding the keys?” Miss Lydia asked.

“Well, when I tried to sleep in the scullery on my first night, Jakeman moved me away from there and yet that is not where he sleeps himself. So I believe that is where he hides them.”

“What will you do afterwards?” Miss Lydia asked.

“I will go back to my friends, the Digweeds, and then take steps to lay the will before the Court.”

“Be very careful, for my nevy’s solicitor, Mr Barbellion, has an intelligencer close to the Court. I have heard them speaking of it.”

“Do not fear,” I said. “I will not let the will out of my sight until I place it in the hands of the Lord Chancellor himself.”

They laughed and Miss Lydia said: “It should be someone almost as elevated. But dressed as you are, you will not get beyond the door-keeper.”

“I have a friend I mean to go to who will help me.”

“But you must allow me to give you some money,” she insisted.

“I cannot accept it,” I said, surprised that she had any and guessing that it would be very little.

“Yes, you can. For Henrietta’s sake if not your own. And for mine and John Umphraville’s.”

She opened a small wash-leather-bag which was lying on the table and turned out its contents so that a clinking shower of bright sovereigns scattered across the sheets of paper on which we had attempted to solve the problem of the quincunx.

“Great-aunt!” Henrietta cried. “Wherever did you get this?”

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The old lady smiled. “That is fifty-one pounds,” she said with modest triumph, putting the coins back.

“But what did you sell?” Henrietta asked and we both looked round the room. I could see none of the usual objects missing, but I knew that not one of them, nor all of them together, could amount to a sum a quarter this one.

“Let that be my secret,” said Miss Lydia.

Henrietta looked penetratingly at the old lady who, to my surprise, began to blush.

“I believe I understand,” Henrietta said. “Will you not get into terrible trouble? And what will you live on from now on?”