The Strange Affair of Adelaide Harris Read online

  About the Book

  Harris and Bostock are best friends, but they are as different from one another as night and day. Harris thinks up harebrained schemes and Bostock gets in trouble for them.

  When Harris puts his baby sister Adelaide in the words to see if she will be adopted by a fox, little do they realize that they are starting a chain of events that will be remembered in their little seaside town as the Strange Affair of Adelaide Harris.

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  About the Author

  Also by Leon Garfield

  Copyright

  The Strange Affair of Adelaide Harris

  Leon Garfield

  To Patrick Hardy

  One

  A MUSTY, DUSTY, leathery smell of boys, books and ink. Words drone and a family of flies stagger through the heavy air as if in pursuit of them. But they turn out to be of Ancient History so the flies blunder moodily against the parlor window beyond which the June sun ripens tempting dinners at roadsides and down by the strong smelling beach—day after day after day.

  “Among the customs of ancient Sparta,” says Mr. Brett at the twelve enormously crumpled boys before him, and then goes on to tell of mothers bidding their sons come back with their shields or cold and dead upon them. He gazes at his twelve and reflects that Spartan mothers knew what they were about. He looks particularly hard at Bostock and Harris whom he hates and fears—day after day after day . . .

  Thin, depressed, humane man, though with a touch of youth still remaining, Mr. Brett was employed to teach classical education at Dr. Bunnion’s Academy in Brighton. There was something of a mystery about Mr. Brett. He was a well-spoken, gentlemanly sort of person, quite out of the usual run of schoolmasters. It was generally supposed that he’d fled from a well-to-do family in the north after committing some horrible crime and had found sanctuary in Dr. Bunnion’s obscure school. This notion lent him a certain melancholy distinction in the eyes of the pupils and helped to explain why he never left the school for more than a few hours—even remaining through the holidays—and always tended to start and grow pale whenever there was a knock on the door.

  From time to time, with the object of trapping Mr. Brett into betraying his crime, some ingenious pupil would ask seemingly innocent questions about patricides, fratricides, and what were Mr. Brett’s thoughts on poisonings (of which matters Ancient History was interestingly full), and then sit back and closely observe him for signs of guilty dismay.

  Oddly enough, such questions did seem to disturb Mr. Brett in quite a striking way. When some sly and brutish boy at the back, or the terrible Harris in the front, inquired how finely glass needed to be powdered before it might be used to commit murder, he would always falter and look alarmed.

  Then there’d fall an absolute silence on the class; the pupils would stare at Mr. Brett and Mr. Brett would stare at the pupils, and each would be struggling with his private thoughts of the other, and only God Almighty knew which was nearer the truth.

  But now the day was almost done. Ten of the boys appeared to be asleep and Mr. Brett dropped his voice, for he did not want to awaken them. Only Bostock and Harris still seemed to be interested in him. Side by side they sat in the front row and watched him attentively. Bostock was the larger of the two, but Harris was the deadlier. Though Bostock had caused more destruction and would most likely end on the gallows, Mr. Brett believed Harris to be his evil genius. Or would have believed it did not “genius” suggest a high intelligence—which Harris did not have. But there would be no more of them. So far as Mr. Brett was concerned, they were the end of their line. Harris had only a quantity of sisters and Bostock was a single child, so Mr. Brett thought that even his parents were appalled by what they’d done and would do no more.

  Ten minutes of the lesson remained and Mr. Brett struggled on with the customs of ancient Sparta. A fat boy at the back was actually asleep with his mouth open. Mr. Brett had a childish desire to throw an ink pellet into it, but did nothing of the kind. The fat boy was a boarder at ninety pounds per annum and so worth three day pupils. Not for worlds would Mr. Brett have risked Dr. Bunnion’s anger, and therefore his situation. He was desperately anxious to remain. Desperately . . .

  “Beg pardon, sir,” said Harris, cupping an ear and leaning forward earnestly. “Can’t quite hear you. Could I have that last item again?”

