The People in the Castle: Selected Strange Stories (6 page)

Next morning at breakfast (which he had with his relatives) he expected to be in disgrace, but curiously enough they paid no attention to him. They were all talking about Mr. Slockenheimer.

“Such a piece of luck,” said Cousin Cedric. “Just as the tourist season is ending.”

“Who is this man?” creaked Great-Aunt Gertrude.

“He is a film director, from Hollywood,” explained Aunt Agatha, loudly and patiently. “He is making a film about Robin Hood and he has asked permission to shoot some of the indoor scenes in Troy—for which we shall all be handsomely paid, naturally.”

“Naturally, naturally,” croaked the old ravens, all around the table.

Wil pricked up his ears, and then an anxious thought struck him. Suppose Mr. Slockenheimer’s people discovered the room with the tree?

“They are coming today,” Uncle Umbert was shrieking into Great-Uncle Ulric’s ear trumpet.

Mr. Slockenheimer’s outfit arrived after breakfast while Wil was doing his daily run—a hundred times around the triangle of grass in front of the house, while Mr. Buckle timed him with a stop-watch.

A lovely lady shot out of the huge green motor car, and shrieked:

“Oh, you cute darling! Now you must tell me the way to the nearest milk bar,” and whisked him back into the car with her. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that Mr. Buckle had been commandeered to show somebody the spiral staircase.

Wil ate his raspberry sundae in a daze. He had never been in the milk bar before, never eaten ice cream, never ridden in a car. To have it all following on his discovery of the day before was almost too much for him.

“Gracious!” exclaimed his new friend, looking at her wristwatch. “I must be on the set! I’m Maid Marian you know. Tarzan, I mean Robin, has to rescue me from the wicked baron at eleven in the Great Hall.”

“I’ll show you where it is,” said Wil.

He expected more trouble when he reached home, but the whole household was disorganized: Mr. Buckle was showing Robin Hood how to put on the Black Prince’s helmet (which was too big) and Aunt Agatha was having a long business conversation with Mr. Slockenheimer, so his arrival passed unnoticed.

He was relieved to find that the film was only going to be shot in the main public rooms, so there did not seem to be much risk of the tree being discovered.

After lunch Mr. Buckle was called on again to demonstrate the firing of the 9th Earl’s crossbow (he shot an extra) and Wil was able to escape once more and reach in safety the regions at the back.

He stood on a dark landing for what seemed like hours, listening to the patter of his own heart. Then, tickling his ear like a thread of cobweb, he heard Em’s whisper:

“Wil! Here I am! This way!” and below it he heard the rustle of the tree, as if it too were whispering: “Here I am.”

It did not take him long to find the room, but his progress through the leaves was slightly impeded by the things he was carrying. When he emerged at the foot of the tree he found Em waiting there. The hug she gave him nearly throttled him.

“I’ve been thinking of some more places to show you. And all sorts of games to play!”

“I’ve brought you a present,” he said, emptying his pockets.

“Oh! What’s in those little tubs?”

“Ice cream. The chief electrician gave them to me.”

“What a strange confection,” she said, tasting it. “It is smooth and sweet but it makes my teeth chatter.”

“And here’s your present.” It was a gold Mickey Mouse with ruby eyes which Maid Marian had given him. Em handled it with respect and presently stored it away in one of her hidey-holes in the trunk. Then they played follow-my-leader until they were so tired that they had to lie back on thick beds of leaves and rest.

“I did not expect to see you so soon,” said Em as they lay picking the aromatic leaves and chewing them, while a prim Jacobean lady shook her head at them.

Wil explained about the invasion of the film company and she listened with interest.

“A sort of strolling players,” she commented. “My father was one—flat contrary to the family’s commands, of course. I saw many pieces performed before I was rescued from the life by my respected grandmother to be brought up as befitted one of our name.” She sighed.

For the next two months Wil found many opportunities to slip off and visit Em, for Mr. Buckle became greatly in demand as an advisor on matters of costume, and even Squabb was pressed into service ironing doublets and mending hose.

But one day Wil saw his relatives at breakfast with long faces, and he learned that the company had finished shooting the inside scenes and were about to move to Florida to take the Sherwood Forest sequences. The handsome additional income which the family had been making was about to cease, and Wil realized with dismay that the old life would begin again.

