Gaudy Night (15 page)

Harriet thought the theory far-fetched; but it interested her, as evidence of the speaker’s prejudice, which amounted almost to obsession.

“The thing that in my opinion points to a man,” went on Miss Hillyard, “is the destruction of Miss Barton’s book, which is strongly pro-feminist. I don’t suppose you have read it; probably it would not interest you. But why else should that book be picked out?”

Harriet parted from Miss Hillyard at the corner of the quad and went over to Tudor Building. She had not very much doubt who it was that was likely to offer opposition to her inquiries. If one was looking for a twisted mind, Miss Hillyard’s was certainly a little warped. And, when one came to think of it, there was no evidence whatever that Miss Lydgate’s proofs had ever been taken to the Library or ever left Miss Hillyard’s hands at all. Also, she had undoubtedly been seen on the threshold of the S.C.R. before Chapel on the Monday morning. If Miss Hillyard was sufficiently demented to inflict a blow of this kind on Miss Lydgate, then she was fit for a lunatic asylum. But indeed, this would apply to whoever it was.

She went into Tudor and tapped on Miss Barton’s door, asking, when she was admitted, whether she might borrow a copy of
Woman’s Place in the Modern State.

“The sleuth at work?” said Miss Barton. “Well, Miss Vane, here it is. By the way, I should like to apologise to you for some of the things I said when you were here last. I shall be very glad to see you handle this most unpleasant business, which can scarcely be an agreeable thing for you. I admire exceedingly anyone who can subordinate her own feelings to the common advantage. The case is obviously pathological—as all anti-social behaviour is, in my opinion. But here there is no question of legal proceedings, I imagine. At least, I hope not. I feel extremely anxious that it should
not
be brought into court; and on that account I am against hiring detectives of any kind. If you are able to get to the bottom of it, I am ready to give you any help I can.”

Harriet thanked the Fellow for her good opinion and for the book.

“You are probably the best psychologist here,” said Harriet. “What do you think of it?”

“Probably the usual thing: a morbid desire to attract attention and create a public uproar. The adolescent and the middle-aged are the most likely suspects. I should very much doubt whether there is much more to it than that. Beyond, I mean, that the incidental obscenities point to some kind of sexual disturbance. But that is a commonplace in cases of this kind. But whether you ought to look for a man-hater or a man-trap,” added Miss Barton, with the first glimmer of humour Harriet had ever seen in her, “I can’t tell you.”

Having put away her various acquisitions in her own room, Harriet thought it was time to go and see the Dean. She found Miss Burrows with her, very tired and dusty after coping with the Library, and being refreshed with a glass of hot milk, to which Miss Martin insisted on adding just a dash of whisky to induce slumber.

“What new light one gets on the habits of the S.C.R. when one’s an old student,” said Harriet, “I always imagined that there was only one bottle or ardent spirits in the college, kept under lock and key by the Bursar for life-and-death emergencies.”

“It used to be so,” said the Dean, “but I’m getting frivolous in my old age. Even Miss Lydgate cherishes a small stock of cherry brandy, for high-days and holidays. The Bursar is even thinking of laying down a little port for the College.”

“Great Scott!” said Harriet.

“The students are not supposed to imbibe alcohol,” said the Dean, “but I shouldn’t like to go bail for the contents of all the cupboards in College.”

“After all,” said Miss Burrows, “their tiresome parents bring them up to cocktails and things at home, so it probably seems ridiculous to them that they shouldn’t do the same thine here.”

“And what can one do about it! Make a police search through their belongings? Well, I flatly refuse. We can’t keep the place like a gaol.”

“The trouble is,” said the Librarian, “that everybody sneers at restrictions and demands freedom, till something annoying happens; then they demand angrily what has become of the discipline.”

“You can’t exercise the old kind of discipline in these days,” said the Dean; “it’s too bitterly resented.”

“The modern idea is that young people should discipline themselves,” said the Librarian. “But do they?”

“No; they won’t. Responsibility bores ’em. Before the War they passionately had College Meetings about everything. Now, they won’t be bothered. Half the old institutions, like the College debates and the Third Year Play, are dead or moribund. They don’t want responsibility.”

“They’re all taken up with their young men,” said Miss Burrows.

