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Title: The Fashion in Shrouds
Author: Allingham, Margery [Youngman Carter, Margery Louise]
   (1904-1966)
Date of first publication: 1938
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   New York: Doubleday, Doran & Company, 1938
   ["first edition"]
Date first posted: 19 December 2019
Date last updated: 19 December 2019
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #1637

This ebook was produced by
Al Haines, Jen Haines, Mark Akrigg
& the Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team
at http://www.pgdpcanada.net


PUBLISHER'S NOTE

Italics in the original printed edition are indicated _thus_.

As part of the conversion of the book to its new digital
format, we have made certain minor adjustments in its layout.

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected.






THE FASHION IN SHROUDS

by Margery Allingham




    In this superb story Albert Campion investigates a
    three-year-old murder. Two other murders which occurred during
    the investigation further complicated the most difficult task he
    had ever attempted. It was made no easier by the theft of the
    dress designs, which seemed to be linked with an order for sixty
    cages of golden canaries, a freshly painted private dining room
    and the identity of the mysterious "third party" in a blackmail
    scheme. Campion was nearly desperate when Lugg, mystery
    fiction's funniest valet, suddenly produced the clue.

    This put Campion on the track. Little did the lugubrious Lugg
    know it, but he was playing Providence, inasmuch as the clue
    altered several destinies and led a murderer to the dock.

    Margery Allingham has written in this long story one of the
    finest mysteries that we have had the pleasure of publishing.








    "..._there reigned throughout their whole world a special
    sort of snobbism and a conscious striving for effect which were
    the very parents of Fashion._"--PAUL POIRET.





THE FASHION IN SHROUDS




CHAPTER ONE


Probably the most exasperating thing about the Fashion is its
elusiveness. Even the word has a dozen definitions, and when it is
pinned down and qualified, as "the Fashion in woman's dress," it becomes
ridiculous and stilted and is gone again.

To catch at its skirts it is safest to say that it is a kind of miracle,
a familiar phenomenon. Why it is that a garment which is honestly
attractive in, say, 1910 should be honestly ridiculous a few years later
and honestly charming again a few years later still is one of those
things which are not satisfactorily to be explained and are therefore
jolly and exciting and an addition to the perennial interest of life.

When the last Roland Papendeik died, after receiving a knighthood for a
royal wedding dress--having thus scaled the heights of his ambition as a
great couturier--the ancient firm declined and might well have faded
into one of the amusing legends Fashion leaves behind her had it not
been for a certain phoenix quality possessed by Lady Papendeik.

At the moment when descent became apparent and dissolution likely Lady
Papendeik discovered Val, and from the day that the Valentine cape in
Lincoln-green facecloth flickered across the salon and won the hearts of
twenty-five professional buyers and subsequently five hundred private
purchasers Val climbed steadily, and behind her rose up the firm of
Papendeik again like a great silk tent.

At the moment she was standing in a fitting room whither she had dragged
a visitor who had come on private business of his own and was surveying
herself in a wall-wide mirror with earnest criticism.

Like most of those people whose personality has to be consciously
expressed in the things they create, she was a little more of a person,
a little more clear in outline than is usual. She had no suggestion of
overemphasis, but she was a sharp, vivid entity, and when one first saw
her the immediate thing one realised was that it had not happened
before.

As she stood before the mirror considering her burgundy-red suit from
every angle she looked about twenty-three, which was not the fact. Her
slenderness was slenderness personified and her yellow hair, folding
softly into the nape of her neck at the back and combed into a
ridiculous roll in front, could have belonged to no one else and would
have suited no other face.

It occurred to her visitor, who was regarding her with the detached
affection of a relation, that she was dressed up to look like a female,
and he said so affably.

She turned and grinned at him, her unexpectedly warm grey eyes, which
saved her whole appearance from affectation, dancing at him happily.

"I am," she said. "I am, my darling. I'm female as a cartload of
monkeys."

"Or a kettle of fish, of course," observed Mr Albert Campion, unfolding
his long thin legs and rising from an inadequate gilt chair to look in
the mirror also. "Do you like my new suit?"

"Very good indeed." Her approval was professional. "Jamieson and
Fellowes? I thought so. They're so mercifully uninspired. Inspiration in
men's clothes is stomach-turning. People ought to be shot for it."

Campion raised his eyebrows at her. She had a charming voice which was
high and clear and so unlike his own in tone and colour that it gave him
a sense of acquisition whenever he heard it.

"Too extreme," he said. "I like your garment, but let's forget it now."

"Do you? I was wondering if it wasn't a bit 'intelligent.'"

He looked interested.

"I wanted to talk to you before these people come. Aren't we lunching
alone?"

Val swung slowly round in only partially amused surprise. For a moment
she looked her full age, which was thirty, and there was character and
intelligence in her face.

"You're too clever altogether, aren't you?" she said. "Go away. You take
me out of my stride."

"Who is he? It's not to be a lovely surprise, I trust?" Campion put an
arm round her shoulders and they stood for a moment admiring themselves
with the bland unself-consciousness of the nursery. "If I didn't look so
half-witted we should be very much alike," he remarked presently.
"There's a distinct resemblance. Thank God we took after Mother and not
the other side. Red hair would sink either of us, even Father's
celebrated variety. Poor old Herbert used to look like nothing on
earth."

He paused and considered her dispassionately in the mirror, while it
occurred to him suddenly that the relationship between brother and
sister was the one association of the sexes that was intrinsically
personal.

"If one resents one's sister or even loathes the sight of her," he
remarked presently, "it's for familiar faults or virtues which one
either has or hasn't got oneself and one likes the little beast for the
same rather personal reasons. I think you're better than I am in one or
two ways, but I'm always glad to note that you have sufficient feminine
weaknesses to make you thoroughly inferior on the whole. This is a
serious, valuable thought, by the way. See what I mean?"

"Yes," she said with an irritating lack of appreciation, "but I don't
think it's very new. What feminine weaknesses have I got?"

He beamed at her. In spite of her astonishing success she could always
be relied upon to make him feel comfortingly superior.

"Who's coming to lunch?"

"Alan Dell--Alandel aeroplanes."

"Really? That's unexpected. I've heard of him, of course, but we've
never met. Nice fellow?"

She did not answer immediately and he glanced at her sharply.

"I don't know," she said at last and met his eyes. "I think so, very."

Campion grimaced. "Valentine the valiant."

She was suddenly hurt and colour came into her face.

"No, darling, not necessarily," she objected a little too vehemently.
"Only twice shy, you know, only twice, not forever."

There was dignity in the protest. It brought him down to earth and
reminded him effectively that she was after all a distinguished and
important woman with every right to her own private life. He changed the
conversation, feeling, as he sometimes did, that she was older than he
was for all her femininity.

"Can I smoke in this clothespress without sacrilege?" he enquired. "I
came up here once to a reception when I was very young. The Perownes had
it then as their town house. That was in the days before the street went
down and a Perowne could live in Park Lane. I don't remember much about
it except that there were golden cream horns bursting with fruit all
round the cornice. You've transformed the place. Does Tante Marthe like
the change of address?"

"Lady Papendeik finds herself enchanted," said Val cheerfully, her mind
still on her clothes. "She thinks it a pity trade should have come so
near the park, but she's consoling herself by concentrating on 'our
mission to glorify the Essential Goddess.' This is a temple, my boy, not
a shop. When it's not a temple it's that damned draughty hole of Maude
Perowne's. But on the whole it's just exactly what she always wanted. It
has the grand manner, the authentic Papa Papendeik touch. Did you see
her little black pages downstairs?"

"The objects in the turbans? Are they recent?"

"Almost temporary," said Val, turning from the mirror and slipping her
arm through his. "Let's go up and wait. We're lunching on the roof."

As he came through the wide doorway from a hushed and breathless world
whose self-conscious good taste was almost overpowering to the upper, or
workshop, part of the Papendeik establishment, Mr Campion felt a
gratifying return to reality. A narrow uncarpeted corridor, still
bearing traces of the Perowne era in wallpaper and paint, was lit by
half-a-dozen open doorways through which came a variety of sounds, from
the chiming of cups to the hiss of the pressing iron, while above all
there predominated the strident, sibilant chatter of female voices,
which is perhaps the most unpleasant noise in the world.

An elderly woman in a shabby navy-blue dress came bustling along towards
them, a black pincushion bumping ridiculously on her hipbone as she
walked. She did not stop but smiled and passed them, radiating a solid
obstinacy as definite as the clatter of her old-lady shoes on the
boards. Behind her trotted a man in a costume in which Campion
recognised at once Val's conception of the term "inspired." He was
breathless and angry and yet managed to look pathetic, with doggy brown
eyes and the cares of the world on his compact little shoulders.

"She won't let me have it," he said without preamble. "I hate any sort
of unpleasantness, but the two girls are waiting to go down to the house
and I distinctly promised that the white model should go with the other.
It's the one with the draped corsage."

He sketched a design with his two hands on his own chest with surprising
vividness.

"The vendeuse is in tears."

He seemed not far off them himself and Mr Campion felt sorry for him.

"Coax her," said Val without slackening pace and they hurried on,
leaving him sighing. "Rex," she said as they mounted the narrow
uncarpeted staircase amid a labyrinth of corridors. "Tante says he's not
quite a lady. It's one of her filthy remarks that gets more true the
longer you know him."

Campion made no comment. They were passing through a group of untidy
girls who had stepped aside as they appeared.

"Seamstresses," Val explained as they came up on to the landing. "Tante
prefers the word to 'workwomen.' This is their room."

She threw open a door which faced them and he looked into a vast attic
where solid felt-covered tables made a mighty horseshoe whose well was
peopled with dreadful brown headless figures each fretted with pinpricks
and labelled with the name of the lady whose secret faults of contour it
so uncompromisingly reproduced.

Reflecting that easily the most terrifying thing about women was their
practical realism, he withdrew uneasily and followed her up a final
staircase to a small roof garden set among the chimney-pots, where a
table had been laid beneath a striped awning.

It was early summer and the trees in the park were round and green above
the formal flower beds, so that the view, as they looked down upon it,
was like a coloured panoramic print of eighteenth-century London, with
the houses of the Bayswater Road making a grey cloud on the horizon.

He sat down on a white basketwork settee and blinked at her in the
sunlight.

"I want to meet Georgia Wells. You're sure she's coming?"

"My dear, they're all coming." Val spoke soothingly. "Her husband, the
leading man, Ferdie Paul himself and heaven knows who else. It's partly
mutual publicity and partly a genuine inspection of dresses for _The
Lover_, now in rehearsal. You'll see Georgia all right."

"Good," he said and his lean face was unusually thoughtful. "I shall try
not to be vulgar or indiscreet, of course, but I must get to know her if
I can. Was she actually engaged to Portland-Smith at the time he
disappeared, or was it already off by then?"

Val considered and her eyes strayed to the doorway through which they
had come.

"It's almost three years ago, isn't it?" she said. "My impression is
that it was still on, but I can't swear to it. It was all kept so
decently quiet until the family decided that they really had better look
for him, and by then she was stalking Ramillies. It's funny you never
found that man, Albert. He's your one entire failure, isn't he?"

Apparently Mr Campion did not care to comment.

"How long has she been Lady Ramillies?"

"Over two years, I think."

"Shall I get a black eye if I lead round to Portland-Smith?"

"No, I don't think so. Georgia's not renowned for good taste. If she
stares at you blankly it'll only mean that she's forgotten the poor
beast's name."

He laughed. "You don't like the woman?"

Val hesitated. She looked very feminine.

"Georgia's our most important client, 'the best-dressed actress in the
world gowned by the most famous couturier.' We're a mutual benefit
society."

"What's the matter with her?"

"Nothing." She glanced at the door again and then out over the park. "I
admire her. She's witty, beautiful, predatory, intrinsically vulgar and
utterly charming."

Mr Campion became diffident.

"You're not jealous of her?"

"No, no, of course not. I'm as successful as she is--more."

"Frightened of her?"

Val looked at him and he was embarrassed to see in her for an instant
the candid-eyed child of his youth.

"Thoroughly."

"Why?"

"She's so charming," she said with uncharacteristic naïveté. "She's got
_my_ charm."

"That's unforgivable," he agreed sympathetically. "Which one?"

"The only one there is, my good ape. She makes you think she likes you.
Forget her. You'll see her this afternoon. I like her really. She's
fundamentally sadistic and not nearly so brilliant as she sounds, but
she's all right. I like her. I do like her."

Mr Campion thought it wisest not to press the subject and would
doubtless have started some other topic had he not discovered that Val
was no longer listening to him. The door to the staircase had opened and
her second guest had arrived.

As he rose to greet the newcomer Campion was aware of a fleeting sense
of disappointment.

In common with many other people he cherished the secret conviction that
a celebrity should look peculiar, at the very least, and had hitherto
been happy to note that a great number did.

Dell was an exception. He was a bony thirty-five-year-old with greying
hair and the recently scoured appearance of one intimately associated
with machinery. It was only when he spoke, revealing a cultured mobile
voice of unexpected authority, that his personality became apparent. He
came forward shyly and it occurred to Campion that he was a little put
out to find that he was not the only guest.

"Your brother?" he said. "I had no idea Albert Campion was your
brother."

"Oh, we're a distinguished family," murmured Val brightly, but an
underlying note of uncertainty in her voice made Campion glance at her
shrewdly. He was a little startled by the change in her. She looked
younger and less elegant, more charming and far more vulnerable. He
looked at the man and was relieved to see that he was very much aware of
her.

"You've kept each other very dark," said Dell. "Why is that?"

Val was preoccupied at the moment with two waiters who had arrived with
the luncheon from the giant hotel next door, but she spoke over her
shoulder.

"We haven't. Our professions haven't clashed yet, that's all. We nod to
each other in the street and send birthday cards. We're the half of the
family that is on speaking terms, as a matter of fact."

"We're the bones under the ancestral staircase."

Campion embarked upon the explanation solely because it was expected of
him. It was a reason he would never have considered sufficient in the
ordinary way, but there was something about Alan Dell, with his
unusually bright blue eyes and sudden smile, which seemed to demand that
extra consideration which is given automatically to important children,
as if he were somehow special and it was to everyone's interest that he
should be accurately informed.

"I was asked to leave first--in a nice way, of course. We all have
charming manners. Val followed a few years later, and now, whenever our
names crop up at home, someone steps into the library and dashes off
another note to the family solicitor disinheriting us. Considering their
passion for self-expression, they always seem to me a little
unreasonable about ours."

"That's not quite true about me." Val leant across the table and spoke
with determined frankness. "I left home to marry a man whom no one
liked, and after I married I didn't like him either. Lady Papendeik, who
used to make my mother's clothes, saw some of my designs and gave me a
job----"

"Since when you've revolutionised the business," put in Campion hastily
with some vague idea of saving the situation. He was shocked. Since
Sidney Ferris had died the death he deserved in a burnt-out motorcar
with which, in a fit of alcoholic exuberance, he had attempted to fell a
tree, he had never heard his widow mention his name.

Val seemed quite unconscious of anything unusual in her behaviour. She
was looking across at Dell with anxious eyes.

"Yes," he said, "I've been hearing about you. I didn't realise how long
Papendeik's had been going. You've performed an extraordinary feat in
putting them back on the map. I thought change was the essence of
fashion."

Val flushed.

"It would have been easier to start afresh," she admitted. "There was a
lot of prejudice at first. But as the new designs were attractive they
sold, and the solidarity of the name was a great help on the business
side."

"It would be, of course." He regarded her with interest. "That's true.
If the things one makes are better than the other man's, one does get
the contracts. That's the most comforting discovery I've ever made."

They laughed at each other, mutually admiring and entirely
comprehending, and Campion, who had work of his own to do, felt oddly
out of it.

"When do you expect Georgia Wells?" he ventured. "About three?"

He felt the remark was hardly tactful as soon as he had made it, and
Val's careless nod strengthened the impression. Dell was interested,
however.

"Georgia Wells?" he said quickly. "Did you design her clothes for _The
Little Sacrifice_?"

"Did you see them?" Val was openly pleased. Her sophistication seemed to
have deserted her entirely. "She looked magnificent, didn't she?"

"Amazing." He glanced at the green treetops across the road. "I rarely
go to the theatre," he went on after a pause, "and I was practically
forced into that visit, but once I'd seen her I went again alone."

He made the statement with a complete unself-consciousness which was
almost embarrassing and sat regarding them seriously.

"Amazing," he repeated. "I never heard such depth of feeling in my life.
I'd like to meet that woman. She had some sort of tragedy in her life, I
think? The same sort of thing as in the play."

Mr Campion blinked. Unexpected naïveté in a delightful stranger whose
ordinary intelligence is obviously equal to or beyond one's own always
comes as something of a shock. He glanced at Val apprehensively. She was
sitting up, her mouth smiling.

"She divorced her husband, the actor, some years ago, and there was a
barrister fiancé who disappeared mysteriously a few months before she
married Ramillies," she said. "I don't know which incident reminded you
of the play."

Alan Dell stared at her with such transparent disappointment and
surprise that she blushed, and Campion began to understand the
attraction he had for her.

"I mean," she said helplessly, "_The Little Sacrifice_ was about a woman
relinquishing the only man she ever loved to marry the father of her
eighteen-year-old daughter. Wasn't that it?"

"It was about a woman losing the man she loved in an attempt to do
something rather fine," said Dell and looked unhappy, as if he felt he
had been forced into an admission.

"Georgia was brilliant. She always is. There's no one like her." Val was
protesting too much and realising it too late, in Campion's opinion, and
he was sorry for her.

"I saw the show," he put in. "It was a very impressive performance, I
thought."

"It was, wasn't it?" The other man turned to him gratefully. "It got
one. She was so utterly comprehendable. I don't like emotional stuff as
a rule. If it's good I feel I'm butting in on strangers, and if it's bad
it's unbearably embarrassing. But she was so--so confiding, if you see
what I mean. There _was_ some tragedy, wasn't there, before she married
Ramillies? Who was this barrister fiancé?"

"A man called Portland-Smith," said Campion slowly.

"He disappeared?"

"He vanished," said Val. "Georgia may have been terribly upset; I think
she probably was. I was only being smart and silly about it."

Dell smiled at her. He had a sort of chuckleheaded and shy affection
towards her that was very disarming.

"That sort of shock can go very deep, you know," he said awkwardly.
"It's the element of shame in it--the man clearing off suddenly and
publicly like that."

"Oh, but you're wrong. It wasn't that kind of disappearance at all." Val
was struggling between the very feminine desire to remove any
misapprehension under which he might be suffering and the instinctive
conviction that it would be wiser to leave the subject altogether. "He
simply vanished into the air. He left his practice, his money in the
bank and his clothes on the peg. It couldn't have been anything to do
with Georgia. He'd been to a party at which I don't think she was even
present, and he left early because he'd got to get back and read a brief
before the morning. He left the hotel about ten o'clock and didn't get
to his chambers. Somewhere between the two he disappeared. That's the
story, isn't it, Albert?"

The thin young man in the horn-rimmed spectacles did not speak at once,
and Dell glanced at him enquiringly.

"You took it up professionally?"

"Yes, about two years later." Mr Campion appeared to be anxious to
excuse his failure. "Portland-Smith's career was heading towards a
recordership," he explained, "and at the time he seemed pretty well
certain to become a county court judge eventually, so his relatives were
naturally wary of any publicity. In fact they covered his tracks, what
there were of them, in case he turned up after a month or so with loss
of memory. He was a lonely bird at the best of times, a great walker and
naturalist, a curious type to have appealed so strongly to a successful
woman. Anyway, the police weren't notified until it was too late for
them to do anything, and I was approached after they'd given up. I
didn't trouble Miss Wells because that angle had been explored very
thoroughly by the authorities and they were quite satisfied that she
knew nothing at all about the business."

Dell nodded. He seemed gratified by the final piece of information,
which evidently corroborated his own convinced opinion.

"Interesting," he remarked after a pause. "That sort of thing's always
happening. I mean one often hears a story like that."

Val looked up in surprise.

"About people walking out into the blue?"

"Yes," he said and smiled at her again. "I've heard of quite
half-a-dozen cases in my time. It's quite understandable, of course, but
every time it crops up it gives one a jolt, a new vision, like putting
on a pair of long-sighted spectacles."

Val was visibly puzzled. She looked very sane sitting up and watching
him with something like concern in her eyes.

"How do you mean? What happened to him?"

Dell laughed. He was embarrassed and glanced at Campion for support.

"Well," he said, the colour in his face making his eyes more vivid, "we
all do get the feeling that we'd like to walk out, don't we? I mean we
all feel at times an insane impulse to vanish, to abandon the great
rattling caravan we're driving and walk off down the road with nothing
but our own weight to carry. It's not always a question of concrete
responsibilities; it's ambitions and conventions and especially
affections which seem to get too much at moments. One often feels one'd
like to ditch them all and just walk away. The odd thing is that so few
of us do, and so when one hears of someone actually succumbing to that
most familiar impulse one gets a sort of personal jolt. Portland-Smith
is probably selling vacuum cleaners in Philadelphia by now."

Val shook her head.

"Women don't feel like that," she said. "Not alone."

Mr Campion felt there might be something in this observation but he was
not concerning himself with the abstract just then.

Months of careful investigation had led him late the previous afternoon
to a little estate in Kent where the young Portland-Smith had spent a
summer holiday at the age of nine. During the past ten years the old
house had been deserted and had fallen into disrepair, creepers and
brambles making of the garden a Sleeping Beauty thicket. There in a
natural den in the midst of a shrubbery, the sort of hide-out that any
nine-year-old would cherish forever as his own private place, Mr Campion
had found the thirty-eight-year-old Portland-Smith, or all that was left
of him after three years. The skeleton had been lying face downward, the
left arm pillowing the head and the knees drawn up in a feather bed of
dried leaves.




CHAPTER TWO


Val's office was one of the more original features of Papendeik's new
establishment in Park Lane. Reynarde, who had been responsible for the
transformation of the mansion, had indulged in one of his celebrated
"strokes of genius" in its construction and Colin Greenleaf's
photographs of the white wrought-iron basket of a studio slung under the
centre cupola above the well of the grand staircase had appeared in all
the more expensive illustrated periodicals at the time of the move.

In spite of its affected design the room was proving unexpectedly
useful, much to everyone's relief, for its glass walls afforded a view
not only of the visitors' part of the building but a clear vision down
the two main workshop corridors and permitted Lady Papendeik to keep an
eye on her house.

Although it was technically Val's own domain and contained a drawing
table, Marthe Papendeik sat there most of the day "in the midst of her
web," as Rex had once said in a fit of petulance, "looking like a
spider, seeing itself a queen bee."

When Marthe Lafranc had come to London in the days when Victorian
exuberance was bursting through its confining laces and drawing its
breath for the skyrocketing and subsequent crash which were to follow,
she had been an acute French businesswoman, hard and brittle as glass
and volatile as ether. Her evolution had been accomplished by Papendeik,
the great artist. He had taken her as if she had been a bale of tinsel
cloth and had created from her something quite unique and individual to
himself. "He taught me how to mellow," she said once with a tenderness
which was certainly not Gallic, "the _grand seigneur_."

At sixty she was a small, dark, ugly woman with black silk hair, a
lifted face and the gift of making a grace of every fold she wore. She
was at her little writing table making great illegible characters with a
ridiculous pen when Mr Campion wandered in after lunch and she greeted
him with genuine welcome in her narrow eyes.

"The little Albert," she said. "My dear, the ensemble! Very
distinguished. Turn round. Delightful. That is the part of a man one
remembers always with affection, his back from the shoulders to the
waist. Is Val still on the roof with that mechanic?"

Mr Campion seated himself and beamed. They were old friends and without
the least disrespect he always thought she looked like a little wet
newt, she was so sleek and lizardlike with her sharp eyes and swift
movements.

"I rather liked him," he said, "but I felt a little superfluous so I
came down."

Tante Marthe's bright eyes rested for a moment on two mannequins who
were talking together some distance down the southern corridor. The
glass walls of the room were soundproof so there was no means of telling
if they were actually saying the things to each other which appearances
would suggest, but when one of them caught sight of the little figure
silhouetted against the brightness of the further wall there was a
hurried adjournment.

Lady Papendeik shrugged her shoulders and made a note of two names on
her blotting pad.

"Val is in love with that man," she remarked. "He is very masculine. I
hope it is not merely a most natural reaction. We are too many women
here. There is no 'body' in the place."

Mr Campion shied away from the subject.

"You don't like women, Tante Marthe?"

"My dear, it is not a question of liking." The vehemence in her deep,
ugly voice startled him. "One does not dislike the half of everything.
You bore me, you young people, when you talk about one sex or the other,
as if they were separate things. There is only one human entity and that
is a man and a woman. The man is the silhouette, the woman is the
detail. The one often spoils or makes the other. But apart they are so
much material. Don't be a fool."

She turned over the sheet of paper on which she had been writing and
drew a little house on it.

"_Did_ you like him?" she demanded suddenly, shooting a direct and
surprisingly youthful glance at him.

"Yes," he said seriously, "yes. He's a personality and a curiously
simple chap, but I liked him."

"The family would raise no difficulty?"

"Val's family?"

"Naturally."

He began to laugh.

"Darling, you're slipping back through the ages, aren't you?"

Lady Papendeik smiled at herself.

"It's marriage, my dear," she confided. "Where marriage is concerned,
Albert, I am still French. It is so much better in France. There
marriage is always the contract and nobody forgets that, even in the
beginning. It makes it so proper. Here no one thinks of his signature
until he wants to cross it out."

Mr Campion stirred uneasily.

"I don't want to be offensive," he murmured, "but I think all this is a
bit premature."

"Ah." To his relief she followed him instantly. "I wondered. Perhaps so.
Very likely. We will forget it. Why are you here?"

"Come about a body." His tone was diffident. "Nothing indelicate or bad
for business, naturally. I want to meet Georgia Wells."

Tante Marthe sat up.

"Georgia Wells," she said. "Of course! I could not think if
Portland-Smith was the name of the man or not. Have you seen the evening
paper?"

"Oh, Lord, have they got it already?" He took up the early racing
edition from the desk and turned it over. In the Stop Press he found a
little paragraph in blurred, irregular type.

    _SKELETON IN BUSHES. Papers found near a skeleton of a man
    discovered in the shrubbery of a house near Wellferry, Kent,
    suggest that body may be that of Mr Richard Portland-Smith, who
    disappeared from his home nearly three years ago._

He refolded the paper and smiled at her wryly.

"Yes, well, that's a pity," he said.

Lady Papendeik was curious but years of solid experience had taught her
discretion.

"It is a professional affair for you?"

"I found the poor chap."

"Ah." She sat nibbling her pen, her small back straight and her
inquisitive eyes fixed upon his face. "It is undoubtedly the body of the
fiancé?"

"Oh yes, it's Portland-Smith all right. Tante Marthe, was that
engagement on or off when he vanished? Do you remember?"

"On," said the old lady firmly. "Ramillies had appeared upon the scene,
you understand, but Georgia was still engaged. How long after he
disappeared did the wretched man die? Can you tell that?"

"Not from the state of the body... at least I shouldn't think so. It
must have been fairly soon but I don't think any pathologist could swear
to it within a month or so. However, I fancy the police will be able to
pin it down because of the fragments of the clothes. He seems to have
been in evening dress."

Tante Marthe nodded. She looked her full age and her lips moved in a
little soundless murmur of pity.

"And the cause? That will be difficult too?"

"No. He was shot."

She moved her hands and clicked her tongue.

"Very unpleasant," she pronounced and added maliciously: "It will be
interesting to see Ferdie Paul turn it into good publicity."

Campion rose and stood looking down at her, his long thin figure
drooping a little.

"I'd better fade away," he said regretfully. "I can't very well butt in
on her now."

Lady Papendeik stretched out a restraining hand.

"No, don't go," she said. "You stay. Be intelligent, of course; the
woman's a client. But I'd like someone to see them all. We are putting
up some of the money for Caesar's Court. I would like your advice. Paul
and Ramillies will be here and so will Laminoff."

"Caesar's Court?" Campion was surprised. "You too? Everyone I meet seems
to have a finger in that pie. You're sitting pretty. It's going to be a
Tom Tiddler's ground."

"I think so." She smiled complacently. "London has never had that kind
of luxury on the doorstep and we can afford it. It was never possible in
the old days because of the transport difficulty and when the transport
did come there wasn't the money. Now the two have arrived together. Have
you been out there yet? It's hardly a journey at all by car."

"No," said Mr Campion, grinning. "I don't want to picnic in Naples, take
a foam bath, improve my game, eat a lotus or mix with the elite. Also,
frankly, the idea of spending six or seven hundred on a week-end party
makes me feel physically sick. However, I realise that there are people
who do, and I must say I like the wholesale magnificence of the scheme.
These things usually flop because the promoters will rely on one or two
good features to carry the others. This show _is_ solid leather all
through. The chef from the Virginia, Teddy Quoit's band, Andy Bullard in
charge of the golf course, the Crannis woman doing the swimming and
Waugh the tennis, while it was genius to make the place the headquarters
of the beauty king chap, what's-his-name."

"Mirabeau," she supplied. "He's an artist. Ditte, his coiffeuse,
designed my hair. Yes, the idea was excellent, but the execution has
been extraordinary. That's Laminoff. Laminoff was the maître d'hôtel at
the Poire d'Or. Bjornson let him in when he crashed. He's incredible,
and Madame is no fool. It was Laminoff who insisted that the flying
field must be made a customs port. Alan Dell arranged that."

"Dell? Is he in it too?"

"Naturally. All the club planes are Alandel machines and his pilots are
in charge. His works are only a mile or so away on the other side of the
river. He has a big interest in the whole hotel. That's how Val met
him."

"I see." Mr Campion blinked. "It's quite a neat little miracle of
organisation, isn't it? Who's the clever lad in the background? Who woke
up in the night with the great idea?"

Tante Marthe hesitated.

"Ferdie Paul. Don't mention it. It's not generally known." She pursed
her lips and looked down her long nose. "Do you know Paul?"

"No. I thought he was a stage man. He's a producer, surely?"

"He's very clever," said Lady Papendeik. "He made Georgia Wells and he
holds the leases of the Sovereign and the Venture theatres. The Cherry
Orchard Club is his and he has a half share in the Tulip Restaurant."

Campion laughed. "And that's all you've been able to find out about
him?"

She grimaced at him. "It's not enough, is it?" she said. "After all,
we're not made of money--who is? Oh, they're here, are they? We'll go
down."

She nodded and dismissed a page boy who had barely entered the room and
had not had time to open his mouth.

"Now," she said without the slightest trace of conscious affectation,
"we will see what beautiful dresses can do to a woman. One of these
gowns is so lovely that I burst into tears when I first saw it and Rex
would have fainted if he hadn't controlled himself, the poor neurotic."

Finding himself incapable of suitable comment, Mr Campion said nothing
and followed her dutifully down the grand staircase.




CHAPTER THREE


It was never Mr Campion's custom to make an entrance. In early youth he
had perfected the difficult art of getting into and out of rooms without
fuss, avoiding both the defensive flourish and the despicable creep, but
he swept into Papendeik's grand salon like the rear guard of a
conqueror, which in a way, of course, he was.

Lady Papendeik at work was a very different person from Tante Marthe in
Val's office. She appeared to be a good two inches higher, for one
thing, and she achieved a curious sailing motion which was as far
removed from ordinary walking as is the goose step in an exactly
opposite direction. Mr Campion found himself stalking behind her as
though to fast and martial music. It was quite an experience.

The salon was golden. Val held that a true conceit is only a vulgarity
in the right place and had done the thing thoroughly.

The room itself had been conceived in the grand manner. It was very long
and high, with seven great windows leading out on to a stone terrace
with bronzes, so that the general effect might easily have become period
had not the very pale gold monotone of the walls, floor and furnishings
given it a certain conscious peculiarity which, although satisfactory to
the eye, was yet not sufficiently familiar to breed any hint of ignorant
contempt.

The practical side of the colour scheme, which had really determined the
two ladies to adopt it and which was now quite honestly forgotten by
both of them, was that as a background for fine silk or wool material
there is nothing so flattering as a warm, polished metal. Also, as Tante
Marthe had remarked in an unguarded moment, "gold is so _comforting_, my
dears, if you can really make it unimportant."

So Mr Campion tramped through pale golden pile and was confronted at
last by a vivid group of very human people, all silhouetted, framed and
set and thus brought into startling relief against a pale golden wall.
He was aware first of a dark face and then a fair one, a small boy of
all unexpected things and afterwards, principally and completely, of
Georgia Wells.

She was bigger than he had thought from the auditorium and now, without
losing charm, more coarse. She was made up under the skin, as it were,
designed by nature as a poster rather than a pen drawing.

He was aware that her eyes were large and grey, with long strong lashes
and thick pale skin round them. Even the brown flecks in the grey irises
seemed bolder and larger than is common and her expression was bright
and shrewd and so frank that he felt she must have known him for some
time.

She kissed Lady Papendeik ritualistically upon both cheeks but the
gesture was performed absently and he felt that her attention was never
diverted an instant from himself.

"Mr Campion?" she echoed. "Really? Albert Campion?"

Her voice, which, like everything else about her, was far stronger and
more flexible than the average, conveyed a certain wondering interest
and he understood at once that she knew who he was, that she had seen
the newspapers and was now considering if there was some fortunate
coincidence in their meeting or if it were not fortunate or not a
coincidence.

"Ferdie, this is Mr Campion. _You_ know. Mr Campion, this is Ferdie
Paul."

The dark face resolved itself into a person. Ferdie Paul was younger
than Mr Campion had expected. He was a large, plumpish man who looked
like Byron. He had the same dark curling hair that was unreasonably
inadequate on crown and temples, the same proud, curling mouth which
would have been charming on a girl and was not on Mr Paul, and the same
short, strong, uniform features which made him just a little ridiculous,
like a pretty bull.

When he spoke, however, the indolence which should have been a part and
parcel of his make-up was surprisingly absent. He was a vigorous
personality, his voice high and almost squeaky, with a nervous energy in
it which never descended into irritability.

There was also something else about him which Campion noticed and could
not define. It was a peculiar uncertainty of power, like pinking in a
car engine, a quality of labour under difficulties which was odd and
more in keeping with his voice than his appearance or personality.

He glanced at Campion with quick, intelligent interest, decided he did
not know or need him, and dismissed him from his mind in a perfectly
friendly fashion.

"We can begin at once, can't we?" he said to Lady Papendeik. "It's
absolutely imperative that they should be quite right."

"They are exquisite," announced Tante Marthe coldly, conveying her
irrevocable attitude in one single stroke.

Paul grinned at her. His amusement changed his entire appearance. His
mouth became more masculine and the fleeting glimpse of gold stopping in
his side teeth made him look for some reason more human and fallible.

"You're a dear, aren't you?" he said and sounded as if he meant it.

Lady Papendeik's narrow eyes, which seemed to be all pupil, flickered at
him. She did not smile but her thin mouth quirked and it occurred to
Campion, who was watching them, that they were the working brains of the
gathering. Neither of them were artists but they were the masters of
artists, the Prosperos of their respective Ariels, and they had a very
healthy admiration for one another.

By this time new visitors had arrived and were drifting towards the
quilted settees between the windows. Rex was very much in evidence. He
had lost his anger but retained his pathos, interrupting it at times
with little coy exuberances always subdued to the right degree of
ingratiating affability.

Campion noticed one woman in particular, a very correctly dressed little
matron whose excellent sartorial taste could not quite lend her
elegance, finding him very comforting. He wondered who she was and why
she should receive such deference. Rex, he felt certain, would genuinely
only find charm where it was politic that charm should be found, yet she
did not by her manner appear to be very rich nor did she seem to belong
to anybody. He had little time to observe her or anyone else, however,
for Georgia returned to him.

"I'm so interested in you," she said with a frankness which he found a
little overwhelming. "I'm not at all sure you couldn't be useful to me."

The naïveté of the final remark was so complete that for a second he
wondered if she had really made it, but her eyes, which were as grey as
tweed suiting and rather like it, were fixed on his own and her broad,
beautiful face was earnest and friendly.

"Something rather awful has happened to me this afternoon," she went on,
her voice husky. "They've found the skeleton of a man I adored. I can't
help talking about it to somebody. Do forgive me. It's the shock, you
know."

She gave him a faint apologetic smile and it came to him with surprise
that she was perfectly sincere. He learnt a great deal about Georgia
Wells at that moment and was interested in her. The ordinary hysteric
who dramatises everything until she loses all sense of proportion and
becomes a menace to the unsuspecting stranger was familiar to him, but
this was something new. For the moment at any rate Georgia Wells was
genuine in her despair and she seemed to be regarding him not as an
audience but as a possible ally, which was at least disarming.

"I ought not to blurt it out like this to a stranger," she said. "I only
realise how terrible these things are when I hear myself saying them.
It's disgusting. Do forgive me."

She paused and looked up into his face with sudden childlike honesty.

"It is a frightful shock, you know."

"Of course it is," Campion heard himself saying earnestly. "Terrible.
Didn't you know he was dead?"

"No. I had no idea." The protest was hearty and convincing but it lacked
the confiding quality of her earlier announcements and he glanced at her
sharply. She closed her eyes and opened them again.

"I'm behaving damnably," she said. "It's because I've heard so much
about you I feel I know you. This news about Richard has taken me off my
balance. Come and meet my husband."

He followed her obediently and it occurred to him as they crossed the
room that she had that rare gift, so rare that he had some difficulty in
remembering that it was only a gift, of being able to talk directly to
the essential individual lurking behind the civilised façade of the man
before her, so that it was impossible for him to evade or disappoint her
without feeling personally responsible.

"Here he is," said Georgia. "Mr Campion, this is my husband."

Campion's involuntary thought on first meeting Sir Raymond Ramillies was
that he would be a particularly nasty drunk. This thought came out of
the air and was not inspired by anything faintly suggestive of the
alcoholic in the man himself. From Ramillies' actual appearance there
was nothing to indicate that he ever drank at all, yet when Campion was
first confronted by that arrogant brown face with the light eyes set too
close together and that general air of irresponsible power the first
thing that came into his mind was that it was as well that the fellow
was at least sober.

They shook hands and Ramillies stood looking at him in a way that could
only be called impudent. He did not speak at all but seemed amused and
superior without troubling to be even faintly antagonistic.

Mr Campion continued to regard him with misgiving and all the odd
stories he had heard about this youthful middle-aged man with the
fine-sounding name returned to his mind. Ramillies had retired from a
famous regiment after the Irish trouble, at which times fantastic and
rather horrible rumours had been floating about in connection with his
name. There had been a brief period of sporting life in the shires and
then he had been given the governorship of Ulangi, an unhealthy spot on
the West Coast, a tiny serpent of country separating two foreign
possessions. There the climate was so inclement that he was forced to
spend three months of the year at home, but it was hinted that he
contrived to make his exile not unexciting. Campion particularly
remembered a pallid youngster who had been one of a party to spend a
month at the Ulangi Residency and who had been strangely loth to discuss
his adventures there on his return. One remark had stuck in Campion's
mind: "Ramillies is a funny bird. All the time you're with him you feel
he's going to get himself hanged or win the V.C. then and there before
your eyes. Wonderful lad. Puts the wind up you."

Ramillies was quiet enough at the moment. He had made no remark of any
kind since their arrival, but had remained standing with his feet apart
and his hands behind him. He was swinging a little on his toes and his
alert face wore an expression of innocence which was blatantly
deceptive. Campion received the uncomfortable impression that he was
thinking of something to do.

"I've just blurted out all my misery about Richard." Georgia's deep
voice was devoid of any affectation and indeed achieved a note of rather
startling sincerity. "I had no idea how frightfully shaken up I am. You
know who Mr Campion is, don't you, Raymond?"

"Yes, of course I do." Ramillies glanced at his wife as he spoke and his
thin sharp voice, which had yet nothing effeminate about it, was amused.
He looked at Campion and spoke to him as though from a slight distance.
"Do you find that sort of thing terribly interesting? I suppose you do
or you wouldn't do it. There's a thrill in it, is there, hunting down
fellows?"

The interesting thing was that he was not rude. His voice, manner and
even the words were all sufficiently offensive to warrant one knocking
him down, but the general effect was somehow naïve. There was no
antagonism there at all, rather something wistful in the final question.

Mr Campion suddenly remembered him at school, a much older boy who had
gone on to Sandhurst at the end of Campion's first term, leaving a
banner of legend behind him. With a touch of snobbism which he
recognised as childish at the time he refrained from mentioning the
fact.

"The thrill is terrific," he agreed solemnly. "I frequently frighten
myself into a fit with it."

"Do you?" Again there was the faint trace of real interest.

Georgia put her arm through Campion's, an unself-conscious gesture
designed to attract his attention, which it did.

"Why did you come to see this dress show?"

He felt her shaking a little as she clung to him.

"I wanted to meet you," he said truthfully. "I wanted to talk to you."

"About Richard? I'll tell you anything I know. I want to talk about
him."

While there was no doubt about her sincerity there was a suggestion of
daring in her manner, an awareness of danger without the comprehension
of it, which gave him his first real insight into her essential
character and incidentally half startled the life out of him.

"You said he was dead, Raymond." There was a definite challenge in her
voice and Campion felt her quivering like a discharging battery at his
side.

"Oh yes, I knew the chap was dead." Ramillies was remarkably matter of
fact and Campion stared at him.

"How did you know?"

"Thought he must be, else he'd have turned up once I'd gone back to
Africa and Georgia was alone." He made the statement casually but with
conviction and it dawned upon the other man that he was not only
indifferent to any construction that might be put upon his words, but
incapable of seeing that they might convey any other meaning.

Georgia shuddered. Campion felt the involuntary movement and was puzzled
again, since it did not seem to be inspired purely by fear or disgust.
He had the unreasonable impression that there was something more like
pleasure at the root of it.

"If it wouldn't upset you to talk about him," he ventured, looking down
at her, "I'd like to hear your impression of his mental condition the
last time you saw him... if you're sure you don't mind."

"My dear, I _must_ talk!" Georgia's cry came from the heart, or seemed
to do so, but the next instant her grip on his arm loosened and she said
in an entirely different tone: "Who's that coming over here with Val?"

Campion glanced up and was aware of a faint sense of calamity.

"That?" he murmured guiltily. "Oh, that's Alan Dell, the aeroplane
chap."

"Introduce us," said Georgia. "I think he wants to meet me."

Val came across the room purposefully and it occurred to Mr Campion that
she looked like the Revenge sailing resolutely into battle with her
pennants flying. She looked very fine with her little yellow coxcomb
held high and every line of her body flowing with that particular kind
of femininity which is neat and precisely graceful. He sighed for her.
He was prepared to back the Spanish galleon every time.

Alan Dell came beside her. Having once met the man, Campion discovered
that his shy and peculiarly masculine personality was now completely
apparent and that his first superficial impression of him had vanished.

Georgia put about.

"My pretty," she said, stretching out both hands. "Come and comfort me
with clothes. I'm in a tragedy."

Her fine strong body was beautiful as she swung forward and a warmth of
friendliness went out to meet the other girl. Val responded to it
cautiously.

"I've got just the dress for it, whatever it is," she said lightly. "The
ultimate garment of all time."

Georgia drew back. She looked pathetically hurt behind her smile.

"I'm afraid it's a real tragedy," she said reproachfully.

"My pet, I'm so sorry. What is it?" Val made the apology so unjustly
forced from her and her eyes grew wary.

Georgia glanced over her shoulder before she spoke. Ramillies still
stood swinging on his toes, his glance resting consideringly upon the
small boy in the corner. Georgia shook her head.

"Tell me about the lovely dresses," she said, and added before Val or
Campion could speak, "Who is this?" a demand which brought Dell forward
with the conviction that there had been a general disinclination to
present him.

He shook hands with unexpected gaucherie and stood blinking at her,
suffering no doubt from that misapprehension so common to shy folk, that
he was not quite so clearly visible to her as she was to him.

Georgia regarded him with that glowing and intelligent interest which
was her chief weapon of attack.

"The second last person on earth to find in a dress shop," she said. "My
dear, are you going to enjoy all this? Have you ever been to this sort
of show before?"

"No," he said and laughed. "I stayed to see you."

Georgia blushed. The colour flowed up her throat and over her face with
a charm no seventeen-year-old could have touched.

"That's very nice of you," she said. "I'm afraid I'm going to be very
dull. Something rather beastly has happened to me and I'm just behaving
disgustingly and blurting it out to everyone."

It was a dangerous opening and might well have proved disastrous but
that her gift of utter directness was a lodestone. Dell's sudden
gratified sense of kindly superiority was communicated to them all and
he murmured something bald about seeing her in trouble once more.

"_The Little Sacrifice?_" she said quickly. "Oh, I adored that woman
Jacynth. I found myself putting all I'd ever known or ever felt into
her, poor sweetie. It was very nice of you to go and see me."

From that moment her manner changed subtly. It was such a gradual
metamorphosis, so exquisitely done, that Campion only just noticed it,
but the fact remained that she began to remind him strongly of the
heroine in _The Little Sacrifice_. Touches of the character crept into
her voice, into her helpless little gestures, into her very attitude of
mind, and he thought ungenerously that it would have been even more
interesting, besides being much more easy to follow, if the original
part had only been played in some strong foreign accent.

Dell was openly enchanted. He remained watching her with fascinated
attention, his blue eyes smiling and very kind.

"It was a long time ago and all very sad and silly even then." Georgia
sounded both brave and helplessly apologetic. "He was such a dear, my
sweet moody Richard. I knew him so awfully well. We were both innately
lonely people and... well, we were very fond of one another. When he
simply vanished I was brokenhearted, but naturally I couldn't admit it.
Could I?"

She made a little fluttering appeal to them all to understand.

"One doesn't, does one?" she demanded with that sudden frankness which,
if it is as embarrassing, is also as entirely disarming as nakedness. "I
mean, when one really is in love one's so painfully self-conscious, so
miserably mistrustful of one's own strength. I'm talking about the real,
rather tragic thing, of course. Then one's so horribly afraid that this
exquisite, precious, deliriously lovely sanctuary one's somehow achieved
may not be really solid, may not be one's own for keeps. One's so
conscious all the time that one can be hurt beyond the bounds of bearing
that in one's natural pessimism one dreads disaster all the time, and so
when something does happen one accepts it and crawls away somewhere. You
do know what I mean, don't you?"

They did, of course, being all adult and reasonably experienced, and Mr
Campion, who was shocked, was yet grudgingly impressed. Her tremendous
physical health and that quality which Dell had called "confiding" had
clothed an embarrassing revelation of the ordinary with something rather
charming. He glanced at Val.

She looked past him and did not speak aloud, although her lips moved. He
thought he read the words "strip tease," and regarded her with sudden
respect.

Georgia did not let the scene drop.

"I'm so sorry," she said helplessly. "This is all so disgustingly vulgar
of me, but oh, my dears!--suddenly to see it on the placards, to make
Ferdie leap out of the car and get a paper, to snatch it away from him
and then to look and find it all true! They've found his skeleton, you
see."

Her eyes were holding them all and there was real wretchedness in the
grey shadows.

"You never think of people you know having skeletons, do you?"

"My dear, how horrible!" Val's ejaculation was startled out of her.
"When did all this happen?"

"Now," said Georgia miserably. "Now, just as I was coming here. I'd have
gone home, my pet, but I couldn't let you and everybody else down just
when we were all so rushed. I didn't realise it was going to have this
dreadful loquacious effect upon me."

"Darling, what are you talking about?" Ferdie Paul slipped his arm round
her and drew her back against him. His face over her shoulder was dark
and amused, but there was more in his voice than tolerance. "Forget it.
You'll upset yourself."

Georgia shivered, smiled and released herself with a gentle dignity,
directed, Campion felt, at himself and Dell. She glanced at her husband,
who came forward promptly, his natural springy walk lending him a
jauntiness which added considerably to his disturbing air of active
irresponsibility.

"That's right, Georgie," he said in his flat staccato voice. "Forget the
fellow if you can, and if you can't don't make an ass of yourself."

Even he seemed to feel that this admonition might sound a trifle harsh
to the uninitiated, for he suddenly smiled with that transfiguring,
sunny happiness usually associated with early childhood. "What I mean to
say is, a lovely girl looks very touching grizzling over a corpse but
she looks damned silly doing it over a skeleton. She's missed the boat.
The great lover's not merely dead, dearest; he's dead and gone. Should I
be a bounder if I asked for a drink?"

The last remark was directed towards Val with a quick-eyed charm which
was ingratiating.

"Certainly not. You must all need one." Val sounded thoroughly startled.
She glanced at Rex, who had been hovering on the edge of the group, and
he nodded and disappeared. Ferdie Paul resumed his hold on Georgia. He
had a gently contemptuous way with her, as if she were a difficult
elderly relative of whom he was fond.

"We're going to see the great dress for the third act first," he said.
"I want to make sure that when Pendleton gets you by the throat he can
only tear the left shoulder out. It's got to be restrained and
dignified. I don't want you running about in your brassière. The whole
danger of that scene is that it may go a bit _vieux jeu_ if we don't
look out... nineteen twenty-sixish or so. Lady Papendeik wants us to
see the dress on the model first because apparently it's pretty hot.
Then I want you to get into it and we'll run through that bit."

Georgia stiffened.

"I'm not going to rehearse here in front of a lot of strangers," she
protested. "God knows I'm not temperamental, sweetheart, but there are
limits. You're not going to ask me to do that, Ferdie, not this
afternoon of all times?"

"Georgia." Paul's arm had tightened, and Campion saw his round brown
eyes fixed firmly upon the woman's own with a terrifying quality of
intelligence in them, as if he were trying to hypnotise some sense into
her. "Georgia, you're not going to be silly, are you, _dear_?"

It was an idiotic little scene, reminding Campion irresistibly of a
jockey he had once heard talking to a refractory horse.

"We'll go. Mr Campion and I will go, Miss Wells." Alan Dell spoke
hastily and Paul, looking up, seemed to see him for the first time.

"Oh no, that's all right," he said. "There's only a few of us here. It's
a purely technical matter. You're going to be reasonable, aren't you,
darling? You're only a bit jittery because of the boy friend."

Georgia smiled at him with unexpected tolerance and turned to Dell with
a little deprecating grimace.

"My nerves have gone to pieces," she said and it occurred to Mr Campion
that she might easily be more accurate than she realised.

It was at this moment that Tante Marthe came over with one of her small
coloured pages at her elbow.

"The _Trumpet_ is on the phone, my dear," she said. "Will you speak to
them?"

Georgia's hunted expression would have been entirely convincing if it
had not been so much what one might have expected.

"All right," she said heavily. "This is the horrible part of it all.
This is what I've been dreading. Yes, I'll come."

"No." Ramillies and Paul spoke together and paused to look at one
another afterwards. It was the briefest interchange of glances and Mr
Campion, who was watching them both, became aware for the first time
that the undercurrent which he had been trying to define throughout the
entire afternoon was an unusual, and in the circumstances
incomprehensible, combination of alarm and excitement.

"No," said Ramillies again. "Don't say a thing."

"Do you mean that?" She turned to him almost with eagerness and he did
not look at her.

"No, dear, I don't think I would." Ferdie Paul spoke casually. "We'll
put out some sort of statement later if it's necessary. It's not a
particularly good story so they won't get excited. Tell them Miss Wells
is not here. She left half an hour ago."

The page went off obediently and Paul watched the child until it
disappeared, his figure drooping and his prominent eyes thoughtful.
Georgia looked at Dell, who moved over to her.

"That must be a very great relief to you," he said.

She stared at him. "You understand, don't you?" she said with sudden
earnestness. "You really do."

Mr Campion turned away rather sadly and became aware of Val. She was
looking at the other woman and he caught her unawares. Once again she
surprised him. Jealousy is one emotion but hatred is quite another and
much more rare in a civilised community. Once it is seen it is not
easily forgotten.




CHAPTER FOUR


The gentle art of putting things over had always interested Mr Campion,
but as he sat down beside Alan Dell to watch the house of Papendeik at
work he was aware of a sudden sense of irritation. There was so much
going on under his nose that needed explanation. The strangers were
vivid personalities but not types he recognised and at the moment he did
not understand their reactions at all.

Meanwhile an impressive if informal performance was beginning. Val and
Tante Marthe were staging an act and he was entertained to note that
they worked together with the precision of a first-class vaudeville
turn.

Tante Marthe had seated herself on the largest of the settees between
the two most central windows and had made room for Ferdie Paul beside
her, while Georgia had been provided by Rex with a wide-seated gilt
chair thrust out into the room a little.

She sat in it regally, her dark head thrown back and her lovely broad
face tilted expectantly. Even so she contrived to look a little tragic,
making it clear that she was a woman with a background of deep emotional
experience.

Val stood behind her, slender and exquisite and very much the brilliant
young artist about to display something that might well prove to be the
masterpiece of a century.

The rest of the conversation piece was furnished by the staff. Every
available saleswoman had assembled together at one end of the room, as
though for prayers in an old-fashioned household. There was a flutter of
expectancy among them, a gathering together to admire a creation for
which they all took a small degree of personal responsibility. Their
very presence indicated a big moment.

Dell caught Campion's eye and leant forward.

"Wonderfully interesting," he whispered with professional appreciation.

There was a moment of silence and Rex slid forward to give an entirely
unnecessary flick to the folds of a curtain. Lady Papendeik glanced
round her and raised a small dark paw. The staff sighed and the dress
appeared.

At this point Mr Campion felt somewhat out of his depth. He looked at
the dress and saw that it was long and white, with a satisfactory
arrangement of drapery at the front, and that it had an
extraordinary-looking girl in it. She caught his attention because she
was beautiful without being in any way real or desirable. She had a
strong superficial likeness to Georgia inasmuch as she was not small and
was dark with broad cheekbones, but there all similarity ended. Where
Georgia was coarse the newcomer was exquisite, where Georgia was vital
the other girl was dead.

Campion glanced at Tante Marthe and was delighted to see her sitting
back, her hands in her lap, her eyes half closed and an outrageous
expression of fainting ecstasy on her face. Ferdie Paul looked
thoughtful but by no means unimpressed and the staff whispered and
preened itself.

Campion and Alan Dell looked at the gown again, each trying to discover
why it should be so particularly pleasing, and were both on the verge of
making the same thundering mistake by deciding that its charm lay in its
simplicity when Georgia dropped the bomb.

"Val, my angel," she said, her lovely husky voice sounding clearly
through the room, "it's breath-taking! It's _you_. It's _me_. But, my
pet, it's not _new_. I saw it last night at the Dudley Club."

There was a moment of scandalised silence. The Greek chorus in the
corner gaped and Rex's nervous giggle echoed inopportunely from the
background. The formal conversation piece had turned into a Gluyas
Williams picture.

Lady Papendeik rose.

"My dear," she said, "my dear." Her voice was not very loud or even
particularly severe but instantly all the humour went out of the
situation and Georgia was on the defensive.

"Oh, my dear, I'm so sorry." She turned to Val impulsively and the most
ungenerous among them could not have doubted her honesty. "There's been
some hideous mistake, of course. This whole day is like a nightmare. I
did see it. I saw it last night and it fascinated me. I can even prove
it, unfortunately. There's a photograph of the Blaxill woman wearing it
in one of the morning papers... the _Range Finder_, I think... on
the back page. She's dancing with a cabinet minister. I noticed it,
naturally. It wiped the floor with everything else."

Val said nothing. Her face was quite expressionless as she nodded to the
horrified group at the other end of the room. There was a discreet
scurrying towards the door and a rustle of chatter as they reached the
hall. Georgia stood up. Her tall, graceful body towered over Val, making
the other girl look as if she belonged to some smaller and neater world.

"Of course it hadn't your cut," she said earnestly, "and I don't think
it was in that material, but it was white."

Lady Papendeik shrugged her shoulders.

"That is Bouileau's _Caresse_," she said, "woven to our design."

Georgia looked like helpless apology personified.

"I had to tell you," she said.

"Of course you did, my dear," murmured Lady Papendeik without thawing.
"Of course."

There was no doubt that the incident was a major catastrophe. Everybody
began to talk and Paul crossed the room to Val's side, with Ramillies,
casual and unaccountable, at his heels.

Mr Campion was puzzled. In his experience the duplication of a design,
although the most dispiriting of all disasters to the artist concerned,
is seldom taken seriously by anyone else, unless hard money has already
been involved, and he began to wonder if this explosion was not in the
nature of a safety valve, seized upon gratefully because it was a
legitimate excuse for excitement actually engendered by something less
politic to talk about.

The other person who might possibly have shared Mr Campion's own Alice
in Wonderland view of the situation was the small boy. He sat staring
into the inside of his Haverleigh cap, his forehead wrinkled, and was
apparently unaware of any crisis.

The return of Rex was dramatic. He came hurrying in with a perfectly
white face, a newspaper in his outstretched hand. Lady Papendeik stood
looking at the photograph for some moments and when she spoke her
comment was typical.

"Only a thief would permit a woman with a stomach to commit such
sacrilege. Who dresses her?"

The others crowded round and Dell turned to Campion again.

"It's a leakage," he murmured. "You can't stop it in any show where
designs are secret. It's an infuriating thing."

"It's a miracle the photograph is so clear," said Georgia forlornly.
"They're usually so vague. But you can't miss that, can you? It was in
ribbed silk. I couldn't take my eyes off it." She put an arm round Val's
shoulders. "You poor sweet," she said.

Val released herself gently and turned to Rex.

"Who is that woman's couturier?"

"Ring her up." Ramillies made the outrageously impolitic suggestion with
all the vigorous irresponsibility which turned him into such a
peculiarly disturbing element. "Say you're a magazine. Georgia, you do
it... or I will. Shall I?"

"No, darling, of course not. Don't be an ass." Georgia had spoken
casually and he turned to her.

"Ass be damned!" he exploded with a violence which startled everyone.
"It's the only intelligent suggestion that's been put forward so far.
What's the woman's name? She'll be in the book, I suppose."

His fury was so entirely unexpected that for a moment the main disaster
was forgotten. Campion stared at him in astonishment. His thin jaws were
clenched and the little pulses in them throbbed visibly. The reaction
was so entirely out of proportion to the occurrence that Campion was
inclined to suspect that the man was drunk after all, when he caught a
glimpse of Ferdie Paul. Both he and Georgia were eyeing Ramillies with
definite apprehension.

