The Nine Tailors

“The art of change-ringing is peculiar to the English, and, like most English peculiarities, unintelligible to the rest of the world.”

The author pokes fun at her own nation’s eccentricities. The island nation developed many of its traditions in isolation from the rest of the European continent. Consequently, the English character and its liking for order are incomprehensible to the French, Spanish, and other southern neighbors.

“By the English campanologist, the playing of tunes is considered to be a childish game, only fit for foreigners; the proper use of bells is to work out mathematical permutations and combinations.”

Sayers describes the logical progression of sound in change ringing and explains it as something other than pretty noises. She amplifies this trait by making a change-ringing sequence the key to the cipher letter. Undoubtedly, the art of change ringing speaks to Wimsey’s character and appeals to him principally because of its mathematical precision. Change ringing is an intellectual exercise.

“To the ordinary man, in fact, the pealing of bells is a monotonous jangle and a nuisance, tolerable only when mitigated by remote distance and sentimental association.”

In this quote, the author points out that even the average English citizen would have trouble appreciating the nuances of change ringing. It is only tolerable in association with a familiar religious rite. Her mention of remote distance as necessary to appreciate the sound will have a darker meaning later in the book when Deacon cannot escape his proximity to the bells.

“‘You’ll want a bit of experience before you can write novels, old girl.’ ‘Rot, Daddy. You don’t want experience for writing novels. People write them at Oxford and they sell like billy-ho. All about how awful everything was at school.’”

This humorous exchange between Hilary and her father echoes Sayers’s own experience. She graduated from Oxford and went on the have a successful career as a novelist. Hilary’s cavalier dismissal of experience is a sly joke on the author’s part about the naiveté of youth.

“‘You don’t expect farm-labourers to have nerves, do you, Lord Peter? But they’re human, like the rest of us.’ ‘And Thoday is a very superior man,’ said the Rector, as though superiority conveyed a licence to keep a nervous system.”

This quote represents a three-way conversation among Wimsey, Venables, and the local doctor. They are discussing Will’s weak health, but the conversation reveals British class system prejudices. Farmworkers like Will belong to the lower orders and are regarded as little more than the dumb beasts that they tend. They are not expected to have imaginations or delicate constitutions like the upper class.

“When I was a lad, there wasn’t none o’ this myster’ousness about. Everything was straightforward an’ proper. But ever since eddication come in, it’s been nothing but puzzlement.”

In this quote, the sexton is conversing with other locals about the funeral of the unknown corpse. At many points in the novel, Sayers uses the common folk to express political satire. She also has the sluice keeper make similar observations. In the commoner’s view, the government creates confusion by sticking its nose where it doesn’t belong.

“Did the old boys who made that amazing roof believe? Or did they just make those wide wings and adoring hands for fun, because they liked the pattern? At any rate, they made them look as though they believed something, and that’s where they have us beat.”

Wimsey sits in church listening to Venables’s sermon, but his mind wanders to the building’s architecture. His comment reveals a great deal about Wimsey’s post-war state of mind. Like many survivors of World War I, he belongs to the Lost Generation, who feel disorientation and despair in a world that no longer makes sense to them.

“Because you have the creative imagination, which works outwards, till finally you will be able to stand outside your own experience and see it as something you have made, existing independently of yourself. You’re lucky.”

Wimsey is predicting Hilary’s future success as a writer because she possesses imagination. Sayers, no doubt, has her character express these views because they describe her frame of mind as an author. Imagination expands the individual mind until it can encompass the experience of others—lucky indeed to have such broad understanding.

“‘If you do see through people as clearly as that, you oughtn’t to make it so brutally plain to them.’ ‘That’s what Uncle calls my unfeminine lack of tact. He says it comes of going to school and playing hockey.’”

This playful interchange between Wimsey and Hilary is yet another poke by the author at Victorian and Edwardian notions of femininity. Uncle Edward frowns upon Hilary’s desire for an education. That would be unfeminine, too, in his eyes. Sayers, no doubt, faced similar disapproval when she pursued a life of the mind.

“It came upon him with a shock that Uncle Edward could not be many years older than himself. He felt for him the apprehensive reverence which one feels for a quaint and brittle piece of antiquity.”

Wimsey has just had his first encounter with Hilary’s stuffy Uncle Edward. As in the preceding quote, Sayers uses Wimsey to express her pitying disapproval of those who hold antiquated notions of women’s place in society. Wimsey’s comment also suggests that such outdated notions will crack under pressure like a brittle antique.

“Yes, I’ve met him. Frightful blithering ass. Handy thing to be, sometimes. Easily cultivated. Five minutes’ practice before the glass every day, and you will soon acquire that vacant look so desirable for all rogues, detectives and Government officials.

Wimsey is describing Uncle Edward to Blundell. He is implying that Edward’s behavior is commonplace among those who hold positions of authority. This is another bit of social commentary by the author regarding the unimaginative individuals who solve crimes and run governments.

“It is a fixed idea with the French that the majority of letters tend to be lost in the post. They put no faith in Government departments, and I think they are perfectly right.”

Wimsey is explaining to Bunter why the French don’t write a return address on their letters. His comment is another jab at government ineptitude. In the previous quote, Wimsey jokingly takes a swipe at his government. In this quote, he extends that criticism to the French. However, the French are wiser than the English since they are deeply suspicious of government bureaucracy. Sadly, the English still believe in theirs.

