Hotel Stardust

by Susan Barrie

  Her daughter, Ann, was a pale, rather frightened sprite of a girl. She wandered about with a lost look on her face, and was only alert in the presence of her mother, who plainly regarded her with a good deal of impatience. She had none of her mother's striking good looks, although Eve thought her rather pathetically attractive, and was a little surprised that Laurence Pope was so little interested in her. Tall, dark, and plainly very studious, Laurence went bathing alone down in the sheltered cove, and went for long walks without inviting anyone to accompany him.

  Dr. Craig was a cheerful, retired general practitioner. He and Aunt Kate seemed to get on extraordinarily well from the moment that she first offered to provide him with a blanket to cover the unblushing violence of his pyjamas; and as he had quite a sound knowledge of horticulture, she listened to his advice on the laying out of the gardens — as soon as money could be spent on them — and on various other aspects of hotel running which had not occurred to her. He was a practical little man, a bit of a sybarite, like herself (when she was able to indulge herself in her Surrey cottage), a bachelor, and Sarah took quite kindly to his ankles, and allowed him to take her for long walks over the cliffs — to get her fat down, as he said. She was far, far too fat.

  Eve, in those busy days when they were doing their best to make their first guests comfortable, had little time to spare for reflection, or even to feel interest in these people who had come so suddenly and violently into her life, and were apparently well content to settle down at Treloan, for the time being at least. Martin Pope she certainly regarded with feelings of gratitude, for she was sure he had been largely instrumental in persuading his friends to stay. And he had a charming, kindly way with him which enabled her to like him very easily. He was not in the least difficult to please, either, and yet she had little doubt that he was something of a connoisseur where food and service were concerned. He was obviously rich enough — and on his own confession! — to have stayed in some of the best hotels in England and abroad, and it was unlikely that, having paid for the best, he would have been willing to accept anything less than what he expected. Therefore the standard of Treloan, simple though it was, must meet with his approval, and his enthusiasm for the house and its situation grew daily.

  Chris Carpenter toiled in the kitchen, and racked her brains to provide appetizing meals. She spent all her spare time, and that was little enough, browsing over a cookery- book, and Eve helped her whenever possible, in addition to ordering supplies, laying tables in the dining-room, checking bed-linen, rearranging flowers, and keeping an account of their expenditure. At first she had been unwilling to discuss the subject of a fixed weekly tariff for her guests, but Martin Pope had settled this question for her, very generously, and it would be a less difficult problem to cope with in the future, when fresh guests arrived.

  Martin Pope was quite certain she would have plenty of guests as time went on and Treloan Manor became known. He himself had plenty of friends whom he said he would go out of his way to persuade to stay there, and discreet advertising would do the rest. A little patience in the beginning, no attempt to run before they could walk, and the rewards would be swift and sure.

  “You don’t realize what an asset you have in the house itself,” he said, more than once. “It's so peaceful and tucked-away, and mellow and gracious. And even more than that, it’s beautifully appointed. I don’t wonder that neighbor of yours wanted to buy it,” for she had let him into the secret of Roger Merlin’s covetousness, “but don’t you ever let him have it! Your uncle left it to you, and you stick to it!”

  “I will if I can make it pay,” she promised.

  “Oh, you’ll make it pay all right!”

  His eyes rested upon her, with a warm, encouraging light in them, and she felt that if he had belief in her she could have belief in herself. She would make it pay!

  The weather, after that stormy night, became absolutely perfect, and the days as they drifted by were mellow and golden. The garden became a sea of blossom, and the scent of it invaded the house. The nights were full of that soft, silken warmth which is so typical of the West Country in spring, and the stars and a young moon looked down upon the restless, slowly surging sea.

  Every evening after dinner, while Aunt Kate retired to their little sitting-room and got to work upon a hundred and one little odd jobs, and Chris Carpenter went upstairs to her room and flung herself full length upon her bed while her wireless-set played dance music, Eve, as the actual hostess of Treloan, went out into the serenity of the night with Martin Pope — sometimes also accompanied by his son — and walked with him along the cliff path to the cliff top, and they stood together and looked down upon that silver-colored immensity.

