Nothing Venture

by Patricia Wentworth

  There was another pause, and Mrs Mellish said,

  “No, ma’am.”

  The tears rushed into Nan’s eyes. They were so hot with anger that they burned there. She stepped back because the impulse to take Mrs Mellish by those plump cushioned shoulders and shake her until her eyes bulged and her teeth rattled was simply overpowering. After a moment she said,

  “You do know something—I know that you do! Why won’t you tell me what you know?”

  The subtle air of offence which had accompanied Mrs Mellish to this interview became more noticeable. It wasn’t for anyone that knew her manners to colour up and behave hysterical like Mrs Weare was doing. Mrs Mellish thanked Providence that she was not as other women were. She thanked Providence that she’d been brought up respectable, and to know her manners and have a proper control of herself. She had had her troubles, and she’d known how to behave herself. At her husband’s funeral she had shed a widow’s decorous tears, but she had been careful not to let them spoil her crape. She despised Nan a good deal for her changing colour and the quiver in her voice. She did not speak.

  Nan went back to her chair and sat down. It was no good appealing to Mrs Mellish. She knew very well that she was being despised, and the Forsyth pride stiffened her back. She allowed the silence to lengthen. Then she said, in a voice which Mrs Mellish had not heard before,

  “I’m waiting.”

  “I beg your pardon, ma’am?”

  “I’m waiting for you to tell me what you saw or heard on Tuesday night.” Nan’s voice had a quiver in it now. It was hard with authority.

  Mrs Mellish looked up, a little surprised, and met steady eyes with something behind them that demanded an answer. The change flurried her a little. Unconsidered words sprang to her lips.

  “Nothing that was to say anything, ma’am.”

  “Then you did see something?”

  Mrs Mellish recovered herself.

  “I couldn’t say, ma’am.”

  “I think you must say.”

  Mrs Mellish bridled.

  “I’m sure I’m the last to keep back anything as ’ud be any help,” she said. With the fingers of one hand she pleated a fold on the white linen handkerchief on her knee.

  “Yes. What did you see?”

  “I’m a poor sleeper,” said Mrs Mellish, “and when I don’t sleep, it’s my ’abit to make myself a cup of tea.” She paused, and added, “On a spirit lamp.”

  “Yes?” said Nan.

  “I’d run out of tea,” said Mrs Mellish. “I make so bold as to keep some handy—I’ve a caddy that was give me by Mr Weare for the purpose. Come Tuesday night, my caddy was empty, and I went down to fill it. It might have been three o’clock or thereabouts.”

  “Yes?” said Nan. “Go on, please.”

  Mrs Mellish meant to take her own time.

  “I went down the back stairs, and so I come up. I had my candle in my hand, and when I came up to the first floor, the door through to the landing was half open. I put my hand on it to bring it to, and I heard a door open along the corridor.”

  “Yes?” said Nan. “What door was it?”

  “It was Mr Jervis’ door—Mr Weare, I should say—so I blew out my candle—it being an awkward time of night to meet a gentleman, and me in my dressing-gown.”

  “Yes?” said Nan rather breathlessly.

  The black curtain that had fallen between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning was going to be lifted; she was going to get a glimpse of what lay behind it.

  “I shut the door,” said Mrs Mellish, “and came away up to my room and made my cup of tea.”

  Nan straightened herself again. She had leaned forward involuntarily to catch the first glimpse of what was behind that curtain.

  There was no glimpse.

  She choked down her sick disappointment and forced her voice.

  “You didn’t see Mr Jervis?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  Nan caught the tone of relief. Now why should Mrs Mellish be relieved? She hadn’t seen Jervis. Why should she be relieved about that? The next question was across her lips before she knew that she was going to ask it.

  “Whom did you see?”

  Mrs Mellish was so much startled that her hand closed on the linen handkerchief and crumpled its neat folds.

  “I went up to my room, and I made my cup of tea,” she said; but her voice had lost its balance; it hurried over one word, and dragged on another.

  Nan gave her no time.

  “You saw someone. Whom did you see?”

  “I blew my candle out, and I shut the door.”

  “You blew out your candle. Mr Jervis’ door was open. Did you see a light? Was there a light in Mr Jervis’ room?”

