The Moving Finger Read Online Free PDF Page B

got any until you came, though,” said Mrs. Dane Calthrop accusingly.
    “But they did, Mrs. Dane Calthrop. The trouble had already started.”
    “Oh, dear,” said Mrs. Dane Calthrop. “I don't like that.”
    She stood there, her eyes absent and far away again. She said:
    “I can't help feeling it's all wrong. We're not like that here. Envy, of course, and malice, and all the mean spiteful little sins - but I didn't think there was anyone who would do that. No, I really didn't. And it distresses me, you see, because I ought to know.”
    Her fine eyes came back from the horizon and met mine.
    They were worried, and seemed to hold the honest bewilderment of a child's.
    “Why ought you to know?” I said.
    “I usually do. I've always felt that's my function. Caleb preaches good sound doctrine and administers the sacraments. That's a priest's duty, but if you admit marriage at all for a priest, then I think his wife's duty is to know what people are feeling and thinking, even if she can't do anything about it. And I haven't the least idea whose mind is -”
    She broke off, adding absently, “They are such silly letters, too.”
    “Have you - er - had any yourself?”
    I was a little diffident of asking, but Mrs. Dane Calthrop replied perfectly naturally, her eyes opening a little wider:
    “Oh, yes, two - no, three. I forget exactly what they said. Something very silly about Caleb and the schoolmistress, I think. Quite absurd, because Caleb has absolutely no taste for flirtation. He never has had. So lucky being a clergyman.”
    “Quite,” I said, “oh, quite.”
    “Caleb would have been a saint,” said Mrs. Dane Calthrop, “if he hadn't been just a little too intellectual.”
    I did not feel qualified to answer this criticism, and anyway Mrs. Dane Calthrop went on, leaping back from her husband to the letters in rather a puzzling way.
    “There are so many things the letters might say, but don't. That's what is so curious.”
    “I should hardly have thought they erred on the side of restraint,” I said bitterly.
    “But they don't seem to know anything. None of the real things.”
    “You mean?”
    Those fine vague eyes met mine.
    “Well, of course. There's plenty of wrongdoing here - any amount of shameful secrets. Why doesn't the writer use those?”
    She paused and then asked abruptly, “What did they say in your letter?”
    “They suggested that my sister wasn't my sister.”
    “And she is?”
    Mrs. Dane Calthrop asked the question with unembarrassed friendly interest.
    “Certainly Joanna is my sister.”
    Mrs. Dane Calthrop nodded her head. “That just shows you what I mean. I daresay there are other things -”
    Her clear uninterested eyes looked at me thoughtfully, and I suddenly understood why Lymstock was afraid of Mrs. Dane Calthrop.
    In everybody's life there are hidden chapters which they hope may never be known. I felt that Mrs. Dane Calthrop knew them.
    For once in my life, I was positively delighted when Aimйe Griffith's hearty voice boomed out:
    “Hullo, Maud. Glad I've just caught you. I want to suggest an alteration of date for the Sale of Work. Morning, Mr. Burton.”
    She went on:
    “I must just pop into the grocer's and leave my order, then I'll come along to the Institute if that suits you?”
    “Yes, yes, that will do quite well,” said Mrs. Dane Calthrop. Aimйe Griffith went into the International Stores.
    Mrs. Dane Calthrop said, “Poor thing.”
    I was puzzled. Surely she could not be pitying Aimйe?
    She went on, however: “You know, Mr. Burton, I'm rather afraid -”
    “About this letter business?”
    “Yes, you see it means - it must mean -”
    She paused, lost in thought, her eyes screwed up. Then she said slowly, as one who solves a problem, “Blind hatred... yes, blind hatred. But even a blind man might stab to the heart by pure chance... And what would happen then, Mr. Burton?”
    We were to know that before another day had passed.
    Partridge, who enjoys calamity,