He caught sight of Geoffrey almost at the same moment and accosted him, demanding an introduction to Miss Andrews. Geoffrey Painter-Dell grew slowly crimson.
‘I’m frightfully sorry, Campion,’ he said awkwardly. ‘I’m afraid I can’t. We – er – we’re not speaking. Terribly sorry. Got to rush now. Goodbye.’
He retreated in considerable disorder before Campion could murmur his apologies, and disappeared among the throng.
Campion was aware of a growing sense of uneasiness. He had been fond of Geoffrey’s elder brother and was genuinely alarmed at the prospect of seeing the young man involved in any sort of mess. He looked about him and espied old Mrs De Goncourt, who was only too happy to introduce him to her niece. She took him by the arm and waddled happily across the floor with him, annihilated the frowning Mr Seazon with her magnificent smile, and pounced upon the girl.
‘The cleverest man in London, my dear,’ she said in a stage-whisper which would have carried across Drury Lane. ‘There you are, Albert. Take the child away and dance with her. Ah, Mr Seazon, you look younger than I do. How on earth do you do it?’
Miss Andrews glanced up at Campion and, although her smile was charming, her grey-blue eyes were very much afraid. He suggested that they should dance, but she hung back.
‘I’d like to, but –’ she began and glanced nervously at her escort, who was doing his best to extricate himself from the clutches of his redoubtable contemporary.
Campion did not press the matter. He smiled down at the girl.
‘I saw you at dinner the other night,’ he said. ‘We weren’t introduced and I don’t suppose you remember me. You’re not wearing your beautiful pearls tonight.’
She stared at him, and every vestige of colour passed out of her face. For a dreadful moment he thought she was going to faint.
‘Not very beautiful pearls, I’m afraid.’ It was Seazon who spoke. He had escaped from Petronella’s aunt and now stood, sleek and very angry, a little behind the girl. ‘Miss Andrews was wearing a pretty little imitation trinket she did me the honour to accept from me. Now, unfortunately, it is broken. She will not wear it again. Shall we dance, my dear? It’s a waltz.’
He had not been actually rude, but his entire manner had been coldly offensive and there was an old-fashioned element of proprietorship in his attitude towards the girl which Campion saw was resented even while she was grateful to him for his interference.
Campion went home depressed. He liked Geoffrey, had been prepared to like Petronella, and he disliked Mr Leo Seazon nearly as much as he disapproved of him, which was considerably. Moreover, the mystery of La Chatelaine was becoming acutely interesting.
He had business which took him to the other end of the town the following morning, so that he lunched at his club and returned to his flat a little after three o’clock. His man, who admitted him, mentioned that there were visitors in the study but did not remember their names, so that he went in entirely unprepared and unheralded.
Standing in the middle of his own Persian carpet, clasped in each other’s arms with a reckless enthusiasm which could be neither disregarded nor misunderstood, were Petronella Andrews and Geoffrey Painter-Dell. They turned to him as he appeared, but neglected to relinquish hands. Petronella looked as though she had been crying and Geoffrey was still harassed in spite of a certain delirious satisfaction in the back of his eyes.
Campion surveyed them politely.
‘How nice of you to call,’ he said fatuously. ‘Will you have cocktails?’
Petronella looked at him pathetically.
‘Geoffrey says you can help,’ she began. ‘Somebody must do something. It’s about those utterly filthy pearls.’
‘Of course the whole thing is fantastic,’ put in Geoffrey.
‘Paralysing,’ murmured Miss Andrews.
Campion restored order. ‘Let’s hear the worst,’ he suggested.
Geoffrey looked at Petronella and she sniffed in an unladylike and wholly appealing way. She took a deep breath.
‘I’ve got a flat of my own,’ she began unexpectedly. ‘It’s in Memphis Mews, at the back of Belgrave Square. You see, I’ve always wanted to have a place of my own, and Mother stood up for me, and after a tremendous lot of trouble we persuaded Father. He said something awful would happen to me and of course he’s right, and I am so sick over that. Still, I needn’t go into that, need I?’
