The Reckoning (19 page)

In the drawing-room he looked around him enquiringly.
'My name is Moineau,' he said, as if in answer to their
question.

Héloïse put her hand to her mouth to conceal a smile, for
moineau
meant sparrow, and really, this round, perky little
man was very sparrow-like. He saw the movement and turned
to smile at her. It was a very nice smile, she thought; made
him look quite boyish. It was hard in any case to judge his
age, for he had one of those smooth, neat faces which always
look young, and nice blue eyes, and soft fawn hair.

‘A foolish name,' he agreed, 'but my own.'

‘I beg your pardon,' Héloïse said, embarrassed.

‘
I could not take offence from those who invite me so
readily into their house. And how comfortable it is! There is a
good spirit here.'

‘
Thank you,' Héloïse said, still rather confused. His was
not the normal way of speaking. She took refuge in formality.
'I am Lady Henrietta Morland, and this is my husband
James, and this my brother-in-law Edward. Won't you please
sit down and tell us what happened?’

Moineau sat down with what sounded like the faintest sigh
of relief. At once Tiger went to him, to lay his head in the
man's lap and gaze at him adoringly. Stroking the hound's
head, Moineau told the story. He was a natural story-teller,
and held his audience as wrapt as if it were one of the Arabian
Nights, and not the account of a mere brush with a footpad.

‘
Let me assure you,' he concluded, 'that your boys have come to no harm, except for a shaking-up, and a bruise to
young Master Henry's face, which I think he will consider a
small price to pay for the story he will have to tell all his
friends tomorrow.'

‘
Henry is the son of an old family friend,' James said. 'And
by the by, my love, we should send a message to Anstey House
at once to explain what's happened. You know how news flies.
It wouldn't do to have them hear a garbled version from
someone else, and think poor Harry was in desperate case.'

‘
Of course, I will do it at once,' Héloïse said, and rang the
bell. 'Won't you pour our guest some more wine,' she added
as she moved to the writing-table.

James rose to do so, and there was a short silence as Héloïse
wrote her note. When the butler entered, she spoke to him
over her shoulder as she completed it. 'Ottershaw, I have a
note here which must be taken at once to Anstey House.
There, it is done. You will seal it for me, please.'

‘
Very good, my lady.' Ottershaw received the note from her with a grave inclination of the head. The fact that his eyes did
not betray so much as a flicker towards the stranger reminded
Héloïse of her duty.

‘
Just a moment, please – Mr Moineau, will you honour us
by staying to supper?’

Moineau glanced briefly down at himself, and then smiled
radiantly at her. 'The honour would be mine, Madame.'

‘
Then it will be one more, Ottershaw, if you please,'
Héloïse concluded.

‘
Very good, my lady.' Ottershaw's final bow was all-inclu
sive. The fact that the stranger had been too well bred to
apologise for his clothing had not been lost on the Lord of the
Backstairs. As he remarked afterwards to the housekeeper
over a comfortable glass of solera before bedtime, 'There's
such a thing, Mrs Thomson, if I may so express myself, as a
natural
gentleman. It don't matter where they're from or who
their parents were, they're at home in any company.’

Mrs Thomson sipped non-committally. 'Foreign, didn't
you say, Mr Ottershaw?'

‘
A foreign name, and a trifle of a foreign accent – but a
foreigner can be a gentleman, all the same.'

‘
Gentleman-like, I grant you, Mr Ottershaw,' Mrs
Thomson demurred, 'but it's not the same thing.'

‘
I didn't mean to suggest it was, Mrs Thomson,' he said
loftily, 'only that there are those who have their own kind of
manners, which go anywhere and fit any occasion, be it in the
company of a commoner or a king.’

The subject of this pronouncement settled himself more
deeply into his chair when the butler withdrew, and looked
around the company with the delightful air of being ready for
anything.

‘So,' he said invitingly.

‘
We are most indebted to you, sir,' James responded. 'You
have done us a great service, for which we can never repay
you.'

‘
No gratitude is necessary, I assure you,' Moineau said.
'But I must say I am a little puzzled that you allow your son
to walk to school unescorted. These are troubled times.'
James exchanged a glance with Héloïse, and said, ‘So I've
found out, to my cost. It was entirely my fault – my wife was
full of very proper maternal fears. I didn't want the lad to be coddled, or to find himself distanced from the other children by the presence of servants. Well, I've been proved wrong. I
can only say in my defence that such a thing has never
happened before. Indeed, it would have been unthinkable until
now. For a Morland to be attacked, virtually on Morland land!'