  There was an unwholesome light in Harris’s eyes. Uneasily Mr. Brett wondered what could have been the cause of it. He hoped it was a fever, as he did not care to think of its being an idea.

  “Little children,” repeated Mr. Brett, as softly and tenderly as he could, “quite tiny infants exposed on the mountainside by their parents . . .”

  Harris nodded shrewdly, and Mr. Brett caught himself wondering why the custom was ever abandoned. He would like to have lived in ancient Sparta—or, better, he would like Bostock and Harris to have lived there.

  As these thoughts drifted into his mind, the bell rang and thunder from aloft proclaimed that Dr. Bunnion’s Religious Instruction had finished for the day. Then all the little academy rocked and shook as Major Alexander’s twelve rose from Arithmetic in the back parlor and all the six and thirty sons of merchants and gentlefolk tumbled fiercely out into the five o’clock sun. Even the fat boarder had gone—not to join his friends, for he had none—but to the kitchen, and Mr. Brett was left alone with his strange secret . . .

  The unearthly light was still in Harris’s eyes. Bostock noticed it and held his tongue. There was no point in interrupting his friend’s thoughts. He would be told of them when Harris was ripe.

  They lived on neighboring streets, about a mile and a half from the school, so there was time enough. As they walked, the sun streamed down and gave them immense shadows which fell like black phantoms among the half-built houses that littered their way—as if haunting them prematurely with the ghosts of tragedies to come. Their pace was slow, their manner winding but sedate. There was no hurry. After some minutes of silence, Bostock stole a glance at his friend, but it was plain that Harris’s thoughts were still in the furnace, and at white heat. So Bostock scowled and punched an imaginary enemy. He was angry; he was often angry. It was part of his nature. Fits of anger came over him like waves of the sea till he longed to hiss and seethe and hurl stones like the sea itself. His father was a retired sea captain and he put it all down to that. Harris had once explained it to him—this notion of inherited passion—and Bostock had nodded fiercely, feeling at one with the elements. Harris’s father, on the other hand, was a learned physician, so Harris was able to explain his own advanced manner of thinking in the same way.

  They suited each other very well, did Bostock and Harris. Each had what the other lacked, and was always ready to part with it: Harris with his powerful mind and Bostock with his powerful limbs. In a way they represented the ancient idea of soul and body, but in a very pure state. Harris was as weak as a kitten and Bostock was as thick as a post. They were the greatest of friends and had the utm
ost respect for each other.

  “I think he admires me, you know,” said Harris abruptly.

  “Who does?” asked Bostock, curious but not surprised.

  “Mister Brett.”

  “Oh,” said Bostock, and waited. Whenever Harris opened his thoughts, the strange light in his eyes seemed to go out—like candles snuffed in an emptied room. But the light was still on, so Bostock knew there was more to come.

  “Haven’t you noticed how he looks at me and drops his voice like we was the only two in the room?”

  The friends halted and Bostock stared down toward the wide, glittering sea where distant fishing vessels seemed like faint perforations on a blaze of silver. They had reached the corner of his street. Far away the clock of St. Nicholas’s began to chime six and the setting sun, striking on the walls of the square flint houses, rosied the cobbles as if to show that even stone, when scrutinized by the eye of heaven, might have cause to blush.

  Harris laid an inky finger on Bostock’s torn blue sleeve. Bostock started and withdrew his eyes from the bright sea. “Old friend,” murmured Harris, his large face seeming vague and luminous in Bostock’s sun-dazzled eyes, “What do you say to this?”

  Then he told Bostock what he had in mind. As he murmured on, now rapidly, now slowly, a wisp of cloud passed across the sun; the flushed houses changed their complexions and an unearthly gray pallor fell across the little golden street. There was a brief chill in the air, and Bostock shivered.

  “Well?” said Harris softly.

  Bostock gazed at him in terrified admiration. Harris wanted to expose an infant.

