WULFSTANE MANOR, a rambling old country house with many unused rooms, winding staircases and a maze of cellars, had been bequeathed to Veronica Mallowood and her brother Martin. The last time the large family of Mallowoods had all foregathered under the ancestral roof was on the occasion of their father’s funeral, and there had been one of those unholy rows which are infrequently follow the reading of a will. That was some years ago, and as Veronica found it increasingly difficult to go on paying for the upkeep of Wulfstane she summoned another family conference—a conference in which Death took a hand. Rope’s End—Rogue’s End is, of course, an Inspector Macdonald case, in which that popular detective plays a brilliant part. It is a first rate story with an enthralling denouement.
ROPE’S END,
ROGUE’S END
by
E.C.R. LORAC
Copyright © 1942 by E.C.R. Lorac
All characters in this novel are fictitious. If the name of any living person has been used, it has been used inadvertently and no reference to such person is intended.
CHAPTER ONE
THE October sunlight was streaming across the hall at Wulfstane Manor, drawing tawny lights from the dark oak panelling and the worn floor, gleaming on brass and copper and pewter, enriching the golden beech leaves which stood in ancient earthenware pots. The same mellow radiance dealt less kindly with worn rugs and sagging chairs: in its shafts quivered myriad dust motes, and its vividness shamed the dull fire, whose logs smouldered sulkily in the vast open hearth.
Paul Mallowood stood with his back to the open doors and drew a deep breath as he stared at the familiar place. The smell was the same as ever: a fragrance compounded of wood smoke, of old leather and older timber, of tobacco, and the subtle tang of chrysanthemums. Radiance and dust: beauty of ancient craftsmanship marred by lack of care and skill: noble proportion and slovenly treatment. Paul swore beneath his breath. He loved the place so dearly. In his cold, able, clear-thinking mind there was just the one weakness, the one sentimental frailty, and that was his passion for the house in which he had been born and reared. There were many finer specimens of the English Manor House than Wulfstane – and within his power to acquire – but the only place he wanted was Wulfstane, and that he could not have.
As he stood there, gazing with distaste at the tokens of neglect which marred a lovely house, a sudden flash of awareness came across his mind. He seemed to be standing for ever at the doorway of something he desired intensely and which just eluded his grasp, and that object of his desire was marred by dust and neglect…
“I’ll tell Higgins, sir, but I’m not sure if he knows about cars like that there.”
Paul Mallowood choked down a snort of disgust. It was the parlourmaid who had spoken to him, startling him out of an unaccustomed reverie. He eyed her with disfavour. There had always been a manservant to open the door at Wulfstane – and now this clumsy ill-spoken country wench. Behind him, gleaming in the sunlight outside, his two-seater Rolls was drawn up. He had told the maid to get the chauffeur to put it away in the garage. At least there had always been a man of sorts about the place who did the duties of chauffeur, even though gardening was his main occupation.
“Oh, leave it alone, then. I’ll garage it myself later,” he said curtly, and advanced into the hall, pulling off his driving gloves, and then threw them down on an ancient bridal chest, whose superb oak lid had been marred by a cigarette end which had charred the edge of the moulding.
“Hallo, Paul! How are you?”
The deep voice from behind him caused Mallowood to turn round with a start: until he actually saw her he was uncertain who had spoken, for his sister’s voice was so deep-pitched that it might well have been one of his brothers speaking. Veronica Mallowood had just come down the stairs, and she stood on the last stair, looking down at him with the ironical smile which always exasperated Paul. He stood still in his turn and surveyed her deliberately, aware of the curious antagonism which she always aroused in him.