Later when he was starting off to visit Em he found a little group, consisting of Aunt Agatha, Uncle Umbert, Mr. Slockenheimer and his secretary, Mr. Jakes, on one of the back landings. Wil shrank into the shadows and listened to their conversation with alarm.

“One million,” Mr. Slockenheimer was saying. “Yes, sir, one million’s my last word. But I’ll ship the house over to Hollywood myself, as carefully as if it were a new-laid egg. You may be sure of that, Ma’am. I appreciate your feelings, and you and your family may go on living in it for the rest of your days. Every brick will be numbered and every floorboard will be lettered so that they’ll go back in their exact places. This house certainly will be a gold mine to me—it’ll save its value twice over in a year as sets for different films. There’s Tudor, Gothic, Norman, Saxon, Georgian, Decorated, all under one roof.”

“
But we
shall have to have salaries too, mind,” said Uncle Umbert greedily. “We can’t be expected to uproot ourselves like this and move to Hollywood all for nothing.”

Mr. Slockenheimer raised his eyebrows at this, but said agreeably:

“Okay, I’ll sign you on as extras.” He pulled out a fistful of forms, scribbled his signature on them and handed them to Aunt Agatha. “There you are, Ma’am, twenty-year contracts for the whole bunch.”

“Dirt cheap at the price, even so,” Wil heard him whisper to the secretary.

“Now as we’re finished shooting I’ll have the masons in tomorrow and start chipping the old place to bits. Hangings and furniture will be crated separately. It’ll take quite a time, of course; shouldn’t think we’ll get it done in less than three weeks.” He looked with respect over his shoulders at a vista of dark corridor which stretched away for half a mile.

Wil stole away with his heart thudding. Were they actually proposing to pull down the house,
this
house, and ship it to Hollywood for film sets? What about the tree? Would they hack it down, or dig it up and transport it, leaves and all?

“What’s the matter, boy?” asked Em, her cheek bulging with the giant sucker he had brought her.

“The film company’s moving away, and they’re going to take Troy with them for using as backgrounds for films.”

“The whole house?”

“Yes.”

“Oh,” said Em, and became very thoughtful.

“Em.”

“Yes?”

“What—I mean, what would happen to you if they found this room and cut the tree down, or dug it up?”

“I’m not sure,” she said, pondering. “I shouldn’t go
on
after that—none of us would in here—but as to exactly
what
would happen—; I don’t expect it would be bad. Perhaps we should just go out like lamps.”

“Well then it must be stopped,” said Wil so firmly that he surprised himself.

“Can you forbid it? You’re the Heir, aren’t you?”

“Not till old Uncle Winthrop dies. We’ll have to think of some other plan.”

“I have an idea,” said Em, wrinkling her brow with effort. “In my days, producers would do much for a well-written play, one that had never been seen before. Is it still like that nowadays?”

“Yes I think so, but we don’t know anyone who writes plays,” Wil pointed out.

“I have a play laid by somewhere,” she explained. “The writer was a friend of my father—he asked my father to take it up to London to have it printed. My father bade me take care of it and I put it in my bundle of clothes. It was on the journey, as we were passing through Oxford, that I was seen and carried off by my respected grandmother, and I never saw my father or Mr. Shakespeere again, so the poor man lost his play.”

“Mr. Shakespeare, did you say?” asked Wil, stuttering slightly. “What was the name of the play, do you remember?”

“I forget. I have it here somewhere.” She began delving about in a cranny between two branches and presently drew out a dirty old manuscript. Wil stared at it with popping eyes.

The Tragicall Historie of Robin Hoode

A play by Wm. Shakespeere

Act I, Scene I. Sherwood Forest. Enter John

Lackland, De Bracy, Sheriff of Nottingham,

Knights, Lackeys and attendants.

john l
.  Good sirs, the occasion of our coming hither

Is, since our worthy brother Coeur de Lion

Far from our isle now wars on Paynim soil,

The apprehension of that recreant knave

Most caitiff outlaw who is known by some

As Robin Locksley; by others Robin Hood;

More, since our coffers gape with idle locks

The forfeiture of his ill-gotten gains.

Thus Locksley’s stocks will stock our locks enow

While he treads air beneath the forest bough.

“Golly,” said Wil. “Shakespeare’s
Robin Hood.
I wonder what Mr. Slockenheimer would say to this?”

