Jane had a moment of panic. Renata’s shoes had fitted her too easily. She had felt secure, and then to have her security shattered by a trifle like this!
“A china shop?” she said meditatively; then, after a pause, “It’s awfully stupid of me—I’m afraid I’ve forgotten the name.”
Lady Heritage stared.
“A shop that you must have passed hundreds of times?”
“It’s very stupid of me.”
Lady Heritage smiled with a sudden brilliance. “Well, it is rather,” she said.
It was on the fourth day that Jane really caught her first glimpse of the black rocks.
She was writing in the library, dealing with an apparently endless stream of begging letters, requests for interviews, invitations to speak at meetings or to join committees.
In four days Jane had discovered that Lady Heritage was up to her eyes in a dozen movements relating to feminist activities, women’s labour, and social reform.
Newspapers, pamphlets, and reports littered a table which ran the whole length of the room. Jane was required to open all these as they came, and separate those which dealt with social reform and the innumerable scientific treatises and reviews. These latter arrived in every European language.
Jane sat writing. The day was clear and lovely, the air sun-warmed and yet fresh as if it had passed over snow. April has days like this, and they fill every healthy person with a longing to be out, to stop working, and take a holiday.
The windows of the library looked out upon the gravel terrace above the sea. The sun was on the blue water.
Jane put down her pen and looked at the hyacinths in the grey stone urns. They were blue too. A yellow butterfly played round them. She sat up and went to the window.
Lady Heritage and Mr. Ember were walking up and down the terrace, Lady Heritage bareheaded, all in white with not even a scarf, and Jeffrey Ember with a muffler round his neck, and the inevitable fur coat. They were coming towards her, and Jane stood back so that the curtains made a screen. She watched Raymond Heritage as she had watched the sea and the flowers, for sheer joy in her beauty.
Raymond’s face was towards her, and she was speaking.
Not a word reached Jane’s ears, but as she looked at those beautiful lips, their movements spelt words to her—words and sentences. She would have drawn back or looked away, but the first sentence that she read riveted her attention too closely.
“Are you satisfied about her, Jeffrey?”
Ember must have spoken, but his head was turned away. Then Raymond spoke again.
“Nor am I—not entirely. She seems intelligent and unintelligent by turns, unbelievably stupid in one direction and quick in another.” They passed level with the window, and so on to the end of the terrace. Jane went round the table to the other side of the window and waited for them to come back.
Ember’s face was towards her when they turned, too far away for her to see anything. But, as they came nearer, she saw that he was speaking. Not easy to read from, however, with those straight, thin lips that moved so little. There was only one word she was sure of—“overheard.”
It was too tantalising. If she had to wait until they reached the far end of the terrace and turned again, what might she not miss?
As the thought passed through her mind Lady Heritage stopped, walked slowly to the grey stone wall, and sat down on it, motioning to Ember to do the same.
Jane could see both faces now, and Raymond was saying, “If she overheard anything, would she have the intelligence to be dangerous?—that is what I ask myself.”
Ember’s lips just moved, but the movements made no sense.
“Perhaps you’re right,” said Lady Heritage; “despise not thine enemy.”
She changed her position, leaned forward, displaying a statuesque profile, and appeared to be speaking fast and earnestly. Then Jane saw her lips again, and they were saying, “Anything but Formula ‘A.’”
Jane gripped the curtain which she held until the gold galon which bordered it marked her hand with its acorn pattern.
“Formula ‘A’!” everything swam round her while she heard Renata’s gasping voice:
“He said ‘With Formula “A” you have the key. When Formula “B” is also complete, you will have the lock for that key to fit; then the treasures of the world are yours.’”
The mist cleared from her eyes; she looked again.
Raymond Heritage had risen to her feet. Ember and she looked out to sea for a moment, then crossed the gravel towards the house. They were talking of the sunshine and the spring air.
“My bulbs have done well,” Lady Heritage said.
They passed out of sight.
Two days later Jane, coming down the corridor to the library, was aware of voices in conversation. She opened the door and saw Jeffrey Ember with his back to her. He had pulled a deep leather chair close to the fire, and was bending forward to warm his hands. Lady Heritage stood a yard or two away. She had a large bunch of violets in one hand; with the other she leaned against the black marble mantel.
She and Ember were talking in German. Both glanced round, and Raymond asked:
“What is it?”
“The letters for the post,” said Jane.
They went on talking whilst she sorted and stamped the letters.
“Which of us is the better judge of character, it comes to that.” Speaking German, Lady Heritage’s deep voice sounded deeper than ever.
“Do we take different sides then?”
“I don’t know. I thought your verdict was inclined to be ‘Guilty, but recommended to mercy,’ whereas mine—” She hesitated—stopped rather—for there was no hesitation in her manner.
Ember made a gesture with the hand that held his cigarette.
“Expound.”
“I doubt the guilt. But if I did not doubt, I should have no mercy at all.”
Jane went out with the letters, and when she was in the corridor again she put out her hand and leaned against the wall. It would be horrible enough, she thought, to be tried in an open court upon some capital count, but how far less horrible than a secret judgment where whispered words made unknown charges, where the trial went on beneath the surface of one’s pleasant daily life, and every word, every look, a turn of the head, an unguarded sigh, a word too little, or a glance too much might tip the scale and send the balance swinging down to—what?
