‘I always think the bed is the important thing-’ began Miss Twitterton. Mr Puffett, scandalised and seeing Peter beginning to lose control of his mouth, diverted her attention by digging her gently in the ribs with his elbow.
‘Oh!’ ejaculated Miss Twitterton. The state of the room and Mr Puffett’s presence forced themselves together upon her mind. ‘Oh, dear, what is the matter? Don’t say the chimney has been smoking again? It always was a tiresome chimney.’
‘Now see here,’ said Mr Puffett, who seemed to feel to the chimney much as a tigress might feel to her offspring, ‘that’s a good chimney, that is. I couldn’t build a better chimney meself, allowin’ for them upstairs flues and the ’ighth and pitch of the gable. But when a chimney ain’t never been swep’ through, on account of persons’ cheeseparin’ ’abits, then it ain’t fair on the chimney, nor yet it ain’t fair on the sweep. And you knows it.’
‘Oh, dear, oh, dear!’ cried Miss Twitterton, collapsing upon a chair and immediately bouncing up again. ‘What you must be thinking of us all. Where can Uncle be? I’m sure if I’d known-Oh! there’s Frank Crutchley! I’m so glad. Uncle may have said something to him. He comes every Wednesday to do the garden, you know. A most superior young man. Shall I call him in? I’m sure he could help us. I always send for Frank when anything goes wrong. He’s so clever at finding a way out of a difficulty.’
Miss Twitterton had run to the window without waiting for Harriet’s, ‘Yes, do have him in,’ and now cried in agitated tones: ‘Frank! Frank! Whatever can have happened? We can’t find Uncle!’
‘Can’t find him?’
‘No-he isn’t here, and he’s sold the house to this lady and gentleman, and we don’t know where he is and the chimney’s smoking and everything upside down; what can have become of him?’
Frank Crutchley, peering in at the window and scratching his head, looked bewildered, as well he might.
‘Never said nothing to me. Miss Twitterton. He’ll be over at the shop, most like.’
‘Was he here when you came last Wednesday?’
‘Yes,’ said the gardener, ‘he was here then all right.’ He paused, and a thought seemed to strike him. ‘He did ought to be here today. Can’t find him, did you say? What’s gone of him?’
‘That’s just what we don’t know. Going off like that without telling anyone! What did he say to you?’
‘I thought I’d find him here-leastways-’
‘You’d better come in, Crutchley,’ said Peter.
‘Right, sir!’ said Crutchley, with some appearance of relief at having a man to deal with. He withdrew in the direction of the back door, where, to judge by the sounds, h was received by Mrs Ruddle with a volume of explanatory narrative.
‘Frank would run over to Broxford, I’m sure,’ said Miss Twitterton, ‘and find out what’s happened to Uncle. He might be ill-though you’d think he’d have sent for me, wouldn’t you? Frank could get a car from the garage-he drives for Mr Hancock at Pagford you know, and I tried to get him this morning before I came, but he was out with a taxi. He’s very clever with cars, and such a good gardener I’m sure you won’t mind my mentioning it, but if you’ve bought the house and want someone to do the garden-’
‘He’s kept it awfully well,’ said Harriet. ‘I thought it looked lovely.’
‘I’m so glad you think so. He works so hard, and he’s so anxious to get on-’
‘Come in, Crutchley,’ said Peter.
The gardener, hesitating now at the door of the room with his face to the light, showed himself as an alert, well-set-up young man of about thirty, neatly dressed in a suit of working clothes and carrying his cap respectfully in his hand. His crisp dark hair, blue eyes and strong white teeth produced a favourable impression, though at the moment he looked slightly put out. From his glance at Miss Twitterton, Harriet gathered that he had overheard her panegyric of him and disapproved of it.
‘This,’ went on Peter, ‘comes a little unexpected, what?’
‘Well, yes, sir.’ The gardener smiled, and sent his quick glance roving over Mr Puffett. ‘I see it’s the chimney.’
‘It ain’t the chimney,’ began the sweep indignantly; when Miss Twitterton broke in: ‘But, Frank, don’t you understand? Uncle’s sold the house and gone away without telling anybody. I can’t make it out, it’s not like him. Nothing done and nothing ready and nobody here last night to let anybody in, and Mrs Ruddle knew nothing except that he’d gone to Broxford-’
‘Well, have you sent over there to look for him?’ inquired the young man in a vain endeavour to stem the tide.
‘No, not yet-unless Lord Peter-did you?-or no, there wouldn’t be time, would there?-no keys, even, and I really was ashamed you should have had to come last night like that, but of course I never dreamt-and you could so easily, have run over this morning, Frank-or I could go myself on my bicycle-but Mr Hancock told me you were out with a taxi, so I thought I’d better just call and see.’
Frank Crutchley’s eyes wandered over the room as though seeking counsel from the dust-sheets, the aspidistras, the chimney, the bronze horsemen, Mr Puffett’s bowler, the cactus and the radio cabinet, before at length coming to rest on Peter’s in mute appeal.
‘Let’s start from the right end,’ suggested Wimsey. ‘Mr Noakes was here last Wednesday and went off the same night to catch the ten o’clock bus to Broxford. That was nothing unusual, I gather. But he expected to be back to deal with the matter of our arrival, and you, in fact, expected to find him here today.’
‘That’s right, sir.’
Miss Twitterton gave a little jump and her mouth shaped itself into an anxious O.
‘Is he usually here when you come on Wednesdays?’
‘Well, that depends, sir. Not always.’
‘Frank!’ cried Miss Twitterton, outraged, ‘it’s Lord Peter Wimsey. You ought to say “my lord”.’
‘Never mind that now,’ said Peter, kindly, but irritated by this interference with his witness. Crutchley looked at Miss Twitterton with the expression of a small boy who has been publicly exhorted to wash behind the ears, and said: ‘Some days he’s here, some not. If he ain’t,’ (Miss Twitterton frowned), ‘I gets the key from her’ (he jerked his head at Miss Twitterton) ‘to come in and wind the clock and see to the pot-plants. But I did reckon to see him this morning because I had particular business with him. That’s why I come up to the house first-came, if you like’ (he added crossly, in response to Miss Twitterton’s anxious prompting; ‘it’s all one, I dessay, to my lord.’
‘To his lordship,’ said Miss Twitterton, faintly.
‘Did he actually tell you he’d be here?’
‘Yes-my lord. Leastways he said as he’d let me have back some money I’d put into that business of his. Promised it back today.’
‘Oh, Frank! You’ve been worrying Uncle again. I’ve told you you’re just being silly about your money. I know it’s quite safe with Uncle.’
Peter’s glance crossed Harriet’s over Miss Twitterton’s head. ‘He said he’d let you have it this morning. May I ask whether it was any considerable sum?’
‘Matter o’ forty pound,’ said the gardener, ‘as he got me to put into his wireless business. Mayn’t seem a lot to you,’ he went on a little uncertainly, as though trying to assess the financial relationship between Peter’s title, his ancient and shabby blazer, his manservant and his wife’s non-committal tweeds, ‘but I’ve got a better use for it, and so I told him. I asked for it last week and he palavered as usual, sayin’ he didn’t keep sums like that in the house-puttin’ me off.’
‘But, Frank, of course he didn’t. He might have been robbed. He did lose ten pounds once, in a pocket-book.’
‘But I stuck to it,’ pursued Crutchley, unheeding, ‘sayin’ I must have it, and at last he said he’d let me have it today, as he’d got some money coming in-’
‘He said that?’
‘Yes, sir-my lord-and I says to him, I hope you do, says, and if you don’t, I’ll have the law on you.’