The meeting in the schoolroom lasted far longer than any meeting in Hailey Compton had ever lasted before. After all possible speeches had been made and votes of thanks proposed to everyone who could be supposed to deserve such a compliment and to a good many people who could not, there remained the business of enrolling the performers for the pageant. This was difficult, for almost everyone present wanted to take part, and the boys, successfully kept out until the speeches were over, managed after that to force their way in and added greatly to the confusion.

It was long after ten o'clock when Mrs. Eames reached home. She hoped but scarcely expected to find her husband waiting for her. Mrs. Eames was a lady who delighted in talking over everything she did at great length, and she had no objection to sitting up until the early hours of the morning. Her husband knew this, as he knew most things about her after twelve years of married life. He disliked talking, which seemed to him a vain amusement, and hated sitting up late. His plan, on the occasions of evening meetings, was to go to bed about nine o'clock and then pretend to be asleep. On the evening of the pageant meeting he really was asleep before his wife came home. This did not altogether save him. Mrs. Eames woke him. It was absolutely necessary to her to discuss the astonishing events of the evening with someone.

"Dearest one," she said, shaking him gently.

He groaned, turned over and buried his face in the pillow.

"Darling Timothy," she said, "you must wake up for just one minute. I want to tell you what happened at the meeting this evening."

She shook him again, not so gently as at first, and he opened his eyes.

"The whole village," she said, "was wildly enthusiastic about the pageant, and James Hinton has promised fifty pounds."

The vicar heard her and was almost startled into complete wakefulness. But the mind, though it works erratically, does work during the interval of half consciousness between waking and sleeping. What Mrs. Eames said was entirely incredible. The vicar took it for granted that she could not really have said it. He was, he supposed, dreaming a dream rather more absurd than most dreams are.

"Yes, yes," he murmured, "how nice."

This seemed to him, still reasoning confusedly, a very good answer to make to a dream statement of a particularly foolish kind. It was not an answer which satisfied Mrs. Eames. She repeated, in much louder tones, her news about the village people. She added details about the meeting and described the extraordinary enthusiasm of the audience. This time the vicar was almost convinced he was awake and tried to make up his mind to sit up and ask questions. But Mrs. Eames repeated the statement about James Hinton's fifty pounds and the vicar's reason reasserted itself. It could not be true that James Hinton had promised fifty pounds to a pageant. If he seemed to hear his wife saying such a thing it was plain that he was still asleep and dreaming. With a view to getting rid of what threatened to become a nightmare he murmured again:

"How nice! How very, very nice!"

Then he turned over again and shut his eyes firmly. Mrs. Eames gave him up after that and went down to the kitchen. Gladys, incompetent cook and unwilling housemaid, was not the listener she wanted. But Gladys would be better than no one, and would be obliged to listen to any story, however long, told by her mistress.

Here luck favoured Mrs. Eames. She found in the kitchen not only Gladys but the lady whom Gladys called "My auntie," the very lady who had made the pancakes for Sir Evelyn Dent. While Gladys fussed about and made tea for Mrs. Eames the "auntie" listened with real interest to the story of the evening. Her husband was one of those chosen to be a smuggler. Her eldest boy had done his full share of the shouting. Mrs. Eames was gratified at the interest with which she listened, but disappointed when she showed little or no surprise at what had happened.

While Mrs. Eames, having more or less exhausted her subject and herself, was drinking the tea which Gladys made for her, the "auntie" told a story of her own which helped to explain the amazing attitude of the villagers towards the pageant. Mrs. Eames was so much interested that she actually listened to what was said to her, a thing she very rarely did.

According to the "auntie," the village people had been at first just as strongly opposed to the pageant as to any of the plays. But James Hinton had talked long to several of the leading men, to Jack Bunce, his fellow churchwarden, to the elder Whitty and others. No one knew exactly what he said, for the conversations were held in private in Hinton's own sitting-room at hours when the bar was not open to the public. The result, whatever was said, was surprising. One after another the leading men of the village declared themselves in favour of the pageant. They told their sons and daughters and other dependents to do exactly what Mrs. Eames bade them, exactly as they were bidden and promptly. If there was any disobedience the consequences would be serious and unpleasant.

