Have His Carcase

Henry seemed gratified by the efforts made to please him, and by Miss Vane’s openly expressed admiration of his driving. This was of a showy and ill-tempered kind, and involved ‘putting the wind up’ other users of the road. Harriet had herself driven cars, and suffered as all drivers do when being driven, but even when Henry rounded a corner very wide at fifty miles an hour and crammed a motor-cyclist into the ditch, she merely remarked (with some truth) that the speed made her feel quite nervous.

Mr Weldon, braking violently at the unexpected sight of a herd of cows nearly under his radiator, and crashing his gears as he changed down, smiled indulgently.

‘No point in these damned machines of you don’t make ’em move,’ he said. ‘Not like a horse — no life in,’em. Only useful for getting from one place to another.’

He waited while the cows dawdled by and then let his clutch in with a bang which nearly shot the liquid refreshment to the floor.

‘You don’t catch me motoring for pleasure,’ said Mr Weldon. ‘I like fresh air none of these beastly stuffy boxes and stinking petrol. Used to breed geese once — but the bottom’s dropped out of the market. Damned shame.’

Harriet agreed, and said she was so fond of horses. Life on a farm must be wonderful.

‘All right if you don’t have to make it pay,’ growled Mr Weldon.

‘I suppose it is rather hard nowadays.’

‘Damned hard,’ said Mr Weldon, adding, however — as though recollecting himself, ‘not that I have a lot to grumble at as things go:

‘No? I’m glad of that. I mean, it’s nice for you to be able to leave your work and come down here. I suppose a really well-managed farm runs itself, so to speak.’

Mr Weldon glanced at her almost as though he suspected her of some hidden meaning. She smiled innocently at him, and he said:

Well — as a matter of fact, it’s a beastly nuisance. But what can one do? Couldn’t leave my mother all by herself in this hole.’

‘Of course not; I think it’s splendid of you to come and stand by her. And besides — well, I mean, it makes such a difference to have somebody really nice to talk to.’

‘Jolly of you to say that.’

‘I mean, it must make all the difference to your mother.’ ‘Not to you, eh? Dukes and lords are good enough’ for you?

‘Oh!’ Harriet wriggled her shoulders. ‘If you mean Lord Peter he’s all right, of course, but he’s a little you know what I mean.’

‘La-di-dah!’ said Mr Weldon. ‘What’s he want to wear that silly thing in his eye for?’

‘That’s just what I feel. It isn’t manly, is it?’

‘Lot of affected nonsense,’ said Mr Weldon. Take that fellow away from his valet and his car and his evening togs, and where’d he be? Thinks he can ride, because he’s pottered round with a fashionable hunt, trampling down people’s crops and leaving the gates open. I’d like to see him—’

He broke off.

‘See him what?’

‘Oh, nothing. Don’t want to be rude to a friend of yours. I say, what’s he after down here?’

‘Well!’ Harriet smirked demurely behind the drooping brim of the preposterous hat. ‘He says he’s interested in this crime, or whatever it is.’

‘But you know better, eh?’ He nudged Harriet familiarly in the ribs. ‘I don’t blame the fellow for making the running while he can, but I do wish he wouldn’t raise false hopes in the old lady. That’s a dashed awkward hat of yours.’

‘Don’t you like it?’

‘It’s topping — suits you, down to the ground, but it does. keep a fellow at a distance. And I don’t want to shout, because my mother can hear. I say, Miss Vane.’

‘Yes?’

‘Listen!’ Henry pushed his face as far, as possible under the guard of the hat and blew his confidence on to Harriet’s cheek. ‘I wish you’d do something for me.’

‘Of course, I’d do anything I could.’

‘That’s nice of you. Do persuade this Wimsey fellow to drop it. As long as she thinks there’s anything in that Bolshie idea of hers, she’ll hang on here like grim death. It isn’t good for her — morbid, you know. Besides, she’s making an ass of herself. I want to get her away and go back to my work.’

Yes, I see. I quite understand. I’ll do my best.’

‘Good girl!’ Henry patted her encouragingly on the thigh. ‘I knew you and I’d get on like a house on fire together.’

Harriet smiled.

‘I don’t know if I shall be able to persuade him. He doesn’t like taking advice. You know what men are.’

‘I bet you know all right. I don’t suppose there’s much you don’t know, by jove!’’ Henry was obviously well aware that he was talking to a rather notorious young woman. He chuckled.

‘Don’t say I’ve said anything just try what you can do. I bet you can twist him round your little finger if you try, eh?

‘Oh, Mr Weldon! I hope I’m not one of those managing sort of women!’

‘You don’t need to be. You know how to get your own way, I bet. I know you could do anything you liked with me:

‘You mustn’t talk like that’

‘Mustn’t I? Can’t help it. You’ve got a way with you — haven’t you; eh?’

Harriet wished that he would not say ‘eh?’ so often. And she disliked the grossness of his voice and the coarseness of his skin and the little tufts of hair in his ears.