Ronnie Hempson crossed to the bench which ran along the back wall of the building, and lifted the telephone-receiver from its hook.
“Yes?” he said. “Yes, sir… Burroughs speaking… yes… right, sir… at three o’clock, sir… very good, sir… will you want me, sir?… you’ll drive yourself… all right, sir… I’ll have it round ready for you…”
He put back the receiver and turned to Jim and Freddie.
“The dear old boss,” he said. “Going for a run this afternoon and won’t be requiring my services. Which of the women is it?”
“Raoul… the dancer from the Alhambra. Carson’s running strong in that direction.”
“Poor girl. Do you know why she’s here? Because she’s plastered with good jewellery given to her by bad men. Do you know why the Brampton girl’s here? Same reason. And you, comrade Usher, of Tower House? Because the Usher heirlooms have fallen into your unworthy hands.”
“And what have the Usher heirlooms got to do with Edwin Carson?” demanded Freddie.
“A hell of a lot. There’s a lot of damned valuable jewellery in this house this weekend—quite apart from the wine-cellarful—and I shouldn’t be surprised if some of it stayed at Thrackley after its owners leave.”
“How on earth?…”
“Ask the Maharajah of wherever-it-was and the Countess of Bemersly. They won’t know, but there’s no harm in asking them.”
Ronnie Hempson looked at the watch on his wrist.
“I’ll have to be getting the car ready,” he said. “Are you two game for a little expedition to-night?”
“As long as you keep it clean,” said Freddie.
“I’ve never had a chance to see those damned cellars of Carson’s. It’s hopeless trying to get down to them single-handed—someone would have to keep a look-out. I don’t see why you two shouldn’t assist the C.I.D. in looking into Edwin Carson’s affairs.”
“What d’you mean?”
“If I could see one of the jewels that have disappeared in the last few years down in those cellars, I’d have the local constabulary up in full force—all two of them—and arrest Edwin Carson on the spot.”
“A nice finish to our weekend party.”
“Well, what about it? To-night, after you’re all safely tucked up in bed—you can meet me in the hall and we’ll have a shot at seeing just what the old boy has down there.”
“Do you know how to get down?”
“Haven’t the foggiest. Which makes it all the more interesting.”
“Of course.”
“I shall wear my chamois gloves,” said Freddie. “Like they do on the films.”
“Splendid. Two o’clock, say, if the coast’s clear.”
“Two o’clock. In the hall.”
“Righto.”
“Remember that time we staged a cabaret in ‘D’ dormitory?”
“Yes. This won’t be quite so dangerous. Two a.m., then.”
“We’ll be there…”
And Edwin Carson, who had gone down to the cool of his cellars and lit a cigarette and thought of his afternoon (and why not his evening, for that matter) with Raoul, and phoned Burroughs to get the car ready, and—just for idle curiosity—had pulled back the switch marked “Garage” and put on the padded earphones, and sworn as he listened… Edwin Carson flicked back the switch into its socket and jabbed the stump of his cigarette viciously on the edge of the desk until the glow left the ash.
Then he rose from his chair and congratulated himself doubly. Congratulated himself on having made Burroughs install this admirable system of microphones all over the house. Congratulated himself even more on having himself installed a microphone in the garage where his trusted chauffeur worked. A precaution which, it seemed, had been well worth the trouble.
He crossed the stone floor of the cellar and closed the doors of the lift behind him. And now… Raoul.
XIV
Edwin Carson gave his arm to Raoul, and settled her comfortably in the seat beside his own, and tucked the cushion in at her back, and patted a rug of thick fur around her two very shapely legs. It gave him rather a thrill as his fingers touched the smooth silk of her stockings, and he took a great deal longer than was necessary to arrange the rug. Then he asked, three times: “Now, you’re sure you’re comfortable, my dear?” and when he was satisfied on this point he gave a final pat to the folds of the rug, and closed the door carefully, and scampered round the car’s bonnet and into his own seat. He noted with a grunt of pleasure that Raoul’s arm brushed against his own as he reached for the self-starter; for he had been just a little afraid that in a big car such as this there would be an unpleasant space between them. But no… the persons who had had the designing of the car to do had planned their spacing perfectly. A pleasant proximity, with no crushing or pressing, but with great possibilities. After a few miles or so, it was only a matter of reaching his left arm along the top of the front seat, and he would have the exquisite Raoul in his arms. No doubt at all, he felt, that this was going to be a wholly delightful outing.