Veronica was ten years younger than Paul – he had just passed his fiftieth birthday – but whereas his aspect was definitely middle-aged with an inclination to stoutness and a heavily lined face belying his still athletic figure and upright stance, Veronica still looked young. She lacked hardly anything of Paul’s height, and he was a tall. man. Broad shouldered, slim hipped, spare, and with a certain magnificence in her bearing, Veronica was a striking figure. Her dark hair was close cropped and brushed well back from her face: a pale unlined skin, fine dark eyes and a clear-cut profile, slightly aquiline, merited the epithet handsome, but just failed to justify that of beautiful. Her lips were beautifully shaped, but just too narrow. They curved now in a smile which was ironical – a thought mocking: amused but not merry. Unreasoningly, Paul felt the same old antagonism towards his sister welling up in his mind again. He never saw her afresh without dislike and an unwilling admiration distracting his mind.
He advanced towards her, saying evenly, “Hallo, Veronica. You look well. How’s the world going?”
She stood on the lowest step and waited for him to come up to her, so that when he raised his face for the brotherly kiss which he never omitted, she was still above him, and bent slightly to touch his cheek with cool close shut lips – a perfunctory salute.
“The world’s going much as usual, thanks. Did you realise that the whole family is here to bid you God-speed before you set out?”
Paul stared. “The whole family? meaning?”
“Just what I say. I usually mean what I say,” she replied, that maddening smile still curving her lips. “Richard turned up the day before yesterday. He flew from Alexandria. Basil came from town yesterday, Richard phoned to him when he arrived. Martin is here as usual – so here we all are. A real family party. It must be years since we were all together under the ancestral roof. Not since father’s funeral, I think.”
Still standing on the lowest stair, Veronica’s smiling lips twitched a little as though in secret amusement, and Paul felt his face growing hot. When the Mallowoods had all come home on the occasion of the old man’s funeral, there had been one of those unholy rows which not infrequently follow the reading of a will. That monstrous will!… Paul still felt fury well up within him when he thought of it; had he followed the primitive instinct within him he would have slapped Veronica’s smiling face as she stood there, deliberately reminding him of his humiliation and hurt.
With unmoved face and a shrug of his shoulders he met her eyes steadily.
“Yes. I suppose that would have been the last occasion. A family party – very nice – once in a way. My room is ready, I take it?”
“Oh, yes. Your room is always ready. We are always prepared to welcome you, Paul. I will come and see if you’ve got everything you want. Those are your suitcases? You always have such handsome luggage!”
Leaving the staircase, she swung across the hall, moving with a long even step, very lightly, her head poised grandly on her long slim neck. She bent and picked up the two heavy leather suitcases and turned with them, holding them with superb ease, one in either hand, while Paul burst out:
“My dear Veronica! Put those things down! What are you dreaming about? Surely Wulfstane is not entirely devoid of servants?”
“Not entirely,” replied Veronica coolly, walking on with a suitcase in either hand, “but Wulfstane is a big house and visitors involve extra work for the servants, however glad we may be to have visitors – and then, you see, I am much stronger than either of the maids, when it comes to muscular exertion. Oh, if you insist… we needn’t brawl about it, need we?”
Paul had snatched at the suitcases which his sister was carrying, his face flushed again, his eyes bulging with the anger which surged up in him unreasonin
gly, and she gave herself a little shake as she recovered her stance and walked on to the staircase, saying:
“You are in the west bedroom, as usual. I think you will find that everything is arranged nicely.”
She went upstairs ahead of him, and Paul granted a little as he followed her with the heavy suitcases. He had made up his mind before he came that this time he would avoid any friction with his sister, and be careful to show no irritation, however exasperating she might be, and yet even as he followed her up the staircase his long-standing grievance broke out into words which he regretted as soon as they were uttered:
“I’m not a visitor here in the usual sense of the term, Veronica, so please don’t treat me as one, and remember, if you’d only fall in with my suggestions and let me share the upkeep here, you could have an adequate staff and live with some appearance of dignity.”
“I have no hankerings after an appearance of dignity, and our staff is quite adequate for my own needs and Martin’s, and we are the people really concerned,” she replied lightly, answering in the same flippant easy tone she had used throughout.
At the top of the stairs she turned, and led the way along a shadowy oak-panelled corridor, whose worn floor was uneven to the feet beneath its thin carpet. At the farther end she opened a door, and the mellow afternoon sunlight streamed out into the narrow passage, half blinding Paul Mallowood as he carried the cases.