Next day Lady Heritage was deep in her correspondence, when she suddenly flashed into anger. Pushing back her chair, she got up and began to pace the room. There was a letter in her hand, and as she walked she tore it across and across, flung the fragments into the fire, and pushed a blazing log down upon them with her foot.
Jane and Ember watched her—the former with some surprise and a good deal of admiration, the latter with that odd something which her presence always called out. She swung round, met his eyes, and burst into speech.
“It’s Alington—to think that I ever called that man my friend! I wonder if there’s a single man on this earth who would translate professions of devotion to one woman, into bare decent justice to all women.”
“What has Lord Alington done?” asked Mr. Ember, with a slight drawl.
Jane, with a thrill, identified the President of the Board of Trade.
“Nothing that I might not have expected. It is only women that are different, Jeffrey. Men are all the same.”
“And still I don’t know what he has done,” said Jeffrey Ember.
“Oh, it’s a long story! I’ve been pressing for women inspectors in various directions. It seems inconceivable that any one should cavil at a woman inspector wherever women are employed. You have no idea of what some of the conditions are. Stewardesses, for instance; I’ve a letter there from a woman who has been working on one of the largest liners—not a tramp steamer, mind you, but one of the biggest liners afloat. All the passengers’ trays, all the cabin meals had to be carried up a perpendicular iron stair like a fire-escape—not a permanent
stair, you understand, but a ladder that is let up and down. Those wretched women had to go up and down it all day with heavy trays. They said they couldn’t do it, and were told they had to. And that’s a little thing compared to some of the other conditions. I want an inspector for them.”
“And Alington?”
Lady Heritage came to a halt by the long, piled-up table. She struck it with her open hand. “Lord Alington is just a man,” she said. “He stands for what men have always stood for, the sacred right of the vested interest. What man ever wants to alter anything? And why should he when the existing order gives him all he wants? It doesn’t matter where you turn, what you do, how hard you try, the vested interest blocks the way; you are up against the Established Order of what has always been. My God, how I’d like to smash it all, the whole thing, the whole smug sham which we call civilisation!”
Jane stared at her open-eyed. She had never dreamed that the statue could wake into such vivid life as this. The colour burned in Raymond’s cheeks, the sombre eyes were sombre still, but they held sparks as if from inward fire.
Ember touched the hand that was clenched at the table’s edge. A sort of tremor passed over her from head to foot. The colour died, the fire was gone. With a complete change of manner she said:
“Alington was hardly worth all that, was he?” Then without a change of key, but in German:
“Thank you, Jeffrey, the child’s eyes were nearly falling out of her head. It was stupid of me; I forgot. These things carry me away.”
The door opened on her last words, and Sir William came in. He was frowning, and appeared to be in a great hurry.
“Ridiculous business, ridiculous waste of time. These damned departments appear to think I’ve nothing to do with my time except to answer their infernal inquiries, and entertain any interfering jackanapes that they choose to let loose on me.”
“What is it Father?” said Lady Heritage—“Government inspection?”
“Nonsense,” said Sir William slowly. “Henry March wants to come down for the night.”
Jane bent forward over her papers. No one was looking at her, no one was thinking of her, but she had felt her cheeks grow hot, and was glad of an excuse to hide them.
She did not know whether she was very much afraid or very glad. A feeling unfamiliar but overwhelming seemed to shake her to the depths. She was quite unconscious of what was passing behind her.
At Henry’s name, Raymond Heritage uttered a sharp, “Oh no!” She came quickly forward as she spoke and caught the letter from Sir William’s hand.
“He can’t come—I can’t have him here—put him off, Father; you can make some excuse!”
“Nonsense!” said Sir William again. “It’s a nuisance, of course—it’s an infernal nuisance—but he’ll have to come, confound him!”
Then, as she made a half-articulate protest, he went on with increasing loss of temper:
“Good heavens! I can’t very well tell the man I won’t have him in what is practically his own house.”
It was Ember, not her father, who saw how fright-fully pale Raymond became. In a very low voice she said:
“No, I suppose not.”
Sir William was fidgeting. He looked at Jane’s back.
“Of course, he’s coming down on business.”
Then he broke off and stared at Jane again.
Lady Heritage nodded.
“Miss Molloy,” she said. “You can take half an hour off.”
Chapter Eight
Henry arrived on the following day and was shown straight into Sir William’s study.
Half an hour later Sir William rang the bell and sent for Lady Heritage. He hardly gave her time to shake hands before he burst out:
“I said you must be told. I take all responsibility for your being told. After all, if I am conducting these experiments, something is due to me, though the Government appear to think otherwise. But I take all responsibility; I insist on your being told.”
He sat at his littered table, and all the time that he was speaking his hands were lifting and shuffling the papers on it. At his elbow stood a tray with tantalus and glasses and a syphon. Only one glass had been used.
“What is it?” said Raymond.
Her eyes went from her father to Henry.
