"He was now nicely placed. He'd disconnected the bell and discouraged intrusion. You'll have guessed what he did. He went into the drawin' room here, turned off the light, and sat down. He took an extremely heavy stonework jar, whose surface wouldn't take fingerprints, held it at full arms' length over his own head, and let it go. That was where he made the last, silliest mistake of his life."
Dr. Rich interrupted.
"Just a moment, Sir Henry! I don't quite understand this. All along you've been referring to him in the past tense. Now you say 'of his life.' Why?"
H.M. peered round. '
"Oh, son! Haven't they told you? Didn't you know?"
"Know what?"
"Hubert died from concussion of the brain early on Monday morning."
Rich whistled. "As bad as that?"
"It wouldn't have been for an ordinary person, no. But haven't you, as a medical man, seen his head? Those hollows at the temples? The bone formation? He's one of those blokes who have almost eggshell skulls. A blow which would only knock out you or me would kill him. But he didn't know it. And in all innocence, to prove the phantom outsider knocked him out, he held that lump of stone high over his head, and — killed him-self. Incidentally, for all of you, it's die best thing that could have happened."
"You mean," muttered Sharpless, and looked at the floor, "scandal."
"Yes. Scandal. I suppose you and madam still are goin' to get married?"
"Are we!" roared Sharpless, and took the hand of a beaming Vicky. "Are we?"
"Well, son, if Hubert Fane had come to trial, the amount of scandal that'd have been poured out would have kept the newspapers (and your old man, and the War Office) interested for some time. Hubert would’ve seen to that. As it is—"
"As it is?"
"They've already given it out that Arthur Fane was murdered by his late uncle, who was believed to be a good deal of a loony. And that's not far out either. So don't be too precipitate, and you'll be all right."
The corners of H.M.'s mouth turned down. He flung his cigar across into the fireplace. An expression of all the world in collusion against him weighed him down and pained him.
"That's the bleedin' trouble, all the tune," he complained. "Look at me. I'm supposed to be dictatin' a book, an important social and political document. But have I finished it? No! Am I likely to finish it?"
"Yes," said Courtney.
"No!" said H.M. fiercely. "And why? I'll tell you. Because all this week, a whole long week, the feller who's supposed to be taking it down has done nothin' but hang about and canoodle with that gal in the chair there. They haven't been apart, either in the figurative or the literal sense, for—"
Again Phil Courtney was utterly at peace with all the world. He reached down and put his arm around Ann, who pressed against him.
"That's a wicked lie!" protested Ann, coloring up.
"So?"
"Yes. But he's' free tomorrow evening, provided you let me come along and listen to the memoirs."
"Well," grinned Sharpless, "the very best of luck, old boy. And you too? Ann."
"And lots of it," said Vicky.
"May I too," said Dr. Rich, "add my congratulations? I am feeling that this is rather a better world than I believed a fortnight ago, despite Hubert Fane and all his works. With the assistance of Sir Henry, I hope before many months—"
"Thanks," said Courtney.
"Loads of thanks," said Ann.
"Hoots!" said Dr. Nithsdale, sternly and implacably.
And so, had you been in the pleasant town of Cheltenham on the mellow September evening following, you might have seen three persons walking abreast in Fitzherbert Avenue, taking the air in the cool of dusk.
On the inside was a fair-haired girl. Next to her walked a preoccupied young man who was holding a note pad in one hand and trying to write shorthand with the other.
On the outside marched a magnificent figure in flannels and a high-crowned hat of loose-woven straw. The curious voice of this figure carried and reverberated under the elms.
"One day towards the close of my fifteenth year, chancing to be in the auditorium at St. Just's, I can recall climbing up to the scene-shifters' platform over the stage. This chanced to be at a time when the Rev. Doctor Septimus Worcester was delivering a lecture on Palestine to the boys, otherwise assembled.
"I also recall that over the proscenium-arch, facing the auditorium, were two small and invisible doors like the doors of a cupboard. As Dr. Worcester spoke of Palestine, some impulse — I know not what — prompted me to fling these doors open, and, popping out my head, cry, 'Cuckoo! Cuckoo!' before instantly closing the doors again.
"Nor could this fail to remind me of the occasion when I contrived to get an uncle of mine, George Byron Merrivale, chucked into the local clink for poaching. I will now tell my readers how I did this."
Peace and drowsy airs lay on the world. The voice passed and faded away up the road.