“Well don’t wait.
Go and ask him.
It’s yours—I’ll make you a present of it.”

He wriggled back through the leaves with frantic speed, slammed the door, and raced down the passage towards the Great Hall. Mr. Slockenheimer was there superintending the packing of some expensive and elaborate apparatus.

“
Hello, Junior. Haven
’t seen you in days. Well, how d’you like the thought of moving to Hollywood, eh?”

“Not very much,” Wil said frankly. “You see, I’m used to it here, and—and the house is too; I don’t think the move would be good for it.”

“Think the dry air would crumble it, mebbe? Well, there’s something to what you say. I’ll put in air-conditioning apparatus at the other end. I’m sorry you don’t take to the idea, though. Hollywood’s a swell place.”

“
Mr. Slockenheimer,
” said Wil, “I’ve got something here which is rather valuable. It’s mine—somebody gave it to me. And it’s genuine. I was wondering if I could do a sort of swap—exchange it for the house, you know.”

“It would have to be mighty valuable,” replied Mr. Slockenheimer cautiously. “Think it’s worth a million, son? What is it?”

“It’s a play by Mr. Shakespeare—a new play that no one’s seen before.”

“Eh?”

“I’ll show you,” said Wil confidently, pulling out the MS.

“
The Tragicall Historie of Robin Hoode,
” read Mr. Slockenheimer slowly. “By Wm. Shakespeere. Well I’ll be goshdarned. Just when I’d finished the indoor scenes. Isn’t that just my luck? Hey, Junior—are you sure this is genuine?—Well, Jakes will know, he knows everything. Hey,” he called to his secretary, “come and take a look at this.”

The dry Mr. Jakes let out a whistle when he saw the signature.

“That’s genuine, all right,” he said. “It’s quite something you’ve got there. First production of the original Shakespeare play by W. P. Slockenheimer.”

“Well, will you swap?” asked Wil once more.

“I’ll say I will,” exclaimed Mr. Slockenheimer, slapping him thunderously on the back. “You can keep your mouldering old barracks. I’ll send you twenty seats for the premiere.
Robin Hoode by Wm. Shakespeere.
Well, what do you know?”

“There’s just one thing,” said Wil, pausing.

“Yes, Bud?”

“These contracts you gave my uncle and aunt and the others. Are they still binding?”

“Not if you don’
t want.
”

“Oh, but I do—I’d much rather they went to Hollywood.”

Mr. Slockenheimer burst out laughing. “Oh, I get the drift. Okay, Junior, I daresay they won’t bother me as much as they do you. I’ll hold them to those contracts as tight as glue. Twenty years, eh? You’ll be of age by then, I guess? Your Uncle Umbert can be the Sheriff of Nottingham, he’s about the build for the part. And we’ll fit your Aunt Aggie in somewhere.”

“And Buckle and Squab?”

“Yes, yes,” said Mr. Slockenheimer, much tickled. “Though what you’ll do here all on your own—however, that’s your affair. Right, boys, pack up those cameras next.”

Three days later the whole outfit was gone, and with them, swept away among the flash bulbs, cameras, extras, crates, props and costumes, went Squabb, Buckle, Aunt Agatha, Uncle Umbert, Cousin Cedric, and all the rest.

Empty and peaceful the old house dreamed, with sunlight shifting from room to room and no sound to break the silence, save in one place, where the voices of children could be heard faintly above the rustling of a tree.

Furry Night

The deserted aisles of the National Museum of Dramatic Art lay very, very still in the blue autumn twilight. Not a whisper of wind stirred the folds of Irving’s purple cloak; Ellen Terry’s ostrich fan was smooth and unruffled; the blue-black gleaming breastplate that Sir Murdoch Meredith, founder of the museum, had worn as Macbeth held its reflection as quietly as a cottage kettle.

And yet, despite this hush, there was an air of strain, of expectancy, along the narrow coconut-matted galleries between the glass cases: a tension suggesting that some crisis had taken or was about to take place.

In the total stillness a listener might have imagined that he heard, ever so faintly, the patter of stealthy feet far away among the exhibits.

Two men, standing in the shadow of the Garrick showcase, were talking in low voices.

“This is where it happened,” said the elder, white-haired man.