  Mrs Mellish looked up, and down again.

  “There might have been.”

  A tingling triumph came up in Nan.

  “There was a light—you saw it! What else did you see?”

  “I couldn’t hardly say.” The words were almost inaudible.

  “You must say,” said Nan.

  “I’d rather you didn’t ask me, ma’am.”

  “I’m afraid you must say what you saw.”

  Why didn’t she want to? What was she hiding?

  Mrs Mellish rallied her dignity.

  “It’d be best for all parties if you’d let me go now, ma’am.”

  “You must say what you saw,” said Nan.

  Mrs Mellish made a curious sort of jerking movement.

  “Well then, I did see someone—and I wouldn’t have mentioned it if I hadn’t been driven. There’s never been no evil speaking, lying, nor slandering in my kitchen—no, nor in my housekeeper’s room neither. But if you will have it, ma’am—”

  “Yes, I will have it,” said Nan.

  “Well then—I saw Miss Rosamund.”

  So the curtain had hidden Rosamund. Nan did not know what she had expected, but it was not this. The shock had numbed feeling, but it left her voice quiet and level.

  “You saw Miss Rosamund. Will you tell me just what you did see?”

  Mrs Mellish put the linen handkerchief to her chin for a moment, and then to either temple. The moisture stood on her pale skin.

  “I blew out my candle, and so soon as it was out, I could see there was a light somewhere. And I looked round the crack of the door—and there was Mr Jervis’ door open and a light in the room, and Miss Rosamund coming out with a suit-case in her hand. And just as I looked, the light went out, and I shut the door quick and come away.”

  Nan sat there pale and straight. She had brought this humiliation on herself. Mrs Mellish would have spared her, but she had forced her to speak. Well—since she had come so far, she must go the whole of the way.

  “You’re sure you saw Miss Rosamund?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  It was no use—she couldn’t go on. If there were more questions to be put, then someone else must put them—Ferdinand, or Mr Page. She would have to send for Mr Page tomorrow if there were still no news. Rosamund. Rosamund, with the suit-case in her hand. She felt very sick and giddy, but she managed to get up and to speak steadily.

  “Thank you, Mrs Mellish. You won’t speak of this to anyone?”

  Mrs Mellish recovered her poise.

  “It’s not by any wish of mine that I’ve spoke of it now,” she said, and withdrew without haste, and with the consciousness of high moral worth.

  It was some time later that Nan realized she was still standing as she had stood to see Mrs Mellish go. The realization came with a slight sense of shock. It was some time since the door had closed, but she did not know how long. Everything had stopped when the door shut; now it went on again with a little jerk, but slowly, unevenly, and as if it might stop again at any moment. The sense of strain and of expectation was gone. Jervis had gone away with Rosamund. She felt humiliated into the very dust. They had gone away secretly, and Rosamund had lied to her. All the time she had talked about drowning and about Jervis getting cramp, she was ly
ing. She had been in Jervis’ room at three o’clock in the morning. She had stood in the door with his suit-case in her hand.

  Nan was too numb to feel hurt. The thought of Rosamund was like a heavy weight that numbed her. Jervis had come into her room and been kind. Was he expecting Rosamund then? Was that why he was awake? Had he only been kind because she must not be awake? She must sleep and know nothing because Rosamund was coming?

  Her mind filled with pictures. They came up like bubbles in dark water. She could see them coming, but she could not stop them. As each one reached the surface of her mind, it floated there, showed its iridescent colours, and broke in a spray like tears.

  She saw herself and Rosamund side by side. Jervis loved Rosamund.

  She saw Jervis comforting her—the curtain blowing in the draught from the open door—the door between his room and hers. He wouldn’t have left it open if Rosamund had been there. She trembled against his shoulder and was comforted. The door was open, and the curtain blew.

  She saw Rosamund with a suit-case in her hand.

  She saw other things.

  After a long time no more bubbles rose. Her mind was dark and empty. She went up to her room, and at the first sound of her foot on the stair, there was Bran, keeping step with her. She locked the door upon them both; she locked the door into Jervis’ room. Then she undressed and lay down on her bed. A heavy weight of fatigue made all her limbs feel like lead. She lay down and covered herself with the sheet. With no interval at all, she dropped into the deepest depths of sleep.