"Wait a moment, old boy." Paul sounded cautious. "You never know. We may
be able to pin it down here."

"You may in an hour or so of fooling about." Ramillies' contempt was
bitter. "But that's the straightforward, elementary way of finding a
thing out... ask."

"Just one little moment," murmured Tante Marthe over her shoulder. "This
is not a thing that has never happened before."

Ramillies shrugged his shoulders. "As you please. But I still think the
intelligent thing to do is to get on the phone to the woman. Tell her
all about it if you must. But if I was doing it myself I should say I
was a magazine and get it out of her that way. However, it's nothing to
do with me, thank God."

He swung on his heel and made for the door.

"Ray, where are you going?" Georgia still sounded apprehensive.

He paused on the threshold and regarded her with cold dislike which was
uncomfortably convincing.

"I'm simply going downstairs to see if they've got a telephone book," he
said and went out.

Val glanced at Georgia, a startled question in her eyes, but it was
Ferdie Paul who answered her.

"Oh no, that's all right. He won't phone," he said and looked across at
the small boy, who nodded reassuringly and, sliding off his chair,
passed unobtrusively out of the room. It was an odd incident and Dell
glanced at Campion.

"Astonishing chap," he said under his breath and regarded Georgia with
increased interest.

Meanwhile Rex, who had been permitted to get a word in at last, was
talking earnestly to Tante Marthe. He had a nervous habit of wriggling
ingratiatingly and now, all the time he was talking, he seemed to be
making surreptitious attempts to stroke his calves by leaning over
backwards to get at them. But his observations were to the point.

"I know Leonard Lôke used to dress her," he said, "and if the design has
gone there, of course it means it'll be turned over to the worst kind of
wholesalers and produced by the hundred. It's a tragedy."

"The premier who made it, the vendeuse, Mrs Saluski, the child in the
fitting room, you, myself and Val," murmured Lady Papendeik, shooting
her little lizard head up. "No one else saw the finished dress. The
sketch was never completed. Val cut it on the living model."

Rex straightened.

"Wait," he said in an altered voice. "I've remembered. Leonard Lôke is
two partners, Pretzger and Morris. Pretzger had a brother-in-law in the
fur trade. You may remember him, madame; we've dealt with him once or
twice. A fortnight ago I saw that man dining at the Borgia in Greek
Street and he had Miss Adamson with him."

The dramatic point of this statement was not clear to Mr Campion at
first but, as all eyes were slowly turned upon the one person in the
room who had hitherto taken no interest whatever in the proceedings, the
inference dawned slowly upon him.

The mannequin had remained exactly where she was when the general
attention had first been distracted from her. She was standing in the
middle of the room, beautiful, serene and entirely remote. Her lack of
reality was almost unpleasant and it occurred to Campion that her
personality was as secret as if she had been a corpse. Now, with
everyone staring at her rather than her dress, she did not come to life
but remained looking at them blankly with brilliant, foolish eyes.

"Caroline, is this true?" demanded Tante Marthe.

"Is what true, madame?" Her voice, a jew's-harp with a Croydon accent,
came as a shock to some of them. Campion, who knew from experience that
the beauty of porcelain lies too often in the glaze, was not so much
surprised as regretfully confirmed in an opinion.

"Don't be a fool, my dear." Lady Papendeik betrayed unexpected
heartiness. "You must know if you've eaten with a man or not. Do not let
us waste time."

"I didn't know whose brother-in-law he was," protested Miss Adamson
sulkily.

"Did you describe the model? Did it slip out by accident? These things
have happened."

"No, I didn't tell him, madame."

"You understand what has occurred?"

Miss Adamson did not change her expression. Her dark eyes were liquid
and devastatingly unintelligent.

"I didn't tell him anything. I swear it, I didn't."

Tante Marthe sighed. "Very well. Go and take it off."

As the girl floated from the room Val made a gesture of resignation.

"That's all we shall ever know," she said to Dell, who was standing
beside her. "There's a direct link there, of course, but she was quite
emphatic."

Campion joined them.

"I thought I noticed a certain clinging to the letter," he ventured.

"That was the diagnosis that leapt to my mind but I didn't care to
mention it," Dell said, and added with the smile which made him
attractive, "She's too lovely to be that kind of fool."

"No one's too lovely to be mental, in my experience," remarked Lady
Papendeik briskly. "What diagnosis is this?"

"We thought she might be a letter-of-the-law liar," Dell said, glancing
at Campion for support. "She didn't tell the man, she drew it for him.
They're the most impossible people in the world to deal with. If you pin
them down they get more and more evasive and convince themselves all the
time that they're speaking the literal truth... which they are, of
course, in a way. In my experience the only thing to do is to get rid of
them, however valuable they are. Still, I shouldn't like to convict the
girl on that evidence alone."

Tante Marthe hesitated and it went through Campion's mind that she was
suppressing a remark that might possibly turn out to be indiscreet.

Ferdie Paul, who had remained silent throughout the interview, looked
down at her.

"Send her to Caesar's Court," he said. "She's too lovely to lose.
Margaret is down there, isn't she? Turn this kid over to her. She can
talk about the gowns there as much as she likes; she won't see them
until they're ready to be shown."

"Perhaps so," said Tante Marthe and her black eyes wavered.

Georgia resumed her seat.

"I think you're very generous, Val," she began. "I'm brokenhearted. I
could weep. You'll never make me anything so deliriously lovely again."

"No," Val said, a cloud passing over her face, "I don't suppose I ever
shall."

Georgia stretched out a strong hand and drew the other girl towards her.

"Darling, that was mean," she said with a sweet gentleness which was out
of period, let alone character. "You're upset because your lovely design
has been stolen. You're naturally livid and I understand that. But
you're lucky, you know. After all, Val, it's such a little thing. I hate
to repeat all this but I can't get it off my mind. Richard's poor
murdered body has been found and here are we all fooling about with
stupid idiot dresses for a stupid idiot play."

She did not turn away but sat looking at them and her eyes slowly filled
with tears and brimmed over. If she had only sounded insincere, only
been not quite so unanswerably in the right, the outburst would have
been forgivable: as it was, they all stood round uncomfortably until Mr
Campion elected to drop his little brick.

"I say, you know, you're wrong there," he said in his quiet, slightly
nervous voice. "I don't think the word 'murder' has gone through any
official mind. Portland-Smith committed suicide; that's absolutely
obvious, to the police at any rate."

Val, who knew him, guessed from his expression of affable innocence that
he hoped for some interesting reaction to this announcement, but neither
of them was prepared for what actually took place. Georgia sat up
stiffly in her chair and stared at him, while a dark stream of colour
rose up her throat, swelling the veins in her neck and passing over her
expressionless face.

"That's not true," she said.

With what appeared to be well-meaningness of the most unenlightened
kind, Mr Campion persisted in his point, ignoring all the danger
signals.

"Honestly," he said. "I can reassure you on that question. I'm hand in
glove with the fellow who found the body. As a matter of fact I was
actually on the spot myself this morning. The poor chap had killed
himself all right.... At least that's what the coroner will decide;
I'm sure of it."

The quiet plausible voice was conversational and convincing.

"No." Georgia made the word a statement. "I don't believe it. It's not
true." She was controlling herself with difficulty and when she stood up
her body was trembling with the effort. There was no doubt at all about
her principal emotion and it was so unaccountable and unreasonable in
the circumstances that even Mr Campion showed some of the astonishment
he felt. She was angry, beside herself with ordinary, unadulterated
rage.

Campion looked to Ferdie Paul for assistance, but he did not intervene.
He stood regarding her speculatively, almost, it seemed to Campion, with
the same sort of puzzled conjecture that he felt himself.

It was left to Tante Marthe to make the enquiry that was on the tip of
everybody's tongue.

"My dear child," she said with faint reproof in her tone, "why be so
annoyed? The poor man has been dead these three years. Had he been
murdered it must have meant that someone killed him and that would
entail trouble for everyone who knew him. If he killed himself no one
need think of him with anything except pity."

"Oh, don't be so silly, angel." Georgia turned on the old woman in
exasperation. "Can't you see the damage a story like that can do once it
gets about? I won't believe it. I know it's not true."

"You _know_?" Campion's eyes were mild behind his spectacles but they
did not disarm her into answering him impulsively.

"Richard was not a suicidal type," she said after a pause which lasted
too long. "This is the final insufferable straw. I can't bear it. You
must all forgive me and manage as best you can. I must go home."

"Going home?" Ramillies' voice sounded disappointed in the doorway.
"Why? What's the matter now?" He seemed to have forgotten his flamboyant
exit of ten minutes before, and came in jauntily pleased with himself as
ever.

Georgia stood looking at him steadily.

"Albert Campion says Richard committed suicide. He seems to think
there's no doubt about it."

"Oh?" Ramillies' casualness was remarkable and Campion wished he knew
the man better. From what he had seen of him so far the reaction might
mean absolutely anything, even genuine disinterest. Since no one else
spoke it came to Ramillies somewhat belatedly that further comment was
expected. "It's a long time ago, anyhow," he remarked with singularly
unhappy effect. "There'll be no ferreting about either, which is one
good thing. That's the one advantage of suicide; everyone knows who did
it," he ended lamely, and remained looking at his wife.

Georgia kept her eyes upon him for almost a minute and, having subdued
him, turned to Dell.

"Would you be most terribly kind and drive me home?"

"Why, yes. Yes, of course." He looked a little startled. "Of course," he
repeated. "I'd like to."

"Bless you," said Georgia and smiled at him faintly.

"Oh, I'll take you home if you really want to go," put in Ramillies
without much enthusiasm.

She drew away from him.

"I'm not sure if I ever want to speak to you again," she said distinctly
and went out, taking Dell with her.

"What on earth did she mean by that?" demanded Ferdie Paul.

Ramillies turned to look at him and there was, incongruously, the
suggestion of a smile in the many creases round his eyes.

"God knows, my dear fellow," he said. "God knows."




CHAPTER FIVE


There is a distinct difference between the state of believing something
to be true and knowing it to be so with the paid stamp of an official
opinion affixed to the knowledge.

When the embarrassed foreman of the coroner's jury stood up in the cool
dark village hall at Wellferry and stated that he and his confreres were
convinced that the skeleton found in the bushes at Eves Hall on the
Shelley road was the skeleton of Richard Portland-Smith, who had died by
his own hand--a hand which had first thrust the barrel of a revolver
into his mouth and then pulled the trigger--and that in their considered
opinion he must have been of unsound mind at the time to have done such
a thing, Mr Campion felt aware of a distinct wave of relief, a
comforting confirmation and a full stop, as it were.

He was sitting beside the man who was his friend and client at the end
of a row of church chairs arranged against a wall of the converted army
hut, and the scene before him was melancholy and very human. It was a
coroner's court in essence, the bare practical bones of that judicial
proceeding which has remained sound and useful from far-off simple
times. A man had died mysteriously and nine of his countrymen had met
together on the common ground of their patrial birth to decide how such
a calamity had befallen him. There had been no decoration, no merciful
arabesques of judicial pomp to smother the stark proceedings. The
witnesses had come to the T-shaped table and muttered their depositions
with nervous humility, while the jury had listened stolidly and
afterwards shuffled out to the little cloakroom behind the stage on
which the Conservative Concerts were held in the spring, and had
returned, self-conscious and unhappy, to give their verdict.

Now the coroner with the patchy pink face and the unfortunate air of
being unaccustomed to his job wriggled in his chair. He glanced shyly at
the four pressmen at the far end of the table, almost, it would seem, in
the hope of getting a little appreciation from them, or at least some
indication that he had been "all right," and returned to his formalities
with the jury.

The witnesses, who had been sitting with their friends around the walls,
began to file out into the sunlight and the inspector came across to ask
Mr Campion's companion about the funeral. He was not tactful but he was
kindly, and his pleasant Kentish voice rumbled on, explaining with
simple practicalness that the shed where the remains now lay was not
public property and the owner needed it for his handcart, whose paint
was even now blistering in the sun. He added that the local builder, who
had been on the jury, was also the undertaker and he had no doubt but
that he would be over in a minute, so that no time would be lost.

While the sad little details were being arranged Mr Campion had leisure
to reflect on the evidence which had brought the Sunday-suited jury,
with their perpetual jingle of darts medals and their solid, sensible
faces, to their conclusions.

The identification had provided the most interesting fifteen minutes of
the morning. The brown paper parcels of grey-green rags, the mildewed
wallet complete with discoloured notes and visiting cards, and the rusty
gun had been first displayed and sworn to by tailor and manservant.
Afterwards, even more gruesome, had come the evidence of the
self-important little dentist, who had rushed in to rattle off his
formidable list of degrees and testify that the dental work in the
remains of the dead man's jaw was his own and that it corresponded to
his records of Portland-Smith's mouth. He had given place to the county
pathologist, who had described the wound in detail and given his
opinions on the length of time during which the body must have lain
undiscovered.

Finally Mr Campion's companion had walked to the table, his enormous
shoulders held erect and the light from a window high in the wall
falling on his white hair, which was silky and theatrically handsome. He
had given his word that as far as he knew his son had no worries of
sufficient magnitude to drive him to take his life. That had been all.
The coroner had summed up and the jury had shambled out. Richard
Portland-Smith had retired from the round dance of life while his
measure in it was yet incomplete and nobody knew why.

Mr Campion and his companion walked down the road to the inn where lunch
was awaiting them. It was bright and clean in the sunlight, with summer
in the air and all that promise of breathless festivity just round the
corner which is the spirit of that time of year.

Campion did not speak, since his companion showed no desire to do so,
but he glanced at the man out of the corner of his eye and thought that
he was taking it very well.

In his own sphere Sir Henry Portland-Smith was a great man. In his
hospital in South London he was a hard-working god whose every half-hour
was earmarked for some separate and important purpose. This was probably
the first morning he had set aside for purely personal considerations
during the past twenty years.

Like many great physicians, he had a fine presence allied to enormous
physical strength, and although he was nearly seventy his movements were
vigorous and decisive. He did not talk until they sat down together in
an alcove of the big dining room, which smelt faintly of creosote and
plaster from recent restoring. The place was very quiet. They were early
and a fleet of little tables, which looked homely and countrified in
spite of an effort at sophistication, spread out before them.

"Satisfied?" The old man looked at Campion directly. He had taken off
his spectacles and his cold but rather fine grey eyes had that pathetic,
naked look which eyes which are normally hidden behind lenses achieve
when the barrier is down.

"I think it was a true verdict."

"Unsound mind?"

Campion shrugged his shoulders.

"What _is_ unsound mind?" he said helplessly. "It means nothing."

"Merely a form to get round the Christian burial difficulty?" There was
bitterness in the query, which was unusual and slightly shocking to find
in the old, and Campion, looking up, found himself thinking irrelevantly
that if over-busy people keep young they also keep raw, retaining the
prejudices and sophistries of their first period. He prepared to listen
to an outburst against the hypocrisy of the law and the Church, but it
did not come. Sir Henry planted his great elbows on the table and pushed
his hands over his face as if he were cleansing it. He had the long,
fine hands of the man who does not use them and the younger man
remembered that he was not a surgeon.

"I'm trying to make up my mind," he said presently. "I appreciate what
you've done, Albert. I like your reticence and your quiet persistence.
I'm grateful to you for finding the boy. It's all over now with the
least possible scandal. In a few months now he might never have been
born."

This time the bitterness was savage and Campion, meeting those old,
chilly, naked eyes, was suddenly ashamed of himself for his smugness. He
caught one of those sudden panoramic glimpses of a whole
thirty-eight-year life and was aware for an instant of the paralysingly
infuriating tragedy of waste.

"I want to know," said the old man. "For my own satisfaction I want to
know. Now look here, my boy, this is a private matter between you and
me. The public aspect of this affair is fixed and finished. Richard is
dead. Everybody knows he shot himself. And that is the end. But I want
to know why he did it and I want you to find out."

Mr Campion's pale eyes were intelligent behind his spectacles but he
looked uncomfortable.

"You're thinking he may have had a brainstorm?" Sir Henry made the query
an accusation. "You're ready to believe in the form, are you? Well, you
may be right. But I want to know."

Mr Campion was an adroit young man and the present situation was not one
he had not encountered before.

"I'll do anything I can," he said slowly. "But, after all, we've covered
a lot of ground already. You say yourself he must have been very
extravagant. He was earning money and could have carried on, but he
_had_ no money when he died. You think he spent all his mother's legacy
on Miss Wells? That is very probable but it is a thing we shall never
find out. No one can find out how a man spent the money he drew out in
cash three years before. I will do all I can but I can't promise
results."

Sir Henry leant back in his chair and surveyed his companion
consideringly. He was smiling a little and his magnificent head had
never looked more imposing.

"My boy," he said, "I'm going to tell you something. This is a secret.
Never let it out of your mouth, whatever happens, but when I tell you,
you'll see why I am so anxious that you should carry on."

He hesitated and Campion was puzzled. It was impossible not to be
impressed by the other man's manner, nor had he any reason to suspect
him of anything faintly theatrical or unsound. In his experience Sir
Henry was a sophisticated and in many ways a hard man.

"Yes?" he invited.

"You've seen this girl Georgia Wells, as I asked you?"

"Yes."

"Are you taken with her?"

The question was so unexpected that Campion blinked.

"No," he said truthfully. "I see her attraction but I should never be
bowled over by her myself."

"Did she strike you as being a clever woman? Not a bluestocking, of
course, but a really clever woman? Clever in the extraordinary way women
sometimes are? Clever enough to get a man to do anything she wanted him
to by reasoning with him?"

Campion gave the matter serious consideration.

"Not unless he was a fool," he said at last.

"Ah!" The old man pounced on the admission. "I thought not. That's what
makes this so very interesting. Richard was not a fool. I would admit it
if he was. I haven't been a physician all my life without learning that
you can't make a true diagnosis if you falsify the symptoms. Richard was
not a fool in that way. He was a virile type, the type to lose his head
over a woman for a night but not for a month or two. Once he got his
mind working again it would work, whatever his physical inclinations
were. Do you follow me?"

"Yes," said Mr Campion dubiously. "But--forgive me--I don't think this
is getting us very far. You see, there's no evidence even of a quarrel.
She seems to have been happily engaged to him right up to the time he
disappeared."

"Campion"--the old man was leaning across the table--"you've seen that
girl and you know her history. Do you honestly think she was the type of
woman to be engaged to anybody?"

The younger man stared at him. The question had jerked him round to face
a problem which had been chipping away at the back of his mind for some
time. Now that it was out, unprotected by the automatic acceptance that
is given to a fact that is known to everybody, the whole matter did
strike him as extraordinary.

"A woman once through the divorce courts, important in a bohemian
profession, doesn't go and get herself involved in a long engagement."
Sir Henry's voice was contemptuous. "She gets married, my boy. She gets
married."

Campion sat up.

"They were married!" he said blankly. "But that's incredible. She
married again. What about Ramillies?"

"Yes, that was six months after Richard disappeared." The old man was
speaking earnestly. "After he disappeared, mind you, not after he died.
No one knows when he died, although the likelihood is that the two
events coincided. But the point I want you to realise is that the woman
knew Richard was dead more than two years before we did. She must have
known it. Why was she so quiet about it?"

He leant back in his chair and surveyed Campion steadily, his fierce
cold eyes hard and intelligent.

Mr Campion passed his hand over his fair hair.

"Are you sure of this?"

"Absolutely."

"You could prove it?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you tell me before?"

"I didn't know it for certain until three or four weeks ago and by then
I felt sure the boy was dead. Now that I know roughly when he died, I am
wondering. Whatever we find out, I don't want it made public. I see no
point in that. The publicity would hardly hurt me or his memory, but I
have daughters and they have children, so I see no reason why the tale
should linger on. Let it die with Richard. But I want to know."

Mr Campion did not look at ease. His thin, good-humoured face with the
twisted mouth was grave and his eyes thoughtful.

"You put me in a very awkward position," he said at last. "When I
undertook this search for your son I simply felt I was making myself
useful to an old friend of Belle Lafcadio's, and I've been more than
glad to do it, but now I'm afraid I can't go any farther. This woman
Georgia Wells is an important client of my sister's. To get hold of her
I must abuse hospitality there. You see how it is."

He paused apologetically, and the old man watched him, a faint smile
playing round the corners of his mouth.

"I'm hardly contemplating revenge," he observed.

"No. I did realise that." Campion was hesitating and unhappy. "But this
marriage alters the whole complexion of the business."

"I think so. It makes it very curious."

Campion was silent, and after a while Sir Henry went on.

"My boy," he said, "I'm an old man who's seen a great deal, and I don't
like mysteries. My son's death was a shock to my affections, of course,
but it was also a shock of surprise. I simply want to know what the
circumstances were that induced Richard, who was no neurotic, to take
his life, and why that woman should never have told what she must have
known. Don't make a mouthful of it, but if you should ever find out,
remember I want to know."

Campion raised his head.

"I'll do what I can," he said, "but don't rely on me."

"Very well," said the old physician, and changed the subject abruptly.

For the rest of the meal they discussed the Abominable Snowmen and other
sedate fripperies, but as Campion drove back to London a thought slipped
quietly into his mind and sat there nagging at him.

Georgia Wells had not been sure of Portland-Smith's death until the day
on which the discovery of his body had been reported in the newspapers:
of that Campion was only fairly certain; but there was one point upon
which he was prepared to stake his all, and that was that she had no
idea that her ex-husband had committed suicide until Campion himself had
told her.




CHAPTER SIX


It was a little over six weeks later, one evening when the summer was at
its height and London was sprawling, dirty and happily voluptuous, in
the yellow evening sun, that Mr Campion, letting himself into the flat,
was accosted by a hoarse voice from the bathroom.

"Your sis rang up. She's coming round with a Frog of some sort."

Not wishing to snub, but at the same time hoping to convey some
disapproval at the lack of ceremony, Mr Campion passed on to the sitting
room without comment.

He had seated himself at the desk, found some cigarettes and pulled a
sheet of notepaper towards him before there was a lumbering in the
passage outside and a vast, melancholy figure in a black velvet coat
surged breathily into the room.

Mr Lugg, Mr Campion's "male person's gentleman," regarded his employer
with reproachful little black eyes.

"You 'eard," he said, and added with charming confiding, "I was cleanin'
meself up. You'd do well to put on a dressing gown and a belt."

"A belt?" enquired Campion, taken off his guard.

"Braces is low, except when worn with a white waistcoat for billiards."
Lugg made the pronouncement with justifiable pride. "I picked that up
down at the club today. You'll 'ave to get a new robe, too. Mr Tuke's
young feller has a different-coloured one for every day of the week.
What d'you say to that idea?"

"Slightly disgusting."

Lugg considered, his eyes flickering.

"I tell 'im it was pansy," he admitted, "but I couldn't be sure. It was
a shot in the dark. 'Robe,' though; make a note of that. 'Robe's' the
new name for dressing gown. I'm learnin' a lot from Mr Tuke. He lent me
'is book, for one thing."

Campion threw down his pen.

"You're learning to read, are you?" he said pleasantly. "That's good.
That'll keep us both quiet."

Mr Lugg let down the flap of the cocktail cabinet with elaborate care
before he deigned to reply.

"Silence is like sleep," he observed with unnatural solemnity. "It
refreshes wisdom."

"Eh?" said Mr Campion.

A slow, smug smile passed over the great white face and Mr Lugg coughed.

"That give you something to think about," he said with satisfaction.
"D'you know 'oo thought of it? Walter Plato."

"Really?" Mr Campion was gratified. "And who was he?"

"A bloke." The scholar did not seem anxious to pursue the matter
further, but afterwards, unwilling to lessen any impression he might
have made, he spurred himself to a further flight. "'Im what give 'is
name to the term 'platitude.'" He threw the piece of information over
his shoulder with all the nonchalance of the finest academic tradition
and peered round to see the effect.

He was rewarded. Mr Campion appeared to have been stricken dumb.

"Is that in the book?" he enquired humbly after a pause.

"I expec' so," said Lugg, adding magnificently, "I read it somewhere. Mr
Tuke's getting me interested in education. Education is the final stamp
of good class, that's what 'e says."

"And a belt," murmured Campion. "Don't forget that."

The fat man heaved himself towards the desk.

"Look 'ere," he said belligerently, "I expected somethin' like this.
Every step I've took in an upward direction you've done your best to
nark. Now I'm on to somethin' useful. I'm goin' to educate myself, and
then I'll never feel inferior, not with anybody, see?"

"My dear chap----" Mr Campion was touched. "You don't feel inferior with
anybody now, surely, do you? Lay off, Lugg. This is a horrible line."

The other man regarded him shrewdly. His little black eyes were winking,
and there was a certain sheepishness in his expression which was out of
character.

"Not with you, of course, cock," he conceded affectionately. "But I do
with Mr Tuke. 'E thinks about it. Still, let 'im wait."

"Is it _all_ in the book?" enquired Mr Campion, whom the idea seemed to
fascinate.

"A ruddy great lot of it is." Mr Lugg wrestled with his pocket. "I'll be
as hot as most when I get this on board." He produced a small dictionary
of quotations and laid it metaphorically at Mr Campion's feet. "I'm
leavin' out the Yiddish," he remarked as they turned over the pages
together. "See that bit there? And there's another over 'ere."

Campion sighed.

"It may be Yiddish to you, guv'nor," he murmured, "but it's Greek to me.
These two lads Milt and Shakes get an unfair look-in, don't they?"

"They're all all right." Lugg was magnanimous. "But when I get good I'll
do me own quotations. A quotation's only a short neat way of sayin'
somethin' everybody knows, like '_It's crackers to slip a rozzer the
dropsy in snide_.' That's the sort of thing. Only you want it to be
about somethin' less 'omely... women and such."

Mr Campion seemed rather taken with the idea of running a line in
personal quotations on the system of "every man his own poet," and Lugg
was gratified.

"I don't often get you goin'," he observed with satisfaction. "Lucky I
'it on this; it might have been religion. There's a bloke at the
club----"

"No," said Mr Campion, pulling himself together. "No, old boy. No,
really. Not now."

"That's what I tell 'im." Lugg was cheerful. "I'll come to it, I says,
but not now. I'm sorry, mate, but I don't see yer as a brother yet.
Which reminds me--what about your sis? She'll be 'ere any minute. What's
she up to? She's in with a funny crowd, isn't she?"

"Val? I don't think so."

Lugg sniffed. "I do. Mr Tuke tell me in confidence that 'e 'eard someone
pass a remark about seein' 'er at a luncheon party at the Tulip with a
very funny lot... that bloke Ramillies, for one."

Once more Mr Campion pushed his letter aside, faint distaste on his
face.

"Of course we don't want to go listenin' to servants' gossip," continued
Lugg happily, "but I like that girl and I wouldn't like to see 'er mixed
up with a chap like Ramillies."

He pronounced the name with such a wealth of disgust that his employer's
interest was stirred in spite of himself.

"I've met Sir Raymond Ramillies," he said.

"'Ave yer?" The black eyes expressed disapproval. "I ain't and I don't
want to. A ruddy awful chap. 'Ide your wife in a ditch rather than let
'im set eyes on her. 'E's a proper blot. I tell you what, if you 'ad to
set in public court and 'ear a beak talkin' to 'im after the sentence
you'd 'ave to turn your 'ead away. You'd blush; that's a fact."

"That's slander," said Campion mildly. "The man's never been in the dock
in his life."

"And wot's that?" Lugg was virtuous. "As you very well know, there's a
lot of people walkin' about today 'oo ought to be in the jug by rights.
'E 'appens to be one of them, that's all."

Long experience had taught Mr Campion not to argue with his aide in this
mood, but he felt bound to protest.

"You mustn't drivel libel about people. You're like a woman."

"Ho!" The insult penetrated the skin and Mr Lugg's mountainous form
quivered. "You've got no right to say a thing like that, cock," he said
earnestly. "I know what I'm sayin'. Sir Ramillies is mud, not so good as
mud. He's done one man in, to my certain knowledge, and the army tales
about 'im make my 'air curl, wherever it may be now. 'Ere's an instance.
Take the time of the Irish trouble. There was a couple of fellers come
over to England after 'im. They were lookin' for 'im, I admit that, but
neither of 'em 'ad a gun. They lay for 'im up in Hampstead where 'e used
to live. 'E spotted 'em and went for 'em quick as a flash. 'E caught one
chap and killed 'im with 'is bare 'ands--broke 'is neck. The bloke was
on the run, mind you, but Ramillies got 'im by the 'air and forced 'is
chin up until 'e 'eard 'is neck go. 'E was only a little feller. It was
'ushed up when they found out the lads were reely after 'im and it was
self-defence, and Ramillies was ruddy pleased with 'imself. Saw 'imself
a Tarzan. I don't know what you think about it but it don't sound quite
nice to me; not at all the article. It's downright brutish, look at it
how you like. Put me off the chap for life. It's not respectable to lose
your temper like that. Makes you no better than an animal. It's
dangerous, for one thing."

The story was certainly not attractive, and it occurred to Mr Campion
that it was unfortunate that, having met Ramillies, it did not strike
him as being obviously untrue.

"Do you know this for a fact?"

"Of course I do." Lugg was contemptuous. "I 'ad a drink with the other
bloke. 'E _was_ in a state--not frightened, you know, but shook. There's
other tales about Ramillies not as pretty as that. I wouldn't soil yer
ears with 'em. 'E's not the bloke for your sis to sit down to table
with, not if she was in Salvation Army uniform, take it from me."

Mr Campion said no more. He remained sitting at his desk with his head
slightly on one side and an introspective expression in his eyes.

He was still there, drumming idly on the blotter with his long thin
fingers, when the doorbell buzzed and a subtle change came over Mr Lugg.

He straightened his back from his ministrations at the cocktail cabinet
and padded over to the wall mirror, where he settled his collar,
arranging his chins upon its white pedestal with great care. Having thus
set the stage, he pulled a silk handkerchief out of his side pocket and
gave his glistening head a good rub with it, using it immediately
afterwards to give a flick to the toe of each patent-leather pump. Then
he pulled himself up to attention and, turning all in one piece with his
plump hands flat against his sides, he tottered from the room.

A moment or so later he returned with an expressionless face and the
words "This way, please. 'E'll see you and be 'appy to," uttered in a
voice so affected in tone and quality that the announcement was barely
comprehensible.

Val came in hurriedly. She looked very charming in her black suit with
the faintly military air about it, and with her came all that fragrance
and flutter which has been the hallmark of the "lovely lady" since Mme
de Maintenon discovered it. She was so vivacious and determinedly gay
that Campion did not notice any change in her for some time.

Behind her came a stranger whose personality was instantly and
engagingly apparent.

Georgy Laminoff, or Gaiogi, as his friends called him, with the g's
hard, was a delightful person. The art of being delightful was with him
a life study, and, since he was no fool and at heart a prince, he
achieved an excellence in it. To look at, he was round and gracious,
with a small white beard and bright circular eyes in sockets as arched
and sombre as Norman gateways.

He took Mr Campion's hand with a murmur of apology which came from his
soul. It was an intrusion, he insisted, an abominable and disgusting
thing, but Val had assured him that it would be forgiven and he was
happy to note from the very amiability of his host's expression that it
was indeed miraculously so. He seated himself when bidden, conveying
without saying so that the chair was incomparably comfortable and that
he knew and appreciated the superb quality of the sherry which had been
offered him.

Within five minutes of his arrival they were sitting round in pleasant
intimacy. The ice had melted rather than broken, and yet his behaviour
had never deviated for a moment from that exact formality which is the
rightful protection of every man against the stranger within his doors.

Val leant back in the winged chair, unaware that she was irritating her
brother, who, for some reason of his own, did not like to see a woman
sitting in it.

"We've got a nice new job for you, my lamb," she said. "Something easy
and vulgar. How would you like to bring your boots and have a slap-up
week end with all the comforts of the rich, and the rare intellectual
treat of mingling with the best people--all for nothing? What about it?"

Laminoff made a deprecating gesture with a spade-shaped hand.

"I am embarrassed," he said. "We are unpleasant, ignorant people. I
shall commit suicide." He chuckled with sudden happiness. "I talk like
all the best plays."

"Anything except divorce," said Campion cheerfully. "Divorce and the
joke's over. I'd rather go back to my people."

"Oh no." Gaiogi was shocked. "No, no, we are not indecent. Good God, no.
This is at least honest vulgarity. Mr Campion, will you come and stay in
my house over the week end? I ask you so that, should I have need to
call upon my guest for assistance, assistance he cannot by all the laws
of hospitality refuse me, I shall have in him someone who will be an
asset and not an encumbrance."

He leant back and laughed until his eyes were shining with tears.

"I rehearsed that coming along. It sounds a little false."

They both looked at him, Val with tolerant amusement and Mr Campion with
simple interest.

"Having trouble?"

"No." Gaiogi was still laughing, and he glanced at Val with that shyness
which comes from the intellect rather than from any social
embarrassment. "We are here on false pretences."

"Not at all." Val spoke briskly, her voice a little harder than usual.
"It's Ramillies," she said.

"Really?" Mr Campion hoped he did not sound cautious. "What's he done
now?"

"Nothing yet, thank God." Val was obstinately bright. "He's going to
Boohoo Land, or wherever it is, on Sunday, in a gold aeroplane, and we
just thought we'd like you about to see he does go."

"In a gold aeroplane?"

"Gold. The propeller hub may be studded with diamonds." Gaiogi made the
announcement gravely and Campion raised his eyebrows.

"Quite the gent," he commented politely. "How serious is all this?"

Val rose, and as the light fell upon her face her brother looked at her
sharply. He had not seen her quite so fine drawn before.

"I'm not very clear about all this," he said. "Explain it all to me
without effects. Ramillies is going back to Ulangi, is he? Alone?"

"Yes. Georgia is going out to join him in six weeks time, with a wild
party. The Taretons and that lot."

"That should be jolly." Campion spoke without enthusiasm.

"Riotous," she agreed. "Paul Tareton is taking 'three girls from totally
different environments,' and Mrs has selected one rather beastly little
boy called Waffle. Still, that's their _après-midi_, not ours. Our
concern is that nothing goes wrong with the flight. Gaiogi was telling
Tante Marthe his troubles and she sent us both along to you."

"Ah yes, the flight," said Campion. "Start at the flight."

"The flight is not exactly an attempt upon the record"--Val's brightness
was growing more and more artificial--"except that no one has ever taken
the trouble to fly from England to Ulangi before. I wonder you haven't
heard about all this, Albert. There's been enough publicity."

At the mention of the magic word Campion began to see a little daylight.

"The plane is being sent out as a present to the native ruler," she
said. "It's an Alandel machine, and it's taking off from the Caesar's
Court flying ground at six o'clock on Sunday night. In it go the pilot
and a navigator and Ramillies. He insisted that they paint it gold. He
said the man would like it better, and pointed out that if you paint a
thing silver there's no reason why you shouldn't paint it gold. I think
Gaiogi made up the diamonds. Anyway, the airmen will stay and instruct
the coloured gentleman how not to break his neck, and Ramillies will
tidy the house up ready for Georgia. On Sunday there is to be a
semiofficial send-off, with Towser from the Colonial Office and one or
two other bigwigs, and the whole thing is to be stage-managed
gracefully. Gaiogi is anxious that nothing shall go wrong."

"I can understand that." Campion sounded sympathetic. "Is there any
reason why anything should?"

Val glanced at the Russian before she spoke.

"No," she said at last but without conviction. "No, I don't think so.
No, none at all. You just come down for the week end. We shall all be
there. You can even bring Lugg, if he'll behave."

"I'm sorry, my dear. It sounds fishy." Campion filled her glass as he
spoke. "Don't think me inquisitive, but I must have a bit more to go on.
It's my luggage I'm worrying about. Do I bring a knuckle-duster and a
chloroform spray, or merely my etiquette book?"

"The chloroform spray, I should say, wouldn't you, Gaiogi?" Val was not
entirely flippant, and the old man laughed at her before he turned his
round eyes towards Campion.

"I hope not," he said, "but who can tell? That is the difference between
the world of my youth and the world of today. Then I was bored because
nothing could happen; now I am apprehensive because nothing couldn't. I
am living my life backwards, my exciting youth last."

"Gaiogi doesn't feel Ramillies is quite safe," Val remarked. "I know
what he means."

So did Campion, but he made no comment and she continued.

"There's been some little trouble about a gun already. He wants to take
one out with him and the flying people are jibbing about the weight.
Anyhow, it's not the sort of thing he ought to want out there, is it?"

"I don't know. It's not a cannon, I suppose?"

"Sir Raymond wishes to take out a Filmer 5A," said Laminoff calmly. "He
does not see why he should not take it to pieces and stow it under the
seat, together with enough ammunition to kill every elephant in Africa.
Do you know the new 5A, Mr Campion?"

"Good Lord, that's not the big one, is it? The mounted one with the
magazine? Really? What does he want that for?"

"No one likes to ask," said Val dryly. "Anyway, he can't take it. Alan
Dell had to make that clear to him himself. Ramillies flew into one of
his idiotic rages, came out of it, and is now sulking with a
watch-what-I'm-going-to-do air about him, which is disturbing. We don't
want him making a scene just when everything is set for the take-off, or
getting tight and trying to take the machine up himself ten minutes
before the official time. I'd like you down there anyway. Don't be a
cad."

"My dear girl, I'm coming. Nothing would keep me away." Campion sounded
sincere. "The suggestion is that Ramillies is slightly barmy, I take
it?"

"No, no, spoilt," murmured Gaiogi tolerantly. "Too much money all his
life, mental age thirteen. A superb soldier, no doubt."

Val wriggled her shoulders under her severe little coat.

"He's abnormal," she said. "I dislike having him in the house in case
something awful happens to him while he's there. A thunderbolt, perhaps.
You know what I mean."

Gaiogi was delighted.

"Val is right. He has an impious challenge," he agreed, grinning at the
phrase. "That is the analysis of my own alarm. He should be exorcised."

"He should be watched," said Val, who seemed to have set her heart on
being practical at all costs. "That's fixed then, is it, Albert? We can
rely on you to come on Saturday? You're a pet. We're terribly grateful.
Gaiogi has to rush off now to catch Ferdie Paul, but I'll stay half an
hour with you if I may."

Her announcement was so brusque that it constituted a dismissal and
Campion regarded her with respectful astonishment. Laminoff rose.

"We shall be delighted to see you," he said earnestly. "My wife and I
have a little cottage in the grounds and we will entertain you there."
He glanced at Val and smiled shyly. "It is more comfortable than in the
hotel."

"It's the loveliest house in the world," she assured him and he seemed
pleased.

He left them gracefully, making the awkward business of departure a
charming experience for everyone concerned, and went away, leaving them
liking him and, for some inexplicable reason, gratified by the
interview, although it had simply served to arrange something he
desired.

"Nice old boy," Mr Campion observed when they were alone.

"A dear. The only genuine Russian prince I've ever met." Val wandered
down the room to look out of the window as she spoke. "He lived in
Mentone before the Revolution, toddling home now and again for the
wolfing or the ballet or whatever they had at home. His wife said that
they were miserable, really miserable; you know what wet blankets
Russians were."

"Cried each other to sleep every night," suggested Mr Campion helpfully.

"That sort of thing." Val was not listening to him. "Then they lost all
and life began anew. Gaiogi has princely ideas, real ones. He
understands organisation as well as magnificence. Just the man for a
luxury hotel. He's a prince with a point to him and he's hysterically
happy. I'd hate anything really unpleasant to happen in that little
kingdom."

Mr Campion took up the decanter.

"Sit down," he said. "I'm not being critical but do you think you're
being a bit nervy? I mean, old Ramillies may have a spot of the devil in
him, but the horns haven't actually appeared yet. He evidently
understands his job. That gilded aeroplane idea shows a certain amount
of practical insight. You can't convince a Gold Coast nigger that silver
isn't an inferior metal. He's probably quite all right in a limited way,
once you get to know him. Don't think I'm not going down to Caesar's
Court; I am. I want to. I only felt it was a bit hysterical, this
roaring round here yourself to bring Laminoff and making a great to-do
about it. You could have phoned me."

Val sat down on the couch and closed her eyes.

"It's amazing about relations," she observed after a pause. "You're a
pleasant, reasonable person. You'd never be so cruelly hyper-critical of
any other woman. Why shouldn't I be hysterical? I'm not, as it happens,
but if I was why shouldn't I?"

Mr Campion was temporarily taken aback.

"One naturally expects one's relatives to behave with the decorum one
demands of oneself," he said primly. "Hysteria doesn't run in our
family."

"Oh, doesn't it?" said Val. "Like to hear me scream the place down? Give
me something to drink."

"Have some gin in it and have a lovely sick?" he suggested.

She laughed and sat up. She had pulled off her ridiculous hat and her
yellow hair was very slightly dishevelled. She looked young and clever
and tolerantly disgusted with herself. She glanced up at him and spoke
wearily.

"'Ardy, 'Ardy, I am wownded."

"Not seriously, I 'ope?" enquired Campion solicitously, dropping into
the nursery joke of their youth without noticing it.

"Mort-u-ally, I fear."

"Really? What's up?"

"Unrequited love." She was still speaking lightly but with a certain
breathlessness which made the words uncertain.

"Oh?" He did not sound very sympathetic. "If I may say so without being
indelicate, it looked very healthy last time I saw you both."

"Did it? You're a detective of some sort, aren't you?" A change in her
voice, a certain hardness, almost a cheapness, that was a stranger
there, caught Mr Campion's attention and silenced the flippant remark on
his lips. He had known that sickening deterioration himself in his time
and, while he still found it infuriating in himself or anyone else who
might be part of his own personal secret dignity, he was not entirely
without pity for it.

"These things happen," he said awkwardly, trying to sound sympathetic
without inviting confidence. "It's all part of the dance."

Val laughed at him. She was genuinely amused and he was relieved to
notice a slackening of the emotional tension in her voice.

"You're just the person not to come and cry to, aren't you?" she said.
"You look as though you're going to be ill already. I'm all right,
ducky. I'm only telling you I'm feeling like suicide because Georgia
Wells has pinched my young man. You might at least say you're sorry. If
I told you I was broke or had a twisted ankle you'd be flapping about
like a mother chicken."

"Hen," said Campion absently. "Hen is the word you want. What do you
mean when you say pinched? Has Georgia merely abducted Dell? Or has she
dazzled him? I mean, has the situation come about because the fellow
wants to hang round or because he's too polite to slash his way out of
the palisade?"

Val lay back again. She was having great difficulty with the cigarette
between her lips and her eyes were startled at her own weakness.

"No," she said at last. "No, I think it's quite genuine. It does happen,
you know. She's simply knocked him off his feet. He's rather added what
he _knows_ of me to what he's _seen_ of her, if you see what I mean."

Mr Campion did see and he looked at her with one of those sharp glances
which betrayed his surprise. Her insight was always astonishing him. It
was misleading, he reminded himself hastily; a sort of inspired
guesswork or, rather, an intermittent contact with truth.

"He certainly didn't know much about women," he remarked. "He'll learn a
bit from Georgia."

Val did not speak and he went on without thinking of her in any
objective way. He was aware of her, of course, but only as of someone
whom he considered another facet of himself.

"A man like that ought to fall in love a few times. It matures the mind.
He can't marry her, of course, because of Ramillies. In a way that's
almost a pity because, in a case like that, that type of decent, rather
sentimental chap is apt to go off and nurse a lovely pie-eyed dream of
tragical frustration for a hell of a time."

He caught sight of her white face with the two tears on her cheekbones
and jerked himself up with sudden contrition.

"My dear girl, forgive me. I was thinking aloud. I forgot you were in
this. I'm mental. Oi! Val! Val, I'm sorry. I'm a tick. What shall we do?
Go and chuck the woman in the Regent's Canal? What's she doing, by the
way? Accepting it all with fashionable languor?"

"Oh no." Val's lips twisted. "You underestimate her. Georgia doesn't do
things like that. Georgia loves. She always does. She's riotously,
deliriously, ecstatically in love at the moment. She's a fire, a
whirlwind. She comes and tells me about it by the hour. I rushed off
with Gaiogi this afternoon to get away from her. She's so
heart-rendingly genuine, Albert, like all the worst in one's self."

Mr Campion looked scandalised and his sympathy for his sister increased.

"That's not quite decent," he remarked. "How startlingly vulgar you
women are."

"It's not vulgarity. It's cheating," said Val calmly. "You do so hope
you're not really hurting, but you do want to do it so much. I know the
instinct. It's a feeling, not a 'think' at all."

Mr Campion made no direct comment.

"Is Ramillies in on all this?" he enquired at last.

"Oh yes. Georgia's like a house on fire. It can't be kept a secret for
the rest of the street, much less from the master in the library.
Ramillies knows more about it than anyone."

"What's he doing? Anything?"

"I don't know." Val sounded uneasy. "He's a very curious person. When I
can bring myself to listen to her Georgia seems to be taking him very
seriously. She says he's frightfully jealous and frighteningly quiet,
but that may mean anything or nothing. He seems to have set his heart on
having this party out there with the Taretons. Georgia's not so keen.
She says that once she gets out there he'll make her stay. That'll be
awkward because _The Lover_ looks like settling down, and whereas they
could risk dropping her out for a month, if it was running away, I doubt
whether it would carry on for a full season without her. It might, of
course. It's a success."

"In six weeks time," said Mr Campion thoughtfully. "I'm not at all sure
that my estimation of Sieur Ramillies doesn't go up. The grand passion
should just about reach the wobbling point by then. These thundering
fires die down pretty fast, don't they?"

He paused. Val was looking at him with a speculative expression that was
not altogether sympathetic.

"You've forgotten Alan," she said. "Alan's in it too. He's a different
kettle of fish altogether. It's not so simple, my dear. Frankly I wish
it were. They're not children. It might so easily be very serious."

"You mean Ramillies might divorce her?"

"Not because of Alan. He'd never get grounds. You don't know Alan at
all. He's an idealist."

"Well, then, it'll come to a quiet, uncomfortable end and you'll have to
stand by and pick up the pieces," said Campion, a little irritated by
what he felt was an unjust estimation of his powers of comprehension.

"Yes," said Val slowly. She shivered and stretched herself with a
graceful, furtive movement like a little cat. "I envy those women who
just love normally and nobly with their bodies," she observed
unexpectedly. "Then they're only engulfed by a sort of lovely high
tragedy. The hero persists. That's at least decent. Once you cultivate
your mind you lay yourself open to low tragedy, the mingy, dirty little
tragedy of making an ass of yourself over an ordinary poor little bloke.
Female women love so abjectly that a reasonable hard-working mind
becomes a responsibility. It's a cruelty that shouldn't have to be
endured. I tell you I'd rather die than have to face it that he was
neither better nor even more intelligent than I am!"

Her passionate sincerity demanded his consideration and he looked at her
helplessly.

"You're asking rather a lot of him, old girl, aren't you?"

"Yes, I know." Val rose to her feet. "That's what I'm kicking at. I'm
asking much too much of most men. I've so constructed myself that I've
either got to ask too much or go maternal. Anyway, that's how it looks
to me when I pull myself together and remember that I'm one of the most
important business women in Europe, with a reputation to keep up and a
staff to look after."

She looked very slim and small standing on his hearthrug and it came to
him with something of a shock that she was not overestimating herself.

"Do you always see your--er--passion in this slightly inhuman light?"

"No." She glanced down at her exquisitely cut shoes, which a Viennese
manufacturer had materialised from her design. "No, my other viewpoint
is ordinary and howlingly undignified. I wish she were dead."

She met his eyes with sudden fire.

"My God, I hate her," she said.

Mr Campion blinked. "I can't do her in," he said.

"Of course not. Don't be an ape." She was laughing. "Don't take any
notice of me. I am nervy, very nervy. I had no idea I could behave like
this. It's come rather late--I ought to be twenty-two to feel like this
and enjoy it--and it's frightened me for the time being. Look here, all
I want you to do is to see that Ramillies goes quietly out of the
country without any fuss on Sunday. Then Georgia will follow him in six
weeks time and meanwhile----"

She broke off so sharply that he was startled.

"Meanwhile what?"

"Meanwhile Alan will at least be safe physically."

"Who from? Ramillies? My poor girl, you're cuckoo. Husbands don't go
around pigsticking their rivals these days. They seize another woman and
sit showing off with her at the other end of the drawing room until the
wife's boy friend leaves out of sheer embarrassment."

Val was not disarmed.

"You're _vieux jeu_, my pet," she said. "Like most men you're between
three and five years out of date. Don't you notice a change in the
fashion? Gaiogi's right. Today anything can happen. People can wear
_anything_, say _anything_, do _anything_. It's the motif of the moment;
look at the waistline. Besides, consider Ramillies. He's a man who might
have taken up a blasé attitude if he thought it would be in any way
shocking. Nowadays it's not. It's dull, it's ordinary, it's provincial.
D'you know, last week the most fashionable woman in London rushed in to
tell me that her husband had thrashed her within an inch of her life and
pitched her boy friend through a first-story window into a holly hedge.
She was scandalised but terribly excited."

"Dear me," said Mr Campion mildly. "You matched up her black eye in your
new _peau de pêche noir_, I hope? Oh well, you surprise me. The old man
must catch up on his homework. Let me get this straight. You seriously
think that Sir Raymond Ramillies is capable of making a physical assault
on Alan Dell?"

"I know he's capable of it," said Val bluntly. "I'm telling you that I'm
haunted by the idea that it's likely. Naturally I'm bothered because I
can't tell if my worry is reasonable or just some silly physical
reaction. I do have to explain things in detail to you. I thought you
were so hot on understanding people."

"I've been cheating all these years. I'm really Alice in Wonderland,"
said Mr Campion humbly. "Still, I'm picking up a crumb or two now in my
fiddling little way. What am I expected to do? Stand by to plant my body
between them to stop the bullet?"

"Oh, darling, don't be a lout." Val was at her sweedling best. "I don't
know what I want. Can't you see that? Just be about. I'm frightened of
Ramillies. I don't think he'd simply hit out like a Christian, but I
think he might do something--something--well, elaborate. That's the
impression he gives me. I'm uneasy with him. After all, there was
Portland-Smith, you know."

Mr Campion's eyelids drooped.

"What about Portland-Smith?" he said. "He committed suicide."

"How do you know?"

"I do. There's no doubt about it."

Val shrugged her shoulders.

"It was very convenient for Ramillies, wasn't it?" she said, sweeping
away the facts with a carelessness that left him helpless. "There's been
no end of chatter about it in the last few weeks."

"Then someone will get into trouble," Campion insisted firmly. "That's
pure slander."

"You can't have smoke without fire, my dear," said Val, and he could
have slapped her because she was both unreasonable and quite right. "Now
I'm going," she said. "Don't come down with me. I'm sorry I've behaved
like a neurotic. You ought to fall in love yourself sometime and get the
angle."

He did not answer her immediately but when he looked up his eyes were
apologetic.

"It wouldn't take me like that, you know," he remarked seriously.

"Evidently not."

"Why?"

"Well, where is she?" Val's glance round the room was expressive and she
went off, leaving him reflecting that the gentle, conservative dog with
his taboos, his conscience and his ideals was a rather pathetic,
defenceless animal beside his ruthless, hag-ridden sister, the cat.

Lugg's stomach appeared round the doorway.

"Sex rearin' its ugly 'ead again, eh?" he remarked, coming into fuller
view. "I didn't 'ear 'er speak because I kep' in the kitchen like a
gent, but you can see it in 'er face, can't you? Funny, we seem to 'ave
struck a patch of it lately. It's pitch, sex is. Once you touch it, it
clings to you. Why don't you sneak off and come on this cruise we're
always talking about? Crime's vulgar enough, but sex crime is common.
There's no other word for it. 'Oo's she in love with? 'Andle to 'is
name?"

Mr Campion regarded him with disgust.

"You turn my stomach," he said. "I believe if you had a fortune you'd
try to buy a title."

"No, I wouldn't." Lugg appeared to be giving the suggestion more serious
thought than it warranted. "Not a title. I wouldn't mind being a
councillor of a nice classy little burrow. That's about my mark. I'm
sorry about your sis but we can't 'elp 'er troubles. You look out. I
don't like sex. Remember the setout we 'ad down in the country. Which
reminds me, I 'ad a note from my little mate the other day. Like to see
it? She's at boarding school."

He waddled over to the bureau and pulled open the bottom drawer.

"'Ere you are," he said with the nonchalance that ill disguises bursting
pride. "Not bad for a kid, is it?"

Mr Campion took the inky square of expensive notepaper and glanced at
the embossed address.

    _The Convent of the Holy Sepulchre_
    _Lording_
    _Dorset_

    Dear Mr Lug [the handwriting was enormous and abominable] _I am
    at scool. Here we speak French. Some of the nuns like the tricks
    you showed me and some do not. I have written "I must not
    swindle" 50 times for S. Mary Therese but S. Mary Anna laffed. I
    am going to read the Gompleat works of William Shakespeare._

    _Lots and lots of love from_
    
    Sarah.

Mr Lugg put the note back among his better shirts, which he insisted on
keeping in the bureau in defiance of all objections.

"I could 'ave done a lot with that poor little bit if I'd 'ad the
educatin' of 'er," he remarked regretfully. "Still, she'd 'ave bin a
nuisance, you know. Per'aps she's better off, reelly, with them nuns."

"Indeed, perhaps so," said Mr Campion not without derision.

Lugg straightened his back and regarded his employer under fat white
eyelids.

"I found this 'ere in one of yer suits," he said, feeling in his
waistcoat pocket. "I've bin waitin' for an opportunity to give it to
you. There you are: a little yeller button. It came off one of Mrs
Sutane's dresses, I think. Correc' me if I'm wrong."

Mr Campion took the button, turned it over and pitched it out of the
open window into the street below. He said nothing and his face was an
amiable blank.

Mr Lugg's complacent expression vanished and he pulled his collar off.

"I'm more comfortable without it," he remarked in the tone of one making
pleasant conversation under difficulties. "Now the company's gone I can
let out the compression. Blest came in while you was talkin' to your
sis. I tell 'im you was busy. I give 'im the end of one of my old
bottles and made 'im leave a message."

"Oh?" Mr Campion seemed mildly interested. "And how did the ex-inspector
take that from the ex-Borstal prefect?"

"Drunk up every drop like a starvin' kitty." Mr Lugg's conversational
powers increased with his anxiety. "It did me good to see 'im. ''Ave
another mite of the wages of virtue, mate,' I said, smellin' another
'arf empty, but he wouldn't stop. Said 'e'd phone you, and meanwhile you
might like to know that 'e'd found a little church down in Putney with
some very interesting records of a wedding three and a 'alf years ago.
'E wouldn't tell me 'oo the parties were; said you'd know and that it
was all okay, he'd got the doings."

"Anything else?"

"Yus. Wait a minute. 'Ullo, that's the bell. It would be." Mr Lugg
fumbled with his collar again. "It's comin' back to me," he said
breathlessly in the midst of his struggle. "He said did you know there
was someone else snouting around for the same information less than a
week ago, and if it was news to you, did you think it funny?"

He lumbered out into the passage. Mr Campion's eyebrows rose.

"Damn funny," he said.

He was still lost in unquiet thought when the fat man reappeared, his
face shining.

"Look 'ere," he said with even less ceremony than usual, "look 'ere.
Look what I've found on the doorstep. 'Ere's a bottle o' milk for you."

Mr Campion raised his eyes to the newcomer and for an instant he did not
recognise the heart-shaped face with the triangular smile and the
expression that was as resourceful, as eager and as infinitely young as
when he had last seen it six years before.

"Hullo, Orph," said Amanda Fitton. "The lieut has come to report. This
is a nice thing to get in my face when I look up at your window for the
first time in six years."

She held out a small brown paw and displayed a yellow button with a rose
painted on it lying in the palm.

"Thank you, Amanda." Mr Campion took the button and pocketed it. "It
burst off my waistcoat as my heart leapt at your approach. A most
extraordinary phenomenon. I wondered what on earth it was. Why did you
come? I mean, nothing wrong, I hope?"

Amanda pulled off her hat and the full glory of the Pontisbright hair
glowed in the evening light.

"It's about my chief, Alan Dell," she said, "and frightfully
confidential. I say, Albert, you don't know a man called Ramillies, do
you?"




CHAPTER SEVEN


Mr Campion leant back in the taxicab, which smelt like the inside of the
dressing-up trunk in the attic of his childhood's home, and glanced at
the shadowy form beside him with a return of a respect he had forgotten.
The six years between eighteen and twenty-four had certainly not robbed
Amanda of her pep. On the whole he was inclined to think they must have
added power to her elbow.

It was now a little after twelve, and the night, it seemed, was yet a
babe.

"What I still don't understand is how you got there," he said. "I
thought aeroplane works were holies of holies."

"So they are." Amanda sounded cheerful in the darkness. "It took me
three and a half years to do it, but I'm a pretty good engineer, you
know. I went straight into the shops when I got some money. I hadn't a
sufficiently decent education to take an ordinary degree so I had to go
the back way. My title helped, though," she added honestly.

"Did it? What does your brother say about it?"

"The little earl?" Lady Amanda Fitton's respect for young Hal did not
seem to have increased. "He's still at Oxford. He seemed to be dying of
old age last time I saw him. He's given me up for the time being. Aunt
Hat says he's gathering strength. Meanwhile don't take your mind off the
business in hand. This is serious. I'm up here on a sacred mission. You
don't seem to realise that. The man Ramillies and his crowd must be
called off A.D. What am I going to tell the boys?"

Mr Campion stirred.

"Amanda," he enquired, "was I a hero in my youth?"

"A hero? No, of course not. What's the matter with you?" She was
surprised. "You've got introspective or had a serious illness or
something. You were a useful, dependable sort of person and the only
soul I could think of to come to in this idiotic mess. Besides, in view
of one thing and another, I thought you might know something about it
already. Look here, you forget about yourself for a minute and consider
the situation. Here's a man--a genius, Albert; there's no one like
him--and in the middle of serious and important work he's got hold of by
the wretched Ramillies and his crowd and taken completely off his
course. It's a frightful calamity; you must see that. We can't get on
without him. The whole machine room is held up. Drawings are waiting for
his okay. Specimen parts are ready to be tried out. All kinds of details
you wouldn't understand.... And it's not only that. There's the
morale of the whole place to consider. He's endangering it. We stuck it
as long as we could and then Sid sent me up to find out how bad things
really were. We talked it all over and decided that real loyalty isn't
just sentimental and unpractical. A.D. has been got at. He's a child in
some things. He must be persuaded back to work."

