"I didn't know you'd got the washing in it," apologised Mr. Flinders.
"No, I expect you thought I kept goldfish there," retorted the lady.
This crushing rejoinder quite cowed the constable. He coughed, and after waiting a minute asked whether she would show him the cellars. "Which I've been asked to inspect," he added boldly.
"I've got something better to do than to waste my time trapesing round nasty damp cellars at this hour," she said. "If you want to go down I'm sure I've no objection. You won't find anything except rats, and if you can put those great muddy boots of yours on one instead of dirtying my clean floor with them you'll be more use than ever I expected. Bowers!"
In reply to this shrill call her husband emerged presently from the pantry, where it seemed probable that he had been enjoying a brief siesta. Mrs. Bowers pointed the rolling-pin at Mr. Flinders. "You've got to take this young fellow down to the cellars and show him the place where the master made all that mess with the cement yesterday," she said. "And don't bring him back here. I've never been in the habit of having bobbies in my kitchen and I'm not going to start at my time of life."
Both men withdrew rather hastily. "You mustn't mind my missus," Bowers said. "It's only her way. She doesn't hold with ghosts, and things, but I can tell you I'm glad to see you here. Awful, this place is. You wouldn't believe the things I've heard."
By the time they had explored the dank, tomb-like cellars, and twice scared themselves by holding the lamp in such a way that their own shadows were cast in weird elongated shapes on the wall, Bowers and the constable were more than ready to confirm a sudden but deep friendship in a suitable quantity of beer. They retired to the pantry, and regaled themselves with this comforting beverage until Bowers found that it was time for him to carry the tea-tray into the library. Upon which Constable Flinders bethought himself of his duty, and took his departure by the garden-door, thus avoiding any fresh encounter with the dragon in the kitchen.
It was at about the same moment that Margaret, returning from a brisk tramp over the fields, emerged on to the right-of-way, and made her way past the ruined chapel towards the house. The sight of someone kneeling by one of the half-buried tombs apparently engaged in trying to decipher the inscription, made her stop and look more closely. Her feet had made no sound on the turf, but the kneeling figure looked round quickly, and she saw that it was Michael Strange.
She came slowly towards him, an eyebrow raised in rather puzzled inquiry. "Hullo!" she said. "Are you interested in old monuments?"
Strange rose, brushing a cake of half-dry mud from his ancient flannel trousers. "I am rather," he said. "Do you mind my having a look round?"