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card.
    â€˜Bit old-fash, aren’t they?’ she said, smiling.
    â€˜Very. That’s one of the things I like about them. They’ve been with me since the war. Both are what used to be called treasures when the genus existed. I’m always being told you don’t get that sort nowadays. Or any sort, for that matter. I’m spoiled.’
    â€˜I notice they don’t put their address,’ said Mrs Lark.
    The remark rather irritated Carolus.
    â€˜On a postcard? Why should they?’
    â€™Oh, well,’ said Mrs Lark, tiring of the subject as Carolus put the card in his pocket. ‘The Rec’s out. Went about elev. Didn’t say where.’
    â€˜He’ll be in to lunch?’
    â€˜Prob. Nearly always is. Tell you what, if you’re not doing anything, would you like to have a chat with my husb? He doesn’t see many peep and would be glad of a chat. Come through to our part of the house.’
    Carolus agreed, not without some curiosity, and Mrs Lark led him to a pleasant room overlooking what had once been a kitchen garden. Ronald Lark was in a wheel-chair.
    He had a pale thin face, not cadaverous but taut. His expression suggested querulousness rather than suffering. He offered Carolus a thin hand when Mrs Lark introduced them.
    â€˜I hear you’re staying here. I can’t think what brings you to Clibburn. It’s a detestable place.’
    â€˜Don’t say that, Ron,’ Mrs Lark said cheerfully. ‘I think it’s rather fun.’
    â€˜Fun? My wife has a strange idea of fun. All we have here to while away the winter evenings is a spot of bogus witchcraft.’
    â€˜You’ve got the telly,’ Mrs Lark pointed out.
    â€˜The telly!’ Ronald Lark dismissed the whole world of televised entertainment with contempt. ‘Will you have a glass of beer? It’s all we have in the house, I’m afraid.’
    He spoke like a man of some education and Carolus suspected him of considering himself his wife’s superior, which in the narrowest sense he probably was.
    â€˜I must get back to the kitch,’ Mrs Lark said, when she had put some beer on the table beside her husband.
    â€˜I don’t know how my wife can stand the people here,’ said Ronald. ‘I don’t have to see much of them, thank God, but from what I hear they’re a lousy lot. Too much inter-breeding, possibly. Have you met a woman called Murrain?’
    â€˜Yes. I went to see her yesterday.’
    â€˜Phony, of course. But dangerous.’
    â€™In what way dangerous?’
    â€˜Half of them are afraid of her. She has the most sinister influence. She couldn’t make a good hell-broth to save her life, but people say she has the Evil Eye.’
    â€˜Interested in that sort of superstition?’ asked Carolus.
    â€˜Not really, but you get a lot of it here. Are you?’
    â€˜Quite,’ admitted Carolus.
    â€˜Then Matchlow’s the man you want to see. He’s an expert. Only it’s hard to make his acquaintance.’
    â€˜I’m told his wife is more sociable.’
    â€˜Judith? Yes. Now there’s a really charming woman. But she knows nothing about her husband’s peculiar hobbies. “As long as he doesn’t turn me into a toad or anything he can do what he likes,” she says. I hope you’ll meet her. She’ll restore your confidence in ordinary people after so many exotic types. She comes here quite often and she and the wife get on like a house on fire. But I wouldn’t have her old man in the house. He was mixed up with Aleister Crowley and all that lot. Nasty piece of work.’
    â€˜I’m told he has one friend. A farmer named Garries.’
    Ronald Lark gave him a somewhat wary look.
    â€˜I don’t get about much in this bloody chair, but I’ve seen Garries in the village. The very last man you’d have associated with all this. A big, lusty old chap—typical farmer of