He picked up a splinter of broken glass, frowned at it, and dropped it into a litter bin. The glass had been removed from the front of the case, and some black tights and gilt medals hung exposed to the evening air.

“We managed to hush it up. The hospital and ambulance men will be discreet, of course. Nobody else was there, luckily. Only the Bishop was worried.”

“I should think so,” the younger man said. “It’s enough to make anybody anxious.”

“No, I mean he was
worried
. Hush,” the white-haired man whispered, “here comes Sir Murdoch.”

The distant susurration had intensified into soft, pacing footsteps. The two men, without a word, stepped farther back in the shadow until they were out of sight. A figure appeared at the end of the aisle and moved forward until it stood beneath the portrait of Edmund Keane as Shylock. The picture, in its deep frame, was nothing but a square of dark against the wall.

Although they were expecting it, both men jumped when the haunted voice began to speak.

“You may as well use question with the wolf

Why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb. . . .”

A sleeve of one of the watchers brushed against the wall, the lightest possible touch, but Sir Murdoch swung round sharply, his head outthrust, teeth bared. They held their breath, and after a moment he turned back to the picture.

    “Thy currish spirit

Govern’d a wolf, who, hang’d for human slaughter

Even from the gallows did his fell soul fleet. . . .”

He paused, with a hand pressed to his forehead, and then leaned forward and hissed,

    “Thy desires

Are wolvish, bloody, starv’d, and ravenous!”

His head sank on his chest. His voice ceased. He brooded for a moment, and then resumed his pacing and soon passed out of sight. They heard the steps go lightly down the stairs, and presently the whine of the revolving door.

After a prudent interval the two others emerged from their hiding place, left the gallery, and went out to a car that was waiting for them in Great Smith Street.

“I wanted you to see that, Peachtree,” said the elder man, “to give you some idea of what you are taking on. Candidly, as far as experience goes, I hardly feel you are qualified for the job, but you are young and tough and have presence of mind; most important of all, Sir Murdoch seems to have taken a fancy to you. You will have to keep an unobtrusive eye on him every minute of the day; your job is a combination of secretary, companion, and resident psychiatrist. I have written to Dr. Defoe, the local GP at Polgrue. He is old, but you will find him full of practical sense. Take his advice . . . I think you said you were brought up in Australia?”

“Yes,” Ian Peachtree said. “I only came to this country six months ago.”

“Ah, so you missed seeing Sir Murdoch act.”

“Was he so very wonderful?”

“He made the comedies too macabre,” said Lord Hawick, considering, “but in the tragedies there was no one to touch him. His Macbeth was something to make you shudder. When he said,

‘Alarum’d by his sentinel, the wolf,

Whose howl’s his watch, thus with his stealthy pace,

With Tarquin’s ravishing strides, towards his design

Moves like a ghost,’

He used to take two or three stealthy steps across the stage, and you could literally see the grey fur rise on his hackles, the lips draw back from the fangs, the yellow eyes begin to gleam. It made a cold chill run down your spine. As Shylock and Caesar and Timon he was unrivalled. Othello and Antony he never touched, but his Iago was a masterpiece of villainy.”

“Why did he give it up? He can’t be much over fifty.”

“As with other sufferers from lycanthropy,” said Lord Hawick, “Sir Murdoch has an ungovernable temper. Whenever he flew into a rage it brought on an attack. They grew more and more frequent. A clumsy stagehand, a missed cue might set him off; he’d begin to shake with rage and the terrifying change would take place.

“On stage it wasn’t so bad; he had his audiences completely hypnotized and they easily accepted a grey-furred Iago padding across the stage with the handkerchief in his mouth. But off stage it was less easy; the claims for mauling and worrying were beginning to mount up; Equity objected. So he retired, and, for some time, founding the museum absorbed him. But now it’s finished; his temper is becoming uncertain again. This afternoon, as you know, he pounced on the Bishop for innocently remarking that Garrick’s Hamlet was the world’s greatest piece of acting.”

“How do you deal with the attacks? What’s the treatment?”

“Wolfsbane. Two or three drops given in a powerful sedative will restore him for the time. Of course, administering it is the problem, as you can imagine. I only hope the surroundings in Cornwall will be sufficiently peaceful so that he is not provoked. It’s a pity he never married; a woman’s influence would be beneficial.”

