“What did she say you weren’t to tell?”
Florrie looked sideways.
“I wasn’t to tell nobody nothin’ about Miss Rose Anne.”
“Florrie,” said Oliver, “if you loved someone very much, and they went right away and you didn’t know where they were, or what they were doing, or whether they would ever come back, wouldn’t it make you very unhappy?”
Florrie stared.
“Fanny went away,” she said.
“Your sister Fanny?”
She nodded.
“But I wasn’t unhappy—I didn’t cry.”
“You know Miss Rose Anne has gone away?”
A scared look went over her face. Then she said in a sort of sing-song,
“Miss Rose Anne’s run off with a gentleman, and I expect they’re married by now.”
“Florrie—who told you that?”
She stared without speaking.
“Someone taught you to say that. Who was it?”
No answer.
“Florrie, when you saw Miss Rose Anne, did she tell you she was going away?”
The red curls were shaken.
“What did she say to you? You were ill, weren’t you?”
The curls were shaken again.
“I wasn’t ill. I cried.”
“Why did you cry?”
“For Miss Rose Anne to come.”
“And when she came, what did she say to you?”
“She put her arms round me, and she said, ‘Oh, Florrie, don’t cry,’ same like she always does.”
“And then?”
“Then I stopped.”
“And then?”
“She sat on my bed and sang to me.”
“What did she sing?”
“She sang ‘Pussy’s a Lady.’ But I’m not really a baby now. Shall I sing it to you?”
She piped up in an untuneful little voice:
“Hush-a-bye, baby. Pussy’s a lady.
Mousie’s all gone to the Mill.
If baby won’t cry, she’ll come back by-and-bye.
So hush-a-bye, baby, lie still and don’t cry.”
“Now can I have my chocolates, please?”
“In a minute,” said Oliver.
Why should Florrie have been forbidden this innocent recital? Why should she have been sent away to prevent her telling people that Rose Anne had sat on her bed and sung her a nursery rhyme? There was more—there must be more. Or was he merely mare’s-nesting? He said as gently as he could,
“And then, Florrie—after she had sung to you?”
“She kissed me good-night, and she said, ‘Bye-bye blessings,’ like she always does, and she went away, and now can I have my chocolates, please?”
“Not just yet. You say she went away. Do you mean she went out of the room?”
“Yes—out of my room.”
“And you didn’t see her again?”
Florrie shook her head. The curls played bob across her face.
“Did you hear her ask for the green hat that she gave you?”
Florrie shook her head again. Her little peaked face began to quiver.
“It was my hat.”
“And Miss Rose Anne borrowed it?”
Florrie shook her head again.
“It was my hat. She give it me for my very own. She give it me for my own self. It was my green hat.”
“Who took it away?” said Oliver.
She gave him a secret look.
“Florrie—who took it away?”
“It wasn’t her hat—it was mine,” said Florrie in a small, determined voice.
“Who took it away from you, Florrie?”
He got another of those looks—wary, secret—and something else—was it afraid? He said.
“Miss Rose Anne wouldn’t want to take your hat away, Florrie.” And all at once Florrie’s tongue was loosed. She began to pant as if she had been running, and to sob, and to say between those panting breaths.
“She didn’t—she didn’t—oh, she never! She give it me—for my very own—and it was my hat—and—Mabel—didn’t—ought—to have—took—it—away!”
“Mabel?” said Oliver. “Mabel took the green hat?”
Florrie stopped crying, stopped half way through a sob, looked sideways, her eyes still bright with tears.
“I didn’t say Mabel—I didn’t say nothin’.”
“You said Mabel took your hat.”
Florrie gave a rending sniff, caught her breath, and recited in the same sing-song as before.
“Mabel came into my room and took my green hat to borrow for Miss Rose Anne that was going to run away with a gentleman and I expect they’re married by now.”
“That’s what your mother told you to say if anyone asked you?”
Florrie nodded.
“And now may I have my chocolates, please?”
Oliver opened the box.
“I’m not going to give them to you all at once. Look here, you can have six, and if you want some more you must come back for them. See?”