She gave Campion a starry if somewhat watery smile and he mentally congratulated Geoffrey on the possession of his family’s celebrated good taste.
‘It begins with the flat, does it?’ he inquired.
‘It begins with the burglary,’ said Miss Andrews. ‘My burglary – the one I had, I mean.’
Campion’s lean and pleasant face invited further confidence and the girl perched herself on the edge of his desk and poured out her story, while Geoffrey hovered behind her with helpless but adoring anxiety.
‘It was last Monday afternoon,’ she said. ‘The day of the dinner party. I was out and my maid let a man in who said he was an inspector from the electric light people. She left him in the big room I call my studio and went back to the kitchen. Then she heard a crash and hurried in, to find that he’d pulled my bureau out from the wall, caught the legs on the edge of the carpet, and spilt everything off it on to the floor. She was still scolding him when I came in and then he just fled. Margaret – that’s the maid – rang up the electric light company and they said they hadn’t sent anyone. That’s how we knew he must have been a burglar.’
‘I see. Did you tell the police?’
‘No. He hadn’t taken anything. How could I?’
Campion smiled. ‘It’s sometimes just as well,’ he said. ‘And then what happened?’
‘Then I found the loose board,’ said Miss Andrews calmly. ‘I said I’d put the room straight if only Margaret would get some tea, and as I was doing it I found that one of the floorboards, which is usually under the bureau, had been sawn off at some time and put back again. It was very wobbly and I pulled it up. There was an old cigarette tin in the hole underneath and I took it out and put the board back. I thought the tin had been stuffed there to make the board fit, you see.
‘It took us some time to get the place straight and then I had to dress. I didn’t think of the tin again until I was just setting out. Margaret had gone home. I took a last look round, because I do like the place to look tidy when I come in, or it’s so depressing, and I saw this dirty old tin on the edge of the carpet. I picked it up to throw it into the wastepaper-basket when I thought it felt heavier than it ought to have done, so I opened it. The pearls were inside in some cotton-wool.’
She paused and blushed.
‘I suppose I ought not to have worn them,’ she said, ‘but I didn’t dream they were valuable, and they looked so lovely against my frock. It was natural to try them on and then I hadn’t the heart to take them off.’
Geoffrey coughed and his eyes sought Campion’s appealingly.
‘Yes, well, there you are,’ he said. ‘I suddenly looked across the table and there they were. I recognised them at once. They’re the famous La Chatelaine. The rooms I spend my life in are littered with paintings and photographs of Lady Lamartine wearing them. I knew they’d been stolen and never recovered, and I was pretty nearly bowled over. I realised there’d been some mistake, of course, but I knew how Lady Lamartine felt about her necklace. She’s a very – well – impulsive woman, you know, Campion, and I’m afraid I said all the wrong things when I did get a moment with Petronella.’
Miss Andrews turned to him with a wholly delightful gesture.
‘You were sweet,’ she said magnanimously. ‘I was a pig. He just rushed up to me, Mr Campion, and said, “Where on earth did you get those things? Who gave them to you? Take them off at once.” I thought he was being a bit possessive, you know, and I was rude. And then of course he had to go. What made it so much worse was that when he phoned me early next morning I was still angry. I refused to give him any
information and I told him I didn’t want to see him again, ever. When he rang up again after that, I was out. I didn’t want to talk about the wretched things by that time, you see, naturally.’
A puzzled expression passed over Campion’s face.
‘Why was that?’ he inquired.
‘Because I’d lost them,’ said Miss Andrews blissfully. ‘I lost them that night, the night of the dinner party. They just went. They got warm, you know, as pearls do, and must have slipped off without my noticing it.
‘I’ve been everywhere to look for them. Leo Seazon took me everywhere the next afternoon. We went to the Carados first, and then on to the Spinning Wheel Club in Bellairs Street, and even to the coffee-stall where a crowd of us had some awful tea about four in the morning, but of course nobody remembered seeing them. I daren’t advertise and I daren’t go to the police because Lady Lamartine is so unreasonable and so difficult, and Geoffrey being her secretary makes it so much worse. You know what she’s like. She’ll make a frightful scandal and think nothing of it. Daddy will never forgive me and it will be ghastly for Geoffrey. What on earth shall I do?’