The room which they entered was long and low panelled, as were most of the rooms in Wulfstane Manor, with mullioned casement windows facing south-west, so that the room was enriched with golden light. A fine Jacobean fourposter stood against one wall, and there were some good oak presses and a long chest beneath the window. Golden and orange chrysanthemums stood in a pot on the wide window ledge, and a log fire had been lighted in the open grate. It was a beautiful room, unspoiled by any incongruous modern addition, and Paul unconsciously heaved a deep sigh, half of satisfaction, half of. exasperation, as he straightened himself after dumping the suitcases. He felt at home here. It was his room, whatever his sister might say.
Veronica, after a glance at the fresh linen hanging on a towel rail, went to adjust the embroidered bedspread, saying:
“I asked Cynthia Lorne to come to dinner this evening. I thought four men and one woman would be a rather unsatisfactory party, so I got Cynthia to come and support me.”
Again Paul felt his face grow hot. Veronica had always had a knack of reading his thoughts, however jealously he guarded them. She went on, her eyes resting amusedly an his hot face:
“Then I knew Basil would enjoy seeing her. She’s not going out much now, of course, but she agreed to come and leaven our family party. Her decree won’t be made absolute for another two months.”
Paul disregarded the last remark, and said curtly, “‘It will be very pleasant to see her, of course, but you will remember that I said I wanted to talk to you and to Martin before I left England. I came down to-day with that as my main intention. Since it seems that the evening is to be a social affair, perhaps you could spare me an hour after tea for a business talk.”
Veronica turned from the bed, where she had been absent-mindedly smoothing the Queen Anne bedspread, and went to the window, seating her long graceful body on the wide window seat.
“If you want to talk, the present is as good a moment as any, Paul. Cynthia will probably drive over soon after tea. Martin is out just now, but as he and I maybe regarded as having identical interests, you can talk to me as easily as though he were here, too.”
Paul shrugged his shoulders and tried to ignore his own feeling of irritation. To his tidy, conventional mind there was something slipshod and unsatisfactory about having a business talk in a bedroom, with his sister lounging casually on a window seat, and his suitcases dumped in the middle of the floor. Veronica went on, reading his thoughts as she always did, and translating them into a parody.
“Of course the proper setting for a business talk with you is an opulent city office, Paul, with a large desk, wire baskets, filing cabinets, and a hovering secretary to answer the buzzer – but that isn’t my milieu, you see. Such a setting gives you all the advantage, because it reminds me that I am only a poor, muddle-headed woman. This is my setting, my own home, a bit casual in service, a bit inefficient in working, but here I am. I’m listening.”
Paul pulled up a chair and choked down an impatient exclamation as its old carved arms moved loosely under his impatient handling: a museum piece, like the house: also, like the house, in sore need of skilled repair. He sat down, facing his sister, conscious that she half-turned away from him and looked out of the window, her eyes gazing beyond the rose garden to the misty line of the Sussex downs far away against the southern sky.
“If you would give me your full attention for a moment, Veronica, I have a proposition to put to you, which you can consider at your leisure while I am abroad. Forgive me if I have to go over familiar ground at the outset. I want to get the position clear.”
He paused, but Veronica made no comment: with her hands round her knees, leaning back against the side of the window embrasure, her eyes still eluded his. He felt baffled. Veronica always achieved this effect of remoteness when he wanted to make contact with her mind – and she had a very able mind when she chose to concentrate. Paul Mallowood cleared his throat and began:
“By the terms of our father’s will, this house was left jointly to you and to Martin. As you know, I, as eldest son, felt keenly at the time that this disposition was an injustice to me. However, I have had plenty of time to consider the matter dispassionately in the intervening years. I realise that father’s intention was to safeguard your interests and Martin’s. At the time of father’s death Martin was still seriously incapacitated by the results of infantile paralysis: it seemed obvious that he would never be able to support himself. You, of course, had had no training for any career.”
Veronica interrupted here.
