“That is out of my stars. I have not the philosophic mind.”
“And how would you define the philosophic mind, Lord Peter?”
“I wouldn’t, definitions are dangerous. But I know that philosophy is a closed book to me, as music is to the tone-deaf.”
The Warden looked at him quickly; he presented her with an innocent profile, drooping and contemplative over his plate, like a heron brooding by a pond.
“A very apt illustration,” said the Warden; “as it happens, I am tone-deaf myself.”
“Are you? I thought you might be,” he said, equably.
“That is very interesting. How can you tell?”
“There is something in the quality of the voice.” He offered candid grey eyes for examination. “But it’s not a very safe conclusion to draw, and, as you may have noticed, I didn’t draw it. That is the art of the charlatan-to induce a confession and present it as the result of deduction.”
“I see,” said Dr. Baring. “You expose your technique very frankly.”
“You would have seen through it in any case, so it is better to expose one’s self and acquire an unmerited reputation for candour. The great advantage about telling the truth is that nobody ever believes it-that is at the bottom of the λέγειν ώζ δεϊt.”
“So there is one philosopher whose books are not closed to you? Next time, I will start by way of Aristotle.”
She turned to her left-hand neighbor and released him.
“I am sorry,” said the Dean, “we have no strong drink to offer you.” His face was eloquent of mingled apprehension and mischief.
“The toad beneath the harrow knows where every separate tooth-point goes. Do you always prove your guests with hard questions?”
“Till they show themselves to be Solomons. You have passed the test with great credit.”
“Hush! there is only one kind of wisdom that has any social value, and that is the knowledge of one’s own limitations.”
“Nervous young dons and students have before now been carried out in convulsions through being afraid to say boldly that they did not know.”
“Showing themselves,” said Miss Pyke across the Dean, “less wise than Socrates, who made the admission fairly frequently.”
“For Heaven’s sake,” said Wimsey, “don’t mention Socrates. It might start all over again.”
“Not now,” said the Dean. “She will ask no questions now except for instruction.”
“There is a question on which I am anxious to be instructed,” said Miss Pyke, “if you will not take it amiss.”
Miss Pyke, of course, was still worried about Dr. Threep’s shirt-front, and determined on getting enlightenment. Harriet hoped that Wimsey would recognize her curiosity for what it was: not skittishness, but the embarrassing appetite for exact information which characterizes the scholarly mind.
“That phenomenon,” he said, readily, “comes within my own sphere of knowledge. It occurs because the human torso possesses a higher factor of variability than the ready-made shirt. The explosive sound you mention is produced when the shirt-front is slightly too long for the wearer. The stiff edges, being forced slightly apart by the inclination of the body, come back into contact with a sharp click, similar to that emitted by the elytra of certain beetles. It is not to be confused, however, with the ticking of the Deathwatch, which is made by tapping with the jaws and is held to be a love-call. The clicking of the shirt-front has no amatory significance, and is, indeed, an embarrassment to the insect. It may be obviated by an increased care in selection or, in extreme cases, by having the garment made to measure.”
“Thank you so much,” said Miss Pyke. “That is a most satisfactory explanation. At this time of day, it is perhaps not improper to adduce the parallel instance of the old-fashioned corset, which was subject to a similar inconvenience.”
“The inconvenience,” added Wimsey, “was even greater in the case of plate armour, which had to be very well tailored to allow of movement at all.”
At this point, Miss Barton captured Harriet’s attention with some remark or other, and she lost track of the conversation on the other side of the table. When she picked up the threads again, Miss Pyke was giving her neighbours some curious details about Ancient Minoan civilization, and the Warden was apparently waiting till she had finished to pounce on Peter again. Turning to her right, Harriet saw that Miss Hillyard was watching the group with a curiously concentrated expression. Harriet asked her to pass the sugar, and she came back to earth with a slight start.
“They seem to be getting on very well over there,” said Harriet.
“Miss Pyke likes an audience,” said Miss Hillyard, with so much venom that Harriet was quite astonished.
“It’s good for a man to have to do the listening sometimes,” she suggested.
Miss Hillyard agreed absently. After a slight pause, during which dinner proceeded without incident, she said:
“Your friend tells me he can obtain access for me to some private collections of historical documents in Florence. Do you suppose he means what he says?”
“If he says so, you may be sure he can and will.”
“That is a testimonial,” said Miss Hillyard. “I am very glad to hear it.”
Meanwhile, the Warden had effected her capture, and was talking to Peter in a low tone and with some earnestness. He listened attentively, while he peeled an apple, the narrow coils of the rind sliding slowly over his fingers. She concluded with some question; and he shook his head.
“It is very unlikely. I should say there was no hope of it at all.”
Harriet wondered whether the subject of the Poison-Pen had risen at last to the surface; but presently he said:
“Three hundred years ago it mattered comparatively little. But now that you have the age of national self-realization, the age of colonial expansion, the age of the barbarian invasions and the age of the decline and fall, all jammed cheek by jowl in time and space, all armed alike with poison-gas and going through the outward motions of an advanced civilization, principles have become more dangerous than passions. It’s getting uncommonly easy to kill people in large numbers, and the first thing a principle does-if it really is a principle-is to kill somebody.”
“‘The real tragedy is not the conflict of good with evil but of good with good’; that means a problem with no solution.”
“Yes. Afflicting, of course, to the tidy mind. One may either hulloo on the inevitable, and be called a bloodthirsty progressive; or one may try to gain time and be called a bloodthirsty reactionary. But when blood is their argument, all argument is apt to be-merely bloody.”
The Warden passed the adjective at its face-value.
“I sometimes wonder whether we gain anything by gaining time.”
“Well-if one leaves letters unanswered long enough, some of them answer themselves. Nobody can prevent the Fall of Troy, but a dull, careful person may manage to smuggle out the Lares and Penates-even at the risk of having the epithet pius tacked to his name.”
“The Universities are always being urged to march in the van of progress.”
“But epic actions are all fought by the rearguard-at Roncevaux and Thermopylae.”
“Very well,” said the Warden, laughing, “let us die in our tracks, having accomplished nothing but an epic.”
She collected the High Table with her eye, rose, and made a stately exit. Peter effaced himself politely against the panelling while the dons filed past him, arriving at the edge of the dais in time to pick up Miss Shaw’s scarf as it slipped from her shoulders. Harriet found herself descending the staircase between Miss Martin and Miss de Vine, who remarked:
“You are a courageous woman.”
“Why?” said Harriet lightly. “To bring my friends here and have them put to the question?”
“Nonsense,” interrupted the Dean. “We all behaved beautifully. Daniel is still uneaten-in fact, at one point he bit the lion. Was that genuine, by the way?”