The coldest of cold suppers awaited them on the table. There was the red ruin of a great joint of beef, a dish of cold potatoes, and plenty of bread, butter and cheese. Miss Femm, with her eyes narrowed and her mouth folded away, was already seated on the left-hand side. Philip and Margaret sat down on the near side; Mr. Femm seated himself opposite his sister; and Penderel marched round to the other side and sat down with his back to the front door. Morgan, looking more sullen than ever, hung about behind Miss Femm.
Philip looked round the table and fell to wondering. When he had first taken leave of the car and the rain and the darkness, his senses had been blunted and he had merely enjoyed, in a numb fashion, the shelter and the warmth and the feeling of security. Now his senses were sharp again and he began to tease himself with questions. Penderel caught his eye and grinned. This was Penderel’s idea of a night, he told himself. It wasn’t his. And then he suddenly admitted to himself that he didn’t like this house and the people in it. These people had lived too long away from everybody and were now half crazy, and the house was musty with their mutual suspicion and resentment. Even Femm himself, who was at least civilised, was unsavoury in some queer way. Fine thoughts, these, for an uninvited guest about to diminish these people’s small store of food.
‘Tell me, Philip,’ Margaret said, ‘why these lights are so jumpy. They’re getting on my nerves. They make everything look so unreal.’
‘Evidently they make their own light here,’ he told her, pleasantly matter-of-fact. ‘And there’s something wrong with the batteries or the wiring. You can’t be surprised, a night like this, whatever they do. So don’t be alarmed if they go out altogether.’
Margaret nodded in silence. The thought of being left in total darkness filled her mind. Her skin tightened and shrank again from a clammy touch. If those lights did go out, she wouldn’t move a yard from the fire and Philip until morning.
Mr. Femm, who had exchanged a remark with Penderel, now remembered his duties as a host and stretched a hand towards the dish of potatoes.
‘Stop!’ screamed his sister, making them all jump. ‘What are you doing? We’re not all heathens.’
He brought back his hand, folded his arms, and looked across at her with a sneer on his face. Then he glanced at the others and spoke to them in a voice that was out of reach of her ears. ‘I had forgotten that my sister, who is nothing if not a good Christian, would want to ask a blessing. We shall enjoy our food so much more once she has called the attention of her tribal deity to us.’
‘Horace Femm,’ she cried across the table, ‘you’re blaspheming. If I can’t hear, I can see. There’s blasphemy written across your face.’
He leaned forward and used that curious hissing voice which they had noticed before. ‘My dear Rebecca, I was merely telling your guests, who were wondering why they were not being served, that you were about to ask a blessing, to thank God for His bounty and His mercy, for this ample and delectable supper——’