Crooked Wreath by Christianna Brand

illiterate, he yet gave his opinions on all subjects, unasked and at interminable length, and was the club bore of the Swan, the village hostelry. He had one joy in life, his small granddaughter, Rosy-Posy; and (since the time that Philip, by a perfectly routine treatment, had seen the child through a slight attack of tonsilitis) one pride and admiration–Philip. He boasted incessantly of the complexities of the case and of the extraordinary lengths to which “the Doctor” had gone to save Rosy-Posy’s life.
    Dark days, however, had fallen upon Brough. With the increasing rigour of the call-up, all his staff had been taken from him, and he found himself obliged to turn to and do some work at Swanswater. Sir Richard had proved unexpectedly stonyhearted, saying, when approached, that if Brough felt too old for the job, he had better retire and make room for a man strong enough to cope with such work as had to be kept going. Mrs. Brough, a gaunt woman, speechless, as must be anyone who lived with Brough, was now “helping out” at the house, and Brough dug and delved and grumbled as never before. He was only too ready to rest, leaning upon his spade and giving of his voluble best when, on the afternoon of Sir Richard’s death, the Inspector came down from the house to talk to him.
    Cockie, who loved a country pub, had before now been driven from The Swan, by the loquacity of Brough; but in his official capacity he stood it for just one minute. “Well, Brough, I haven’t got time to worry about your troubles with Sir Richard; they’re over now anyway, and,” he could not help adding maliciously, “I daresay you may not be at Swanswater much longer.” He pushed the new panama hat on to the back of his head, motioning with one nicotined finger at the lodge, and said abruptly: “Is it true that you sanded those paths last night?”
    â€œNine o’clock I was working till,” said Brough, immediately, in a whining voice. “Had my bit of supper at eight o’clock all by myself, the wife being up at the ’ouse working her fingers to the bone for them as was born equal with us, I says, and by rights ought to be waiting on us, not us on them …”
    Cockrill, not unfamiliar with Brough’s ideas of an equal world, restrained himself from asking under what compulsion save that of cupidity Mrs. Brough was now working her fingers to the bone, and merely inquired as to the time she had gone up to the house the night before, and the time Brough had commenced the sanding of the paths.
    â€œEight o’clock, she went up,” said Brough, grudgingly. “Quarter to eight the fambly ’as their meal and she goes and helps the old woman to wash up. Eight o’clock I got in from the–the garden, and she says, ‘I’ll put you out a bit of cheese and an onion to your bread,’ she says, ‘and you’d better ’ave a glass of beer, for I haven’t got the time now to make you a cuppa tea,’ and off she goes to the house. I ’as me supper and a read of the paper and I’m due to go down to The Swan at nine, for me fire watch; and suddenly I thinks to meself, ‘Dang it, I’ve still got them paths to finish, and the old beggar’ll carry on if they ain’t done tonight like ’e said’; and I see that it isn’t too late, I can just manage it; and that would be the end of the sand. Just went round, it did, and not a grain more have I got left. How the Council thinks I’m going to keep my paths nice if they don’t allow me no transport, they’d better explain to Sir Richard …”
    â€œWell never mind the Council now. You started this sanding at about twenty to nine, and ended it at nine. Mr. Garde tells me that you seemed to be just finishing when he came through the gates; and a minute or two later, Miss Claire saw you from a bedroom window. Now how do you do it? Do you rake