“Drat their young men,” said the Dean. “In my day, we simply thirsted for responsibility. We’d all been sat on at school for the good of our souls, and came up bursting to show how brilliantly we could organise things when we were put in charge.”

“If you ask me,” said Harriet, “it’s the fault of the schools. Free discipline and so on. Children are sick to death of running things and doing prefect duty; and when they get up to Oxford they’re tired out and only want to sit back and let somebody else run the show. Even in my time, the people from the up-to-date republican schools were shy of taking office, poor brutes.”

“It’s all very difficult,” said Miss Burrows with a yawn. “However, I did get my Library volunteers to do a job of work today. We’ve got most of the shelves decently filled, and the pictures hung and the curtains up. It looks very well. I hope the Chancellor will be impressed. They haven’t finished painting the radiators downstairs, but I’ve bundled the paint-pots and things into a cupboard and hoped for the best. And I borrowed a squad of scouts to clean up, so as not to leave anything to be done tomorrow.”

“What time does the Chancellor arrive?” asked Harriet.

“Twelve o’clock; reception in the S.C.R. and show him round the College. Then lunch in Hall, and I hope he enjoys it. Ceremony at 2:30. And then push him off to catch the 3:45. Delightful man; but I am getting fed up with Openings. We’ve opened the New Quad, the Chapel (with choral service), the S.C.R. Dining-Room (with lunch to former tutors and Fellows), the Tudor Annexe (with Old Students’ Tea), the Kitchens and Scouts’ Wing (with Royalty), the Sanatorium (with address by the Lister Professor of Medicine), the Council-Chamber, and the Warden’s Lodgings, and we’ve unveiled the late Warden’s Portrait, the Willett Memorial Sundial and the New Clock. And now it’s the Library. Padgett said to me last term, when we were making those alterations in Queen Elizabeth, ‘Excuse me, madam dean, miss, but could you tell me, miss, the date of the Opening?’ ‘What Opening, Padgett?’ said I. ‘We aren’t opening anything this term. What is there to open?’ ‘Well, miss,’ says Padgett, ‘I was thinking of these here new lavatories, if you’ll excuse me, madam Dean, miss. We’ve opened everything there was to open up to the present, miss, and if there was to be a Ceremony, miss, it would be convenient if I was to know in good time, on account of arranging for taxis and parking accommodation.’”

“Dear Padgett!” said Miss Burrows. “He’s the brightest spot in this academy.” She yawned again. “I’m dead.”

“Take her away to bed. Miss Vane,” said the Dean, “and we’ll call it a day.”

Often when they were gone to Bed, the inner doors were flung open, as also the Doors of a Cupboard which stood in the Hall; and this with a great deal of Violence and Noise. And one Night the Chairs, which when they went to Bed stood all in the Chimney-corner, were all removed and placed in the middle of the Room in very good order, and a Meal-sieve hung upon one cut full of Holes, and a Key of an inner Door upon another. And in the Day-time, as they sate in the House spinning, they could see the Bam-doors often flung open, but not by whom. Once, as Alice sate spinning the Rock or Distaff leapt several times out of the Wheel into the middle of the room... with much more such ridiculous stuff as this is, which would be tedious to relate.

—WILLIAM TURNER

“Peter,” said Harriet. And with the sound of her own voice she came drowsing and floating up out of the strong circle of his arms, through a green sea of sun-dappled beech leaves into darkness.

“Oh, damn, said Harriet softly to herself. “Oh, damn. And I didn’t want to wake up.”

The clock in the New Quad struck three musically.

“This won’t do,” said Harriet. “This really will not do. My sub-conscious has a most treacherous imagination.” She groped for the switch of her bedside lamp. “It’s disquieting to reflect that one’s dreams never symbolise one’s real wishes, but always something Much Worse.” She turned the light on and sat up.

“If I really wanted to be passionately embraced by Peter, I should dream of something like dentists or gardening. I wonder what are the unthinkable depths of awfulness that can only be expressed by the polite symbol of Peters embraces. Damn Peter! I wonder what he would do about a case like this.”

This brought her mind back to the evening in the Egotists’ Club and the anonymous letter; and thence back to his absurd fury with the sticking-plaster.

“... but my mind being momentarily on my job...”