“When shall I come?”
“Tomorrow morning—ten o’clock.”
She shook her head.
“There’s school.”
“Two o’clock?”
She nodded.
“But I don’t know nothin’ about Miss Rose Anne,” she said.
CHAPTER XII
Oliver walked back to Sindleby. Had he learned anything from Florrie, or hadn’t he? Had she anything to tell, or was he merely wasting time that was the most precious thing in the world? As he went over his interview with Florrie, the thing that stuck out a mile was that the child had been coached. She had been taught the answers to two of his questions, and when they came along she was pat with her sing-song. Someone had taught her to say, “Miss Rose Anne’s run off with a gentleman,” and someone had tried to explain why Mabel Garstnet had come into her room and taken the green hat—explain, or explain away. When Florrie, between violent sobs, accused Mabel of taking her hat, Oliver was convinced that she was speaking the truth. When she recited an explanation of why the hat had been taken, she was saying a piece that had been put into her mouth. It was a very good piece, and the explanation was a completely plausible one. But why had Florrie been coached with it, and why had Florrie been sent away from home? The more he thought about it the less he liked it. If there is only the truth to tell, why should it need so much dressing up? What need is there to coach a child unless the child knows something which must at all costs be covered up or explained away?
Mabel—and the green hat—Rose Anne’s own hat which she had given to Florrie, and which Mabel had borrowed on that horrible evening. Mabel Garstnet had borrowed it, and Florrie had been taught to say she had borrowed it for Rose Anne. Mabel—Mabel and the green hat … She might, so far as description went, have passed for Rose Anne in a half light. They were of the same height, the same build. Mabel in the green hat might quite easily have been so described that the description would fit Rose Anne Carew, especially if she had worn Rose Anne’s coat.
This last thought stabbed into his mind like a knife. He had not known that he could feel a keener pain, but this struck very deep. Rose Anne stripped, Rose Anne defenceless—and in whose hands? His own extreme helplessness filled him with despair. How could he go to the police and say, “I believe Rose Anne has been kidnapped by Amos Rennard, who has been officially dead for ten years. So far as I know, he never saw her or heard of her, but his late wife’s brother married her old nurse, and they keep the inn at Hillick St Agnes. I want a search warrant.” Well, he supposed that, if he was sufficiently insistent, the search warrant might be forthcoming. Did he even dream that Rose Anne was hidden away at the Angel, where the house had been full to overflowing with her relations? He didn’t think it, he didn’t even dream it. Then what would a search warrant effect? Mr Smith’s words came back—“I fear you would only put a very powerful and unscrupulous organization upon its guard.” Did he believe in this organization? He didn�
�t know. Did he believe in Amos Rennard? He didn’t know that either. He only knew with a deadly certainty that Rose Anne would never have left them all of her own free will. She was either dead, or she was under some restraint. If there was the slightest chance that one of Mr Smith’s tangled threads might lead him to her, what did it matter what he believed or didn’t believe? There was no chance that he dared neglect.
He went back to Hillick St Agnes, and put up at the Angel. They gave him his old room and a very good welcome. Matthew Garstnet was bluff and hearty, and his wife kind and attentive.
“You know we’ve had to send our little Florrie away, sir. Poor child, she took on so, and we thought a little change—she was that fond of dear Miss Rose Anne.”
Oliver hadn’t noticed Florrie being very fond of anyone except herself. He tried a cast.
“Where have you sent her, Mrs Garstnet?” Now—if she lied—if she lied—
But Mrs Garstnet did not lie. She said in a grateful voice,
“I’m sure it’s so very kind of you to take an interest, sir. It’s my husband’s sister-in-law she’s gone to, and most kind of her it is, but the doctor we took her to—you know we took her to a London doctor a matter of a few weeks ago—he said most particular that it would be the best thing in the world for her to be away from home for a bit, only I couldn’t bring myself to it, not till now, Florrie being my only one. And I’m sure it’s most kind of you, sir, to ask when you’re in such trouble yourself—I suppose you’ve no news, sir?” Her voice broke on the question, and when Oliver had said, “None,” she wiped her eyes and hurried from the room. It seemed to him impossible to suspect her. She was so entirely the concerned family servant, the doting, anxious mother. And on that he got an echo of Mr Smith’s hesitant, cultured voice saying, “If the choice lay between Florrie and Miss Carew, what line would you expect Mrs Garstnet to take?” How could there be a choice? He had no answer to that. He had no answer to the hungry clamour of questions which filled his mind.
