"You don"t mean to tell me it"s all in the papers already, Jim?" said Timothy incredulously.
"I don"t know about all, but quite enough!" said Mr. James Kane. "You aren"t mentioned, but you can bet your life Mother will guess you were there!"
Timothy, who had picked up the newspaper, and was interestedly reading the fatal paragraphs, retorted: "Mamma doesn"t take in a rag like this! If you hadn"t such a low taste in literature -"
"Thanks very much, this is Nanny"s chosen organ! How that woman knows what she does know beats me!" "Oh, Daddy, aren"t these Uncle Timothy"s friends? I thought you"d like to see what it says here about them!" Like h.e.l.l I would! You"d better tell me the worst, and be done with it! Who is this Seaton-Carew, and are you really implicated, or not?"
"Of course I am!" said Timothy indignantly. "I"ve got no alibi, I didn"t like the fellow, and the Serg - I mean, the Chief Inspector, says I"m cold-blooded! So stop thinking you"re the only member of the family who can be suspected of brutal murder! Such side! The only thing that stops our old friend arresting me here and now is my low cunning in using picture-wire instead of a knife. Come to think of it, I believe I"ve still got that lovely weapon somewhere." He cast a look around the room. "I don"t say I could put my hand on it, but -"
"No, that I"ll be bound you couldn"t, sir!" said Hemingway. He turned to Jim Kane. "I wish I could stay and have a bit of a crack with you, sir, but I can"t, and in any case you"ll be wanting to talk to Mr. Harte, so I"ll say goodbye. He hasn"t changed much: I keep thinking of that burglar alarm he fixed up outside your door!"
"Wretched brat!" said Mr. Kane, grinning reminiscently.
Timothy escorted the Chief Inspector to his front door, and returned to find his half-brother filling a pipe. "What brings you up to town, Jim?" he enquired.
"Business, primarily. Also that!" Mr. Kane jerked his head towards the newspaper. "Are you really mixed up in this, Timothy?"
"I don"t think so. I was present, however. Rather a mess, one way and another."
Mr. Kane grunted, and struck a match. "I should have thought we"d had enough murders in the family, I must say.
"Too true. Not that this one can be said to be in the family."
Pressing the glowing tobacco down into the bowl of his pipe with his thumb, Jim Kane glanced shrewdly across at his young relative. "Got more than a casual interest in it, haven"t you?" he asked.
"Yes," responded Timothy coolly. "I have. The girl I propose to marry is, like myself, one of those who might have committed the murder."
Mr. James Kane was still busy with his pipe. Puffs of smoke arose from it. "So that"s serious, is it? I heard something about it from Mother."
"Did she tell you it was your duty to come and reason with me?" asked Timothy, uns.c.r.e.w.i.n.g another bottle of beer. "Beulah didn"t go big with her at all, I"m afraid."
Jim accepted the gla.s.s that was handed to him, and set it down on the mantelshelf behind him. "No, she didn"t. Far from it, but don"t run away with the idea that I swallow all Mother says without a tablespoonful of salt, because I know Mother rather better than you do, and that isn"t one of the errors I fall into! All the same, are you quite sure you aren"t making a mistake, old son?"
"Quite sure," said Timothy.
These simple words made it difficult to continue the conversation, but Jim tried his best. "Silly question to have asked you. What I mean is, don"t go and do something you"ll regret for the rest of your life!"
"All right, I won"t."
Mr. Kane recruited his forces with a drink. "If you will have it in plain English, don"t make a mesalliance, Timothy! G.o.d knows I don"t want to barge into your affairs, but, even allowing for Mother"s exaggerations, this tie-up doesn"t look like the right sort of marriage for you at all! I daresay I sound d.a.m.ned offensive, but do think it over carefully before you do anything rash! Setting aside your own future, you ought to consider Mother, and your Father a bit!"
"I don"t think Father will worry much," said Timothy. "He doesn"t, you know. As a matter of fact, I"ve always thought he had more interest in you than in me. Of course, I quite see that it"s disappointing for Mamma.
What with you marrying your great-aunt"s companion, and me marrying Mrs. Haddington"s secretary - !"
"Look here!" exclaimed Jim. "Pat may have been Aunt Emily"s companion, but she comes of a good family, and she"s got hordes of relations, all out of the right drawer, let me tell you!"
