Touch and Go

by Patricia Wentworth

  Mr. Darnac was not amused. With his arm about her shoulders, he shook her a little and said in an annoyed tone,

  “It seems that I amuse you.”

  “Very much,” said Lucilla, and kissed his cheek again.

  He let his arm fall and moved away along the trunk.

  “You are laughing at me!”

  “Yes, darling.”

  “Why do you laugh at me?”

  “Because you are very, very funny, Ran.”

  “And why am I funny?” Offence stared at her out of his dark eyes.

  “Funny—and nice.”

  “You laugh at me—you mock yourself of me! Perhaps all the time you have been laughing at me—you have been mocking yourself of me! Is that it?”

  Lucilla tilted her head sideways. Her lips still smiled. Her eyes were blue and wary. She said with a bubble of laughter in her voice,

  “Perhaps.”

  “All this time you have been laughing at me—you have been playing a scene of the theatre!”

  “Perhaps I have.”

  He sprang up, his face convulsed with anger and pain.

  “Mon dieu, Lucilla! And you dare to tell me that!”

  The blue eyes gazed at him innocently.

  “How cross you are.”

  “Cross? It is to tear the heart! You throw back my love, my faith!” His voice choked on the words. “And you say I am cross! It is all a trick then—that you love me—that you are afraid—that you are in danger! There is nothing true about it from the beginning to the end! Is that what you would tell me? Perhaps it is a trick that you play on us at Holme Fallow that you pretend to fall—and a trick with your bicycle when you ride down the hill? Answer me, then! Were these things a trick?”

  Lucilla continued to gaze at him. The wariness had gone. Her look was one of admiration tinged with awe.

  The young man’s voice became thunderous.

  “Answer me, Lucilla!

  Lucilla got up. She drooped a little. She said in a bashful voice,

  “Do you know where the screws were, Ran?”

  Mr. Darnac started. He had been about to declaim some fine rolling reproaches. Her question checked them. He found himself saying instead,

  “The screws of your bicycle?”

  Lucilla gave a little schoolgirl nod.

  “Yes, Ran. Do you know where they were?”

  “I? How should I know? Do you think it was I who took them out?”

  She looked down at the emerald moss. She said,

  “Oh, no, Ran.” Then, after a little pause, “They were in my pocket. Sarah found them there.”

  CHAPTER XXV

  John Brown had finished the portrait of his dragon-fly. While he put the final touches to it he talked pleasantly to Sarah on the unemotional topic of protective colouring in insects and birds. Having kissed her hand and informed her that he loved her—very much—he had resumed his painting.

  Sarah found her rather agitated declaration of indifference falling a little flat. While she explained with more heat than she intended that she hadn’t ever been in love, wasn’t in love, and never meant to be in love, Mr. Brown was mixing his colours and did not appear to be very much interested in what she was saying. This goaded her into an amplification of her remarks, and if by the time she had finished he had not gathered that if she ever did fall in love it would not be with him, it certainly was not Sarah’s fault. She derived a good deal of angry pleasure from making herself perfectly clear on this point.

  John Brown preserved an amiable silence until she had finished. Then he turned his head, smiled into her eyes as if she had just been saying something very delightful, and inquired in his pleasant voice whether she had ever seen a stick-insect.

  “They pretend to be sticks. There are some very large ones in Brazil. Protective colouring, you know. You wouldn’t believe they were not just dry twigs. I can show you some drawings if you’re interested. There’s no end to the things that creatures will pretend. It’s a very interesting subject. Of course you get wise to it, and then it doesn’t take you in—much.” There was an amused flicker in his eyes as he went back to his drawing.

  All at once Sarah said abruptly,

  “We’re going to town on Tuesday—but you know that.”

  John Brown nodded. He was washing his brushes preparatory to putting them away.

  “Yes, I know. I don’t want you to go, Sarah.”

  His tone was too serious to be taken personally. She frowned and said,

  “I don’t see how you can help it.”

  “Nor do I. But I don’t want you to go.”

  “Why not?”