Later he went over to see Elfreda. She took him into the schoolroom after ten minutes or so of difficult conversation with Miss Hortensia and James Carew.
Elfreda banged the schoolroom door.
“I’ve got to stay here for another week because Daddy won’t be back till then. Isn’t it grim? I think aunts ought to be abolished—don’t you—except some of them are rather lambs really. I think Aunt Hortensia must have been frightfully badly brought up. I mean, why doesn’t Uncle James tell her to hold her tongue and go to Timbuctoo?”
“Elfreda, I want to talk to you,” said Oliver. “I suppose you really knew Rose Anne better than anyone else.”
The tears rushed into Elfreda’s eyes.
“I suppose I did—I mean I do—I mean I’ll do anything for her.”
“Well, I want you to tell me something—which might be a help—in looking for her.” The words stuck and wouldn’t come out. It wasn’t so easy to ask questions about Rose Anne.
Elfreda stared.
“But I can’t think of anything, Oliver.”
“Wait a minute—I haven’t asked you yet. Did she ever speak of anyone—any man? Was there anyone who—who—anyone with red hair?”
“Oliver, she wasn’t like that. She wouldn’t—she didn’t—I mean we just laughed about him. It wasn’t the least bit serious—I know it wasn’t.”
Oliver’s heart gave a thump. He said quickly,
“Then there was someone—with red hair?”
“But it wasn’t anything in the world. Oliver, it wasn’t—she wouldn’t.”
He put his hand down hard on her shoulder.
“I know she wouldn’t, but I want you to tell me about it all the same—everything, please.”
Elfreda blinked, and blinked away a couple of tears.
“It was when she was staying with us last summer in the Isle of Wight. There was a big fancy dress dance—you know, we wanted you to come, and you couldn’t get leave—and Rose Anne went as a white rose. Nannie made the dress. She really did it beautifully—all big cut-out petals. It was a lovely dress.”
“When you say ‘Nannie,’ whom do you mean?”
“Oh, Mrs Garstnet. Rose Anne still calls her Nannie. Well, she really did look like an angel in the dress, and she had a great success. And about half way through I saw her dancing with the most frightfully good looking man—he really was. He was all in white too, a kind of eighteenth-century court dress, only instead of a powdered wig he had his own red hair.”
Oliver’s hand closed on her shoulder. She cried out,
“Oh, you’re hurting me!”
“I’m sorry.” He took his hand away. “You said this man had red hair—”
“Too marvellous—the dark red sort. And as soon as I got the chance I asked Rose Anne who he was, and she said, ‘Well, he calls himself Mr Octavian.’ So I said, ‘How do you mean, he calls himself?’ and she laughed and said, ‘Well, he says he’s the Rosenkavalier.’ And of course the Rosenkavalier’s name was Octavian, and I suppose what he meant was that he was Rose Anne’s cavalier—anyhow that’s how he behaved. But it was only a joke to her—it really was, Oliver, because we all teased her about it, and she just said that their dresses went together and their steps went together, so why shouldn’t she?”
“Why shouldn’t she what?”
“Oh, dance with him. And she did, quite a lot, and I don’t blame her, because he was easily the best dancer in the room.”
Oliver said, “Go on,” and got a frank, surprised look.
“But there isn’t anything—there really isn’t.”
“Do you mean she didn’t see him again?”
“No, of course she didn’t. He just blew in and blew out again. I think he must have come ashore from one of the yachts. The amusing thing was that everybody thought he was with somebody else’s party. Personally I believe he gate-crashed—he looked as if he’d got nerve enough to do anything. He told Rose Anne he had come there to dance with her, and as a matter of fact he didn’t dance with anyone else—at least I don’t think he did—and we ragged her about it. And then he just faded away, and no one ever saw him again.”
