"Good Lord, that's a tall order," he said, laughing.
"And I've only the haziest layman's idea of it myself. But let's see, now: I think a psychoanalyst would say the trouble lay much further
back than those few months in prison--but that prison might have
brought it to the surface. He'd certainly explore that period
thoroughly-make your Father remember every detail of it; in a way, he'd have to be put back in prison."
"You don't mean physically ?"
"No, of course not. Though--let me think now-yes, I suppose it's just conceivable that if the trouble did arise in prison, another period of imprisonment might resolve it. But it's very farfetched-and quite
unworkable anyhow, because if he consented to imprisonment, he wouldn't really feel imprisoned; and no psychoanalyst would dare to imprison him without his consent."
"No psychoanalyst would ever get within miles of him. The very mention of psychoanalysis always annoys him--he says it's all rubbish."
"Well, it sometimes is," said Simon, "but not always. The fact that he's prejudiced against it might be symptomatic. By the way, I suppose you're sure he isn't working on something secretly ?"
"I don't see how he could be--we can see right into the gatehouse, there are windows back and front, and he hardly goes near his desk. He just sits reading his old detective stories. He did raise our hopes a few weeks ago- Topaz saw him writing. But it turned out to be a
crossword puzzle."
"He's rather like a detective story himself," said Simon, ""The Case of the Buried Talent." I wish I could solve it. I'd so much like to write about him."
I hadn't known that he wrote. I asked what sort of things.
"Oh, critical essays, mostly- just spare-time work. I've only had a few things published. Your Father'd be a superb subject--if I could
find out what monkey-wrench got thrown into his works."
"It would be even better if you could get the monkey-wrench out," I said.
"Well, finding it's the first step." He lay back on the grass with his eyes closed, thinking. I took the opportunity to have a good look at
him. It was queer to notice how young his skin looked, contrasted with the beard. I had been liking him better and better all the time we had been talking and I was planning to tell Rose encouraging things about him. I was glad to see that he has nice ears, because she values good ears. People do look different with their eyes closed, their features seem so much more sculptured. Simon's mouth is very sculptured- an
interesting mouth. I heard myself telling Rose: "Do you know, I think he might be quite an exciting sort of man ?"
Just then he opened his eyes and said: "You don't like it, do you?"
I felt myself blushing.
"Like what?" I said.
"My beard," said Simon.
"You were wondering how any man could wear one unless, of course, it has acquired a fascination of horror for you. Which is it?"
"As a matter of fact, I'm getting used to x."...."
He laughed and said that was the ultimate humiliation -every one did.
"Everyone except me," he added.
"I
never see myself in a glass without feeling astonished."
"Would it be rude to ask just why you do wear it?"
"It would be natural, anyway. I grew it when I was twenty-two, for a bet, and then kept it out of sheer pigheadedness-it looked so
wonderfully unsuitable for a Wall Street office; I was with a cousin of my Mother's there and our dislike was mutual.
And I think I felt a beard kept me in touch with literature. But it
probably has some deep psychological significance--I expect I'm trying to hide an infamous nature from the world."
"Well, it's quite the nicest beard I ever saw," I said.
"Do you think you'll ever get rid of it?"
For some reason, that made him laugh. Then he said:
"Oh, in ten or twelve years, perhaps--say when I'm forty.
It'll be so useful to come down without it one morning, looking twenty years younger.
Does your sister hate it ?"
I wondered if I said "Yes," whether he would shave it off to please Rose. And I suddenly wasn't sure that I wanted it to go.
"You must ask her yourself," I said, laughing.
He looked at his watch and said he was afraid he couldn't wait any
longer for her.
"Neil's picking me up at the Godsend inn at a quarter after twelve. Be a nice companionable child and walk to the village with me."
He got up and held out his hand to pull me to my feet. Then he looked up at Belmotte Tower.
"I meant to ask you to show me over that," he said, "but there's no time now. It's more impressive than ever, at close quarters."
"Have you got used to it belonging to you yet ?" I asked.