“Very like Looking-Glass Country […] same as the picture in the book. But as for staying in the same place—all I can say is, it don’t look like it, my lord—not where you’re concerned.”

Wimsey is having a conversation with Blundell about their lack of progress in solving the murder. He compares their efforts to running at top speed only to remain in the same place. Blundell’s reply suggests his high opinion of Wimsey’s detective skills. Throughout the story, Blundell demonstrates a remarkable degree of tolerance for an amateur sleuth meddling in police affairs.

“I never met such a liar as that fellow was. He was so crooked, you could have used his spine for a safety-pin. It serves me right for having to do with menials. A mean, sneaking spirit, that’s what you find in that sort. No sense of honour at all.”

Cranton is bemoaning his association with Deacon, and ironically, he attributes the latter’s duplicity to his lower-class origins. At many points in the book, various characters offer comments suggesting that social rank determines good character.

“Bunter she found rather alarming. But she was of the bulldog breed, and had been brought up in the knowledge that a servant was a servant, and that to be afraid of a servant (one’s own or anybody else’s) was the first step to an Avernus of domestic inefficiency.”

This quote echoes the preceding one. The servant class is expected to behave in a certain way. Their employers view them as inferior beings, and these deeply ingrained values keep the social hierarchy in place. In this case, Mrs. Venables is somewhat intimidated by the redoubtable Bunter, but she stands her ground.

“‘Poor old Cranton,’ said the Superintendent, perversely, ‘I rather hope it isn’t. I don’t like to see a perfectly good jewel-thief stepping out of his regular line, so to speak. It’s disconcerting, that’s what it is.’”

Wimsey and Blundell have just been speculating that Cranton might have killed Deacon. Blundell’s comment indicates that this notion upsets him because the social order applies to criminals as well as servants. A jewel thief ought not to cross the line and commit murder because this upsets the established hierarchy.

“I rather wish I hadn’t come buttin’ into this. Some things may be better left alone, don’t you think? My sympathies are all in the wrong place and I don’t like it. I know all about not doing evil that good may come. It’s doin’ good that evil may come that is so embarrassin’.”

Wimsey is confiding his misgivings to Venables. He has already pieced together enough of the events surrounding Deacon’s murder to know that Mary will be hurt by what he reveals. This quote speaks directly to the theme of the dangers of dredging. As the sluice keeper warned, you have to go on once you start digging, no matter where it might lead.

“Make righteousness your course bell, my lord, an’ keep a-follerin’ on her an’ she’ll see you through your changes till Death calls you to stand. Yew ain’t no call to be afeard o’ the bells if so be as yew follows righteousness.”

The bell ringer named Hezekiah gives this advice to Wimsey. He has already spoken of the bells’ intolerance for evil but adds that a good man has nothing to fear. This comment foreshadows the punishment that the bells will mete out to the wicked Deacon later.

“I never met anything like the blackness of that place. And I felt as if there was hundreds of eyes watching me. Talk about the heebie-jeebies! Well, there!”

Cranton is describing his trip to the belfry. He hasn’t yet discovered Deacon’s body, but the place itself gives him a sense of foreboding. The author depicts the bells as watchful eyes, and they disapprove of wrongdoing. Cranton instinctively recognizes their judgment of him, and he wants to escape. His partner in crime isn’t so lucky.

“It wasn’t loud, but kind of terribly sweet and threatening, and it went humming on and on, and a whole lot of other notes seemed to come out of it, high up and clear and close—right in my ears. You’ll think I’m loopy, but I tell you that bell was alive.”

Cranton continues his unnerving report about his belfry visit after accidentally striking one of the bells. By having this character speak about the eerie sentience of the bells, the author is allowing the reader some insight into Deacon’s last hours. Since the dead man cannot give voice to his own excruciating experience, Sayers uses Cranton and Wimsey to paint a picture of his misery through their encounters with the bells.

“You wait till you get stuck on a ladder in a belfry in the dark. Bells are like cats and mirrors—they’re always queer, and it doesn’t do to think too much about them.”

A policeman has just rebuked Cranton for his overly imaginative reaction to the bells, but Wimsey defends the thief. His lordship has spent enough time with the bells to understand their unnerving effect. By putting himself in Cranton’s shoes, he demonstrates the same imaginative empathy that he praised in Hilary early in the novel.

“So far as he could see, his interference had done no good to anybody and only made extra trouble. It was a thousand pities that the body of Deacon had ever come to light at all. Nobody wanted it.”

Wimsey has just learned that the Wilbraham emeralds are now his. They are a reproachful reminder of the trouble he has brought to Fenchurch St. Paul. Again, this quote reinforces the sluice keeper’s advice to leave well enough alone. Digging up a body and digging a new wash cut can both carry negative consequences.

“The fact is, once you start on a job like this, you never know where it’s going to end. It’s all piecemeal work. Stop it up in one place and it breaks out in another.”

Wimsey is speaking to the engineer in charge of the new wash cut. The man reinforces the words of the sluice keeper by admitting that his best efforts will only result in trouble somewhere else. His comment applies equally well to Wimsey’s detective work. Dig up one body, and it will lead to other crimes.