The car swung over the nose of the hill and down into Adderly and through the twistings of Adderly’s street. And the few villagers who were about at the time (very few indeed, for taking forty or so winks with a handkerchief over one’s face was an almost universal custom in Adderly’s afternoons) blinked at the immaculate blue saloon as it passed them, and decided that that was that there Carson bloke from the big house or (if not) then they were Dutchmen, and hurried in to their various homes to waken their various relatives and tell them the news. And, said the few who saw, not half a bad-looking bit of stuff sitting in front with the old geyser, and no mistake. (Meaning, of course, when they said that, a very good-looking bit of stuff and no mistake.) And the car left Adderly behind it, having so rudely upset its siesta, and accelerated itself as the roads grew wider and the surface of them grew less erratic. The man in the driving-seat turned to the lady beside him, and asked for what was now either the ninth or tenth time if she was sure she was comfortable. He showed her how to press the silver-plated contraption at her elbow to make it present a very expensive specimen of Turkish cigarette. Or, he explained, an equally expensive Virginian if she pressed the little switch this way instead of that. He slowed the car down, and lit a match for the Turkish specimen which she chose, and left the steering-wheel to manage as best it could by itself while he held the match close to her face. And now would she like the roof open? She would. Then there we are… and the sun poured into the car, and the breeze swept over the windscreen and down into their faces, and Raoul took off her absurd half-hat and allowed the wind to play havoc with her hair. Now was she sure that wasn’t too much of a draught for her? For she had only to say the word, and he would close the roof again. But no, it was not too much of a draught. Unless, of course, he himself would like it shut. “Not at all, my dear Raoul,” said Edwin Carson. “Not at all. Just whatever you say, my dear. To-day, my dear, it is your wish—not mine.” And Edwin Carson took his hand once more from the steering-wheel, and gave a series of little pats to Raoul’s gloved hands, and Raoul, when the patting was finished, slid her hands under the rug and kept them there. And in this delightful atmosphere the needle of the car’s speedometer hovered around the figure sixty, and (with one or two unavoidable lapses when cattle loomed large on the roadway) remained there or thereabouts for nearly two hours.
At the end of that time the car had the very good sense to run out of petrol just opposite those red and yellow and blue and green pumps which are the only drawback to that other-wise excellent establishment, the Haversack Inn at Higher Yelmer. The Haversack Inn (which was the Fisherman’s Arms before all this epidemic of khaki shorts and Zipp-fastened shirts and studded boots broke out) is run by one Samuel Fish and his wife Martha. And a very good job they make of the running of it. They will receive their “reggellers” (as Mr. Fish terms those who have been more than once to the Haversack)
as old friends, and they will receive their first-timers with a pleasant insinuation that in next to no time (or, at any rate, before the end of the month) they too will be “reggellers”. And they set you down in a spotlessly clean parlour, and before you have had time to examine the oleograph of Queen Victoria or the sampler which hangs underneath it (reading “ABCDEFGH Blessed are the Pure in Heart for they shall see God IJKLMNOPQ”) Mrs. Fish’s face will appear round the door and suggest that if you will be so good as to step along to the back-parlour, there’s as nice a tea as ever you saw all laid out and waiting. And that if there’s anything else you fancy, just give the bell a push and they will see what they can do. Within the last few years, since the words “Fisherman’s Arms” were painted out of the sign over the front door and “Haversack Inn” substituted, and the salmon at the bottom of the sign transformed into a rucksack, the inn has altered a little in character. The petrol pumps, perhaps, were the beginning of it; and there is more grape-fruit than porridge eaten at breakfast now; and the number of couples bearing the name of either Smith or Jones who have signed the visitors’ book is quite remarkable. But you can still get an admirable tea of freshly-caught trout and home-made bread and scones and cake and jam for the sum of one shilling and sixpence. Which was only one of the reasons why Edwin Carson did not fill up the tank of his car and proceed on his way.