  He closed his paint-box and slipped it into the old brown satchel. He said,

  “Too many chances, Sarah.”

  “You mean—for Lucilla?”

  “Yes.”

  “But I shall be there—I shall be with her all the time. What could happen?”

  He was shutting his sketching-book now. He held the page to the light to see if it was dry. The dragonfly gleamed like a jewel in the sun. Then the board came down on it and the satchel covered all.

  “What could happen?” said Sarah impatiently.

  She had felt when he spoke as if a single drop of very cold water was trickling down her spine, and it irked her. She had an intense longing to get out of this place, to be in London, to get away, to be in brightly lighted restaurants, theatres, shops, to spend money, to be surrounded by people, to have no time to think. That was it—here in Holme there was a great deal too much time to think.

  She repeated, with that irked sound in her voice,

  “What could possibly happen?”

  John Brown answered her very seriously,

  “I don’t know, Sarah—any one of a number of things.”

  “Well, we’re going anyhow. Mr. Hildred has arranged it all. It will be very good for Lucilla—she’s getting morbid here.”

  He nodded.

  “I suppose you’re staying at Millington’s?”

  “Yes. Did Mr. Hildred tell you?”

  “No—but they always do.”

  “How do you know?” said Sarah quickly.

  She thought his colour rose a little, but he laughed.

  “I know quite a lot of things. That’s one of them. Now look here, Sarah, I want you to promise me that you’ll stick to Lucilla like glue. Don’t leave her alone for a moment. Don’t let her stir a yard by herself. Either you or I have got to be there all the time. I’d like you to share a room with her. I think you might stick out about that—tell Geoffrey it looks better—something of that sort. But I don’t think there’s any real risk at night.” He looked away from her, frowning deeply. “It’s the day we’ve got to be careful about—the hundred and one chances of something that would look like an accident. You see what I mean? Don’t cross a road till the policeman stops the traffic—that’s the sort of thing. Do you know, I’ve wondered sometimes how many road accidents really weren’t accidents at all. It’s rather a horrifying thought.”

  A second drop seemed to be trickling down her spine after the first. She shivered and said vaguely,

  “Oh—accidents—” Then she put up her hand and yawned. “My dear John, I can’t spend the rest of my life clamping on to Lucilla like a dog with a bone.”

  John Brown laughed.

  “You won’t have to. If you can stick it out till the end of the week, we’ll be all right. If we can keep Lucilla safe to the end of the week, she’ll be safe for good and all. But whatever is due to happen will be comfortably dressed up as an accident—of that I’m quite sure—so we’ve not got to take any risks that way.”

  Sarah had turned rather pale.

  “Why will Lucilla be all right at the end of the week?”

  John Brown seemed to hesitate. He may have been considering what to say, he may have been regretting that he had said so much. He looked past Sarah up the hill and saw Lucilla coming across the fields on the far side of the orchard. There was a trace of reli
ef in his voice as he said,

  “There’s Lucilla. I’ll tell you some other time.”

  He stood up and waved, and Lucilla waved back at him. Then she began to run towards them down the hill, coming up with bright blown hair and a changing colour, to drop on the grass between them.

  She leaned her elbows on the grass and said in a little mournful voice,

  “I’ve quarrelled with Ran.”

  “Why on earth?”

  “Oh, just because—Don’t you ever quarrel with people, angel darling? It’s a frightfully good way of getting to know them, really.” She sat up and began to speak with more animation. “You see, when they boil over, all the nice company manners go and the real things come bubbling up all hot and hot. Ran boiled like anything. I came away because he’d got to the point where English wasn’t any good to him, and I didn’t know what sort of French words he was saying. I expect some of them weren’t a bit proper, and I didn’t think Aunt Marina would like me to go on listening to them, so I came away.”

  “Why did you quarrel?” said Sarah again.

  Lucilla sighed.

  “We were having a lovely time before it began. Do you know what he said about my eyes?”

  “No—and I don’t want to.”

  Lucilla threw a saintly look upwards.