  Mrs. Neville Wilmott, once she made up her mind to forsake her own room, preferred the quiet dignity of the drawing-room, and Dr. Craig laid out endless patience cards in front of the small log fire which always smouldered there after tea.

  Only Ann Wilmott seemed alone in the truest sense of the word, and unable to concentrate her mind on anything that would offer her diversion. Her mother urged her to play the piano or to do her knitting, or to read or something; but Ann seemed to prefer sitting silently and staring into space — unless Laurence Pope entered the room, when she sat and stared at him instead. But Laurence was so self- contained and grave, and addicted to burying himself in the heaviest-looking tomes, that Eve was afraid his interest in the opposite sex would be hard to arouse. And certainly it did not look as if Ann would ever arouse it.

  But life flowed along very pleasantly for Eve, alt

  “I don't know. I don't think so. Unless ... ” He p

  But courage came to her before Aunt Kate returned

  But life flowed along very pleasantly for Eve, although she was actually very tired by the time she went to bed, and Chris and Aunt Kate were certainly tired as well. But no one complained. They were living in Treloan, and the summer was just around the corner, and they had actually received some further bookings as a result of the campaign of advertising which they had started.

  And the night of the Grand Opening Dance at the Stark Point Hotel drew near.

  CHAPTER NINE

  EVE had seen nothing of Roger Merlin since that night when he had assisted the local lifeboat men to bring Martin Pope and his friends ashore from their yacht. Even when she had visited The Smuggler in Treloan, where she bought vegetables from Tom Geake, she had not run up against him, and as he and Tom seemed to have a great deal in common this surprised her a little. But she supposed he was caught up in all the preparations for a really busy season.

  Martin Pope had collected his car from Falmouth, and in it Eve was often driven on her shopping expeditions and on little jaunts about the Cornish countryside, with her most important guest. She regarded him as her most important, not only because he was probably far wealthier than any of the others, but because she was sure that it was his influence which had persuaded the others to stay. And one day when they were returning from visiting the bank in Truro, he suggested that they drive out to that other extreme tip of the bay on which was the Stark Point Hotel.

  It was close upon lunch-time when they entered the courtyard before the hotel, where already several expensive- looking cars were-parked. In the great glassed-in verandah which ran along the whole front of the hotel people were drinking aperitifs and looking out over brilliant green lawns and flower-beds to the sea. They had an unrivalled view, which even Treloan could not better, and when, after Martin had suggested that they stay for lunch, they went inside, Eve quickly recognized the fact that it would be a very long time indeed before Treloan could offer so much sumptuous and yet well-organized luxury to its guests as which began in the wide, grey-carpeted vestibule, and continued in a wave through public rooms and smaller, private that which they could enjoy at the Stark Point. Luxury offices and writing-rooms, right through the depth of the house to the model kitchens, and out into the lavishly cared-for gardens.

  An obviously experienced wai
ter bowed them to their table in the wide bow-window of the dining-room, and Eve’s morale received a further jolt at the sight of the table’s appointments. Spotless napery and sparkling silver and flowers in a shallow crystal bowl which had taken skilled hands to arrange — and out-of-season flowers at that! (Probably flown from the South of France!)

  “I think,” said Martin Pope, watching her with a faint smile in his eyes, “that what we need is something to drink. How about a dry sherry, followed by a bottle of wine? Waiter, bring me the wine list!”

  Eve looked across the table at him and smiled a little apologetically.

  “I was trying to imagine Treloan reaching this pitch of perfection,” she confessed, “and my imagination just wouldn’t stretch that far!”

  “Rubbish!” he rebuked her softly. “Remember, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and the Stark Point has been a flourishing concern for several years now. Your turn will come! ”

  “I hope so,” she said a trifle forlornly, and he gently pushed her glass of sherry closer to her hand.

  “Drink it up,” he ordered.