“You’re sure Rose Anne didn’t see him again—quite sure, Elfreda?”
“Oh, yes, I’m quite sure.”
“Or hear from him?”
“No, I’m sure she didn’t.” She paused, hesitated, and said in a dragging voice, “Unless—there was that telephone call.”
“Which telephone call?”
Elfreda gulped.
“You know—the one they’ve all badgered me sick about.”
“Yes. Just run over it again, will you?”
“Well, you know—it was that afternoon, and you were in the garden. We were talking about people flirting, and you said she didn’t need to flirt. You said, ‘She just looks, and we fall down flat,’ and she got up—and went away—and looked round over her shoulder and said, ‘Did anyone call up for me?’”
Oliver said, “Yes, I remember.” Had Rose Anne at that moment remembered someone, not Oliver, who had fallen down and worshipped at a single look? Had she expected a call, a message? She had looked over her shoulder and smiled. Of what had she been thinking—of whom had she been thinking?
Elfreda swallowed a choking sob.
“Then, when Aunt Hortensia was scolding me about the wreaths, there was that telephone call—and it’s no use anyone asking me any more about it, because the only single thing I know is that there was a man on the line, and he said, ‘Is that Miss Carew?’ And I said, ‘Miss Hortensia Carew—or Miss Rose Anne Carew?’ and he said, ‘Miss Rose Carew.’ So of course I thought it wasn’t anyone who knew her, because no one ever calls her Rose. And I said she couldn’t come, could I take a message? And he said no, I couldn’t, and it didn’t matter and he’d ring again—only he didn’t.”
Oliver stared straight in front of him. “No one ever calls her Rose.”… But the Rosenkavalier—the Cavalier of the Rose—who had met her, seen her, just that on
ce in her white rose dress—he might think of her as the Rose, and ask for her as Miss Rose Carew.…
With an abrupt movement he turned away. It was all madness. Because they had nothing to go upon, they were trying out of this nothing to make something—to force a shape upon it—clothe it with empty theories. Could he ask himself or anyone else to believe that this man, this red-headed gate-crasher who had met Rose Anne once four months ago, had only to ring her up on her wedding eve for her to throw everything to the winds and go to him? No, he hadn’t ever rung her up. He had said he would ring again, but there had been no second call—only Mrs Garstnet telephoning from the Angel begging Rose Anne to come to Florrie—to Florrie.
He turned back to Elfreda.
“Thank you very much, my dear. I shouldn’t cry any more if I were you—it doesn’t do any good.”
He went back to the Angel. It was in his mind that he must go to London and see Mr Benbow Smith again. He had left his car in a Malling garage, so he would have to make an early start if he meant to do the three miles on foot and catch the 8.20. He would miss his appointment with Florrie, but that couldn’t be helped. He doubted very much whether there was anything to be got out of her. Anyhow she could wait.
He went in by the back way, because he didn’t want to meet anyone. Anyone really meant Mabel Garstnet, who was showing a tendency to linger in his path and giggle at him. The back way was the one he had commonly taken when coming in from the garage. It led past the kitchen, and the parlour used by the Garstnets. It occurred to him that he might knock on the parlour door and notify his early start. He was just about to do so, when he saw that the door was ajar, and it went through his mind that this probably meant the room was empty. And then, hard upon that, he heard the sound of a sob. He had just come from one weeping woman, and he was in no mood for another. He drew back as Matthew Garstnet said “Shut up!” on a low growl of anger.
Well, if there was a family row going on, he had better go up to his room and ring. But before he could pass he heard Mrs Garstnet say in a choking voice, “It’s her face—the way she looked at me. Oh, I can’t get it out of my mind!”
This time Matthew Garstnet swore. He may have struck her as well, for she cried out sharply. He certainly struck the door, for it slammed to not a foot from Oliver’s shoulder.
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