Adders on the Heath

'Did you, now?' she said. 'Well, you read them before you burnt them. Did they add to the total of the world's knowledge?'

'They were a lot of damned lies,' sobbed the child.

'So much is obvious. Be specific,' said Dame Beatrice.

'What's that?' He sat up, master of himself again.

'You know!' retorted Dame Beatrice, who had learned this cliche from her secretary.

They said he...well, you know!' said Clive, adroitly turning the tables.

'And you know that this was not true?'

'That string-bean!'

'Really, Clive!' protested his mother.

'He does not lack stamina,' said Dame Beatrice; but whether she referred to Richardson or to Clive, neither the boy nor his mother could tell. Dame Beatrice did not beat about the bush. 'How well do you know some people named Campden-Towne?' she enquired of the woman. Her tone was abrupt and compelling. Mrs Maidston glanced at Clive. His eyes were venomous.

'Campden-Towne? Oh, well, yes, I suppose you might call them acquaintances of ours,' she said weakly. Clive made a very rude noise. She ignored it. 'Why do you ask?'

'There is some slight evidence that they may be able to shed a little light on Mr Richardson's activities when he discovered that a dead man had been placed in his tent. You have read about that, I am sure.'

'Well, I don't see what it has to do with us.'

'Yes, you do,' said Clive. 'You sacked Mr Richardson. That's what she's here about. She just wants to know why. It wasn't the letters, whatever you may say. You didn't have to believe the letters. They were phoney, and you jolly well know they were. You said yourself, a minute ago-'

'Be quiet, Clive! You weren't in the room-'

'No, but I listened outside the door,' observed the repellent but pathetic child. 'You ought to know me by now.'

'Indeed?' said his mother, very coldly, but with a terrified glance at Dame Beatrice. 'You are an untruthful, nasty-minded little boy and had better go to your room.'

The boy put out his tongue at her and accepted this advice. Left by themselves, the two women faced one another squarely.

Clive's mother fidgeted with a bracelet.

'He's such a little snooper,' she said.

'Well, now, why was Mr Richardson dismissed?' demanded Dame Beatrice. 'You are not going to tell me that you or your husband would jeopardise a young man's future because of some anonymous comments on his character?-comments which you yourself describe as filthy.'

'Well, of course, it wasn't only the letters. He was unsatisfactory,' said Mrs Maidston, hedging.

'As a tutor?'

'Oh, in other ways, too. He was quite disinclined to exert himself in any way which did not take his fancy.'

'Such as...?'

'Well, there seemed no reason why he should not have done a little secretarial work for my husband in the evenings, but would he help him?'

'I presume that he would not. Was it agreed beforehand that he should do so?'

'It couldn't have been, could it? Otherwise my husband would have insisted. One would have thought, though, that Mr Richardson might have stretched a point in order to help out. My husband is a very busy man.'

'How did Mr Richardson spend his evenings?'

'In his own room, mostly, using the electric light and the electric fire. Sometimes he switched on his wireless set.'

'His own property?'

'Oh, yes, but our electricity. It wasn't a battery set, you see. That young man had plenty of perks here.'

'How did he and your son get on together?'

'When you speak of Clive as my son, well, of course, he isn't. He is the child of a maid we used to have. It's not a formal adoption. She agreed to let us have him, but since then she has completely disappeared. We've tried to trace her, but without success.'

'You wish to adopt the boy?'

'I want to get rid of him. He's uncouth and unmannerly, as you saw for yourself. He's nothing but a tie, and he's so ungrateful for everything that's done for him that he doesn't deserve a good home.'

'But he and Mr Richardson seemed to hit it off, I gather. Why do you think that was?' The woman clasped her hands together.

'I have no idea,' she replied. 'Clive did not seem to be learning anything and his manners did not improve. In any case, I...there were things about Mr Richardson of which nobody could possibly approve. When he was not wasting our electricity in his own room, he was disporting himself at the local public house.'

'Disporting himself?'

'Beer, darts and, no doubt, flashy girls.'

'Ah, yes, no doubt. And the anonymous letters enlarged upon the importance in his life of the flashy girls, I suppose.'

'I suppose so, if you care to put it that way. Anyhow, what with Clive's lack of progress and the anonymous letters and these public house visits (all too frequent, I'm afraid), and his disobligingness towards my husband, and the waste of electricity with the consequent expense...well, I ask you!'

'Expense? I suppose, though, that, even allowing for the electricity plus Mr Richardson's salary, it was a good deal cheaper to keep Clive in tutors than to pay the fees at a preparatory school.'

'I have never considered the matter, and I am certain my husband has not.'

'I am sorry I could not meet him.' Dame Beatrice rose to take her leave. 'Thank you so much for receiving me. I have found our talk most informative and have enjoyed it very much.'

Clive's foster-mother rang the bell and directed a tousle-haired maid to show Dame Beatrice out. On the drive was the child. He sidled up to Dame Beatrice and cast conspiratorial glances round about.

'Hist!' he said. 'Do you read the Bible at all?'

'A most interesting library,' she replied.

'Yes, well, what about Potiphar's wife?' He leapt away, but, with a yellow claw of surprising strength, Dame Beatrice collared him.

'Before you return to your room, to which I believe you were sent by your mother,' she said, 'there is something I should be interested to know. There are two things, in fact.'

'I shall please myself whether I tell you.'

'Of course, Clive. That is understood.'

'You see,' said Clive, 'I'm a bastard.'

'So was the Duke of Orleans at the time of Joan of Arc. He was also a most able general. Then, of course, there is Shakespeare's King Lear, in which a bastard is one of the most important characters. But you were saying...?'

'Oh, nothing. What do you want to know?'

'Where you went to school and how you got on with Mr Richardson while he was your tutor.'

'My form-master, too. He saved me from a licking once, for something I hadn't done. He got the push later on, but I don't know why. My people took me away before he went. I was ever so surprised when he turned up here as my tutor.'

'Oh, dear! These coincidences!' said Dame Beatrice, disguising her delight at obtaining this valuable information. 'Well, good-bye, Clive. I hope we shall meet again at some future time. I suppose you weren't expelled from the school, were you?'

'Me? Don't give it a thought. Of course I wasn't. Mind you, I ought to have been, but nobody knew about that...no one at school, I mean, except-well, he took the money all right. I told them at home because I didn't want any mistakes.'

'What kind of mistakes?'

'Can't tell you that. I might get into serious trouble. Anyhow, they took them away and I've never set eyes on them since.'

'Although you have a key to Mr Maidston's desk?'

'He didn't put them in there. Oh, well, be seeing you!'

Dame Beatrice let him go and walked briskly back to her car. As she went she gave Potiphar's wife a moment's thought. Nothing could be more likely, she decided. She returned to the hotel, saw Laura, and enquired for Richardson. Laura informed her that the two young men were playing golf and that they expected to be back at the hotel in time for dinner but were unlikely to be earlier than that.