The day came and, at the appointed hour, Dean Spanley arrived at my house. I had champagne for him and no Tokay, and noticed a wistful expression upon his face that increased all through dinner; until by the time that the sweet was served, and still there was no Tokay, his enquiring dissatisfied glances, though barely perceptible, reminded me, whenever I did perceive them, of those little whines that a dog will sometimes utter when gravely dissatisfied, perhaps because there is another dog in the room, or because for any other reason adequate notice is not being taken of himself. And yet I do not wish to convey that there was ever anything whatever about Dean Spanley that in the least suggested a dog; it was only in my own mind, preoccupied as it was with the tremendous discovery to the verge of which I had strayed, that I made the comparison. I did not offer Dean Spanley any Tokay during dinner, because I knew that it was totally impossible to break down the barrier between him and his strange memories even with Tokay, my own hope being to bring him not so far from that point by ordinary methods, I mean by port and champagne, and then to offer him the Tokay, and I naturally noted the exact amount required with the exactitude of a scientist; my whole investigations depended on that. And then the moment came when I could no longer persuade the Dean to take another drop of wine; of any ordinary wine, I mean; and I put the Tokay before him. A look of surprise came into his face, surprise that a man in possession of Tokay should let so much of the evening waste away before bringing it out. ‘Really,’ he said, ‘I hardly want any more wine, but….’
‘It’s a better vintage than the other one,’ I said, making a guess that turned out to be right.
And it certainly was a glorious wine. I took some myself, because with that great bundle of keys to the mysterious past, that the Maharajah’s dozen bottles had given me, I felt I could afford this indulgence. A reminiscent look came over Dean Spanley’s face, and deepened, until it seemed to be peering over the boundaries that shut in this life. I waited a while and then I said: ‘I was wondering about rabbits.’
‘Among the worst of Man’s enemies,’ said the Dean.
And I knew at once, from his vehemence, that his memory was back again on the other side of that veil that shuts off so much from the rest of us. ‘They lurk in the woods and plot, and give Man no proper allegiance. They should be hunted whenever met.’
He said it with so much intensity that I felt sure the rabbits had often eluded him in that other life; and I saw that to take his side against them as much as possible would be the best way to keep his memory where it was, on the other side of the veil; so I abused rabbits. With evident agreement the Dean listened, until, to round off my attack on them, I added: ‘And over-rated animals even to eat. There’s no taste in them.’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that,’ said the Dean. ‘A good hot rabbit that has been run across a big field has certainly an, an element of …’ And he did not complete his sentence; but there was a greedy look in his eyes.
I was very careful about refilling the Dean’s glass; I gave him no more for some while. It seemed to me that the spiritual level from which he had this amazing view, back over the ages, was a very narrow one; like a ridge at the top of a steep, which gives barely a resting-place to the mountaineer. Too little Tokay and he would lapse back to orthodoxy; too much, and I feared he would roll just as swiftly down to the present day. It was the ridge from which I feared I had pushed him last time. This time I must watch the mood that Tokay had brought, and neither intensify it nor let it fade, for as long as I could hold it with exactly the right hospitality. He looked wistfully at the Tokay, but I gave him no more yet.
‘Rabbits,’ I said to remind him.
‘Yes, their guts are very good,’ he said. ‘And their fur is very good for one. As for their bones, if they cause one any irritation, one can always bring them up. In fact, when in doubt always bring anything up: it’s easily done. But there is one bit of advice I would give to you. Out-of-doors. It’s always best out-of-doors. There are what it is not for us to call prejudices: let us rather say preferences. But while these preferences exist amongst those who hold them, it is much best out-of-doors. You will remember that?’
‘Certainly,’ I said. ‘Certainly.’
And as I spoke I carefully watched his eyes, to see if he was still on that narrow ledge that I spoke of, that spiritual plane from which a man could gaze out on past ages. And he was. A hand strayed tentatively towards the Tokay, but I moved it out of his reach.
‘Rats!’ I said. And he stirred slightly, but did not seem greatly interested.
And then, without any further suggestion from me, he began to talk of the home-life of a dog, somewhere in England in the days long before motors.
‘I used to see off all the carts that drove up to the back-door every day. Whenever I heard them coming I ran round; I was always there in time; and then I used to see them off. I saw them off as far as a tree that there was, a little way down the drive. Always about a hundred barks, and then I used to stop. Some were friends of mine, but I used to see them off the same as the rest. It showed them that the house was well guarded. People that didn’t know me used to hit at me with a whip, until they found out that they were too slow to catch me. If one of them ever had hit me I should have seen him off the whole way down the drive. It was always pleasant to trot back to the house from one of these little trips. I have had criticism for this, angry words, that is to say; but I knew from the tone of the voices that they were proud of me. I think it best to see them off like that, because, because….’
I hastily said: ‘Because otherwise they might think that the house wasn’t properly guarded.’
And the answer satisfied him. But I filled the Dean’s glass with Tokay as fast as I could. He drank it, and remained at that strange altitude from which he could see the past.
‘Then sooner or later,’ he continued, ‘the moon comes over the hill. Of course you can take your own line about that. Personally, I never trusted it. It’s the look of it I didn’t like, and the sly way it moves. If anything comes by at night I like it to come on footsteps, and I like it to have a smell. Then you know where you are.’
‘I quite agree,’ I said, for the Dean had paused.
‘You can hear footsteps,’ he went on, ‘and you can follow a smell, and you can tell the sort of person you have to deal with, by the kind of smell he has. But folk without any smell have no right to be going about among those that have. That’s what I didn’t like about the moon. And I didn’t like the way it stared one in the face. And there was a look in his stare as though everything was odd and the house not properly guarded. The house was perfectly well guarded, and so I said at the time. But he wouldn’t stop that queer look. Many’s the time I’ve told him to go away and not to look at me in that odd manner; and he pretended not to hear me. But he knew all right, he knew he was odd and strange and in league with magic, and he knew what honest folks thought of him: I’ve told him many a time.’
‘I should stand no nonsense from him,’ I said.
‘Entirely my view,’ said the Dean.
There was a silence then such as you sometimes see among well-satisfied diners.
‘I expect he was afraid of you,’ I said; and only just in time, for the Dean came back as it were with a jerk to the subject.
‘Ah, the moon,’ he said. ‘Yes, he never came any nearer. But there’s no saying what he’d have done if I hadn’t been there. There was a lot of strangeness about him, and if he’d come any nearer everything might have been strange. They had only me to look after them.
‘Only me to look after them,’ he added reflectively. ‘You know, I’ve known them talk to a man that ought at least to be growled at; stand at the front door and talk to him. And for what was strange or magical they never had any sense; no foreboding I mean. Why, there were sounds