Mr Campion, thirty-eight next birthday, was aware of a chill. It began
in the soles of his feet and swept up over him in a tingling wave.
Behind Amanda's story he had caught a glimpse of a world which he had
practically forgotten. In many ways it was an idiotic, exasperating but
tremendously exciting world wherein incredible dreams fed fine
enthusiasms and led to fierce consultations, pathetically noble
sacrifices and astounding feats of endeavour, to say nothing of heights
of impudence which made one giddy even in considering them.

"You're all pretty young down there, I suppose?" he ventured.

"A lot of us are. A.D.'s wonderful like that." Amanda's eyes were
shining in the dusk. "It's just ability that counts with him. Of course
there are a few old people too, but they're all fanatically keen on the
work and that keeps them young. We're all so helplessly worried, Albert,
or at least all those of us are who realise what's up. It's such a
wizard show. We're all behind him, you see. We'd do anything for the
work, absolutely anything. We all would. He _couldn't_ let us all down,
could he?"

Her voice was wonderfully young and clear and he was reminded of the
first time he had ever heard it in the drawing room at Pontisbright Mill
when the curtains had been drawn to hide the tears in the furniture. A
lot of water had gone through the wheel since then, he reflected.

"It all depends," he said cautiously. "A man has a private life, you
know, apart from his work."

"Not A.D." Amanda was vehement. "His work's his life and he's a very
great man. That's why we all depend on him so. He's a genius."

It went through Mr Campion's mind that he had had a spot of trouble with
geniuses before but he thought it politic not to say so. He continued
with his diffident questioning.

"What put you on to Ramillies?"

"That's the only telephone number that seems to reach Dell. He's got
some money in Caesar's Court, you know, and he must have picked up that
crowd down there. Ramillies is all right really, I believe; I mean his
family is all right and he's a governor on the West Coast somewhere; but
he's wild and in with a wild crowd. A.D. has probably never met anything
like him before and is going into some idiotic scheme for setting up an
airport in an African swamp. He gets wrapped up in things like that
sometimes. The only alarming thing is that he's never neglected us
before and we are so hoping that there aren't any sharks in Ramillies'
lot. You don't know, do you? Sometimes these clever crooks get hold of
wild hearties like Ramillies and impress them. A.D. wouldn't fall in the
ordinary way but if they approached him through a county mug he might
just possibly be taken in."

Mr Campion's eyebrows rose in the darkness.

"I say," he murmured, "don't you think you may be getting a bit
melodramatic? No offence, of course, but if a lad doesn't turn up at the
office for a day or two it doesn't always mean that he's in the hands of
what counsel calls 'a wicked and unscrupulous gang.'"

"An office, yes," conceded Amanda with contempt, "but not our works. You
don't seem to understand at all. He's neglecting his _work_. We haven't
seen him at all for a fortnight and before then he was vague and
preoccupied. Sid and I diagnosed a succession of hangovers. It really is
serious. Sid has sent me to find out and I must. Then if things don't
improve we must have it out with him and get him back to normal."

"I see," said Mr Campion a little helplessly. "Who is Sid?"

Amanda chuckled. "Sid's my immediate boss. A grand chap. He was born in
Wallington and went to the Polytechnic and starved through the shops,
finally got his M.I.M.E. and is one of the finest men in his own line in
the kingdom. He's only twenty-nine and an awful snob, but so absolutely
honest as a workman."

"A snob?"

"Yes, bless him. He's batty about my title. He's always getting at me
for it just so he can hear himself use it. I like Sid. He's got
enthusiasm. Where is this place, the Tulip? What makes you think they
may be there?"

"Intuition backed by the law of elimination." Mr Campion sounded dogged.
"If they're not here, my child, we shall have to start knocking at doors
and asking. London is a largish town for that method, but since you've
made up your mind I see no other course."

"I hope you're not getting old," said Amanda dubiously. "If the worst
comes to the worst we'll begin at Hampstead and work our way south."

The Tulip had been flowering for a little over seven months and was
therefore nearing its zenith in the fashionable sunlight. Jules
Parroquet, whose golden rule for the exploitation of a successful
restaurant and night club was simple--a new name and orchestra to every
two changes of paint--already considered it one of his triumphs. The
ceiling of flowers was still noticed and admired and the silly little
striped canvas canopies every now and again were as fresh and piquant as
when they had first been erected.

Mr Campion and Amanda stood for a moment looking over the broad silver
rail above the orchestra before going down to the dance-floor level,
where Campion was relying on the headwaiter, the lean Ulysse, the one
permanent husbandman in Parroquet's ever-changing flower garden, to find
them a respectably prominent table.

He did not find Georgia immediately but was relieved to see that the
place was filled with likely people. Stage and society were well
represented and Money hung about with Art in the corners, while the mass
attempt at complete unself-consciousness provided the familiar
atmosphere of feverish effort.

Young Hennessy, sitting at a table with a duchess, an actor-manager and
two complete strangers, made an importunate attempt to attract his
attention, and it was not until then that Campion, normally the most
observant of men, glanced at Amanda and noticed that she had grown
astonishingly good to look at. She saw his expression and grinned.

"I put my best frock on," she said. "Hal chooses all my things. Hal says
good undergraduate taste is the only safe criterion of modern clothes.
He takes it terribly seriously. Do you see anybody you know or have we
got to go on somewhere else?"

"No, this'll do." Mr Campion's tone contained not only relief but a note
of resignation. Amanda, he foresaw, was about to discover the worst.

Ulysse received them with all that wealth of unspoken satisfaction which
was his principal professional asset and conducted them to the small but
not ill-placed table which he swore he had been keeping up his sleeve
for just such an eventuality. The worst of the cabaret was over, he
confided with that carefully cultivated contempt for everything that
interfered with beautiful food, which was another of his more valuable
affectations. He also spent some time considering the best meal for
Amanda at that time of night.

As soon as they were at peace again Mr Campion took it upon himself to
rearrange his companion's chair so that her view across the room was not
impeded. Then he sat down beside her.

"There you are, lady," he said. "Once more the veteran conjuror staggers
out with the rabbit. There's the situation for you in the proverbial
nut."

Georgia and Alan Dell had a table on the edge of the dance floor and
from where she now sat Amanda had clear view of the two profiles.
Georgia's slightly blunt features and magnificent shoulders were thrown
up against the moving kaleidoscope of colour, and Dell sat staring at
her with fifteen years off his age and the lost, slightly dazed
expression of the man who, whether his trouble be love, drink or merely
loss of blood, has honestly no idea that he is surrounded by strangers.

Infatuation is one of those slightly comic illnesses which are at once
so undignified and so painful that a nice-minded world does its best to
ignore their existence altogether, referring to them only under
provocation and then with apology, but, like its more material brother,
this boil on the neck of the spirit can hardly be forgotten either by
the sufferer or anyone else in his vicinity. The malady is ludicrous,
sad, excruciating and, above all, instantly diagnosable.

Mr Campion glanced at Amanda and was sorry. Illusions may deserve to be
broken, young enthusiasts may have to take what is coming to them, and
heroes may desert their causes as life dictates, but it is always an
unhappy business to watch. Amanda sat up, her round white neck very
stiff and the jut of her flaming curls dangerous. Her face was
expressionless, and the absence of any animation brought into sudden
prominence the natural hauteur stamped into the fine bones of her head.
She regarded the two for a long candid minute and then, turning away,
changed the conversation with that flat deliberation which is a gift.

"This is excellent fish," she said.

Mr Campion, who had the uncomfortable feeling that he had been a little
vulgar, laboured to make amends.

"It's dudgeon," he said. "Very rare. They have great difficulty in
keeping it. Hence the term 'high----'"

"Yes, I know." Amanda met his eyes. "We lived on it down at the mill one
year. Do you remember? Who is that woman?"

"Georgia Wells, the actress."

Amanda's fine eyebrows rose.

"I thought that was Lady Ramillies?"

"Yes," said Mr Campion.

She was silent. There was no possible way of divining what was in her
mind, but he reflected that the younger generation was notoriously
severe.

"It wears off, you know," he said, trying not to sound avuncular. "He
can't help the out-in-the-street-in-the-nude effect, poor chap, at the
moment. Nothing can be done. The work will have to wait."

"No, nothing can be done," agreed Amanda politely. "That's what I have
to explain to Sid. Thank you very much for bringing me."

She moved her chair a little to shut out Dell, and set herself to be
entertaining. Mr Campion approved. He remembered enough of the
hard-working, hero-worshipping, ecstatic days of his own youth to
realise some of the shame, the sneaking jealousy and horrified sense of
injustice and neglect that comes when the great man lets his fiery
disciples down. But if Amanda was conscious of any of this she was not
inflicting it upon him. Her manners were irreproachable. Amanda was, as
ever, the perfect gent.

It occurred to him also that both Val and Amanda had intrinsically the
same quarrel with Dell inasmuch as they both dreaded his loss of
dignity. He sighed. The man had his sincere sympathy.

He glanced across the dance floor and caught a fleeting glimpse of
Georgia dancing. It was only a momentary impression but he recognised
her by her distinctive silver dress and the ridiculous but charming
spray of swallows on her dark crown. His astonishment was considerable,
therefore, when his glance, travelling back, lighted upon her still
sitting at the table, her face radiant, her eyes shining, and the whole
warmth of her magnificent, fraudulent personality glowing at the man
before her. He sat up and looked out at the floor again and his
expression changed. His mistake was triumphantly justified.

Another woman of Georgia's type was wearing a replica of Georgia's
silver dress and Georgia's silver swallows. Her dark curls were dressed
in Georgia's style and at that distance the two faces were
indistinguishable. Mr Campion recognised Miss Adamson with difficulty
and reflected that the girl was a fool as well as a knave. Then he
caught sight of her partner, and once again experienced that faint sense
of outrage which thundering bad taste invariably produced in him.

Dancing with Miss Adamson, his small head held at a slight angle and his
whole body expressing his tremendous satisfaction, was Sir Raymond
Ramillies.




CHAPTER EIGHT


Ulysse had settled Sir Raymond and Miss Adamson safely at the table
immediately behind Georgia, and Ramillies was grinning happily at his
success in acquiring it before the good maître d'hôtel noticed the
phenomenon of the two Miss Wells.

Mr Campion, who found himself watching the scene with the fascinated
apprehension of a village idiot at a dangerous crossing, almost laughed
aloud at the expression of incredulity which spread over Ulysse's face
as his glance took in the two women. His small bright eyes flickered and
he thrashed the menu card which he happened to be holding as if it had
been a tail and he a labrador. It was a comic moment but it passed too
soon, leaving only a growing sense of embarrassment as half-a-dozen
diners at other tables swung round to stare with that insolence which
comes from an attempt to look casual, or perhaps invisible, before they
returned to warn their companions not to look round immediately.

Amanda looked at Campion and for the first time in their entire
acquaintance he saw her rattled.

"That _is_ Ramillies," she said. "What can we do?"

"Fire at the lights," he suggested, his wide mouth twisting with brief
amusement. "No, it's no good, old lady; this is grownup vulgarity. We
sit and watch. Oh, Lord!"

The final exclamation was occasioned by a movement at Georgia's table.
Alan Dell had dragged his dazzled eyes away from Lady Ramillies for an
instant, only to be confronted immediately by Miss Adamson, seated
directly behind her. Georgia noted the sudden deflection of interest and
turned her head impulsively. Ramillies met her eyes and grinned with
bland self-satisfaction.

She gave him a single offended and reproving glance, natural if
unreasonable in the circumstances, and turned her eyes to his companion
with an expression half condescending, half curious. The next moment,
however, as the full insult became apparent, she was reduced to
elementary emotions. The colour rose over her chest and flowed up her
neck to her face in an angry flood. There was a sudden cessation of
conversation at all the tables round about and she sat for a moment in a
little oasis of silence in the desert of hissing sound.

Mr Campion dropped his hand over Amanda's but she drew it away from him
and began to eat as resolutely and angrily as her Victorian grandfather
might have done in similar circumstances.

Ramillies bent forward and said something to his wife and she pushed
back her chair, her face as pale as it had been red, while Alan Dell
sprang up and fumbled for her bag and flowers.

It was a dangerous moment. There was something not quite ordinary in the
quality of the contretemps--an ultimate degree of outrage, the
quintessence of going a bit too far--so that the situation became
vaguely alarming even to those least concerned. At the very instant when
the clash of many emotions was still tingling in the air and everyone in
that half of the room was waiting uncomfortably for Georgia's exit, a
preserving angel appeared somewhat heavily disguised as Solly Batemann.

When Solly was described as an ornament to the theatrical profession,
the word was never meant to be taken in its literal or decorative sense.
He looked like a cross between a frog and a bulldog and was reputed to
have the hide and warts of a rhino, but his personality was as full and
generous as his voice, which was sweet and caressing without any of the
oiliness which one was led to expect from his appearance. He was very
pleased with himself at the moment. Three of his theatres were playing
to capacity and the fourth production, which had flopped, had been by
far the least expensive of them all. He surged across the floor to
Georgia, his great stomach thrown out, his little eyes popping out of
the top of his head, and his many grey-blue jowls quivering with
bonhomie.

"Ah, my darling, you are a clever girl," he said when he was within
hailing distance. "If we were only alone I should kiss you. I saw the
show tonight. I sat and cried all over my shirt. Fact. No, not that
spot; that's minestrone--this one."

Solly's irresistibility was the irresistibility of a tidal wave. Even
Georgia could only succumb. She had no need to speak. He swept a chair
from another table and planted it squarely between her and Dell. Then,
with one elephantine knee resting on its velvet seat, he held forth,
pouring unstinted praise upon her as though from some vast cornucopia.
It was a performance and its genuineness was Georgia's own. In spite of
herself she warmed under it and within three minutes he had her
laughing.

Mr Campion was bewildered. Since Solly's interests were concentrated
solely upon musical and spectacular shows and Georgia was well known to
be under a long contract with Ferdie Paul, there could scarcely be any
ulterior motive in the display, so that the tribute became sincere and
heaven sent.

Mr Campion glanced at the other table and his eyebrows rose. In fact
heaven seemed to be sending all sorts of things. As soon as general
interest had become focussed upon Solly, Ramillies had turned in his
chair like an unnoticed child with every intention of joining in the new
conversation, but now a waiter appeared at his elbow with a card on a
salver. Ramillies took the pasteboard absently. His interest was still
centred on his wife, but a glance at the message distracted him. He
looked up eagerly, his dazzling childlike smile appearing, and, making a
brief excuse to Miss Adamson, he set off across the room after the
waiter without a backward glance. The next moment, as if these two
dispensations of Providence were not enough, Ramon Starr, the Tulip's
most promising gigolo, sidled over to the deserted girl and she jumped
at his murmured proposal. They floated away together to the strains of
"Little Old Lady."

Dell himself had remained standing, regarding the exuberant Solly with
growing disapproval, but before Georgia could become preoccupied with
his discomfort yet another minor miracle occurred, taking the whole
thing out of the happy-coincidence class altogether. Tante Marthe
herself came sweeping by, looking like a famous elderly ballerina in her
severe black gown, her head crowned by a ridiculous little beaded turban
which only Val could have devised.

She nodded to Georgia, who did not see her, which was not surprising
since Solly still filled every arc of her horizon, and, passing on,
pounced upon Alan. She said something to him in which the name of
"Gaiogi" alone was audible and laid her small yellow hand familiarly on
his arm. From the little distance at which Campion and Amanda sat it was
not possible to hear his reply, but Lady Papendeik's lizard glance
darted round the room and came to rest on the two with a sparkle of
satisfaction. A minute or two later she bore down upon them with Alan
Dell following reluctantly at her heels, but she still had him by the
cuff so that he could hardly escape her without brusquerie.

There was no time to warn Amanda with words and Campion kicked her
gently under the table as he rose to greet the newcomer.

"Albert, my dear, I hear you're going to join our party at Caesar's
Court. I am so glad, my dear boy. You and Mr Dell have met, I think?"

Tante Marthe looked him full in the eyes as she spoke and he read there
a command that he should be helpful. He made a suitable rejoinder and
turned to Dell.

The conventional words faded on his lips as he saw the other man's face,
however, and once more the whole situation became real and painful. Dell
was staring helplessly at Amanda. There was colour in his face and his
eyes were indescribably hurt, almost bewildered, as if he could scarcely
credit the astonishing cruelty of the mischance. Mr Campion felt very
sorry for him.

Amanda took the situation in hand.

"Hallo, A.D.," she said with charming embarrassment. "I'm having a night
on the tiles. This is my fourth meal this evening. The food is good.
Come and have some. You haven't eaten yet, have you?"

"I'm afraid I have." He was looking at her suspiciously. "I've been
sitting just over there all the evening."

"Really? Where?" She stared across the room with such regretful
astonishment that she convinced even Mr Campion, who thought for an
instant that she was out of her mind. "I'm so sorry. I didn't notice
you. I was engrossed in my fiancé. Do you know him?"

Mr Campion received a mental thump between the shoulder blades and saved
himself from blinking just in time.

"Albert?" Lady Papendeik was startled. "My children, congratulations!
Why haven't we heard of this before? It's Amanda Fitton, isn't it? My
dears, this is great news. Does Val know?"

"Engaged?" Alan Dell peered at Amanda. "You? Really? Is it recent?
Tonight?"

Mr Campion glanced at his companion from under his eyelashes. He hoped
she knew what she was doing and would let him in on it. So far she had
certainly succeeded in changing the conversation, albeit somewhat
drastically.

"But how long has this been a fact?" Dell persisted, seizing on the
point as though it had been the only solid spar in the conversational
sea.

Amanda glanced at Campion demurely.

"We shall have to explain," she said.

"I think so," he agreed affably. "You do it."

"Well, it's my brother," she confided unexpectedly. "Do sit down. We
ought to drink some champagne to this, you know, darling," she added,
looking Campion firmly in the face and rubbing her chin thoughtfully
with one finger, a gesture that fogged him utterly until he recollected
that it was a secret sign in the Fitton family indicating that the
speaker was there and then possessed of sufficient funds to cover the
proposed extravagance.

Tante Marthe seated herself at once, and Dell, with a backward glance at
Georgia, who was still monopolised, sat down in the opposite chair. As
they drank, Mr Campion met Lady Papendeik's eyes. He read vigorous
approval in them and was alarmed.

Dell was even more embarrassing.

"You're extremely lucky, Campion," he said seriously. "She's a very
remarkable girl. We shall feel the draught without her. When is the
wrench to be, Amanda?"

"Not for quite a time, I'm afraid." The bride-to-be spoke regretfully.
"It's Hal, you know. He's young and frightfully self-opinionated. Of
course he's head of the family and I don't want to hurt him by flouting
his authority. He'll come round in time. Meanwhile the engagement is
more or less secret--as much as these things ever are. It's simply not
announced; that's what it amounts to. It's a howling pity but we're both
such very busy people that we can--er--bear to wait about a bit."

Lady Papendeik approved.

"So sensible," she said. "So French. You have been very sly, Albert.
This has been going on some time. You're both so composed, so friendly.
The coy period is over, thank God. When was the grande passion?"

Amanda smiled at her and her honey-brown eyes were guileless.

"That's all a bit shy-making in a crowd," she said. "I'll leave you with
Albert for a bit. He'll tell you the worst. A.D., would you like to
dance with me?"

Dell carried her off unwillingly and Tante Marthe looked after their
retreating figures. "Well, that's astonishing but very nice," she said
with a sigh. "You took our breath away. She is so fresh, so charming, so
really young. Val will design her a wedding dress that will make her
look like a Botticelli angel. She has taste, too. That is a Lelong she
is wearing."

Campion regarded the old woman thoughtfully.

"You came along remarkably opportunely just now," he observed.

"I?" Her face was completely innocent but the narrow black eyes
flickered. "Oh, to hear your news? Yes. I shall have some gossip again
at last."

"I didn't mean that, as you know very well. You and Solly Batemann did a
remarkably neat stroke of peace-preserving between you just now, didn't
you? That wasn't pure act of God, was it?"

Lady Papendeik stared at him, her thin mouth widening.

"You detectives," she said with good-humoured contempt. "What a lot you
see. My dear, I was simply sitting over there with the Bensons and
Donald Tweed when I caught sight of Alan Dell across the room. I wanted
to make sure that he was coming down on Saturday to Ramillies' farewell
party at Caesar's Court and so I stepped across to speak to him. Georgia
looks very exuberant, doesn't she? A woman who wears birds in her hair
ceases to look like Primavera after thirty and simply reminds one of
that song they will keep playing."

Mr Campion reflected.

"You're thinking of a nest of robins, my dear," he said. "A very
different caper; someone didn't consult his nature notes when he wrote
that. Miss Adamson also favours swallows, I saw."

Lady Papendeik did not look at him. She sat up, her small shoulders
compact and severe.

"That is the end of that little girl," she remarked briefly. "Tell me
about your engagement. It is so entirely unexpected."

"It is, rather, isn't it?" he agreed. "Still, Amanda's an unexpected
young person."

"She's sweet." Tante Marthe glanced across the tables to the dance
floor. "She looks so lovely. Her figure is completely natural. How does
she keep her stockings up?"

Mr Campion gave the matter his serious consideration.

"I tremble to think. Two magnets and a dry battery, if I know her, or
perhaps something complicated on the grid system."

The old woman leant back in her chair.

"Delightful," she murmured. "You love her so comfortably. There is no
unhappy excitement. I am so glad, my dear boy. I hope the brother is
reasonable. What is his objection?"

"Age," supplied Mr Campion promptly. He made the first excuse that came
into his head and was amused to find that he was irritated when she
accepted it without incredulity.

"You are old for your years," she said. "You'll grow out of it. My God,
I nearly died of old age when I was thirty-three, yet look at me now.
There they are."

Campion glanced round and saw that Dell and Amanda had paused at
Georgia's table. Ramillies was still absent and Miss Adamson seemed to
have disappeared altogether, since there was no sign of her on the dance
floor. He watched the little scene round Georgia with interest. It was
not possible to hear any remark save from Solly, but his were
enlightening.

"When I was married you know what my mama said? She said: 'Have your
photograph taken, Solly; you'll never look the same again.' Such a
pretty little flower! It is a pity to pick her so soon."

He almost chucked Amanda under the chin, and Lady Papendeik laughed
softly at Campion's side as he changed his mind and the plump hand,
fluttering uncertainly, accomplished the chucking an inch or so above
the red head.

Amanda appeared to be enjoying herself. She smiled at Solly, whom she
seemed to like, and was gracefully deferential to Georgia. The brief
gathering broke up with Lady Ramillies embracing the younger girl with a
sort of fine, generous spirituality which made Mr Campion think of
Britannia in the cartoons of Sir Bernard Partridge, and Solly trotting
off across the dance floor waving and nodding like a Bacchus in a
triumphal car.

Dell and Georgia settled down again and Amanda came back to her seat.
Lady Papendeik rose.

"Good night, my dears," she said. "This is only a secret, isn't it? I
mean, I can tell it in confidence? Felicitations, Albert. You are a very
clever young man."

Amanda watched her depart before she spoke.

"He _is_ in a mess, isn't he?" she said gloomily. "It wasn't too good
over there. He was hoping I wouldn't notice anything and she was trying
to tell me all about it. I concentrated on the hearty old party with the
chins and talked about my own engagement. I'm afraid that Georgia
woman's a sweep."

"I think she's genuinely very much in love at the moment." Campion put
forward the excuse in all fairness.

"She's not," said Amanda. "If you're in love with a man the one thing
you're frightened of is doing him any harm. That's the whole principle
of the thing. She's not thinking of A.D. at all. She's using him to make
herself feel emotional and that means that there are at least two or
three hundred other men who would do just as well. I don't mind her
going on in her natural way if she's that sort of person, but she's a
sweep to pick on A.D., who has work to do."

Mr Campion regarded her with amusement.

"Taking up philosophy in your old age?"

"That's not philosophy; that's elementary common sense," said Amanda.
"Have you got enough money on you to pay for the champagne? If you
haven't, that's going to be the next problem. I thought I had thirty bob
with me but I see it's only ten."

"No, it's all right. They know me," he assured her, reflecting that Hal
and his colleagues must find her a relief to entertain. "That was
inspirational."

"It was, wasn't it?" Amanda was never modest in her self-appreciation.
"There's nothing to take your mind off an embarrassing situation of your
own like being asked to celebrate someone else's engagement. It's partly
the champagne and partly the feeling that you're not responsible in any
way for the setout. Poor chap, I thought he was going to be sick when he
saw me. I felt like the blue-eyed toddler who had staggered in when
Daddy was making a beast of himself. Look here, we've got to go. I
excused you from that crowd by saying that you had to be in bed early
after your illness."

"What illness?" demanded Mr Campion, startled into bald enquiry.

Amanda sat looking at him, her round brown eyes curious.

"You have been rather ill, haven't you?" she enquired seriously. "You're
quieter than you used to be and you look a bit bleached. I took it you'd
had tonsillitis or something on the chest."

"I'm perfectly healthy and always have been," declared Mr Campion with
an outraged dignity that was at least half genuine, "and I'll thank you,
miss, to keep your dispiriting remarks to yourself. I'm damned if I want
to be rejuvenated, either," he added, a note of genuine resentment which
he had not quite intended creeping into his tone.

"Perhaps you're sickening for something," she murmured with intent to
comfort. "Come on. We shall have to stay engaged for a week or two. It
was a nuisance in a way but it seemed the best thing to do. I couldn't
let A.D. feel we'd been spying on him. I thought he was simply being
rooked, you see. I didn't dream it was anything like this. I knew you'd
back me up so I got out of the situation as neatly as possible. We can
let the betrothal excitement die down gradually. I've got a ring of Aunt
Flo's somewhere, so you needn't bother about that."

"Splendid." Mr Campion seemed relieved. "Then it's just my wife to
square and we're all set."

"Yes, well, you can do that," said Amanda. "I've done all the dirty work
so far. Put me in a cab and I'll go down to Boot's Hotel on my own. It's
right out of your way. You do look rather tired, you know."

Mr Campion prepared to depart.

"You're stewing up for a thick ear," he remarked. "I never raise my hand
against a woman save in anger."

Amanda sighed and he had the uncomfortable impression that it was with
relief. Her smile vanished immediately, however, and he caught her
looking a trifle older herself.

"I'm behaving like a goat mainly because I feel so miserable, you know,"
she remarked presently. "Can you see the sort of blazing shame this all
is?"

"Yes," he said gravely, catching her mood. "It's not good. Rotten for
Sid and all of you. The death of a hero but not a hero's death, so to
speak."

"Oh, you're still all right." She was grinning at him with a warmth that
no Georgia could ever counterfeit. "Up here, away from it all, I can
understand some people feeling that this angle of ours is all a bit
'footy' and small, but down there...! We all _live_ from him,
Albert. He's the spark that lights the fires. That woman's not so much a
sweep, you know, as an enemy. Ramillies is a bit of a tick, too, isn't
he? That incident might have been most indelicate. It was rather
miraculous how it all cleared up in a moment."

"Rather miraculous? My poor young woman..." Mr Campion regarded her
with affection. "That was not merely a miracle; that was fishy. I've
never actually believed in a guardian angel, but when I observe such a
veritable cloud of feathers I do suspect something of the sort. You
don't seem to realise I've been sitting here watching a conjuring trick
that leaves Caligari cold. There's someone around here to whom I take
off my hat--all my hats."

He was still pondering over the phenomenon as they went out and as they
crossed into the wide aisle behind the pillars someone nodded to him
from a table not too well placed in a corner. He returned the nod and
comprehension came to him with recognition.

Ferdie Paul lay back idly in his chair looking more like a bored gilt
Byron than ever. There was an air of great weariness and disinterest
about him, but his smile was friendly and he raised a pale hand in
salute. There were two women at his table and a deserted chair. Campion
recognised one of his companions as the very well-dressed but
ill-at-ease little person whom Rex had been so anxious to placate at
Papendeik's dress show, while the other, a big-boned good-tempered
blonde, was unmistakably Mrs Solly Batemann. At the moment she was
talking to Gaiogi, who was standing at her side.

Campion glanced round him. As he thought, Tante Marthe was seated not so
very far away.




CHAPTER NINE


When the seventh Earl Hurrell rebuilt Caesar's Court in the late
eighteenth century he incorporated a great many of the brighter ideas of
the day into the construction of the house and grounds. The Pinery, the
ice house, the Vine Palace and the useful gazebo were all much admired
at the time, and the sloping lawn, which not only ran down to the Thames
but presumably continued under it, since it reappeared on the opposite
bank and went on and on for the best part of a mile like a strip of
gigantic stair carpet, had been commented on by George IV ("Impressive,
Hurrell, an't it? What? What?").

Since that time the succeeding Hurrells had been fully occupied keeping
the monstrous property a going concern, let alone improving it, so that
when Gaiogi Laminoff took charge the place was, as the estate agent
said, delightfully unspoilt.

At eleven o'clock on the Sunday morning following the farewell party
given for Sir Raymond Ramillies, Mr Campion sat on a little footbridge
over the river and considered Gaiogi's alterations with sober
admiration.

The rosy building itself had retained the dignity of a great private
palace but had miraculously lost its pomposity. Even at this distance it
exuded a party atmosphere and it occurred to Mr Campion that it looked
like some millionaire child's play pen magnified up to an impossible
scale. There were expensive toys everywhere. Little silver aeroplanes
taxied off the green turf on the other side of the river. Glossy hacks
and shiny motorcars paraded on the gravel drives and everywhere there
were flowers and casually elegant clothes, with a suggestion of music in
the background. The general effect was expensive, exclusive and very
pleasant; the Royal Enclosure at Home sort of atmosphere.

There was much activity on the flying field, especially round the hangar
where the new plane had been housed the night before, and Campion did
not notice the two who came striding towards him until Amanda spoke. She
looked very like herself in a brown suit, better cut than her working
clothes of old but the same in general effect, and her heart-shaped face
was alive and interested with all the freshness of a sixteen-year-old.

"Hallo," she said. "Has the old cad turned up yet?"

"Ramillies? No, I'm afraid not."

"Where on earth is he? Oh, Albert, I quite forgot. This is Sid."

They had reached the middle of the bridge by this time and Mr Campion
found himself confronted by a tall, bull-necked young man with very
black hair, which he wore practically shaved save for a solid thatch on
the very top of his head. He shook hands with deep resentment and said
with patent insincerity that he was pleased to meet Mr Campion.

"Well, I'll get back," he said immediately with an assumption of ease
which was ridiculous or heroic according to the way one's mind worked.
"If you can find out when Sir Raymond returns, Lady Amanda, send a
message over to us. The broadcasting blokes are twittering away like
spadgers over there."

"I thought you were coming up to the bar?" Amanda was surprised. "He'll
be there if he's back."

"No, I don't think I will, thanks awfully." Sid had his hands in his
pockets and the skirts of his brown jacket, which were a trifle too
fluted, jutted out behind him like a cape. "I'll get back. So long. Take
care of yourself."

He seemed to mistrust the social tone of the final admonition as soon as
he had made it, for he reddened and, nodding to Campion without looking
at him, strode off with his broad shoulders hunched and his trousers
flapping. Amanda looked after him, her eyebrows raised. She glanced at
Campion appealingly.

"He's all right, really," she said. "Or don't you think so?"

"Dear chap," murmured Mr Campion. "Not quite sure of himself, that's
all. That's nothing."

"Don't you believe it," said Amanda gloomily. "Class is like sex or the
electric light supply, not worth thinking about as long as yours is all
right but embarrassingly inconvenient if there's anything wrong with it.
Sid _will_ feel he's lowish, and so he is, and nothing much can be done
about it. It doesn't worry other people at all, of course, but it's
lousy for him. What about Ramillies?"

"He hasn't shown up yet but I don't think there's much point in
worrying. He'll appear when the time comes."

She glanced at him sharply. "You think he's simply doing this to put
everybody in a flap?"

"It wouldn't be astounding, would it?"

"No. Disgustingly likely. What a crowd they all are...." Amanda
sounded tolerant. "It was a bad show clearing off in the middle of his
own farewell do like that. He's too old to go roaring off into the night
at two o'clock in the morning as if he were twenty. It's so
old-fashioned."

Mr Campion was inclined to agree but he could not forget that there had
been extenuating circumstances.

"Georgia wasn't helping," he ventured.

Amanda sniffed. She was wandering along beside him, her hands clasped
behind her and her head bent.

"D'you know, I can't believe it of A.D.," she said suddenly. "When I
actually see it I can't believe it. It's--well, it's shocking, isn't it?
That's a spoilt word but you see what I mean."

He laughed.

"What's the reaction among the disciples?"

"I don't know. I mentioned it to Sid but he didn't believe me until
yesterday when he came over here and got the gossip. He's just murderous
towards the woman, of course. Sid sees things in black and white. It
doesn't seem to be a bad idea. It saves him no end of bother. Where are
we going?"

They had turned aside and taken a path which led through a rose garden
to a shrubbery interspersed with several high trees, all very brave and
gay in their summer finery.

"I'm staying with the Laminoffs," he explained. "They're having a small
hangover party at a quarter to twelve. I promised I'd bring my fiancée
if I could find her. You're getting on nicely with my family, aren't
you?"

"I think I do you credit," agreed Amanda complacently. "You asked me to
marry you at the Olympia Circus last year. It was just like the
pictures. We came together over a game of darts in the amusement park
afterwards. I don't suppose Val will ask you about it but you may as
well know what she's talking about if she does. I like Val. I came to
you about this business in the first place because I had an idea that
A.D. was a friend of hers. He was, wasn't he?"

"They seemed to like each other."

Amanda sighed. "Then you do know about it. I only wondered. Relations
are sometimes dense. It shows, you know. I noticed it as soon as I saw
them together. That makes Georgia more of a sweep than ever, don't you
think?"

Mr Campion had not the opportunity to reply. They had turned a corner in
the shrubbery path and now came to an unexpected wicket gate which gave
on to one of the seventh earl's prettier follies. The seventh earl had
seen the Petit Trianon and it had taken his fancy. His recollection had
been by no means accurate, however, and perhaps his purse had been
shorter than the French king's, but he had achieved a little house. It
sat solid and white, like an upended box of bricks, with pillars and
steps and a fine flat lead roof. The little trees, which had once
matched its miniature magnificence, had now grown to big trees and the
tiny terrace was moss grown and charming.

So much for the earl. Gaiogi had added gaiety. The pompous windows were
wide, and pink and apple-green curtains billowed in their dark eyes.
There were chairs on the steps, and cushions and great stone urns of
flowers. It was a party house and Gaiogi was the perfect party host. His
head appeared through a window as soon as they entered the gate.

"The sun has come out," he shouted to Amanda. "How are you?"

"Excited," said Amanda obligingly.

Gaiogi met her eyes and laughed, and it occurred to Campion that it was
the meeting and mutual recognition of two persons of resource.

Mme Laminoff met them in the hall, which would have been a grim box with
a black-and-white squared marble floor if Gaiogi had not taken it into
his head to have a set of red chessmen painted on the stones and to
enliven an alcove with a red glass lobster in place of the seventh
earl's bust of Cicero.

Sofya Laminoff was herself unexpected. She was plump and gracious and
succeeded in looking like a very exotic film star unsuccessfully
disguised as Queen Victoria. She was far more placid than her husband,
but her eyes, which were theatrically black against her magnificent
white hair, had a twinkle in them and her small fat hands fluttered
charmingly as she talked.

"Still no news of him?" Her anxious enquiry stood out from the flurry of
welcome as though it had leapt into blacker type. "No? Never mind. He'll
come. I tell Gaiogi he will come. He is simply a man who likes to make
himself interesting. Come in."

She swept them into the salon, where the hangover party was already in
progress. The room itself was charming. It ran through to the back of
the house and ended in wide windows giving on to a small formal garden.
Here again the seventh earl had not been so much suppressed as made a
little tipsy. His graceful fireplace and flat-fluted columns remained,
while much of the furniture was pure Georgian, but the rest was Gaiogi's
own collection of interesting pieces, many of which were of the frankly
bought-for-fun variety. It was all remarkably comfortable. Tante Marthe
sat in a rocking chair in a patch of sunlight, and Val, looking like one
of her own advertisements in _Vogue_, was curled up on a Mme Récamier
chaise longue. There were four or five strangers present: an affable
young man from the B.B.C., a gloomy youngster with a big nose whose name
was Wivenhoe and who seemed to be something to do with Towser of the
Colonial Office, two quiet little men who talked together respectfully
and might have had "Money" neatly embroidered on sashes round their
middles, and a large gentleman with a Guardee moustache who devoted
himself to Val and turned out most unexpectedly to be the managing
editor of one of the larger dailies.

Gaiogi himself was happy, playing apothecary, and he dispensed his three
sovereign remedies, champagne, tea or iced draught beer, according to
the condition of the individual patient.

Campion wandered over to him.

"I've phoned his house, his clubs and every Turkish bath in London," he
said quietly. "We'll give him another couple of hours and then I'll go
to town and get the bloodhounds out. We can't very well do a thing like
that too soon. I also tried to get hold of a Miss Adamson but apparently
Annie doesn't live there any more."

"Ah? Oh yes, _that_ girl." Gaiogi hunched his shoulders and looked
vaguely introspective. "Yes, a pretty girl. No head. No perception. No,
she doesn't live here or at Papendeik's any more."

"Nor with her aunt Maggie either, it would appear."

"Really?" Gaiogi did not seem interested. "That may be. Very likely. We
will give him until after lunch. Meanwhile, my dear fellow, don't let it
distress you. What will you drink? Let us all forget the miserable chap.
Towser is coming to the lunch. He wants a round of golf before the
ceremony. I had hoped that Ramillies would be here to help entertain
him, but from what Wivenhoe tells me perhaps it is almost as well. Not
all these charming people like one another."

He exploded with laughter on the last word and his round brown eyes met
Campion's shyly.

"That fellow Wivenhoe is a bit of a stick. Marthe Papendeik keeps
talking to him about his chief, Pluto. He is quite offended. She is
innocent. It is a natural slip. I thought I'd warn you."

"Thank you. I'll remember that." Campion spoke gravely and it went
through his mind that more than half Gaiogi's secret lay in his naïveté
and the rest was deep understanding of important fun. There was an air
of magnificent goings on about this morning's party, much of which was
justified if one accepted the all-importance of the success of Caesar's
Court.

"I talked to Ferdie Paul on the telephone just now," Gaiogi went on. "He
says don't worry. In his opinion the fellow is something of an
exhibitionist. He knows him well. That is between friends, of course. He
says like all these people, when the moment on which their job depends
actually arrives, they are always there."

"There's a lot in that," said Campion. "Is Paul coming down this
afternoon?"

"No, unfortunately no. He is just off to Paris. He has interests over
there and must be back in London tomorrow."

"He's a clever chap," Campion remarked absently.

"Oh, extraordinary." Gaiogi pronounced each syllable of the word in his
admiration. "Brilliant. If only he weren't so lazy he'd be a force, a
power."

"Lazy? I should hardly have thought that."

Gaiogi filled a glass.

"There is a phrase for him in English," he said. "Do you know it? He is
'born tired.' He never does anything at all if he can get someone to do
it for him. Will your beautiful betrothed drink champagne?"

Mr Campion glanced at his beautiful betrothed with a certain amount of
apprehension. She was talking to Val and Tante Marthe and the older
woman's little lizard head was cocked on one side and her eyes were
dancing.

"You're both darling to want to help," Amanda was saying firmly, "but
you don't know my brother. We've decided to let him grow. His mind will
expand. Meanwhile we're perfectly happy, aren't we, Albert?"

"You have your aeroplanes, my dear," said Mr Campion with caddish
resignation.

Amanda blinked. "That's terribly true," she agreed earnestly. "I must
try not to be selfish--or vulgar," she added warningly.

Campion caught Val's eye and turned away hastily. She had looked a
little sorry for him.

"You didn't find him?" Tante Marthe put the question in an undertone and
she grimaced when he shook his head. "He expected to find that girl here
last night. That is why he went off. He was piqued, like a child. I told
Gaiogi so. Georgia was being thoughtless, I know, but he's been married
to her for over two years. He must be used to that sort of thing by this
time. Who's that coming now?"

There was a stir in the room and Gaiogi hurried to the window and they
caught over his plump shoulders a fleeting vision of a small vehicle
passing up the drive. It was a calash, one of the pneumatic-tired
electric cars like glorified bath chairs for two which Gaiogi had
acquired to transport his lazier lotus-eaters about the grounds and
which were proving very popular in this little world of toys. Val
glanced at Campion questioningly and once again he avoided her eyes.

"Georgia," he said briefly.

"And Alan?"

"Yes, I think so."

She did not speak but glanced out across the little flower garden as if
she were half a mind to escape into it, but there was no sign of any
emotion on her face.

With the sound of Georgia's warm happy voice in the hall outside a
flatness passed over the company. For the first time the title of the
party became apt, as though everyone had just remembered that he had
taken part in an uproarious ceremony the night before.

Georgia came in with Dell in attendance. She was beautiful, alive and
blatantly triumphant. In any other circumstances her naïve delight in
her captive would have been disarming, but this morning, in view of
everything, it was not quite forgivable and succeeded in striking a
démodé note in that aware community. Campion caught Amanda regarding
them speculatively and, as was his gift, saw them for a moment through
her eyes. He was startled. She was thinking that they were poor old
things.

Georgia crossed the room, her white silk sports suit emphasising the
warmth of her skin and the strong grace of her figure. She kissed Tante
Marthe, nodded to the two decent young men and sat down beside Val with
an arm round her shoulders. Dell remained by the door talking to Gaiogi.
There was a distinct air of defiance about him which was young and sat
oddly upon him, destroying his dignity, but when he came over at
Georgia's imperious command they saw that his eyes were bewildered and
unhappy.

"Something will have to be done," said Georgia clearly above the
chatter. "He's got to go in that plane. Where on earth is he?"

It was the first time that the subject of Ramillies' absence had been
mentioned in any tone above a whisper and the effect upon the whole room
was interesting. Everybody stopped talking and Campion realised for the
first time that every member of the party had a definite reason for
being present. It was another evidence of Gaiogi's celebrated diplomacy
and was, for some obscure psychological reason, faintly disturbing, as
if one had accidentally discovered that the floor was laid over a well.

"Didn't he leave any message when he went off last night, Lady
Ramillies?" enquired Wivenhoe, who seemed constitutionally incapable of
grasping the unconventional. "Surely he said something to somebody? I
mean a man doesn't go off into the night like that without a word."

Georgia looked at him steadily, holding his eyes while she laughed.

"It does sometimes happen, my pet," she said, and the large man with the
moustache chuckled and the two little men who had been talking about
money smiled at each other.

"Well, darlings," said Georgia, looking round the room and conveying,
most unjustifiably, that they were all in the family, "we were all at
the party last night, weren't we? Did anyone notice anything peculiar
about the old villain? I rather lost sight of him myself." She glanced
under her lashes at Dell, who blushed. The colour rushed into his face
and suffused his very eyes. He was so mature for such an exhibition, so
entirely the wrong sort of person for the reaction, that he could
scarcely have been more obvious or caused more embarrassment if he had
burst into tears. Everybody began to talk again.

As Mr Campion turned his head he saw two profiles, Amanda as red as her
hero and Val so white that her face looked stony. Georgia seemed
surprised.

"It's all all right," she said. "He probably realised he was getting a
bit tight and trotted off to a Turkish bath in town. He'll turn up very
clean and hungry half an hour late for lunch. He hasn't been frightfully
fit, as a matter of fact. He went to a specialist a fortnight ago. He
knows he ought not to drink. His sins are finding him out, wicked old
thing."

Why these revelations should set everyone's mind at rest was not very
clear, but conversation became general again, indicating that everyone
had found out that no one knew much more than he did and had decided to
wait a little longer.

Georgia's attention returned to Dell, who was standing by the windows
looking into the little garden. He came when she called him and paused
before her. Georgia appeared to have forgotten what she wanted him for
and was clearly about to tell the tasselled gentle so when Val
intervened.

"What's that in your coat?" she said. "I've been trying to place it. May
I ask?"

The ordinary question was a relief to him and he seized on it.

"This?" he enquired, pulling his lapel and squinting down at it. "That's
the Quentin Clear."

"Good heavens, I never noticed it." Georgia's tone was vigorously
possessive and her arm tightened about the other woman unconsciously, so
that she was virtually holding Val back by main force. "My dear man, you
can't go about like that. You look like a darts champion. Whatever is
it, pet? Give it here."

She held out her free hand and, after fidgeting with the split pin that
held it in place, he gave it to her unwillingly. It was a small silver
medallion, not particularly distinguished in design but of exquisite
workmanship, as these things sometimes are. Georgia turned it over.

"It's rather sweet," she said. "I like the little propeller things,
don't you, Val? But you can't wear it, dear, you simply can't. I'll keep
it."

Dell hesitated. He looked profoundly uncomfortable.

"I'm afraid you mustn't," he said awkwardly. "I'll put it back."

"You won't." Georgia was laughing. "If anyone wears it I will. It looks
rather sweet on this revers."

There was a force in her voice that he seemed to find unanswerable and
Mr Campion felt himself led firmly out into the garden.

"Sorry, but I thought I was going to protest," said Amanda, striding
across the grass plot. "That's the Quentin Clear. The woman must be
nuts. He is, God knows."

"That's rather special, isn't it?"

"Special?" Amanda made a noise like an angry old gentleman. "It's it.
It's _the_ one. Only about three men in the world have it. A.D. wouldn't
wear it if it wasn't for this 'do' this afternoon. She's simply
ignorant, of course, and evidently doesn't understand that he isn't just
anybody, which is what I've complained of all along. He ought to be
taken home and given a sedative, of course, but if Sid or any of the
boys see her wearing that thing there'll be a riot. It's a howling
insult. Can't we tell her?"

"I'm afraid that's his pigeon, my dear." Mr Campion spoke mildly.
"Anything we do reflects on him, doesn't it?"

Amanda kicked the edge of the lawn with a small neat toe and glanced up
at him.

"The older one gets the more one understands and the smaller the things
are that matter," she remarked. "It doesn't get easier, does it? I'm
sorry I cleared out. I suddenly felt it was all a bit beyond me. Hullo."

Her final remark was addressed to a small boy who was seated on a wooden
settle against a southern wall. He had been hidden from them as they
came out by the angle of the house and was sitting very quietly all by
himself, a book on his knee. He rose politely and pulled off his
Haverleigh cap as Amanda spoke and Campion recognised him as the child
he had seen at Papendeik's. He looked now much as he had done then,
self-contained and patient, like somebody waiting on a railway station.

"It's very pleasant out here in the sun," he remarked, more, they felt,
in an attempt to put them at their ease than in an attempt to cover any
embarrassment of his own. "I like this little garden."

He was an undersized fourteen, Campion judged, and he tried somewhat
hurriedly to remember his own mentality at that age. Meanwhile, however,
Amanda came to the rescue.

"Haverleigh is shut, isn't it?" she said. "What was it? I.P. in the
village? Do you think you'll get back at half?"

He shrugged his shoulders and smiled wryly.

"We hope so. The last case was reported three weeks ago. Meanwhile one
can only wait. It's rather rotten. It's only my second term."

The confidence was the first sign of immaturity he had shown and Campion
was relieved to notice it.

"I saw you in town the other day," he said, trying to avoid the accusing
tone one so often uses to children.

The boy looked up with interest.

"With Georgia and Raymond at Papendeik's?" he said. "Yes, I remember
you. I'm afraid I'm not as interested in clothes as I should be," he
added apologetically. "Mother--that's Georgia, you know--is doing her
best with me but I'm not really keen. That sort of interest grows on one
later, don't you think?"

"It's not a thing you're born with, necessarily," remarked Amanda
cheerfully. "We're going back to the party. Are you coming?"

"No, I don't think I will, thank you very much," he said, reseating
himself. "I've got this that I must read, and it's very warm out here in
the sun."

Amanda eyed the solid green volume on his knee.

"Holiday task?"

He nodded. "_Ivanhoe_," he admitted, a touch of amused embarrassment in
his eyes.

"Heavy going?" enquired Campion sympathetically.

"Well, he wrote in a hurry, didn't he?" There was no affectation in the
pronouncement, nor did he censure, but appeared to be offering an
explanation merely. "It's a bit theatrical, you know, or at least I
think so. The people aren't like anyone I've met." He paused and added,
"So far," with a cautiousness which gave his age away again.

"That's all very true," said Mr Campion, "but I shouldn't put it in your
essay if I were you."

The child met his eyes with a startled expression.

"Good Lord, no," he said fervently and smiled at Campion as if he felt
they shared a secret about schoolmasters.

They had been longer in the garden than they realised and the party had
broken up when they returned. The room was deserted and the debris of
empty glasses and overfilled ash trays made it look forlorn in spite of
its essential gaiety. Through the front window the departing crowd was
visible, straggling towards the wicket gate.

Amanda turned aside to look for her handbag and Campion went on to the
hall alone. In the doorway he paused. Georgia was standing with her back
to him looking up the staircase, and as he appeared she spoke to Dell
over her shoulder.

"I shan't be a moment. You start the little bath chair thing."

With some vague idea of allowing them to get away first Campion remained
where he was and he was still in the salon doorway when Val came
hurrying downstairs, a small square box in her outstretched hand.

"There's only one left," she said. "You know how to take it? Soften it
in water and gulp it down."

"Bless you, darling, you've saved my life." Georgia took the box without
glancing at the other woman. "I must fly. He's waiting for me like a
little dog on the step, the sweetie. Thanks so much."

She hurried across the hall and Val stood on the lowest stair looking
after her. There was a startled expression upon her face and her lips
were parted. Campion stared at her and she turned and saw him.

She did not speak but started violently, made a little inarticulate
sound and, turning, fled up the staircase, leaving him bewildered and,
in spite of every ounce of common sense that he possessed, alarmed. He
had half a mind to follow her, and would, of course, have altered a
great many things had he obeyed the impulse, but Georgia's precipitate
return drove the incident from his mind.

"Where's Gaiogi?" she demanded, flying into the hall, her eyes bright
with excitement. "My dear, he's turned up! Raymond's back. They say he's
tight as forty owls, the abominable old brute. He must have been
drinking like a fish all night. He's gone straight to his room. He says
he'll sleep for an hour. I think it's best to let him, don't you? He's
got to go on that plane. If it's the last thing he does he's got to go
back today."




CHAPTER TEN


The Ulangi Flight Luncheon given by Alan Dell in the Degas Room at
Caesar's Court was, as is the fashion, strictly informal. In spite of
the fact that Towser spoke, Dell spoke, the heads of the various
departments in the huge Alandel works responsible for the machine spoke,
a wit from Towser's party who _could_ speak spoke, and even the pilot
drawled a few shy, halting words, the informality was strictly
preserved. In spite of the amusing aeroplane of flowers suspended in a
block of ice on a pillar in the centre of the horseshoe table, in spite
of the silver-gilt souvenirs that Gaiogi had so thoughtfully provided,
in spite of the Ulangi pears, a rather dreadful fruit imported at great
trouble and expense for the occasion and served mercifully soaked in
kirsch to deaden their own unpalatable flavour, the happy family party
atmosphere was firmly maintained.

The one genuinely unconventional note was provided by Ramillies' absence
and a great many excuses were offered, both publicly and privately, for
that omission.

Towser, who was one of the older school of politicians with a big head
and such an affectation of plain-manishness on top of a natural bent in
that direction that one automatically suspected him, most unjustly, of
every sort of insincerity, explained at laborious length what he
honestly understood about Sir Raymond's slight indisposition. It came
out an overpowering story, hinting at sickly relatives dying in
inaccessible parts of the island, cross-country journeys, and a noble if
exhausted Ramillies crawling gamely home to be persuaded by an adoring
wife to snatch what rest he might before attempting the feat of
endurance which lay before him as a passenger on an almost epic flight.

It was unfortunate that the impression which this recital conveyed to
that experienced audience was even worse that the facts. By the time the
distinguished speaker had gone on to something else there was a
universal conviction that Sir Raymond had been brought in drunk on a
police stretcher and was even now lying unconscious on the floor of a
private cell in the barber's shop. The pilot and the navigator exchanged
glances and shrugged their shoulders philosophically. They were both
lean stringy youngsters with faded hair and the curious clear-eyed,
unimaginative stare of that new and magnificent breed that seems to have
been created by or for the air. So long as their cargo avoided delirium
tremens they did not care.

Sir Raymond's adoring wife, who was getting on very nicely in her place
of honour between the minister and the host, looked properly tolerant of
her husband's misfortunes, and the meal progressed happily with everyone
being as charming as possible to the one uncertain element in their
midst, the bored but ungullible Press.

Mr Campion was not present. He lunched alone in the open-air restaurant
in the water garden and avoided the eyes of more acquaintances than he
had realised he possessed. Caesar's Court was flourishing. Gaiogi's
principality was in its golden age.

With Ramillies safely in his room recovering from a night out, his own
immediate charge was at a standstill. Like all professionals who are
doing a little work on the side to oblige a friend, he felt at a
disadvantage. Friendship is a hampering thing at the best of times, and
the demands made in its name are often unreasonable. As far as he could
see, everybody in his immediate circle was beseeching him to avert
something different. Looking round this pleasant and expensive scene, it
struck him forcibly that such universal alarm was quite extraordinary.
Ramillies appeared to be the focal point of the general anxiety.
Ramillies was clearly expected to do something spiteful or sensational
or both. So far, it seemed to Campion, he had simply behaved like a
spoilt undergraduate with a gift for the offensive, yet neither Val nor
Gaiogi was unduly nervous or even inexperienced. He reminded himself
that he knew all these decorative, volatile people very slightly. They
were all such natural exhibitionists, all so busy presenting various
aspects of themselves, that to meet them was like watching a play in
which by the end of the evening all the actors seem old friends and yet
in the back of one's mind there is the conviction that ten minutes
behind the scenes would make them all strangers again. He decided to
wander up and take a look at the patient.

He located the bedroom and was bearing down upon the door when it opened
six inches or so and remained dark and ajar. He paused. Of all the minor
incidents of life a door which opens at one's approach is perhaps the
most disconcerting. An eye regarded him through the aperture.

"Campion."

"Yes?"

"Come in. Are the others still eating? Come in, will you?"

The thin sharp voice was not so strident as usual but the note of
insolence was still there. Campion walked into a room whose only light
crept in round the edges of drawn curtains and the door closed behind
him. A shadowy figure laid an unsteady hand on his arm.

"I'm going to take my things down to the plane now." Ramillies sounded
excited and the confidential tone was new in him. "I'm not travelling
much. They're sticky about the weight because she's carrying so much
extra juice. My man's gone on by sea and rail like a Christian and I
don't want any damned hotel servants touching my stuff. That's natural,
isn't it?"

A querulous anxiety in the question confirmed the general diagnosis, and
his visitor made haste to reassure him. Ramillies tittered. It was an
unpleasant sound in the gloom and reminded Mr Campion that he never had
liked the man.

"I'm going to shift it myself," Georgia's husband continued huskily.
"You come down with me and see it weighed. You bear witness that I
haven't got that gun. I've had my head talked off about that gun and I'm
bloody sick of it. You come along. I've been on the lookout for a
stranger but you're better. You'll do nicely."

Campion disengaged himself from the gripping fingers.

"Anything you like," he said easily. "Are you all right? I thought you
weren't feeling too good."

"I've been drunk. God, I've been drunk!" He made the words a breathy
little prayer of satisfaction. "I'm sobering up now. It's rotten
sobering up but it won't last. Nothing gets me down for long. Besides,
I've got something to do. I've got something on. I can always snap out
of it if I've got something on. It doesn't really affect me."

The bravado sounded a trifle forlorn to Campion.

"Have you packed?" he enquired.

"Lord, yes, packed in town. What the hell are we doing chattering here
in the dark?"

This was a question which had occurred to Mr Campion himself and he said
so.

"Georgia pulled the curtains to keep the blasted light out of my eyes."
Ramillies was blundering slowly across the room as he spoke. "She's full
of wifely concern, isn't she? Have you noticed it?"

He turned round suspiciously on the last word, letting in a shaft of sun
with the same movement, but apparently the younger man's expression was
satisfactory, for he seemed content.

"I've only got one little case and some coats," he said. "We'll take
them down and show them. Then I'll come back and sleep. I'll be all
right by the time we leave. We go at five, they say, not four; weather
or something damned silly. What are you looking at? Do I show it much? I
do sometimes."

He lurched unsteadily towards a mirror and stared at himself, and
Campion felt a twinge of pity for him. The man was grey and positively
sweating, and his eyes had sunk into his head.

"Where on earth did you get the stuff at two in the morning?" he
demanded involuntarily.

Ramillies looked round and for an instant there was a flicker of his old
childlike smile.

"She had a cellar," he said. "Come on. I'm going to put on one coat.
They'll weigh me as well as the baggage. I dislike those fellows. I
dislike people who live for machinery. I dislike Dell himself. Not for
the reason you think, Campion. Not for that reason. I dislike Dell
because he's a mechanic and a blasted prig."

He found the coat he wanted and struggled slowly into it.

"A blasted sentimental petrol-scented prig," he added, standing swaying
in the shaft of sunlight with the ulster flapping against his calves.
"Georgia needs a sense of proportion. She'll get one when she comes out
to me with the Taretons. I shall probably have my gun by then. I'm going
to show them some sport. You're not the kind of chap who'd like what I
call sport, Campion."

"No," said Mr Campion, remembering him at school. "No, I don't think I
am."

Ramillies began to laugh but thought better of it and presently they
began a weary descent. Side by side in a calash they set off for the
footbridge and a hangar. Ramillies looked like a great tweed parcel and
a death's-head, and sat balancing a small suitcase on his knee while
Campion drove the flimsy machine. It was nearly three quarters of a mile
over gravel and turf and they took it slowly to avoid jolting. Ramillies
sat silent, hunched up in his coat in the blazing sun, and Campion
glanced at his beaded forehead with apprehension.