“Why didn’
t he?
”

“Jilted when he was thirty. Never looked at another woman. Some girl down at Polgrue, near his home. It was a real slap in the face; she wrote two days before the wedding saying she couldn’t stand his temper. That began it all. This will be the first time he’s been back there. Well, here we are,”
said Lord Hawick, glancing out at his Harley Street doorstep.
“Come in and I’ll give you the wolfsbane prescription.”

The eminent consultant courteously held the door for his young colleague.

The journey to Cornwall was uneventful. Dr. Peachtree drove his distinguished patient, glancing at him from time to time with mingled awe and affection. Would the harassing crawl down the A30, the jam in Exeter, the flat tyre on Dartmoor, bring on an attack? Would he be able to cope if they did? But the handsome profile remained unchanged, the golden eyes in their deep sockets stayed the eyes of a man, not those of a wolf, and Sir Murdoch talked entertainingly, not at all discomposed by the delays. Ian was fascinated by his tales of the theatre.

There was only one anxious moment, when they reached the borders of Polgrue Chase. Sir Murdoch glanced angrily at his neglected coverts, where the brambles grew long and wild.

“Wait till I see that agent,” he muttered, and then, half to himself, “‘Oh, thou wilt be a wilderness again,/Peopled with wolves.’”

Ian devoutly hoped that the agent would have a good excuse.

But the Hall, hideous Victorian-Gothic barrack though it was, they found gay with lights and warm with welcome. The old housekeeper wept over Sir Murdoch, bottles were uncorked, the table shone with ancestral silver. Ian began to feel less apprehensive.

After dinner they moved outside with their nuts and wine to sit in the light that streamed over the terrace from the dining-room French windows. A great walnut tree hung shadowy above them; its golden, aromatic leaves littered the flagstones at their feet.

“This place has a healing air,” Sir Murdoch said. “I should have come here sooner.” Suddenly he stiffened. “Hudson! Who are those?”

Far across the park, almost out of sight in the dusk, figures were flitting among the trees.

“Eh,” said the housekeeper comfortably, “they’re none but the lads, Sir Murdoch, practicing for the Furry Race. Don’t you worrit about them. They won’
t do no harm.
”

“On my land?”
Sir Murdoch said.
“Running across my land?”

Ian saw with a sinking heart that his eyes were turning to gleaming yellow slits, his hands were stiffening and curling. Would the housekeeper mind? Did she know her master was subject to these attacks? He felt in his pocket for the little ampoules of wolfsbane, the hypodermic syringe.

There came an interruption. A girl’s clear voice was heard singing:

“Now the hungry lion roars,

And the wolf behowls the moon—”

“It’s Miss Clarissa,” said the housekeeper with relief.

A slender figure swung round the corner of the terrace and came towards them.

“Sir Murdoch? How do you do? I’m Clarissa Defoe. My father sent me up to pay his respects. He would have come himself, but he was called out on a case. Isn’t it a gorgeous night?”

Sitting down beside them, she chatted amusingly and easily, while Ian observed with astonished delight that his employer’s hands were unclenching and his eyes were becoming their normal shape again. If this girl was able to soothe Sir Murdoch without recourse to wolfsbane, they must see a lot of her.

But when Sir Murdoch remarked that the evening was becoming chilly and proposed that they go indoors, Ian’s embryonic plan received a jolt. He was a tough and friendly young man who had never taken a great deal of interest in girls; the first sight, in lamplight, of Clarissa Defoe’s wild beauty came on him with a shattering impact. Could he expose her to danger without warning her?

More and more enslaved, he sat gazing as Clarissa played and sang Ariel’s songs. Sir Murdoch seemed completely charmed and relaxed. When Clarissa left, he let Ian persuade him to bed without the topic of the Furry Race coming up again.

Next morning, however, when Ian went down to the village for a consultation with cheerful, shrewd-eyed old Dr. Defoe, he asked about it.

“Heh,” said the doctor. “The Furry Race? My daughter revived it five years ago. There’s two villages, ye see, Polgrue, and Lostmid, and there’s this ball, what they call the Furry Ball. It’s not furry; it’s made of applewood with a silver band round the middle, and on the band is written,

  Fro Lostmid Parish iff I goe

Heddes will be broke and bloode will flowe.