Sir William’s hand was shaking. Henry wore a look of grave concern.
“What is it?” she repeated.
“It’s Formula ‘A’”—Sir William’s voice was just a deep growl. “He comes here, and he tells me that Formula ‘A’ has been stolen. I’ve told him to his face, and I tell him again, that it’s a damned impossibility.”
The shaking hand fell heavily upon the table and made the glasses ring.
“Formula ‘A’?” said Raymond—“stolen? Henry, you can’t mean it?”
“I’m afraid I do,” said Henry, at his quietest. “I’m afraid there’s no doubt about it. We have the most indisputable evidence that Formula ‘A’ has been offered to—well, to a foreign power.”
The flush upon Sir William’s face deepened alarmingly. Under the bristling grey brows his eyes were hard with anger. He began to speak, broke off, swept his papers to one side, and, taking up the tantalus and the used glass, poured out a third of a glass of whisky. He let a small quantity of soda into it with a vicious jerk, and then sat with the glass between his hands, alternately sipping from it and interjecting sounds of angry protest.
“The information is, I’m afraid, correct.”
Henry’s tone, though studiously moderate, was extremely firm. “There is undoubtedly a leak, and, in view of Formula ‘B,’ it is vital that the leak should be found and stopped.”
He addressed himself to Lady Heritage:
“Sir William tells me that all employees correspond with the list in my possession, that none of them leave the enclosure, and that all letters are censored. By the way, who censors them?”
“Ember,” growled Sir William.
Lady Heritage elaborated the remark.
“Mr. Ember—Father’s secretary.”
She and Henry were both standing, with the corner of the writing-table between them. She saw inquiry in Henry’s face. He said:
“Who does leave the premises?”
“Father, once in a blue moon, I when I have any shopping to do, and, of course, Mr. Ember.”
“And when you go you drive, of course? What I mean is—a chauffeur goes too?”
Sir William made a sound between a snort and a laugh; Lady Heritage smiled. Both had the air of being pleased to catch Henry out.
“The chauffeur is Lewis, who was your uncle’s coachman here for twenty-five years. Are you going to suggest that he has been selling Formula ‘A’ to a foreign power? I’m afraid you must think again.”
“Who is Mr. Ember?”
Sir William exploded.
“Ember’s my secretary. He’s been my right hand for ten years, and if you’re going to make insinuations about him, you can leave my house and make them elsewhere. Why, damn it all, March!—why not accuse Raymond, or me?”
“I don’t accuse any one, sir.”
There was a pause, whilst the two men looked at one another. It was Sir William who looked away at last. He drained his glass and got up, pushing his chair so hard that it overturned.
“You want to see all the men to check ’em by that infernal list of yours, do you? The sooner the better then; let’s get it over.”
Later, as the men answered to their names in the long, bare room which had once been the Blue Parlour, Henry was struck with the strangeness of the scene. Here his aunt had loved to sit doing an interminable embroidery of fruits and flowers upon canvas. Here he and Anthony had lain prone before the fire, each with his head in a book and his heels waving aloft. Memories of Fenimore Cooper and Henty filled the place when for a moment he closed his eyes. Then, as they opened, there was the room all bare, the windows barred and uncurtained, the long stretcher tables with their paraphernalia of glass retorts, queer, twist
ed apparatus, powerful electric appliances, and this row of men answering to their names whilst he checked each from his list.
“James Mallaby.” He called the name and glanced from the man who answered it to the paper in his hand. A small photograph was followed by a description: “5 feet 7 inches, grey eyes, mole on chin, fair complexion, sandy hair.” All correct. He passed to the next.
“Jacob Moss—5 feet 5 inches, dark complexion, black hair and eyes, no marks.…”
“George Patterson—5 feet 10 inches, sallow complexion, brown hair and beard, grey on temples, grey eyes, scar.…”
The man who answered to the name of George Patterson stepped forward. He had the air of being taller than his scheduled height. His beard and hair were unkempt, and the scar set down against him was a red seam that ran from the left temple to the chin, where it lost itself in grizzled hair. He stooped, and walked with a dragging step.
Henry, who for the moment was speaking to Sir William, looked at him casually enough. He opened his list, and in turning the page, the papers slipped from his hand and fell. George Patterson picked them up. Henry went on to the next name.
Jane had keyed herself up to meeting him at teatime, but neither Henry nor Sir William appeared.
“Captain March is an extremely conscientious person,” said Lady Heritage. It was not a trait which appeared to commend itself to her. “I should think he must have interviewed the very black-beetles by now. Have you been passed, Jeffrey?”
“I don’t know,” said Mr. Ember, “but it hasn’t taken away my appetite for tea.”
In fact it had not. It was Raymond who ate nothing.
Jane and Henry did not meet until dinner-time. As she dressed, Jane kept looking at herself in the glass. She was pale, and she must not look pale. She took a towel and rubbed her cheeks—that was better. Then a little later, when she looked again, her eyes were far too bright, her face unnaturally flushed.
“As if any one was going to look at you at all— idiot!” she said.
After this she kept her back to the mirror.
The Astonishing Adventure of Jane Smith: A Golden Age Mystery Page 7
