Peter Smith

    Having arrived home in ‘Many Happy Returns,’ Mrs. Butterworth asked the nameless exile his name. I suppose she had to pretend not to know it so as to keep up the pretence. If she actually knew what his real name was in the first place of course. But why didn’t the Prisoner give his real name, something which has often puzzled me. After all what harm could it have done? I suppose to the Prisoner it could have been a matter of trust. Trust in himself, in his surroundings, and trust in this woman who he finds to be living in his one time home, when there was still six months on the lease left to run. After all he didn’t know who Mrs. Butterworth was, so he gave her a false pseudonym, Peter Smith. It was as good a false name as any, and after his recent experience in The Village, any name is preferable to a number!
    If Mrs. Butterworth had been genuine, and the log book of the car had been the original, then his proper name would have been on it. And she would have known she was being duped!

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