"That"s where I score over you," said Timothy.
"Listen, Timothy!"
"Listen, Jim!" interrupted Timothy. "I love you very much, I love your well-born wife, I even love your extremely exhausting brats! You"re the h.e.l.l of a nice chap, and I wish you hadn"t lost your leg, but -"
"Go to the devil!" said Jim rudely.
"You"ve taken the words out of my mouth, brother," said Timothy. "Have some more beer!"
"Blast you!" said Jim.
Timothy refilled his gla.s.s. "What kind of an impressionable a.s.s do you take me for, Jim? Facetiousness apart?"
"I don"t. I should have said you were pretty hardboiled, but you seem to have taken a header this time."
"I have, but if Mamma gave you the idea that I"ve fallen for a cross between a film-star and an adventurers, get rid of it! So far, I"ve failed to get my intended to name the day; and although I happen to admire her appearance I"m well aware that she wouldn"t stand an earthly in any Beauty Compet.i.tion."
"Oh!" said Jim, rather blankly. "It"s like that, is it?" He lowered himself into one of the armchairs, and leaned forward to tickle Melchizedek under one ear. "I see."
"I hoped you might. You fell for a lot of Lovelies before you took a similar header over Pat, who wasn"t a patch on any of them as far as looks went. So, if you"ve finished coming the elder brother, we can go on from there. If not, we"ll discuss the weather."
"All right," Jim said. "Go on from there!"
"There isn"t really very much to tell you," Timothy said reflectively. "I can set your mind at rest on one point. In spite of her often atrocious manners, she is indisputably a lady. No, blast it, she isn"t! She"s a gentlewoman! As far as her background goes, I only know that her mother was an Italian, and her father was an English artist. Since I"ve never heard of him, and since he demonstrably left his daughter without a penny, I deduce that he was a very poor artist. But since he seems to have supported a wife and a child in moderate comfort I also deduce that he had some private means - possibly an allowance from his family, which died with him. I do know that when her mother died, Beulah went to live with an uncle and aunt, on her father"s side of the family. For some reason, undivulged, she broke with them; and has been earning her own living ever since."
"Hasn"t she told you why she broke with them?"
"No." Timothy stirred the fire with one foot, and watched the flames leap up. He glanced down at his half brother. "I"m being very frank about this, Jim."
"Yes, all right! Go on!"
"I"d a lot rather not, but I"ve a pretty good idea of what Mamma probably told you, and you"d better have the true picture presented to you. At some time or other, Beulah took a knock. I don"t know what it was, but it put a crust on her, She"s scared white of something, and tries to hide it under a general air of belligerence. Seems to have taken Mamma in all right. Told you Beulah was an adventuress, didn"t she?"
"Well, I don"t know that she actually said -"
"Cut it out! We both know Mamma! If Beulah"s out to entrap me and my money and my prospective t.i.tle, she"s going to work in a weird way to achieve her ends! She knows d.a.m.ned well I"d get a special licence and marry her tomorrow, if she"d consent. All she does is to try to choke me off."
"Any idea why?"
Timothy shrugged. "Oh, same line of talk you"ve been handing out! New style in adventuresses!"
"You needn"t keep on harping on that theme: she obviously isn"t an adventuress. I never thought she was: you aren"t nearly a big enough catch for an adventuress! But what I do think, Timothy, little though you may like it, is that she doesn"t sound the girl your fond relations would wish you to marry."
"My fond relations -"
"Yes, I know! We can all of us go to h.e.l.l. I"ll take that as read. You"ve been perfectly frank with me, and I"ll be equally frank with you. I don"t like the sound of this carefully shrouded background. Without wanting to hand out a lot of drip about Perfect Love and Perfect Trust, I do strongly advise you not to plunge into matrimony with a girl who conceals her past and her family from you!"
Timothy was silent for a moment; then he said abruptly: "I"d like you to meet her. Are you going home today, or are you staying in town?"
"I"ve got a room at the club. So likely I"d bolt for home in the middle of this imbroglio you"ve got yourself into, isn"t it?"
A smile of considerable affection was bestowed upon him. "You great fool, what do you think you can do?" asked Timothy.
"I can run down to Berkshire, and dissuade Mother from taking the first train up to town!" said Jim grimly.
