The Glimpses of the Moon

‘Er didn’arf create.’

‘The girl did?’ said Padmore, baffled. ‘“Er” means “he”, my dear chap,’ the Major told him. ‘In this context, anyway.’

‘In this context,’ said Padmore heavily. ‘Yes. I see. But anyway, what girl? This is the first I’ve heard of there being a woman in the case – I mean, apart from Mrs Leeper-Foxe and the Bust child.’

‘I don’t think Hagberd would have referred to Mrs LeeperFoxe as a sheila,’ said the Major. ‘Sheila’s a more or less complimentary word, isn’t it?’ He returned to the attack. ‘Now listen, Gobbo. You say Hagberd was going on about a sheila.

What sheila?’

‘Doan know no Sheilas,’ Gobbo retorted firmly, as if he were being accused of something. ‘Furrin sort of a name,’ he offered, supplementing entertainment with instruction.

‘Let’s try another tack, then,’ said the Major, ‘Gobbo, you know where Routh was murdered, do you?’

‘Ehss.’

‘Well, where?’

‘Bawdeys Meadow.’

‘And how far away from here is that?’

Gobbo ruminated. ‘Better nor tew mile,’ he eventually said. A joke occurred to him. ‘So be they abbn’ move’ en,’ he added, cawing with laughter.

‘Yes, well, my dear fellow, don’t you see, if Hagberd was two miles away from here murdering Routh, you couldn’t have been talking to him under the tree, could you?’

‘Ehss.’

‘No, you couldn’t, Gobbo.’

‘So be,’ said Gobbo happily, ‘they abbn’ move’ en – abbn’ 12