No, of course not; that was absurd. The thing was criminal and he wouldn't touch it.
"It would be quite safe, you know," said a voice in him. "They wouldn't prosecute you even if they found out, because of the scandal. Loding said that."
"Shut up," he said. "The thing's criminal."
It might be amusing to go and see Loding act, one night. He had never met an actor before. It would be a new sensation to sit and watch the performance of someone you knew "off." How would Loding be as a partner?
"A very clever partner, believe me," said the voice.
"A plain bad lot," he said. "I don't want any part of him."
"You don't need any part of any of it," said the voice. "You have only to go to Latchetts and say: Take a look at me. Do I remind you of anyone? I was left on a doorstep on such-and-such a date, and as from to-day I want a job."
"Blackmail, 'm? And how much do you think I'd enjoy a job I'd blackmailed out of anyone? Don't be silly."
"They owe you something, don't they?"
"No, they don't. Not a bean."
"Oh, come off it! You're an Ashby and you know it."
"I don't know it. There have been doubles before. Hitler had several. Lots of famous people have doubles. The papers are for ever printing photographs of the humble doubles of great men. They all look like the great men with the character sponged out."
"Bunk. You're an Ashby. Where did you get your way with horses?"
"Lots of people have a way with horses."
"There were sixty-two kids at that orphanage, and did any of them go about spurning good jobs, and adoption by rich parents, so that they could find their way to horses?"
"I didn't know I was looking for horses."
"Of course you didn't know. Your Ashby blood knew."
"Oh, shut up."
To-morrow he would go down to Lewes and have a go at that jumping stable. He might be lame but he could still ride anything on four legs. They might be interested in someone who could ride at ten stone and didn't mind risking his neck.
"Risk your neck when you might be living in clover?"
"If it was clover I wanted I could have had it long ago."
"Ah, but not clover with horses in it."
"Shut up. You're wasting your time."
He began to undress, as if movement might put an end to the voice. Yes: he would go down to Lewes. It was a little too near his calf country, but no one would recognise him after those six years. It wouldn't really matter, of course, if they did; but he didn't want to go backwards.
"You could always say: Sorry, my name is Ashby," mocked the voice.
"Will you be quiet!"
As he hung his jacket over the back of the chair he thought about that young Ashby who had bowed out. With everything in the world to live for he had gone and thrown himself off a cliff. It didn't make sense. Did parents matter all that much?
"No, he was a poor thing, and you'd make a much better job of Latchetts in his place."
He poured cold water into the basin and washed vigorously; an orphanage training being almost as lasting as a Regular Service one. And as he towelled himself on the thin turkish-so old that it was limp-wet before he was dry-he thought: "I wouldn't like it, anyhow. Butlers, and things." His idea of English middle-class life being derived from American films.
Anyhow, the thing was unthinkable.
And he'd better stop thinking about it.
Someone had said that if you thought about the unthinkable long enough it became quite reasonable.
But he would go some time and see those photographs of Loding's. There was no harm in that.
He must see what his «twin» looked like.
He didn't like Loding much, but just going to see him could do no harm, and he did want to see photographs of Latchetts.
Yes, he would go to see Loding.
The day after to-morrow perhaps; after he had been to Lewes.
Or even to-morrow.
6
Mr. Sandal, of Cosset, Thring and Noble, was nearing the end of his afternoon's work and his mind was beginning its daily debate as to whether it should be the 4.55 or the 5.15 that should bear him home. This was almost the only debate that ever exercised Mr. Sandal's mind. The clients of Cosset, Thring and Noble were of two kinds only: those who made up their own minds about a problem and told their solicitors in firm tones what they wanted done, and those who had no problems. The even pulse of the Georgian office in the shadow of the plane trees was never quickened by unexpected news or untoward happenings. Even the death of a client was not news: clients were expected to die; the appropriate will would be in the appropriate deed-box and things would go on as before.
Family solicitors; that is what Cosset, Thring and Noble were. Keepers of wills and protectors of secrets; but not wrestlers with problems. Which is why Mr. Sandal was by no means the best person to take what was coming to him.
"Is that all, Mercer?" he said to his clerk, who had been showing a visitor out.
"There's one client in the waiting-room, sir. Young Mr. Ashby."
"Ashby? Of Latchetts?"
"Yes, sir."
"Oh, good; good. Bring in a pot of tea, Mercer, will you?"
"Yes, sir." And to the client: "Will you come in, sir?"
The young man came in.
"Ah, Simon, my dear boy," Mr. Sandal said, shaking hands with him, "I am delighted to see you. Are you up on business, or are you just — "
His voice died away uncertainly, and he stared, the gesture of his arm towards a chair arrested mid-way.
"God bless my soul," he said, "you are not Simon."
"No. I am not Simon."
"But-but you are an Ashby."
"If you think that, it makes things a whole lot easier for me."
"Yes? Do forgive me if I am a little confused. I didn't know that there were Ashby cousins."
"There aren't, as far as I know."
"No? Then-forgive me-which Ashby are you?"
"Patrick."
Mr. Sandal's neat mouth opened and shut like a goldfish's.
He stopped being a green thought in a green shade and became a very worried and staggered little lawyer.
For a long moment he looked into the light Ashby eyes so near his own without finding any words that seemed adequate to the occasion.
"I think we had better both sit down," he said at last. He indicated the visitors' chair, and subsided into his own with an air of being glad of an anchorage in a world suddenly at sea.
"Now, let us clarify the situation," he said. "The only Patrick Ashby died at the age of thirteen, some-let me see-eight years ago, it must be."
"What makes you think he died?"
"He committed suicide, and left a farewell note."
"Did the note mention suicide?"
"I am afraid I cannot recall the wording."
"Nor can I, exactly. But I can give you the sense of it. It said: 'I can't stand it any longer. Don't be angry with me. "
"Yes. Yes, that was the tenor of the message."
"And where in that is the mention of suicide?"
"The suggestion surely is-One would naturally infer-The letter was found on the cliff-top with the boy's coat."
"The cliff path is the short cut to the harbour."
"The harbour? You mean — "
"It was a running-away note; not a suicide one."
"But-but the coat?"
"You can't leave a note on the open down. The only way to leave it is in the pocket of something."
"Are you seriously suggesting that-that-that you are Patrick Ashby, and that you never committed suicide at all?"
The young man looked at him with those unrevealing eyes of his. "When I came in," he said, "you took me for my brother."
"Yes. They were twins. Not identical twins, but of course very — " The full implication of what he was saying came home to him. "God bless my soul, so I did. So I did."
He sat for a moment or two staring in a helpless fashion. And while he stared Mercer came in with the tea.