‘
I told you,' Edward said, 'that there were all sorts of bad
people about these days – tramping men and discharged
soldiers and Irish beggars. The times are not normal.'

‘So it seems,' James said ruefully.

‘
From now on, Nicholas shall have a footman to take him
to school and fetch him afterwards,' Héloïse said.

‘
Certainly,' Edward agreed. 'And I suggest also that we
lock the outer gates at dusk as we used to in the old days, and
loose the dogs in the yard –
and
give the gatekeeper a shot
gun, just in case.'

‘
Oh come – must we live in a state of siege?' James
protested.

‘
State of siege, nonsense! Just common-sense precautions.
I'm sure our visitor agrees with me.'

‘
Indeed I do. There are such strange people wandering the
lanes nowadays,' he said with a straight face and a laughing
eye. There was a moment of pause, during which they all
realised they still knew nothing about him beyond his name,
and then, before anyone could launch any kind of question,
he said, 'I wonder what will happen to the ruffian? Will you
not search for him, and bring him to justice?’

Edward shrugged. 'He'll be long gone by now, and I
haven't enough constables even for regular duties. I certainly
haven't enough men to conduct a search for a nameless
vagrant – unless I use our own servants, and, frankly, they
have enough to do already.'

‘
Ah, you are responsible, then, for law and order?' Moineau
said, looking at him with interest.

‘In this area. I'm the local Justice of the Peace.’

Moineau sat forward. 'I have often wondered how it works
in England. Is it you who appoints the constables? How are
they chosen?'

‘
Well, in theory every citizen is liable to serve as a
constable, if asked,' Edward said, 'but since they're allowed to
nominate a substitute, in practice we have a few regular
people who do the job, and they're paid for it out of a fund
provided by the better class of householder. In normal times it
works pretty well. Being local people, the constables know
everyone, and everyone knows them. When a crime's
committed they know exactly who has done it, and how.'

‘
But the times, as you say, are not normal,' Moineau put
in. 'What happens if there is a special need?'

‘
I can appoint special constables, or if necessary call in the
militia, or even the army. But that's pretty much by way of a
last resort, because they don't like being called, I can tell you.
You remember Colonel Barker at Fulford, Jamie, back in the
year twelve, when we had that spate of rick-burning?'

‘
Lord, yes! How he griped at having to perform what he
called "police-duties". Of course, he was always saying that
England should have a regular permanent body of police,
paid for out of taxes – but that's the army for you! Their
minds always run that way.'

‘Would it not be a good idea, then?' Moineau asked.

‘
Good idea?' Edward exploded. 'It's bad enough having a
standing army, without police as well! It'd be no better than
military rule. A man couldn't call his soul his own.' He fixed
Moineau with a gimlet eye. 'We in England are a liberty-
loving people, sir. We don't lightly submit to a Government's
tyranny, like our friends on the Continent.'

‘I beg your pardon,' Moineau said meekly.

Edward thawed a little. 'You don't understand, perhaps,
that the English people are self-governing and self-regulating.
If a country – a
free
country, that is – has rational and
humane laws, and an effective and enlightened magistracy, it
needs no other police. There will always be one or two male
factors, of course; but if the vast majority of the population does not regulate itself by its own strong sense of morality,
not all the standing armies and government spies in the world
will control it.'

‘
In France they have a permanent police-force,' Héloïse
said mildly, 'and it seems to work very well. Everyone says the
Paris police are admirable.'

‘
They may be admirable, but by God, the Parisians pay for
it dear enough!' Edward said. 'I tell you, I'd sooner have half
a-dozen murders a year, than be subjected to domiciliary
visits and spies and informers, and all the rest of the appar
atus!'

‘Oh, but surely –'

‘
And I speak for the majority in this country, I can tell you
– high and low! It's too great a price to pay for a little
security. No, no, there'll be no Government-paid police-force
in this country. Never! A liberty-loving people will never hand
the Government such a powerful instrument of oppression as
that!'

‘
You must guard yourselves, then, by your own efforts,'
Moineau suggested.

‘
That's every citizen's duty,' Edward said. 'Which is why,
Jamie, I suggested those simple precautions of locking the
outer gates at dusk –'

‘
Yes, yes, you're quite right,' James said hastily. 'I just
don't like the idea of being shut in. I wandered freely all over
these fields when I was a boy, and I don't like to think of my
own children losing that liberty.'