  Among his numerous sisters, there was one of seven weeks old who was peculiarly suitable, and he was quite willing for Bostock to carry her up and expose her on the Downs. “It’s a warm evening,” he concluded with unusual humanity, “so I don’t suppose she’ll come to much harm. And anyway, my pa says it’s wonderful what they can stand.”

  He stopped. The light had gone out in his eyes so Bostock knew he had finished. Bostock frowned. He knew Harris was not mad. There were good reasons behind Harris’s scheme—very good reasons indeed. Only Bostock had not quite taken them in. A real tidal wave of anger at his own stupidity swept over him. He kicked a stone violently and watched it bounding down the street. Having no sisters of his own, he didn’t presume to judge of Harris’s generosity with his. The only living creature that Bostock had to share his meager thoughts and confidences with was a great brute of a ginger cat called Jupiter. Not for worlds would he have exposed Jupiter, but then he supposed cats were different. So Bostock, who would have trusted Harris with his life, helplessly nodded and hoped to understand everything in time.

  Adelaide was the infant’s name and Harris swore she was fed at six and then put down till she howled about four hours later. She wouldn’t be missed.

  Bostock felt himself being gently tugged toward the neighboring street where the Harris family lived a shade more elegantly than did the Bostocks. Already he could hear the faint shouts of the Harris girls and wondered, with a little pang, which was Mary’s—for she had a thin, wild beauty that Bostock greatly admired.

  “Quiet, Bosty—quiet as a mouse!”

  Tiny Adelaide, fed and happy and dreaming her muslin dreams, snoozed in her crib while her giant sisters squabbled in the garden and the rest of the household obligingly forgot her. Of a sudden, she dreamed she was lifted into the air in a big fluffy cloud. She bubbled and chuckled and tightened her creased-up eyes against any interruption. She flew . . . she flew . . .

  Bostock had got her partly under his coat. Leaving their loud boots in the street, the friends had entered the house, crept upstairs and abstracted the child. The fine weather had drawn everyone out of doors and only a kitchen maid had glimpsed them as they’d vanished through the front door. But she’d taken no particular notice. Master Harris and Master Bostock always came and went like ghosts, and were just about as welcome.

  Once outside, the friends paused only to put on their boots before turning northward and hastening toward the Downs. This first, easy success of the scheme filled them with a trembling anticipation—though Bostock, heavily burdened, still did not know for what.

  Already evening was coming on and the little town, lazy in the warm, buzzed only with the ever-busy flies. Silently the friends passed along the quiet, narrow streets, but always on the shady side. Ahead of them rose the great shoulders of the Downs where dark shadows were sweeping, like giant’s hands lifting in abhorrence at the deep, inquiring brother and his patiently following friend. For, though Bostock was immensely strong, Adelaide was portly and her weight hampered his stride and kept him in the rear.

  Tiny Adelaide dreamed she was in the branches of a tree and the wind was bouncing her up and down. She smiled into the musty darkness of Bostock’s coat and her fat fingers found a waistcoat button . . .

  “Harris!” Bostock’s voice was sharp with alarm. “I—I think she’s leaking or something. I’m all wet, Harris.”

  Harris hurried back and examined his sister. “I think she’s peed, Bosty.” For a moment the friends stared down at Adelaide in her cocoon of shawling, as if for the first time divining her to be vaguely as themselves, subject to the same pains, pleasures and natural laws. Then they observed the rapidly deepening sky and hastened on till the road dwindled away and became no more than a finger scratch of broken chalk through the stubbly green.

  On and on went Harris, across the uneven ground and skirting the chalky hollows that glared up abruptly, like the bleached sockets of half-buried giants’ skulls. It was plain to the panting Bostock that Harris had one particular spot in mind. At last they reached it, and Bostock knew it well: a place of mystery, trysts and blackberries. It was a steep declivity, carpeted with close turf and bordered on three sides by thick, mysterious walls of bramble. This dense darkness was always full of strange rustlings and sudden cracklings as unseen denizens went about their sharp affairs.