"But," said the "auntie," "young men aren't what they were when I was a girl. Nor the girls aren't either." Here she scowled at Gladys. "And as likely as not the thing they're bidden to do is just what they won't do though they would have if they hadn't been bidden."

Fortunately there was another influence which could be and was brought to bear on the young men. James Hinton was admittedly the richest man in the village and wealth is power everywhere in the world. When he came to Hailey Compton and took over the inn from the executor of the previous owner, he had re-painted, re-decorated, and largely re-built the house. He had, moreover, paid cash without hesitation or grumbling for everything that was done. Never in living memory had so much money been spent in the village on building and furnishing. It therefore seemed possible, and indeed likely, that Hinton might spend more money and that made everyone anxious to be on good terms with him. He was also, from the point of view of the village men, a model landlord for their only inn. The beer and cider which he sold were good, of a much better quality than they had been before he came. He was willing to extend credit to those who, though thirsty, had no ready money. He seldom pressed for the payment of accounts, even when they were large and long overdue. He was willing to accept mortgages on cottages and gardens, even mortgages on future catches of fish, as satisfactory discharges of debts.

A man to whom half the community owes money, to whom the other half expects to owe money very soon, is in a strong position. If he chooses to support any cause there will be little opposition. When James Hinton, having persuaded the older men that the pageant was desirable, said the same thing without explanation to the young men and maidens, all real opposition vanished.

This was the "auntie's" account of what had happened. Mrs. Eames accepted it as an explanation of everything except James Hinton's attitude. That remained a mystery.

It was true, as the "auntie," a shrewd woman, suggested, that James Hinton might make a good deal of money out of the pageant, if it were a success.

"If there were a lot of people came to Hailey Compton in them there charabancs——"

"And there will be," said Mrs. Eames eagerly. "Hundreds of people will come. Thousands. And they'll all have to go to the Anchor Inn for lunch and tea. There's nowhere else they can go."

"And James Hinton can charge what he pleases," said the "auntie."

"I see that," said Mrs. Eames. "He'll make money out of it. That's it."

To anyone with Mrs. Eames's faith in the ultimate success of the pageant, the explanation should have been completely satisfying. James Hinton had promised what he would never be called upon to pay, with the certainty that his promise secured him the opportunity of earning large sums. To anyone less enthusiastic than Mrs. Eames, Hinton's guarantee would have looked like a desperate speculation. If the pageant cost a good deal, as it would, and then failed to attract a large audience, he would have to pay and would stand no chance of recouping himself. Even to Mrs. Eames this view of Hinton's action presented itself all the more clearly because she knew the man and was firmly convinced that he would never allow himself to be swayed by altruism. His guarantee, in spite of the explanation offered, remained a puzzle.

"It's time," said the "auntie," "for me to be getting home along."

She had drunk her share of the tea. She had heard all that Mrs. Eames had to say, thereby providing herself with a store of authentic gossip which would make her an important person in the village next day.

Mrs. Eames chased the unwilling Gladys to bed, having very little hope that the girl would be up in time to light the kitchen fire next morning. Girls, especially girls with Gladys's disposition, are exceedingly sleepy at six o'clock in the morning if they have sat up till nearly midnight the night before.

Then Mrs. Eames went to bed herself and slept soundly, untroubled by the problem of James Hinton's support of the pageant. She had long learnt the folly of worrying over the "whys" of things, especially satisfactory things. James Hinton had done what she herself could never have done nearly so well. He had persuaded the whole village to take up the smuggling pageant with enthusiasm. That was a fact of the most agreeable kind. Why poke into the reasons of it? James Hinton had promised fifty pounds, and, an almost more astonishing thing, had induced the village people to promise one pound two and sixpence. These also were facts. With them, as a sensible woman, she was more than content. It would, indeed, have been nice to know just why James Hinton had offered his money and how he expected to make anything substantial out of the business. But the problem was not one which could keep Mrs. Eames awake.