I Hullo-there-ed cordially, and expressed some surprise at finding her on the premises.
‘I wouldn’t have thought Oates would have let you in. It isn’t Visitors Day, is it?’
She explained that the zealous officer had gone up to the house to see her Uncle Watkyn and that she had sneaked in when he had legged it.
‘Oh, Bertie,’ she said, ‘I wish I could slip you in a file.’
‘What would I do with a file?’
‘Saw through the bars, of course, ass.’
‘There aren’t any bars.’
‘Oh, aren’t there? That’s a difficulty. We’ll have to let it go, then. Have you had breakfast?’
‘Just finished.’
‘Was it all right?’
‘Fairly toothsome.’
‘I’m glad to hear that, because I’m weighed down with remorse.’
‘You are? Why?’
‘Use the loaf. If I hadn’t pinched that statuette thing, none of this would have happened.’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t worry.’
‘But I do worry. Shall I tell Uncle Watkyn that you’re innocent, because I was the guilty party? You ought to have your name cleared.’
I put the bee on this suggestion with the greatest promptitude.
‘Certainly not. Don’t dream of it.’
‘But don’t you want your name cleared?’
‘Not at the expense of you taking the rap.’
‘Uncle Watkyn wouldn’t send me to chokey.’
‘I dare say not, but Stinker would learn all and would be shocked to the core.’
‘Coo! I didn’t think of that.’
‘Think of it now. He wouldn’t be able to help asking himself if it was a prudent move for a vicar to link his lot with yours. Doubts, that’s what he’d have, and qualms. It isn’t as if you were going to be a gangster’s moll. The gangster would be all for you swiping everything in sight and would encourage you with word and gesture, but it’s different with Stinker. When he marries you, he’ll want you to take charge of the parish funds. Apprise him of the facts, and he won’t have an easy moment.’
‘I see what you mean. Yes, you have a point there.’
‘Picture his jumpiness if he found you near the Sunday offertory bag. No, secrecy and silence is the only course.’
She sighed a bit, as if her conscience was troubling her, but she saw the force of my reasoning.
‘I suppose you’re right, but I do hate the idea of you doing time.’
‘There are compensations.’
‘Such as?’
‘I am saved from the scaffold.’
‘The – ? Oh, I see what you mean. You get out of marrying Madeline.’
‘Exactly, and, as I remember telling you once, I am implying nothing derogatory to Madeline when I say that the thought of being united to her in bonds of holy wedlock was one that gave your old friend shivers down the spine. The fact is in no way to her discredit. I should feel just the same about marrying many of the world’s noblest women. There are certain females whom one respects, admires, reveres, but only from a distance, and it is to this group that Madeline belongs.’
And I was about to develop this theme, with possibly a reference to those folk songs, when a gruff voice interrupted our tete-a-tete, if you can call a thing a tete-a-tete when the two of you are on opposite sides of an iron grille. It was Constable Oates, returned from his excursion. Stiffy’s presence displeased him, and he spoke austerely.
‘What’s all this?’ he demanded.
‘What’s all what?’ riposted Stiffy with spirit, and I remember thinking that she rather had him there.
‘It’s against regulations to talk to the prisoner, Miss.’
‘Oates,’ said Stiffy, ‘you’re an ass.’
This was profoundly true, but it seemed to annoy the officer. He resented the charge, and said so, and Stiffy said she didn’t want any back chat from him.
‘You road company rozzers make me sick. I was only trying to cheer him up.’
It seemed to me that the officer gave a bitter snort, and a moment later he revealed why he had done so.
‘It’s me that wants cheering up,’ he said morosely, ‘I’ve just seen Sir Watkyn and he says he isn’t pressing the charge.’
‘What!’ I cried.
‘What!’ yipped Stiffy.
‘That’s what,’ said the constable, and you could see that while there was sunshine above, there was none in his heart. I could sympathize with him, of course. Naturally nothing makes a member of the Force sicker than to have a criminal get away from him. He was in rather the same position as some crocodile on the Zambesi or some puma in Brazil would have been, if it had earmarked Plank for its lunch and seen him shin up a high tree.