Instead of doing which, he led Raoul from the car through the Haversack’s front door, and was met by Samuel (with Martha hovering in the background, the taps of her shining gas stove turned on in readiness for the order) and slipped Raoul’s coat from her shoulders and followed Samuel into the front-parlour. And ordered two gin-and-gingers immediately and two of Mrs. Fish’s special omelettes in, say, half an hour. And Mr. Fish nodded his head vigorously, and rubbed his hands over each other, and disappeared backwards from the parlour, remarking how nice it was to see Mr. Carson again after all these years and that there was Punch and the Sporting and Dramatic on the sofa, and that if Mr. Carson or the young lady wanted anything else they had only to ring the bell. Over there, sir, to the left of the mantelpiece. And with a final nod and a last rub, Mr. Fish’s head vanished round the edge of the door, and he scuttled off to the kitchen and said to his wife: “It’s that stingy old twister, Carson, with a furren-looking kind of a wench. Omelettes, they want. In arfanour.” And Mrs. Fish, who had already started on the usual tea of eggs and bacon, said “Hell!” and turned off her gas jets.
When the gin-and-gingers arrived, Edwin Carson lifted his glass and said: “To you, my dear.”
“You’re very kind to me, Mr. Carson,” said Raoul. “Why do you… how is it that you put it?… leave all the other ones and pay so much attention to me, eh?”
“Because you’re different from the others, my dear.” (Things, thought Edwin Carson, were panning out excellently.) “Very different. They’re all… ordinary. Terribly ordinary, compared with you. And you’re alone here… you don’t know people, you don’t understand our English ways—they’re very difficult things to understand… you need someone to look after you, Raoul.”
“You think so?”
“I’m sure of it.”
“Always I have looked after myself. And very well, too.”
Edwin Carson sipped his drink and stared at her.
“Never been in love, Raoul?”
“What do you call being in love, eh? I dare not say that I have been so… in England it may mean something so different from in other countries. You understand?”
“But… you’ve had affairs? Love affairs, I mean? Flirtations?…”
“I am on the stage. Silly boys, they come and give me flowers and rides in their big motorcars and give me great big dinners and good wines. Because, I suppose, I am on the stage.”
“Just the sort of things I’m doing to you, eh?”
“No… you are different.”
Edwin Carson edged a little farther along the sofa. He took Raoul’s empty glass from her hand, and then took her empty hand in his. He was different, was he? Splendid, perfectly splendid…
“How am I different, Raoul?” he asked.
“You? You are old.”
Not so perfectly splendid.
“Too old?” he asked her again.
“No, no, no… just—just old. The others, they are too young. You understand?”
“Raoul, I’ve got a plan. For to-night.”
“Yes?”
“After we’ve had tea here, we’ll motor into town… let’s see, we could be in by seven or thereabouts… dinner somewhere, and then a show. And then back here… my friend, the innkeeper, will have a supper ready for us. Suppers are his speciality.”
“But me—I am supposed to be… indisposed, that is the word they call it, yes? I must not be seen in London.”
“We can go to the show late and come out early. You won’t be recognized.”
“But your guests? What will they think?”
“I will telephone them and tell them what to think.”
“But—”
“But, my dear, is such a silly little word.”
“I suppose it is.”
Splendid again.
He crossed to the door of the parlour, and went out to the hall and closeted himself in the office where Mrs. Fish wrote out her bills and Mr. Fish kept his keys and where a rather ancient type of telephone jutted from the wall. He asked for “Adderly 7” and strummed with the tips of his fingers on Mr. Fish’s desk as he waited for the reply.