“As you knew, it was unthinkable to our parents that any daughter of theirs should have a career – other than a matrimonial one.”
Paul frowned over the interruption; he liked to be allowed to complete his sentences, and Veronica’s interpolation had broken his current of thought. His mind went off at a tangent: Veronica and matrimony… No man could ever have wanted to marry her. Handsome, yes. Intelligent, undoubtedly, but devoid of allure. Further, not only unattractive, but to him, almost repulsive. Her voice made him start as she put in:
“Yes? You were thinking?”
“I was trying to express my own thoughts clearly without reference to, er”
“To my attractiveness, or lack of it, in the matrimonial market,” she said coolly, her eyes meeting his for a second with their inscrutable smile, and he hurried on.
“In the light of the fact that I and Basil were well established in the City, and that Richard was a rolling stone, a nomad by nature, there was a certain justice in leaving the house and the means for its upkeep to you and to Martin. I admit that now, though I resented the will at the time. I cared for this house, cared for it in away which neither you nor Martin did”
“That’s a statement for which you have no real justification in fact,” she responded. “Who can form a criterion of ‘caring’? Oh, never mind. As you said, all this is ‘familiar ground.’ Naboth’s Vineyard, oh King! Can’t you break fresh ground?”
“If you will have patience with me, Veronica, you will see the point at which I am aiming. You will remember that after I had had time for consideration, I made an offer to you and to Martin concerning sharing in the upkeep of this house. Even before our father’s death, his income was inadequate for the maintenance of Wulfstane. After death duties were paid it was obvious that the income shared by you and Martin would be too small to keep the place as it deserved to be kept.”
“I seem to have heard most of this before,” she replied. “Each time you have raised the point I gave the same answer, Paul. I did not mind being poor, but I had – and I still ha
ve – every objection to becoming your pensioner. That is a position which I refuse to accept.”
“There is no question of your becoming my pensioner,” he retorted. “My offer to you was a business-like proposition, involving mutual benefit. I was prepared to pay for the proper upkeep of house and grounds in return for the use of the east wing. It is virtually self-contained, and quite large enough for what I wanted. However, you refused to consider my offer, though heaven knows, both common sense and the blood ties between us might have led you to perceive its equity.”
Veronica did not answer. Her eyes still rested on the distant downs, her profile was expressionless.
“Very well, then,” went on Paul, his voice hardening as he repressed the feeling which had vitalised his last sentence. “Let us leave the past and come to the present. I take it that you read the papers, or pay some attention to the state of the stock market.”
“Not more than I can help,” she replied, and Paul broke out:
“For God’s sake don’t play at being a complete fool, Veronica. It isn’t becoming to you. You must realise that the new paper combine has left your shares in Barton’s virtually valueless. The larger part of your income and Martin’s will cease. If your joint means were inadequate before, it is plain that your present financial position will be quite impossible.”
He paused a moment, and then, since he got no response, continued:
“I am your eldest brother, Veronica. It is not a matter of indifference to me to see you – and Martin – faced with poverty and indignity while I myself am well placed so far as this world’s needs are concerned. I want to help you. Why not meet me half-way and discuss things reasonably?”
She turned at last and met his eyes full, considering him in silence for a while before she replied; and then speaking deliberately, her deep voice very quiet and even.
“Thank you very much for your brotherly concern, Paul, but I would rather face matters without investing them in a mist of sentiment. You and I are both capable of looking facts in the face, and the facts are these. You have always disliked and despised me, and the feeling is reciprocated. The moment you saw me to-day that old sense of antagonism was so strong that you could have taken pleasure in slapping my face, as you did once long ago. I don’t blame you: I don’t even mind, but I’m aware of it. I know you resent the fact that Martin and I own this house, which you consider ought to be yours. You may be justified in your resentment. Again, I don’t care. I only know this. I will not accept anything from you, and I will not share this house with you. I don’t mind poverty, or loss of social prestige. What I should mind is being dependent on you, or giving you any right of any kind to dictate to me. That is my answer. In short, leave us alone.”
Rope's End, Rogue's End Page 1