  “Governesses always are jealous,” she murmured. Then, with a sudden twist of her slim length, she faced John Brown. “I shall tell my Noble Preserver. He said the most thrilling things. Don’t take any notice of Sarah—she’s just a govvy. If I could make a face with the back of my head, I’d be making one at her.”

  John Brown laughed.

  “Come along then—what did he say?”

  Lucilla gazed up at him, but her expression had changed. It was obvious that her attention had wandered from Mr. Darnac’s pretty speeches. She frowned a little, and said in a confidential voice,

  “I partly quarrelled with Ran because he said you were Uncle Maurice. It would be lovely if you were.”

  “Would it?”

  “Lovely. Are you?”

  John Brown laughed.

  “Why should anyone think I was?”

  Beyond Lucilla he saw Sarah looking at him. Her expression puzzled him. It distracted his attention for a moment. Then he heard Lucilla say,

  “Ran thinks you’re like us—all of us—even Aunt Marina.” She giggled. “Talk about compliments—there’s one for you!”

  “Am I like Ricky? Have a heart, Lucilla!”

  She sat right up, shook back her hair, and stared at him. It was the solemn, unwinking stare of a very young child.

  Sarah moved so that she could see them both. She had a feeling that something might be going to happen, she didn’t know what. She watched them both—Lucilla with that solemn stare, and John Brown sitting carelessly with the old brown satchel across his knees and that air of being quietly amused.

  Lucilla spoke at last.

  “You’re not like Ricky—but I know what Ran means. There’s a sort of a kind of a family look, the sort you can’t pin down. When you look for it, it isn’t there, and when you’re not thinking about it, it gets up and hits you in the eye. Are you Uncle Maurice?”

  He shook his head very slightly and answered as he had answered Sarah.

  “No, Lucilla. Maurice is dead.”

  Lucilla sighed.

  “What a pity—it would be so romantic. You see—” she drew up her heels and hugged her knees—“you see, Ran’s got it all mapped out. You’re Maurice, and you’ve come here on purpose to get Holme Fallow out of my clutches. Well, the only way you can do that is by making me have a fatal accident, so that’s why my bicycle ran away with me and I nearly took a header over the balustrade when we were playing Devil-in-the-dark. Ran’s got the mos’ melodramatic mind. I’m sure he ought to be writing scenarios for Holywood instead of learning to be an avocat.”

  Sarah’s eyes were sparkling.

  “Lucilla, you really ought not to talk such nonsense.”

  Lucilla looked innocent.

  “It’s not my nonsense, but Ran’s. And I quarrelled with him—I told you I did. I’m afraid you weren’t attending, darling. I told you the very first thing of all that I’d quarrelled with Ran. Only I didn’t tell you why, but it was really because of him saying that Mr. Brown was a Secret Assassin, and my saying that he was my Noble Preserver. And then he got into a fresh rage, and I came away all calm and dignified with my nose in the air.”

  “Darnac’s an ass,” said John Brown.

  Lucilla nodded.

  “That’s what I told him. I said, ‘I don’t suppose you can help it any more than red hair or a squint, but you needn’t be a silly ass.’ But it didn’t seem to soothe him at all.”

  Sarah got the curious impression that all this was according to plan. It was more than an impression, it was a conviction. Lucilla had not just strayed here by chance. She had come here of set purpose because there was something she wanted to say. All this nonsense was her way of getting it said.

  John Brown had made some laughing reply. Lucilla did not laugh. It struck Sarah suddenly that she was very pale. She said,

  “Ran went right off the deep end when I told him about the screws.”

  Sarah knew what was coming now, but John Brown did not.

  “Don’t, Lucilla!” said Sarah quickly, but all she got was a mournful shake of the head.

  “Must. Can’t have people saying that the Noble Preserver is a Secret Assassin.”

  “Lucilla, what on earth are you talking about?” said John Brown.

  “Hasn’t Sarah told you where she found the screws? I thought she told you everything. You know—the screws that came out of my bicycle. She found them in the pocket of my cardigan when we were dressing for dinner. Didn’t you, darling?”