  During the course of the meal — and there was no doubt about it, the Stark Point had a good chef as well as so many other advantages

  — Eve was almost, afraid to lift her eyes from her plate in case they suddenly encountered another pair of eyes, as blue as the sparkling sea outside, watching her with a strong hint of mockery under level black brows.

  “What!” the eyes would say. “So you wanted to find out how we do things here at the Stark Point, did you? And now that you’ve found out, how do you feel about it?”

  But actually she need not have worried, because Roger Merlin did not appear in the dining-room while they were there, and as soon as they had had their coffee on the verandah they left. But before they left Martin announced his intention of buying tickets for the dance for all their party, including Aunt Kate and Chris Carpenter, and as soon as they got back to Treloan Eve broke the news to her relative.

  “Well, now, I think that’s really splendid!” Aunt Kate exclaimed. “A dance — and all of us going! We three, and our five guests! I hope I get a chance to exchange a few words with Commander Merlin.” ‘'Why?” Eve asked curiously.

  Aunt Kate smiled a little impishly.

  “Oh, just so that I can let him know that, although we're not yet at the top of the tree, we’ve really started to climb.” “I don’t think that will impress him at all,” Eve said sceptically. “And you haven’t yet seen the Stark Point!” “No, my dear,” Aunt Kate agreed, “but I shall see it quite soon now, and, believe me, it will not depress me in the slightest. My plans for Treloan are not the kind of plans to be damped by a display of ostentation. Treloan, I am sure, would not take kindly to being decked out like one of Brighton’s leading hotels, with all the amenities of Brighton. Oh, dear me, no!” And she smiled mysteriously.

  Eve could not help feeling a certain amount of admiration for her aunt rise up in her heart — she looked so smugly sure of herself — and she gave her one of her rare hugs.

  “Well, perhaps you’re right,” she admitted. “But even if we are going to be frightfully exclusive, we can still take a few lessons from more vulgar establishments, and I think we can learn a lot from the Stark Point. So don’t be too superior to absorb hints.”

  “I’ll try not to be,” Aunt Kate replied. “But they’ll have to, be the kind of hints I consider worthwhile.”

  The afternoon before the dance, Miss Barton made a hurried trip to Truro to buy a new dress for the occasion, and afterwards found time to get her hair attended to. It was not often that she paid a visit to a hairdresser’s, and when she returned, with a black chiffon evening-gown cut on the smartest lines, her greying hair had not only been shorn rather close to her head, in an up-to-date version of the shingle,

  but had been washed and set in attractive waves, as well as treated to a delicate, lavender-blue rinse which quite definitely became her.

  Eve at first could only look her astonishment, and then, when she saw the cobwebby hose Miss Barton had purchased to wear with the dress, and the little sequin- covered coat she planned to wear over it

  — no doubt because the neck-line was a little too low even for her sudden emancipation! — she realized that her aunt had obviously made up her mind that the hour had arrived when she must seek to impress. But whether Commander Merlin or the collection of guests gathered beneath Treloan's dignified roof, she could only guess.

  Eve herself had decided on the wearing of a leaf-green evening gown which had been bought for a rather special occasion only a short while before. It was filmy and high-waisted, with a Grecian line about it, and with her Titian hair and creamy skin it made her look like a dryad.

  Whilst Aunt Kate went shopping in Truro, Eve spent the afternoon on the beach with Martin Pope. Martin Pope did not bathe — she wondered whether, perhaps, this was against doctor's orders' — but Eve thoroughly enjoyed herself in the warm, sparkling water, and Martin reclined on the hard white sand, a pipe gripped between his teeth, and watched her disporting herself in her brief bathing-costume the color of an olive.

  Eve enjoyed that afternoon on the beach. Somehow, there was a curious dreamlike quality about, her these days. She was not yet completely accustomed to being her own mistress for one thing, and for another, it would be a very long while before she became completely accustomed to the loveliness of Treloan. Treloan in the early mornings, when the mist lay sleeping on the sea; Treloan in the golden afternoons, and the star-studded evenings. Treloan was a tiny niche she had found for herself, which she hoped she need never vacate. It was all she would ever want, or demand of life, she felt sure, if only she could keep it — if only the house, the gardens, her sheltered cove, her own little strip of blue sea, could be hers for always!

