The Book of the Lion

by Elizabeth Daly

“Gail,” said Mrs. Dunbar in some agitation, “you must not speak so carelessly. Aunt was over eighty years of age, and she didn’t fall downstairs. She had had a stroke before. She simply fell in the hall. There is no excuse for—”

  “Oh please, Mother darling! I didn’t mean it. I was just trying to be funny,” said Abigail, her hand on her mother’s arm.

  Mr. Dunbar was still shocked. “A lawyer doesn’t care for that kind of joke, Gail; unless he happens to be the wrong kind of lawyer, in which case you would find yourself in court answering to a charge of slander.”

  “Oh goodness.”

  Mrs. Dunbar, suddenly frowning, looked at her husband. “I suppose none of those young men would put in a claim of any kind, Angus?”

  “Nonsense.”

  “You hear of such things.”

  “Impossible here.”

  “But it happens, after old people die, and it doesn’t look well when the family refuses to pay.”

  Mr. Dunbar was really irritated. “These fellows were simply cases she heard of through the hospital, war cases. She had them out at her place sometimes for a little rest, or a good meal. One of them—this Dobbs—helped in the garden and with the car. I understand that they all have work now; perfectly respectable young men.”

  “Handsome young men,” said Mrs. Tanner, laughing.

  “Who says so?” asked Mrs. Dunbar.

  “Aunt Woodworth said so; at least one of them was.” She added, moving her salt-cellar about and looking at it, “By the way, talking of young men, would you two pets mind if I had a couple in this evening after dinner?”

  Alice looked up at her sister, and then down at her plate again.

  “Not at all, dear,” said Mrs. Dunbar.

  “You needn’t meet them, don’t bother,” said Mrs. Tanner. “They’re nobody you know, just friends of Richie’s. Some of his squadron pals might seem a little rough to you. Just types from the wide-open spaces, nice boys, but you wouldn’t quite understand them.”

  Mr. Dunbar said: “I suppose they won’t break the furniture.”

  Alice said with a short laugh: “More likely to break the piano,” and Gail cast a viperish look in her direction.

  “Oh dear,” said Mrs. Dunbar.

  “It isn’t the playing,” said Mr. Dunbar, “it’s what they play.”

  “And when they play,” said Alice. “Excuse me; I take it back.”

  Her parents looked at her, puzzled; Abigail went on: “I really oughtn’t to do this kind of thing to you dear people.”

  “But we never sit in the drawing-room,” said Mrs. Dunbar. “It won’t be a bother if they don’t stay too late.”

  “I ought to go back to the Stanton,” said Mrs. Tanner.

  “No, no, darling. For such a short time! And it’s so nice to have you here again.”

  “Cheers us all up,” remarked Alice.

  “At least your callers can’t be accused of doing that.” Mrs. Tanner smiled. “There used to be a word for them. What was it? Muffs?”

  Mr. Dunbar leaned back in his chair to laugh. “I haven’t heard that word for fifty years!”

  “I picked it up in the R.A.F.,” said Mrs. Tanner smugly.

  The maid came in and began to clear the table for dessert. Mr. Dunbar, still laughing, said: “All very nice fellows. Now Arthur Jennings—quiet, but he’s an excellent lawyer. Knows a lot about patent law.”

  Abigail said with affected pique: “But he’s my gentleman friend, Father; I just lend him out sometimes.”

  Alice had flushed a little, but she did not carry on the fray with much interest. She said: “I’m always flattered, of course, to go out with him after you’ve refused the invitation. But I wish he didn’t always insist on coming in afterwards. I get a little tired of his conversation.”

  Mrs. Dunbar said: “Sometimes we hear him droning on for half the night. What do you find to talk about?”

  “He finds it.” As if her contribution to the talk had been an effort, and had tired her, she sank against the back of her chair. The maid went out of the room with her tray. When she had gone Abigail addressed her father demurely: “Why don’t you ask the muffs their intentions, Father? They’ve been hanging around for at least ten years.”

  Alice said absently: “Or Father might ask you your intentions. Rich has been dead four years—that’s a long time.”