"If ever I spoke of you in opprobrious terms, I take them all back!" said Timothy. "You"re a tower of strength, Jim!"
"Get out!" said his ungrateful half-brother. "You said this Beulah of yours was implicated in the murder: were you serious?"
"She knew Seaton-Carew, she disliked him, she had the opportunity to murder him. She"s implicated to that extent. Like several others, including me."
"Could she have done it? I don"t mean, did she: I"ll accept that she didn"t: but could any woman?"
"Easily," replied Timothy. "I know one or two neat ways of doing a man in, but I rather think this has "em beat. I saw the body, and I saw how the trick had been worked. No strength required. Hold your arm up! I"ll show you. All I need is a handkerchief, and - and - this ruler will do, for purposes of demonstration." He cast his folded handkerchief round Jim"s wrist, applied the ruler, and turned it twice.
"Hi!" exclaimed Jim.
Timothy released the tourniquet. "Sorry! Wouldn"t take many seconds, if that was round your neck, would it? In the actual murder, picture-wire was used - bought, earlier in the day, by Beulah, on Mrs. Haddington"s instructions, and left on a shelf in the cloakroom. No secret about that - a fact which I trust our old friend has a.s.similated. I should think he would have: he"s got a d.a.m.ned intelligent face."
"Hemingway? Got any reason to think he suspects the girl?"
"Not sure. He came here to get the low-down on what he calls the dramatis personae. Noticeable that he asked me no questions about Beulah. That might be because he guessed I was an interested party, or it might be that your arrival interrupted him. If Beulah treated him to her talented impersonation of a clam, which is all too likely, I should imagine that he"s fairly bristling with suspicion. I wanted to muscle in on that interview, just to prevent her behaving like the silly little cuckoo she is, but she wasn"t having any. What happened I really don"t know. I motored her home to her digs when it was over, but she wasn"t communicative, and I didn"t press her. I"m going round to Charles Street this afternoon, ostensibly to make kind enquiries. If I can do it, I shall get Beulah to dine with me tonight. Some quiet place - Armand"s. You come and join us, Jim! Eightish, and morning dress. I"ll be there anyway."
"All right," Jim said, hoisting himself awkwardly out of his chair. "I"ve got to meet a man at the Savoy for lunch, but I don"t think my business with him will take me long. If I get away in decent time, I"ll nip down to Chamfreys this afternoon, administer a large soporific to Mother, and come back."
"What a b.l.o.o.d.y pest I am to you!" said Timothy remorsefully.
"You are, and always have been. I"m punch-drunk!" said Mr. Kane. "I"ll tell Mother I"m going to see Beulah for myself: that"ll hold her for a bit. But she"ll want to know what I made of her, so bring her along tonight! She sounds pretty alarming, but better than the blonde, if Mother"s description is anything to go by!"
"Good G.o.d, did Mamma get the wind up over Cynthia Haddington? What a rare turn she is, to be sure! The mildest of flirtations! She wouldn"t look at me anyway: out for big game, Cynthia Haddington!"
This lighthearted conviction was destined to be shaken. Upon his presenting himself in Charles Street that afternoon, at an hour when he judged that Mrs. Haddington would still be resting, Timothy was led by Thrimby to the drawing-room, where he found Cynthia huddled in a chair beside the fire, a litter of periodicals at her feet, and an expression of the deepest discontent on her lovely face. At sight of Timothy, she sprang up, and flung herself in an embarra.s.singly uninhibited way upon his chest. "Oh, Timothy, thank G.o.d you"ve come!" she cried, and burst into tears.
Young Mr. Harte blenched, but he kept his head. Bracing treatment seemed to be called for, and he applied it. "Well don"t make such a song and dance about it!" he said. "Pull yourself together, Cynthia!"
"It"s all been so awful!" sobbed Cynthia, unresentful of this cavalier response.
"I"m sure it has," said Timothy, detaching her clasp about his neck. "You"d better not cry about it, though: it"ll make your nose red. Sit down, and tell me what"s been happening since last night!"