  “There,” breathed Harris, pointing to the turf. “Lay her there.”

  Bostock hesitated, and Harris looked surprised. Then and only then did he understand that Bostock was totally ignorant of his purpose. At once a great warmth filled him as he realized the scope of his friend’s trust. That Bostock should have come so far and on so strange an errand just because he, Harris, had asked him, spoke volumes for the power of friendship. Harris blinked. Even though Bostock must have thought he was mad, he’d followed him without a word.

  “Old friend,” he whispered moistly. “You an’ me’s going to behold wonders.”

  Rapidly and eagerly he explained everything. Did Bostock recall the tale of the two Roman infants that were suckled by the she-wolf? Bostock frowned and nodded. Few things ever got into his mind, but when they did there was no getting them out again. They stayed there like the alien fixtures of another man’s house—a source of passing wonder and bewilderment. He did not have the creative imagination that seizes on matters, apparently of little use and far apart, and instantly divines the link between them.

  But Harris had. When Mr. Brett had mentioned the she-wolf, Harris’s mind had leaped to the vixens that roamed the Downs, and when Mr. Brett had told of Spartan infants being exposed, Harris had thought at once of Adelaide. Then, putting all together in a sudden blaze, he’d hit on the inspired notion of seeing how native wild life accepted a human baby in its midst. He had every hope, he whispered excitedly, of a vixen with full dugs coming to suckle Adelaide!

  Bostock stared at Harris in awe. “Well?” said Harris. But Bostock was unable to speak, so Harris, mistaking his silence for doubt, said defensively, “Anyway, she’s my sister, and if she perishes it’ll be me what’ll have to bear her loss. Go on, Bosty—lay her down, old friend . . .”

  Fat little Adelaide smiled and dreamed . . . dreamed she was being laid among buttercups and daisies on a cradling green.

  Bostock and Harris crouched down to the windward in a patch of long grass through which only disconnected parts of
them could be seen, and there, with bright sharp eyes and pounding hearts they awaited the arrival of the vixen with full dugs.

  Harris never doubted for a moment that something of the kind would turn up and they’d witness an extraordinary phenomenon in nature. And Bostock never doubted Harris.

  “This is the most exciting moment of my whole life,” thought Bostock, with difficulty. “Harris is a real genius and he’s my best friend. I’m so excited I could jump and shout and kick the grass. Something’s going to happen. I don’t know how to keep still. Who can I tell about it? I must . . . no, I mustn’t. I wish I could think. Oh, I’m so horribly excited and Harris looks so calm. I wish I could stop thinking. Someone might hear me . . .”

  Harris’s thoughts, though no less turbulent, were of a more advanced nature and concerned the youngest person ever to read a learned paper before the Royal Society. Faintly, in his inner ear, he heard the bravos peal out like a storm of church bells on Judgment Sunday, and he bowed his head to hide his happy tears . . .

  Suddenly the two friends grew still in mind and body. A sound had petrified them. A faint, but unmistakable panting and snuffling and crackling of bramble. Then there was a crunching of dry twigs. Harris’s face, briefly blossoming in the long grass, was ashy with expectation.

  Little Adelaide, deep in her blind sleep, chuckled and dreamed she was about to be fed again.

  It was coming, it was coming! The vixen—the vixen with full dugs!

  Two

  YOUNG, PRETTY AND in yellow muslin, Tizzy Alexander, daughter of the fiery Major who taught arithmetic, was in a condition of terrified excitement. Her heart was thumping half out of her bodice and she kept clutching at her scarf to hide it. She must have been mad to have put herself in Ralph Bunnion’s way, but wild curiosity had at last overpowered her. Ralph Bunnion—cricketer, horseman and hero of the school. What was he like, this terrible, handsome, heartless breaker of hearts? Tall, fashionable, and so far as could be judged from the ends of them, clean-limbed.