The Paradise Mystery quotes

American tourists, sure appreciators of all that is ancient and picturesque in England, invariably come to a halt, holding their breath in a sudden catch of wonder, as they pass through the half-ruinous gateway which admits to the Close of Wrychester.

Nowhere else in England is there a fairer prospect of old-world peace.

There before their eyes, set in the centre of a great green sward, fringed by tall elms and giant beeches, rises the vast fabric of the thirteenth-century Cathedral, its high spire piercing the skies in which rooks are forever circling and calling.

“

Heaven help me if the lad ever insists on the real truth and on having proofs and facts given to him!

” he muttered. “I shouldn’t mind telling her, when she’s a bit older—but he wouldn’t understand as she would. Anyway, thank God I can keep up the pleasant fiction about the money without her ever knowing that I told her a deliberate lie just now.

“I disagree with you entirely,” retorted Bryce. “On the last particular, at any rate. A man who considers any word of a woman’s as being final is a fool.

What a woman thinks on Monday she’s almost dead certain not to think on Tuesday.

The whole history of human relationship is on my side there. It’s no opinion—it’s a fact.”

“May satisfy you—but not me,” said Bryce. “Mine’s different.

My conception of a man is of a being who’s got some perseverance. You can get anything in this world⁠—anything!⁠—by pegging away for it.

”

“And—when it isn’t?” asked Ransford. “What are you then?—as you’re so candid.”

“I could be a very bad enemy,” replied Bryce.

There was a moment’s silence, during which the two men looked attentively at each other.

In one corner rose a gigantic elm; in another a broken stairway of stone led to a doorway set high in the walls of the nave; across the enclosure itself was a pathway which led towards the houses in the southeast corner of the Close.

It was a curious, gloomy spot, little frequented save by people who went across it rather than follow the gravelled paths outside, and it was untenanted when Bryce stepped into it.

But just as he walked through the archway he saw Ransford. Ransford was emerging hastily from a postern door in the west porch—so hastily that Bryce checked himself to look at him.

He nodded—as if reassuringly—and went off to rejoin his gardener, and Mary walked home with her roses, more thoughtful than ever.

Mystery?⁠—a bit of mystery? There was a vast and heavy cloud of mystery, and she knew she could have no peace until it was lifted.

“Who did it?” interrupted Bryce. “Precisely! Well—I’ll say this much at once, Mitchington.

Whoever did it was either a big bungler⁠—or damned clever!

That’s what I say!”

Harker edged his chair a little closer to his guest’s, and leaned towards him.

“What,” he asked in a whisper, “what have you done with that scrap of paper that you took out of Braden’s purse?”

“Here!” he said, handing some articles to Bryce. “Put those on over your boots.

Thick felt overshoes⁠—you could walk round your own mother’s bedroom in those and she’d never hear you.

I’ll do the same. A stranger, you say? Well, this is a proof that somebody knows the secret of that scrap of paper besides us, doctor!”

“You’ve none!” retorted Mary, gathering up her work and moving towards the door. “

I’ve no more intention of marrying Mr. Sackville Bonham than of eloping with the Bishop!

The idea’s too absurd to—even be thought of!”

Then, if you’re an honest man, a man with any pretensions to honour, why don’t you at once! Any man who had such feelings as those I’ve just mentioned wouldn’t hesitate one second. But you—you!—you come and—talk about it! As if it were a game!

Dr. Bryce, you make me feel sick, mentally, morally sick.

”

If the police arrest Dr. Ransford, Dr. Ransford knows how to defend himself. And you’re not afraid for him! You know you aren’t. It wouldn’t matter twopence to you if he were hanged tomorrow, for you hate him. But look to yourself!

Men who cheat, and scheme, and plot, and plan as you do come to bad ends. Mind yours! Mind the wheel doesn’t come full circle.

And now, if you please, go away and don’t dare to come near me again!”

Folliot replied with a shrewd glance.

“A man who by giving away another man gave himself away would be a damned fool!”

he answered. “If there is another man—”