"Henry disliked any attempt to soften the edges at such a time," explained the dead man's sister. "He held that death was the skeleton at the feast of life—a wholesome and stark reminder to the thoughtless living that the grave is the end of our mortal days. He liked a funeral to be a funeral—black—black. He did not want the skeleton at the feast to be decked in roses and lilies."
"An opinion worthy of all respect," declared Mr. Churchouse.
Then he asked after the health of his guest and expressed sympathy for her sorrow and great loss.
"He'd been so much better lately that it was a shock," she said, "but he
died as he wanted to die—as all Ironsydes do die—without an illness.
It is a tradition that never seems to fail. That reconciled us in a way.
And you—how are you? You seldom come to Bridport nowadays."
Mr. Churchouse rarely talked about himself.
"True. I have been immersed in literary work and getting on with my magnum opus: 'The Church Bells of Dorset.' You see one does not obtain much help here—no encouragement. Not that I expect it. We men of letters have to choose between being hermits, or humbugs."
"I always thought a hermit was a humbug," said Jenny, smiling for the first time.
"Not always. When I say 'hermit,' I mean 'recluse.' With all the will to be a social success and identify myself with the welfare of the place in which I dwell, my powers are circumscribed. Do not think I put myself above the people, or pretend any intellectual superiority, or any nonsense of that sort. No, it is merely a question of time and energy. My antiquarian work demands both, and so I am deprived by duty from mixing in the social life as much as I wish. This is not, perhaps, understood, and so I get a character for aloofness, which is not wholly deserved."
"Don't worry," said Miss Ironsyde. "Everybody cares for you. People don't think about us and our doings half as much as we are prone to fancy. I liked your last article in the Bridport Gazette. Only I seemed to have read most of it before."
"Probably you have. The facts, of course, were common property. My task is to collect data and retail them in a luminous and illuminating way."