"I should take that thing off if I were you," he remarked. "You'll
suffocate yourself."

"That would suit Dell, wouldn't it?" said Ramillies. "I expect he prays,
don't you? That sort of chap hugs his virtue and prays I'll die--blasted
prig! Damned fool, too. I'll tell you something. Campion. You're sitting
there thinking I'm more offensive drunk than sober, aren't you?"

"Well," said Mr Campion, not wishing to be offensive himself, "roughly
that sort of thought, you know."

"I am," said Ramillies modestly, as if he had received a much-prized
compliment. "I am. D'you know why I ever thought of leaving my wife here
with that fellow hanging around her? Nobody knows Georgia. That's the
cream of the joke. She's out of date. She's the 1902 chorus-girl type.
It's damned low-class blood in her. She's got the careful-virgin
mentality. I know. My God, I know! She wears a _ceinture de chasteté_
with a wedding-ring key. She'll come out with the Taretons in six weeks
time and when I get her there she'll give up the stage. This is a
prophecy. You listen to it. Write it down somewhere. Georgia won't come
back to the stage. I've got something on, you know. I'm not the
complacent husband. I've got a surprise for Georgia and that fellow
Dell. Sorry I'm being so vulgar. I don't know you well, do I?"

"We're not buddies," said Mr Campion mildly. "You're tight."

"Yes," Sir Raymond agreed in his thin flat voice. "I'm very, very
tight." He laughed. "These government fellows," he said, "they wouldn't
stand me for ten minutes if it wasn't for one thing. Do you know what
that is? I'm a genius with my niggers. My province is the most damned
degenerate hole in the entire creation. My niggers would make your hair
stand on end. They even startle me at times and I like 'em. The rest of
the West Coast doesn't mention us when it writes home. It doesn't want
to be associated with us. But my niggers and I understand one another. I
suit them and they suit me. I'm not afraid, you know. I'm not afraid of
anything on earth."

"Jolly for you," murmured Mr Campion politely.

Ramillies nodded. "I've never tolerated fear. There's only one thing I'm
afraid of and I've overcome that," he said earnestly and with that
naïveté which Campion had noticed in him once before, "and I have just a
touch of the miraculous with my two dirty little tribes. You look at
this plane."

They were admitted somewhat grudgingly into the hangar. The plane stood
half in and half out of the shed and was certainly something to see. It
was a pretty four-seater single-engined machine of the Alandel Seraphim
class, with the typical sharp nose and a specially designed
undercarriage in anticipation of the Ulangi landing grounds, but by far
the most sensational feature to the lay observer was the yellow metal
paint which transformed the whole thing into a gaudy toy.

The mechanics who surrounded her each wore the slightly sullen
expression reserved by the conscientious workman for anything
unconventional in the way of decoration and one of them made so bold as
to comment upon it.

"'Is Coloured 'Ighness will find this 'ere all colours o' the rainbow in
three months," he observed ostensibly to a colleague but with a sidelong
glance at Ramillies.

"He'll have broken his neck in it long before then or sold it to a
dangerous relation," muttered Sir Raymond under his breath to Campion.
"Where do I get myself weighed?"

Since practically everyone of authority was at the lunch there was a
certain amount of confusion over this preliminary, and Mr Campion
fancied that he detected a certain transparency in his charge's motive
in choosing this particular moment to make his arrangements. There was a
brief delay, and he had leisure to observe the preparations for the
official send-off. A narrow wooden platform had been erected against the
wall just inside the hangar, and while at the moment this was smothered
in cables and batteries in anticipation for the broadcast, a cut-glass
water carafe and two enormous pots of hydrangeas standing precariously
in a corner indicated the general effect desired.

Meanwhile Ramillies had got himself in the centre of a small group and
Campion was summoned to be a witness to the fact that his small suitcase
contained nothing to which anyone could possibly take exception. It was
also sealed, an unnecessary precaution embarrassing to everyone except
its owner, who insisted upon it being taken. Ramillies then clambered
upon the scales himself while the old dangerous and irresponsible
expression returned to his pallid face.

Since there appeared to be no deception here, either, everything was
being very satisfactorily concluded when there was an unexpected
interruption as Georgia appeared, very sweet and gracious and maternal.

"Darling," she said earnestly, hurrying over to her husband, "you ought
to be lying down. I nearly had a fit when I found you'd gone. I'm going
to take you back at once. My dear man, you're starting in a couple of
hours. You must get some rest. Mr Campion, you do agree, don't you?"

It was a charming little domestic scene and the group of interested
minor officials were properly impressed. Ramillies proclaimed "night
out" as clearly as if the words had been stamped all over him, and
Georgia did much to counteract the gossip which had been floating about
by as charming an exhibition of wifely devotion as the most sentimental
British workingman could have wished to see. She no longer wore the
Quentin Clear, Campion was relieved to notice.

Ramillies eyed her narrowly and Campion, who was watching him, was
startled to see a sudden docility come into his face. He smiled at her
happily, almost triumphantly, and tucked her arm into his.

"We'll go back together," he said. "Campion won't mind us taking the
calash."

They went off arm in arm and Mr Campion added another interesting and
contradictory fact to his collection. Ramillies was genuinely in love
with his wife and was therefore, presumably, deeply jealous of her.

He was strolling back across the turf when he encountered Amanda, who
greeted him enthusiastically and seemed disposed to gossip.

"A.D.'s gone golfing with Towser," she said, "and I've just passed
Georgia and Ramillies sitting side by side in a bath chair. It was very
pretty. 'Having ten minutes to spare, I spent them with my husband.' I
almost like her, don't you? She's so comfortingly obvious. The lunch was
good--the food, I mean. Did you like the plane? It's only one of the
Seraphim, of course. You should come and see the new Archangels we're
building."

"I'd like it," he said gravely. "Tell me, do you do Cherubim as well?"

"Yes, we did, but the model wasn't too satisfactory." She shook her head
over the failure.

"Too short in the tail, perhaps?" he suggested sympathetically. "Nothing
to--er--catch hold of."

"That's right," she agreed, eyeing him admiringly. "You're picking up,
aren't you? The pink feathers came off the wings, too, just as you were
going to say. Did you know Val was ill?"

"Ill?"

Amanda nodded and her big honey-coloured eyes were thoughtful.

"Not seriously. But she looked pretty white and sort of hunted at lunch
and afterwards she went off to lie down." She hesitated and shot him one
of those odd direct glances which were peculiarly her own. "It's
terrifying and ludicrous and ugly, isn't it?" she said. "Not Val, of
course, but the thing itself; cake love."

"Cake love?" he enquired, remembering her interest in food. Amanda
raised her eyebrows at him.

"Oh, use your head," she said. "Don't embarrass me. This thing they've
all got that's hurting them so and making us all feel they may blow up.
Cake love as opposed to the bread-and-butter kind."

"Oh, I see. You're plumping for bread and butter, are you, my young
hopeful?"

"I'm full of bread and butter," said Amanda with content.

Campion looked down at her. "You're very young," he remarked.

She grunted contemptuously.

"Please God I'll stay like it, you poor old gent," she said. "Let's sit
on the terrace and digest. We can keep our eye on 'em all from there.
Ramillies is up to something, isn't he? You don't think he's going to
pop his head out of the plane and pick Georgia off just as they start to
taxi?"

"Relying on the engine row to hide the shot?" Campion laughed. "That
would be rather pretty. If he wasn't seen doing the deed the body
wouldn't be noticed till they were away, and nobody would suspect him."

"Except us," agreed Amanda complacently. "It's not such a batty idea.
It's the kind of childish thing he might do. Fancy dressing that girl up
as his wife the other night."

They sat chatting on the edge of the terrace until the sun passed over
the edge of the house. Amanda was a stimulating conversationalist. Her
complete lack of self-consciousness rendered no subject taboo, and he
found her philosophy, which appeared to be part common sense and part
mechanics, refreshing after the purely medical variety on which his
generation had fed so long.

The ceremony was timed for a quarter to five, and by four o'clock there
was a fair-sized crowd round the hangar, far away over the river at the
end of the lawn. Amanda sat silent, considering the view. The scene was
peaceful, there was a light wind, and the treetops were golden against
an eggshell sky.

"There goes Ramillies," she said, nodding towards his tweed-coated
figure gliding over the gravel in a calash. "He's in good time. Since
he's alone, I suppose that means that A.D. is back."

Mr Campion looked surprised. Traces of femininity in Amanda were rare.
She smiled at him.

"I'm not one of your beastly 'kind women,'" she said. "I don't go round
shedding grace. That was quite justified. There goes that little ape
Wivenhoe with his nose."

They sat where they were for another half-hour, and then, when Georgia
and Dell, Tante Marthe, Gaiogi and the rest of the morning's party had
joined the stream winding over the bridge and across the turf, they rose
themselves and wandered after the others. Campion was content. He felt
rested and at ease. The air was soft and pleasant, and that tranquil
mood which is induced by the contemplation of the derring-do of others
was upon him.

The two boys with the faded hair and level eyes were going to fly
Ramillies over the Sahara, and all Mr Campion had to do was to watch
them go. The hundred-year-old turf was spongy beneath his feet, and
Amanda, the least exacting woman in the world to entertain, was by his
side. In his own mind he had dismissed Ramillies as a possible source of
disturbance. He felt sure that any project Ramillies had in mind was
being preserved for his party with the Taretons.

The awakening came a minute or two later. Dell appeared, hurrying back
with Georgia just behind him.

"Have you seen Ramillies?" he demanded. "We thought he was down here.
The--the fellow seems to have gone again. The ceremony begins in a
minute."

"Oh, but he's there," said Amanda inexplicitly. "We saw him go into the
hangar, didn't we, Albert?"

"He certainly came down this way just over half an hour ago, just before
Wivenhoe," said Campion more cautiously. "Are you sure you haven't
missed him?"

"There's a lot of people there, darling," said Georgia nervously,
pulling at Dell's sleeve. "He may be among them."

"My dear girl, that's impossible." Dell stood hesitating. "Time's so
short," he said.

"But I saw him," insisted Amanda, and set off for the aeroplane shed at
a run, with Campion behind her.

There was the usual excitement in the crowd round the entrance, and the
platform was a seething jumble of privileged guests, guests who were not
privileged, and experts who were trying to protect their untidy
paraphernalia. Everyone seemed to have heard that Ramillies was missing
again, and the long sibilant name sounded from all sides. Campion
hoisted himself on the dais and looked around him. It seemed impossible
that the man should be there unobserved. He pushed his way over to a
mechanic.

"He _was_ 'ere." The man looked over his shoulder as if he expected to
find the lost sheep behind him. "'E come in about 'alf an hour ago, just
before the gentleman from the government who wanted everything altered.
No, I ain't seen 'im since."

"Albert." Amanda came round from behind the plane, which had been
wheeled out into the sunlight. She was dragging behind her a
bespectacled young man in oily dungarees. "Jimmy says Ramillies _was_
here," she said. "He wanted to see the seating accommodation again, and
they let him in the plane. Then Wivenhoe came along and took everyone's
attention, and they think Ramillies went off then."

Campion glanced at the gaudy little Seraphim spreading its golden wings
to the evening.

"Let's have a look," he suggested.

"He's not _in_ there," said Jimmy, revealing a stammer and a
public-school accent. "Don't be absurd, old man. I've c-c-called him."

"Let's have a look."

They found Ramillies cramped in the back seat. His tweed ulster billowed
round him, and beneath it, strapped to his body, were the dismantled
parts of the Filmer 5A together with two hundred rounds of ammunition.
He was quite dead.




CHAPTER ELEVEN


Mr Campion's first thought as he looked down at the body was that if
Ramillies merely intended to reawaken his wife's interest he had
overdone the effort considerably. After that he had little time for
reflection.

A dead man in a gilded aeroplane in the midst of a crowd, with a
broadcast imminent, an African flight about to begin, and in authority a
cabinet minister who does not wish to be convinced that anything
unpleasant has occurred, is a responsibility which absorbs all one's
attention.

The magic words "taken ill" circulated through the inquisitive gathering
inside the hangar and acted, as they always do, as a temporary sedative.
No doctor appeared but Georgia hurried forward, all grace and anxiety,
and the photographers obtained their one useful picture of the afternoon
when she stood looking up at Wivenhoe in the doorway of the plane.

It was Wivenhoe, supported by Dell and a white-faced Gaiogi, who made
the situation clear to Campion.

"My dear fellow, he can't die here," he whispered urgently, indicating
by a single expressive lift of his shoulder the fidgety crowd, the
weaving pressmen, and the mechanics and groundsmen who were at bay round
their precious plane. "He can't. The Old Man wouldn't stand for it for a
moment. Sir Ray must be taken up to the house and a doctor must see him
there." He leant forward, his big nose bringing his face much nearer the
other man's own than he seemed to realise. "He's alive. The Old Man is
convinced that he's alive. I'll bring Lady Ramillies along after you.
I'll explain he's very ill, so she'll be prepared for anything."

Mr Campion said no more. He was barely on speaking terms with himself,
let alone anyone else. To spend an entire day watching a man to see that
he does not make a nuisance of himself and, in the furtherance of one's
object, to connive at the most obvious piece of smuggling one has ever
seen, only to be so entirely frustrated at the eleventh hour, is an
exasperating experience. His frame of mind did not encourage him to
insist on the letter of police procedure. He hoped he knew a corpse when
he saw one, but if the government wished its servant, Sir Raymond
Ramillies, to die in a bed, who was Albert Campion to protest? He was,
also, very sorry for Ramillies.

Actually there seemed little reason why this particular body should not
be moved. There were no signs of wounding, and the possibility that the
man had been shot in that confined space, firstly without sound and
secondly without any smell of cordite, seemed more than unlikely.

The lean head with the doormat hair lolled forward on the chest, the
weight of the skull dragging the tendons of the neck horribly. The skin
was still clammy with sweat and the flesh was not quite cold. Campion
was curious to see the eyes and as he lifted one flaccid lid he was
surprised to find the pupil almost normal. There were one or two other
curious circumstances and he made a note of them.

The arrival of the ambulance provided a few grim moments. All that had
to be done was accomplished in whispers, since the broadcast, which
waits for no man, had begun and Towser's resonant voice, a trifle shaken
but otherwise normally monotonous, had embarked upon the prearranged
speech.

Georgia climbed into the ambulance and was persuaded out of it by the
resourceful Wivenhoe, while Mr Campion took her place on the spare
leather bench. The stretcher was hoisted gently into position, the doors
closed, and the wheels began to move. It was a very discreet departure.

Ramillies lay on his back beside the dark glass windows and Mr Campion
and the attendant sat and looked at him.

A uniform can make a man the next best thing to invisible, and when
someone sucked a tooth with a sound both human and ingratiating Mr
Campion started and turned to see, for the first time, a small,
sharp-featured, red face lit with the bright ghoul's eyes of the
professional calamity fancier.

"You're a relative, I expect," observed a wistful voice.

"No, no, I'm not, I'm afraid." Campion felt for a cigarette and changed
his mind.

The attendant got up and stood looking down at Ramillies with
fascination.

"You're just a friend, are you?" he said regretfully. "Well, I dare say
it'll be a bit of a shock for you. You've got to prepare yourself, you
know. I thought that as soon as I set eyes on 'im. I've seen too many of
'em. You get used to 'em in our work. As soon as I see 'im I said to
myself, 'This is goin' to be a shock for someone.' I thought it might be
you."

He conveyed considerable reproach and unconsciously Mr Campion did his
best for him, as was his nature.

"I knew him quite well."

"Knew? So you know he's a goner?" Reproach had become disappointment.
"You're right. 'E is dead. I see it the moment I saw 'im. 'E's nearly
cold. Still, you can't be too sure. When we git up to the 'ouse we'll do
one or two of the tests, although I expect there'll be a doctor there by
then."

There was not so much relief as contempt in the last phrase.

"Once a doctor gets 'old of a patient you're nowhere. They think they
know everything. And yet a man like me, who's seen serious cases every
day of 'is life, he knows quite as much as any doctor. Look at this chap
'ere, now. D'you know what I notice about 'im? I wouldn't say it if you
were a relative, but as you're only a friend I shan't 'ave to be so
tactful. (We're taught that, you know: be tactful with relatives. That's
part of our training.) Looking at 'im, I should say, 'You've 'ad a
seizure, my lad, a sort of fit, and, though I couldn't say for certain
without openin' you up, in my opinion you've got a clot of blood over
the 'eart or in the 'ead, and if it's not that, then it's fatty
degeneration. You've had trouble with your arteries for a long time and
you've bin livin' a bit too 'ard and now the excitement of getting ready
for this 'ere trip's bin too much for you, and I'd give you my
certificate... after I'd done the tests to see you _was_ dead.'"

He paused and looked at Mr Campion brightly.

"That's what I'd say and I'd be right," he said.

Mr Campion considered him with distaste, but there was something
forgivable in those bright, excited eyes. The man was a ghoul, but a
good-natured one, and the dreadful thought came to Campion that if
Ramillies' truculent spirit should by chance be hanging about its late
abode its reply to the address might be worth hearing. There is a lot of
talk about the dignity of death, yet it is but a negative kind of
dignity. Ramillies alive would have made short work of this
impertinence.

Meanwhile the ambulance had bumped off the flying field onto the lower
road and had passed the main entrance gates of Caesar's Court.

"We're goin' round to the cottage, you know," said the ghoul. "That's
standing orders. Nothing unpleasant near the main 'otel. It's very
sensible reelly. As soon as you get a bit o' class there's no sympathy
with illness. 'Ave you noticed that? In a different neighbour'ood a
thing like this 'd be an attraction, but not with the smart people you
get 'ere. No, it's all 'ush, 'ush 'ere. Coo, 'e's ill! Shut 'im in a
nursing 'ome and don't let me see 'im. That's the cry every time. Did
you know this gentleman very well, sir? Would you say 'e was an 'ard
liver? I don't want to sound inquisitive. It's just a professional
question. I like to know if my diagnosis is correct. 'E's bit 'is
tongue. That's a seizure, isn't it?"

Mr Campion breathed deeply.

"I really can't tell you," he said. He was not naturally squeamish, but
a ghoul is a ghoul and to suffer them gladly is not in everybody's
capacity.

"I'm sorry, I'm sure," said the attendant stuffily and was silent for a
while.

Presently, however, Mr Campion, who had forgotten him, turned to find
him looking down at one of the rather fine brown hands which lay upon
the cover. He had tied a small piece of string very tightly round the
lower phalanx of the forefinger and was studying the effect.

"That's the only test you can do in the ambulance," he said. "You can't
go mucking about with saucers of water on the chest in 'ere. There you
are, you see; there's no pinky glow. 'E's dead. I knew 'e was dead as
soon as I saw 'im. I expect 'e was all right this afternoon, was 'e?
Must 'ave been a shock for you."

"Yes, he was all right this afternoon." A certain lack of decision in Mr
Campion's tone brought the bright eyes up again.

"Then you did notice something? 'E was 'eavy, was 'e? Very likely.
P'raps 'e was a bit appre'ensive? A lot of people are 'oo die sudden.
It's a funny thing and the doctors say there's nothing in it, but I've
noticed it time and again. Time and again I've 'ad a sobbing relative
sittin' where you're sittin' now and they've told me the same thing.
Just before a seizure, just before someone's took off sudden, they've
bin overcast, as you might say. Felt there was somethin' 'angin' over
them. Of course that's psychic; that's not medicine; and I don't suppose
there's anything in it. But it does 'appen. Would you say it 'ad
'appened in this case? Would you say this gentleman 'ad any premonition?
D'you think it went through 'is 'ead that 'e was goin' to die?"

"No," said Mr Campion soberly. "No. I don't think it occurred to him for
a moment."

The heavy tires scrunched on gravel and the ghoul looked out of the
window.

"'Ere we are," he said. "Well, there'll be a doctor 'ere, but 'e'll tell
you the same as me and get paid more for it."

It was during the next twenty minutes that Mr Campion received the key
to the entire story. At the time he did not recognise it, but
afterwards, when he looked back, he saw that it was then that the
shadowy words were formed and spread out for him to recognise.

Gaiogi was waiting on the cushion-strewn steps of his doll's house when
the ambulance arrived and only the presence of a calash, abandoned on
the path, indicated that he had not flown there. Already evidences of
his extraordinary organisation were apparent. There was even a woman in
nurse's uniform in the doorway behind him and a houseman, with blankets
and hot-water bottles, appeared in the hall as the two ambulance men
carried the stretcher inside.

"I'm afraid all that is useless," murmured Campion, trying not to be
nettled by the reproachful expression in his host's shiny brown eyes.
"He was quite dead when I found him."

Gaiogi took his arm.

"Oh no, my dear fellow," he said pleadingly. "Oh _no_. Be careful, be
careful, you two men. Take the stairs carefully--carefully. No jolting,
please."

The nurse superintended the ascent and he watched her critically, still
holding Campion's arm.

"His doctor will be here in a moment," he whispered. "Then we shall see.
I've been talking to him on the phone. He's coming at once."

"From town?"

"No. Oh no. He was here this afternoon, playing tennis. He's
Buxton-Coltness, of Upper Brook Street, a very distinguished fellow.
Very good. Do you know him? He's just coming."

Gaiogi made the announcement blandly and with the faintest suggestion of
a smile behind his anxiety. He was like a man throwing off a small
conjuring trick in the midst of some other major manoeuvre.

"Wasn't it fortunate that he should have been here?"

"Miraculous," said Mr Campion involuntarily. "One's every want
anticipated. There'll be an inquest, of course."

"An inquest? An inquest at Caesar's Court?"

There is one expression that is the same upon every countenance. It is
the slow, incredulous stare of disgust which is reserved for him who
reveals the ultimate depths, the mortal insult, the utterly unforgivable
error of taste or morals. Gaiogi wore it now and Mr Campion was almost
apologetic until he pulled himself together and grasped at his fleeting
sense of proportion.

"My dear chap, it's a sudden death," he protested.

"I doubt it," said Gaiogi calmly. "You are a good chap, Campion, a
sensible fellow, but you jump to conclusions. We do not know if this man
is dead. Let us hope he is not. It is for his doctor to say."

Mr Campion blinked and was prevented from implicating himself still
further by the arrival of a second calash bearing Georgia and Wivenhoe.
Georgia came to Campion, her hands outstretched. She was pale but
controlled, and there was something about her manner that made him think
of suppressed excitement before he put the idea aside as unworthy.

"My dear, how is he?" she said, her eyes meeting his frankly. "Don't be
afraid to tell me. Is it terribly bad? I'm being as sensible as I
possibly can and you can rely on me. This dear boy here has been
preparing me for the worst and I'm not a child. I can stand it if you
tell me. How is he?"

"Georgia, we don't know." Gaiogi seemed to have caught her mood and for
the first time Mr Campion felt slightly nauseated. Everybody was
behaving too well for anything. "The doctor is coming. Don't go up yet.
There is a nurse with him, an excellent girl. You are wonderfully brave.
You are taking it just as I knew you would. Look, we will go into my
little room and sit down."

"He's quite right, you know, Lady Ramillies." Wivenhoe's solicitude was
charming. "You can see the door from the window. The moment the doctor
arrives we shall know everything."

The living room had been tidied after the hangover party and a decanter
of old brandy and glasses had been set out on a small table as though
ready for some emergency. Gaiogi dispensed the cordial with an air.

"I've told Dell to keep everybody down here," he said. "Meanwhile this
house is positively surrounded, so we shan't have any Press for a little
while at least. Ah, there is someone now. That will be Doctor
Buxton-Coltness."

Everyone so far forgot his manners as to stare out of the window at the
newcomer. Even in flannels and a blazer Dr Harvey Buxton-Coltness
managed to convey that he was a distinguished man. The white scarf round
his throat was folded with precision and his step was firm and
purposeful. His voice floated in to them from the hall. It was deep and
reassuring. Here, at any rate, was a man with a manner, the kind of
doctor who was entirely in keeping with Caesar's Court.

Georgia and Gaiogi hurried out to him. Wivenhoe gave them two minutes
and then went out himself to bring her back. There was something
familiar about her when she returned. Campion was reminded forcefully of
the heroine in _The Little Sacrifice_. There was the same quiet,
only-just-balanced movement, the same air of suppressed tragedy.

"I think I'll sit down," she said. She glanced at Campion and smiled
wanly. "They've promised to send for me the instant he's conscious."

It was a horrible moment. The complete insincerity of the entire scene
sickened Campion and he looked at Wivenhoe steadily. The young man
frowned at him and bent over his glass.

Georgia went on playing her part for some little time. It was not an
inspired performance; rather, a trifle mechanical, as if her thoughts
were not on it.

"I can't imagine Ray ill," she said. "He's not the kind of person who
ought to suffer. Haven't you noticed it? There's something so vital
about him, like a child. I think that's what I fell in love with first
of all. He's been going the pace terribly lately. I persuaded him to go
and see Buxton-Coltness only a little while ago. He didn't tell me what
he said. He wouldn't, you know, not if it was anything serious. That's
where Ray's rather sweet."

Mr Campion was not given to hating people but at that moment he
conceived an active dislike for Georgia Ramillies and surprised himself
in an impulse to take her by the shoulders and shake her till her teeth
rattled. He felt she knew as well as he did, as well as Wivenhoe knew,
as well as the ghoul knew, as well as Buxton-Coltness must know by this
time, that Ramillies was dead, dead as mutton, and in appallingly fishy
circumstances. He knew now what Val had meant when she had described
Georgia as vulgar. Georgia's vulgarity was staggering. It was the
overpowering, insufferable vulgarity to which nothing is sacred. It was
also, he found, the vulgarity which breeds vulgarity; his own
inclination to stand and shout the brutal truth at her until he forced
her out of her performance was almost uncontrollable, and when someone
came in he turned towards the door with physical relief.

It was Val. She had evidently just made up her face but her pallor made
the colour look artificial and there were shadows round her large light
eyes. She glanced from one to the other enquiringly.

"I met a servant on the landing," she said, "and he told me something
quite incredible. Is it true?"

The direct question in the clear, startled voice brought a draught of
reality into the room. Georgia looked up at her and became,
miraculously, a human being again.

"It's Ray," she said bluntly. "He was taken ill in the plane. The doctor
is with him now. Everyone's being awfully kind but I'm afraid it's
serious."

It was an odd situation. For a moment it was Georgia who was softening a
staggering blow to the other woman. There was alarm in her eyes and
something dreadfully like apology in her tone.

Like most men Mr Campion was at heart conventional, and when he saw
brutal, practical reality thrust under his very nose he could not bring
himself to recognise it. He watched the two women with growing
bewilderment. They were both entirely female, both sharp-witted, both
realists, but whereas the one had a balanced intellect in control the
other was as wanton and unexpected as a rudderless steamboat in a gale.
Val sat down.

"Is he dead?"

Wivenhoe, even more out of his depth than Campion, made a disparaging
sound, but for once Georgia did not respond to him. She seemed to be
absorbed by the other woman.

"I think so," she said. "They've been preparing me for it. Oh, Val,
isn't it _fantastic_? I mean it's frightful, terrible, the most ghastly
thing that could have happened! But--it's amazing, isn't it?"

Mr Campion felt his eyes widening. Now it was impossible to
misunderstand. He and Wivenhoe had been forgotten as completely as if
they had been children, to be ignored as soon as a grownup entered.
Georgia was doing no play acting for Val. They were equals coming down
to essentials in the face of the unexpected.

Val was sitting on a low chair, her hands folded in her lap. She was
wearing a bright red dress of some smooth material which had been
designed for her, and in it she made a complete and finished work of
art, as artificial in appearance as any other ornament in that mannered
room, but her personality was vivid and entirely human. She alone
expressed that sense of shock and calamity which her brother now
realised was the element he had missed throughout the entire incident.

"What happened?" she enquired quietly.

"I don't know." Georgia glanced at Wivenhoe. "What was it? Some sort of
stroke? How did he die?"

"I say, you know--really. We--we must wait for the doctor." The young
man was flustered. "I mean, we don't actually know yet, do we? He was
breathing in the plane. I'm sure of it. That is definite. Otherwise he
couldn't have been moved, do you see? It was probably some sort of
embolism. He was getting on for fifty, wasn't he? I know that sort of
thing does happen. An uncle of mine died the same way. It's dreadful
when it does occur but it's very much kinder for the old boys...."

He was drivelling and seemed to realise it. Neither of the two women was
looking at him. Val's eyes were holding Georgia's.

"You saw him when he came in today, didn't you?" she said. "How was he?
I thought he seemed so well last night."

There was no hint of accusation in her voice or in the words, but
Georgia recoiled.

"He was in a fearful state this afternoon," she said sharply. "He'd been
drinking all night. He said so. He was thick and loquacious and--oh,
Val, don't look at me like that! I'm brokenhearted, really I am. I'm
holding myself together with tremendous difficulty, darling. I am sorry.
I _am_. I am sorry. When you're married to a man, whatever you do,
however you behave to one another, there is an affinity. There is. It's
a frightful shock. I haven't begun to realise it yet. When I do I----"

"My dear Lady Ramillies!" Wivenhoe's startled voice was what she needed.
She swung towards him, put both her hands in his and began to cry. Val
blushed. The slow resentful colour spread over her face and neck and her
eyes were sombre.

"You poor, poor darling," she said.

Georgia wiped her eyes.

"I hate hysterical women," she murmured, smiling wryly at Campion. "I'm
all right, I'm all right now." She patted Wivenhoe's hands and released
them. Then, rising, she went over to Val and sat down beside her with an
arm round her shoulders. "You see, dearest, I don't know what's
happened," she said earnestly. "Nobody knows yet. It's all so--so
utterly extraordinary. It's incredible. But, Val, incredible things do
happen to me, don't they? You know that, don't you? We're always
commenting on it, aren't we?"

She seemed to be pleading with the fair girl, striving to force some
reassurance out of her, and Campion saw the strong, capable fingers
pressing into the shoulder of the red dress. Val laid a hand on
Georgia's knee but she did not speak. She was rigid, and there was a
short, unhappy silence before it was mercifully broken by footsteps in
the hall.

Gaiogi and the doctor came in solemnly and shut the door behind them.




CHAPTER TWELVE


The personal humility of all medical men is jeopardised throughout their
career by the fact that one of the disadvantages of their profession is
that they should be treated with much greater seriousness than any other
visitor to the normal household. Their lightest words are hung upon and
they receive every hour the flattery of absorbed attention. Some noble
natures can stand up to this and some cannot, but there is a small class
which turns a disadvantage into an asset and thrives upon the thing that
should defeat it.

Dr Harvey Buxton-Coltness was one of these. Critical colleagues told
each other bitterly that it was Buxton-Coltness' conceit alone which
kept him on the register. His head, they said, was like a balloon which
lifted him gently over morass and crevice, bearing him gracefully from
cocktail party to ducal bedroom, from exorbitant nursing home to
fashionable funeral, with a grace and ease not afforded to any man with
his feet set firmly upon the ground.

Mr Campion recognised his type as soon as he saw him and another little
detail in the key of the problem flickered under his nose.

The doctor was a large man with what is called a fine presence. His
light grey eyes were entirely without humour in spite of the laughter
lines beside them, and his shapely pink hands were graceful and
expressive. He waited for Gaiogi to introduce him to Georgia and
bestowed a general nod upon the rest of the room. When he judged the
right moment had come he made his announcement tactfully.

"Lady Ramillies," he said, "I am afraid I have bad news for you. Can you
bear it?"

Georgia nodded. Even she seemed to feel that a return to artificiality
would be indecorous.

"I was so afraid," she said simply. "What--what was it, Doctor? His
heart?"

"His heart--yes." Dr Buxton-Coltness conveyed that he was making a very
difficult thing very simple. He also seemed considerably relieved. "Yes,
I think we may say in actual fact his heart." He took the hand which she
had stretched out to him and stood looking down at her, his cold eyes
cautious in spite of his general air of contented omnipotence. "Tell me,
Lady Ramillies," he began, his voice rolling melodiously round the room,
"is this quite the shock it might have been? Did Sir Raymond tell you
nothing which might just conceivably have made you apprehensive?"

There was a pause and he glanced round him enquiringly.

"We are all in committee, are we not?"

"Oh yes," said Georgia hastily. "We're all very close friends."

She made some perfunctory introductions and returned to his question.

"He told me he'd been to see you. He'd been worried about himself and
some of our friends advised him to go to you. He told me you thought he
ought to go slow."

"I did. I did, most emphatically." The deep voice was thick with sad
conviction. "There were distinct symptoms of chronic nephritis, a
considerably raised blood pressure, and I diagnosed cardiovascular
trouble. I warned Sir Raymond to be very careful of himself. I told him
to avoid every sort of excess. I can't put it plainer than that, can I?
Every sort of excess. I impressed it upon him that alcohol was
definitely dangerous to him and I advised a visit to a spa. Now Mr
Laminoff tells me he can hardly have been said to have taken my advice.
Do you agree with that?"

Georgia looked at him blankly and he, mistaking her reaction, fell back
upon his charm.

"Forgive me," he said. "Of course this is a very great shock for you.
Surely it's not necessary for you to give me these details yourself, is
it? Isn't there some member of the family you can depute to act for you?
If I might prescribe for _you_, Lady Ramillies, I should go to bed
immediately. Keep warm. Take a sedative. What do you usually use?
Aspirin? Or do you like luminol? Anything like that. Wrap yourself up.
Get your maid to bring you plenty of hot-water bottles."

"No," said Georgia with sudden decision. "No, I'm all right. I can tell
you. We can all tell you. Ray hasn't been looking after himself. He's
been very gay during the last week or so--more, I think, than usual."

She glanced round at them for confirmation, and Gaiogi, who was watching
the scene with the bright anxiety of a squirrel, made a reassuring
noise. Georgia went on steadily.

"Then last night, in the middle of a farewell party, he went rushing off
somewhere and came back this morning about lunchtime. He said he'd been
drinking all night, and frankly that was obvious. He didn't come to the
farewell luncheon and when I saw him afterwards I thought he was even
worse. He was unsteady, you know, and pale, and frightfully talkative
and--well..." She threw out her hands expressively and the doctor
nodded.

He glanced round at his small audience with sad resignation.

"There you are," he said. "There you are."

Georgia opened her mouth but did not speak. She stood staring at him.
The matter-of-fact expression which he had used seemed to have jolted
her. Presently she turned to Val, her eyes wide and dark.

"Dead," she said. "Ray is dead. Val, do you realise it? Ray is dead."

The doctor moved to her side with unexpected agility.

"Now, my dear lady," he began warningly, "my dear lady, sit down. I
foresaw this. It was only to be expected. Sit down. Mr Laminoff, I want
some water, please."

"No." Georgia pushed him away. "No, really. I'm not hysterical. I
suddenly saw it. That was all. Why did he die? What was it?"

She listened to his recital with deep attention and so did Campion.

The full medical definition of the words "arterial thrombosis" is
impressive to the lay mind. It is one of those simple mechanical
disasters which are easily comprehensible to anybody, and as Mr Campion
sat listening to the full, confident voice his brows rose.

In a well-ordered society it is easy to think of some things as concrete
when they are nothing of the kind. After long years of experience Mr
Campion had come to consider a sudden and suspicious death as synonymous
with a post-mortem and a coroner's inquest, but now for the first time
it was brought strongly to his mind that this was not so in actual fact.
No ordinary hard-working general practitioner would dream of giving a
certificate of natural death in the present case, for the excellent
reason that should any talk arise afterwards, as well it might in
ordinary circumstances, the consequences would be thunderingly
inconvenient for him, and whereas he would have everything to lose he
would have precious little to gain. But there was no earthly reason why
a man like Harvey Buxton-Coltness should not give a certificate; rather,
every reason that he should.

Buxton-Coltness' practice was not bounded by any district. His patients
were all wealthy folk recommended to him by each other. The more
influential friends he made the better for him, and here he was in a
nest of influential people. It was clearly to everyone's advantage that
there should be no fuss over Ramillies' death. Towser, for one, would be
more than grateful to hear that it was a natural tragedy. Gaiogi,
Georgia herself, nobody wanted publicity. The ghoul's words returned to
him forcefully:

"It's all 'ush, 'ush 'ere.... Coo, 'e's ill! Shut 'im in a nursing
'ome and don't let me see 'im. That's the cry every time."

It was horribly true and nobody could possibly know it better than the
fashionable doctor with his partnership in Mayfair, his colossal fees
and his magnificent manner. There was no reason why he should not issue
a certificate of death from thrombosis of a main artery following kidney
disease and cardiodilation, and attend the funeral at Willesden
Cemetery, fixing himself in yet another twenty useful minds as that
charming man who was "so clever and considerate when poor Ray died after
getting so abominably tight." And if there was a little talk afterwards,
what was the real danger? It would only be talk among people who would
never risk seeing themselves in court on a slander charge. At worst it
would be frivolous and meaningless talk, and not in any case detrimental
to the doctor.

Mr Campion blinked. He saw how it was going to be done. Buxton-Coltness
was going to give the certificate and there was only one thing that
would stop him. That was immediate talk. Talk now. He glanced round the
room. He saw Gaiogi, Wivenhoe, Georgia and Val. Even Val was financially
interested in the preservation of the peace and privacy of Caesar's
Court. There remained himself. He was the sole representative of the
general public who might demand to know more definitely the cause of
Raymond Ramillies' extraordinarily opportune death. He alone was
unsatisfied. He alone was curious to know exactly what sort of seizure
had caused those last convulsions. It was up to him. He was the only
disinterested agent.

The hesitant words were on the tip of his tongue when he saw the
pitfall, and as it opened beneath his feet he experienced for the first
time that deep anger which altered him so and changed him from the
affable universal uncle to the man with an intolerable personal affront
to avenge. How could he protest? He was the guest of a host who had
expressly invited him to prevent just such trouble as he was preparing
to make. Moreover, he had spent the day watching a man who had died
under his nose. If the circumstances were suspicious, had he not had
every opportunity to alter them as they occurred? Both his professional
dignity and his natural ingrained reluctance to abuse his position as a
guest prevented him from speaking. They were his two vulnerable spots,
his two vanities. It was almost as though someone had sized him up and
sized him up accurately, a degrading experience for anybody at the best
of times.

Most people dislike to be made use of and resent being forced into a
position wherein their hands are tied, but in some folk the experience
raises a devil. Mr Campion was one of these. Had he been sure of his
ground, he flattered himself, he would have conquered his weaknesses and
taken the strong, if oafish, course, but he was not sure. If
Providence's celebrated Mysterious Ways Department was actually as
blatantly at work as it appeared to be, then Ramillies might have died
from a thrombosis, a cerebral hæmorrhage or any other natural
thunderbolt known to medicine.

As it was, Campion would do nothing. He saw that at once and his sense
of personal outrage grew. He was trapped by himself, fettered by his own
personality. The thing was mental jujitsu. The plaything-of-fate
sensation was bad enough but he had an uncomfortable feeling that the
fate in question had a human brain behind it, and there was insult as
well as inconvenience to counter.

Mr Campion's amiable brown face became dangerously blank and he stood
looking at the company, his hands deep in his pockets and his pale eyes
narrowed behind his spectacles.

The unexpected development came from Georgia. She was sitting on a
corner of the couch under the window, her hands between her knees and
her dark head bowed.

"I couldn't have done anything, could I?" she demanded, looking up.

"Nothing." Dr Buxton-Coltness managed to give the word sympathy as well
as conviction.

Georgia sighed.

"It's so extraordinary," she said. "It's so utterly extraordinary."

"It's very terrible." Gaiogi substituted the better word with gentle
firmness.

"Of course," said Georgia sharply. "Of course. No one knows that better
than I do, Gaiogi. But it is extraordinary, too, isn't it, Val?"

The fair woman did not reply and she hurried on.

"He didn't even take anything. He had nothing at all. He didn't even
take a sleeping powder. I gave him a cachet blanc when I first saw him
and he decided not to come down to lunch."

She seemed to find something surprising in her own words, for she broke
off abruptly and sat up.

"It was that cachet you gave me, Val. I meant to take it myself. But
when I saw him it seemed only charitable to hand it over. He took it at
once. That's all he had."

Val regarded her steadily. She was cold and slightly contemptuous.

"It was a perfectly ordinary cachet blanc," she said.

"My dear, of course it was." Georgia was eyeing her. "Of course." She
laughed and covered her face with her hands immediately afterwards. "I'm
completely off my balance. I only suddenly remembered that that was the
only thing he did take, and that you had meant it for me."

The words were out of her mouth before she realised their full
significance and she looked as startled by them as anyone else in the
room.

Val rose.

"You don't mean that, do you?" she said.

"No," said Georgia hastily. "No. No, of course not." But she spoiled the
denial a moment afterwards by allowing a glimmer of ill-timed mischief
to pass over her face. "After all, my pet, why should you want to get
rid of me?"

That was all, but the trouble was made. The little flame flickered and
grew. It flared in Gaiogi's eyes, passed over Wivenhoe's head, and
revealed itself to Buxton-Coltness, who recognised it and retreated
hastily, his cautious expression deepening. He coughed.

"Lady Ramillies," he began, "I've been thinking. This is a sudden death,
you know, and if Sir Raymond had not been a patient I could never have
considered giving a certificate. In that case a post-mortem and an
inquest would have been automatic. You realise that, don't you?"

Georgia looked at him blankly.

"Don't you know how he died?" she said.

Dr Buxton-Coltness smiled faintly with his small mouth and Gaiogi turned
away.

"My dear lady." The doctor's beautiful voice was kind. "_I_ am
satisfied, but in a case of this sort there are certain formalities
which can hardly be ignored. These things are very painful but they have
to be endured."

Georgia saw Gaiogi's face.

"Not an inquest," she said. "Doctor, can't you have a post-mortem
without an inquest? Isn't that possible?"

Wivenhoe cleared his throat.

"In such exceptional circumstances, sir," he said, "couldn't--I mean,
couldn't the certificate be held up for an hour or two while the P.M.
was rushed through?"

Campion watched the doctor curiously. The man was very tempted. After
all, his entire scheme of life was to be obliging to the right people.

"I suppose it might be arranged," he was saying dubiously. "My partner,
Rowlandson Blake, the surgeon, might possibly be persuaded. I don't
know, really. I should have to telephone, of course."

It was at that moment that Campion caught sight of Val and her fixed
expression and white face sent a thrill of unreasoning alarm trickling
down his spine. He moved over to her, and, taking her by the arm, led
her out into the little walled garden, lying smug in the warm evening
sun. She went with him obediently, her hands clasped limply behind her
back, but she did not speak and he missed her direct, confiding glance.
They walked over the grass plot in silence and after a while he spoke
himself.

"What are you thinking?"

"I'm not."

"Bad business."

"Frightful."

"I say, Val?"

"Yes?"

"What did you give that woman?"

"A cachet blanc."

There was a long pause and when Campion spoke again his tone was very
casual.

"They're things in rice-paper cases, aren't they?"

"You know they are." The icy quality in her voice did not warn him, as
it might have done. There is nothing like the blood tie to render
ordinary sympathetic comprehension void.

"One could open a thing like that?"

"One could, easily."

"She simply asked for it, I suppose, and you just handed it over?"

"You know exactly what happened. You saw me."

"Yes," he said. "I did. That's what's worrying me. I did. Val, you
wouldn't be an utter fool?"

"My God!" Her outburst startled him and he turned to her so that they
faced each other on the turf.

"My dear girl," he said, "you behaved like an amateur actress
registering stealth. It's no good being angry with me."

"I'm sorry." To his relief there was a glimmer of a smile on her mouth,
although her eyes were heavy with an old pain which he was embarrassed
to recognise and remember. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "But it all seems
so blazingly silly. I gave Georgia a perfectly ordinary cachet blanc.
She asked me if I had any after the party this morning, and I went up to
get her one. When I put it into her hand I had one of those dreadful mad
thoughts; insane impulses they call them, don't they? Anyway it went
through my mind that a good dose of cyanide in that thing would silence
her beastly, predatory vulgarity forever. And then, of course, as soon
as I'd thought it I looked up and saw your ridiculous face. I felt I
_was_ mad and I suppose I shuddered or recoiled, as one would naturally.
However, it doesn't matter. It was only one of those things."

Campion was silent and she laughed at him.

"Good heavens, you believe me, don't you?"

"I? Oh, Lord, yes." His tone was still troubled. "I was only thinking.
If they find a good narcotic poison in that chap's belly you'll be very
awkwardly placed. That woman has a mind like a demented eel; does she
always say any mortal thing that comes into her head?"

"Usually, I think." Val spoke lightly. "It was the fashion to be daring
some years ago, and the women who grew up at that period seem to have
got it incorporated in their general make-up. The trouble is that when
it's natural like that it becomes a negative thing. When it was
deliberate it was considered a decoration, or at least a weapon. Now
that's it's natural it's just an ordinary unbridled tongue. It's
dangerous, of course."

"Dangerous? My good girl, it's terrifying. If they find----"

Val laid a restraining hand on his arm.

"They won't find anything," she said.

Her complacency was irritating and he shrugged his shoulders and was
silent.

Presently she shuddered. He felt the tremor run through the arm against
his side.

"They won't find anything suspicious," she went on quietly. "I know
that. I'm certain of it. If there was any real danger of that the whole
thing would have worked out differently."

"Do you know what you're talking about, my sweet?"

"Yes, I do." He had succeeded in nettling her. "I know that
Portland-Smith died very conveniently for Georgia, and now Ramillies has
done the same thing. I know that it has been proved that Portland-Smith
committed suicide, and I know it will be proved that Ramillies died
naturally. There's no danger of a row because danger has been carefully
eliminated. It's all working out. There's a superstition in the theatre
that everything works out for Georgia. You must never cross Georgia. If
you go with her you're on wheels. This is another evidence of the truth
of it, that's all."

Campion frowned at his sister. His masculine mind revolted from this
in-touch-with-the-stars attitude and he said so.

"This is all very fine and large," he added, "but there's obviously
going to be a P.M.--Georgia brought that on her own head--and if the
fellow died unnaturally everybody's going to know."

Val shook her head.

"I don't think so."

"But, my dear good girl!" Mr Campion was restraining an impulse to
jitter at her with difficulty. No one else in the world save the whole
skein of his blood relations had this undignified effect upon him. "What
do you mean? Do you think that that pompous ass of a doctor is going to
risk his reputation saving anybody's skin? He'll spaniel round as long
as everything is pretty, but did you see him when the first flicker of
awkwardness showed? Did you see him?"

"I did. Don't shout at me."

"Darling, _am_ I shouting?" The injustice of the accusation took his
breath away. "You saw him. You know as well as I do that he's only going
to be obliging as far as it suits him, and it doesn't suit any doctor on
earth to hush up anything really serious unless he's personally
involved. It's an ordinary question of value for risk. If Ramillies was
poisoned, as I'm open to bet he was, the P.M. will uncover it and
there'll be an almighty row."

"I don't agree with you."

Mr Campion breathed deeply.

"Are you getting any fun out of baiting me or are you just not
listening?"

She squeezed his arm and her head touched his shoulder.

"I can't argue," she said. "I'm only telling you. However Ramillies
died, there won't be a row."

"If you think that doctor could be bribed I very much doubt it."

"I don't think that."

"Well then, Val, Val darling, put me out of my misery; how's it going to
be done?"

"I don't know," she said frankly. "I just realise that if a P.M. will
reveal anything unpleasant or dangerous there won't be a P.M."

"But there's _going_ to be a P.M., woman!"

"Then they won't find anything."

"Do you think it was a natural death?"

She closed her eyes.

"I think someone hoped very much it would happen."

Mr Campion sniffed. "And administered some dangerous drug unknown to
science, no doubt," he murmured.

Val's expression was infuriatingly vague.

"Perhaps so," she agreed absently.

He looked down at her with a mixture of rage and affection and finally
slid an arm round her shoulders.

"You're a dear little bloody, aren't you?" he said. "Let's be practical.
You've got no access to anything dangerous yourself, have you? Nothing
anyone could get silly about in case the dangerous drug wasn't unknown
to science after all?"

Val considered and finally glanced up at him.

"I've got about half a pound of morphine crystals at the Park Lane
house," she said.

"How much?"

"An enormous amount. About half a pound. A little under, perhaps."

"Don't play the fool, Val. This is fairly serious."

"I'm not, my dear. I'm telling you the literal truth. Tante Marthe knows
about it. It's in a drawer at the back of my desk in a big cigarette
tin. It's been there for two years at least."

She looked up at him and laughed softly.

"It came over from Lyons in the cardboard cylinder of a roll of taffeta
which we hadn't ordered," she said. "Rex found there was one odd bale
and the silk was put in my office to be returned. Tante Marthe knocked
it over and the cap fell off. There were about twenty-five little
packets of this stuff inside. We talked it over and decided that it was
quite obvious that someone was using us as a cover, and we suspected a
woman on the buying side. Naturally we didn't want a fuss, police in the
place and that sort of horror, so we sacked the woman, kept the material
and stuck the stuff in a drawer, where it still is, as far as I know."

"How do you know it was morphine?"

Val raised her eyebrows.

"I sent a little down to a chemist and asked, naturally."

"Weren't they curious?"

"No. I told some likely story about finding it in an old medicine chest
I'd bought. I sent very little. And when I had the report I told them
they needn't return it."

"I see," said Mr Campion a trifle blankly. "You're an alarmingly
matter-of-fact lot, you businesswomen, aren't you?"

"I suppose so." The depth of bitterness in her voice startled him and he
felt again that old bewilderment at her range of thought and her
staggering inconsistencies. His common sense reasserted itself.

"Look here," he said seriously, "I'm going to collect that stuff
immediately and you forget you ever had it unless I tell you to come out
with the whole story. I hope to God you can substantiate it."

"All right." He had the impression that she was laughing at him a little
and he regarded her helplessly.

"I don't understand you," he said. "You come roaring to me in town,
making a mountain out of a positive worm cast, and yet when a situation
which is really unpleasant does arise you behave as if I were an
overexcited Boy Scout."

"I'm sorry. I'm really very grateful." The clear high voice sounded flat
and she bestirred herself. "It's a question of proportion," she said.
"When I came to you in London I was afraid of losing something really
important for always; now I think I have lost it. It's altered my entire
perspective."

"Perspective?" he ejaculated, resenting the intolerance which she
engendered in him without being able to suppress it. "Do you know the
meaning of the word? Val, you're an intelligent woman. Your mind works,
so do use it, darling. This may be a beastly situation."

"If there's a P.M. they won't find anything," she repeated placidly.

He caught his breath and resisted the impulse to shake her.

"How can you possibly know that?"

"I do. You must leave it at that. Whatever we're up against, it's not
something childish or careless. But I can't discuss it now. I can't be
bothered with it. As far as I'm concerned it doesn't matter. I'm full,
satiate, with my own personal aspect of this affair. I've got to pull
myself together and behave, and I'm funking it. Now do you see what I
mean by perspective?"

"I think you're off your head," said Mr Campion frankly.

She looked at him with surprise.

"I am," she said. "I thought I'd explained all that pretty thoroughly.
Oh, Albert, my dear good ape, do try and understand. You're a sensible,
reasonable, masculine soul. If you fell in love and something went wrong
you'd think it all out like a little gent and think it all quietly away,
taking the conventional view and the intelligent path and saving
yourself no end of bother because your head plus your training is much
stronger than all your emotions put together. You're a civilised
masculine product. But when it happens to me, when it happens to
Georgia, our entire world slides round. We can't be conventional or take
the intelligent path except by a superhuman mental effort. Our feeling
is twice as strong as our heads and we haven't been trained for
thousands of years. We're feminine, you fool! I'm trying to use my head
constructively: she isn't. She's sailing with the tide."

"Oh," said Mr Campion furiously, "this is damned silly introspective
rot. What you need, my girl, is a good cry or a nice rape--either, I
should think."

Val's laughter was spiteful.

"There's a section of your generation who talks about rape as a cure for
all ills, like old Aunt Beth used to talk about flannel next to the
skin," she said witheringly. "This mania for sex-to-do-you-good is
idiotic. You'd far better get back to bloodletting or cod liver oil. No,
my dear, you may have the mental discipline, but we're the realists. At
least we don't kid ourselves even if we try to put on a decent
performance for everyone else. When I heard Ramillies was dead I didn't
think 'Oh, poor man, what a shock for his wife!' I thought, 'My God, now
Georgia will be able to marry Alan.' I'm still thinking that. And so is
she. It's disgusting and shocking to the sentimental or conventional
mind, but at least it's not false. Georgia may change round suddenly. It
all depends on whether she happens to see herself in some new dramatic
situation which demands a genuine regret for Ramillies."

"Hush," said Mr Campion and swung her gently round. Georgia was
advancing towards them across the grass. She was crying unaffectedly.
There were tears on her cheeks and tears swimming in her eyes. She held
out her hands to Val with a gesture that was oddly youthful.

"Val darling, where are you? Come and help me. I don't know what to do.
I can't bear it alone--I can't! I've got to get on to Ferdie in Paris
and I've got to tell Ray's half-brother, and there are some old aunts
somewhere. Alan's still down at the hangar. They're not putting off the
flight. There's no one, no one I can rely on at all. You must come. You
must. Whatever you feel about me, you can't desert me. I couldn't help
falling in love any more than you could."

Mr Campion stared, wondering if his ears had deceived him. Georgia had
flung her arms round Val and was crying like a child.

"Oh, come in," she sobbed, "do come in! There's a dreadful nurse there.
She seems to think I ought to go up and look at him, and I don't want
to. I'm terrified of him. What shall I do? What shall I do?"

"I'll come." Val sounded very cool and quiet after her revealing
outburst of five minutes before and Campion saw that she looked as
comfortingly calm and matter of fact as ever she did.

"When Alan comes he'll look after everything." There was a naïve warning
in Georgia's tearful announcement. "But until then you can't leave me,
Val. You can't. I've no one to turn to."

"There, there," said Val. "There, there," and they went into the house
together.

Campion stood looking after them. From the depth of his memory came a
remark of old Belle Lafcadio's: "Women are terribly shocking to men, my
dear. Don't understand them. Like them. It saves such a lot of hurting
one way and the other."

That was all very well, he reflected, but in the present situation this
feminine inability to adjust the viewpoint was appallingly dangerous.
Now, without Val's level-eyed gaze to help convince him, her story of
the morphine was terrifying, more especially when, having glimpsed her
state of heart, he saw Georgia rubbing caustic into the wounds with a
wanton recklessness which no man in his senses would risk. He shook his
head impatiently. Val was getting him muddled with her intuitive
convictions and airy statements. The facts were the thing. Had Ramillies
died naturally? It seemed most unlikely. If he had been murdered, who
had done it? Who had any motive? Georgia? Alan Dell? If, on the other
hand, he had died from some noxious thing intended for his wife, who
then?

He was pacing down the grass plot trying to force all personal
considerations out of his reckoning when another thought occurred to
him. To whose interest was it that Ramillies should be avenged if he
deserved vengeance? Who in his entire circle minded if Ramillies died?
Who, during the two hours since his death, had thought for an instant of
Raymond Ramillies suddenly and tragically ended? Who cared?

As it happened it was at that particular moment that he heard the
shuddering breaths in the shrubbery. Someone was weeping.




CHAPTER THIRTEEN


The boy sat on the edge of an ornate marble love seat hidden in the
shrubbery. His feet were set squarely on the ground and his head rested
in his hands. He was crying in that steady absorbed fashion which is
peculiar to childhood. His grief engrossed him and he was blind and deaf
to everything else in the world.

The hopvine growing over the high wall behind the seat made a yellow
curtain and its scented folds hung down to spill over the stone. There
were birds about and the lazy grumble of bees. Art was out of the way
for once and Fashion might never have existed. There was life and
reality in the garden and this ridiculous weeping figure was a part of
it. Mr Campion felt suddenly grateful to him. He sat down on the stone
step and took out a cigarette. _Ivanhoe_ lay at his feet and presently
he turned over the pages, looking for the Black Knight.

He had been reading for several minutes when the shuddering breaths
ceased and he glanced up to find a pair of fiery red eyes regarding him.

"It happens," he said when the silence had to be broken. "It's one of
the things that do. It's beastly, but it's part of the experience of
being alive."

"I know." The boy wiped his face and kicked the foot of the bench with
his heel. "I know." He spoke with the resignation of a much older
person. "This is silly. I just felt like it. That was all."

"My dear chap, it's perfectly natural. The weakness part of it is only
shock. It's physical. That's nothing."

"Is it?" There was quick relief in the question. "One doesn't _know_,
you know," he added presently and summed up the whole misery of youth in
the statement.

Mr Campion did his best to recount the physical effects of shock and
Georgia's son listened to him with interest.

"That does explain it," he said at last. "That makes it understandable
anyway. How about Georgia? Do you think I ought to go in to her? I don't
want to. This--er--this shock might make me blub again and anyhow I
should probably be in the way. Is Mr Dell with her?"

"I don't know. She had my sister there with her the last time I saw
her."

"Your sister? Oh, that's good. That's all right then. I'll get over the
wall and sneak back to the hotel to wash in a minute. I'd better pack.
She may want to get back to town."

Mr Campion glanced at the small pointed face with interest. It was not
unattractive but the son would never have his mother's dark handsomeness
nor her magnificent physique. All his life he would be small and in age
would look very much as he did now. He was a funny sort of child.

They sat in silence for a long time, both of them unexpectedly at ease.

"Ray wasn't my father, you know." The announcement was made bluntly and
sounded like a confession. "My name's Sinclair."

"Fine. I didn't know what to call you. What's the other name?"

Campion was sorry for the question as soon as it was out of his mouth.
His companion's embarrassment was considerable.

"I was christened 'Sonny,'" the boy said with a protective formality
which was clearly of some years growth. "It seems to have been all right
then. Fashionable, you know. Now, of course, it's ghastly. Everyone
calls me Sinclair, even Mother."

"I was christened Rudolph," said Mr Campion. "I get people to call me
Albert."

"You have to, don't you?" said Sinclair with earnest sympathy. "Georgia
says my father insisted on the name in case I went on the stage." His
lip trembled and he scrubbed his face angrily with a sodden
handkerchief.

