Number Nineteen: Ben’s Last Case. J. Farjeon Jefferson

       7

       Conversation on a Doorstep

      Ben’s first feeling on hearing the bell was one of resentment. Wasn’t he ever to be let alone? This was what he had meant to safeguard himself against when he had tried to get Mr Smith to define and limit his working hours.

      If the person who had rung the front-door bell was a house-hunter, this was a most unreasonable time to call! How can you expect to see a house properly if you’re shown over it by candle-light? On the other hand, if the person were not a house-hunter, then there would probably be other good reasons against answering this late summons.

      ‘They’ll ’ave ter ring twice,’ decided Ben, ‘if they’re goin’ ter git me!’

      They did ring twice, and the second ring was followed by the sound of the door-knocker. Lummy, he s’posed he’d have to go! But if he had any say in the matter, which was of course a moot point, he did not intend to make himself pleasant.

      Managing to keep his eyes from straying along the passage towards the room with the locked door—he was trying hard not to think of that—he left the kitchen and mounted the basement stairs, candle held before him, his shadow sliding up behind. When he reached the hall he was tempted to desert his duty and to continue mounting up to the top, but he knew that the candle-light would be betraying its flickering presence in the fanlight above the front door, so he could not pretend that nobody was in the house. Taking a deep breath—it sort of steadied him like—he went to the door, transferred the candlestick from his right hand to his left, grasped the door-knob, paused, then turned the knob quickly and pulled the door open.

      His action was so sudden that the feeble flame of the candle failed to survive the draught of air that came through the doorway, and went out. There was no unkind trick that had not been played on Ben in moments of tenseness. He had had even this one before. The dim figure standing before him on the doorstep might be anybody from the Archbishop of Canterbury to a devil with a forked tail. The voice that addressed him, however, clearly came from neither.

      ‘Perhaps if you relit it,’ said the voice, ‘we could see each other.’

      It was a woman’s voice. Apart from a certain strained tenseness in it, it was not unpleasant. Feeling that, so far, things were not as bad as they might have been, and might soon become, Ben fumbled for his matches. Then it occurred to him that after all there might be some advantage in darkness, and it would be as well to delay lighting up.

      ‘’Oojer want?’ he asked.

      ‘I prefer to see who I’m talking to,’ came the response.

      ‘Oh! But if yer’ve come ter the wrong ’ouse—’

      ‘Isn’t this Number 19?’

      ‘Well, yus.’

      ‘Billiter Road?’

      That destroyed his happy hope.

      ‘That’s right,’ he answered. ‘But it’s a bit laite fer callin’, ain’t it?’

      ‘If it were earlier,’ replied the woman, ‘we would not need that candle to talk by. Aren’t you going to light it?’

      He supposed he would have to, and he did so with an inward sigh. He struck a match, applied it to the wick, and the little flame glowed again. By its insufficient illumination Ben saw that the woman was young and rather attractive, if not exactly his meat. He preferred ’em plump and fair, and this ’un was dark and slim. Nice neat dress, anyhow. In fact, you shouldn’t call her a woman, really. She was a lidy.

      All at once Ben switched off her on to himself. He stopped thinking of what he was looking at and thought of what she was looking at, and a wave of self-consciousness swept over him. This was the first person, not counting his employer, who had seen him in his new guise, and quite apart from getting used to being seen like he wasn’t, it set up a pretty problem. Should he try and talk like he thought Marmaduke would, or go on being natural like? His natural voice certainly did not fit his neat attire. A cat as audience didn’t matter, but this was a very different cup o’ tea.

      ‘Thank you, that’s better,’ said the young lady.

      ‘Don’t menshun,’ returned Ben.

      ‘Then I won’t.’ There was something odd in her voice, a hardness which somehow Ben did not think natural. Was she playing a part, too? But Ben did not quite believe that, either. Probably there was some other reason, and not a nice one. ‘May I know who you are?’