"Nothing." she said. "That"s what makes it utterly frightful! Everything"s ghastly, and Mummy wouldn"t let me go to Meg"s party, and she says I"ve got to wear this filthy black frock, which makes me look a hag, and Aunt Violet"s here, and I can"t find my powder-compact anywhere, and there"s nothing to do, and that beastly radio"s got nothing but Choral Services and Forces" Educational, and I wish I was dead! And on top of that I"m so utterly upset about Dan, but n.o.body understands, or cares! He wouldn"t have wanted me not to go to any parties! It isn"t as though he was a relation! Mummy ought to want me to go out, to take my mind off it all!"
She then dragged her reluctant visitor to the sofa by one hand, pulled him down on to it, and sobbed gustily into his shoulder. It was quite impossible to discover which item of the catalogue of disasters, so movingly recited, affected her most. Timothy did not even try, but applied his energies to the task of soothing her distress. To his intense discomfort, she acquired a limpet-like grip on the lapel of his coat; he guessed that the shoulder of his coat would shortly become impregnated with her expensive powder, and mentally registered a resolve to send the coat to the Express Cleaners without loss of time. She said that if she had to wear black until after the funeral Mummy might at least buy her some new frocks, instead of sending for that dim Miss Spennymoor to convert two frocks of her own to her daughter"s use; she said that even Aunt Violet, whom she detested, thought it was ridiculous to wear mourning for anyone outside one"s family; she said that in all probability Mummy"s disgusting maid had stolen her favourite powdercompact; and she demanded corroboration from Timothy that she was quite too terribly sensitive, and liable to be upset by the least little thing. Whether she included the ugly murder of an old friend in this category, Timothy did not trouble himself to enquire. He a.s.sured her that no one could doubt her sensibility, and tried to induce her to sit up. She said: "Oh, Timothy, you"re so sweet! I do love you so! I thought I was going mad, till you walked in, and now I feel quite different!"
Mr. Harte was convinced that he felt the hair rising on his scalp. His saner self told him that it would be foolish to refine too much upon this artless speech; but his male instinct bade him fly from such a dangerous locality. He was never more glad to be interrupted in the middle of a tender pa.s.sage. Interrupted he was: the door opened to admit Mrs. Haddington, and her sister; and, since Cynthia relaxed her grip on his coat sufficiently to enable her to turn to see who had come into the room, he was able to free himself from her hold, and to rise from the sofa.
It was evident that both the elderly ladies had had ample opportunity to observe the touching scene, and equally evident that both regarded Timothy with approval. Mrs. Haddington, trailing clouds of black chiffon, smiled, and put out her hand, saying: "How sweet of you to have come, dear Timothy! No one could do more good to my poor little daughter, I know! The child is dreadfully upset: Dan was like an uncle to her!"
"Mummy, he was not!" hotly declared Cynthia.
"Nonsense! Of course he was, and ifhe wasn"t he ought to have been!" said Miss Pickhill sharply. "So you are Mr. Harte, are you? I"ve heard a lot about you, and I"m very glad to meet you, very! Goodness, child, dry your face! That disgusting stuff you put on your eyelashes has made a black mark on your cheek! I"m sure I don"t know what young girls are coming to! You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Lily, encouraging her to ruin the face the Almighty gave her!"
"You simply don"t understand!" Cynthia said.
"Very likely I don"t, or want to!" said her aunt, the asperity of her voice tempered by the indulgent gleam in her eyes as they rested on the lovely but woe-begone countenance before her. "All I understand is that you"ve plunged yourself into the most disgraceful scandal, just as I always knew you would! Whatever my private feelings may be, blood is thicker than water, and I sent a message to dear Mr. Broseley, excusing myself from attending the Meeting today, and came straight up to London. I sometimes think my poor father must turn in his grave!"
"Lord Guisborough!" announced Thrimby from the doorway, enacting providence.
"Lance!" shrieked Cynthia, hurling herself upon him, to the profound relief of Mr. Harte. "You angel!"
"Cynthia dear!" said Mrs. Haddington, her smile more than ordinarily mechanical.
Miss Pickhill grasped the pince-nez which hung from a sort of b.u.t.ton pinned to her spare bosom, pulled out a length of gold chain, and fixed the gla.s.ses on the bridge of her nose. "Oh!" she said discouragingly. "So this is the young man I"ve heard so much of, is it? Well!"