"You're not attracted to the stage?"

"Oh, it's not that." The voice broke helplessly. "I wouldn't care,
really. I wouldn't care about anything. I'd be _anything_, only--only I
did think it was all settled at last. That's why I'm blubbing. It ought
to be about Ray, but it's not. He was all right really--friendly, you
know, and rather exciting when he got on to his adventures in Ireland,
but he was an awful worry to you. You had to follow him around the whole
time and play up to him and coax him into being reasonable and doing
what Georgia wanted. I liked him sometimes and sometimes I got jolly
tired of him. I was frightened when I heard he was dead. I mean I
thought I was going to cat, like you said. But I was blubbing because of
myself."

He sniffed violently and kicked the bench for support again.

"I thought I'd better tell you--not that I think you'd care, of
course--but after all it's the truth and it's ghastly to have someone
sympathise with you because he thinks you're cut up about your
stepfather dying when you're really being selfish. I don't really care
frightfully for anyone except Bunny Barnes-Chetwynd and old Grits. Grits
is Georgia's housekeeper. She looked after me when I was a kid."

"Who is Bunny?"

Sinclair brightened.

"Bunny's a good chap. We came on from Tolleshurst Prep to Haverleigh
last term. He has trouble with his people too. They keep on starting
divorces and changing their minds. Bunny's all right. He'd be able to
explain this better than I can. It's all so stinkingly mouldy. I don't
want to be a snob or a squirt but when you're _in_ a thing you've got to
_be_ in it, haven't you?"

The last question was a plea from the heart and Mr Campion, who was ever
honest, gave a considered reply.

"It's very unsettling if you're not."

"That's what I mean." There was despair in the red eyes. "Before Ray
turned up I was always in such a _mess_. It began at Tolleshurst. It's a
snoop sort of prep and at first I was a sort of curiosity because of
Georgia being so well known, and then..." He paused. "Oh, things
happened, you know," he said vaguely.

"Scandal, you mean?"

"Yes, I suppose so."

"About Georgia?"

"Yes. Nothing beastly, of course." Sinclair was scarlet with shame. "I
didn't follow it very well at first, of course, because I was a little
kid, but you know what prep schoolmasters are. They talk like a lot of
old women and fellows' people take their kids on one side and put them
off you and that sort of thing. It wasn't anything beastly. It was just
a sort of feeling that we were a bit low. My father appeared in a rather
hot sort of farce in the town one term while Georgia was having a lot of
publicity and being photographed with one of the fighters."

He took a deep breath and leant forward.

"I didn't really care," he said earnestly, "but I wish they'd sent me to
a lower place. I don't want to be bogus and pretend. I only want to be
something definite. I find things awfully confusing anyway. It's not the
work; I like that. But it's not knowing ordinary things, like that shock
business, for instance, and why you suddenly feel you must go and do
something silly even though you know it's silly, like telling barmy lies
or pretending you're awfully keen on poetry when you're not. _You_
know."

"Yes, I know," said Mr Campion and saw for the first time the use of
Raymond Ramillies. The advent of Ramillies must have made a great
difference to Sinclair. Ramillies sounded all right. His family was good
and his position unquestionable. As a stepfather he must have been a
rock. Much has been said against the English system of moulding young
gentlemen to a certain pattern, but, whatever the arguments for and
against it may be, the system itself when in operation is a formidable
machine. The passage through it is painful anyway if one's corners are
stubborn but to be jerked in and out of it by the capricious tricks and
antics of one's parents' fluctuating whims or incomes is a mangling
process not to be endured.

"Do you like Haverleigh?" he asked.

Sinclair stared at his feet. His eyes were swimming.

"It's marvellous," he said. "It's pretty good."

"We used to play you," Mr Campion observed. "You were very strong in
those days. You are still, aren't you?"

The boy nodded. "We're the top," he said. "It was foul at Tolleshurst,
being not quite sound--presentable, you know--but here it would be hell.
You'd let the place down, you see. They wouldn't chuck it at you, of
course, but you'd feel you were doing it."

Since the talk was an intimate one and complete frankness seemed in
order Mr Campion put forward a comforting suggestion somewhat baldly.

"Perhaps you'll get someone as good."

"Yes," said Sinclair and let the air sizzle through his teeth. There was
a flicker of hope in his eyes, stifled immediately, which was among the
most genuinely pathetic sights Campion had ever seen. "Mother was
engaged to Portland-Smith once," the boy remarked presently. "I liked
him. He was hopelessly stiff and conventional but he did know what he
wanted and what he was going to do next. He was going to be a county
court judge. Georgia would have to have left the stage if she'd married
him. I hoped she would but that was pretty low of me. I was only
thinking of myself. He was a moody person, though. He shot himself: Did
you know?"

"Yes. I found him, as a matter of fact."

"Did you?" Sinclair hesitated over the obvious question, instinctive to
everyone and yet always false to the ear. Campion answered it for him.

"In a place very much like this," he said, looking round at the leaves.

Sinclair considered the astounding vagaries of life for some time and
finally reverted to his own problems, which were at least concrete.

"It's filthy to sit and blub about oneself," he remarked. "A lot of what
I've been saying is filthy. But I've started, you see. I've started to
be one sort of chap. Ray said if I worked I could go to Oxford and have
a shot at the diplomatic. I meant to hold him to that if it was
possible. I tried to make it square with him by trailing round and doing
what I could. It's putrid talking like this when he's just dead, and I
liked him. I did like him, but it's my _life_, you see. It's all I've
got. Now I may have to change everything again, and anyway I won't know
what I'm doing for a bit. I wish I'd started on something where none of
this mattered a hang. That's not quite true. I love Haverleigh and I'd
miss Bunny."

The name made him laugh.

"Bunny would burst if he heard me talking like this," he said with a
chuckle. "Bunny's 'fearfully decent.' Sorry I told you. I'll go and
pack. She'll be going back to town, and if I'm not there when the car's
ready I'll have to cadge a lift from someone. There's not a train for
miles. Good-bye, Mr Campion. Thank you for the tip about shock."

Having no other convenient place to carry it, he stuffed Sir Walter's
great romance into the seat of his flannels and hoisted himself up the
wall. Perched on the top, he looked down at Campion.

"I've been talking like Ray did when he was tight," he said with a
bravado which deceived neither of them. "Forget it, please, won't you?
It was seeing things working again that put the wind up me. It does,
doesn't it?"

"Things working again?" echoed Mr Campion sharply.

Sinclair seemed surprised.

"Things do work, don't they?" he said. "Things happen and link up rather
peculiarly. Haven't you noticed it? They do round Georgia and me anyway.
Don't they do it everywhere?"

"I don't know," said Mr Campion slowly.

"I think they do," persisted Sinclair. "You'll jolly well see it if you
watch, or at least I think you will. I do. I say, this wall's giving.
Good-bye, sir."

Raymond Ramillies' chief mourner dropped out of sight and Mr Campion was
left alone, thinking.

He was still there, sitting with his arms clasping his bent knees, when
Amanda found him. She was dishevelled and almost weary, for once in her
life.

"Gone to ground?" she enquired, pausing before him. "I don't altogether
blame you. The plane's off at last. Nearly an hour late. What a show!"

She sat down on the step beside him and retied her shoelace, her red
hair hanging over her face.

"How did that chap die?"

Mr Campion related the entire story truthfully, omitting only Val's
incredible admission about the morphine. He knew from experience that
there was not much which could be hidden from Amanda for long and so
made the rest of the tale as exact as possible.

She listened to him in complete silence and when he had finished began
to whistle a little tune, very flat and breathy.

"Albert," she said suddenly, "I'll tell you something. I can _hear
machinery_!"

He turned his head.

"It's getting a bit obvious, isn't it?" he murmured. "Even my great ears
began to throb. Who's the little god in charge?"

Amanda hesitated, her hand still on her shoe and her skinny young body
arched forward.

"Could she have the nerve?"

"Has she the organising ability? I know poison is supposed to be sacred
to women, but she brought that P.M. on herself. Buxton-Coltness would
have signed up like a lamb."

Amanda grunted.

"Perhaps she overplayed the part," she said. "Or perhaps she knows she's
safe."

"How can she know she's safe? The Buxton-Coltness combine may be a
gaggle of quacks, but they're not criminal and presumably they can do a
P.M. between them."

Amanda opened her mouth and thought better of it.

"I don't care about Ramillies," she said at last. "I thought the chap
was close to being a bounder and he was certainly a dreadful old cad,
but I don't like us being used. It's this Old Testament touch that
frightens me. I don't like being caught up in the cogwheels if I think
someone's doing it. It's bad enough when it's the Lord."

"Organised machinations of fate," murmured Mr Campion, and felt for the
first time that old swift trickle down the spine. It was astounding that
three such very different people should have expressed so unusual a
thought to him within the hour.

Meanwhile Amanda was still talking.

"What's going to happen next?" she said. "Something's up. When the pilot
got into the Seraphim he found this lying on his seat and he gave it to
me to attend to."

Campion glanced at the little silver model in her outstretched hand. It
was the Quentin Clear. Amanda's brown fingers closed over it.

"I thought I'd better hang on to it, for a while anyway," she said.
"What do you know about that?"

"Georgia wasn't wearing it when she came down to the hangar after
lunch."

"I know she wasn't. Nor was A.D. And why should it be lying on the seat,
right under the nose of one of the few men who would know what it was
and whose it was when he saw it? It's a plant, another 'mysterious
way.'"

Mr Campion stirred.

"It's so damned insulting," he said. "Amanda, we'll get the impious god
in this machine."




CHAPTER FOURTEEN


The post-mortem examination on the body of Sir Raymond Ramillies was
performed and an examination of certain organs was rushed through, the
Richmond Laboratories performing in twenty-four hours a task over which
the public analyst might have been expected to take three weeks.

After the reports had been made Dr Harvey Buxton-Coltness saw no reason
to withdraw the certificate which he had given, and the funeral took
place on the fifth day, Messrs Huxley and Coyne, the big furnishing and
warehouse people, making an excellent job of the arrangements.

The details in the box headed "Cause of Death" in the registrar's oblong
black book read "Cardiac failure due to myocardial degeneration. Other
conditions present: chronic nephritis," and meant, in much plainer
English, that Sir Raymond's heart had ceased to beat and that there was
no really satisfactory reason, as far as Dr Buxton-Coltness, Mr
Rowlandson Blake, F.R.C.S., and the Richmond Laboratories could
ascertain, why on earth this should have been so. It also meant, of
course, that these three authorities were prepared to bet that no other
experts could ascertain more, and there the official side of the matter
rested.

Several people were surprised, Amanda among them, but Mr Campion was
also angry. His sense of outrage grew. His personal and professional
dignity had been assailed, his reputation had been utilised, and Val's
prophetic judgment confirmed. Moreover, the "mysterious drug unknown to
science" seemed to have materialised at last. He became very affable and
friendly and he and Amanda went everywhere together.

They went to the memorial service at St Jude's-by-the-Wardrobe, near the
Old Palace, and Val saw them there looking very charming and sleek in
their black clothes, two rows behind Gaiogi. Val went with the widow.
Georgia had phoned her in the morning.

"Darling, you must. I'm relying on you, Val. The only women in the
family are the aunts and the half-brother's wife and they're all
definitely hostile besides being frightful females who smell like
puppy's breath. I've got Sinclair, of course, but I must have a woman,
mustn't I? I thought of having Ferdie sit with me, but somehow I don't
think... do you? He's not old enough. Alan's to go alone. He must
appear but I can't have him near me. That would be too filthy. Darling?"

"Yes."

"Isn't it _amazing_?"

"Extraordinary."

"I'm terribly upset, you know."

"I'm sure you are."

"You don't sound as though you were. But I am, Val. I've cried myself to
sleep every night since. I _have_. I really have. I did love him. Not
like Alan, of course, but I did love Ray. Poor Ray! I miss him terribly.
Come with me. I'll call for you at a quarter to. Not late or early, I
think, don't you? Just on time."

"It's safest."

"Val, you sound chilly, almost distant. You're not angry with me by any
chance, are you?"

"Angry with you? My dear, why should I be? What have you been up to?"

There had been a light, relieved laugh.

"Nothing. Of course not. I only wondered." And then, in a burlesqued
cockney accent, "We girls are funny sometimes, duck. We imagine things,
don't we? It's our natures, I suppose. Val?"

"Yes."

"You do like me a little bit, don't you? We are friends?"

"Darling, of course." Val was not a great actress and a hint of dogged
determination came through the words.

"Honestly?"

"Oh, don't be a fool, woman. I'm at work. Of course we are."

"All right. You needn't be so very brittle, need you? It's a memorial
service to my dead husband, you know. You don't understand, do you, pet?
You're hard, Val."

The word had done the work it always does, and Val's face betrayed her,
but the telephone had only carried her cool, high voice to the other
woman.

"Am I? I don't think so. I don't know."

"Take it from me, then. But I don't blame you. I admire you for it. You
don't know how much you save yourself by it. You miss a lot but you save
more, I think. Look here, what about Lady Papendeik? Would she come with
us? We don't want to look like a couple of floozies. Not that we should,
of course. But we both do look so young. Who is she coming with?"

"She's not going, I'm afraid."

"Oh? Why not? I think she ought to."

"She doesn't feel like it," said Val. Tante Marthe had actually said
that she knew Ramillies well enough to realise that mere praying for him
was a waste of her own and the Bon Dieu's time, but there seemed no
point in repeating it.

"Oh, I see. Then it's just you and me and, of course, Sinclair. I've
tried on the entire ensemble again and I like it enormously. You don't
think those millions of little black butterflies on the cap are a tiny
bit pert for the occasion?"

"No, I don't think so.... After all, he liked you to look lovely."

"Are you laughing at me?"

"My dear, why should I?"

"I never know with you. You don't understand. I loved him. I adore Alan
but I loved Ray. I did. I really did."

"You love us all," said Val. "God bless you. Good-bye, my pet."

"Good-bye, darling. A quarter to three, then. I say, Val, don't wear
_all_ black. _I'm_ the widow. You don't mind me saying that, do you? I
thought you wouldn't. That's why I love you. I can be myself with you.
Val, do you think I'm vulgar?"

"Not more than we all are. Good-bye, my dear."

The memorial service was charmingly devised and, since the church
specialised in such offices, well carried out. Glancing round the
ancient greystone nave, it occurred to Mr Campion that the familiar
"friends of the bride" and "friends of the groom" division had been
aptly translated into "relations and officials" and "friends of the
deceased."

Towser, representing royalty, and a small brigade of supporters
presumably representing Towser, sat on one side of the aisle with the
aunts, the half-brother and a host of army and club folk, while Georgia
and the Caesar's Court contingent formed the flower of the opposition.
Sinclair stood by his mother, his small drawn face stoical.

Val had given her mind to her clothes and her femininity had triumphed.
She was exquisite. Georgie's dark galleon was for once a little heavy, a
little funereal, beside this dainty mourning skiff. Val had conceded to
the not-all-black request in her own way, and carried, instead of the
more ordinary enamel compactum, a pochette made from the chased silver
binding of an old German missal, with three or four large real violets
threaded through its solid clasp.

Many people looked at her and there were some who nudged their
neighbours and pointed her out. Much of this notice was an ordinary
tribute to a distinguished and beautiful woman, but not all. Val was
sublimely unconscious of the general interest. She was acutely aware of
Alan Dell seated five or six rows behind her and of Georgia kneeling and
rising at her side, but save for them the rest of the church might have
been empty as far as she was concerned.

Mr Campion was aware of Dell also.

The vicar of St Jude's-by-the-Wardrobe had been a soldier himself in his
time and had decided to give an address. He was an oldish man with a
failing memory, and once or twice during his discourse it became
apparent that he had confused Ramillies with some other warrior, but his
parsonical intonation robbed most of his words of any meaning whatsoever
and fortunately embarrassment was thus avoided.

The homily provided an interlude, however, and during it Campion had
leisure to look at Dell.

He was sitting forward, his silk hat hanging from his hand and his face
clearly outlined against a pillar. From time to time he glanced towards
the backs of the two women sitting far in front of him. Amanda kicked
Campion.

"A.D. looks like that at work," she murmured.

He nodded and glanced at the face again. There was no shyness there now,
nor was there weakness or uncertainty. The Alan Dell at Ramillies'
memorial service was the Alan Dell of Alandel planes, Val's love, Sid's
hero and Amanda's boss. Mr Campion felt more than sorry for him.

He could just see Georgia, looking unapproachable in her beauty, her
elegance and her grief. Val, he knew, was beside her, and the thought of
her reminded him of the uncanny accuracy of her guesses. Most women were
alarming in that way, he reflected again. They muddled through to truth
in the most dangerous and infuriating fashion. All the same they were
not quite so clever as they thought they were, which was as it should
be, of course, but odd considering their remarkable penetration in most
other practical matters.

It was astonishing how the simple, direct reactions of the ordinary male
eluded them. In many cases he was their main interest and yet they
invariably boggled over him, approaching a machine of the relative size
and simplicity of a bicycle with an outfit which one might be expected
to need to take a watch to pieces.

He glanced at Dell again and picked up some of the other man's thought;
he recognised the pail-of-water-over-the-head experience which
Ramillies' sudden death and Georgia's sudden release must have been to
him. That shock had been physical, of course, while the decent,
well-behaved mind, which is always being bewildered by the body's
antics, had no doubt reacted conventionally. The beloved was free and
the beloved must therefore be claimed and married, so that, after making
all allowances for natural regret at another human being's untimely end,
the heart should be bounding. And yet did Dell's heart bound? Mr Campion
was inclined to bet his all that it did no such thing. In Mr Campion's
opinion Dell was probably disgusted, and, if he was as inexperienced as
he appeared to be, disconcerted by himself. In his idle mind Mr Campion
addressed him across the church. "You'll ask the woman to marry you, old
boy, insistently if you're pigheaded and half-heartedly if you're not,
and if she agrees to do so with sufficient speed you will marry her, and
you'll become one of the half-resentful, half-obstinately optimistic
husbands that the Georgias of this world acquire. But, ever since
Ramillies died, ever since the moment when the first word of his death
reached you, although Georgia's body has remained sickeningly desirable
and will remain so for some time, every other word that has escaped her,
every little offensive trick of mind which she has betrayed and which
until now has been muffled by you automatically because her deficiencies
were not your affair, has suddenly become italicised. In fact, ever
since Ramillies died Georgia has got on your nerves and you cannot bring
yourself to believe that you are such an outsider, or love is so
fragile, that the two events have any connection."

Mr Campion read the label in his hat. It gave him a childish sense of
satisfaction to reflect that this elementary mental process was one that
neither Val nor Georgia would ever grasp until it had been bitten into
their minds with the slow acid of the years. They would both of them pry
and probe with their delicate little forceps, they would weigh
intonations and pore over letters, forcing little pieces of jigsaw to
fit into fantastic theories as ingenious and delightful as Chinese
puzzles, and yet the elementary fact would sit and stare them in the
face, defeating them by its very simplicity.

He looked down at Amanda. She was reading in a very old Prayer Book she
had found in the pew a Form of Service for Thanksgiving for the Delivery
of King James from the Gunpowder Plot.

It was raining a little as they came out of the church and they paused
for a moment in the half cupola of the pillared porch. Ferdie Paul
joined them. He looked profoundly mournful and his curling mouth was
drawn down. His eyes lit up at the sight of Amanda and he congratulated
Campion heartily on his engagement, about which he seemed to know a good
deal; but having completed these formalities, his gloom returned.

"It's bad," he said, his unexpectedly thin voice irritable. "Damn bad
luck all round. Too near the other business. It's bad for Georgia.
People will begin to think she's poisonous or something, poor girl. It's
amazing what people _will_ think, you know."

The last remark was uttered with sudden directness and the full brown
eyes were intelligent.

"I don't know how half the lunatics in this world arrive at their
beliefs. By the way, how is Val?"

The connection between the two remarks was not apparent and Mr Campion
looked blank. Ferdie Paul, who was watching him closely, seemed startled
and then, if such a thing had been possible, almost confused.

"She's here, is she? That's good. Oh, with Georgia? Really? That's
splendid. She's been a great comfort there, I know. Georgia's far more
cut up than she shows. I can tell it when she's working. She's put up a
stronger performance in some respects than I've ever heard her give
these last few nights, but you can tell she's running on her nerves."

He paused and a faint smile passed over his face.

"Thank God it's not a farce," he said, "or we'd have to come off. As it
is, the 'gallant little woman' can carry on with entire propriety."

Mr Campion was mildly surprised. The reference to Val had not been lost
upon him in spite of the adroit cover-up.

"The whole thing was a great shock to everyone concerned," he said.

"Oh, my dear chap, frightful! Frightful!" There was no doubting Ferdie
Paul's sincerity. The nervous energy in his voice was almost a touchable
thing. "Frightful! I nearly had apoplexy myself when Georgia phoned me.
I mean, think of the publicity. If poor old Ray had wanted to make a
stink he couldn't have fixed it better, could he?"

"I suppose not. Gaiogi seemed upset."

"Oh, Gaiogi?" Ferdie laughed. "He took to his bed for three days
afterwards. Did you know? He's in love with that hotel. My God, the
fellow sleeps with it. It's indecent. Here he is. Czar Gaiogi,
representing Caesar's Court."

The dig was unkind, but apt. Gaiogi Laminoff came out of the church door
with the dignity of a sorrowing emperor. He bowed gravely to them and
came over.

"Not a good address, did you think?" he remarked seriously as he joined
them.

"Rotten. Not an ad in it," said Ferdie maliciously.

Gaiogi raised his eyebrows and turned to Amanda.

"You are a lovely thing on a sad day," he said simply. "I am so glad to
see you."

Somewhat ungallantly Mr Campion deserted his betrothed to deal with this
sort of impasse as best she could and was relieved to hear her
confessing that much the same notion had come into her head at the sight
of Gaiogi. He went forward with Ferdie to meet Georgia, who had just
appeared.

Val had become separated from her charge during their passage down the
aisle and she was waiting with the rest of the fashionable crowd, on
whom enforced silence had inflicted a certain simmering quality, when
she caught sight of Dell looking at her anxiously.

Her first fleeting impression was that he had been waiting for her, but
she dismissed it irritably and favoured him with a faint, cool smile of
recognition. He came over to her, edging his way through the group
clumsily, and was by her side as the crowd began to move. She was aware
that he was making up his mind to speak to her and was suddenly
unreasonably and degradingly elated, but when the words did come,
blurted out huskily as they stepped into the rain, she was only puzzled
by them.

"Val," he said, "you've got intelligence, my dear. You wouldn't blame
the wrong person, would you?"

She had time to stare at him blankly and then Georgia was before them.

"Come with us, Val. We'll drop you. For God's sake don't smile. You know
what photographs are. Where's Sinclair? Oh well, never mind. He can take
a taxi. Come, we can't stand here. It looks terrible. Come, Alan.
Sinclair is a little beast. I told him to stick to me."

Sir Raymond's chief mourner was in a pew at the back of the church. A
thought had been tormenting him all the way down the aisle and at the
last moment he had weakened and given way to it.

"O God, dear God," he prayed, "if so be it You do exist, hear me. I know
they say there isn't a hell, but if there is, O God, dear God, kind God,
don't let Ray burn. He was only silly, O God, dear God, only stinkingly
silly. Don't let him burn."

Then, this last orison performed, he scrambled up, caught a verger
looking at him suspiciously, and hurried out, his ears burning. The car
had gone and he looked about for a cab and would have taken one had not
Amanda and Campion met him on a street island and carried him off to tea
with them.

Meanwhile Val and Georgia sat side by side in Georgia's car and Alan
Dell sat opposite them.

Georgia was on edge. There was a certain quality of defence about her
also which was new in her in Val's experience. She was working hard.
Every ounce of her physical magnetism was forced into service and,
because this was hardly necessary and even a large car is a confined
space, the effect was overwhelming and uncomfortable.

Val became very quiet, almost sedate. She sat gracefully in her corner,
one knee tucked up under her and the four-inch heel of her little shoe
showing against the grey rep-covered seat.

Dell looked preoccupied and morose but Georgia was irresistibly warm.
Her life flowed over him, forcing him to respond to it in spite of his
inclination, which was towards peace.

"Oh, darlings, this is the first time that I've felt happy since that
dreadful afternoon. You're the two people I rely on most. I couldn't
live without either of you. I know I say and do the filthiest things but
I don't mean it. Do you think I could take my hat off, Val? No one could
see in here, could they? Not to recognize me, I mean."

Dell took her hat from her outstretched hand and put it down on the seat
beside him. The little black butterflies on the crown attracted him and
he filliped one of them idly. Georgia laughed.

"They're like aeroplane wings, aren't they?" she said. "Val's a genius.
She's entirely brilliant. Do you realise that, Alan?"

He looked at the two of them dispassionately, his bright blue eyes
reproving.

"Val is a good friend," he said. "The best friend you have."

Georgia shrank back like an abashed baby and there was new colour in her
cheeks.

"Oh, but, darling, I _know_," she said with passionate reproach in her
tone. She laid a hand on Val's wrist possessively. "I do know. Don't I
know? Alan, why do you say that? I adore Val and Val likes me, don't
you, Val? You do like me. We've been friends for years. We're all
frightfully upset. The service was terribly emotional. That's why I
dread these things. Let's stop and have a cocktail somewhere. Oh no, I
suppose we can't like this. My God, I suppose we can't be seen out at
all tonight. Where shall we go?"

"I must go back to Tante Marthe. She's waiting for me at Park Lane,"
said Val.

"Oh, must you." Georgia did not make the words a question. "What a
frightful nuisance. I don't know what we shall do. Alan?"

"Yes."

"Take me up in a plane."

"What, now?"

"Yes, as soon as we've changed. Drive me out to Caesar's Court and take
me up in a plane. I want to get away, right away, just for a little tiny
while. Do. Please, Alan, because I ask you."

"All right," he said dubiously. "It'll be frightfully cold, you know,
and it's raining."

"Oh, all right." Georgia shrugged her shoulders. "We'll light a fire and
sit round it and talk, or dress up in old clothes and go to some dirty
little Soho restaurant where we shan't be recognised. What shall we do?"

Val glanced at Dell. He was watching the other woman gravely. There was
no telling what was the thought in his mind. He was regarding her
earnestly and with evident interest, but his opinion was secret. Val
blinked and turned her head.

"Here we are," she said with relief. "Will you come in? No? All right.
I'll see you soon, Georgia. Good-bye, Alan."

Her small gloved hand rested in each of their own for an instant and
then she was gone. Georgia looked after her and smiled with genuine
sadness.

"Poor pretty Val," she said. "Isn't she a dear?"

Dell did not answer her directly. He moved over into the seat Val had
vacated and laid a hand on Georgia's arm.

"I'm going to take you home now and then I'm going to leave you," he
said. "I'll phone you tomorrow."

"Oh, but why?" She moved away and sat looking at him with the wide-open
eyes of an injured child. It was Georgia at her most appealing, her
warmest and most vulnerable. He hesitated.

"Don't you think I ought to?" he said at last.

"Ought to?" She was honestly bewildered and he laughed uneasily.

"I think I will," he said.

Georgia could see herself faintly mirrored in the glass between them and
the chauffeur's dark back. It was a flattering reflector and she was
reassured after a momentary misgiving. His obvious reason, which was a
natural conventional distaste for the proximity of love and death,
escaped her and she was puzzled. She slid an arm through his.

"I want to be with you this evening, Alan," she said. "I'm not playing
tonight, you know, because of the service. No, my dear, this is the
first time, the very first time, I've felt free." There was no mistaking
her confiding. It was genuine, voluptuous and entirely generous.

He did not speak and she felt him stiffen. She looked up and was amazed.
She had caught him unawares and there had been nausea on his face.

"All right," she said, releasing him. She was laughing but obviously
deeply hurt. "All right. I shall be terribly rushed tomorrow. Phone me
the day after."

He sighed and rubbed his hard, scrubbed hands over his face.

"You don't understand at all, do you?" he said.

"My dear, I do, of course I do," said Georgia with more conviction than
truth, and sat looking at him with patent speculation in her tweed-grey
eyes, so that he felt like a medical specimen and was revolted and
ashamed of himself and very unhappy.

Meanwhile Val proceeded calmly to her office. Rex met her in the hall
with two queries concerning dresses which she had forgotten and she
dragged her mind out of its self-protective coma and considered them
intelligently. He noticed nothing unusual about her and when she stepped
into the little wrought-iron gazebo of a room, Lady Papendeik, who was
sitting at her desk, thought she looked particularly well and was
grateful for the circumstance in view of the letter before her.

They talked of trivialities for some moments and touched on business.
Val pulled off her small black hat and her yellow hair shone in a stray
shaft of sunlight cutting through to them from the west landing window,
where the sun was breaking through after the rain.

"It was tiring," she explained, smiling in faint apology.

Tante Marthe's little black eyes glinted.

"Georgia played the leading part well, no doubt? Did she enjoy herself?"

"Oh, I think so. She behaved excellently."

"Did she? That must have been a comfort to her husband's ghost."

"Mustn't it?" Val agreed absently.

She had not seated herself and there was an undercurrent of restlessness
in her movements which did not escape the old woman.

"Are you feeling irritable?"

"No, not particularly."

"Good." Lady Papendeik sniffed over the word. "I had a letter this
afternoon from Emily."

"From Mother?" There is nothing like surprise to ease emotional tension
and Val moved over to the desk with her natural step.

Lady Papendeik spread her small hands over the blotter.

"It is annoying."

"I can imagine it."

"I wonder. I hope not." Tante Marthe shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, read
it," she said. "It must be true or she could never have heard of it. No
one can do anything."

Val took up the thick cream double sheet with the well-known crimson
heading, the single arrogant house name and county which had once been
so familiar and which even now brought a far-off memory of a peach tree
of all things, a sprawling peach tree on a rosy wall.

    Dear Lady Papendeik,

    _I am an old woman_ [the letter had originally begun "We are
    both," but the three words had been struck out with a single
    broad line from the hard steel pen and remained a shining
    example of British county tact at its unhappiest], _and I am
    writing to you instead of to my daughter because I feel that you
    at least will appreciate to the full my natural reactions to the
    monstrous situation which has arisen. This morning I received a
    letter from Dorothy Phelps. She is a fool, of course, but I am
    sure she wrote me out of the kindest of motives. She is a
    distant relation of my husband's, a collateral branch of his
    mother's family, and I am sure she would never do anything to
    wound me maliciously. I enclose her letter, which I hope you
    will return to me. You will see she says "everyone is talking
    about it." This is quite intolerable. I have suffered enough
    from my children, God knows, but even they must see that this is
    the last straw. Will you kindly see that Val has nothing more to
    do with this woman? Val should never again visit this hotel,
    Caesar's Court, and must be brought to realise that, even if she
    has obstinately thrown away every advantage to which her birth
    has entitled her, she cannot escape from the_ responsibility
    _which is hers as much as it is mine or any other owner of our
    name or those few names like ours which are left. They tell me
    times have changed_, but they have not changed here. _This
    precious little part of England is as it ever was, thank God,
    and until I die it will remain so. After that I dare not
    contemplate. Of course no_ action _is possible. Val, I am sure,
    will recognise this in spite of the subversive influences of the
    past few years, but in my opinion a_ threatened _action might
    have some effect, and I am instructing our solicitors to put
    themselves at her disposal. I do not want to hear from Val.
    Explanations do not interest me, as all my children know. In my
    world explanations and excuses have ever been taken, rightly or
    wrongly, as signs of guilt or weakness. This abominable slander
    should never have been uttered. No daughter of ours should ever
    have put herself into a position which made its utterance
    possible. Since it has been uttered, I am forced to take steps
    to see that it is silenced and I appeal to you to bring Val to
    her sense of responsibility in the matter. If she can do nothing
    she should at least go abroad for six months. Meanwhile, you
    will oblige me by refusing, of course, to have any future
    transactions with this woman Georgia Ramillies._

    _Believe me,_
    _Yours sincerely,_
    
    Emily K----

The rest of the signature was illegible.

Val put the letter down quietly and picked up the enclosure, which was
written on single sheets with a club address and was in an 1890
calligraphy.

    Dearest Aunt Emily,

    _I do not know how to write to you, darling, without hurting you
    much more than you could ever deserve, but something has come to
    my ears which Kenneth and I feel we ought to let you know about.
    I was playing bridge here yesterday and a Mrs Fellowes--her
    husband is one of the Norfolk people, I think--was talking about
    poor Val. Of course I listened and said nothing. Amy Fellowes
    has a daughter who is in the stage set (many quite good young
    people play at this nowadays, you know, dear) and when the
    conversation turned to the death of Raymond Ramillies (no doubt
    you read about it; it was very sudden) Mrs Fellowes came out
    with an extraordinary story. According to this, Lady Ramillies,
    who is Georgia Wells, the actress, actually said to Amy
    Fellowes' daughter, in front of several other people, that it
    was a very extraordinary thing that her husband should have died
    so suddenly after taking some aspirin which Val had given Lady
    Ramillies for herself. What made it worse is that she hinted
    that Val and this Ramillies woman had some quarrel over a man
    whose name I did not hear although several were mentioned. Of
    course this cannot be_ true. _Neither Kenneth nor I would
    believe it for a moment. But I felt it was my duty to write to
    you because it is the kind of gossip which should be_ stopped.
    _Everyone is talking about it. Val, I know, is very clever and
    probably very foolish. I am sure if she realised the pain she
    gave you she would be more careful. Forgive me for sending you
    such bad news but I thought it best to come out in the_ open,
    _and so did Kenneth. I expect your dear garden is very beautiful
    now. How you must love it!_

    _Very affectionately, dear Auntie, yours,_
    
    Dorothy Phelps

Val let the paper drop and her fingers fluttered over it in a little
gesture of distaste.

"A frightful old woman," she said. "I remember her. Yes, well, that
accounts for it."

"Accounts for what?" demanded Tante Marthe sharply.

"Oh--things." Val walked down the room and stood looking across the
landing to the west window blazing in the evening sun.

"Georgia must have said this thing to someone," remarked Tante Marthe.

"Oh, Lord, yes, she's said it." Val sounded weary. "She's said it to
everyone she's become confidential with in the last fortnight. There
must be dozens of them. You know what Georgia is. She doesn't really
mean it. She doesn't think I tried to poison her. She simply knows it's
a good story but doesn't realise how good. She doesn't actually think at
all. She goes entirely by feel."

"It's dangerous, my dear."

"Is it?" The younger woman spoke bitterly. "There's been a P.M.
Ramillies is safely buried. It's all perfectly normal. Am I likely to
sue her?"

"You could."

"I could. But am I likely to? If she weren't one of our most important
clients would I be likely to admit I've even heard that I am so much in
love with Alan Dell that I attempted to murder the woman he preferred?"

Lady Papendeik did not speak for a moment.

"It's very naughty of Georgia," she observed somewhat inadequately, when
the silence had gone on long enough. "What shall one say to Emily?"

"She's seventy." Val sounded tolerant. "Say you'll do all you can. She's
a hundred and fifty miles away and a hundred and fifty years off. She's
living in the past, somewhere just before the Napoleonic Wars. You get
like that down there. The house hasn't changed and neither has she. If
she weren't so gloriously hard it would be pathetic. Still, it's
idiotic. You can't behave like Queen Charlotte just because you live in
a Georgian pile."

Lady Papendeik nodded regretfully.

"Will you mention this to Georgia?"

"Oh no." Val was standing with her back to the room, the sun turning her
hair into a blazing halo. "No. She'll forget it in a day or so. If I
talk to her it'll give her something else to add to it, or else she'll
be brokenhearted and contrite and have to confess to someone terribly
confidentially, and the whole thing'll blaze up again."

"You're very wise for your age." Lady Papendeik seemed to find the fact
a pity. "Perhaps this niece of Emily's has exaggerated."

"Perhaps so. Let us look on the bright side by all means."

"You are afraid the man will hear of it?"

"I'm afraid he has." Val's tone was commendably matter of fact. Ever
since she had read Dorothy Phelps's letter the full significance of
Dell's muttered injunction on the church step had been slowly sinking
into her mind. It is the little unexpected nicenesses which creep
through the armour chinks, and suddenly her restraint shivered. She laid
her forehead against the pane.

"_My dear, oh, my dear, my dear, my love, oh, sweet, sweet, oh, my
dear._" The idiotic refrain made existence just bearable until the
moment was over.

She turned away from the window and glanced at Tante Marthe.

"It passes," said the old woman, answering her thought. "Of all the
things that pass that passes most completely. Enjoy it while you can."

"Enjoy it?"

Lady Papendeik looked down at her hands with the little brown mottles on
them.

"There's a great deal to be said for feeling anything," she remarked. "I
don't."

Val sat down at her table and began to scribble. Presently the other
woman rose to look over her shoulder.

"What's that?" she demanded. "A nightgown?"

Val ran a pencil through the design. She looked up, her cheeks red and
her eyes laughing.

"A tiddy little shroud," she said. "It should be made in something
rather heavy and expensive. Berthé's new corded chîne-chîne, I think."

"Morbid and silly," said Lady Papendeik. "I like the little bows. What's
the pocket for?"

"Indulgences," said Val cheerfully. "They're always in fashion."




CHAPTER FIFTEEN


"I tell you wot, cock," said Mr Lugg, looking at an enormous gold hunter
which had been entirely ruined, from his point of view, by an engraved
tribute in the back which rendered it of little interest to pawnbrokers.
"I tell you wot. She's not coming."

Mr Campion turned away from his sitting-room window and wandered across
the carpet, his lean dinner-jacketed shoulders hunched.

"A nasty little girl," he observed. "Take the crème-de-menthe away.
Drink it if you like."

"And smell like a packet o' hiccorf suckers. I know." Lugg waddled to
the coffee table and restored the offending bottle to the cocktail
cabinet. "You treat me as a sort of joke, don't you?" he remarked, his
great white face complacent. "I'm a regular clown. I make you laugh. I
say funny things, don't I?"

His employer regarded him dispassionately. In his velvet house coat, his
chins carelessly ranged over a strangling collar and his little black
eyes hopeful, he was not by any means an uncomic figure.

"Well, go on, say it. I'm a laugh, ain't I?"

"Not to everyone."

"Wot?" He seemed hurt and also incredulous.

"Not to everyone. A lot of my friends think you're overrated."

"_Overrated?_" The black eyes wavered for a moment before a faint smile
spread over the great face. "Reelly?" he said at last, adding
tolerantly, "It takes all sorts to make a world, don't it? It's a funny
thing, I often give meself a laugh. I think we'd better give 'er up,
don't you? It's no use me sitting around dressed like a parcel if
company's not expected. That's _makin'_ trouble. Mr Tuke advises me to
wear lower collars. One inch above the shirtband, in 'is opinion, is
quite sufficient if a gentleman 'as an 'eavy neck. What would you say?"

"What's the time?"

"Close on arf-past. She's not comin'. She's led you up the gardin.
That's a woman all over. I don't know what you want to bother with them
for. Two blokes 'ave died and are tucked up tidy, and what if there is a
lot of talk about your sis and a sleepin' tonic? That's nothin'. Leave
it alone. Fergit it. Be a gent and look it in the face and don't see
it."

"A sleeping tonic?" Mr Campion's pale eyes were cold behind his
spectacles and Mr Lugg perceived the pitfall too late.

"A naspirin, then," he said defiantly. "Fergit it. Don't roll in the
mud. Don't _bathe_ yerself in it."

"When did you hear this?"

"Oh, ages ago. Months, it was. Last week per'aps." Mr Lugg was throwing
the subject about until he lost it. "I changed the conversation, if you
want to know, same as any gent would 'oo 'adn't fergot 'isself."

"Where was this? At your beastly pub?"

"I may 'ave 'eard a careless word at the club. I really fergit." Mr
Lugg's eyes were veiled and his dignity was tremendous.

"The club!" said Mr Campion with a force and bitterness which were
unusual in him. "All the blasted clubs. Oh, my God, what a mess! There's
the bell at last. Let her in, there's a good chap. Where on earth has
she been?"

Mr Lugg raised his eyebrows, or rather the ridge of fat where his
eyebrows should have been, and shuffled out of the room. His voice came
back from the passage a moment or so later.

"No luck. It's only Miss Amanda. This way, yer ladyship. She's let 'im
down. No, 'asn't showed up at all."

Amanda came in full of sympathy. She did not take off the thick ivory
silk coat which covered her from throat to toe but seated herself on the
arm of a chair and regarded her host enquiringly.

"What do we do now?"

He grinned at her. Her enthusiasm was infectious and comforting and it
occurred to him then that she would retain it all her days. It was part
of her make-up and sprang from a passionate and friendly interest in all
the many and exciting surfaces of life.

"I was considering," he said seriously. "At the moment we face an
impasse. The old maestro allows beautiful suspect to slip through
nicotine-stained fingers. I had been all over London for that wretched
girl and I was lying harmlessly in bed this morning, wondering if the
Salvation Army wasn't the next most likely hunting ground after all,
when she phoned me. I recognised the jew's-harp voice immediately and
promptly fell out of the bed onto the bear I shot in the Afghanistan
campaign. She gave her name at once and plunged into business. 'It's
Miss Caroline Adamson speaking. Is that Mr Albert Campion? Oh, it is?'
_Light laugh._ 'I don't know if you remember me?' _Pause._ 'Oh, you do?
That's divine of you.' _Gasp._ 'Well, Mr Campion, would you be in
tonight about eight if I was to call round? I think you've been looking
for me and I think I know what you're interested in. You want me to tell
you something, don't you?' _Seductive upward inflection._ 'I'll call
then. Oh no, no, thanks, that's sweet of you. No, I won't dine. I just
want a little business chat. You understand it will be business, don't
you?' _Firm, straight-from-the-shoulder tone._ 'Oh, you do? I thought
you did.' _Relief._ 'I've only seen you once to speak to but I thought I
was right about you.' _Unnecessary laugh._ 'Well, I've got your address
so I'll drop in about eight, then. What d'you want to know where I live
for?' _Hur hur hur._ 'I'll come round to you. No, really, I'm on a diet,
I am really. About eight then. Righty-ho.'"

He finished his impersonation with a realistic giggle.

"There you are," he said. "I couldn't discover where the call came from.
Never try to trace a London telephone call unless you're a
superintendent of police. So I washed my hands and face, bought three
pennyworth of mimosa for the desk vase, lassoed Lugg into a collar and
sat down to wait. When I asked you to come along at half-past nine I
thought we'd have some jolly gossip to discuss. Instead of that the
little canine has ditched me and here I am, disconsolate and foolish."

"You'd look more foolish if she'd fixed up to meet you outside the
Leicester Square tube. It's raining like stink," said Amanda with
typical practicalness. "What does she know? It must be something fairly
good or she'd never approach you. She must have some sort of information
to sell."

Campion glanced at her with mild surprise.

"Without wanting to wound your finer susceptibilities, I should have
thought that was fairly obvious," he said at last. "I take it that Miss
Adamson knows where Ramillies went when he rushed away from his farewell
party at Caesar's Court, and where he got the alcoholic drenching which
was so tactfully avoided in Doctor Buxton-Coltness' report."

Amanda looked up. She was quietly pleased with herself, he noticed.

"She may, of course," she said, "but I doubt it. I know where Ramillies
went that night. He went to Boot's Hotel."

"Boot's?" Mr Campion was frankly incredulous.

Boot's Hotel is one of those curious survivals which still eke out a
failing existence in odd corners of London's mysterious western end. It
had been founded early in the nineteenth century by a retired royal
servant, and something of the stuffy, homely dignity of the court of
Silly Billy still persisted inside its dusty crimson walls. The place
had possessed a distinguished clientele in the days when a fine country
lady and her husband were at a disadvantage if their relatives were out
of town and could not offer them hospitality for their visit, since
hotels which were not also public houses were scarce. But now its period
was long past and only its tremendously valuable freehold and the
sentiment of its owners stood between it and the housebreaker. So far as
Mr Campion knew, the Fitton family were the only people wealthy enough
to face the tariff yet sufficiently hardy to stand the discomfort. There
was a legend that hip baths were still provided in the vast bedrooms and
were filled from small brass cans by ancient personages in livery, but
Amanda said it was a good hotel and gave it as her opinion that once
they got rid of the rats it would be very healthy.

"Boot's?" Campion repeated. "Boot's and Ramillies? Ramillies left
Caesar's Court and beetled off back down the years to Boot's? Why?"

"To get a little peace, perhaps," suggested Amanda. "He wasn't awfully
young. Love and the dance band may have got him down between them. It's
not unlikely. Anyway he was there on the nineteenth because I saw his
name in the book when I signed mine tonight. It was on the top of the
page before mine. (I don't think they're doing very well.) I asked
George about it. He's that old man in the office place, and he remembers
him coming in very well. Ramillies arrived fairly late and went up to
his room, and, what's more, George doesn't think he came down again
until the next morning, rather late. He's going to find that out for
certain. Also--and this is the funny thing--George doesn't think he was
drunk then."

"My dear child, he must have been." Mr Campion was almost dogmatic.
"Otherwise no man on earth could have done it in the time. I diagnosed
at least a twelve-hour blind when I saw him after lunch. The whole story
sounds fantastic. He may have taken a quart of whisky to bed with him at
Boot's and privately drunk himself pallid. It's a form of vice which I
don't understand myself, but, having seen Ramillies, I'm open to concede
that such a form of perversion might conceivably appeal to him. I say,
are you sure you've got the right date and the right man?"

"Raymond Ramillies, The Residency, Ulangi," said Amanda, "_and_ George
described him."

"George also says he wasn't tight," objected Mr Campion.

"George is a wonderful smart old man." She dropped into her native
Suffolk by way of emphasis. "If George said you were tight now I'd take
his word for it against yours, and as for the date, if Ramillies went
and stayed alone on any other night at Boot's for no good reason
whatever, that _would_ be astonishing. But if he suddenly got fed up
with Caesar's Court and Georgia and the noise and wanted somewhere quiet
to sleep, then it would be a perfectly normal thing to go to Boot's,
where there's not even any plumbing to uggle-guggle at you from inside
the walls. That's all right. That's the kind of thing I'd do myself."

Campion was silent. There was a great deal of common sense in Amanda's
remarks. It was the kind of thing Amanda would do herself, and
Ramillies, for all his vagaries, came from much the same background as
Amanda. He stood frowning down at her.

"Suppose you're right," he said. "Suppose all this is true. Where and
when did he get in the condition in which he arrived at Caesar's Court
and what in the name of good fortune has Miss Adamson to tell us that is
sufficiently interesting for her to think we might buy it?"

"That's what I was wondering," said Amanda. "We ought to get hold of
her, you know. This is a filthy tale that's going round about Val."

Campion raised his head sharply.

"It's reached you too, has it?" he said. "Isn't that jolly? New York
will get it tomorrow when the Queen Mary docks and Uncles Henry and
Edwin will mail their protests from the outposts of empire a couple of
months from now. That's Georgia. That's what comes of emancipating the
wrong type of female. For a thousand years they breed a species to need
a keeper and then they let it off the chain and expect it to behave.
Progress has made things damned difficult. Twenty years ago Val would
have been forced to bring an action for slander, but nowadays, when we
have decided that quarrelling is childish, friendship is the fashion,
and we're all one big unhappy family, there's nothing to be done at all
except to produce an even better story to contradict the first, and
that, let me tell you, is not so frightfully easy."

Amanda slid down into the chair and sat looking up at him gravely. Her
heart-shaped face was intelligent and he noticed again in an
absent-minded fashion how much her appearance had improved. She would
never have Val's extraordinary elegance but there was strength and
breeding in her fine bones and her personality was as refreshing as the
small clear streams of her own county.

"It's this hand-of-fate method that's the trouble," she remarked. "We
can't get at anything, not even the body. I suppose those doctors were
all right?"

"Oh, I think so." He smiled at her seriousness. "They'd hardly risk
their own necks. Why should they? No, I fancy they were genuinely
fogged, just as I am, and I think that whoever arranged that Ramillies
should die (and I'm open to bet that somebody did) knew that any
ordinary doctor would be taken in. The P.M. didn't disclose anything at
all, you see, not even why the fellow died. I wish that Adamson girl had
turned up."

"You think she meant to come?"

"Well, I wondered," he began and shot her a glance which was half amused
and half genuinely grateful. "What a pleasant girl you are, Amanda. Did
you deduce that from my reported telephone conversation? You comfort me.
Thank you. I need it. I wasn't quite my usual corruscating self this
morning. But when she phoned I admit it did go through my mind that she
might have a girl friend in the box with her. There was a distinct
flavour of third person in the air and if so, you see, the whole thing
may be a discreet enquiry to find out just how much I'm interested."

"In that case there's something definite to know, which is a comfort,
and the sooner we find her the better." Amanda rose with determination.
"What are you looking like that for?"

Mr Campion had taken off his spectacles and was staring absently at the
carpet. He looked older and, as Amanda had said, a trifle bleached.

"I was thinking," he said slowly, "I was thinking that suppose we do
find out who got rid of Sieur Ramillies, and supposing when we do it's
not quite such a good telling story after all?"

"Then we shut up about it, of course," said Amanda cheerfully. "It's our
hanging. Where do we go from here? If you know anything you'd better
tell me. It'll save time and I'm bound to find out in the end."

He sighed. "I don't know much. During my little mug round after the
elusive Miss Adamson I picked up a crumb here and there. Nothing
sensational like your Boot's Hotel bomb. That's the irony of life. Poor
old Blest and I go nosing about like a pair of bloodhounds for days on
end and discover practically nothing, and you go dancing into your
horrible home from home and discover Ramillies' name and address in the
visitors' book. Just before you descended on me and we went to the Tulip
that night Blest had been round with the useful information that someone
besides myself had been looking into a trifling matter in Georgia's
past, and since then I have discovered that it was Caroline Adamson.
That's one crumb. I then found out from various Aunt Maggies that our
Caroline was the daughter of a former employee of Gaiogi Laminoff's and
that she began her career at the Old Beaulieu when Gaiogi was managing
it. She was the girl who sat in a box in the vestibule and exchanged
one's hat and coat for a ravishing smile and an artificial gardenia.
After that he seems to have got Ferdie Paul to give her a chance on
tour, and when everyone was perfectly certain that although the flesh
was beautiful the voice was foul, she landed a mannequin job at
Papendeik's. That's the other crumb."

"It's a bit," said Amanda. "Have you been to see Gaiogi?"

"About Miss Adamson? No."

"But why not? He's the obvious person to go to. He knows more about her
than anyone. Let's go now."

She was already halfway to the door, but paused, when he did not follow
her, to stand regarding him with open suspicion in her eyes.

"Can I say something rather rude?" she said. "If you're thinking that
there's the least chance that the story about Val is true you're nuts.
You don't mind me putting it like that, do you?"

"Not at all. I agree with you."

"Thank goodness for that. Let's go to Gaiogi at once."

"I don't think I would."

"Why not?"

Mr Campion looked uncomfortable beneath her steady gaze.

"It's a little question of self-advertisement," he explained evasively.
"While I admire your forthrightness, Amanda, it gives me pins and
needles in the soles of my feet. In view of everything I think Ferdie
Paul is our most likely bet. He'll know who she was on tour with. In
situations like this the girl friends have a tendency to cling
together."

"All right." Amanda sounded dubious. "He has a flat over the Sovereign
Theatre, the one Sir Richard built for Lucy Gay. He's not likely to be
in at this hour of the night but we can try."

"How true, my sweet, how true," said Mr Campion and reached for the
telephone.

Ferdie was not only in, but in cheerful mood. His thin voice, which
suited so ill with his appearance, squeaked heartily over the wire.

"I've got to leave town in forty minutes. Come round and have a drink.
I'll tell you all I know about the bit, which isn't much. Is young
Amanda with you? She is? Good God, what are you worrying about another
woman for? I'll expect you both then, in five minutes. Fine. Good-bye."

The flat, which a great actor-manager had built for a charming leading
lady on top of the Sovereign Theatre, was, if sumptuous in the main, a
trifle furtive about the entrance. The back of the theatre possessed a
yard, now used by privileged persons as a car park, and in the yard
beside the stage door was another, smaller and even meaner in
appearance, giving on to a flight of uninviting concrete stairs. Once
inside, however, the atmosphere changed, and Campion and Amanda came up
in a small hand-worked passenger lift to a front door as impressive as
any in Victorian London.

They were admitted by a Japanese manservant, who led them across a
narrow hallway to the main living room, which was a quarter as large as
a church and not at all unlike one in structural design.

Ferdie Paul, who had employed most of the great decor men of the day in
his productions, had not permitted their work to get into his home. The
vast untidy room had grown. No man on earth could have sat down in cold
blood and visualised such jolly chaos.

Ferdie himself sat on a gigantic chesterfield with his feet up, and
around him were manuscripts, books, papers, sketches and even patterns
of material, in happy confusion.

On the floor before an open suitcase knelt a now familiar figure. She
rose as they came in and stood waiting to be introduced with the same
hidden discomfort which Campion had noticed in her when he had first
seen her at Papendeik's dress show and later with Ferdie at the Tulip.

"Haven't you met Anna? Surely? Oh, you must meet Anna. She's the most
extraordinary woman in London."

Ferdie rose lazily.

"Lady Amanda, Mrs Fitch. Anna, the Lady Amanda Fitton. Anna, Mr Albert
Campion; Campion, Mrs Fitch. And now, darling, I shan't need four pairs
of socks for twelve hours in Frogland. Would you like to be barmaid?"

He sank down on the couch again, moved a pile of loose papers to make
room for Amanda beside him, and waved Campion to an armchair opposite.
Mrs Fitch mixed the drinks. As she moved about her home her position in
it was as clear as if she had announced it in lights round her head, and
it was odd that the fashionable little hat which she wore on one side of
her carefully waved hair, and the fact that her bag and gloves lay
conspicuously on the side table, should have made this position even
more apparent. She was self-contained and polite without being friendly,
yet conveyed that because they were friends of Ferdie's they were
delightful and exalted beings on whom it was her duty and privilege to
wait.

She was the mistress of the house and the handmaid of Ferdie Paul, and
it occurred suddenly to Mr Campion that what she really represented was
an old-fashioned, pre-Chaucerian wife, entirely loyal, completely
subject, her fortunes inescapably her husband's own. The notion amused
him, since he reflected that in view of all the excitement in the past
century over the legal status of females the only way for a man to
achieve this natural if somewhat elementary relationship with a woman at
the present time was to persuade her to love him and never to marry her.

He glanced at her with interest. She could never have been beautiful and
the cut of her dark gown showed ugly little spaniel haunches and plump
elbows, but her face was placid and there was a veiled expression in her
pretty diamond-shaped eyes which might have hidden intelligence. Ferdie
was supremely unaware of her save as an added comfort.

"I won't drink, if you'll forgive me," he said to Campion. "I may have a
bumpy crossing tonight. I've got to run down to Caesar's Court to catch
one of their planes. Bellairs is going over at ten-thirty and we fixed
up to share a machine. Do you know Bellairs, the furniture man? That
gives me six hours sleep when I get to Paris and then a couple of
appointments and I can catch the evening plane back. It's very
convenient, this service. I used to have to stagger backwards and
forwards once every six weeks. Now I can nip over every three and do the
whole thing inside twenty-four hours."

He glanced at his watch and laughed at the other man, his round brown
eyes impudent.

"Is your car downstairs? You wouldn't like to run me down to Caesar's
Court? It wouldn't take you fifty minutes there and back."

"Not at all. I'd like to." Campion glanced at Amanda questioningly and
she answered at once. "I'll wait for you here if I may." She looked at
Mrs Fitch, who smiled politely.

"That's grand," said Ferdie, obviously delighted at getting his own way.
"My car's laid up. I hate cabs. We'll start in ten minutes. Anna, no
one's drinking. Give me a brandy."

"I shouldn't." It was the first definite statement they had heard her
make. She spoke flatly and placidly.

"Shouldn't be blowed! She treats me as though I was ill already. One
small brandy."

She refused to hear him and there was quite a tussle between them,
Ferdie laughing and the woman mutely obstinate. In the end he got his
drink and sat sipping it, laughing at her over the glass.

"It may be the best thing for me," he said. "It hasn't proved so in the
past, but still, one never knows. That's the exciting part of life.
Isn't that so, Campion?"

"It adds to the general gaiety," agreed Campion affably. "What about
Miss Caroline Adamson?"

"Zut! Before the jeune fille?" Ferdie set down his glass and raised his
eyebrows. He looked more baroque and Byronic even than usual, with his
dark-skinned face shining and his eyes dancing. "Oh, I didn't know. I
was trying to be discreet. I don't know where she's living at the moment
but I remember the bit well. She got the sack from Papendeik's when poor
old Ray dressed her up as Georgia and took her to the Tulip to annoy his
wife. She ran around with Ray a bit, I believe. I say, we ought to go,
old man. I'll tell you all I know about Caroline on the way down, and
when you get there you can talk to Gaiogi about her. He'll know where
she is. If Gaiogi feels like it he can put his hands on anyone in London
within twenty-four hours. (Is that case packed, Anna? Send Yusai down
with it.) What do you want Caroline for, Campion, or aren't you
telling?"

"She phoned me this morning and made an appointment with me which she
didn't keep," said Mr Campion mildly and with perfect truth.

Ferdie Paul stared at him, a questioning smile curling his mouth.

"And when you called the number she gave you they put you on to the
zoo?" he suggested, grinning at Amanda.

"That's right, and I answered the phone," she said cheerfully. "He has
had a beastly evening. You'd better hurry. Don't smash the car up. We
may go to the races tomorrow."

"Oh no, be careful." The words had escaped the other woman before she
could stop them and they saw her for a moment with the visor up. The
expression in her eyes was not intelligent. Its mute, adoring stupidity
was startling.

Ferdie laughed at her good-humouredly.

"She has a theory I'm going to drop to pieces at any moment," he said,
inviting them to join in his amusement at her. "We must go. Have I got
everything? Is that contract in the portfolio, Anna? And the sketches?
Good. Right. Last plane tomorrow if I don't miss it. Good-bye. Come on,
Campion."