“The ball is kept in Lostmid, and on the day of the race one of the Polgrue lads has to sneak in and take it and get it over the parish boundary before anybody stops him. Nobody’s succeeded in doing it yet. But why do you ask?”

Ian explained about the scene the night before.

“Eh, I see; that’s awkward. You’re afraid it may bring on an attack if he sees them crossing his land? Trouble is, that’s the quickest shortcut over the parish boundary.”

“If your daughter withdrew her support, would the race be abandoned?”

“My dear feller, she’d never do that. She’s mad about it. She’s a bit of a tomboy, Clarissa, and the roughhousing amuses her—always is plenty of horseplay, even though they don’t get the ball over the boundary. If her mother were still alive now . . . Bless my soul!” the old doctor burst out, looking troubled, “I wish Meredith had never come back to these parts, that I do. You can speak with Clarissa about it, but I doubt you’ll not persuade her. She’s out looking over the course now.”

The two villages of Lostmid and Polgrue lay in deep adjacent glens, and Polgrue Chase ended on the stretch of high moorland that ran between them. There was a crossroads and a telephone box, used by both villages. A spinney of wind-bitten beeches stood in one angle of the cross, and Clarissa was thoughtfully surveying this terrain. Ian joined her, turning to look back towards the Hall and noticing with relief that Sir Murdoch was still, as he had been left, placidly knocking a ball around his private golf course.

It was a stormy, shining day. Ian saw that Clarissa’s hair was exactly the colour of the sea-browned beech leaves and that the strange angles of her face were emphasized by the wild shafts of sunlight glancing through the trees.

He put his difficulties to her.

“Oh, dear,” she said, wrinkling her brow. “How unfortunate. The boys are so keen on the race. I don’t think they’d ever give it up.”

“Couldn’t they go some other way?”

“But this is the only possible way, don’t you see? In the old days, of course, this all used to be common land.”

“Do you know who the runner is going to be—the boy with the ball?” Ian asked, wondering if a sufficiently heavy bribe would persuade him to take a longer way round.

But Clarissa smiled, with innocent topaz eyes. “My dear, that’s never decided until the very
last
minute. So that the Lostmidians don’t know who’s going to dash in and snatch the ball. But I’ll tell you what we
can
do—we can arrange for the race to take place at night, so that Sir Murdoch won’t be worried about the spectacle. Yes, that’s an excellent idea; in fact, it will make it far more exciting. It’s next Thursday, you know.”

Ian was not at all sure that he approved of this idea, but just then he noticed Sir Murdoch having difficulties in a bunker. A good deal of sand was flying about, and his employer’s face was becoming a dangerous dusky red. “‘Here, in the sands,/Thee I’ll rake up,” he was muttering angrily, and something about murderous lechers.

Ian ran down to him and suggested that it was time for a glass of beer, waving to Clarissa as he did so. Sir Murdoch noticed her and was instantly mollified. He invited her to join them.

Ian, by now head over heels in love, was torn between his professional duty, which could not help pointing out to him how beneficial Clarissa’s company was for his patient, and a strong personal feeling that the elderly wolfish baronet was not at all suitable company for Clarissa. Worse, he suspected that she guessed his anxiety and was laughing at it.

The week passed peacefully enough. Sir Murdoch summoned the chairmen of the two parish councils and told them that any trespass over his land on the day of the Furry Race would be punished with the utmost rigour. They listened with blank faces. He also ordered man traps and spring guns from the Dominion and Colonial Stores, but to Ian’s relief it seemed highly unlikely that these would arrive in time.

Clarissa dropped in frequently. Her playing and singing seemed to have as soothing an effect on Sir Murdoch as the songs of the harpist David on touchy old Saul, but Ian had the persistent feeling that some peril threatened from her presence.

On Furry Day she did not appear. Sir Murdoch spent most of the day pacing—loping was really the word for it, Ian thought—distrustfully among his far spinneys, but no trespasser moved in the bracken and dying leaves. Towards evening a fidgety scuffling wind sprang up, and Ian persuaded his employer indoors.

“No one will come, Sir Murdoch, I’m sure. Your notices have scared them off. They’ll have gone another way.” He wished he really did feel sure of it. He found a performance of
Caesar and Cleopatra
on TV and switched it on, but Shaw seemed to make Sir Murdoch impatient. Presently he got up, began to pace about, and turned it off, muttering,