Campion considered the problem. It was not an easy one. Lady Lamartine was indeed, as even Superintendent Oates was prepared to admit, a very difficult old woman.
‘It’s all those people,’ Petronella continued. ‘All those people at the dinner party and at the Carados afterwards. You see, everybody seems to have recognised the wretched things. Apparently they’re famous. The story is bound to go back to Lady Lamartine eventually and, of course,’ she added thoughtfully ‘there is Leo Seazon.’
Campion avoided Geoffrey’s eyes.
‘Ah, yes, of course, Seazon,’ he said casually. ‘Why did you tell him about it in the first place?’
‘I didn’t,’ said Miss Andrews. ‘He told me. I had no idea what they were until he came out with it. I’ve met him two or three times lately and he was always very attentive and all that. When we discovered that he was going on to the Carados too, we decided to go together. He seemed quite amusing. He left us at the Spinning Wheel and I didn’t think of him again until he phoned the next morning and asked if I could see him on “a private matter of great urgency” – you know how he talks. I told him to come along and when he arrived he started off by asking me in a fatherly fashion if I’d be a good girl and take La Chatelaine to the police.’
She took a deep breath.
‘I was simply staggered, of course,’ she said, throwing out a pair of small gloved hands, ‘but he made me understand what he was talking about at last and I got rather frightened. He put it so badly and he would keep begging me to “do the sensible thing” and “own up”.’
‘You told him you’d lost the pearls?’
She nodded and her little diamond-shaped face grew grave.
‘I’m afraid he didn’t believe me,’ she said. ‘He didn’t believe the story of the cigarette tin either, even when I showed him the loose board.’
Geoffrey made an inarticulate sound and she turned to him.
‘Oh, he didn’t actually say so, of course, darling,’ she protested. ‘He pretended to be very helpful. But he did let me see that he didn’t really trust me. And now he’s come out in the open. He spends hours exhorting me to “be wise”, to “trust him”, and not to “force him to do anything he’d hate to have to do”.’
She looked directly at Campion and he saw that behind her flippancy there was genuine distress in her eyes.
‘It’s almost a sort of blackmail,’ she said. ‘I’m getting to loathe him. I can’t move him off the doorstep and I daren’t shoo him away in case he goes roaring round to Lady Lamartine. The trouble is I’m afraid he’s stewing up to the point where he’s going to make an offer to marry me and keep quiet. I can feel that in the wind. I think he rather fancies an alliance between the two families.’
Geoffrey snorted and Campion intervened.
‘Don’t you think that’s a little old-fashioned and melodramatic?’ he ventured gently.
Miss Andrews met his eyes with an unexpectedly forthright glance.
‘Leo Seazon is old-fashioned and melodramatic,’ she said. ‘He must be nearly seventy.’
Campion, who knew that debonair and conceited man to be but fifty-six, felt a sneaking sympathy for Leo Seazon. However, it was not of long duration. Geoffrey took the girl’s hand.
‘When Petronella rang me up today and poured out the whole story I was beside myself,’ he said. ‘Lady Lamartine is on the war-path already. She’s heard something. There was a Yard man down there yesterday asking nervous questions. He practically apologised to me for bringing up the subject, but I felt pretty guilty. What can we do, Campion? What on earth can we do?’
Campion made no rash promises. The two young people standing so forlornly in front of him touched his heart, however. He gave them a cocktail and sent them away with the assurance that he would do what he could.
Just before they left, Geoffrey turned to him wistfully.
‘About this fellow Seazon,’ he began diffidently. ‘I can’t pitch him out yet on the street, can I?’
‘My dear boy, no!’ Campion was mildly scandalised. ‘I’m afraid Mr Seazon must be placated at all costs. He’s the danger point, you see.’
Geoffrey nodded gloomily. ‘The man’s practically ordered Petronella to go to the ballet with him tonight.’
‘Then she must go,’ said Mr Campion firmly. ‘I’m sorry, but it’s imperative. The one thing we must avoid at all costs is publicity, I take it? Mr Seazon has a devastating tongue.’
