“So I supposed. You’ve a list of subscribing members?”

“Three hundred and forty-five,” said Decima proudly.

“And the subscription?”

“Ten bob. Are you thinking of joining us?”

“Who collects the ten bobs?”

“The Treasurer.”

“And Secretary…Mr. Legge?”

“Yes. What are you driving at? What were you at, last night, baiting Bob Legge?”

“Wait a moment. Do any other sums of money pass through his hands?”

“I don’t see why I should tell you these things,” said Decima.

“There’s no reason, but you have my assurance that I mean well.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“And you may be sure I shall regard this conversation as strictly confidential.”

“All right,” she said uneasily. “We’ve raised sums for different objects. We want to start a Left Book Club in Illington and there are one or two funds: Spanish, Czech, and Austrian refugees, and the fighting fund, and so on.”

“Yes. At the rate of how much a year? Three hundred, for instance?”

“About that. Quite that I should think. We’ve some very generous supporters.”

“Now look here, Decima. Did you inquire very carefully into this man Legge’s credentials?”

“I — no. I mean, he’s perfectly sound. He’s secretary for several other things: some philatelic society and a correspondence course, and he’s agent for one or two things.”

“He’s been there ten months, hasn’t he?”

“Yes. He’s not strong; touch of T.B., I think, and some trouble with his ears. His doctor told him to come down here. He’s been very generous and subscribed to the movement himself.”

“May I give you a word of advice? Have your books audited.”

“Do you know Bob Legge? You can’t make veiled accusations—”

“I have made no accusations.”

“You’ve suggested that—”

“That you should be businesslike,” said Watchman. “That’s all.”

“Do you know this man? You must tell me.”

There was a very long silence and then Watchman said:

“I’ve never known anybody of that name.”

“Then I don’t understand,” said Decima.

“Let us say I’ve taken an unreasonable dislike to him.”

“I’ve already come to that conclusion. It was obvious last night.”

“Well, think it over.” He looked fixedly at her and then said suddenly: “Why won’t you marry Will Pomeroy?”

Decima turned white and said: “That, at least, is entirely my own business.”

“Will you meet me here to-night?”

“No.”

“Do I no longer attract you, Decima?”

“I’m afraid you don’t.”

“Little liar, aren’t you?”

“The impertinent lady-killer stuff,” said Decima, “doesn’t wear very well. It has a way of looking merely cheap.”

“You can’t insult me,” said Watchman. “Tell me this. Am I your only experiment?”

“I don’t want to start any discussion of this sort. The thing’s at an end. It’s been dead a year.”

“No. Not on my part. It could be revived, and very pleasantly. Why are you angry? Because I didn’t write?”

“Good Lord, no!” ejaculated Decima.

“Then why—?”

He laid his hand over hers. As if unaware of his touch, her fingers plucked the blades of grass beneath them.

“Meet me here to-night,” he repeated.

“I’m meeting Will to-night at the Feathers.”

“I’ll take you home.”

Decima turned on him.

“Look here,” she said, “we’d better get this straightened out. You’re not in the least in love with me, are you?”

“I adore you.”

“I daresay, but you don’t love me. Nor do I love you. A year ago I fell for you rather heavily and we know what happened. I can admit now that I was— well, infatuated. I can even admit that what I said just then wasn’t true. For about two months I did mind your not writing. I minded damnably. Then I recovered in one bounce. I don’t want any recrudescence.”

“How solemn,” murmured Watchman, “how learned, and how young.”

“It may seem solemn and young to you. Don’t flatter yourself I’m the victim of remorse. I’m not. One has to go through with these things, I’ve decided. But don’t let’s blow on the ashes.”

“We wouldn’t have to blow very hard.”

“Perhaps not.”

“You admit that, do you?”

“Yes. But I don’t want to do it.”

“Why? Because of Pomeroy?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to marry him, after all?”

“I don’t know. He’s ridiculously class-conscious about sex. He’s completely uneducated in some ways but — I don’t know. If he knew about last year he’d take it very badly and I can’t marry him without telling him.”

“Well,” said Watchman suddenly, “don’t expect me to be chivalrous and decent. I imagine chivalry and decency don’t go with sex-education and freedom, anyway. Don’t be a fool, Decima. You know you think it would be rather fun.”

He pulled her towards him. Decima muttered, “No, you don’t,” and suddenly they were struggling fiercely. Watchman thrust her back till her shoulders were against the bank. As he stooped his head to kiss her, she wrenched one hand free and she struck him, clumsily but with violence, across the mouth.

“You—” said Watchman.

She scrambled to her feet and stood looking down at him.

“I wish to God,” she said savagely, “that you’d never come back.”

There was a moment’s silence.

Watchman, too, had got to his feet. They looked into each other’s eyes; and then, with a gesture that, for all its violence and swiftness, suggested the movement of an automaton, he took her by the shoulders and kissed her. When he had released her they moved apart stiffly, with no eloquence in either of their faces or figures.

Decima said: “You’d better get out of there. If you stay here it’ll be the worse for you. I could kill you. Get out.”

They heard the thud of footsteps on turf and Cubitt and Sebastian Parish came over the brow of the hillock.

Chapter IV

The Evening in Question

i

Watchman, Cubitt and Parish lunched together in the taproom. Miss Darragh did not appear. Cubitt and Parish had last seen her sucking her brush and gazing with complacency at an abominable sketch. She was still at work when they came up with Watchman and Decima. At lunch, Watchman was at some pains to tell the others how he and Decima Moore met by accident, and how they had fallen to quarrelling about the Coombe Left Movement.

They accepted his recital with, on Parish’s part, rather too eager alacrity. Lunch, on the whole, was an uncomfortable affair. Something had gone wrong with the relationship of the three men. Norman Cubitt, who was acutely perceptive in such matters, felt that the party had divided into two, with Parish and himself on one side of an intangible barrier, and Watchman on the other. Cubitt had no wish to side, however vaguely, with Parish against Watchman. He began to make overtures, but they sounded unlikely and only served to emphasize his own discomfort. Watchman answered with the courtesy of an acquaintance. By the time they had reached the cheese, complete silence had overcome them.

They did not linger for their usual postprandial smoke. Cubitt said he wanted to get down to the jetty for his afternoon sketch, Parish said he was going to sleep. Watchman, murmuring something about writing a letter, disappeared upstairs.

They did not see each other again until the evening when they met in the private tap-room for their usual cocktail. The fishing boats had come in, and at first the bar was fairly full. The three friends joined in local conversation and were not thrown upon their own resources until the evening meal which they took together in the inglenook. The last drinker went out saying that there was a storm hanging about, and that the air was unnaturally heavy. On his departure complete silence fell upon the three men. Parish made one or two half-hearted attempts to break it but it was no good, they had nothing to say to each other. They finished their meal and Watchman began to fill his pipe.