  XXXV

  Jervis Weare opened his eyes. He might as well have kept them shut, because he could see nothing. An even blackness with no shading in it confronted him. He dropped his lids and slipped back into a vague half consciousness. Presently he moved, threw out an arm, and groaned. The sound of this groan was the first to reach his ears since he had heard Rosamund move beside him in the dark just before he leaned forward to put on the lights of her car. He heard his own groan, and opened his eyes again. He was still in the dark. But where was Rosamund, and where was the car?

  He sat up and felt his head. There was a lump on the back of it like a tennis-ball. He frowned furiously. His head was swimming, and the darkness was full of fireworks. He put his head in his hands and leaned forward. The fireworks grew paler, and his head began to clear. He became aware of something hard running into him. His right leg felt numb. He put down one hand gropingly, and touched stone. The damp cold of it roused him. He moved his leg. It was not injured; it was only numb.

  He scrambled up, and once more the darkness filled with rockets and catherine-wheels. He had to sit down again. His mind cleared momentarily. He was in the dark, sitting on wet stone, with a lump on his head. But a moment ago he had heard Rosamund move beside him in the darkness, and he had leaned forward to switch on the lights of her car. She had no business to leave a dark car by the side of the road—it was damned dangerous.

  He put his hand to his head again. You couldn’t raise a lump like that in a moment. Had they been run into? He remembered leaning forward to put on the lights. He couldn’t remember the lights going on—they hadn’t gone on—his hand had never reached the switch—he had leaned forward, and someone had knocked him out.

  Who? That was the question.

  And why?

  Someone had most undoubtedly knocked him out—unless there had been an accident. Someone might have run into that dark car.

  Jervis fingered his head. He had been leaning forward to switch on the lights—his head was already inside the car. If there had been a smash, he couldn’t see how he had got off with a bump on the head. And then, how had he got here—and where was he?

  He felt about him again.… Stone … not a stone floor … damp … uneven. He got over on to his hands and knees and felt farther afield. One groping hand passed roughened ridges and came down into a slimy hollow; the other, feeling ahead, went over a rounded edge and found nothing beyond it. For a moment Jervis stayed like that, his left hand slipping, and his right over the edge of an unknown drop. Then a sharp splinter of rock cut his knee, and half involuntarily he drew himself back into a sitting position. What place was this? A dark place, and damp with the passage of water. With his mind awakened to this, his ears caught a sound which had not meant anything until now, when he became aware that it had been present all the time. It was the sound of water.

  He sat there listening. The sound was the sound of water, but it was not the sound of a stream. It neither flowed, nor rushed, nor tinkled; it had none of the notes of running water. It was the sound most familiar to him of any sound on earth. It was the sound of the sea.

  Everything stood still in his mind for a moment. Then the sound of the sea again. His hand went down and touched the damp stone. He put a finger to his mouth, and found it salt. The sound of the sea—and rock with a salt dampness upon it.… The sea had been over this stone, and not so long ago. Then if there was a way for the sea to come in, there must be a way by which he could get out. He wasn’t going to stay here to be drowned like a rat in a trap. Only he must have light. This intense darkness puzzled him. It must mean many winding turns. But then, of course, it was the middle of the night. Or was it? How long had he been unconscious?

  He began to feel in his pocket for matches. There was a box in his blazer pocket, but it felt uncommonly light. He opened it gingerly and found two matches. Perhaps his hand shook; perhaps the first match was rotten. It left a luminous streak upon the roughened side of the box, jigged off with a hiss and a spirit of blue flame, and went out. He had seen his own knuckles with green smears on them, and the corner of the match-box yellow and black.

  There was one match left.

  He wetted his finger and held it up to see if there was a draught, but could discern none. He struck the match quickly, and it caught, the soft damp wood sizzling as the yellow flame took hold. He held it up. There was an immense static blackness for it to contend with—an old tyranny of the dark, and one little point of light to fight it with.