‘Here, but I say …!’ Geoffrey protested in sudden revolt. ‘If we’re going to accept that premise, Petronella may have to marry the fellow if La Chatelaine doesn’t turn up.’
Campion’s pale eyes were hidden behind his spectacles.
‘Let us hope it doesn’t come to that,’ he said solemnly. ‘Bless you, my children. Let me have your card, Miss Andrews. I’ll ring you in the morning.’
As soon as his visitors were safely off the premises, Campion sat down at his desk and drew the telephone towards him.
Superintendent Oates was even more helpful than usual. His curiosity was piqued and he listened to the Memphis Mews address with considerable interest.
‘Yes,’ he said, his voice sounding lazier than ever over the wire, ‘it does strike a note in my memory. That’s the place where “Stones” Roberts’s girl lived. Her father was a chauffeur, I remember. They’ve turned all that Mews into society flats now. What’s the excitement?’
Campion did not answer him directly. Instead he put another question and once again the Superintendent was helpful.
‘It’s funny you should ask,’ he said. ‘I was just thinking about Roberts when you rang. One of our men reports that there’s a fellow very like him acting as a waiter at the Spinning Wheel Club. He couldn’t be quite sure and didn’t want to frighten him. He wants Ralph or me to go down and identify him.’
‘Fine.’ Campion sounded relieved. ‘That’s a real bit of luck. Look here, Oates, do me a favour. Don’t pull the man in, but have him tailed. I’ve got a very good reason for asking.’
Oates began to grumble.
‘When is your lordship thinking of taking the humble police force into his confidence?’ he demanded.
‘Right away,’ said Campion cheerfully. ‘I’ll come round. Oh, Stanislaus, heard from Lady Lamartine today?’
Mr Oates made a remark which the telephone department would have considered vulgar, and rang off.
Petronella Andrews was entertaining Mr Leo Seazon to tea when Mr Campion telephoned to her the following afternoon. She was paler than usual and there were definite signs of strain in her young face. It seemed to her that she had been entertaining Mr Seazon for several hundreds of years without respite.
He sat, grave and handsome, in the quilted armchair by the fireplace and regarded her with the half-reproachful, half-sympathetic expression which she had grown to hate. They had been talking, as usual,
of La Chatelaine, of Mr Seazon’s considerable fortune, and of the advisability of a young girl having a husband who could protect her in times of trouble.
Petronella had skilfully led the conversation away from the sentimental whenever it had appeared, but it had been growing steadily more and more apparent that his evasion could not last forever, and the telephone call came as a heaven-sent interruption.
Campion was very discreet on the wire.
‘Miss Andrews,’ he said, ‘do you remember some earrings you lost? No, don’t speak; I said earrings. You lost them when your flat was robbed and you told the police. You may not remember all this, but I want you to know it now. Will you come down to Scotland Yard at once and get them? Mr Seazon is with you, isn’t he? Perhaps he’d bring you in his car, which our man reports is outside your door. Don’t be alarmed. Just come along. Explain who you are when you arrive and you’ll be taken straight up to Superintendent Oates. I shall be there. Goodbye.’
An excellent training by a mother of the old school had taught Petronella both self-possession and adroitness, and within half an hour the courtly Mr Seazon, who was not unadroit himself, was handing her gracefully out of his grey limousine in the courtyard of the ugliest building on the Embankment.
The square high-ceilinged room in which Superintendent Oates received them with the avuncular charm he kept for pretty ladies was already half-full of people. Petronella’s heart leaped as she caught sight of Geoffrey sitting next to Mr Campion in a corner, and when he smiled as he rose to greet her she blushed very charmingly.
Mr Seazon, who observed the incident, did not seem so pleased.
Besides the Superintendent there were two other officials present, a thin man in uniform with a box and a fat man in a brown suit with a portfolio. It was very impressive.
Mr Oates beckoned the thin man, took the box, and smiled encouragingly at the pretty girl.
‘Now, Miss,’ he said.
‘My – my earrings?’ stammered Petronella.
Oates regarded her blandly.
Mr Campion & Others Page 29