  It was surely not such a tremendous thing to ask of life, when the house had been left to her by her uncle!

  At tea-time she climbed back up to the house with Martin, and they had tea with the others, except Aunt Kate, who had not yet returned from Truro. Tea in the long, low drawing-room, where the shadows of late afternoon stole across the polished floor, and every vase was filled with flowers. Looking about her as she dispensed tea,

  Eve thought that the Stark Point Hotel, for all its magnificence, had none of this gracious, period calm, this dignified elegance which no guests could shatter. Treloan might in time become a well-known hotel, but it would still be Treloan — if they were careful to preserve the soul of the house! And it could still be enchanting to visitors, as it was enchanting to her — and had enchanted even Commander Merlin.

  Aunt Kate was right. Treloan had got something which the Stark Point had not. It was no use thinking about turning it into something which one day might resemble the Stark Point.

  It was, and always would be, Treloan. . . .

  She devoted a lot of time to her toilet that night, because she was for some reason excited by the thought of the evening ahead of her, and she wanted to dwell upon it while she added the final touches to her appearance.

  Not too much lipstick, and no color at all in her smooth, pale face, and only a very light dusting of powder. . .. She was already acquiring a coat of tan, as a result of her morning and afternoon bathes, and it suited her. She even had a few freckles, pale and golden, scattered across her shapely nose.

  Her hair she brushed vigorously until it shone, allowing it to wave softly back from her face and form soft curls behind her ears. With the green dress she wore a fine platinum chain about her rounded throat, and attached to the chain was a delicate ivory cameo. Her feet were encased in silver sandals so fragile that they appeared like the strands of a silver cobweb criss-crossing her instep.

  Aunt Kate came bustling into her room when she was dressed, and Aunt Kate, the complete transformation, was enough to take anyone's breath away. Eve gaped at her for a minute before she could believe that it really was Aunt Kate, and then she clapped her hands together delightedly.

 
“You look marvellous!” she told her. “Absolutely marvellous.”

  Aunt Kate did not appear impressed by the note of enthusiasm, but she put her head on one side and looked at her niece critically.

  “And you,” she said, “really do look a niece to be proud of!”

  “Thank you, Aunt,” demurely.

  “Don’t let that Merlin man offer you any of his snubs — if he deigns to speak to you at all, that is, which he probably won’t, surrounded by all the magnificence of his hotel and his multitude of guests! And remember that Martin Pope has more charm in his little finger than the Merlin man has in his whole arrogant body.”

  “Meaning, Aunt ... ?” Eve looked at her coolly.

  “Oh, nothing at all, darling, except that I like Martin, and I don’t like Commander Merlin.”

  “But have you forgotten that you said you were going to change your mind about him, because of his ‘distinctive’ bravery the other night? You were quite full of all that he had done, and even wanted me to bathe his eyes for him! ”

  “Which he wouldn't let you do, by the way! Such independence puts your teeth on edge! Give me a man like Dr. Craig, who can speak his mind without being rude, and is very much a man’s man while having a weak spot for anything feminine at the same time. A considerate man, too, and willing to do things for one; not stiffnecked and unfriendly, and full of his own importance, and ”

  “You do seem to have learned a lot about Dr. Craig in a very short time,” Eve observed, her eye roving again over the black chiffon evening-gown and the new hair-do. “Surely all this is not in aid of Dr. Craig?”

  “Don’t be so absurd!” her aunt returned shortly but with an excess of energy, and then turned quickly towards the door. “Come along, or we shall keep the others waiting.” Chris joined them in a grey velvet evening-gown which made her look most un-cook-like, and at the foot of the stairs, in the wide and gracious hall, Mrs. Neville Wilmott, her daughter Ann, Martin and Laurence Pope, and Dr. Craig were waiting.