  He held it up. He could see his own hand, and the flame dropping suddenly from a yellow tongue to a blue flare. He reversed the match, saw the glimmer fade and then suddenly sprang up again into flame. He looked away from his hand and saw wet black rock—a drop to what he thought was water—and bars. The match burnt his fingers, and he dropped it. It fell with a splutter on the wet stone and went out. A red spark was there for a moment, then it was gone.

  Jervis came with a tremendous mental shock to the realization of where he was. It was the bars that did the trick. There was only one place with a barred exit to the sea, and that was Old Foxy Fixon’s Cellar. It took him a minute or two to pull round from the shock. How in the world had he got into Old Foxy Fixon’s Cellar? Why, there weren’t half a dozen people who knew of its existence—Basher—possibly Mabel Tetterley. But Basher wasn’t the sort who told his wife things, so Mabel was doubtful. Who else?

  Himself, of course—and Rosamund. The rock moved beneath him giddily. His head swam. He put down a hand on either side of him and waited for it to clear. The dark cave filled with pictures. Rosamund on a visit at fourteen—the first time he had seen her. They had got on like a house on fire then. She had stayed for a month and then gone back to her mother. Five years before they met again. And then a different Rosamund—a grown-up Rosamund with a hardish streak in her. He went back to Rosamund’s visit, and the very low tide which had sent them exploring along the foot of the cliffs. That was when they had found Old Foxy’s Cellar. At first it looked like any other little cave; but it went on, got larger, and after a succession of break-neck boulders and dangerous pools ended, for them, in a sort of iron portcullis with a gate in the middle of it, a gate that could not be opened. They explored precariously with candle-ends stuck on splinters of wood and as many boxes of matches as they could gather from the King’s Weare bedrooms. For two days the tide left the entrance bare. On the third they were very nearly drowned, and Basher had come to their rescue a
nd made them promise to hold their tongues about the cave. He said he didn’t want a lot of silly asses messing round and getting themselves drowned. When they had both promised, he showed them the landward entrance from Old Foxy’s house and told them all about it. Old Foxy Fixon used to use the place to store the French brandy which he smuggled. In his time the entrance was practicable for a day or two round about spring tides. He put up the bars to keep his kegs safe from his rivals and from the Preventive men. The iron gate had never been opened since Old Foxy died, and no one knew what had happened to the key.

  Jervis sat with his palms cold on the wet stone and saw these things. They were like pictures seen by flash-light, unnaturally clear, but a long way off. Himself—Rosamund, with a heavy yellow plait—Basher—the rusty portcullis—Basher telling them how Old Foxy Fixon diddled the Preventive men—Basher taking them into Old Foxy’s house, where the wall-papers hung in mouldering strips and a smell of damp and must and rotting wood lurked in the empty rooms—Basher taking them into the kitchen, and from there down brick steps to a cellar which was surprisingly dry and warm—Basher shifting a barrel and lifting up a tremendous trap-door with an iron ring in it—himself and Rosamund kneeling and peering into the black uncertainties below. There was a passage that led to the cave, but Basher wouldn’t take them down into it, and they had to promise on their most sacred words of honour never to go there alone. Jervis could see Rosamund, with her head tipped back, thanking Basher. She had torn her dress, and she was covered with wet green slime, but she thanked him very composedly. Jervis had not thanked him at all. It was the most wonderful moment of his life. He dreamed of it for months, recurred to it with a secret thrill for years, and had never passed Old Foxy’s house without a thought of its hidden secret.

  Well, he was in Old Foxy’s Cellar—and what about it? Someone had put him there. It became blindingly obvious that it was Robert Leonard who had put him there, and that Rosamund had shown him the way. A cold rage stiffened Jervis from head to foot. Rosamund had come to him with a cock-and-bull story which he had been fool enough to believe, and Leonard had knocked him on the head and dumped him in Foxy’s Cellar. It was so obvious, that there was nothing more to be said. The question was, what did they want? And the answer came pat in Ferdinand’s words—Nan’s words. “Who gets King’s Weare and the money if anything happens to you?” Rosamund got it. And Rosamund knew about the cellar. And Rosamund had thrown a stone up at his window and brought him down to a convenient dark place where Leonard could lay him out without any risk.