He did not kiss the woman but rubbed her solid shoulder affectionately
as he passed her and, having said farewell to Amanda, bustled out of the
room, taking an atmosphere of nervous excitement which was somehow
backless and ephemeral, like a methylated spirit flame, with him. As he
descended the few steps to the lift they heard his thin voice rising
heartily.

"I warn you of one thing; Caroline's a good deal older than you think."

Mrs Fitch stood watching the door for a moment. In the arrested movement
she looked shorter and stockier than ever, but with Ferdie's going her
poise increased. The handmaid vanished and the mistress of the house
remained.

"He's in a good mood tonight," she remarked. "I do hope he has a flat
crossing. A bad one takes it out of him so."

She hesitated and glanced at Amanda, who was still sitting on the
chesterfield, looking a trifle over sixteen and very comfortable and
content.

"I'm going to have some tea," she said. "Would you like some? You
haven't drunk your gin and lime."

Her visitor accepted the suggestion with genuine enthusiasm and, when
the tray arrived with a small tin of ginger biscuits, settled down to
enjoy them. They made a funny pair, and Mrs Fitch slid unconsciously
into the half-sentimental, half-patronising frame of mind that the
consciously sophisticated keep up their sleeves for extreme youth and
foolish innocence.

"You're getting married," she said. "That's going to be exciting, isn't
it?"

"Staggering, I should think," agreed Amanda, swallowing a piece of
biscuit. "Tolerance is the great secret, don't you think?" she added
with a graceful effort to keep the ball rolling. "Tolerance and three
good meals a day."

Mrs Fitch did not laugh. Her diamond-shaped eyes narrowed and she looked
for a moment almost frightened. She had a curious habit of moving her
lips as if she were trying out words and finding them unsuitable, and
she sat for a moment holding her teacup and staring over it
consideringly.

"You don't want to be too tolerant," she said at last and added
feelingly, "if you can help it."

"I suppose not."

"No. Do you know this girl, Caroline Adamson?"

"I've seen her once. She's rather like Lady Ramillies, isn't she?"

"Yes," said Mrs Fitch and suddenly laughed. The laugh altered her
personality entirely. It was revealing and intimate and made her less of
an unknown quantity, and Amanda, who was one of those optimists who
confidently expect every new person to be a delightful surprise, was
disappointed once again.

"I shouldn't be too tolerant where Caroline Adamson is concerned,"
repeated Mrs Fitch. "She's not the type of girl you know much about, I
should say." She glanced at her visitor dubiously as she spoke, as
though she wondered if there was anything on earth of which Amanda knew
much. "When you asked me if she was like Georgia Wells I laughed because
you're not the first person who's noticed the likeness. You were in the
Tulip, weren't you, when Ray Ramillies brought her in with those
swallows in her hair? When I saw those two women together I laughed
until I cried. Gaiogi Laminoff was so cross with me but I couldn't stop.
There they were, the two of them, with Ramillies in the middle and
Georgia with her new man. It was funny."

She laughed again at the picture recreated in her mind and Amanda echoed
her, since it would have been impolite not to do so. Of all the band of
personal traitors the sense of humour is the most dangerous. Mrs Fitch's
sense of humour disarmed her and made her careless.

"Oh, Lord, that was funny!" she said. "And that wasn't the only thing. I
knew something else, you see. Don't you ever tell Georgia this because
she doesn't know, only it does make the story. Long ago there was
another man who was taken with Caroline because she looked like Georgia.
That makes it funnier, doesn't it?"

She went off into paroxysms of laughter again and uncertainly Amanda
laughed with her.

"I ought not to have told you that," said Mrs Fitch, wiping her eyes
before she poured herself another cup of tea, "but I happened to know
Caroline long ago when she was a cloakroom attendant trying to get on
the stage, and that night at the Tulip I was the only person who knew
the other story. That's what made me laugh. Two men! Both Georgia's
specials! It _is_ funny."

"Who was the first man?"

"Oh, you wouldn't know him. He was long before your time. You were in
the cradle when all that happened. Besides, he's dead now. He was a very
stuck-up chap. Saw himself as a judge or something. Not at all Georgia's
type, nor Caroline's either. But she could tell you something about him
if she liked. She's a naughty girl."

She laughed again.

"Don't you repeat this, though. I don't know why I told you except that
it was so funny. I've been dying to tell somebody."

"Was Ferdie amused?"

"Mr Paul? Oh, I wouldn't tell him." Mrs Fitch looked shocked but the
sight of Amanda's face seemed to amuse her again. "There's a great
difference between the things you tell men and the things you tell
another woman. You'll have to learn that when you get married. Women
think the same things are funny while men often don't see anything in
them at all."

"Don't you like Georgia?" enquired Amanda innocently, still in quest of
the joke.

"Yes, I do, as much as I like any actress." Mrs Fitch was clearly
truthful. "She's very clever. Did you see her in _The Little Sacrifice_?
My dear, in that last scene, although it was so farfetched, she was
wonderful. I had to sit in the theatre and wait till everyone else had
gone. I couldn't go out into the foyer with my face. It was in a state.
Georgia is an artist. I spotted her as a winner years before I met her
up here."

She paused and added, as Amanda looked puzzled, "I used to buy for the
Old Beaulieu at one time. That's where I met Caroline."

"Buy?"

"Yes. Linen. Silver. Electric-light bulbs. Novelties. It all has to be
done, you know. These places have to be looked after, the same as a
house."

"Of course they do. I never realised that." Amanda seemed astounded by
the discovery and there was a brief pause in the conversation. A chiming
clock in the hall struck the half-hour and Mrs Fitch sighed.

"They'll be just taking off," she observed. "I do hope they have a good
crossing. Your boy will be back by eleven. He looks strong."

"Oh, very healthy," said Amanda heartily and hesitated, as the
conversation seemed to have reached an impasse. "That's very important,"
she added heroically.

"It saves a lot of worry," murmured Mrs Fitch. "You're always fidgeting
if you feel they're not well."

"Ferdie looks disgustingly fit." Amanda made the remark sound
inconsequential.

"So he may, but all the same he's not strong." There was a new
tenderness in the woman's voice which was unexpected and her lips moved
soundlessly again. "Not really strong," she repeated. "He'll see Doctor
Peugeot this time, I expect. He usually does. He's too clever and he
works too hard. Think, think, think; that's all there is in his work.
Some people imagine it doesn't take anything out of one, but it does.
The brain uses blood just like the muscles do. It stands to reason."

She spoke of Ferdie's mind as if it were an incomprehensible mystery to
her and it occurred to Amanda that it probably was.

"Have you got a clever man?" Mrs Fitch was still misled by Amanda's
youth and her tone was gently chaffing.

"Brilliant," said Amanda, who believed in taking a firm line.

Mrs Fitch chuckled.

"Isn't that sweet?" she said to no one in particular. "Go on believing
that and you'll always be happy. Never see round your own man, that's
the secret." She laughed again a little spitefully. "Even if you have to
blind yourself."

Amanda looked hurt and the other woman handed her the biscuit tin. It
was a conciliatory gesture and her stupid eyes were kind.

"Never mind. You won't have to worry about that sort of thing for a long
time yet," she said, "if you ever do. But once you've met a really
clever man he spoils you for everyone else."

Amanda said nothing but sat up digesting this piece of dubious
information and nibbling her third biscuit.

"Oh, I hope they have a good trip," Mrs Fitch repeated. "There _is_ a
clever man for you. Ferdie Paul is in a class by himself. If he told me
to jump off the roof I'd know he was right."

Amanda looked up.

"Are you sure that's his brains or is it...?"

She broke off delicately and the woman stared at her.

"No, my dear," she said with sudden sharpness. "It's his brains. There's
no silly love stuff about me. I'm far too old a bird." She shook her
head, stupidity and pride and a certain doggedness all apparent in her
expression.

"I wonder if he's got to the coast yet," she added as she relaxed. "The
weather report said 'fair.'"

                 *        *        *        *        *

Mr Campion and Amanda spent the last hour of the evening driving slowly
round the outskirts of the town, which were fresh after the rain.

"Gaiogi wasn't there," he said. "He's come to town and isn't expected
back until late. I put Ferdie on the plane. I wondered why he was so
pleased when we rang up. He hadn't much to tell about Miss Adamson
except what I already knew. You seem to have been more successful.
Suppose you repeat that conversation word for word as far as you can?"

Amanda lay in the Lagonda, her head resting on the back of the seat, and
the street lamps shining on her triangular mouth as she talked. She made
a very good job of her report, cutting out only the extraneous matter.

"It was Portland-Smith, of course," she said. "Georgia simply couldn't
have had two boy friends who wanted to be judges."

"One would seem to be enough."

Amanda stirred.

"Two women, two Georgias," she announced. "And two men, Ramillies and
Portland-Smith, both dead. It's funny, isn't it?"

"That depends on your sense of humour, my girl," said Mr Campion. "It's
frightening me to death. We'll find Miss Adamson tomorrow."

But the following day an Essex constable made a discovery.

To the police a corpse is a corpse and murder is a hanging matter, and
the whole affair slid out of the shrouding mists of the fashionable
world and the gossip of the bridge clubs and came under the glare of a
thousand bulls'-eyes and the ruthlessly indelicate curiosity of the
Press.




CHAPTER SIXTEEN


Superintendent Stanislaus Oates of the Central Investigation Department,
New Scotland Yard, was one of those happy people who retain throughout
their lives a childlike belief in a sharp dividing line between that
which is wrong and that which is right. It is this peculiarity which is
common to all the great English policemen and is probably the basis of
their reputation both for integrity and for stupidity. In his
thirty-five years in the force he had acquired a vast knowledge of the
incredible weaknesses and perversities of his fellow men, but, while
these were all neatly tabulated in his pleasant country mind, his sense
of what was black and what was white remained static and inviolate. He
was a gentle man, quiet in speech and possessed of a charming yokel
sense of fun, but in spite of this he was as hard, as clear-eyed, and
therefore often as cruel, as a child of five.

Mr Campion, who had known him for eleven years and was very fond of him,
still paid him that respect which has a modicum of fear in it.

At a little after five on the day following Amanda's enlightening
interview with Mrs Fitch, Mr Campion came up on the carpet in Oates's
office. Although he was so well known to the superintendent his
invitation to "step up for a few words" had been as formal as if he had
never set his nose inside the place before, and he was conducted to the
visitors' chair with considerable ceremony. He looked round him with
quick interest. There was quite a gathering. Besides Oates himself,
whose bony smile was even less expansive than usual, there was present
Chief Detective Inspector Pullen, a great lump of a man with a squat
nose and bright eyes who had spent much of his earlier service in the W
Division and was one of the Yard's best bets of the year. He sat, solid
and solemn, on the superintendent's right hand, looking, in his dark
clothes and unnatural gravity, like a bearer at a funeral.

Detective Sergeant Flood was with him, Campion was relieved to see, but
his face, which was kite-shaped, did not lighten as the visitor
appeared.

A police stenographer sat in the background and they all four looked up
silently as the lean man in the horn-rimmed spectacles came quietly in.

Mr Campion surveyed the scene, his face amiably blank and a
headmaster's-study feeling gripping the back of his neck.

"Well, who's been riding a bicycle without a reflector?" he said in a
well-meaning effort to lighten the atmosphere.

Oates shook his closely cropped head at him.

"It's not a very nice business, Mr Campion," he said. "It was good of
you to come. Just one or two questions, if you don't mind."

Campion was familiar with the superintendent's brand of understatement
and his eyebrows rose. "Not a very nice business" was unusually strong.

"Oh," he said cautiously. "What's up?"

Pullen glanced at his chief and cleared his throat.

"Mr Campion," he said, "a young woman has been found dead in
circumstances which suggest violence. In the back of a powder compactum
in her handbag we found a slip of paper with some figures on it. The
superintendent here recognised them as forming your telephone number,
although only the first letter of the exchange was given. I will now
read you a description of the deceased. If you think you recognise it I
shall be compelled to ask you to come with me to view the body."

He had a curious, staccato delivery which was not unlike the rattle of a
tape machine and gave the official words an inhuman quality.

Mr Campion preserved his famous half-witted expression. It was not quite
so misleading as it once had been, since the last ten years had etched
lines of character in his face, but it was still serviceable.

"Height five seven, slender build, eyes grey, hair very dark brown,
hands and feet well cared for. Age at present doubtful, between
twenty-five and thirty-five. Exceptionally well dressed."

Oates leant over the desk.

"That's tall for a woman," he said. "A tall dark girl with grey eyes who
was very smart. I asked you to come round because I have a fancy that
_was_ your telephone number. Do you know her?"

"Yes," said Mr Campion slowly. "Yes, I think I do. Hadn't she any other
papers?"

"None at all. Not a card, not a letter, not a mark on her clothes. This
scrap in the powder box may have been overlooked."

He was waiting expectantly and Mr Campion hesitated. He knew from
experience that complete openness is the only thing to offer the police
once one is convinced that one's affairs are also their own, but while
there is still a chance that things may not be as bad as that it is
wisest not to awaken their insatiable curiosity.

"I'd like to see the body before I mention any name," he said.

"Naturally." Oates looked disappointed. "Perhaps you'd like to go along
with the inspector now? The identification is holding us up," he
continued, relapsing into a more natural manner for a moment. "We can't
very well turn her over to Sir Henry until we get that done."

Mr Campion stirred. Sir Henry Wryothsley, the eminent pathologist, was
not called in for the obvious or mediocre.

Pullen heaved himself out of his chair.

"It's a little way out of town, I'm afraid, sir," he said. "Do you
mind?"

"Not at all. How long is it going to take me?"

"It all depends on how much you know, my boy." Oates grinned as he
spoke. "I think I'll come down with you if you don't mind, Pullen. If
she does turn out to be a friend of Mr Campion's I may be able to give
you a hand with him. He's a slippery witness."

There was general laughter at this, none of it ringing quite true, and
Mr Campion found himself checking up on dangerous points, considering
Val's position, Gaiogi's and his own. He had time to notice that the
inspector took his superior officer's co-operation in very good part.
The two men had worked together for some years and were fortunate in
possessing different faults and qualities. As he sat jammed in the back
of a police car between the two of them he reflected that they made a
formidable team and hoped devoutly that he was going to be on their
side.

"It's technically an Essex crime," Oates remarked as they swung down the
Embankment. "The corpse was found on a common at a little place called
Coaching Cross. Where is it exactly, Inspector?"

"Half a mile off the Epping and Ongar main road."

Pullen rattled the words more cheerfully. In the open air, away from the
official atmosphere of the Yard, both policemen seemed to have
experienced a humanising change, a loosening of the belt, as it were,
and there was even just a hint of the "outing" spirit in their smiles,
but Mr Campion was no more misled by them than they by him.

"It's hardly a common. More of a wood," the inspector continued more
conversationally. "A sort of thicket. It's a bit of the old forest, I
should say. It's full of brambles and hasn't done my trousers any good.
I'm a London cop and my clothes aren't constructed for a cross-country
beat. Still, the Essex police say it's a London crime and I think
they're right. They called us in straight away, not but what an hour or
so earlier wouldn't have hurt 'em."

"Anyway, it's our body from now on," Oates remarked complacently. "If
they call us in within three days we pay the cost of the enquiry; if
not, it's their county council's pigeon." He paused. "We're talking
lightly and there's a poor girl lying dead. I hope we're not hurting
you, Mr Campion?"

The naïveté of the question was disarming and Campion smiled.

"No," he said. "No. If it turns out to be the girl I think it may be, I
know her name and that's about all. She was a very beautiful person with
a terrible voice."

"This young woman is good looking," said Pullen dubiously, "but she
hasn't much voice left, poor kid, with a damned great wound clean
through her chest. It's a funny wound. I don't know if I've ever seen
anything quite like it except once, and that was made by a sword.
However, that's for Sir Henry to say."

The rest of the drive took place in comparative silence, both parties
having indicated quite clearly just how far they were prepared to talk,
but as soon as they entered the long cool room at the back of the police
station at Coaching Cross Mr Campion realised that the mischief was
done. The canker had come to the surface. Now there was no hiding, no
saving of faces nor guarding of reputations. The realisation thrust a
little thin stab of alarm behind his diaphragm, but in the back of his
mind he was aware of a sense of relief. The pseudo-Nemesis had slipped
up at last. The hand of Providence so seldom has a knife in it.

The detective sergeant of the Essex constabulary, who had lifted the
sheet from the sharp-angled mass on the table, looked at him enquiringly
and he nodded.

It was Caroline Adamson. Rigour had set in before the body had been
moved and she lay in a dreadful, unnatural attitude, with one knee a
little bent and her spine curved. Her face lay on the sheet so that he
had to stoop to see it properly. She was still beautiful, even with the
greying flesh shrinking away from the cosmetics on her face and her long
eyelashes stiff with mascara, and Mr Campion, who had never quite got
over his early astonishment at the appalling waste when death comes too
soon, drew back from her with pity.

"Do you recognise her?" Oates was touching his elbow.

"Yes," he said and was aware of a general sigh of relief from the
assembled policemen. One more step in the enquiry had been accomplished.

There was an immediate adjournment to the Charge Room, where there was
an embarrassment of important police officials. The Essex
superintendent, who, etiquette demanded, should receive a place of
honour, sat on Oates's right hand at the solid kitchen table which half
filled the room. Pullen was beside him, while Flood and the Essex
detective sergeant stood behind. A constable perched at the desk, pen in
hand.

Mr Campion sat on the other side of the table before this impressive
array and gave Miss Adamson's name and a list of addresses where he had
sought her without success.

Oates listened to him with his head a little on one side. He looked like
a very old terrier at a promising rathole, and Mr Campion spoke casually
and with engaging candour.

"I didn't know the girl at all," he said. "I only had one conversation
with her in my life and that was over the phone yesterday morning, but
I'd seen her once when she was a mannequin at Papendeik's and once or
twice at various restaurants."

"Yet you knew all these former addresses of hers?" Pullen sounded
puzzled rather than suspicious.

"Yes, I'd been looking for her. I thought she might be able to give me a
little information on a private matter."

Mr Campion regarded the London superintendent steadily as he spoke, and
Oates, who knew better than any man the advantage of having a willing
witness, hurried on with routine questions. He had the statement
finished in fifteen minutes and as soon as Campion had signed it the
telephone wires began to buzz and purposeful detectives in London went
off to make enquiries at the houses where Miss Adamson had lodged.

Oates had a word apart with Pullen and returned to Campion with an
entirely unprecedented invitation to take a stroll down the road to see
the scene of the discovery of the body.

"It's only a step," he said and added charmingly, "I know you're
interested in these things. I've got full instructions. I think I'll
find it. Pullen will be along in a moment. He wants a word with Sir
Henry on the phone."

On a less uncomfortable occasion his guest might have been amused. Oates
in tactful mood was delightfully unconvincing.

They avoided the loitering sight-seers and circumnavigated the Press,
and as they walked down the narrow lane together, the flint dust eddying
before them and the brown grasses nodding in the hedgerows, the air was
warm and clear, soft and sweet smelling. The superintendent breathed
deeply.

"If I hadn't been ambitious I might still be getting a lungful of this
every night," he said unexpectedly. "This isn't Dorset but it's not bad.
That's what getting on does for you. Nowadays I never see a bit of uncut
grass but what it leads me to a perishing corpse. What about this girl,
Campion?"

"I've told you practically all I know." The younger man was speaking
slowly. "She was once the hat and coat attendant at the Old Beaulieu.
From there she went on the stage, where she was not successful. After
that she got a job at Papendeik's where there was a spot of bother over
a stolen design for a dress and she was sent down to Caesar's Court to
show models there. While she was at the hotel she participated in a
silly joke on a client and got the sack. This was about six weeks ago.
Where she's been since then I cannot find out."

Oates trudged along in silence. His shoulders were bent and his hands
were deep in his pockets, rattling his money.

"Caesar's Court," he said at last. "Seems like I've heard that name
before, quite recently." He pursed his lips, and Campion, glancing up,
caught him peering at him out of the corners of his eyes. The
superintendent laughed, drawing back his lips from his fine narrow
teeth. "I'm a terrible one for a bit of gossip," he said. "It seems to
me I heard a funny story about this lad who died in an aeroplane down at
Caesar's Court. He died so pretty there wasn't an inquest nor anything.
It was about him and his wife and a very clever lady who's the head of
Papendeik's, a very clever, pretty lady. She's a sister of yours, isn't
she?"

Mr Campion's eyelids flickered and for a long time he said nothing at
all. Oates walked along, jingling his money.

"It's not far down here," he remarked conversationally. "We're to look
out for a turn to the left and a cop with a bike. I don't believe all I
hear," he added as his companion made no comment. "When a man's safely
buried, with a certificate backed by a P.M. report and nobody making any
complaints, I know he died as naturally as makes no difference. I just
happened to pick up a bit of high-class scandal which fixed it in my
mind. That was all. Who was this dead girl exactly? Did she know
Ramillies?"

"Yes. I'm afraid she did. She got the sack from Papendeik's when he
dressed her up as his wife, whom she resembles, and took her to dine at
the restaurant where Lady Ramillies was having supper after her show.
Ramillies got hopelessly tight the night before he died and no one knew
where he spent the hours between midnight and noon. I thought he might
have been entertained by Caroline Adamson. That was why I looked for
her."

"Oh." The superintendent seemed relieved. "That accounts for it. That
covers the telephone number very nicely. It's funny how I stumble on
things, isn't it? I never seem to forget a name. Faces often mislead you
but names have a way of linking up. That 'Caesar's Court' stuck in my
head. You can't call to mind anyone else who knew this girl besides the
landladies at these addresses? Papendeik's, of course; they knew her.
What about the Caesar's Court people?"

"That place is run by Mr Laminoff," remarked Campion without expression.

"Laminoff." Oates turned the name over on his tongue. "Gaiogi Laminoff,
a naturalised British subject. He used to run the Old Beaulieu."

"Did he?"

"He did." Oates wagged his head. "It's funny, I should have thought you
would have known that, somehow," he said. "There's the footpath and
there's our man with his bike. Good afternoon, Constable. Detective
Superintendent Oates of the Central Division here. Can you take us
along?"

As Mr Campion stood on the bald path and peered over the
superintendent's shoulder through a gap between two bramble bushes at
the spot where Miss Adamson had been found, a distressing sense of
travesty assailed him. The scene was the traditional _Midsummer Night's
Dream_ set. There was the overhanging oak tree, the lumpy bank, and even
the wings of thorn for Moth and Mustardseed to vanish into, but here was
none of the immortal wild thyme, the sweet musk roses nor the eglantine.
This was a forest which three hundred years of civilisation had laid
bald and waste. The brown grass was thin and there were roughnesses and
threadbare patches which suggested that the coaching of Coaching Cross
was motor coaching and the place had been frequented by untidier souls
than sweet Bully Bottom and his company.

The constable indicated the position of the body and the sordid joke was
complete. Unlike Titania, Miss Adamson had lain head downwards on the
bank, one leg drawn up and her face cushioned on a tuft of soiled
twitch.

The constable, who was a cheerful countryman, forgot his awe for the
distinguished London detective after the first three stultifying minutes
and presently so far forgot himself as to impart a circumstance which
had been delighting his bucolic soul all day. The local detective,
gathering clues, had removed at least two barrow-loads of waste paper,
cigarette ends, used matches, cartons, tins and other delicacies which
had lain defacing the clearing for the past three years. The constable
also pointed out with some glee that the ground was so turrible hard it
afforded no wheel or footmarks and was so trodden over at the best of
times that any information which it might yield was practically certain
to be misleading. Oates listened to him with a sad smile and a patience
which made Campion suspect him until he realised that the old man was
merely enjoying the country accent, and finally sent him back to his
post with the gentlest of snubs.

"Poor chap, he's got too much sense of humour for a policeman," he
remarked when the man was out of hearing. "He'll stick to his helmet and
his bicycle for the rest of his days, lucky bloke."

He looked round him and indicated a fallen tree trunk which might have
been a piece of sylvan loveliness had it not been for the remnants of a
dozen picnic meals strewn around it.

"Have a sit-down," he suggested, wrapping his thin grey overcoat tightly
round his haunches before perching himself uncomfortably upon the wood.

Mr Campion took up a position beside him and waited for the ultimatum.
It came.

"I've always found you a particularly honest sort of a feller." The
superintendent made the announcement as if it were an interesting piece
of information. "You've been very fair, I've always thought. Your dad
brought you up nicely too."

"A proper little Boy Scout," agreed Mr Campion helpfully. "If you are
asking me in a delicate way if I am going to play ball with you or if I
would rather not because I am afraid my sister may have murdered someone
by mistake and I do not want to assist in her apprehension, let me say
at once, as an old reliable firm with a reputation to maintain, I play
ball. I did not know the young woman who is lying in your icebox, and
what I knew of her did not amuse me particularly, but I don't associate
myself with anybody who sticks a breadknife into any lady. I'm against
him, whoever he is. I endorse your point of view in the matter. On the
other hand, I do not want to be involved in a lot of unpleasant
tittle-tattle or scandal in the daily press, nor do I want my innocent
friends and relations to have that degrading experience either. Do I
make myself clear?"

"Yes," said Oates. "Yes, you do." He was silent for some moments and sat
looking at the yellow evening light on the treetops with apparent
satisfaction. "Why did you say 'breadknife'?"

"Joke," explained his companion grimly. "Why?"

"It might have been a breadknife," said Oates seriously. "A thinnish
breadknife. Still, that's conjecture." He showed no desire to rise but
remained with his coat wrapped round him, staring down at his feet, and
presently he began to talk about the case with a lack of official
discretion which Mr Campion fully appreciated without altogether
enjoying it, since any deviation from routine in such a die-hard must
have some specific purpose.

"The local bobby found the corpse when he came past here on a bicycle at
ten minutes past eight this morning," Oates began slowly. "He was taking
a short cut to a farm down here in connection with some foot-and-mouth
regulations. Now I don't know if you've noticed this place, Campion, but
it's not very secret, is it? It's simply the first piece of cover which
a fellow would come to if he had taken a chance on a lonely turning off
the main road."

"Arguing that the fellow who dumped the body need not have had any
pre-knowledge of the district?"

"That's what I thought." The superintendent nodded his appreciation of
his guest's intelligence. "As a matter of fact the choice of this
particular place rather argues that he didn't know the village. Do you
know what this is, Campion? This is the local sitting-out acre, the
petting-party field. Every decent village has something of the sort. I
remember when I was a boy down in Dorset there was a little wood above a
disused quarry. Go down there after tea alone and you'd feel like the
one child at the party who hadn't been given his present off the
Christmas tree. The place was alive with boys and girls minding their
own affairs. Now wouldn't that be a silly place to turn up to with a
body? You'd walk into trouble the moment you set foot on the grass with
a couple of witnesses behind every bush. No, I don't think our feller
knew where he was at all. I think he saw a tree or two and thought
'This'll do.' Pullen, who is a good man, saw that at once. He's got the
local lads going round talking to country sweethearts now. That'll mean
some delicate interviews. Well, that's one point. Then there's another.
That girl was stabbed clean through the chest. Sir Henry said the heart
was grazed, in his opinion, but he couldn't say for certain until he'd
done his examination. We haven't found the weapon, yet she wasn't
saturated with blood."

He paused and cocked an enquiring eye at his companion.

"The sword, or whatever it was, was removed some time after death?"

"Looks like it, doesn't it? They're searching for it now but somehow I
don't think they'll find it. If a murderer doesn't throw away the weapon
within ten minutes of the crime he's a cool hand and that means we'll
never find it like as not."

The old detective was working up to his argument and Campion listened,
fascinated by the placid common sense which is the essence of all good
police work.

"Then there's the question of rigour." Oates sounded contemptuous. "I
don't trust it. I've known it have some amazing vagaries. But we can't
afford to ignore it. Rigour is now well advanced and there's no sign of
it abating. That shows the chances are a hundred to one that she's not
been dead thirty hours yet. So say the crime took place after one
o'clock midday yesterday. She was wearing a black silk dress and a small
fur cape. It didn't look to me like a morning getup. It was the kind of
outfit you might go to a cinema in."

Mr Campion blinked intelligently.

"Had rigour set in before she was put on the bank?"

"No, after. That's the expert opinion."

"So she must have been brought here within six hours of death?"

"There's no must about it, my lad, and don't you forget it." Oates
sounded irritable. "We can only say that the probability is that it was
round about six hours after. Yet rigour was well advanced when she was
found at eight o'clock. Therefore it's fairly certain that she was
killed before 2 a.m. at the latest. As we see it the poor thing was
murdered somewhere, probably in London, and the weapon was left in the
wound for a time, thus staunching the blood flow. Then, some little time
later, say within six or seven hours at least, she was brought down here
by car and dumped and the weapon removed. She was wearing high-heeled
black patent shoes when she was found and these were grazed on top of
the toes, indicating that she'd been carried face forward, with her legs
sprawling behind her. There was also a smear on one of her stockings
which looked to me like oil. None of this is proved, of course; the
whole thing is pure conjecture; but that's how we see it at the moment.
You follow where that takes us?"

"Nowhere at all," said Mr Campion cheerfully, his pale eyes belying his
tone.

Oates grunted.

"It takes us to _you_, mate," he said bluntly. "It takes us back to you
and your pals, and you know that better than anyone. We've got to go
over that girl's immediate past with a magnifying glass and we've got to
have a chat with everyone who knew her. It's the motive that's going to
put us on to our man and that's what we're after. That's plain speaking,
isn't it?"

"Almost homely," agreed Mr Campion absently. "I've told you all I can, I
think. There's one trivial little thing which may be interesting. It's
only an impression but they're sometimes useful. I don't think she was
alone when she phoned me yesterday."

"An accomplice?"

"I don't know. An audience, anyway. She hadn't her entire mind on me."

The superintendent was interested.

"There you are," he said. "That's corroboration. This isn't an ordinary
knifing. I said that to Pullen as soon as I heard the details. In the
normal way, when a good-looking young woman gets herself stabbed it's a
perfectly straightforward human story, but this is different. This is
what I call number-one murder. It's an honest, done-on purpose killing
for a reason. There was no 'Gawd-I-love-you--take-that' about that stab.
Do you know, her dress was rolled down neatly off her shoulders and the
weapon inserted as carefully as if she'd been on an operating table. Not
torn down, mind you, but rolled."

Mr Campion stared at him in natural astonishment at this bewildering
piece of information.

"What was she doing while all this was happening?"

"The Lord alone knows." Oates shook his bowler hat over the mystery. "I
tell you, Campion, the poor thing was barely untidy. Her hands weren't
torn and there wasn't another mark on her skin. She hadn't defended
herself at all. I've never seen anything quite like it." He hesitated
and laughed because he was embarrassed at the fancifulness of his own
thoughts. "There's a sort of inhuman quality about that killing," he
said. "It's almost as if it had been done by a machine or the hand of
fate or something. Where are you going?"

Mr Campion had risen abruptly. His face was expressionless and he held
his shoulders stiffly.

"That is a very unpleasant thought," he said.

"It's foolishness. I don't know what possessed me to say such a thing."
Oates seemed genuinely surprised at himself. "I'm getting lightheaded in
this country air; that's about it. Well, if he's Dracula himself we'll
get him and hang him up by his neck until he's learnt his lesson, and I
warn you, Campion, there'll be a lot of questions asked around your part
of the world."

"I can see that."

"So long as you know." Oates was avuncular. "I'm taking you at your
word," he pointed out. "You're working with us. You've never been
foolish yet and I don't suppose you will be this time."

"I'm glad to hear it." Campion spoke with mild indignation. "If I may
say so without offence, your rustic personality has been ruined by your
association with the police. This perpetual 'I know you're a little
gentleman because I've got my beady eye on you' embarrasses me. I don't
want to shield any murderer. I'm not anti-social. I'm against murder on
principle. I think it's unethical and ungentlemanly and also unkind."

"That's all right," said Oates. "But don't forget it. That's all I'm
saying."

"I shall probably visit my sister tonight."

"Why shouldn't you?"

"Why indeed? I'm only mentioning it in case you have me tailed and your
suspicious nature suspects conspiracy."

The superintendent laughed.

"It's not that I don't trust you, but I wish you were in the force," he
said.

"In other words you don't doubt my honour, but you wish it was a fear of
my losing my pension," commented Mr Campion with acerbity. "You
embarrass and disgust me."

Oates was still grinning, the tight skin shining on the bones of his
face.

"So long as that's all I've got to do, it won't hurt," he said piously.
"Do you know the party you fancy I may come after?"

"No. If I did I should tell you. Can't you see I'm not afraid that you
may make an arrest? It's the dust you'll kick up snouting round the
rabbit burrows which is my concern."

Mr Campion seemed to have lost some of his composure and his friend was
sympathetic.

"We'll come on tiptoe," he promised.

Campion regarded him affectionately.

"The patter of your little boots will sound like a regiment of cavalry,"
he said. "Rest assured I'll do everything I can. Frankly, I want this
man quite as much as you do."

"Oh, you do, do you? What for?"

"A question of personal affront," said Mr Campion with deep feeling.

Oates eyed him thoughtfully.

"You were at Caesar's Court when that fellow Ramillies died so suddenly
and so naturally, weren't you?" he observed. "And you found the body of
that young lawyer fellow who shot himself? He was engaged to the present
Lady Ramillies at one time, if I remember. You've got no particular
party in mind, you say?"

"No. No one. It may be a Malignant Fate for all I know."

"Ah." The superintendent grunted. "When fate is as malignant as this I
take an interest in it. Well, Mr Campion, since you've failed, we'll see
what we can do. We may not be so delicate with our fancywork but we have
one great advantage over you, you know."

Mr Campion glanced down the footpath. Inspector Pullen was striding
towards them. His heavy face was animated, for once, and the skirts of
his dust coat were flapping.

"You have--The Hired Help," said Campion with feeling. "He's got
something."

The inspector was delighted. Satisfaction oozed from him.

"Important new development," he announced with a rattle like a machine
gun.

"Let's have it. Never mind Mr Campion; he's going to be very useful."

Pullen opened his small eyes but he did not demur. His news was bursting
from him.

"Sergeant Jenner of the local force has found a witness," he said
joyfully. "She's a girl who works in the all-night carmen's café on the
main road. Her boy's a milk lorry driver from Eye and apparently he's
been in the habit of speeding up his schedule to get half an hour or so
extra with this little miss. She can't be eighteen. (I don't know what
these country girls are coming to.) Anyway, he got in here at one-thirty
last night and hadn't to get to town before four, so she fetched him a
meal and then they walked down here. She's going to point out the place
where they were sitting. As far as I can make out it's over there behind
the tree. About twenty to three, or thereabouts, because her boy was
talking of having to get on to London, they heard a car stop in this
lane and then there was a lot of movement behind them. The youngsters
minded their own business and the girl actually saw nothing, but the
young man got up, she says, and looked over a briar hedge. She doesn't
know what he saw and no doubt it wasn't anything very sensational, but
anyway he sat down again and said, as far as she can remember, 'They've
gone.' Then she heard the car go off again and they said good night and
walked back. This morning when she heard of the crime she was frightened
because of the boy friend's schedule irregularities, but when Jenner put
it to her direct she came out with it. We're getting on to the boy now.
With luck he saw whoever it was who dumped the body. The whole thing may
be in the bag within twenty-four hours."

"I wonder," said Oates and added slyly, glancing at Campion, "Don't you
leave London. There may be another description for you to identify. Can
you see our Nemesis fellow in a bag?"

Mr Campion said nothing. The familiar stab behind his diaphragm was
disturbing and he caught his breath.

"Nemesis?" said Inspector Pullen with disgust. "He's a two-legged
Nemesis, if you ask me, and if he has two legs the chances are he also
has a neck."




CHAPTER SEVENTEEN


Val and Mr Campion were in the studio at Papendeik's; not the little
office, which was only a semiprivate apartment, but the great studio at
the top of the house, which was a holy of holies and looked to Mr
Campion's inexperienced eyes like the inside of a woman's handbag
magnified. It seemed to contain everything except a bath, although there
certainly was a businesslike sink in one corner of the room, besides a
remarkable assortment of tables, cupboards, mirrors and mysterious
boxes.

They had chosen this place for conversation partly because it was secret
and partly because there was a gas fire and, although it was midsummer,
the night was chilly.

Miss McPhail, Val's secretary, who spent her life guarding this
sanctuary, had gone home, but Rex was still about in spite of the time,
and the three of them were alone in the great house. Val had come back
from her little Queen Ann bandbox in Hampstead at her brother's request
and they had found Rex still working when they arrived a little after
ten. Georgia was expected after her show and they were waiting for her.

Campion sat on the edge of a solid wooden table before the fire directly
under a hanging daylight bulb. The rest of the room was in shadow, and
the hard, unnatural glare shone down on his dark back and bent head.

Val walked about the room. Her dress was the bright, clear green of
cooking apples and she looked young but very brave and capable, with her
fine hands clasped behind her and her chin set.

Rex leant against the mantelshelf. He held a small square of chestnut
velvet and was playing with it absently, feeling the yielding quality of
the material and trying the light on it as he laid it on his arm. It was
very quiet in the room and still cold.

"I remember her at the Old Beaulieu," Rex remarked without looking up.
"She was very attractive. Not chic, never any class, but a _pièce_. Well
worth looking at. Her father was Gaiogi Laminoff's accountant. His name
was Wilfred Adamson. He died before she left. That was very early in
'33, I think. Gaiogi Laminoff did what he could for her. He got Ferdie
Paul to give her a little part on tour, and I know one September--it
must have been that same year--she was hanging round the agents, very
sorry for herself."

"Gaiogi didn't take her back?" enquired Campion curiously.

"No, he was shutting the Beaulieu and looking about for capital to start
the Poire d'Or." Rex was still speaking in an absent fashion, as if he
were working round to a point and wondering whether to make it. Mr
Campion, who was liable to moments of irrelevant observation, suddenly
saw him objectively, a natty, demure little soul, only effeminate
insomuch as sex shocked him for its ugliness and interested him because
it shocked him.

He went on talking, still stroking the scrap of material on his cuff.

"Then she came into money," he said. "I don't know if there was a man or
not, but for quite a bit she was running round with the dancing boys and
driving about in a little car. She even bought one of our models. I used
to see her quite a bit. She never said where she got the cash but she
certainly had it."

Mr Campion looked up sharply, enlightenment on his thin face.

"That was in 1934, the year Portland-Smith disappeared?"

Rex raised his head, and his eyes, which were doggy and harassed in the
usual way, now had a flicker of excitement in them.

"Yes," he said. "He went off on June the eighteenth. I've always
remembered that; it's the anniversary of Waterloo. Caroline Adamson had
plenty of money, but long before then. It was early spring when she came
round here for a model and she'd had it some time then. I noticed her
particularly. She chose a very lovely grey moire which Madame admired
and which passed over the heads of the buyers. It's only three years
ago. She was broke again early the next autumn, when Gaiogi Laminoff
recommended her. She was a good model but not a pleasant girl. She was
very bitter about Gaiogi, although he did so much for her. He was having
trouble of his own then. The Poire d'Or opened in April or May of '34
and Bjornson had let Laminoff in by that crash of his by the January; it
had been coming some time."

"I thought Gaiogi was only the manager of the Poire d'Or?" put in Val,
who had paused behind the table.

"No. He had money in it. Bjornson never put up _all_ the money for
anything. Besides, I knew Bud Hockey, who was running the music there,
and I remember he told me that Laminoff was down for a packet. I know I
wondered where the old man had got it from because there was no squeal.
His backer, if he had one, was very quiet."

There was a long silence while everybody digested this information.

"You think it was Gaiogi's own money?" said Val at last.

Rex shrugged his shoulders and twisted the velvet into a rosette,
holding it at arm's length to admire the effect.

"It looked like it, madame. But he had none when the Beaulieu closed.
There was a little gossip about it at the time; nothing exciting, just
speculation." He laughed at Campion shyly. "One talks about money," he
said. "It's the other subject."

Mr Campion considered the discovery and Val cut into his thoughts with
another of the tag phrases from their childhood.

"There's no proof, but I've lost a ha'penny and you're eating nuts," she
remarked.

He nodded. Portland-Smith had shot himself in June and Miss Adamson had
been well supplied with money since the previous winter. After the
shooting she had become poor again. He did not say the words aloud, but
Val, he knew, was following his thought. As with many people of one
blood, there was a curious, wordless communion between them which might
have been telepathy or an identically similar mental process.

"I didn't know she knew him," said Val.

"Caroline Adamson and Portland-Smith?" Rex hesitated over the names. "I
don't know that she did but I think she did. It's merely an impression;
something to do with a joke about her being so like Georgia Wells. I
can't remember it at all. I doubt if I ever really heard it. It wasn't
much, I know; only snack-bar talk."

"You're quite the little gossip, Rex, aren't you?" Val was amused. "A
little bit here, a little bit there. It all tells up."

The man wriggled and giggled coyly and his face flushed.

"I've got a very good memory," he said primly. "Besides, I like to know
what's going on. But I never put two and two together; it's too
disturbing."

An electric bell over the door began to vibrate and Val hurried across
the room.

"There she is," she said. "No, Rex, thank you, I'll go down myself. I
want to."

The little man bowed elaborately and held the door open for her. His
every movement was self-consciously gallant and there was a nervous,
chuckling effrontery behind his manner which was quite out of keeping
with this or any other situation. He came back to the mantelpiece to
pick up his piece of velvet. It lay, a dark pool, on the white ledge,
and as his hand hovered over it he suddenly drew back. Then, controlling
himself, he took up the scrap and threw it into a wastepaper basket.

"She was stabbed, wasn't she?" he said. "That velvet reminded me. It's
very lovely material. Very soft and beautiful to drape. But I don't care
for it. Dried blood is that colour, you know. I saw a lot of it in
France."

"In France?" Mr Campion was surprised. The notion of the ladylike Rex as
a warrior was incongruous.

"'Fourteen to '17." Rex spoke briskly. "The Somme and the Marne. I was a
Tommy. I never got a commission. It was a long time ago but it cured me
of all kinds of things. I've never put up with ugliness or discomfort
since. I shall advise Madame against the velvet. All this plum and
magenta which is so popular is a great pity, I think. It was the
Coronation which introduced it, of course, but I still don't like it. It
doesn't make _me_ think of royalty."

He giggled again and smoothed his hair.

"Laminoff had some peculiar experiences in Russia, I believe. He doesn't
talk about them, but he went back during the Revolution and only came
through with his life. He can't stand ugliness either. Have you noticed?
Everything has to be easy, delicate and elegant. He'll do anything for
it. When the Poire d'Or was actually smashing he wouldn't give up the
orchid on each table. Money for its comfort's sake means more than a lot
to him."

He glanced at his neat wrist watch, which was gold and very delicate
without being at all womanish.

"Beddy-byes," he said unexpectedly. "I shan't be home till midnight. I
don't know if I've been of any use. It's only gossip, as Madame says. I
don't know anything unpleasant. I don't really want to. Good night."

He giggled again and went out, adroitly avoiding the visitor by thirty
seconds.

Georgia was not alone. Campion heard Ferdie Paul's excited squeak before
the party reached the second floor. He came in a little in advance of
the others, a great wave of nervous energy sweeping into the room with
him.

"My God!" he said. "My God, what a schemozzle! One damned thing on top
of another!" He sat down on a wooden chest and pulled out a cardboard
packet of cigarettes, lighting one from it and pitching the spent match
into the furthest corner of the room.

Georgia came in with Val. She was at her loveliest, in a black dress of
some soft, transparent material draped over her bosom and flowing out
into soft baby frills round the hem and train of the skirt. She looked
graceful, womanly and, in some inexplicable way, pathetically bereft.

"Oh, darling," she said to Campion. "Oh, darling. How incredibly
depressing. I've had a policeman in my dressing room and Ferdie's had
two; one at the plane and one at the flat. What a slut of a girl!"

"Damn it, you can't blame her," said Ferdie from the background. "It's
not her fault. She's simply the person who fell through the hole in the
floor. She was a good-looker, too. It's a pity."

He spoke with real regret, no doubt at the thought of beauty wasted.

Georgia sat down on the table close to Campion.

"Two deaths," she said huskily. "Two. But I'm not superstitious. I won't
be superstitious. What are we going to do? What exactly does it mean to
us?"

Everyone looked at Campion, who bestirred himself.

"It's an awkward position," he said slowly, thinking that it would have
been easier for Val and himself to tackle Georgia on the delicate matter
which they had met to discuss if a fourth party had not been present.
"You see, once the police get hold of a case like this they're so
infernally thorough. Everyone who knew Miss Adamson will be
cross-examined for days by earnest detectives trying to sound as though
they had just dropped in to talk about string. In the end they'll find
out every mortal thing the wretched girl has said and done during the
last six months. That doesn't matter much, of course. I promised them I
would give them any information I came across, and I shall, as anyone
else would. But whereas it doesn't matter what they find out if it's
relevant, they may so easily get on to all kinds of things which are
nothing to do with the case and which, although not criminal, have their
awkward aspects. These may make the good dicks red herrings and land us
all with a kettle of fish."

He paused. Ferdie Paul was looking at him with his head a little on one
side and a slightly derisive smile, which was tolerant rather than
contemptuous, on his curly mouth.

"Exactly!" he said. "Exactly, my dear boy. And so what?"

"It's about me," said Val, coming forward with sudden determination.
"It's no good being vague and lawyer-like, Albert. You must say the
words in a case like this. Now look here, Georgia my pet, you must not
go telling the police that story about me and the cachet blanc. It's a
good yarn and amusing and all the rest of it and it doesn't matter who
else you tell it to, because everyone we know will see it as you see it
and realise that you don't really mean that it's true. But the police
may take it seriously and we don't want them going all hysterical and
applying for exhumation orders and that sort of thing, do we? It isn't
as though they could find anything, we know. There was a P.M. at the
time, thank God, but there would be a frightful row which would ruin us
both professionally."

Ferdie Paul, who had been sitting admiring his feet throughout this
eminently straightforward statement, now glanced up.

"You're a good girl, Val," he said. "A sensible girl and a damned good
sort to take it like that. I told you, Georgia, that story was stark
lunacy at the time."

Georgia put her arm round Val. It was a long, slow movement, and, laying
her dark head gently against the apple-green dress, she allowed two
tears, and only two, to roll slowly down her cheeks. It was exquisite,
thee most abject, expressive and charming apology Campion had ever seen.
Georgia seemed to think it was pretty good, too, for she brightened
perceptibly for an instant before resuming her mood.

"I didn't realise it," she said earnestly. "I've got a blind spot. I
didn't see it. That story has got me into terrible trouble, Val, more
than you'll ever know, so I have been punished. But if it wasn't for you
I'd be almost glad. If it hadn't been for that silly story I'd never
have realised something rather awful that was happening to me. Now at
least I'm sane again."

She paused.

"And my darling is dead," she said in her breath, but with a tragic
depth of feeling which startled them all by its staggering sincerity.

"Who's dead?" said Val sharply.

Georgia stared at her in genuine bewilderment.

"Ray," she said. "Oh, my dear, you haven't forgotten him so soon? He was
the only man I ever really loved and when he died I didn't realise it. I
don't want to talk about it or I shall make a fool of myself. Forgive
me."

She blew her nose on a little white handkerchief and smiled through her
tears.

Ferdie sat looking at her with professional admiration. Then he glanced
at the other two and laughed.

"She's a dear girl, isn't she?" he said, not without a certain pride.
"That's very sweet, Georgia, but get the main idea. Don't tell the
police fairy stories, even if you believe them. Val's absolutely right.
This thing could make one hell of a stink if the Press decided to risk
it, which they might, of course. I don't know. What do you think,
Campion? Oh, Lord, what a mess! How long will the police keep at this
thing?"

"Until they find out how the girl died." Mr Campion seemed to consider
the question superfluous. "The longer it takes the more ground they'll
cover. They're a fairly efficient machine."

"I know." Ferdie was disgusted. "They went along to the flat and
frightened Anna Fitch out of her wits. She told them where I was and
they met me on the landing ground. Poor old Bellairs was in the plane,
too, and he came in for it as well. Among other things we told them when
we left, where we stayed in Paris, and who I'd seen during the day. I
was convinced they thought I'd done it at least. Then I told them all I
could remember about the blasted girl, which wasn't a lot. Apparently
Anna had the same questions and so did Georgia. Two o'clock in the
morning seems to be the fatal hour. I don't like to think how the girls
got on, but I had a nice clean tale to tell for once in my life.
Bellairs and the pilot and I were all eating respectably at the Bouton."
He paused. "They asked me a lot of questions about Gaiogi. Did you put
them on to him?"

Mr Campion blinked before the implied reproach.

"She was last employed at Caesar's Court. Val's had the police round
here about her. You employed her too."

"Oh, I see. Of course." Ferdie sighed. "It's bad," he said.
"Thunderingly bad. Lousy. However you look at it. She was running round
with Ray, you know, Georgia."

"I know." Georgia's voice was very small and quiet. "I know. That was my
fault. I was infatuated with Alan Dell. That was a nightmare, a dreadful
insane sort of dream. I neglected Ray horribly--don't remind me of it,
Ferdie; I've been terribly punished--and he was brokenhearted and picked
up that little beast because she was vaguely like me. That's all there
was to that."

"Very likely," agreed Ferdie grimly, "but it's very unfortunate in view
of everything, isn't it, _dear_?"

Georgia responded to the implied rebuke.

"Must you be brutal, Ferdie?"

"Darling, it's the coincidence." Val spoke with the dogged patience
which the other woman seemed to inspire in her. "And it's not only that,
either. There's another coincidence which may come out, isn't there?
There's nothing in them. For God's sake don't think I mean that. But
Caroline knew Portland-Smith too, didn't she?"

Ferdie's shiny eyes opened to their widest extent.

"Did she indeed?" he ejaculated. "'Strewth! Where did that come from,
Val?"

"Rex told me. He seemed to think there was a sort of tale about it at
the time. He was very vague but that's the kind of thing the police get
hold of. If they're going to ferret out everything we may as well be
prepared for it."

Georgia laughed. She seemed unaccountably flattered.

"I never heard that," she said, "but it's quite possible. My dears, that
girl was _like_ me. That's why you let her model my frocks, Val. If a
man was terribly miserable because I'd been a cat to him it was quite
natural if he tried to console himself with someone who reminded him of
me. Surely the police could see an elementary point like that?"

Mr Campion, who was listening to the scene with interest, considered
Superintendent Oates and wondered.

"I know, Georgia, I know." Val was helpless. "But, dearest, _they're all
dead_."

"I say, you know, I say, Georgia! I say! It's bad." Ferdie Paul rose as
he spoke and strayed down the room with a peculiar jaunty gait which he
adopted when excited. "Shattering publicity if it came out. For God's
sake don't go talking about cachets blanc and what not. Look here, the
whole thing is nothing to do with you or Val. Let 'em talk to me and
Campion. Where were you last night, Campion?"

"Driving round the houses with Amanda."

"Were you? I suppose that's fairly conclusive. I like that kid. Good
class is attractive when it's genuine, isn't it? Oh well, then, you're
all right. So am I. I've got a blameless twenty-four hours and no
extraneous odds and ends to hide, for a change. We'll talk to the
police, then. You lie low, Georgia, and don't try to tell any bobby what
men will do in love. It's over his head."

Georgia smiled at him affectionately.

"Common old Ferdie," she observed. "My dear, I'm not a lunatic. I may
have been a little insane just lately but I've snapped out of it. I've
told Val I'm sorry, or at least I've conveyed that I am, and she's
forgiven me. The cachet was a silly little bit of nonsense we've both
forgotten. That's over. Now none of us has anything to worry about, have
we?"

Mr Campion coughed. There was unusual determination on his face and his
eyes were cold.

"I'm afraid it's not quite so simple," he said decisively, turning to
Georgia. "There is one other matter which I think we ought to mention
while we're about it. It's not my affair but it may come up, and if it
does you must be ready for it. The police will find out everything
remotely connected with Caroline Adamson. They're certain to discover
that she was thought to have known Portland-Smith when he was engaged to
you. That's all right, I know, but in the course of their investigations
they may stumble on another fact which might make them curious. You were
married to Portland-Smith, weren't you?"

The effect of the question was startling. The whole room, with its hard,
unnatural light and black-shadowed corners, seemed to contract round the
girl in the black dress and round Ferdie Paul, arrested in his walk
behind her.

Georgia did not move a muscle. She sat looking at Campion and the colour
rushed into her face as if she had been a baby, while her grey eyes were
guilty and appalled.

Ferdie Paul's reaction was less restrained. For an instant his plumpish
face, with its rococo curves and contours, was frozen with astonishment.
Then he leapt forward and took the woman by the shoulder.

"You weren't? My God!"

He conveyed that his particular deity was insane.

"Georgia, you trollop! Why didn't you tell me? When did you marry him?
When? Out with it. When? My blessed girl, don't you see how this is
going to look?"

There was ferocious urgency in his thin voice and he shook her,
unconsciously digging his fingers into her shoulder. Georgia pulled
herself away and rubbed the place. She looked utterly pathetic and as
guilty as an accused puppy.

"When?" Ferdie repeated mercilessly.

"One lovely rainy April day." The infuriating words tinkled in the quiet
room.

"The year he vanished?"

"No. We were married fifteen months, the most miserable months of my
life."

"Oh, for God's sake!" said Ferdie Paul.

He sat down heavily on the edge of the table and began to whistle.
Georgia went over to him.

"_He_ insisted on it being a secret," she protested. "It was his career.
Apparently if you're going to be a county court judge the stage is still
a bit low to marry into."

"Is it? What was the idea? Was he going to keep you under the dresser
all his life?"

"No. When he became this judge person I was going to leave the stage. It
was the getting there that might have been mucked up. Besides, we had
money to think of."

"Really? You astound me."

Georgia ignored him. She was looking over his head, a half smile on her
lips.

"It may sound silly now, but that was the argument at the time," she
said. "It seems mad at this distance. Utterly mad. I was so hopelessly
in love, Ferdie. He was such a sweet prig. I'd never met anything like
him before. He was so secretive, all pompous and shut up inside himself,
and gloriously narrow and conventional. It was the same thing you like
in Alan, Val. You get so sick of it when you're married to it. But at
first it was like a heavenly closed door, all stern and secret and
mysterious."

"We'll imagine it," said Ferdie.

"Forgive me, but I don't see why you actually married the poor
mysterious beast." Mr Campion put the question diffidently.

"Why does one marry?" Georgia appealed to him for information.

"I know." A dreadful travesty of a sentimental smile spread over
Ferdie's face. "So you could have a dear little baby."

Georgia eyed him. "No," she said. "Not necessarily. Look here, Ferdie,
you and Val and everybody, you don't understand. I really love them. My
whole life is controlled by them. I see everything from their point of
view. I love them. I want to _be_ them. I want to get into their lives.
I'm quite sincere, Ferdie. At the time I'm terribly, desperately hurt. I
can't stop it. I'm just the same as any little servant girl helplessly
in love for the first time, but _it wears off_."

She hesitated, looking at them, her beautiful dark face earnest and her
eyes imploring.

"It's because I'm a natural actress, of course," she continued,
revealing that odd streak of realism which made her lovable. "When I've
made a character I've made it and she's done. She's finished. She bores
me unbearably. Val, you understand. You've made some divine gowns but
you wouldn't wear any one of them for the rest of your life. I can't
help it. It's my tragedy. When I feel morbid I wonder if I myself exist
at all."

Ferdie regarded her. He seemed wearier and heavier. Only his eyes were
animated.

"Don't worry," he said dryly. "You exist." He thrust out an arm and
pulled her to his side, holding her there as if she were an obstinate
child. "You're obsessed by contracts," he observed. "That's your
complex. It's got its basis in ordinary inbred female funk. I don't
blame you. But if you must sign documents think about them first. A
marriage certificate isn't quite the same as a Guild contract. The time
clause is different."

Georgia freed herself and walked slowly round the room, her black dress
rippling over her strong, slender thighs.

Ferdie was silent for some time. He sat on the edge of the table, his
head bowed, so that the inadequacy of his dark curling hair was
revealed. He was thinking, and it occurred to Mr Campion that he had
never seen a man think more obviously. The man's brain was almost
audible.

"Hey," Ferdie said suddenly, "how the hell did you know?"

He swung round and sprawled across the table, looking up into Georgia's
face.

"What?"

"How did you know that you were free to marry Ray Ramillies?
Portland-Smith's body's only just been found."

Georgia shied away from him and from the question, but he caught her and
pulled her round to face him. There was a tremendous force in the man
and his incredulity was so great that they were all as conscious of it
as if it had been their own.

"Did you know he was dead?"

"Not exactly--I mean of course I knew. You're hurting me, you fool. I
thought he must be."

"_You thought he must be!_" Ferdie scrambled off the table and stood
before the girl, peering into her eyes as if they were keyholes. "Are
you telling me that for all you knew you might have been committing
bigamy? You're insane, woman. You're mad. You ought to be locked up.
You're sex crazy. A nymphomaniac. You're _barmy_! You must have known."

Georgia covered her face with her hands and managed to convey the
tragically adventurous innocence of an Ibsen heroine.

"I believed what Ray told me."

"Ray?" This development was a surprise to Mr Campion and he glanced up
sharply. But he had no need to question. Ferdie pounced on the
admission.

"What did he know about it? He was present at the suicide, I suppose,
egging the wretched chap on."

"Don't, Ferdie, don't!" It was a cry from the heart and Georgia turned
to Val for support. Val submitted to the considerable weight upon her
shoulder and took the quivering hand in her own.

"This is all too emotional, my children," she said, the quiet authority
of her voice surprising herself a little. "Everybody sit down. Now,
Georgia, you'll have to explain this. What happened?"

Seated on a hard chair, with her lovely rounded elbows resting on the
worktable, in her black dress, tears in her eyes and a foil in
apple-green beside her, Georgia evidently felt stronger. She raised her
head and the hard light gave her black hair a blue depth and darkened
the shadows beneath her eyes.