You’d think he was quite bird-witted, sometimes, she thought. But he does keep his mind on the job, when he’s doing it. One’s mind on the job. Yes. What am I doing, letting my mind stray all over the place. Is this a job, or isn’t it?... Suppose the Poison-Pen is on its rounds now, dropping letters at people’s doors... Whose door, though? One can’t watch all the doors... I ought to be sitting up at the window, keeping an eye open for creeping figures in the quad... Somebody ought to do it—but who’s to be trusted? Besides, dons have their jobs to do; they can’t sit up all night and work all day... The job... keeping one’s mind on the job...

She was out of bed now and pulling the window curtains aside. There was moon and nothing at all to be seen. Not even a late essay-writer seemed to be burning the midnight lamp. Anybody could go anywhere on a dark night like this, she thought to herself. She could scarcely see even the outline of the roofs of Tudor on her right or the dark bulk of the New Library jutting out on her left from behind the Annexe.

The Library; with not a soul in it.

She put on a dressing-gown and opened her door softly. It was bitterly cold. She found the wall-switch and went down the central corridor of the Annexe, past a row of doors behind which students were sleeping and dreaming of goodness knew what—examinations, sports, undergraduates, parties, all the queer jumble of things that are summed up as “activities.” Outside their doors lay little heaps of soiled crockery for the scouts to collect and wash. Also shoes. On the doors were cards, bearing their names: Miss H. Brown, Miss Jones, Miss Colburn, Miss Szleposky, Miss Isaacson—so many unknown quantities. So many destined wives and mothers of the race; or, alternatively, so many potential historians, scientists, school-teachers, doctors, lawyers; as you liked to think one thing of more importance than the other. At the end of the passage was a large window, hygienically open at top and bottom. Harriet gently pushed up the bottom sash and looked out, shivering. And suddenly she knew that whatever reason or instinct had led her to look at the Library had taken a very just view of the situation. The New Library should have been quite dark. It was not. One of the long windows was split from top to bottom by a narrow band of light.

Harriet thought rapidly. If this was Miss Burrows, carrying on legitimately (though at an unreasonable and sacrificial hour) with her preparations, why had she troubled to draw the curtains? The windows had been curtained, because a Library that faces south must have some protection against strong sunlight. But it would be absurd for the Librarian to protect herself and her proper functions from scrutiny in the middle of a dark March night. College authorities were not so secretive as all that. Something was up. Should one go and investigate on one’s own, or rouse somebody else?

One thing was clear; if it was a member of the S.C.R. lurking behind those curtains, it would not be politic to bring a student to witness the discovery. What dons slept in Tudor? Without consulting the list, Harriet remembered that Miss Barton and Miss Chilperic had rooms there, but on the far side of the building. Here was an opportunity to check up on them, at any rate. With a last glance at the Library window, Harriet made her way quickly back past her own room on the Bridge and through into the main building. She cursed herself for not having a torch; she was delayed by fumbling with the switches. Along the corridor, past the stair-head and round to the left. No don on that floor; it must be on the floor below. Back, and down the stairs and along to the left again. She was leaving all the passage-lights burning behind her, and wondered whether they would arouse attention in other buildings. At last. A door on her left labelled “Miss Barton.” And the door stood open.

She knocked at it sharply, and went in. The sitting-room was empty. Beyond it, the bedroom door stood open too. “Gracious! said Harriet. “Miss Barton!” There was no reply; and, looking in, she saw that the bedroom was as empty as the sitting-room. The bed-clothes were flung back and the bed had been slept in; but the sleeper had risen and gone.

It was easy to think of an innocent explanation. Harriet stood for a moment, considering; and then called to mind that the window of the room overlooked the quad. The curtains were drawn back; she looked out into the darkness. The light still shone in the Library window; but while she looked, it went out.

She ran back to the foot of the stair and through the entrance-hall. The front door of the building was ajar. She pulled it open and ran out and across the quad. As she ran, something seemed to loom up ahead of her. She made for it and closed with it. It caught her in a muscular grip.

“Who’s that?” demanded Harriet, fiercely.

“And who’s
that?
”

The grip of one hand was released and a torch was switched on into Harriet’s face.

“Miss Vane! What are you doing here?”