When the phone rang in the lounge of Thrackley, Jim Henderson was on the point of lifting a cigarette from the table on which the telephone stood. He lifted instead the receiver and said “Hullo.” Yes, this was Thrackley. Henderson speaking. Oh, it was you, was it, you old crook? What was that? A tragedy? Raoul had unfortunately met her manager in London… he had taken her into town for a drive… and the poor girl had to appear at the evening performance of Soft Sugar. Really? So, of course, Mr. Carson had had to offer to stay in town until the end of the performance, and drive Raoul back to Thrackley. What else, after all, could he do? A confounded nuisance, though, and would Mr. Henderson be so very good as to convey his apologies to the other members of the house-party? Really very annoying to have to leave them on their own for so long, but there it was, and what could he do? Exactly, said Jim. He could do nothing, said Jim. And, added Jim, Soft Sugar, from all accounts, was a damned good show. So he would try and be back in Thrackley as soon as ever he could, and they must all try to amuse themselves as best they could. And would he tell Mary of this unfortunate happening? Then she would be able to give all the directions for dinner, and so on. Thank you very much indeed. It really was most lamentable, and Raoul, poor girl, was most distressed at having to play in the show. But there, these managers. Quite, said Jim. Expect you both back about one o’clock, then? Right… good-bye.
“The dirty old devil,” said Jim as he replaced the receiver.
“I beg your pardon?” said Freddie Usher.
“That was Carson. He took Raoul up to town for a run, and they’ve bumped into her manager or someone, and her indisposition has had to have a hasty cure and she’s got to play in the show to-night.”
“Good. We’ll go up and see it.”
“We’ll do no such thing. This is the chance of a lifetime. We’ll have the whole night—until about one in the morning, at any rate—-to look into old man Carson’s affairs. No need to wait until two a.m. now.”
“Of course. I was forgetting that.”
“You would. I’m going to find comrade Hempson and tell him the glad tidings.”
And between five and six hours later, in the back-parlour of the Haversack Inn at Higher Yelmer, Mr. Edwin Carson held Raoul very tightly in his arms, and his thin, bloodless lips pressed down on Raoul’s dark painted lips, and his hands gripped at Raoul’s dress until it was crumpled and stained. And then Ra
oul pushed her body away from this man, who had suddenly become a great deal older and uglier and more repellent than ever she had noticed him to be before, and she stared at him for an instant, and then said: “We will go back to your home, please, at once, you understand?” And a very sulky Mr. Carson pressed the self-starter of a very sulky car, and Mr. Samuel Fish and his wife, Martha, were left with a supper of cold salmon and salad and pineapple fritters and a magnum of champagne standing untouched on the table of their back-parlour, and ended their day by eating and drinking the lot of it themselves. And the car hummed along the trafficless roads, and neither of the two people in the front seat spoke as it hummed. They were within a mile of the village of Adderly when three men met in the hall of Thrackley and set out (with socks over their slippers and electric torches in their hands) on a little expedition. The expedition was progressing very favourably when Mr. Edwin Carson, still swearing inwardly, pressed his foot on the accelerator as he reached the summit of the hill which dipped down to Thrackley.
XV
Jacobson, slightly drunk, was sitting on his bed, clad in a pair of unnecessarily thick flannel pyjamas and reading the sporting page of the Daily Observer when Burroughs opened the door of his bedroom.
“What the hell d’you want at this time of night?” asked Jacobson.
“Have you got the spare bunch of keys, Jacobson? I’ve left my watch in the garage.”
“Why not go on leaving it there?”
“And rely on you waking me up in the morning? No fear. Anyway, I’ll have to open up the garage for the boss coming home.”
“He won’t be home to-night,” said Jacobson, launching an attack on his toe-nails with a large pair of scissors.
“Why not? He phoned, didn’t he? Said he’d be back about one o’clock.”
“When you’ve known Carson as long as I have,” said Jacobson, “you’ll know that if he goes out with a bird he don’t come back the same night. It’s an old Carson custom. Got a pair of sharp scissors on you? These is as blunt as hell.”
Weekend at Thrackley Page 11