"I married Richard Portland-Smith in April 1933," she said slowly. "You
know how I loved him. I've told you that. We were going to keep it a
secret until we could afford to announce it and I could leave the stage.
It was a ridiculous, idealistic programme and it failed. We lived apart
and met in sordid hole-and-corner ways, stole week ends and did all the
things that are absolutely fatal. Gradually we got on each other's
nerves and by the end of the year we both realised it was a horrible,
unbearable mistake. In September you put on _The Little Sacrifice_,
Ferdie, and when I played that part I realised for the first time what
real unhappiness means. I was caught, I was trapped. My lovely, lovely
life was spoilt. I'd ruined it and there was no escape ever."

"Ramillies was over here then, wasn't he?" Ferdie made the remark
without spitefulness.

"It wasn't only Ray." Georgia leapt to her own defence with childlike
eagerness. "It wasn't. I'd say if it was. I'm not ashamed of love. It's
a beautiful thing that one simply can't help. Ray and I did fall in love
at first sight but I was desperately, helplessly miserable before.
Richard was fantastically jealous and mean about it. He was petty and
disgusting. He listened at doors, even, and got possessive and
revolting. I begged him to let me divorce him, or even to divorce me,
but he wouldn't. His filthy career came first every time. I can't tell
you what it was like. He went off in October for one of his walking
tours and the relief of being without him was like kicking off a
pinching shoe. Ray was so very sweet. He was going back in a few weeks
and he spent most of his leave hanging round the theatre. I loved him.
He was so strong and happy and extroverted. When Richard came back he
really had become impossible. He'd got parsimonious suddenly and was
narrower than ever. After a while I began to realise the dreadful truth.
He was going off his head. It must have been in his blood all the time
and being piqued brought it out."

She passed her hand over her forehead and her eyes were pained and
sincere.

"We had fantastic rows, dozens of them. It was unspeakably sordid and
degrading. He used to try to make me jealous. It was so piteous. I never
actually saw him with Caroline Adamson but he used to rave about women,
reviling the whole sex and generally behaving more and more like a
lunatic. I bore it as well as I could but it made life impossible. I was
physically frightened of him. The subject of divorce sent him into a
ferment. He wouldn't even hear the word. Finally I was so utterly
miserable that I went to a firm of private detectives in Rupert Street,
but they couldn't find a thing. Apparently he really was insane, and
simply worked all day and lived on sardines. He sacked his servant and
lived like a hermit. There's a name for that sort of mental trouble.
Melancholia, or dementia praecox, or something. Meanwhile the detectives
were horribly expensive and quite useless, and at last in despair I
called them off. And then, in June, quite suddenly, Richard disappeared.
I couldn't believe it at first. I went about like a child, crossing my
fingers and praying that he'd never come back. I had _suffered_, Val."

The other girl looked down at her and there was a bewildered expression
in her eyes.

"She had, you know," she said to Ferdie Paul. "She really had."

He met her glance and a faint smile passed over his curly mouth.

"Astounding, isn't it?" he agreed. "Go on, Georgia. I believe you're
doing your best. Don't lie. Let's have the full strength."

Georgia shook her head.

"You don't know me, Ferdie," she said tolerantly. "I couldn't lie about
Ray. That was my real love affair. When he came back I knew that this
was the true thing. It was about six weeks after Richard had gone and I
was still quivering in case he came back. Ray walked into my dressing
room one night and stood looking at me. You remember how he used to
stand, all lean and exciting and sort of gallant. We didn't speak. It
just happened. I cried all over him. I was so--so happy."

Ferdie Paul chuckled involuntarily, and, half shamefacedly, because she
was heart-rendingly sincere, they joined him.

"What a life you have!" he said. "Then what?"

"He wanted to marry me at once, of course." Georgia ignored the
interruption. She was used to being misunderstood. "So I did, of course.
I held him off as long as I could and then I saw it was no use, so I had
to tell him everything."

"This was all after Portland-Smith had disappeared? You're sure of
that?"

"Ferdie, I am not lying. My dear, can't you see I'm not? I'm being
wonderfully frank. I'm telling you the absolute, literal truth. I'm not
sparing myself. This is what actually happened. It was November when I
told Ray I was married to Richard--on Guy Fawkes night as a matter of
fact. I remember, because we'd had a party for little Sinclair, who was
silly and didn't like it. Ray was adorable with him, and I suddenly saw
what home life could be with them both, and it was too much for me
altogether. I told Ray and he was kinder than I can possibly describe.
He simply laughed in that slightly devilish way he had and said I wasn't
to worry."

She pressed her handkerchief to her lips and shook her head.

"After that it wasn't so frightfully easy. I loved him with all my soul,
you see, and yet... and yet..."

"And yet you do like a contract," said Ferdie easily. "You're a
remarkable girl, aren't you? So respectable at heart. Ray went to find
him, I suppose. Did he find him?"

"We-ell..." Georgia was evidently coming to the crux of her story and
was considering the light in which to present it. Presently she threw
out her hands in a particularly charming gesture of renunciation. "I'll
tell it simply," she said. "If you don't understand you've never really
loved. Ray was absolutely convinced that Richard was dead. He said he
would never have left me for so long if he had been alive, and of course
that was true. Besides, knowing Richard in that insane brooding mood of
his, I couldn't help feeling that it would be just like him to go off
and die somewhere secretly, revenging himself on me by leaving me in
doubt. He was like that in the end, all mad and tied up and mean in
soul."

"When you got the secret door open you found it led to the junk
cupboard," Val remarked dreamily.

"The _cellar_, my dear! Old bottles and damp newspapers and frightful
white crawly things." Georgia threw the bagatelle over her shoulder
happily. She and Val were dear friends again and she was so glad. "Ray
hurled himself into the search. He worked like a lunatic. You know how
energetic he was, Ferdie. _You_ saw him, Albert, over that idiotic gun.
Once he wanted a thing he wanted it more than anything in the world. He
scoured the country for unidentified bodies, but he couldn't find a
trace of him until just before Christmas, and then he found Richard."

"Found him?"

The words were jerked from Mr Campion, who had been standing quietly by
the fireplace listening to the scene with his habitual politeness.

Georgia met his eyes steadily.

"Yes," she said. "He found him in a crevasse in Wales. He'd been
mountaineering or something. People often go to mountains with broken
hearts; they're so comfortingly solid. Anyway, he'd fallen and been lost
for months. Ray wouldn't let me go to see him because of the filthy
things that happen to bodies. He simply gave me his word of honour and I
took it. We married on January the fifth, by special licence, as you
know. As my marriage to Richard was secret I called myself Sinclair."

"In fact, as far as you knew, you committed bigamy." Ferdie strode down
the room. "If this comes out you're done. It mustn't, of course. I don't
see it need. We shall all hold our tongues for our own sakes."

Georgia rose. She was angry and her cheeks were bright.

"It _was_ Richard," she said. "Ray gave me his word of honour."

"Don't be silly, dear." For the first time Ferdie betrayed an
unintentional irritation. "Portland-Smith was found in Kent with a
bullet through his skull. His papers were found on him. The coroner
decided the bones were his. You drove the poor brute off his head and he
killed himself. That's the truth of that. See a few facts now and again.
Don't let 'em cramp your style but don't kid yourself all the time."

"That is not true." Georgia was gentle. "Ferdie, you're sadistic. You
enjoy hurting me. My dear boy, Ray _proved_ to me that the body in Wales
was Richard's."

"How?"

"He went down in the train with a woman who was also travelling to
identify the body. He recognised her as the wife of an old
sergeant-major of his, a perfect fiend of a hag who'd led her wretched
husband such a ghastly life that the poor creature ran away from her.
Ray knew because the man had been to him and borrowed some money to get
to Canada and Ray had lent it to him. The woman was mad to identify this
body to get a widow's pension, and so of course Ray was in a cleft
stick. Once this woman had decided that her husband was dead the man was
free from her forever. Besides, if Ray had put his foot down and
insisted that it was Richard, we couldn't very well marry immediately,
could we? After all, it was only he and I who had to be satisfied. We
were the only people to whom it really mattered."

"Except his parents and his clients," murmured Mr Campion tactlessly.

"Oh? Had he got people?" Georgia was both startled and contrite. "He was
over thirty. I never thought of him as being someone's child. How
disgustingly selfish of me! But I was so, so terribly in love. Well, Ray
saw it was Richard, and the awful woman, who was sick at the sight of
the body and couldn't look at it, insisted that it was her husband, and
so Ray didn't interfere. I think it was rather nice of him. He told me
the whole story and even took me to see the woman, who had some dreadful
little hovel in Hackney. She convinced me utterly."

"That it was her husband?"

"No, of course not. She convinced me that she had persuaded herself that
it was. She was unbelievable. I sympathised with the wretched man in
Canada. Then she went into the most gruesome details and Ray had to take
me away. Then, of course, since I was sure, Ray and I married."

There was a long pause after her husky voice had died away. Ferdie sat
looking at her, his chin resting on his hands and his face morose and
inscrutable.

Mr Campion was shocked. There are some people to whom muddled thinking
and self-deception are the two most unforgivable crimes in the world.

Val patted Georgia's shoulder absently.

"How did _he_ dare?" she demanded suddenly. "He had an enormous amount
to lose."

"Oh, Ray was like that." Surprisingly it was Georgia herself who
answered. "Ray was a natural adventurer. That's why I adored him. He
risked everything all the time. He didn't care. So long as he achieved
his objective he didn't care how dangerous it was."

She went on talking happily, sublimely unconscious of the tacit
admission she was making.

"Ray just wanted Georgia and he didn't care what he did to get her. He
was so young always, so brave, so gloriously dangerous."

"He was a damned fourflusher," said Ferdie Paul. "Dangerous is the word.
What happened when Portland-Smith's body was discovered? That tarnished
his word of honour a bit, didn't it?"

"Oh, I was frightfully angry with Ray." Georgia spoke involuntarily,
adding with maddening gentleness, "Until I realised that there'd been
another mistake, and anyway it didn't really matter then. I was so
terribly upset about poor Richard at the time. I only remember the best
in people, you know."

Ferdie Paul rose to his feet with what appeared to be a considerable
physical effort.

"Yes, well," he said heavily, "let's all hope she never gets into the
witness box. Now look here, you people, there's only one thing we need
all remember and that is that this particular mess is nothing to do with
us. We can be as helpful and as polite as we like. The more helpful we
are the better. It looks well. But the affair is not our business. It's
quite obvious what happened to Caroline Adamson. She went around with a
dangerous lot, the dregs of the fur and the restaurant trade and the
lower West End mob. Heaven knows what scrap she got herself into.
They're a nasty crowd to monkey with and she was a pretty piece. We're
all all right if we don't go and jump into it. Get that well into your
head, Georgia."

"I have, my dear." There was a flicker of shrewdness in Georgia's
tweed-grey eyes, but it vanished almost at once. "I should probably be
very good in court, you know."

"You wouldn't." Ferdie's brown eyes were intensely earnest. "Don't for
pity's sake get that idea in your head. You wouldn't. D'you remember
that blank-verse play you would try one Sunday? You do? It would be like
that only a million times worse. Take my word for it."

Georgia shrugged but she looked chastened.

"I see things so clearly," she said and laughed at herself. "Even when
I'm wrong."

It was nearly two in the morning. Campion had the Lagonda in the drive
and Val's man was waiting in her famous grey Daimler with the special
body. As Georgia lived in Highgate she went home with Val, while Campion
dropped Ferdie at the Sovereign.

As the two women settled down in the soft grey-quilted depths of the
car, which was like a powder closet inside, shut away from the chauffeur
and as exquisitely feminine as a sedan chair, Georgia linked her arm
through Val's.

"Ferdie's quite right," she said with a return to the more truthful mood
which she kept for the few women she recognised as her equals. "If we
simply smile and do all we can for everyone without actually doing
anything, it may be all all right. I do hope so. It'll all pass. We'll
laugh about it when we're old women."

"I hope so," said Val soberly.

"Oh, we shall." After her ordeal Georgia's spirits were reviving and she
was dangerously optimistic. "I'm so glad all that about Ray and Richard
has come out at last. It's been half on my conscience. I hate secrets.
It was dangerous, but it didn't matter as it happened. I simply didn't
care at the time. You don't, do you? Nothing else seems to matter.
That's why Ray and I got on so well together. In that respect he was
feminine too. He was the only man I ever met who really understood how
my mind worked. His own was the same. Oh, my dear, it's going to be hell
without him."

She was speaking quite sincerely and Val glanced at her out of the
corner of her eye. Georgia was aware of the scrutiny in spite of the
shifting darkness.

"I've got rid of Alan," she said, adding in a burst of truthfulness
which was more than half pure generosity, "In a way he got rid of me. We
had a dreadful row the day after the memorial service, of all indecent
moments. He simply abused me, Val. Not noisily in a way you could
forgive, but quietly, almost as though he meant it. It was about that
cachet story, as a matter of fact. It had come round to him again,
fifteenth hand. Someone got tight and tried to tell it as a joke. I said
that I was sorry and that you did understand but he was just quietly
unreasonable, and suddenly, while he was talking, I came to my senses. I
saw him objectively. He's not my type, Val. He's too 'all on one plane.'
Then, of course, I realised what I'd done, I ought to have looked after
Ray. He was the only man I ever loved and I let him die. It's terribly
tragic, isn't it?"

"It has its disastrous aspects." There was humour in Val's dry little
comment, which robbed it of much of its bitterness. "There's a word for
you, Georgia my pet. You're a proper cough drop, aren't you?"

"Darling, how vulgar. I thought you were going to say bitch."

Georgia was laughing but broke off to sigh.

"Isn't it odd?" she said presently. "Have you noticed that women like me
who have dozens of men in love with them spend such an astounding amount
of time alone? Here am I, under thirty-two, a pathetic, brokenhearted
widow, utterly deserted, and yet God knows I've had enough men
hysterical about me. I like your brother, Val. He doesn't approve of me.
Men who don't approve of me always intrigue me. I can never understand
why it is and that keeps me interested in them."

"Albert?" said Val dubiously. "What about Amanda?"

"Oh yes. The pretty little red-haired child." Georgia was thoughtful.
"Isn't it tragic when you think what all these babies have got to go
through?" she added, sighing. "All the hurts, the heartaches, the
wretched emotional agonies which make one mature."

"Darling, I don't know and I don't care. It's nearly half-past two.
Don't you live somewhere along here?"

"No, it's miles further yet." Georgia peered out into the darkness. "I
love my little house," she remarked. "Ray and I adored each other there.
When I get sentimental I think of it as a little shrine. Don't be angry
with me, Val. After all, I've given up Alan. You can have him now if you
want to."

Val was silent. The car sped on down the faintly lit street and only now
and again, when they passed a street lamp, was her face visible.

"Don't look like that." There was a note of panic in the childish
phrase. "Val, don't look like that. You're grim. You're frightening me.
Say something."

"Can you see that you've put that man out of my life forever?"

The words were spoken unemotionally and Georgia considered them.

"No," she said at last. "No, honestly I don't see that, darling. Not if
you love him. Nothing in love is forever, is it? Be reasonable."

They were two fine ladies of a fine modern world, in which their status
had been raised until they stood as equals with their former protectors.
Their several responsibilities were far heavier than most men's and
their abilities greater. Their freedom was limitless. There they were at
two o'clock in the morning, driving back in their fine carriage to
lonely little houses, bought, made lovely and maintained by the proceeds
of their own labours. They were both mistress and master, little
Liliths, fragile but powerful in their way, since the livelihood of a
great number of their fellow beings depended directly upon them, and
yet, since they had not relinquished their femininity, within them,
touching the very core and fountain of their strength, was the dreadful
primitive weakness of the female of any species. Byron, who knew
something about ladies if little enough about poetry, once threw off the
whole shameful truth about the sex, and, like most staggeringly
enlightening remarks, it degenerated into a truism and became
discountenanced when it was no longer witty.

"Love really can rot any woman up," Georgia observed contentedly. "Isn't
it funny?"

"Dear God, isn't it dangerous!" said Val.

They drove on in silence, both of them thinking of a very different
thing from the common disaster which they had met to discuss and which,
had they been less preoccupied, must have terrified them by its
imminence and its tremendous risk.




CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


Mr Campion, arriving home a little before three in the morning full of
the deepest misgivings and secretly uneasy because the police had not
called upon him to identify anyone whom the amorous lorry driver might
have described, found, instead of the expected detective, Lugg and
Amanda in the kitchenette eating bacon and eggs.

"The poor kid's got to get to work at the factory by seven-thirty
termorrow." Lugg's greeting was reproachful. "I thought at least I'd
give 'er a bit of breakfast. What will you 'ave yourself? Eggs or a mite
of 'erring? I've got a lovely little tin 'asn't been opened above a
couple of days. I was savin' it for when I fancied it."

The kitchen was warm and odorous, and Mr Campion, who suddenly felt he
had been too long among the sophists, sat down on the other side of the
enamel-topped table and glanced at his lieutenant with satisfaction. She
was rosy with sleep but bright-eyed and very interested.

"I've been here since ten, sleeping in a chair. I thought I'd better
wait in case you needed any help. What happened?"

He gave her the rough outline of the momentous interview, while Lugg
sizzled contempt and bacon fat in the background.

"So you see," he said at last, "Portland-Smith was being blackmailed.
That emerged with a blinding flash and a smell of damp fireworks. No one
who heard Georgia's story of the six months before he vanished--heard it
with anything beside his ears, I mean--could possibly have missed that."

"Who blackmailed him? Miss Adamson?"

Amanda's untroubled logic was comforting after the tortuous mental
fancywork of the past three hours.

"She was in it; I think that's certain." He spoke decisively and paused,
a shadow of embarrassment passing over his face. She caught his
expression and grinned.

"I'm getting a big girl now," she said. "You can mention it in front of
me. It was the usual story but 'she had her auntie Jessie underneath the
kitchen sink,' I suppose? When and where did all this happen?"

"I don't know, of course." Mr Campion sighed and his lean face looked
less weary. Amanda was easy to talk to. "He went off on a walking tour
in October and came back all peculiar. He seems to have been batty about
his wife at this time and she evidently loathed him, so I take it that a
solicitous Caroline who resembled the Dear Unkind might easily have had
a walkover. That angle is a job for Blest. I'll get hold of
Portland-Smith's itinerary and Blest must go, round all the pubs he
might have stayed in. That should put us on to it. But we must be
prepared for it only leading us to the girl, and I'm more than certain
she didn't do it alone. It was too opportune. The whole thing has a
curious organised flavour, like everything else. Portland-Smith was
caught and bled until he took the shortest way out, poor beast. All this
evening I've been quaggly in the middle at the thought of that fellow.
He must have had hell's delight."

"Very nice dick work, but it's unsatisfactory," remarked Mr Lugg,
flopping another egg onto the plate before his keeper. "There's no fear
of blackmail nowadays. It's Mr A. and Miss X. and three years, yes, yer
lordship, thankyer very much. You don't even read the papers."

"That's where you're wrong, you with your mammy's eyes, poor hideous
woman." Mr Campion spoke without resentment. "It's because of the
anonymity rule that I'm certain the whole thing was a more subtle affair
than would at first appear. Miss Adamson's own methods were just plain
abominable. I gathered that much when she phoned me. There usually is a
third, negotiating party in this sort of case and it's pretty obvious
that this particular third was the brains of the act. You see,
Portland-Smith was a barrister, i.e. he had the one kind of job which
makes the anonymity rule a trifle less than useless. He couldn't go into
the Central Court at the Old Bailey calling himself Mr X., at least not
with any marked success, unless, of course, he wore a false beard or a
cagoulard hood, either of which might so easily have been
misunderstood."

"Oh well, if you say so, cock. I can't talk about trade risks." Mr Lugg
was magnanimous. "I'll do you a bit o' bacon."

"I suppose the threat was divorce information for Georgia," Amanda
observed. "That might have cooked his county court ambitions. Was it
done purely for the money? How much had he got?"

"I don't know exactly, but I think he must have got through about four
thousand pounds in the last six months of his life. He died broke. I had
taken it that he'd been wallowing in diamonds, costly furs and ballet
shoes of champagne, but it seems not." Campion spoke lightly but his
eyes were not amused. "All the same, I don't believe money was the
primary motive, although somebody thought a lot about it. Our Caroline
did, for one. I may be braying in the wilderness, but whenever I
consider the events in the round I smell fish. It's fishy that
Portland-Smith should have been driven to suicide just as Georgia met
Ramillies, and fishier still that Ramillies should have looked up his
ancestors just as Georgia fell for Dell. I may merely have a beastly
mind, of course, but it shouts to heaven to me."

Amanda nodded gloomily.

"A.D.'s back at work," she observed. "He looks a bit tempered but he's
making up for lost time. We're getting the old atmosphere back. Sid's
like a dog who's discovered he's got his collar on after all. I say,
Albert?"

She sat back from the table and remained looking at him, her face
scarlet and her honey-brown eyes embarrassed.

"She couldn't possibly have persuaded _them_ to do it, could she?"

"What? Persuaded each succeeding boy friend to do in the retiring
chairman?" Mr Campion was impressed. "That's a very beautiful idea,
Amanda. It's got a flavour of the classics. Lovely stuff. All clean,
ruthless lines and what not. But I don't fancy it for a bet. It belongs
to a more artistic age."

"I find that very comforting," said Amanda candidly. "Would you like
some more to eat?"

The downstairs button sounding a cuckoo-clock device in the hall outside
forestalled Mr Campion's acceptance. Lugg paused, frying pan in hand,
his eye ridges raised.

"Eh?" he demanded.

"That damned owl again," said Mr Campion. "Go and see who it is."

"Three o'clock in the mornin'?" Lugg's little black eyes were startled.
"'Ere, is your aunt in London, yer ladyship?"

"My dear fellow, you could chaperone a regiment of Georgias." Amanda was
cheerful. "Don't put on a collar. Decolletage is perfectly all right at
this time of night. Buck up."

The cuckoo called again and Lugg surged to the door.

"I've laid them eggs there and I want to see 'em when I come back," he
said warningly. "I'm coming. I'm coming."

"His mother instinct is strong, isn't it?" commented Amanda as he
disappeared. "Who is this? The police?"

"I don't know." Mr Campion looked uneasy. "I don't like this show,
Amanda. I'd feel much happier if you were out of it. You don't mind, do
you?"

Amanda laughed at him. "Don't drop the pilot," she said. "I'm the only
disinterested intelligence in the whole outfit. My motive is nice clean
curiosity. I'm valuable. Listen."

It was Lugg's breathing, of course. The noise of it came up from the
stairs like a wind machine. As he reached the flat door they heard him
speak.

"On a bicycle?" he protested. "That's a nice way to get about! Would you
care for an egg or a nice fresh bit of 'erring?"

Mr Campion and Amanda exchanged startled glances and were on their feet
when the visitor appeared shyly round the doorpost. It was Sinclair. He
looked smaller than ever in his grey suit, his hair untidy from his ride
in the wind.

"It's stinkingly late," he said. "I hope you don't mind, but I thought I
might find you up, and it seemed important."

He was evidently excited but his self-possession was extraordinary and
he reminded them both of some little old gentleman in his old-fashioned
ease. Amanda made room for him on the edge of her chair and pushed rolls
and butter towards him.

"That's all right," she said affably. "What's up? New developments?"

"Well, I don't know." Sinclair glanced questioningly at Lugg and,
receiving Campion's reassuring nod, hurried on. "It's about Ray. I say,
they--they're not going to dig him up, are they? That's why I came at
once. I didn't like to wait until the morning if there was anything I
could do to stop them. It's such a filthy thing to happen."

"My dear chap, don't worry about that." Mr Campion had caught a glimpse
of the horror behind the small white face. "That's all right. That won't
happen. And even if it did there 'd be a tremendous setout first. The
Home Office would have to move, for one thing, and that takes weeks even
if everyone there happens to be awake. What put the idea in your head?"

Sinclair looked relieved and afterwards a little foolish.

"I'm sorry to have come so soon," he said. "I didn't know this, you see,
and I got worrying. Georgia came in just now. I was waiting up for her;
I often do, as a matter of fact. She was a bit hysterical, I'm afraid,
and she rather frightened me. I hadn't heard of the murder of this girl
friend of Ray's. I read the case in the evening papers, of course, but
she hadn't been identified then. Georgia wept over me and I finally got
it out of her that she was afraid the police might get suspicious over
Ray's death. That upset us both, naturally. Then I suddenly realised
that I knew something that might help, so I got out my bicycle and came
down to see you. I didn't want to go to the police if it wasn't
necessary."

"Jolly sensible," encouraged Amanda. "Eat while you talk. There's
nothing like food when you're rattled; even if it gives you indigestion,
that takes your mind off the main trouble. It's actually about Ray, is
it?"

"Yes." Sinclair accepted the plate which Lugg placed before him, showing
a certain amount of enthusiasm. "It's about old Ray getting tight that
morning. I've been thinking. Perhaps he wasn't so tight, you see."

They stared at him and he hurried on, wrestling with his bacon in
between remarks.

"I don't know if you knew old Ray very well," he said shyly, "but I did
and I saw him pretty tight dozens of times. He used to weep, as a rule,
and then thresh round a bit and finally sleep. I never saw him as chatty
as he was on that day and yet so sort of thick and unsteady." He
hesitated. "I don't want to sneak on the old man," he said, "but he told
me something one day in strict confidence which may be rather important.
It was about courage."

"Courage?"

"Yes." Sinclair flushed. "He used to go a bit kiddish and earnest at
times. He was nuts about courage. He thought it was the one really big
thing. He'd done some pretty brave stunts, you know, and I think he was
frightfully proud of them really. We were talking one night about six
weeks ago when he suddenly told me something and made me swear I'd never
repeat it. I don't like doing it now, but he is dead, and my hat, I'd
hate them to disturb him. Ray told me that in spite of everything he did
about it there was one thing that put the wind up him. He said he had a
complex about flying."

"Had he, by George?" said Mr Campion with interest.

Sinclair nodded.

"So he said, and I believed him, because he was pretty well sweating
when he told me. He said he used to make himself go up now and again,
but he couldn't stand it and he used to get the breeze up for days, both
before and afterwards."

"There are people like that, of course," put in Amanda, "but it doesn't
seem possible in Ramillies. Why on earth did he take on this big
flight?"

"I asked him that," agreed Sinclair, nodding to her, "but as a matter of
fact, though, I understood pretty well. It was because of the flight
that he told me about the complex. He was so jolly scared that he had to
tell someone. I've felt like that about other things. What he actually
said was that he'd arranged the whole business because he thought that
as flying was the one last thing in the world that he was afraid of he
ought to make one great effort to cure himself of it once and for all."
He blushed. "That wasn't true, though. Old Ray used to pretend a bit.
You know how people do. As a matter of fact he didn't arrange it. The
government did that. He was asked to make the flight and it would have
looked stinkingly bad if he'd refused. He was simply telling me to make
it sound all right to himself."

He sighed for the weaknesses of man and the perversities of
circumstance.

"Your idea is that he died of shock induced by fright, I take it?"
enquired Mr Campion with interest.

"Oh no, I think he took something." Sinclair was innocent of any attempt
at dramatic effect. "You see," he continued awkwardly, "he went on
talking to me for quite a bit. He explained how frightfully brave he was
in everything else except this, and then he said that in a way he was
really extra brave over the flight, because he knew someone who could
give him a drug to make him perfectly fit and confident throughout the
whole thing. It was quite easy, he said. You just took it in your arm
and you felt a bit rotten for four hours and then you suddenly felt
magnificent and that lasted for about a day. He pointed out what a
temptation it was, and then he said he wasn't going to give in to it and
that he'd made up his mind to make the flight without."

"I see." Mr Campion's pale eyes were darker than usual. "Did he mention
the name of this stuff?"

"No. He wouldn't tell me. He just said he knew someone who could see he
got it if he wanted it. I half thought this person, whoever it was, had
found out how scared old Ray was. I think he'd told them. But he didn't
want to go on talking about it to me and so naturally I didn't mention
it."

"Four hours feeling rotten and then a day feeling fine?" Amanda repeated
the words dubiously. "Is there such stuff, Albert?"

"I've never heard of it. It sounds to me like a tale from someone with
an unpleasantly perverted sense of humour." Mr Campion's precise tone
was grim. "You think Ray succumbed to the temptation after all, then,
Sinclair?"

"He might have done, mightn't he?" The young voice was very reasonable.
"When I heard that he'd cleared out in the middle of the farewell party,
I thought at once that it was probably because he'd suddenly realised
that he couldn't face the flight after all, and had dashed up to town to
get hold of this drug stuff somewhere. That would have been frightfully
like him."

"There you are." Amanda was sitting up. "There you are. That's it.
Sinclair's right. Ramillies left the party in a blue funk, went to
Boot's to be quiet and attempt to pull himself together. In the morning
he found it was no good and he went round to Miss Adamson, who gave him
this stuff. He must have taken it round about noon. Probably he began to
feel peculiar almost at once and told that story about being tight in
order to cover up any obvious ill effects. That must be right, because
the flight was timed for four. Don't you see, the murderer would have
expected him to die in the air. Ramillies thought he was going to feel
fine in four hours and instead of that it killed him. Miss Adamson
realised what had happened and tried to blackmail the person who had
given her the drug for Ramillies. She used you as a threat and got
herself killed. It all fits in."

"I know, I know, my dear, but there's no proof." The words escaped
Campion reluctantly. "I'm sorry to be so unhelpful but there's no proof
that he went near our Caroline after he left Boot's. Besides--and this
is vital--what was it? What was the stuff? There was a P.M., you know,
and an analysis."

"That's irritatingly true." Amanda was deflated. "I thought we were on
to it. It's frightfully good, though, Sinclair. Part of the truth is
there. Don't you think so, Albert?"

"Yes." Mr Campion still spoke cautiously. "Yes, there was no mention of
alcohol in the report on the body, and the entire story points to him
having been poisoned somewhere in town. And yet what about that badge in
the plane?"

"The Quentin Clear?" Amanda had the grace to look startled. "I'd
forgotten it. I've still got it, too. A.D.'s never enquired about it.
That's odd. You're right. We shall have to consider that. And yet I
don't know, though. It was an obvious plant, wasn't it? We decided that
at once."

"Is that the badge of the Award?" Sinclair was interested. "It's
frightfully good, isn't it? What did Mr Dell get it for?"

"The first Seraphim." In spite of her preoccupation there was tremendous
pride in Amanda's statement. "It's only given for exceptional pioneer
work in aviation design. Look here, Albert, it does fit in. Whoever gave
Miss Adamson the stuff to kill Ramillies would naturally be there
watching him, and when they saw that the man was going to die in the
plane before she went up they planted the Quentin Clear there to pin the
thing on A.D. How's that?"

"Not bad, for the one 'disinterested intelligence,'" said Campion and
grinned as she grew fiery at the dig. "I don't know. I don't know, my
hearty young betrothed. I don't really like to think."

He leant back in his chair and sat there, his head jutting forward and
his hands in his pockets. For a long time he did not look up.

At four the morning papers were on sale outside in Piccadilly and they
all went down to get them. The story had made the wrong side headlines
on the front pages, most of which also carried studio portraits of Miss
Adamson, looking beautiful and more like Georgia than ever. Much of the
published account was unusually accurate and fitted in with the
superintendent's own version, but there was one interesting new
development. A formal police appeal, boxed and leaded, took the pride of
place in every double column.

    _In connection with the death of Miss Caroline Adamson, late of
    Petunia House, W. 2, whose body was found yesterday morning on a
    piece of waste ground at Coaching Cross, Essex, the police are
    anxious to trace the whereabouts of two men, both of medium
    height and very heavy build, who are thought to be in possession
    of a small four-cylinder car of some considerable age. These men
    were observed by a witness near the scene of the discovery at 3
    a.m. approximately on the morning of Wednesday, July 21st.
    Information should be lodged at any police station._

As they stood in the Circus, with the thin cold wind of dawn drawing its
fingers up their spines, they looked up from the papers and stared at
each other.

"Two shortish, very fat men in an old car?" translated Amanda in
bewilderment. "They don't fit in at all. We're all wrong. It almost
looks as though it was nothing to do with our business after all. It's
another incredible coincidence, another manifestation of the hand of
Providence."

The words struck an answering note in Lugg's mysterious consciousness.
He looked over his paper with that plump, gratified satisfaction at a
chance to shine which in the dog world is the peculiarity of the hound.

"'Providence, 'aving the advantage of knowin' both the strengths and the
weaknesses of men, 'as a facility for unostentatious organisation
undreamed of by our generals.' Sterne," he said. "That come out of my
book. What's the matter, cock?"

Mr Campion was staring at him with fascinated excitement.

"What?" he demanded.

Mr Lugg obligingly repeated this latest fruit of his labours in the
fields of culture.

"Tell you anythink?" he enquired with interest.

Mr Campion put an arm round each of his two younger lieutenants.

"Yes," he said and the old enthusiasm returned in his voice and in the
gleam behind his spectacles. "Yes, my secondhand scholar, it does. Look
here, I'll drive you down to work, Amanda, and I'll phone you in the
lunch hour. We can drop Sinclair and his bicycle on the way. And when I
come back, Lugg, I'll want a bath, a clean shirt, and you ready for
outside work. We start, we stir, we seem to feel the thrill of life
beneath our keel."

Amanda laughed with pure excitement.

"Seen his taillight?"

"Not yet," said Mr Campion, "but the Lord be praised, I've seen his
wheels go round."




CHAPTER NINETEEN


Sir Montague Paling, the chief commissioner, who was a soldier and a
gentleman and everything that phrase implies, phoned his superintendent
of the Central Criminal Investigation Department early in the morning.

"Oates? That you? You still there? Good man. Good man. About this
girl-in-the-wood case of yours; is there a foreign element in that?"

"We don't know yet, sir." Stanislaus Oates tried to suppress any
placatory tone which might have crept into his pleasant country voice.
"Pullen found a quantity of drugs in her flat last night. We're working
on that angle with Wylde at the moment."

"Who?"

"Detective Inspector Wylde, sir--Narcotics."

"Oh yes, of course. I didn't catch you. Oh well, that's very promising.
What is it? Cocaine?"

"No sir. Morphine. Quite a bit of it. Seven or eight ounces."

"Really? She was a distributor, I suppose? Yes, yes, that's
satisfactory. I phoned you because I've had a private word from the
Colonial Office. The girl was the mistress of one of their fellers who
died the other day, and, while they don't want to interfere in any way,
of course, they do hope we'll be discreet. No need to drag up a lot of
mud if it's not necessary. We know that as well as anyone, don't we?"

"I hope so, sir."

"Good man. Good work, Oates. Advise me from time to time. Good-bye."

The superintendent in charge of the Essex side phoned Superintendent
Stanislaus Oates five minutes after the commissioner had returned to his
breakfast.

"We've taken Robin Whybrow, the lorry driver, over his statement again,
Superintendent, and he's remembered that one man was hatless. He only
saw him up against what light there was in the sky, remember, but he
says the top of his head was all crinkled, like as if he had curls. I
don't know if it's worth noting."

"Eh? I dunno. Every crumb means something to an empty spadger. No news
of the car?"

"Not yet, there isn't. We're working on it."

"Nor the weapon?"

"No. I don't think we ever will find that. Sorry to disappoint you, but
we've combed that place. Still, we're working on it. I'll give you a
call the moment anything crops up. I thought I'd let you know we were
keeping busy."

"Oh yes, fine, thank you very much. Good-bye."

Oates wrote down "One bloke seen in dark may have curly hair" on his
blotting paper, added an exclamation mark and drew a ring round it. He
glanced absently at the teapot on his desk, his sole sustenance for
twenty hours, and, resisting it, took up the telephone again.

Sir Henry Wryothsley was happy to hear from him. The fine precise voice
which was so impressive in the box sounded bright and enthusiastic.

"I'll bring it round myself as soon as it's finished. I've been working
all night. A lovely wound. Oh yes, definitely. Obviously sole cause of
death. I'm working out the specifications now. I'll read you the
opinion. It gives it in one. Are you listening? Don't take it down; I'll
bring the report round. Listen, '1. The cause of death was the wounding
of the main blood vessel of the heart and the consequent internal
bleeding. 2. The wound on the wall of the chest, penetrating the main
heart bag, was caused by a sharp-pointed two-edged instrument
approximately six tenths of an inch wide. 3.'--and this is interesting,
Oates--'the blow was delivered practically straight.'"

"What?"

"I know. The direction is all but dead level. I'll talk to you about it
when I see you, but for the present take it from me she was lying
peacefully on her back when it was done, and so far I don't see any
trace of an anaesthetic or anything else. I'm doing the analysis myself.
The only other mark was a slight contusion high up on the left side of
the neck, but it's very faint. What? Oh, I don't know, old boy. I don't
know at all. Before midnight and after midday. I daren't be more
specific. I'll come round. Good-bye."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Meanwhile Georgia was phoning Val.

"I simply threw myself on his mercy, my dear, and he was charming. He
says he'll do all he can and I'm not to worry. He was very sensible and
very sweet. Government people so often are. Did you meet him?"

"I think I did." The line was bad and Val's high voice sounded very far
away.

"Old, but rather nice. Slightly doggy, with a sprouty moustache. Just
like his name. Don't you remember?"

"I can't hear you."

"Oh, it doesn't matter, darling. This line is abominable. I only phoned
to tell you I'd fixed everything and it's all going to be hushed up, so
we needn't worry any more, thank God. Toddy Towser's going to see to
everything. Isn't Toddy a perfectly vile name? Good-bye, sweet."

Val phoned Mr Campion, and the steady buzzing echoing in the empty flat
answered her. As she hung up the receiver the little white instrument in
her panelled room at Hampstead rang once more and she pounced on it
eagerly, but it was only Rex again.

"Lady Papendeik is with the inspector now." He was gabbling in his
annoyance. "Everyone in the place is talking about drugs. I'm doing
everything I can, madame, but I simply cannot guarantee that some
wretched vendeuse won't blurt it out in confidence to the first trade
buyer who comes in. One wouldn't think they'd be so vulgar but one can't
be sure. Marguerite Zingari has had hysterics and handed in her
resignation. What would you advise?"

"I'll come, Rex, I'll come. Since your last message I've been trying to
phone my brother. Never mind. Keep them all quiet if you can. Don't
worry. I'll come."

Val sounded calm and her authority was consoling. The little man's
theatrical sigh was magnified over the wire.

"I shall be relieved," he said. "This is appalling. Such frightful
disorganisation. Can I send the peach 'Fantastique' to Lady B.? I can't
be more specific over the phone, can I? She's asked for it, but you know
that we did say that next time, in view of the past, we ought to have a
trifle on account. Lady B. B for bolero."

"I'll leave it to you, Rex." Val sounded breathless. "I should be
tactful but firm. I'll come down at once."

She hung up and made one more attempt to get Campion's flat. There was
still no reply, and she phoned the Junior Greys and left a message for
him.

The Daimler was at the door and she was setting a small black hat at
precisely the right angle over her left eye, characteristically giving
the task the same intelligent care which she would have bestowed upon it
had she been summoned by the Last Trump and not Rex's shrill alarum,
when Papendeik's rang through again. It was Tante Marthe herself this
time. The ugly voice betrayed that faint trace of accent which the
telephone always seems to accentuate.

"Val, my child, there is an inspector here. He is at my side now. Do you
remember that mannequin, Caroline, the one we got rid of? She has got
herself murdered, wretched little girl. The police seem to think she may
have had something to do with drugs, and they are enquiring about them
from all former employees. Do you remember anything about some morphine?
There was something, my dear, wasn't there? I seem to remember it."

No policeman on earth could have mistaken Madame's warning tone, and Val
grew hot and then very cold again.

"The inspector says it is purely a matter of form," Tante Marthe
concluded, speaking apparently from dictation.

"I'm coming right down, darling. I'll be with you both in fifteen
minutes." The high voice was brisk and cheerful, and Val rang off.

While she was riding through the streets Gaiogi Laminoff stood in his
amusing sitting room and telephoned Mr Paul.

"Ferdie, my dear fellow, listen to me for a moment." The Russian's voice
was sibilant and charged with all the emotional force of his dramatic
race. "Have you seen the papers? I have had the police here at my house.
Yes, here. My dear Ferdie, it is not at all funny. I am not laughing.
They have found some drugs in the girl's flat at Petunia House, and they
have found out that Ramillies took up the lease of that flat. I have
told them nothing, naturally; it is not my affair. The abominable girl
was only here for six weeks. But for everybody's sake, Ferdie, keep
Georgia quiet. That story of hers about the cachet--it won't do any
good, you know. Things are bad enough as they are."

"You're telling me," said Ferdie Paul and hung up.

                 *        *        *        *        *

The obliging Sinclair succeeded in getting a call through to the Alandel
works and bore the instrument in triumph to his parent. Dell's
secretary, who had been trying to get Papendeik's all the morning
without success, put the incoming call through to the inner office in
all innocence.

"Alan"--Georgia's tone was motherly--"I wouldn't have disturbed you,
dear, but don't you think you ought to ring up Val?"

"Hallo, Georgia. Ring Val? Why?"

"Oh, darling"--she was reproachful--"don't you read the papers? She's
frightfully worried and upset. That murdered girl was one of her
mannequins, the one who stole my dress, you remember. Papendeik's are
bound to be positively bristling with police. It will be frightful for
her. You know how temperamental these artist people are. A phone message
from you would probably help a lot."

There was a long pause from the other end of the wire, and Georgia began
to feel dubious.

"This is just between ourselves, of course," she said hurriedly. "I'm
only trying to help you both, my sweet. Of course I haven't said a word
to her."

She heard him laugh. It was one of those short explosive laughs
associated in her mind with an embarrassed expression and a change of
colour.

"What a _dear_ you are, Georgia, aren't you?" he said.

She was surprised and gratified. She laughed herself.

"It's funny to hear you say that. Do you know, Alan, everyone who has
ever loved me has said that in the end. Oh well, you ring her, darling.
She'll be frightfully pleased. Good-bye, Alan. I say, give the poor
sweetie my love."

He rang off, a little abruptly, she thought, but put it down quite
seriously to eagerness on his part to condole with Val. She sighed.
There was a tremendous satisfaction in being magnanimous, so much
satisfaction that she sometimes wondered if there wasn't a catch in it
somewhere.

Val had not expected any friendly offer of assistance from Dell, but had
only hoped for it. She was, therefore, not surprised when he did not
ring her.

                 *        *        *        *        *

Just before noon a little girl with ferret's eyes in an innocent face
stepped out of Papendeik's, where she was employed in the sewing rooms
with nearly two hundred others and turned into a public telephone booth.
Within a minute or two a fat young man with a superior manner and
disreputable clothes was listening to her with interest in a corner of
an editorial mezzanine floor.

"It's drugs. Madame was with the police an hour and they took a
statement." The squeaky voice was thin with excitement. "Madame's shut
up in the studio now and no one can get near her. They say she's crying
and we're wondering if she's going to be arrested. If this is useful I
get the usual, don't I?"

"Have I ever let you down, kiddo?" The pseudo-American accent was slick.
"Step on it, baby. Keep your ears open. So long."

At about the same time, in a glass cubicle on the other side of the same
floor, a far more elegant personage was listening to a far better
accent.

"Well, my dear"--the instrument's voice was crisp--"that's all I know. I
was actually in the Tulip when it happened. Ray Ramillies brought this
girl in actually _disguised_ as Georgia Wells and there was nearly a
frightful scene, and then poor Ray died and now this girl. Dangerous? Of
course I know it's dangerous. But isn't it exciting?"

                 *        *        *        *        *

Mr Campion's call to Papendeik's came through to Val while her employee
was still in the phone box in Oxford Street. Val was in the studio, and
Miss McPhail, who was both discreet and practical, hurried out of the
room and planted her solid back against the door, casting suspicious
glances at anyone who ventured within twenty feet of it.

"Albert?" Campion knew at once by the very control in Val's voice that
she was badly rattled. "The police have been here. They've found that
morphine I told you I had. It was in Caroline Adamson's flat."

"My dear girl, you told me you'd destroyed it."

"I know I did. I couldn't find it when I came to look for it. I took it
for granted that it had been mislaid. It never dawned on me that someone
might have pinched it."

"Oh, I see." He sounded comfortingly unalarmed. "Oh well, it can't be
helped. She saw what it was and thought it marketable, I suppose. It was
all packed up in little doses, was it?"

"Yes, I'm afraid it was. I say, I told the police."

"Oh, you did? I daren't ask. Good, that's good. What did you tell them?
The full strength?"

"Yes, everything. I gave the name of the woman we sacked on suspicion of
smuggling it and the firm in Lyons from whom we bought the bale of silk.
They took it all down and I signed it. I say, Albert?"

"Yes ma'am?"

"The men--the inspector had someone called Wylde with him--weren't
exactly matey after I'd told the story."

"Old Pullen? Not offensive, surely?"

"What? Oh no, just reserved. 'Yes' and 'no' and that sort of thing."

"The atmosphere changed, you mean?"

"Yes, it did rather. Is that bad?"

"Oh, Lord, no." His tone was hearty, but not entirely convincing. "The
police are always like that when they get a new bit of information.
They've got to go home to Poppa and see what it means, that's all.
That's all right. That's nothing. I'm glad you told them. Tell 'em every
mortal thing. You haven't suppressed anything, have you?"

"No, nothing. At least, I didn't mention the cachet blanc. Ought I to
have?"

"No." The word sounded considered. "No, I don't think so. If things stew
up a bit more before this evening we'll go along to see Oates and have a
showdown, but it may not come to that. You did tell them everything
else?"

"Yes, I did. I did, dear. You sound suspicious."

"I'm not. Only you told me you destroyed that muck."

"Oh darling"--Val sounded helpless--"this really honestly is the truth,
all of it."

"May all your designs fail if you lie?"

"May all my designs fail if I lie."

"Right, that's fine. Now, is Rex about? I want to know if anyone saw
that girl at a night club recently."

Rex was summoned by Miss McPhail, who seemed to have got it into her
head that Val was in danger of being kidnapped, for she only admitted
one person at a time into the room, and then only after a keen visual
"frisking."

Rex did his best, but it was not very helpful.

"I've only seen her at the Tulip," he said. "I'll enquire if you like."

"Will you? Make a list of any names and phone it to the Junior Greys.
Don't leave any other message; just the list of clubs where the girl may
have been seen. If you would do that? Thank you. Look after my sister.
There's nothing to worry about. Good-bye."

He rang off and felt for another twopence. His face was sharper than
usual, and for once his natural indolence had vanished. Oates could not
speak to him at once and he waited and rang again. He rang every five
minutes for half an hour, and when at last he got hold of the old man,
he gathered that Pullen had been before him, for conversation was not
easy.

"I'm so rushed, Mr Campion. If you haven't anything relevant to tell me
I'll have to ask you to excuse me. You know how it is. I haven't slept
since it broke."

"You should take a shot of morphine," said Campion and plugged in a
question while he still had the other man's attention. "Have you had the
P.M. report? What was the weapon? Go on, that can't be a state secret.
Damn it, man, I'm likely to help you. What was the weapon?"

"A long double-sided blade six tenths of an inch wide. That's all I can
tell you, mate. Sorry. Good-bye."

Campion hung up. He was whistling a slow, mournful little tune which
went painfully flat in the middle and his eyes were troubled. He went
out to the hotel bookstall, obtained another pocketful of pennies, and
returned, still whistling. He was soothed by getting on to the hospital
immediately. Also, Sir Henry Portland-Smith was unexpectedly easily
found. The old man was evidently curious and his fine voice sounded
eager.

"I wondered if I should hear from you, my boy. I was thinking of you
this morning. Have you any news for me?"

"No proof, sir." Campion had to drag his mind round to this
half-forgotten angle of the case which yet remained the other man's main
interest. "But I think it's fairly obvious now that the cause was
blackmail."

"Blackmail." There was no question in the word, only enlightenment and
considerable relief.

"I haven't finished by any means. It's still in the air. I can't tell
you the details over the phone. I'll call on you when I've got it
straightened out a bit. I really wanted to bother you for a piece of
information. How long does morphine take to kill?"

"What kind of morphine?"

"I don't know. White powdery crystals."

"Diluted and taken subcutaneously?"

"No. By the mouth."

"How much?"

"God knows."

"What?"

"I have no earthly means of finding out."

The old man laughed. "I can't help you, my boy. I'm sorry. Thirty-six
hours, perhaps."

"Really? As long as that? You wouldn't expect fatal results in four
hours?"

"Well, I don't like to say on such vague grounds. You'd get some effect
in four hours, you know. Perhaps even coma."

"I see. There would be a protracted period of coma, would there?"

"Oh yes. That is, in straight morphine poisoning. But there might be
other conditions present, you see. Those would have to be considered."

"Yes, of course. But if you saw a man take--well, say a rice-paper
container full of morphine crystals you wouldn't expect him to throw a
fit four hours afterwards, bite his tongue and pass out?"

"No, I shouldn't. I should expect him to be sick. If not you'd get
sleep, and afterwards no reflex action, slow pulse and so on, and
finally coma."

"No fit?"

"No, no, no convulsions. At least I shouldn't say so. If you could be
more specific I could help you. Post-mortem would find it, you know."

"It would?"

"Oh, certainly, if it was competently done. Bound to. Sorry I can't help
you more. You'll come and see me, will you?"

"Yes, I will. I can't give you a date, unfortunately, but I'll come."

"Then we'll have the whole story?"

"Yes." Campion's voice was unusually sober. "The whole story. Good-bye.
Thank you enormously."

"Not at all. I'm afraid I've been most unhelpful. These things depend so
much on circumstances. As far as it goes the instance you give sounds
most unlikely, but one can't tell. Odd things happen in medicine.
Good-bye."

"Good-bye," said Mr Campion.

Oates was eating a sandwich when Pullen's call came through to him. The
superintendent's eyes were hard and bright with the nervous "second
wind" which comes after the first intolerable desire for sleep has been
overcome, and he held the receiver at some little distance from his ear.
The inspector's machine-gun delivery was apt to be paralysing when
received at short range.

"One of Wylde's men has dug up a band-boy friend of the girl's," Pullen
rattled. "He has some story about her offering dope openly to anyone who
seemed likely to have any money. It all sounds very amateurish. Wylde's
seeing the man now. I don't like the dope angle myself. All the stuff
came directly from Papendeik's. We mustn't lose sight of that."

"What?"

"All the dope we found came from Mrs Valentine Ferris, I told you that
last time I phoned, sir. There is no evidence to show that Adamson had
any more than this in her possession. Wylde is inclined to believe Mrs
Ferris' story about the smuggling. His people are looking up the woman
she sacked on suspicion. He thinks the name is familiar to him."

"Ah." Oates sounded unhappily convinced. "That leads us back to the
swells."

"Looks like it. Still, that alibi of Laminoff's is not satisfactory, is
it? He's a fat man, you know. I've got it here. Will you check it with
yours? 'Six-fifteen, left Caesar's Court. Six thirty-five, Savoy
cocktail bar. Seven-forty, Tulip Restaurant. Eight-fifty, the Tatler
Theatre to see Mickey Mouse programme (alone). Eleven approximately the
White Empress. Four-thirty a.m., left the White Empress for Caesar's
Court in taxicab.' That's the White Empress Club in Grafton Street."

"I know. The high-class all-alien dive. No reliable witnesses there, you
feel?"

"Not one." The machine gun was vehement. "Every one of 'em would swear
each other out of hell."

"I suppose they'd try. You'll go over them, of course."

"I was going down there now. I'll ring you at two-thirty. Good-bye,
sir."

By a coincidence Gaiogi Laminoff was telephoning Matvey Kuymitchov,
manager of the White Empress, at the same time that the two policemen
were considering his alibi. He also was a trifle worried but not over
the same matter.

"Matvey," he said, "you have in your hall some little birds in a gold
cage shaped like a basket. Will you tell an old friend where you got
them? They are charming."

Kuymitchov was delighted to oblige. He rattled off the name of the
importers of the golden canaries and explained that the firm were also
part owners of the cage-making company.

"I know them very well, Excellency. They are not easy people to deal
with, but if you want some, perhaps I could get them for you."

"Would you do that, Matvey? That would be kind of you. I should
appreciate that." The faint note of irony was well suppressed. "Can you
get me sixty cages, each containing two little birds, to be delivered
here by the thirtieth?"

"Sixty cages?"

"Yes. I went through my dining room just now--not the main dining room,
but the little romantic one in the flower garden--and it depressed me.
It is sad, Matvey. It is almost gloomy. I want it to be essentially gay,
and I thought that if over each table there was one of those little
basket-shaped gold cages it would make it look a little happier. Don't
you think so?"

Matvey laughed. "It is not very practical," he said. "You will get tired
of them."

"Of course I shall. Then I shall get rid of them. But meanwhile they
will look gay. Sixty cages by the thirtieth. You won't disappoint me?
Tell the firm to send a little boy to look after them. You will see they
are all there?"

"I will. You are an extraordinary person."

"Not at all." Gaiogi's laugh was infectious. "I was depressed. Now I
feel quite happy."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Mr Lugg phoned Mr Campion by appointment. Mr Campion was in the private
office of the Boiled Owl Club and Mr Lugg was in a small basement room
which looked as though some thoughtless person had built four walls
round a gipsy encampment.

"Not a sossidge, cock." The thick melancholy voice was just audible
above a chatter like the din of a monkey house. "Ma Knapp was no good at
all. Thos. is inside again, so he can't help, poor chap. I've been to
Walkie's and to Ben's and I dropped in at Conchy Lewis'. Not a sossidge
anywhere."

"Have you tried Miss King?"

"I 'ave. Just got out alive. If Mr Tuke ever 'ears of this I'll never
'old up me 'ead again. Mud-rollin', that's what I'm doing. They was all
very pleased to see me. It was like old times."

"That must have been ever so nice. Keep your mind on the job."

"I am. My Gawd, you're grateful, aren't you? Here am I with me pockets
sewn up mixin' with dust I've shook orf my feet for ever. What d'you
think I'm doin' it for? What luck your end?"

"Nothing yet. Phoebe gave me the Starlight, the Fish, the Newspaper, the
Enraged Cow and a staggering dive called the All At Home. I've had a
morning long after the night before. All a blank. Look here, try
straight food with a smear."

"Smear meanin' filf?"

"Yes. I was wrapping it up for you. Ollie is the man you want. Ollie
Dawson of Old Compton Street. Take him a bottle of kümmel."

"Is it kümmel? I thought 'is fancy was dressed crab? I'll take both.
Righto. Any more dope?"

"Dope? Oh, I'm sorry, I was on the other book. Yes, one thing. Listen. A
long two-edged knife, very narrow indeed."

"Ham and beef type?"

"That's about it. My hat, you're horrible. All right then. Phone me at
four at the Dorindas' in the Haymarket. I'm keeping Pa Dorinda as a last
hope. Good-bye."

"Good-bye, cock. Good hunting."

"Yoicks to you, sir. Good-bye."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Amanda, who had been sitting over the telephone in her private cubbyhole
at the works for considerably over an hour, was commendably
good-tempered when at last her fiancé kept his promise.

"Never mind," she encouraged with all the boundless energy of youth in
her voice. "Never mind. Keep at it. I've got something. It's a bit
negative. You know the Clear, the badge? I say, that was Sid. Yes, Sid.
He pinched it from Georgia. The sight of her wearing it turned him up,
as I thought it would, and he pinched it off her lapel during the crush
after lunch. He didn't want to go into a lot of explanations, so he put
it where someone who knew what it was would be bound to see it. He did
that at once, while the plane was still empty."

"Did he though? That was a bit roundabout, wasn't it?"

"Not really." She sounded embarrassed. "He's only a bit touchy on the
subject of his snappy pinching. He's shy about it. The accomplishment
wasn't thought a lot of at his school. At your place they probably
thought it was clever and funny; at his they didn't. It's a social
question. I got it out of him this morning."

"I see. That means the deity in the machine may not have been near the
hangar at all?"

"I know. But so few people were there before Ramillies, were they? I
say, A.D. has been trying to get you all the morning, but he's out now
seeing Gaiogi. I think he wants to ask if there's anything he can do."

"If there is I'll let him know. Good-bye, Lieut."

"Good-bye."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Detective Inspector Wylde of Narcotics had a soft, friendly voice and a
habit of lowering it when speaking on the telephone. Superintendent
Oates had to concentrate to hear him.

"I've had a little talk with Happy Carter," Wylde murmured. "I'm afraid
it's not down our street at all, sir. We shall go on working on it, of
course, until further orders, but I thought I'd let you know what the
situation is. This girl Adamson certainly wasn't in touch with any of
the big people. It looks to me as though she stole the stuff, or had it
given her, from someone at Papendeik's, and simply tried to make a bit
on the side."

"Oh, I see. Thank you very much, Inspector." Oates was gloomy. "You'll
just cover every angle, won't you? We don't want anything to slip
through our fingers at this stage, do we?"

"No, of course not, sir, but I think you'll find it's not our pigeon.
All right, sir. Good-bye."

He had barely replaced the receiver when the Essex superintendent was on
the line again.

"Nothing at all to report." The cheerful voice sounded unwarrantably
pleased with itself. "We've practically stripped the clearing and
there's no weapon of any sort, unless you'd count three tin openers and
a bicycle pump. I reckon the seat of the mystery is at your end, as I
said all along. Mayhap if you could get on to the motive now we might
learn something."

"Mayhap we might," agreed Oates grimly. "We've had the medical report
and none of the usual reasons apply."

"Fancy that, now. Oh well, we'll go on looking. So long."

"Wait a minute. No news of the car?"

"No, no, not a sign of it. The petrol stations can't help us. There's
plenty of traffic on our roads just now, you know. We've been on to the
lorry driver again and he can't add to his statement. He only heard it,
you see. Still, he knows engines and he sticks to his story. He says it
was four cylinders, missing on one, and there was a body rattle like a
sackful of old iron. But there's plenty o' they about at this time of
year."

"You're right, son. The woods are full of 'em. The boy's evidence isn't
worth the paper it's written on as it stands. It's seeing that's
believing; that's what they say."

"So they do, so they do. I don't know if it interests you, but
Glasshouse for the three-thirty. It's a local horse. Sure to do well.
Oh, perhaps not. I only thought it might. Good-bye."

Oates hung up, considered a few moments, sighed and recalled Sir Henry
Wryothsley. The pathologist seemed surprised at his question.