  John Brown looked quickly at Sarah, and as quickly away again. He too found Lucilla pale—dreadfully pale. She essayed an impudent laugh.

  “I put it across you all pretty well, didn’t I? You were all scared stiff, weren’t you? There wasn’t any danger really. I could ride that old hill in my sleep.”

  “I see,” said John Brown—” it was a trick.”

  Lucilla nodded.

  “And the fall from the balustrade—was that a trick too?”

  Lucilla nodded again.

  “Perhaps you’ll tell us how you managed it, or rather how you would have managed it if I hadn’t caught you.”

  She jerked up her chin and looked at him defiantly.

  “I knew you were there. I screamed first and then tipped over. I was going to hang by my knees until someone caught me. It was just a trick. It’s quite easy if you know how.”

  “I see—” said John Brown gravely.

  Sarah was looking at Lucilla’s hands. They were still locked about her knees. They were locked as if the world and all hung on their grip. The knuckles were as white as bone, the fingers straining. What effort was she making, and at what cost? Why?

  At John Brown’s quietly spoken words the grip relaxed. It seemed as if the effort had spent itself.

  “I frightened you all—didn’t I?” said Lucilla.

  “Very much.”

  There was a silence. A sunny stillness with a weight upon it. Lucilla broke it with an exclamation.

  “Oh! Just then you did look like someone—you really did!”

  “Who did I look like?” said John Brown.

  Lucilla unlocked her hands in an excited gesture.

  “You looked like my Eleanor grandmamma in the picture at Holme Fallow! You saw it there—in the dining-room, opposite the door as you come in. And that’s a compliment if you like, because she’s frightfully lovely. She must be of course, because she’s like me.” She paused, staring hard, and then went on again. “She was Maurice’s mother. Are you sure you’re not Maurice?”

  John Brown tossed the old brown satchel on to the grass and got up.

  “Quite sure,” he said in a tone of finality.

  CHAPTER XXVI<
br />
  Sarah felt as if it had been rather a long day. The nasal singing of the village choir and the sermon on kindness appeared to be quite incredibly removed from the moment when they all said good night and went upstairs. There had been Sunday tea. There had been Sunday supper. Aunt Marina had talked about the family. Uncle Geoffrey had talked about porcelain.

  As a matter of fact Uncle Geoffrey had been quite interesting. He had opened the cabinets at the end of the drawing-room and shown her a number of very beautiful things, all of which were Lucilla’s property. There was a mandarin’s supper set in four tiers, each tier a different colour—egg-shell blue, egg-shell green, rose-pink, and primrose-yellow—each with its own tracery of pæony and pomegranate. On one side of the lid a single wary grasshopper stared at them across four hundred years. There was a collection of snuff-bottles—rose quartz, with a green jade frog for a stopper; lapis, with a blood-red fruit; mutton-fat jade; deep red lacquer. There were about a hundred of them, and every one a very perfect work of art—amber, crystal, onyx, malachite, in the shape of fruit or gourd, the stopper delicately fashioned in a contrasting colour. An eighteenth-century Hildred had brought them back from China.

  “Lucilla doesn’t care for them,” said Geoffrey Hildred regretfully. “But I hope she will some day.”

  Lucilla did not look up from her book.

  She followed Sarah into her room when they went upstairs, and Sarah turned on her.

  “Now look here, Lucilla, you’re not going to stay here and talk. You can sleep in whichever room you like, but you must just pack along and undress.”

  “How harsh you are,” said Lucilla plaintively.

  “I feel harsh. Go and undress! This day has lasted about a century and a half already.”

  Lucilla giggled.

  “Aren’t you funny? Such a nice day too—no nasty rough accidents and things. And I’m sure I’ve been a Perfect Pattern of Piety. Ungrateful—that’s what I call you, Sarah Trent.”

  “Lucilla, will you go to bed!”

  “Presently, darling. I’ve got something awfully important to say to you. You don’t want me to go to bed without saying it?”