  Mrs. Tanner, very angry, cast her napkin on the table and seemed about to rise. She said: “I won’t take this kind of thing.”

  Mrs. Dunbar said sharply: “No quarrelling, Alice. You know I can’t stand it.”

  “I know,” said Alice. “If I say anything, that’s quarrelling.”

  “It takes two.”

  Alice burst out laughing. The maid came in with ice-cream, and had just finished passing the plates when the doorbell rang. She hurried out, and then there was a sound of giggling and whispering in the hall.

  “What on earth,” murmured Mr. Dunbar. Mrs. Dunbar was frowning heavily, but her face cleared when a young man came into the room.

  Everybody turned to look at him. “Why Bruce,” exclaimed Mrs. Dunbar and Mrs. Tanner together, and Mr. Dunbar was smiling too. Even Alice showed interest, but it was mingled with a certain irony.

  The young man was very blond, light-haired and grey-eyed, with a faint look of Mr. Dunbar about him; but he was very good-looking, full of vitality, and with a natural gaiety that he had not inherited from any Dunbar. He went over to Mrs. Dunbar and kissed her cheek.

  “Wha hae, wha hae, how’s the clan? Dear Auntie Pibroch. And Uncle Haggis, and little Plaidie and Kiltie.” He went around the table, shaking hands with Mr. Dunbar, kissing Abigail and Alice, sitting down at last in the chair between Mrs. Dunbar and Abigail that the maid, smiling, had pushed up for him. “No, no ice-cream, thanks. Iced coffee? Just what I need.”

  “But why so Scottish?” asked Mr. Dunbar, laughing.

  “Well, I’m doing a genealogy for an old gentleman, he’s looking for his clan. I don’t know how I’m ever going to get him into the Highlands, unless”—his eyes fell on a stained-glass plaque let into the middle light of the window—“Alice might give me a hand. That was a job!” He laughed with whole-hearted amusement. “Alice, you’ll have to help me; you’re a whiz at bridging the gaps and blotting the ’scutcheons.”

  Mrs. Dunbar was unable to be cross with this privileged relative; but she said with dignity: “It’s only what Alice found in the books, Brucey. My people really were—”

  “I know, Auntie, I know. Alice, mind you do me my next Christmas card with my armorial bearings on it.”

  Abigail said: “You certainly seem to have found yourself a man-sized job this time, Brucey.”

  “Jobs? They pay for my real jobs—my tennis, you know, and picking the winners.”

  “Are you staying in town?” Mr. Dunbar was also indulgent towards the lively young man.

  “Lord no, I just came up to see my tailor and so on. I’m driving back this afternoon, in fact right away.”

  “Driving!” exclaimed Abigail. “When on earth did you start from Washington?”

  “Oh, in the small hours. That’s when I like to drive in summer, and I’ll get back in the cool of the night. Ever see the Pennsville Ferry at sunrise? Beautiful sight.” He got his cigarette case out of his pocket, and looked at Mrs. Dunbar. She nodded. “Have one, anybody?”

  Abigail took one, and he lighted it and his own.

  “You’re a very bad boy, you know,” said Mrs. Dunbar affectionately. “You ought to have come on for the funeral.”

  “Well, Auntie, I never laid eyes on any Woodworth in my life, and I wasn’t expecting a legacy.”

  “Neither were we,” said Mr. Dunbar. “But families must show a united front on these occasions.”

  “I saw in the papers that she left everything to some hospital. Hanged if I’d have bothered to go in your place.”

  “I’m her executor, Bruce my boy.”

  “Is that a good thing to be?”
<
br />   “I think her own lawyer, old Baynes, would have liked the job,” said Mr. Dunbar with a quirk of his mouth.

  “And Bruce,” said Mrs. Dunbar, “you did lay eyes on Aunt Woodworth. Your mother took you there once when you were a little boy.”

  “I must have been a very little boy. I don’t remember a thing about it. Well, she probably knew you don’t need the money, but my God, why didn’t somebody tell her I do?”

  “You don’t really, Bruce?” His aunt looked concerned for him.