"But it doesn't--well, not for a little matter of around thirty years.
Anyway, it takes me all my time to realize that Scoatney does."
As we walked down the mound I told him how I had imagined his first
glimpse of Scoatney, that night back in March.
"Large as it is, it had shrunk," he said.
"Do you mean you'd seen it before ?"
"Oh, yes, when I was seven. Father brought me over with him when he patched up the row with my grandfather--which unfortunately, broke out again when Father became an American citizen."
"Did you know Scoatney was going to be yours then ?"
"Good Lord, no--there were six lives between me and it.
And I loved it with a most precocious passion. I remember standing at the top of the staircase looking down on my grandfather, my father and uncles, and a cousin of my own age all at tea in the hall, and
thinking: "If they were all dead, Scoatney would belong to me."
And then rushing screaming to the nursery, appalled at my wickedness. I sometimes think I ill-wished all my relations then."
"It'd be a powerful lot of ill-wishing for a child of seven," I said.
I tried to imagine him, very small and dark, on the Scoatney stairs
where I sat watching the dancing.
"My grandfather called me "the little Yankee" which infuriated me. But I thought he was wonderful. I wish I could have seen him again before he died--perhaps I oughtn't to have waited until he agreed to it, but I didn't like to force myself on him."
Then he told me that the position had been particularly difficult
because he had never been sure if old Mr.
Cotton would leave him enough money to keep Scoatney up- the estate is entailed but the money isn't, and without it Simon would just have had to lease the house and stay in America.
"It must have been very mixing for you," I said, "not knowing whether to settle down there or fix your mind on England."
"You're dead right it was mixing--sometimes I think I shall never get un-mixed. Oh, I shall strike roots here eventually, I guess.
But I wish I could have known when I stood on those stairs."
We had come to the stile leading to the lane. He sat on the top rail
for a moment, looking at the barn.
"That's magnificent," he said.
"Wonderful old timbers. Oughtn't I to repair the roof his I'd like to be a good landlord."
I said that was our job, as we have the castle on a repairing lease.
Then we caught each other's eyes and burst out laughing.
"You won't count on us doing it this year ?" I added.
He helped me over the stile, still laughing.
Then he said:
"Listen, Cassandra, there's something I want your father to know and I don't like to tell him myself. Can you make him understand that I
don't mind at all about the rent, that I shall never mind, even if he doesn't pay a cent for the rest of his lease his I'd like him to know that I'm honoured to feel he's my tenant."
"I'd call him more of a guest than a tenant," I said, and we both laughed again. Then I thanked him and promised to tell Father.
"Do it tactfully, won't you? Don't let me sound gracious and
patronizing."
"But I do think you're gracious--the right kind of gracious.
There's a right kind of patronage, too, you know.
Perhaps Father'll dedicate his next book to you as its "only
begetter."" "What a nice child you are," he said quietly.
"Not too consciously naive?"
I swear that I said it without thinking--it just leapt from my mouth.
It was looking at the barn did it--while we talked I had been
remembering that day, gloating over the way things had changed.
His head jerked round.
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, nothing in particular," I said, lamely.
"I daresay some people think I am."
We were passing the barn. And that minute Heloise put her head out
from where I sat listening that day, and let forth a volley of barks-
she takes naps on the chaff with one ear well open for rats.
"Were you up there ?" said Simon.
I nodded. We were both of us very red.
"How much did you hear?"
"Just that, about me."
Heloise came dashing out of the barn still barking, which I hoped would mean the end of the subject; and stooping to pat her was a good way to avoid his eyes. But she instantly stopped barking, and then he bent
down and patted her, too, looking at me across her.
"I'm so terribly ashamed of myself," he said.
"I
apologize most abjectly."
"Nonsense. It did me a lot of good," I told him.
"That wasn't all that you heard, was it his Did you hear his I didn't let him finish.
"Come on, we'll be late for your brother," I said.
"Just let me get rid of my journal."
I ran off and put it in the barn, taking my time over it; and I talked very determinedly about the weather as I rejoined him.