Her tone led no one to suppose that his lordship met with her approval, but, happily for his self-esteem, he was so dazed and transported by the flattering behaviour of the most beautiful girl in London that he scarcely noticed Miss Pickhill. Nor did the rapid recapitulation of Cynthia"s grievances in any way shake his besotted admiration of her. He a.s.serted, on what grounds no one could imagine, that in Russia mourning was a thing of the past, such senseless conventions belonging to an outworn bourgeoisie; and uttered a slightly involved but vehement speech, the gist of which seemed to be that the only right and proper course for Cynthia to pursue, in recognition of the hideous fate which had overtaken her old friend, was to plunge instantly into as much gaiety as London could offer, preferably in his company.
"Young man," said Miss Pickhill, "you are talking nonsense, and, what is more, objectionable nonsense! It is one thing to rush into exaggerated mourning, and quite another to racket about London before that unfortunate man is even buried!"
None of his advanced ideas had ever quite succeeded in quelling in Lord Guisborough an instinctive respect for the conventions of the bourgeoisie in which he had been reared. He hesitated, and then said: "I thought you could come and dine quietly with Trixie and me, at the studio, Cynthia. Just ourselves!"
"Oh, no, Lance darling, don"t let"s!" begged Cynthia. "Of course I adore Trixie, but she"s so dim and drab, and it"s no use her telling me I should love living in Russia, being called CoMr.ade by ghastly people I don"t even want to know, and being ordered about all over the place, and not having any more money than anyone else, because I should loathe it! And I particularly couldn"t stand it tonight!"
"But it"s not like that at all!" Guisborough a.s.sured her. "You"ve got a wholly false idea of the Communist State, derived from prejudice, and preconceived -"
"I don"t see why my idea shouldd be any falser than yours," argued Cynthia. "You can"t possibly know, because you haven"t been there, and, anyway, I do think it"s too boring and lethal to go on and on and on about some rotten foreign country that probably isn"t half as nice as England, if you only knew!"
"Not half as nice as England!" echoed Guisborough, in a stunned voice.
"Of course it isn"t! I daresay the Russians like it, but I never can see, and I never shall see why people like you and Trixie have to put on that Holy, Holy, Holy expression whenever anyone so much as mentions Russia, exactly as if you"d got religion! You"ll have somebody thinking you are a Russian if you"re not careful! Too degrading, Lance darling!"
His lordship"s eyes kindled; he became very pale; and it was plain that his infatuation for Cynthia was not strong enough to induce him to swallow blasphemy without protest. Before he could give utterance to the words trembling on his lips, Timothy intervened to take leave of his hostess. Mrs. Haddington bestowed her most gracious smile upon him, indicating in a subtle style that she perfectly understood that he was being driven away by Lord Guisborough"s presence. She held his hand between both of hers for a pregnant moment, and said: "You know you are always sure of a welcome here! Perhaps in a day or two -just a little intime party: nothing formal!"
He managed, by murmuring a few polite and unmeaning phrases, to avoid giving a definite answer to this; begged Mrs. Haddington neither to ring for the butler nor to accompany him downstairs herself; and escaped, feeling much like a stag who had contrived, for a short breathing-s.p.a.ce, to throw off the hounds.
He ran downstairs, wondering how to find Beulah. The faint clack of a typewriter led him to the library. He walked in, softly closing the door behind him, and said cheerfully: "Hallo, ducky! How do you find yourself today?"
"Timothy!" she exclaimed. "What are you doing here? Does Mrs. Haddington know?"
"Not that I"m here, and let us hope that she won"t track me down," he replied, bending over her to drop a kiss on the top of her head. "You look rather sweet: what are you up to?"
"Writing a rude letter to a hat-shop."
"Enjoying yourself, in fact. Listen, my heart, are you going to be kept here till all hours, or will you dine with me?"
"No, I don"t think so, but - Oh, I"d better not!"
"Well, I think you better "ad," said Timothy.
She smiled faintly. "Don"t be so vulgar! Timothy, I don"t know what to do! This is all wrong!"
"Well, don"t worry, my love: we"ll thrash it out at Armand"s," he said encouragingly. "I may as well break it to you at once that you"ve dam" well got to marry me, to save me from the Haddington clutches. I"ve just had that infernal wench weeping all over my coat, not to mention the harridan making unmistakable, if vicarious, pa.s.ses at me. What they see in the fellow! Look, will eight o"clock suit you?"