He had been living only a fortnight in Lancashire. Why he migrated from Kent was a mystery to the friends he had left behind. Perhaps he did not know himself, unless it was surrender to a sudden, almost eccentric desire for pastures new.
Up to a certain point he possessed the artistic temperament. He worked only when it suited him, and generally seized every plausible excuse to "knock off." Yet, when he did settle to his task he wrote at a tremendous rate, and so vilely that often he was quite unable to decipher his own caligraphy. In financial matters he was as careless as a man could possibly be. Rarely he knew the state of his current account. Trivial matters in everyday life would send him into a towering rage, while the loss of a couple of hundred pounds hardly troubled him in the least degree. He would ransack the house to find a favourite pipe which he had mislaid, or waste half a day searching in vain for a certain pen which he felt sure he had left in such-and-such a place. On the other hand, when a valuable and almost new overcoat was stolen from the hall he just shrugged his shoulders and soon forgot all about it.
During the fortnight he had been the tenant of Ladybird Fold, Peter Barcroft had either "sacked" or had been "sacked" by three housemaids and two cooks, to the consternation and despair of his wife. The servant problem, probably more acute in the manufacturing district of Lancashire than anywhere else in the kingdom, was in this case rendered even more difficult by Peter's display of irritation at the manifold but trivial delinquencies of his staff of menials.
Mrs. Barcroft had gone on a visit to a relative in Cheshire on the strength of a vague report that there was a girl who might be willing to take the vacant place of housemaid at Ladybird Fold-His wife's absence for two days had given Peter the excuse to "knock off." It was one of his avowed peculiarities that he could not write a stroke unless his wife were with him in the study. So Mr. Barcroft had gone for a jaunt in his light car.
After the splendidly-surfaced gravelled or tarmac roads of Kent the greasy granite setts and bumpy slag roads of the north came as an unpleasant surprise to the easy-going Peter. A couple of punctures in addition to a slight collision with a "lurry"—a type of vehicle hitherto known to him as a lorry—did not improve his peace of mind, while what ought to have been the climax to a day of mishaps was the sudden failure of the magneto at a desolate spot on the western slope of the Pennine Hills.
But unruffled Peter pushed the car on to the side of the road and tramped stolidly into the nearest village—a good three miles. Here, in an interview with the decrepit motor-engineer (Barcroft guessed rightly that he was too passé even for munition making), he learnt that at least a month must elapse before the magneto could be re-wired. He received the intelligence with equanimity, for in his pocket was a telegram to the effect that Billy was coming home that night. Nothing else mattered.
"Which is the Tarleigh train?" enquired Mr. Barcroft of a porter.
"Next one in on this side," replied the man gruffly.
Half a minute later the train rumbled into the station. Mr. Barcroft, realising that up to the present he had not mastered the intricate system of train-service of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway, and having had many previous experiences of being misinformed by surly servants of the various railway companies, addressed himself to a passenger who was about to enter a carriage.
"Tarleigh? Yes, you're quite right. At any rate, I'm for Blackberry Cross."