Honeybath's Haven Read Free Page A

Melissa? It comes – doesn’t it? – in so many different forms.’
    â€˜Delusions. He believes himself to be somebody else, and never the same person two weeks running. Or even something else. A few days ago he set up that system of mirrors you use when you’re going to do a self-portrait and don’t want your left ear to face the world as your right. As if it made any difference! But what appeared on his drawing board wasn’t a man at all. It was a motorcar. I wonder whether he’s brought anything to drink.’
    â€˜If Edwin…?’ Honeybath realized his mistake. ‘I’m afraid not. I thought…’
    â€˜He used to bring something to drink. Fortunately there’s plenty in the house. The two of them can talk twaddle to each other through the night, and let me get some decent sleep for once.’ Mrs Lightfoot had led the way into her sitting-room, and she now sat down. ‘Charles,’ she asked, ‘did you ever hear of a man called Flannel Foot?’
    â€˜Never.’ Honeybath remembered that the third-person singular treatment was administered by Melissa only in a standing position. ‘Who is he?’
    â€˜He’s what Edwin has become now. It started with a horrible journalist calling on us three or four weeks ago. He’s writing something about Flannel Foot, and it seems that Flannel Foot was living in this flat when they caught him.’
    â€˜You mean he is a criminal?’ By this time Honeybath had sat down too. There was no sign of Melissa’s husband appearing. Perhaps he was away from home, which would mean that this awkward visit was going to fail of its purpose. Honeybath didn’t know whether he would be disappointed or relieved. It didn’t sound as if resuming relations with Edwin Lightfoot was going to be an easy matter. Prout had certainly been playing down the oddity of his mental state.
    â€˜Flannel Foot was a criminal. He died on the 18th of December 1942, after doing five years’ penal servitude to which he had been sentenced on the 2nd of December 1937.’
    â€˜Good heavens, Melissa! Where have you collected all this rubbish?’
    â€˜From Edwin. And he dug it out of some dreadful place where they keep all the old newspapers the world has ever seen. Dingley Dell, or some such.’
    â€˜Colindale. Do you mean that Edwin has been researching into the life of this person?’
    â€˜Yes, of course – and just because of this intrusive young man. Flannel Foot’s real name was Vickers, and he was a burglar in a petty line of business. Children’s piggy-banks and what could be got out of the gas meter. And he ended up, as I say, either in this flat or in another close by. It seems they can’t be quite sure.’
    â€˜On the strength of piggy-banks, Melissa? It sounds most improbable.’
    â€˜He was pertinacious, it seems, and achieved about two thousand successful burglaries before slipping up. That’s what has caught Edwin’s fancy. So Lightfoot has become Flannel Foot. Only for part of the day, of course, since Edwin’s madness is always a kind of bad joke. I believe he’s at it now.’
    â€˜I can’t hear him at it.’
    â€˜Of course not. That’s the point. Nobody ever did hear Flannel Foot. Or see him, for that matter. But you can see Edwin. And here he is.’
    Edwin Lightfoot had entered the room. He didn’t look much changed. Or rather his physical man didn’t look much changed. But he was wearing what might have been thought of as the Sunday attire of a respectable artisan of the Edwardian period, shiny and drab; a pair of shabby leather gloves; and a brown Homburg hat. Bright-eyed and apparently inwardly amused, he advanced soundlessly over the parquet floor. The soundlessness resulted from each of his feet being swathed in several yards of flannel. He might have been a gentleman of a past age, badly afflicted by