  “I get by. And they say it’s just as expensive to live in Europe, so I think I’ll stay on here after all.”

  “I’m glad of that.”

  “Do you miss it frightfully, Bruce?” asked Abigail.

  “That’s a foolish question,” said Mr. Dunbar. “Of course he misses it, and he misses his home.”

  “They certainly didn’t leave much of the villa,” said Bruce. He finished his coffee, stubbed out his cigarette. “My mother was well out of it—I’m glad she never lived to see that ash heap. I got a glimpse of it while I was back there on the staff.”

  “Too bad, too bad.”

  “Might be worse, mightn’t it?” He got up.

  “Why don’t you come up to the Cape and stay with us, dear?” asked his aunt, while he kissed her.

  “Just wait till I finish Mr. Gummy’s fairy tale; I’ll have him a lineal descendant of King Duncan before I’m through with him. He has wads of money; perhaps he’ll send me to England to confer with Portcullis. Don’t forget, Alice—paint me that Christmas card. How about a couple of winners, proper, supporting tennis balls quartered with highballs?”

  When he had gone, and the front door had been heard to slam, Mrs. Dunbar sighed deeply.

  “Poor boy; it was very sweet of him to drop in on us. Did he get anything at all out of France, dear?”

  “Not a thing,” said Mr. Dunbar. “But he has what his mother invested here. Quite enough for him. He could really do anything if he liked.”

  “I like him as he is,” said Abigail.

  “There’s a word for him,” said Alice. “Faux bonhomme.”

  “That’s like you,” said Abigail without looking at her. “Just like you.”

  “I have always found him candid and sincere,” said Mr. Dunbar, glancing at his elder daughter in some surprise.

  “I suppose he is. Yes, I think he is.”

  “And his high spirits are certainly not put on,” said Mrs. Dunbar, rising.

  They all rose. “No, they’re not,” agreed Alice.

  “Then what did you mean?”

  “I mean they don’t mean anything.” Alice Dunbar dismissed him, and the subject, with coldness and finality. She followed the others out of the room, and began to climb the stairs.

  “Alice,” said her mother.

  “Yes?” She turned and looked over her shoulder, her hand on the balustrade.

  “Gail says she is going out at five, and your father will be at his office until all hours. Don’t plan to stay out yourself later than five, if you do go out again.”

  Alice smiled faintly. “I ought to be back by then; but if I don’t come, there are three servants.”

  “Your father doesn’t wish me to be alone in the house with the servants.”

  The sound of the piano came from the drawing-room. Alice said: “If Gail can find a party to go to at this time of the year, perhaps I could.”

  “Nonsense, your friends are not in town.”

  “There’s that.”

  She went on up the two flights of stairs; there was a pinched look about her face as she turned into her bedroom at the back of the house.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Bargains

  ALICE DUNBAR CLOSED the door behind her. She stood for a few moments leaning her shoulder against it, her hand still on the knob; she felt herself trembling a little, and waited as she was until she had controlled that absurd chattering of the teeth and had stiffened her knees. Then she turned and walked firmly across the room and sat down in front of the low dressing-table.

  It was a girl’s room, hardly changed from the day when she had been promoted to it from the nursery. Pink walls, white woodwork, iridescent pink tiles enclosing the gas log fire, maple furniture, Dresden ornaments on the mantelpiece. Pictures in maple frames—flower pieces. One of them was an early effort of her own, a watercolour and an awful daub, she knew very well. But it always got rehung after the walls were repainted.

  The curtains and the old-rose rug had been put away for the summer, and their absence gave the room a pleasantly bare look; as if it were ready for a change. But in the autumn the pink curtains would go up again, the imperishable rug go down.

  She sat looking at herself closely in the glass. Not bad features, she had never been able to see anything much wrong with them. Baffled by that problem as always, she turned her eyes away from herself and opened a drawer. She took out a large black handbag with a wide, stiff base, which seemed well-filled already. She transferred a few things to it from her other bag, the one she had carried that morning; a compact, a plain handkerchief, a purse with clean notes in it.

  She got up, took the small plain hat off the bed and put it on, pulled her gloves on, picked up the handbag, and stood looking about her; seeing nothing, merely thinking whether she had forgotten something. Then she went quietly out into the hall.

  The house was silent; all the way downstairs there was not a sound. Her mother would be in her room, her father reading in the upstairs sitting-room—unless he had gone to his office. Not that it mattered. She opened the front door and went out, slammed the great walnut-and-glass bulwark behind her, and descended the steps. Turning left, she walked to Fifth Avenue; turning left again, she went south for several blocks; then she crossed to the park side.

  She waited for a bus, boarded it, and settled herself next to a window as for a long ride. She got off at a busy corner in the midtown shopping district, and stood surprised at the crowds; Alice Dunbar had had a vague idea that there were very few people in New York in summer. The Friday afternoon bustle astonished her.

  She entered a department store, looking about her as if she was unfamiliar with it, but asking no questions. After a while she found a stocking counter, a table where boxes of stockings were displayed at a reduction. She pushed through the crowd, found a pair of stockings that would fit her, and got hold of a salesgirl. The things were an ugly light colour, and would not last long, but she saw many just like them on the legs that went past in droves up and down the aisles.

  A little farther on, at a cosmetics counter, she bought a compact of a lighter powder than her own carefully blended brand, and bright lipstick. The girl was too busy to help her, so she found rouge for herself, thrusting her arm between other women to get it. She held out her hand with the things in it, and they were snatched from her and wrapped. She had to wait for her change.

  She fought her way out of the store, crossed the avenue, and went into another bigger place. Here she found a counter where hats were being sold—mere strips of ribbon and cheap flowers. She bought one, and on her way out, a white muslin collar worked with machine-made embroidery. At a near-by ten cent store, she bought a paper shopping bag and put her parcels into it.

  On the avenue again, she crossed and took a bus downtown. She got out and walked to a huge emporium which she had often heard of but never seen. Here she acquired a pair of fabric gloves, thick and white; gilt earrings, fastened to a card; and a transparent red raincoat off a rack. Then she went up in the elevator to the ladies’ room.

  It was a big place with cross-aisles, and no attendant in sight. She shut herself into a cubicle, changed her stockings, changed her hat, put on the earrings, and, as well as she could without a mirror, adjusted the collar. Afterwards, at one of the long row of mirrors, she fastened the collar more firmly and began to make up. When she had finished she half smiled at the figure in the glass; by her own standards she looked like a clown, but no more clownish than the faces aroun
d her; and there was a certain haggard handsomeness about her that she had certainly never had before.

  She slipped on the mackintosh, leaving it open. A warm day to be wearing any coat, but perhaps the kind of suburbanite she had turned into would carry one from the end of some mysterious subway line, in case of a thunderstorm, and wear it for convenience.

  Would anybody recognize her now? Not her own parents. She had changed more than her appearance, she had changed her whole personality.

  Her handbag under her arm, her shopping bag in her white-gloved hand, she went down in the elevator and out into the street. She found an up-town subway station, and stood aghast; shoppers were already making for home. But she finally allowed herself to be swept down the stairs, dropped her dime in the turnstile, and pushed her way into the local that was standing there as if actually waiting for her. The doors closed her in, the lights of the station moved past, there was a roar, and they were in the dark.

  For more “Henry Gamadge” novels, as well as other “Vintage” titles by Felony & Mayhem Press, including titles by Ngaio Marsh (the “Inspector Alleyn” series) and Margery Allingham (the “Albert Campion” series), please visit our website:

  FelonyAndMayhem.com

  All the characters and events portrayed in this work are fictitious.

  THE BOOK OF THE LION

  A Felony & Mayhem “Vintage” mystery

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  First edition (Rinehart): 1948

  Felony & Mayhem print and electronic editions: 2014

  Copyright © 1948 by Elizabeth Daly

  Copyright renewed 1971 by Daly Harris, Virgnia Taylor, Eleanor Boylan, Elizabeth T. Daly, and Wilfrid Augustin Daly, Jr.

  All rights reserved

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-63194-027-9