"The Richmond Laboratories?" he repeated. "Why yes, I think so. I've
never had any reason to doubt them. I can't give you any firsthand
information, unfortunately. They don't do my stuff. But a big place like
that is sure to be pretty sound. What's the trouble? Anything I can do?"

"No trouble at all." Oates was suspiciously casual. "I was only curious.
It's not this affair we're on now. Another matter. If these people did a
rushed analysis they'd be bound to find anything fairly obvious, would
they?"

A laugh reached him. "What do you call fairly obvious?"

"Well, acute morphine poisoning, for instance."

"A fatal dose? Oh, Lord, yes, I should say so, if they tested for it.
Why don't you ask 'em? Parsons is the man there. He's a good chap.
Frightfully conscientious. Ask him. He's not chatty. He'll be discreet
if you tell him so. Ring him up."

"Perhaps I will. Thank you very much. Sorry to trouble you."

"Not at all. Have you been through my report? It's interesting, isn't
it? I've got one or two theories. I'll put them forward when I see you.
I've got to rush back now. My assistant's calling. We're doing a
Stass-Otto. Good-bye."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Sergeant Francis Gwynne, hopeful product of the Hendon Police College,
caught Inspector Pullen just before he settled down to write his report.
The young man was diffident.

"I took up the angle you suggested, sir, and I've found one interesting
piece of gossip which may or may not be of some use to you...."

"Come to the horses," snapped the machine gun, who was irritated by the
accent which he insisted on considering, quite erroneously, as unmanly.

"Well, sir, I saw Madame Sell of the big hairdressing firm just off Bond
Street and she tells me that there has been a story going about for some
weeks now concerning the death of Sir Raymond Ramillies and Mrs
Valentine Ferris of Papendeik's. Apparently Lady Ramillies and Mrs
Ferris were quarrelling over the same man, and on the morning of
Ramillies' death Mrs Ferris gave Lady Ramillies a cachet blanc--a sort
of aspirin in a rice-paper case--for herself, but instead of taking it
the woman gave it to her husband. According to the story it was the last
thing he had before he died."

"This is only gossip, you say?" Pullen was loth to show his intense
interest.

"Yes sir, but I thought I'd better let you know at once in case it was
useful."

"It may be. I can't say. I'm going up to the superintendent now. I'll
mention it to him. That's all right, Gwynne. Carry on. That may be of
some use."

                 *        *        *        *        *

Meanwhile Rex wrestled with the newspapers.

"Lady Papendeik authorises me to state that she is extremely sorry that
she cannot help you any further. The whole matter is in the hands of the
police. I am really very sorry but I myself know nothing. No sir,
nothing at all. Miss Caroline Adamson left our employ some weeks ago. I
really cannot remember if she was dismissed or if she resigned. Yes,
that is my last word, absolutely my last word."

He rang off, only to pick up the receiver again as the instrument buzzed
once more.

                 *        *        *        *        *

Val's attempts to find her brother brought her in despair to Amanda's
office wire.

"No, Val, not since lunch." Mr Campion's fiancée was intensely
sympathetic. "What's the matter? Reporters?"

"Oh, my dear, they're everywhere." Val sounded despairing. "We're in a
state of siege. Four women have actually got into the building at
various times by representing themselves as clients. The staff is
hysterical. Tante Marthe's had half a bottle of champagne and gone to
sleep. You don't know where he is at all?"

"No, not at the moment, but he's on the job. If you could only hang out
for a bit he'll see you through. Lock the doors if you have to. Shall I
collect A.D. and come and help you? We could always barricade the
windows."

"No, my dear." Val was almost laughing. "It's not as bad as that yet.
I'll send out an SOS when the party begins to get rough. You think
Albert's doing something?"

"Doing something? He's moving heaven and earth."

"Your faith is very comforting."

"Faith nothing," said Amanda. "It's the old firm. We're invincible."

                 *        *        *        *        *

It was four o'clock when a reluctant Oates, with Pullen at his elbow,
got on to Papendeik's.

"Is that Mrs Valentine Ferris? This is Superintendent Oates of the
Central Department, New Scotland Yard. Mrs Ferris, I wonder if you'd
mind coming down to see me? Yes, at once, please. I'll send a car for
you. It's nothing to get worried about. We just want a little
statement."

"But I've told you all I can about Caroline Adamson." The high clear
voice was nervy now and very much on the defensive.

"I dare say you have, ma'am." Oates was avuncular but firm. "It's
nothing alarming. I just want to have a little talk with you, that's
all."

"Is it very important? The house is surrounded by reporters. I daren't
set my foot outside the door."

"I'm afraid it is, ma'am. Very important. Don't worry about the press,
ma'am. We'll get you through them all right. You'll be ready, will you?
Thank you very much. Good-bye."

"Good-bye," said Val faintly.

                 *        *        *        *        *

At four o'clock Papendeik's phoned Mr Campion's flat without result. At
four-one Papendeik's called the Junior Greys, but Mr Campion had not
come in. At four-three Papendeik's called Mr Campion's fiancée again,
but she had not heard from him. At four-five and a half Mr Campion
called Oates and, on hearing that the superintendent could not speak to
him, sent him a message which not only brought the eminent policeman to
the phone, but sent him and Inspector Pullen, to say nothing of a couple
of plain-clothes men, hurtling down to 91 Lord Scroop Street, Soho, like
a pack on the scent. Mr Campion's original message sounded cryptic to
the secretary who took it.

"Ask him," he had said, "ask him if one of his fat suspects had curly
hair."




CHAPTER TWENTY


In summertime the streets of Soho are divided into two main species,
those which are warm and dirty and jolly, and those which are warm and
dirty and morose. Lord Scroop Street, which connects Greek Street and
Dean Street, belongs to the latter category. Number 91 was a restaurant
with high brick-red window curtains and the name Hakapopulous in a large
white arc on the glass. The main entrance, which was narrow and a
thought greasy, had a particularly solid door with a picture of a grove
of palm trees painted on the glass, while the back entrance, which gave
on to Augean Passage, was, as the local divisional superintendent put it
in a moment of insight, like turning over a stone.

Inside, the restaurant was strangely different from its exterior. The
main room, which possessed a gilt-and-mahogany staircase rising up into
mysterious blackness above, was indubitably shabby, but it was not a
bare shabbiness. There was a cold darkness, a muffled quiet in the big
curtain-hung room. All the tables were half hidden, if only by shadows,
and the carpet, the Victorian hangings and the columns to the ceiling
were all so thick and dusty that the smell of them pervaded the place
like a kind of unscented incense. It was this quality which met one as
one entered. The quiet swooped down on one as does the quiet of a
church, but here there was no austerity, only secrecy: not the exciting
secrecy of conspiracy but the awful, lonely secrecy of passion, the
secrecy of minding one's own business. It was not a pleasant room.

The divisional superintendent, a grizzled friend of Oates, who knew and
rather loved his district, arrived at the back door at the moment that
Oates and his company arrived at the front. This happy co-operation
avoided the suggestion that anything so unfriendly as a raid was
intended, and the two parties, save for those four men who were left to
hang about the entrances, met in the shadows of the main dining room,
where there were only two customers, four-fifteen in the afternoon not
being a busy hour with the house.

Mr Lugg and Mr Campion came out of their obscurity as Oates arrived.
They had been sitting in a corner and their appearance had some of the
elements of a conjuring trick, so that Pullen glanced round him
suspiciously.

"Anyone else here?"

"No one. Only this lad." Mr Campion's murmur was as discreet as the room
itself, and they all turned to stare at the waiter on duty, who had come
sidling out from behind a column. He was a small furtive person in an
oiled tail coat and dirty tablecloth and he took in the nature of the
visit in a single wide-eyed glance. Then, shying away from them like a
field animal, he sent an odd, adenoidal shout up into the pit of
darkness above the staircase. He was answered immediately and there was
a tremor in the walls above and every chin in the room was raised to
greet the newcomer. After a moment of suspense he appeared, and a small,
satisfied sigh escaped Inspector Pullen.

Fatness and curliness are relative terms, but there is a degree at which
either condition becomes remarkable. In each case Andreas Hakapopulous
strained the description to its limit. He was nearly spherical, and the
oily black hair, which carried the line of his stupendous nose to a fine
natural conclusion somewhere about six inches above the top of the back
of his head, was curly in the way that the leaves of the kale are curly,
or Italian handwriting, or the waves surrounding an ascending Aphrodite
in a Pre-Raphaelite painting.

He came downstairs daintily, like a big rubber ball, bouncing a very
little on each step. His welcoming smile was more than friendly. It had
a quality of greasy joy in it, and he winked at the divisional
superintendent with such convincing familiarity that Inspector Pullen
had to glance at the other man's unbending stare to reassure himself.

"We will all 'ave a nize bot'le of wine." The newcomer made the
suggestion as if he were announcing a rich gift to the Police Orphanage.
"Louis, quickly. A nize bot'le of wine for everybody 'ere."

"That'll do." Oates was not amused. "We want a few words with you only,
Mr Hakapopulous. Will you please look at this photograph and tell us if
you have ever seen the girl before?"

Andreas Hakapopulous was not abashed. He stood balancing on the last
step but one of the staircase, exuding a strong odour of jasmine and an
ingratiating affectionateness which in that particular room was almost
unbearable. He put out a shapeless hand for the pasteboard and looked at
it with a casual interest which, although unconvincing, was also,
unfortunately, negative.

He peered at Miss Adamson's lovely, languorous face for some moments and
finally carried the photograph under the window, where he held it at
arm's length.

"Euh!" he said at last. "A nize little bit. Who iz shee?"

"We're asking you." The divisional superintendent put the words in
briskly. "Come along, Andreas. Don't be a b.f. We're not interested in
your theatricals. Have you seen her before?"

"No."

"Wait a minute." Oates was smiling sourly. "Have you seen the papers?"

The Greek perceived his mistake and rectified it jauntily.

"She might be a girl who was found dead somewheres," he said. "I don'
know. I see something this morning. I don' take much account of it."

"Yes, well, you clean up your memory, my lad. Where's your brother?"

"Jock iz upstairs."

Andreas kept his smile and his soft, satisfied tone. He was neither
sulky nor reproachful. A divisional plain-clothes man went up to find
the other member of the firm and a minor inquisition began in the dining
room.

"Now, Mr Hakapopulous, think carefully: have you ever seen that girl in
the flesh?"

"In the flesh?"

"Yes. Have you seen her?"

"No."

"You understand me, don't you? Have you ever seen the girl alive?"

"Has she been 'ere?"

"That's what I'm asking you."

Andreas smiled. "I don' know," he said. "So many girls come 'ere. I don'
think I ever saw 'er before."

Pullen thrust his chin out and butted into Oates's enquiry.

"Have you seen her dead, by any chance?"

"Dead?" Andreas raised his eyebrows.

"You heard what I said."

"Dead? No."

"Look here, Hakapopulous." The name was cramping to Pullen's staccato
style but he took it manfully. "Do you want to come inside and think it
over? You know what the inside of a cell is like, don't you?"

Andreas laughed aloud. It was a little teetering giggle which displayed
his magnificent teeth.

"Excuse me," he said. "I tell you I don' know the girl. Ask someone
else. Don' let's quarrel. We understand each other. I have not seen the
girl except in the papers."

"I see." Oates took up the questioning again. It made an interesting
picture in the gloom, the lean grey-haired policeman with the eyes which
were as bleak and honest as the North Sea, and before him, supremely
happy in his security, the monstrous Latin, smiling and guileful.

"Mr Hakapopulous"--the old super was always studiously polite--"you have
several private dining rooms here, haven't you?"

"Yes, for business conferences." Andreas made the statement with
unblushing simplicity.

"For business conferences?"

"Yes."

"Very well." The glimmer of a smile passed over the superintendent's
thin lips. "We're not going into that now. Where are these dining
rooms?"

His question was answered somewhat precipitately by the hurried return
of the divisional detective, who made a startled announcement from the
head of the staircase.

"Painting?"

Pullen was across the room in an instant. The Greek's smile broadened.

"That is so," he admitted placidly. "We do a little redecoration. My
brother makes a 'obby of it."

"Does he?" Oates was very grim. "We'll go up there, please."

"Why not?"

The entire company mounted the staircase, Campion and Lugg dropping in
behind the procession. They came up into a dark, quiet passage which had
four solid doors on either side and a small half-glassed one at the far
end. The doors were all numbered very plainly, odd on the left and even
on the right. Number eight alone stood open. In the passage the
atmosphere so noticeable in the room below was intensified. It was not
unlike the box of a very old theatre. Muffling festoons of drapery hung
everywhere, and the strong smell of turpentine issuing through the one
open doorway came as a relief. With the turpentine fumes came a little
song. Jock Hakapopulous was singing at his work.

They found him on a stepladder, his head protruding through a hole in an
old sheet which was tied about his tremendous middle with a blind cord.
Apparently he wore no shirt, for his great forearms were naked save for
a thatch of long soft black hair. He was engaged in painting the
cornice, and his head, which was exactly like his brother's, save that
it was bald, was very near the ceiling.

The room was uncompromisingly bare. There was not a vestige of furniture
in it anywhere. Even the walls had been stripped and the dirty boards of
the floor were furred where linoleum had been removed.

Oates avoided Pullen's eyes and a gloom descended on the raiding party.
Andreas indicated the visitors.

"The police," he said unnecessarily. "They want to know if we seen a
girl."

"That'll do." Pullen snapped out the admonition and the pantomime with
the photograph was repeated.

Jock Hakapopulous was even blander than his brother. He too was
ingratiating but he was an older man, and there was an underlying
capability about him and a dreadful rat intelligence which was not only
not negligible but, somehow, in that atmosphere, alarming.

He too professed himself unhappy not to be able to oblige. There were so
many girls in the world, he said. One was very much like another. He
himself had no use for women.

The divisional superintendent remarked that this fact would hardly seem
to emerge from his police record, and both brothers were inordinately
amused.

Since there was nothing to be seen in number eight, always excluding
Jock Hakapopulous in his drapery, which was a sight with merits of its
own, Mr Campion and Mr Lugg drifted away from the police party and
explored the other rooms. As soon as they opened the doors the story was
evident. Every dining room was suspiciously clean and there were uneven,
discoloured patches on the wallpaper where furniture had been removed
and replaced. Every room on the floor had been recently rearranged.

"They've got the police cold." Mr Lugg made the observation through
closed lips. "There's not much those two don't know. Where are you
going?"

Mr Campion did not reply. He had opened the half-glass door and was
already some way down a flight of dirty stairs which he had discovered
behind it.

When Oates joined him five minutes later he was still standing at the
foot of the staircase looking out of the back door into the small yard
which gave on to Augean Passage. The old superintendent had left the
Greeks to the pack and he came down to Campion, holding the skirts of
his coat closely round him like a fastidious woman.

"Lumme," he said expressively.

Mr Campion nodded. "A corner of our picturesque London," he observed.
"Mind that swill can. See what this is?"

Oates glanced up the staircase and then out into the yard again.

"A convenient getaway," he said. "Getaway or, of course, a get-in.
Trusted clients take the back stairs, I suppose. Let's get out in the
air. I don't really fancy the atmosphere of this place. They're a couple
o' daisies, aren't they? How did you come to stumble on them?"

"Old-fashioned footwork. Lugg and I have been round every fishy club and
suspicious eatery in London. What do you think?"

"About them?" Oates jerked his head upward and smiled with his lips
only. "They know something, don't they?" he said.

It was not effusive thanks but Mr Campion knew his Oates.

He led the other man across the yard to an open shed which he and Lugg
had inspected less than an hour before. The plain-clothes man inside
looked up from the car which he was examining, shamefaced disappointment
in his smile.

"Well, here it is, sir," he said, "such as it is. I was just coming in
to report."

The superintendent walked round the machine, his shoulders hunched.
There it was indeed, a nondescript four-seater Morris Twelve which had
been someone's pride in 1929 and was still serviceable. The most
irritating thing about it was its cleanliness. There were certainly a
few traces of vegetable litter in the back, but the leather upholstery
had been recently scrubbed and the paint positively scraped. Also, which
was even more depressing, it possessed four new tires.

Oates said something under his breath, nodded to the man and came out
into the yard again. He looked at Campion.

"I hate this kind of outfit," he said. "Did you see anyone in that house
except those two and the waiter?"

"No," said Campion. "And yet, of course, there must be other people
about; kitchen staff and so on."

"That's what I mean." Oates was spiteful. "They're all there somewhere.
The place is full of people. We'll find 'em, of course, but it's like a
rat warren. The whole house is so darned furtive you never know if the
chair you're leaning on hasn't someone curled up in the bottom of it.
They're all the same, these places--cold, dark, dirty and alive. They
get on my nerves. Come on, we'll go in."

They picked their way to the back door through a miscellaneous
collection of kitchen refuse, dirty delivery trays and fresh supplies of
greengrocery. Campion was in front and in the doorway he stopped
abruptly, so that the superintendent ran into him.

"I say," he said.

Oates peered over his shoulder and an exclamation escaped him. At
Campion's feet was a basket half full of cabbage leaves and among them,
its bright blade gleaming wickedly against the green, was a long, thin,
double-edged knife, about six tenths of an inch wide at the shaft.

Oates took up the basket without a word and went upstairs. The entire
company had moved down to the main room again and as they passed along
the passage curtains sighed dustily around them and the carpet swallowed
up their tread.

Pullen looked down at the knife and for the first time during his visit
a gleam of satisfaction appeared in his face.

"Ah," he said, "that's something like, sir. Yes, indeed. Now then, you
two."

The brothers Hakapopulous regarded the discovery without interest. Jock
had removed his sheet and now stood clad in a torn singlet and a
disreputable pair of trousers. His great neck flowed from his jowls and
swelled into a double roll at the top of his spine.

"Don' you like it?" he enquired. "We got a dozen of these. Show 'im,
Andreas."

Andreas Hakapopulous was delighted to oblige in any way. He threw open
the drawers of his sideboard. He invited Inspector Pullen and his
friends into the unholy mystery of his dreadful kitchens. Jock had
underestimated his possessions. They found twenty-seven knives of the
same pattern in various parts of the establishment and the elder
Hakapopulous took up one of them and balanced it in his hand.

"Nize little knife," he said as the filtering light from the top of the
window glistened on his shining face.

"'Andy. They're very popular just now in the trade. We get them from
Loewenstein in Ol' Compton Street. He tell me the other day he sells
more of these knives to restaurants than any other kind. Sharp, you
know. She goes through a tough ol' chicken as though she was a little
bit o' butter." He wiped the blade affectionately along his forearm and
Mr Campion, who was not unimaginative, turned away.

In the shed, where the car stood, the police held a brief conference.
Pullen faced the two superintendents while Mr Campion nosed about
discreetly among the rubbish in the background.

"I'd like to pull 'em in at once, sir, all three of them." Pullen spoke
earnestly. Lack of sleep had changed the key of his machine-gun rattle
and his eyes were angry. "They're lying, of course, but you can't seem
to get at 'em in a place like this. You can't see 'em, for one thing.
I'd like to get 'em into the light. Jock has a record as long as your
arm, and Andreas has been inside half-a-dozen times to my knowledge.
That little waiter chap might be made to squeal too," he added, not
without a certain grim anticipation. He glanced across at Campion and
gave him a conciliatory smile. "It makes you wild when you see it under
your nose and can't lay your hands on it, don't it?" he demanded. "The
job was done here if it was done anywhere and you can see how it was
done."

"Those two wouldn't kill in their own house," said the divisional
superintendent, unaware that he was making a nice distinction.

"No, no, they didn't do the killing." Oates made the pronouncement out
of the fund of his vast experience. "They had a corpse wished on 'em.
They're accessories after the fact."

"_And_ they've had two days to clear up the mess." Pullen was bitter.
"Let's get 'em inside," he said. "No arrest, of course; just a little
friendly chat. They know something."

"Of course they do." Oates was laughing in spite of his weariness.
"You'll leave someone to go over the house. That's your pigeon, Super."

"Righto." The divisional man grinned. "God knows what I'll find," he
said. "Half-a-dozen stiffs, I shouldn't wonder."

Pullen went off to superintend the exodus and Oates looked at Campion.

"We'll go back together, I think," he said. "Not forgetting Master Lugg
either. I want to talk to you two. I was just going to see your sister
when you phoned. Don't worry; I put her off." He paused. "We don't want
to _make_ trouble," he added presently. "You'll come along, will you?"

"Right by your side," said Mr Campion. "I'm not leaving you."

                 *        *        *        *        *

At ten o'clock on the same evening he had not gone back on his word.
Lugg had returned to the flat for sustenance and a relief from his
collar and shoes, but in a corner of the superintendent's office Mr
Campion sat on, and because of his service, and because he might be even
more useful, no one disturbed him. Oates remained at his desk. The hard
artificial light made him look old and his shoulders were prominent
under his coat.

Four hours intensive questioning in the little office next door had
elicited a number of things from the Hakapopulous brothers, among them
the fact that the respectability of their establishment was, in spite of
several extraordinary miscarriages of justice in the past, absolutely
above reproach. They agreed, moreover, that they had used their car not
only in the small hours on the morning of the twenty-first, but on every
other morning for the past two years. A car, they explained, was
indispensable for an early visit to Smithfield or Covent Garden, and, if
one was to provide one's customers with good clean wholesome food,
personal marketing was the only way to avoid economic ruin. Both
brothers professed themselves charmed by the photograph. It reminded
them of several customers, they said, and offered names and addresses to
prove it. As for the redecoration--well, it was about time. The house
was just a little old-fashioned. Had the inspector noticed it? It was
indeed a coincidence that they should have chosen just this particular
time to make a start, but then one must begin sometime, and the summer
air carried away the smell of the paint.

It was an unequal contest. The police were handicapped and knew it.
Their one forlorn hope, the lorry driver, had let them down badly. He
had been rushed from Coaching Cross and had arrived eager to help. For a
long, wearisome hour he had watched the brothers parading in half
darkness in company with half-a-dozen or so other well-nourished aliens,
only to confess himself "a bit muddled" at the end of it. In despair
Pullen had dismissed him and returned to the direct attack.

The brothers remained friendly, oily and untired. Although the whole
story was clear for anyone to read, and no one appreciated that fact
more deeply than themselves, they knew that so long as they kept their
heads they had nothing worse than inconvenience to fear. They were both
men of tremendous physical stamina and mental agility. Moreover, their
experience of police procedure was considerable. Nothing was new to
them. Any deviation from the beaten track of police questioning brought
a bland demand for their solicitor and the farce began again.

At a little after eleven Pullen came in to Oates. He was hoarse and
irritable, and there was a limpness about his appearance which suggested
that a portion of the grease of his captives had somehow got on to
himself.

"Nothing," he said savagely. "Absolutely nothing. Something's happened
to that race since they did all that marble work."

Mr Campion grinned and looked up.

"Those two are 'wide,' are they?"

"Wide?" The inspector threw out his arms expressively. "Not only do they
know all the answers, but they enjoy giving them. I've got my hands
right on it, you know. Chorge! That makes me wild."

He looked like an exasperated setter and Mr Campion sympathised with
him.

"How about the other chap?" he enquired.

"Him?" Pullen showed the whites of his eyes. "Have you ever had a long
serious talk with an idiot child? He ought to be in a bottle, that's
where he ought to be, in a jar. Flood's got him now. He's gentle, is
Flood. They were matching cigarette cards when I left 'em. God give me
strength!"

Oates sighed. "Sit down, Inspector," he said. "Mr Campion's got a fag on
him. Now we'll see what Flood's up to." He took up the telephone and
made the enquiry. The instrument crackled back hopefully and Pullen
jumped up. "Oh." Oates was interested. "Is that so? That's better than
nothing, Sergeant. _Is_ he? Yes, I dare say. Yes. They often are, these
fellows. Yes. Well, bring him up here." He hung up and cocked an eye at
Pullen. "Flood says he's weak-minded, but his mouth is moving," he said.
The inspector sat down again and bit at his cigarette.

"It's in our hands," he said. "That's what pips me."

Louis Bartolozzi came in with Flood, who treated him as if he were
certified, that is to say with great tenderness.

"Sit there," he said, stretching out a great bony arm and planting a
small chair in the exact centre of the room. "Put your hat under it. Now
are you all right? There's the superintendent."

Louis smiled faintly at the gathering and looked as though he were going
to be sick.

"His mother was half Italian and half Rumanian and his father was
probably French," explained the sergeant, consulting his notebook. "He
was born in the Boro', he thinks, and he can't speak any other language
than--er--what he does."

"Street Arabic," exploded Pullen and laughed unpleasantly, relapsing
into bitter silence as Oates glanced at him.

"He remembers a girl in room number eight on Tuesday," Flood continued
softly. "That's right, isn't it, Louis?"

"Da girl in da room, a nize pretty girl, yes."

"On Tuesday night? Last Tuesday?"

"Ver' like. Y'know we have a lot of people come there. Rich people. Nize
girls, some of dem. Smart, y'know."

"In room eight on Tuesday last?"

The wide-eyed stare on the man's face became intensified.

"Tuesday, yes, every day."

"That's how he keeps going, sir." Flood looked at Oates apologetically.
"Perhaps I'd better read you what he's said so far. He thinks he
recognises the photograph but can't be sure. He remembers a girl in room
eight on Tuesday last. She came in alone and ordered a meal. She must
have been expected, but he doesn't know how the rooms are booked. He
took her some food and never saw her again."

"Never saw her again?"

"No sir. He can't remember if she was gone when he went in again or
whether the door was locked."

"But it's only two days ago!" roared Pullen. "He _must_ remember."

Flood looked at his protégé helplessly. "He doesn't seem to," he said.

Louis seemed paralysed, but after a moment of complete vacancy he burst
into sudden and excited speech.

"She was annoyed," he said. "Wild, y'know. Feller hadn't come.
Somethin', I don' know."

"Annoyed, was she?" Oates sat up. "When was this? What time of the
evening?"

The little creature, who looked as if he had never before been above
ground, gave the old man an ingratiating smile.

"In the evening, yes, tha's right."

"What time? Was it still light?"

An elaborate shrug answered him. "In the evening."

Oates turned to Flood. "Any more?"

"No sir, not really, I'm afraid. He thinks people did use the back
stairs, but he doesn't seem to notice people getting in and out of the
place. When they're there he waits on 'em. He works very hard, sir."

"I don't doubt it, son." Oates's smile at Flood was half amused and half
affectionate. "All right, take him away. See what you can get."

The sergeant collected his charge and shepherded him out again.

"That would look nice in the witness box, wouldn't it?" Pullen spoke
with feeling. "You'd throw that to counsel as you'd throw a dog a bone."

Oates shook his head. "No, I see," he said. "I see. That explains the
Hakapopulous calm. There's nothing very useful there except that it's
fairly clear now what actually did happen. She went there by appointment
and somebody came up those back stairs and killed her, probably with one
of the restaurant's own knives, leaving the body for the Greeks to deal
with. One of the brothers must have found her, and, not wanting any
trouble--heaven knows they understand trouble, those two--they cleaned
up the mess in their own way. Frankly I'm inclined to take my cap off to
them. They've been thorough. When they went to market I suppose they
slung the body in the back of the car, drove a little further out,
dumped it and probably returned to do their shopping without raising an
eyelid. They're that kind."

Mr Campion stirred in his corner.

"If I might suggest," he said slowly, "if your man--I take it it was a
man--came into that place up the back stairs he must have known his way
about. Ergo, he'd been there before. Do you think Flood's little packet
of trouble could recognise a photograph?"

"That's an idea, sir." Pullen shot up. His energy was amazing and it
flashed through Campion's mind that one could almost see his body
pumping it out. "It won't be evidence but it might be useful. If we
could only get something to jolt those greasy beggars in the next room
out of their damned complacency it would be something."

Oates unlocked a drawer in his desk and took out a bundle of
photographs. They were all there, taken from illustrated papers or
begged or borrowed from servants; Val, Georgia, Gaiogi, Tante Marthe,
Ferdie, Alan Dell, even Mr Campion himself. Pullen gathered them up.

"I'll mix 'em with the usual," he said. "We'll see."

As the door closed behind him Oates swung round in his chair and looked
at Campion.

"You're still on the blacking?"

"Yes," said Campion with a complete lack of hesitation which was unusual
in him. "It's blackmail all right, guv'nor. Think of it. What a place
for a transaction of that kind! Complete safety. Complete secrecy. Our
Caroline has used that place before for the same purpose. Andreas
recognised her immediately and it wasn't a good photograph if one had
only seen her dead. Besides, my dear chap, how could she get into the
place alone if they didn't know her? If this little Louis person is any
good and he's been there long I should be very much inclined to show him
a photograph of Portland-Smith. Don't you see, someone knew that place
well. Whoever he was, he got Caroline Adamson to book a room there by
promising her money. Then he sneaked across the yard and slipped up the
stairs. He need not have met anybody. It was made for him. It was a
place where muffled figures were always slipping in and out. The
Mazarini mob used to use it for a paying-out place last year; did you
know that? That's where Mazarini used to pay his thugs for services
rendered on the racecourse."

"Is it? I didn't know that. When did you hear that?"

"This afternoon, from the friend who gave me the name of the place as a
likely dive."

"Oh, I see." Oates glanced at the younger man with a smile that was only
part amusement. "You and your friends," he said. "_All_ your friends."

Mr Campion's expression grew serious.

"I don't mind my friends' troubles," he remarked feelingly, "but I draw
a line when they get mixed up with the family."

They were still eyeing each other when Pullen came in. He walked over to
the desk and laid the photographs down without a word. His heavy face
was blank and his eyes looked bloodshot.

"Well, did he recognise anyone?" Oates was hopeful.

"He did." The inspector could barely trust himself to speak. "He knew
'em all. Why shouldn't he? They're all fairly well-known people. He knew
Miss Wells and Mr Dell and Mrs Ferris and Laminoff, of course. He'd
waited on every one of 'em, he said. He also recognised a photograph of
the ex-Emperor of Germany, Sergeant Withers of the K Division, and the
portrait of you, sir, as an inspector. He's worse than hopeless. Flood
seems to understand about half he says, but I'm hanged if I do. I'll go
back and have one more talk to those perishing Greeks. I can't keep 'em
here all night without charging 'em and although there's plenty we could
hold 'em for I don't see much point in it. They won't run away. Why
should they? I don't suppose the boys on the car have phoned yet, sir,
have they?"

"No, nothing. That's a forlorn hope, Inspector, I'm afraid. We didn't
get on to it soon enough. I'll leave you to it. I've had forty-eight
hours solid and I'm no longer intelligent. If you want me you know where
you can find me."

The phone bell answered him, and he pounced on the instrument hopefully,
all trace of weariness receding from his eyes. Mr Campion had seen the
same phenomenon in the face of an angler who had noticed a nibble when
he was just about to wind in his line.

"What? Yes, Superintendent Stanislaus Oates here. Yes. Sanderson
speaking? Yes. You have? Really? Good man. She saw 'em, did she?
Splendid! Saw the two brothers lifting a girl into the car? She thought
the girl was what? Oh, drunk. Yes, of course. Fine. Bring her round.
She's just what we want. What? What? Oh. Oh, I see. Oh. What a pity! No,
no, of course. Of course not. Well, yes, yes, you may as well. Yes,
Inspector Pullen will be here. Yes, righto. Good-bye."

He replaced the receiver and grimaced at them.

"You heard that, did you? They've found a witness who saw the Greeks
carry a girl out of the back door at two in the morning of the
twenty-first. She thought the girl was drunk and took no notice of them.
Unfortunately she's a vagrant and not a good witness. We could never put
her in the box. She'd be discredited in five minutes. They're going to
bring her round, but I don't see that she's going to help. There you
are, Pullen. I'm sorry, but what do you expect in Augean Passage?"

The inspector thrust his hands into his pockets.

"It's always the same with these cases," he said. "Still, I'll get back
to those two. This might rattle 'em. There's a chance. If only they'd
play ball we might get a description of the man. That'd be something."

"If they saw him," said Mr Campion.

Both men turned to look at him and he spread out his hands.

"With a back entrance like that, why should anyone ever have seen him?
Why shouldn't he have come and gone like any other of the shadows in
that rats' nest? No one need ever have seen him there that night."

"Except the girl," put in Oates. "She saw him and she knew him. We're
back where we started, Mr Campion. It's motive we want; motive and Miss
Adamson's friends."

"Give me a week." The demand was out of the younger man's mouth before
he realised he had spoken. "Give me a week, Oates, before you stir up
the dovecotes. The chief won't like it if you do, the Colonial Office
will be furious. What's the good of an exhumation order? What's the good
of an unholy stink? What's the good of smearing all this appalling mud
over people who don't even dream it exists? Give me a week, only a
week."

"It'll take a week to get the Home Office to move," said Oates.




CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE


On the Sunday Amanda gave a formal sherry party to mark the breaking off
of her engagement to Albert Campion.

It took place at her cottage on the river near the Alandel works and was
one of those elaborately masochistic gestures which the modern cult for
the proper sublimation of all the more commonplace emotions has made
fashionable among the highly civilised.

Coming, as it did, at the end of one nightmare week and at the beginning
of another, it seemed very appropriate and was almost, as Tante Marthe
said, the only conceivable kind of celebration which one could decently
bring oneself to face in the circumstances.

No one knew the cause of this new trouble, and most people were too
worried to care, but the first impression, which was that young
Pontisbright had put his foot down, was dispelled. The mischief lay
between the two parties most concerned. So much was evident as soon as
one set foot in the house.

Amanda's house was like Amanda inasmuch as it was both small and
astonishingly rational. The main room, which, with a little kitchenette,
comprised the whole of the ground floor, possessed one glass side which
opened on to a steep lawn running down to the river, and was otherwise
individual inasmuch as the furnishings had been taken over complete from
the prim old lady who had lived there before, and had been made
comfortable and attractive with anything which had taken Amanda's fancy,
from a nice piece of machinery to a two-foot bowl of marigolds. The
result of this marriage of tastes was a big, odd room in which a fine
"tea-chest" clock and a plush-framed photograph of Edward VII in a kilt
lived in harmony with an architect's drawing table and a magnificent Van
Gogh.

Hal Fitton, Earl of Pontisbright, supported his sister at the gathering.
He stood by her side, grave and old-fashioned as he had always been. At
twenty he was a sturdy, serious young man with the family's eyes and
hair and a double dose of the family's composure. The situation was one
which appealed to his youthful sense of the dramatic, while appeasing
his individual mania for decorum. He was very nice indeed to Mr Campion
and frequently spoke to him, making it even more clear than if he had
said so in so many words that the dissolution of the proposed
partnership had been a matter of mutual arrangement, and that nothing
unpleasant had been said or even thought on either side.

Amanda was at ease, if a trifle brittle, but Mr Campion was not so good.
He looked hunted rather than harassed and there were fine lines running
down his cheeks from ears to chin, as if his facial muscles were under
particularly good control.

Val was inclined to be bitterly amused. She had come over with most of
the others who had been lunching at Caesar's Court and she was, as never
before, the complete professional woman, hard, experienced and aware of
her responsibilities. Her tailored silk suit was a minor miracle. She
looked unapproachable and, had it not been for her essential femininity,
severe.

Ferdie Paul was there. He had come over with Gaiogi and his wife, and he
stood in a corner, his quick brown eyes interested. Val fascinated him
and the paralysing decency of the whole procedure evidently took his
fancy, for he watched the brother and sister with a smile that was part
genuine admiration.

Georgia arrived alone, her chauffeur driving. She caused a little
sensation by appearing in white muslin, blue bows and a picture hat,
which, although decorative and eminently suitable to the weather, were
out of keeping both with the last mood in which anyone present had seen
her and the unfortunate nature of the gathering.

"Mon Dieu!" said Tante Marthe aloud and turned away with interest,
having caught sight of her own discreetly clad, silk-caped figure in a
convex mirror.

Gaiogi alone seemed to appreciate the essential preposterous charm of
the main idea of the party. He behaved as if he were at the funeral of
an old enemy, looking about him with a kind of mock solemn relish. Too,
he alone seemed to have shaken off the real bond of calamity which
encompassed them all. If ruin threatened, for him it was at least not
yet. He talked earnestly in a low voice about trivialities and was
delighted with Hal, whom he obviously took to be a particularly
interesting English "piece." But if Gaiogi could forget the main
situation, the others were not so fortunate. After the first overbright
five minutes the morale broke down. The room was littered with Sunday
papers and by the time Dell arrived, looking if anything a little more
worn than Campion himself, the post-mortem upon them was in full swing.

The cheaper press carried little new about the actual mystery. The
Hakapopulous brothers had burst upon the world two days before and the
photograph of "Mr Andreas Hakapopulous, who has been questioned by the
police in connection with the death of beautiful Caroline Adamson (Miss
Adamson was once a mannequin at a famous dress house)" was still vivid
enough in everyone's mind. So far the name of Ramillies had not appeared
in print in connection with the case, and the references to Papendeik's
had been most carefully confined to the bare fact that the dead girl had
once been in their employ, but what the laws of libel restrained in
print had not been silenced in conversation, and the feature, or
magazine, sides of the family Sundays were littered with evidences of
the trend of popular thought.

There was in particular an article by Lady Jevity called "My Life as a
Mannequin. How I Saved Myself from the Dreaded Drug Habit. The Canker of
the Upper Classes" which came as near being actionable as anyone dared
go, and a catchpenny indictment headed "Hands Off Our Girls!" by Honest
John McQuean, which began "In a little country morgue a lovely girl lies
dead" and ended with typical inconsequentiality, "Will no one tell them
drugs and lovely dresses are snares for little moths?" printed in gothic
letters.

Most of the other papers had something in the same vein but _Oliphant's
News_ had taken another and more ominous line. They had merely written
up Val very thoroughly. There was no reference to the crime in their
article at all, but the house of Papendeik received a full-page spread
adorned with Val's photograph and a press picture of Georgia in a Val
negligee. This publicity was a trifle suspicious in itself, but the
writer of the copy had infused a touch of melancholy into her account
which gave the whole thing the dreadful flavour of an obituary notice
and left the uninitiated reader with the uncomfortable feeling that the
end of the story would be sad and that he must wait until next week for
it.

Georgia brought the ball out into the open field in her own unmatchable
style.

"It's very sweet of Alan, you know," she said, smiling across at him.
"Most people in his position would just keep away from us all, wouldn't
they? I don't mean anything personal by that, Amanda. I know you and
Albert just don't want to get married and that's all there is to that.
Besides, you've got a family and a village and traditions and that sort
of thing. But I mean, poor Alan is nothing to do with this and he could
so easily just stay away, couldn't he? We all are a bit leprous just
now. It's got to be faced. Do you know, my dears, I've been astonished.
Quite a lot of people have been really awfully nice. Which reminds me:
what's the time?"

"Half-past six," said Ferdie, who appeared to be the only member of the
party still coherent. "Got a boy friend?"

"No, just a food appointment." Georgia nodded to him but glanced out of
the front windows immediately afterwards and smoothed down her muslin
frills with an expression of such tender artlessness on her lovely face
that several people glanced at her sharply. After her original
pronouncement normal reticence seemed a little affected and people began
to talk freely.

"I am ill," said Tante Marthe. "I feel the end of the world is coming,
and I do not care what I wear for it. Don't you know anything at all,
Albert? We haven't even seen you for two days."

"Albert's had troubles of his own," said Val absently and bit her tongue
as he turned to look at her with sudden darkness in his eyes.

"Ciel! Yes. But what a time to choose!" Lady Papendeik spoke to herself,
but the events of the last week had destroyed a poise which had lasted
half a lifetime and the words were audible. Hal heard them and so did
Amanda, and their reactions were precisely similar. Hal replenished Lady
Papendeik's glass and Amanda began to talk about her house. There was
not a lot to be shown, but she did the thing thoroughly, displayed the
convenience of the white gas stove, the sink and the cupboard in the
kitchenette, the stairs to the two little bedrooms, the bathroom, and
her own newly invented electric geyser. There were several interesting
labour-saving features, all of a startlingly practical rather than a
merely gadgety character, and Gaiogi began to chip her gently about her
domesticity, avoiding most adroitly any errors of taste which the nature
of the occasion might have invited.

"But, darling, it's mad to live here _alone_," said Georgia, innocently
spoiling everything. "It's all so sort of honeymoon, isn't it? What do
you do about service?"

"Oh, a char, you know." Amanda spoke with determined cheerfulness.
"She's a good old thing. She lives just down on the highroad and she
doesn't come when I don't want her. I go away rather a lot. I'm off to
Sweden tomorrow."

"Really?" It was Gaiogi who spoke, but everyone had heard and there was
a moment of embarrassment as her immediate personal difficulties were
recalled to everyone's mind. Hal moved over to her side.

"I have persuaded my sister to come with me to visit the Tajendie
works," he said primly. "Alan, you approve, don't you?"

"Oh yes, rather. Very useful. We must keep in touch with what the other
fellow's doing." Dell spoke dutifully but his eyes strayed curiously
towards Mr Campion, who met his glance with studied disinterest. Campion
did nothing, nor did he speak, but at that moment everyone was aware of
him. He stood looking at Dell and there was a wave of unrest in the room
as it passed through most people's minds that perhaps this lean, affable
person was not entirely reliable in his present mood. It was a sort of
telepathic warning that he was not taking his personal disaster with
quite the same decent casualism that everyone else was prepared to
afford it and they were all, in spite of their own worries, a little
embarrassed by it.

Georgia alone seemed unaware of the signal. As usual she was entirely
occupied with her own point of view.

"You just shut the cottage when you go away, do you, Amanda?" she said.

"Yes, it's very convenient. In the country but with all the amenities of
town." Amanda's satisfaction had a trace of hardness in it. "I'm off
tonight. I go home to Suffolk first and we sail on Tuesday. I'm looking
forward to it."

"My dear, of course you are. I wish I could do something like that, but
then you haven't got children, have you?" Georgia sighed and looked out
of the window again. Her beautiful face was troubled and her eyes were
gentle. "I wish to God I _could_ go away and get out of it all," she
went on quite sincerely, forgetting the unfortunate inference. "I bet
you do, too, don't you, Val? My dear, let's _rat_. Let's bunk and go to
Cassis and lie in the sun."

"Darling!" The protest escaped Val before she could prevent it and as
Georgia gaped at her she added with the quiet bluntness of exasperation,
"For pity's sake, sweetheart, shut up. Things are bad enough."

"I wonder if you realise how bad they are, my dear." Mr Campion's soft
observation from the other side of the room made them all turn to him.
He was leaning over the drawing table, his strong, sensitive hands,
which no one seemed to have noticed before, gripping the sides of the
board. His natural vacuity of expression had vanished and he had taken
off his spectacles. He looked vigorous, deeply intelligent and by no
means unhandsome in his passionate sincerity. "I don't like putting it
to you as baldly as this," he said, clipping his words a little. "It's
not a jolly subject to rake up at this particular party, of all times.
But you terrify me. You appal me, standing around hopefully as you
discount this and that little private awkwardness, packing it away in
the back of your minds as not really important while you blind
yourselves to the terrifying fact that these little awkwardnesses all
mounting together make up one tremendous and overpowering sum, awkward
enough to ruin every one of you. At the actual moment you're all
comparatively safe. The libel laws protect you and the police enquiry is
at its beginning. But my enquiry is nearing its end. I don't intend to
rat to the police but the methods I have used are ordinary orthodox
methods and what I know tonight they are bound to know soon, certainly
by the end of the week. There is nothing to stop them finding out
everything if they consider it necessary to pursue the enquiry, and as
long as the murderer of Caroline Adamson goes free they will consider it
necessary."

"What do you know?" Tante Marthe's question was sharp and unexpected,
but no one in Mr Campion's audience looked round at her.

"I know a number of interesting things." He was very earnest. "Several
of them are criminal and the rest are, in varying degrees, unfortunate.
For any one of them to be set down in print would be a considerable
embarrassment for one of you, but for all of them to come out would be a
catastrophe for the whole crowd of us. Let me tell you something. I
know, and the police will eventually know, that Richard Portland-Smith
was driven to suicide, not deliberately but by accident. The fact that
he committed suicide was fortuitous. The idea behind that blackmailing
was the desire to ruin him, to get him out of the way. I know that a
carefully arranged frame-up, involving Miss Adamson, was staged for him
at the Green Bottle Hotel at Shelleycomb on the Downs in October 1933. I
know that one other person was present on that occasion besides Caroline
Adamson and that that other person was a woman."

"A woman?" Georgia spoke faintly but Campion ignored her.

"I know," he went on, "that Portland-Smith used to meet this second
woman in a back room in Hakapopulous' restaurant in Lord Scroop Street
and that there he paid her all he had. I also know that this woman was
not the main instigator of the plot. She merely did the work and took
the money, half of which she paid to Caroline, who threw it away, and
half of which she kept herself and invested most unprofitably. I know
that Ramillies was murdered. I know that he left Caesar's Court in the
middle of a party because he was so frightened of the approaching flight
that he couldn't bear himself any longer. He went to Boot's Hotel and
spent the night there in an agony of apprehension, and in the morning he
went to see someone who knew his phobia and who gave him a hypodermic
injection, promising him that the effects of it would be discomfort for
four hours followed by a feeling of happy irresponsibility and freedom
from fear. I know that the flight was unexpectedly postponed for an hour
and that therefore Ramillies died on the ground when he should have died
in the air. But I also know that any accident of this sort was
anticipated by the fact that his specialist was at Caesar's Court in
response to an invitation to sample the amenities of the place at the
management's expense. I know that Miss Adamson was killed because,
having been taught to blackmail once, she saw in Ramillies' death an
opportunity to blackmail again. I know that she visited Hakapopulous'
restaurant thinking to receive money and met a knife instead."

He paused and looked round. They were all watching him. Georgia stood
with tears on her cheeks and her eyes wide, but the others were all
imperturbable, their faces strained but expressionless.

"That is the criminal side," said Mr Campion. "Now we come to the merely
interesting but unfortunate. I make no apology for digging up these
facts about you all. My principal care has naturally been for my sister
and in her interest I have done my best to satisfy myself of the whole
truth of the story. I've told you that I shan't squeal to the police,
and I shan't, but, as I say, my methods of enquiry are the same as
theirs and they are doing now what I did a week ago. Some of these facts
are relevant and some of them aren't. I don't know yet which are which,
but I shall know, and should the police come to discuss them the entire
world will know. I know, for instance, that you, Gaiogi, received a
small but mysterious backing for the Poire d'Or. I know that you, Dell,
have an enormous sum of money invested in Caesar's Court. I know that
you, Georgia, have all the money you possess in the world in the same
place. You too, Ferdie, have a packet there, and so has Val and Tante
Marthe. Then there's Rex. Rex has a lot of money, Tante Marthe. He's
your senior partner, isn't he? Then Caroline Adamson's father was a
friend of Gaiogi's and when he died Gaiogi promised to keep an eye on
the girl. I know lots of little odd things which may mean nothing, but
which have come out in my enquiry, personal things which perhaps don't
matter very much to anyone but those concerned. I know Georgia's first
husband is playing in a concert party in a third-rate watering place. I
know the name of Ferdie's doctor in Paris. I know the White Empress Club
is financed by Gaiogi, and I know that Val was criminally careless to
leave some seven ounces of morphine where any member of her staff could
steal it. None of these may matter very much, but they won't look jolly
in print, with ghouls like Honest John McQuean and Lady Jevity
underlining them. There's only one way to save the worst of the mess and
that is to get the murderer into the hands of the police immediately.
Fortunately one can only hang a murderer once. One body is sufficient to
inaugurate the ceremony. If the police can only get Caroline Adamson's
murderer they won't go into the death of Ramillies. That is why I am
still here. I shall make one last attempt. If I fail--and I warn you I'm
not too hopeful--then I'm through. I don't care what happens to me or to
anyone else. I'm finished."

He glanced across at Amanda.

"God knows this business has cost me enough," he said.

Nobody spoke for a long time. Young Pontisbright was white and angry and
the others were thinking the swift, absorbing, lonely thoughts of
self-preservation. It was an appalling minute and the incident which
ended it was mercifully ludicrous. Tires crackled in the flint road
outside and Georgia started. Everybody looked out of the window and
Gaiogi laughed abruptly. A long black chauffeur-driven car had pulled up
outside the garden gate. The tonneau was nearly all glass and the three
occupants were clearly visible. Two of them sat side by side in the
back. One was Sinclair and the other was Towser. They had been to
Whipsnade and had called back by appointment for Mama, forced to waste
her time at a tiresome formal party. Even at that distance it was
evident that the outing had been a success. Towser spoke to the
chauffeur, who smiled faintly and sounded the horn. Georgia did not say
good-bye. She picked up her little pale blue handbag and her long gloves
and walked out of the cottage in her demure white muslin, her bows and
her picture hat. She looked beautiful, sweetly feminine and virginal, as
she went off on a new adventure, tears still on her cheeks.

Dell walked over to Val and led her out onto the little lawn behind the
house. There was a gate leading into a flat meadow there and he piloted
her through it. The atmosphere had been so electric that there seemed
nothing odd in his behaviour. Her instinct had been to get away at all
costs and his appearance at her elbow merely made the going easier, but
out in the warm air, with the world green and rational about her, the
sensation of nightmare wore off, leaving her battered but aware again of
life as it was in the daylight.

"He's very cut up," Dell remarked as they stepped onto the turf.

She nodded. "I've never seen him like that before. It's rather unnerving
when you see someone you know so well go all out of character. He's
frightened, too, I think. Things aren't good."

"No," he said. "No. Yet they may not be as bad as he seems to think. We
can only hope, you know."

He was comfortingly calm and Val glanced up at him. She was relieved to
see that he was at least not embarrassed by their recent personal
upheaval. She tried to consider him objectively, and saw only that his
hair was going grey and that he looked tired. In common with most
modern-thinking women she was pessimistic where her own emotions were
concerned and she found herself acutely conscious of her attitude
towards him. She was still most painfully in love with him. He still
created in her that unaccountable excitement and exquisite sensitiveness
which would seem to have some psychic or at least some chemical origin,
since it had no birth in reason, but she still shrank from investigating
him. She still recoiled from the secret door which Georgia's Pandora
instinct found so irresistible in all men. A living room or a junk
cupboard? The risk was too great to take. Her own exacting intelligence,
her own insufferable responsible importance, weighed her down like a
pack. She was desperately aware that she wanted something from him that
was neither physical nor even mental, but rather a vague moral quality
whose very nature escaped her. It was something of which she stood in
great need and her fear was not only that he did not possess it but that
no one did. Her unhappy superiority made her feel lonely and she turned
from him so that she was not looking at him when he spoke.

"I wanted to talk to you, Val. Do you mind if I talk about myself?"

The question was so unlike him and yet so much to be expected that her
heart sank.

"Oh, that's all right," she said. "I think we can almost take that as
read, don't you?"

"What?" He was astonished and his bright blue eyes were amused. "What do
you think I'm talking about? Georgia?"

"Aren't you?"

"Well, no, I wasn't exactly." He was laughing a little. "I wanted to
talk about myself. This is my trouble, Val. I am in love and I want to
marry, but there are difficulties, my own mainly. I don't want a
mistress or a companion. I want a wife."

Val paused in her walk. She was surprised. She held her head stiffly and
her eyes were interested. Her business people knew her thus and in
certain Parisian quarters the attitude was viewed with deep respect.
Madame was alert.

Dell smiled at her. He seemed to find her charming.

"It's not so easy," he said. "Wives are out of fashion. I love you, Val.
Will you marry me and give up to me your independence, the enthusiasm
which you give your career, your time and your thought? That's my
proposition. It's not a very good one, is it? I realise that I've made a
fine old exhibition of myself with Georgia Wells which has hardly
enhanced my immediate value in the market, but I can't honestly say that
I regret the experience. That woman has maturing properties. However,
that is the offer. In return--and you probably won't like this
either--in return, mind you (I consider it an obligation), I should
assume full responsibility for you. I would pay your bills to any amount
which my income might afford. I would make all decisions which were not
directly in your province, although on the other hand I would like to
feel that I might discuss everything with you if I wanted to; but only
because I wanted to, mind you; not as your right. And until I died you
would be the only woman. You would be my care, my mate as in plumber, my
possession if you like. If you wanted your own way in everything you'd
have to cheat it out of me, not demand it. Our immediate trouble is
serious, but not so serious as this. It means the other half of my life
to me, but the whole of yours to you. Will you do it?"

"Yes," said Val so quickly that she startled herself. The word sounded
odd in her ears, it carried such ingenuous relief. Authority. The simple
nature of her desire from him took her breath away with its very
obviousness and in the back of her mind she caught a glimpse of its
root. She was a clever woman who would not or could not relinquish her
femininity, and femininity unpossessed is femininity unprotected from
itself, a weakness and not a charm.

He pulled her towards him and her shoulders were slim and soft under his
hands.

"It's the only unfashionable thing you've ever done, Val."

Her eyes were clever as a monkey's and sunny as a child's.

"My fashions are always a little in advance," she said, and laughed in
that sudden freedom which lies in getting exactly what one needs to make
the world that place in which one's own particular temperament may
thrive.

They walked on through the meadow and, finding the road, came back to
the front of the cottage. Georgia's chauffeur had driven away and the
Lagonda now lay first in the line. The sight of it brought the general
situation back to their minds with an overpowering sense of dismay. Dell
was holding Val's elbow and he pressed it encouragingly.

"We'll get by," he said. "Come on."

Their first impression was that the party had dwindled. Ferdie was
talking to Hal about jujitsu and Gaiogi and Tante Marthe were standing
together in more serious consultation. The three glass doors on the lawn
stood wide, and through them, on the edge of the river's bank, Mr
Campion was listening to Amanda. Ferdie looked up as Val came in and his
glance followed her own to the two on the lawn.

"Hallo," he said suddenly. "What's this? A reconciliation? That lad's in
a nasty state. I thought she was going to take pity on him when she took
him out there."

"I don't think..." Hal began stiffly and paused abruptly as the
conversation on the lawn took a sudden turn.

As Amanda ceased to speak Mr Campion took her hand and raised it to his
lips with a gallantry which might or might not have been derisive.
Amanda recovered her hand and hit him. It was no playful salutation but
a straight broadside attack delivered with anger, and the noise of the
impact sounded clearly in the room.

"Indeed," murmured Gaiogi with an embarrassed laugh, and added instantly
"Good God!"

Campion had picked up his ex-fiancée and they saw him poised for an
instant with the girl over his head. He said something which no one
caught, but which possessed that peculiar quality of viciousness which
is unmistakable, and then, while they all stared at him, pitched her
from him into the deep river with a splash like a waterspout. He did not
wait to see what became of her, but swung away and strode up the garden,
the imprint of her hand showing clearly on his white face. As they
reached the water's edge they heard the roar of the Lagonda.

Amanda's comment as she swam ashore and was lifted, breathless and
dripping, onto the lawn by a bewildered gathering, was typical of her
new mood.

"Not everybody's form of humour," she said briefly. "Will you all go and
have a drink while I change?"

Tante Marthe accompanied her and Val made helpless apologies to Hal, who
was devastatingly polite.

"He's not taking it very well," he said. "Frankly I was afraid something
like this might happen. Anyway, she'll be out of the country for a bit.
It's really nothing to do with you, Mrs Ferris. Please don't worry about
it. Fortunately there was no one here who could make a gossip paragraph
of it."

"He's obviously off his head with worry," put in Alan Dell hastily.
"That résumé which he gave was most enlightening. He evidently knows
what the police intend to do. I heard this morning that there was talk
of an exhumation order for Ramillies' body. What he said is quite true.
If there is no arrest the enquiry may turn into a long ordeal for all of
us. A murder is the one and only thing which cannot be hushed up in this
country."

Amanda's brother regarded him with a curious little smile on his young
mouth.

"Believe me, I appreciate that," he said. "If you'll excuse me I'll just
have a word with my sister."

Ferdie looked after his retreating figure.

"There's not much that that kind of kid in that kind of position
couldn't hush up, is there?" he said. "What was the row about? Anybody
know?"

And Gaiogi, who had been listening with his bright eyes on Ferdie's
face, shrugged his shoulders.

"That is how it should be," he said.

Val laughed uneasily.

"I thought you were going to say, 'What is a little murder to disturb an
aristocrat?' Gaiogi," she murmured.

The Russian looked at her steadily, his round eyes intelligent.

"Among clever aristos, what is it?" he said.




CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO


Ferdie Paul was on the telephone when Mrs Fitch brought Campion in. The
room was much tidier than usual and struck cold after the warmth of the
summer streets, but Ferdie himself was slightly dishevelled in his
anxiety.

"Well, do what you can, anyway, old boy, won't you?" he said into the
instrument, his thin voice carrying a world of nervous force and
irritability behind it. "Yes, I know, but it's not a pleasant experience
for any of us, is it? You were an old friend, that was all."

He hung up and glanced at Campion, the welcoming smile fading from his
face as he saw him.

"Hullo, you all right?" he enquired.

"All right?" Mr Campion threw himself down in the armchair which Mrs
Fitch pulled up for him. He barely remembered to thank her but she did
not seem to notice the omission. "Yes, I'm all right. I'm alive, anyway.
The corpselike effect is induced by lack of sleep."

"It's getting you down, is it? I don't blame you." His host was grimly
amused. "Have a drink. Anna, for God's sake, dear, get the man a
snifter. Don't hang about. Don't hang about."

If Mrs Fitch resented his tone she did not show it. She mixed a drink on
the sideboard and carried it to the visitor, who took the glass from her
absently and set it down untasted. He looked like a skeleton in a dinner
jacket. There were blue hollows round his eyes, while the skin
stretching over his jaws seemed to have pulled his lips back a little.
His normal affability had vanished completely and a sort of spiteful
recklessness, which was wrong in him, had taken its place. Ferdie
watched him, his shiny eyes laughing a little contemptuously in spite of
his friendliness.

"Your girl friend swam ashore last night," he remarked.

"Did she?" Mr Campion was profoundly disinterested.

"They have nine lives, all of 'em." Ferdie was not intentionally
tasteless, but the little joke amused him. "You forgot the brick," he
said.

Mr Campion did not smile.

"You said you wanted to see me?" he enquired pointedly.

Ferdie raised his eyebrows and turned round to frown at Mrs Fitch.

"Just a moment, dear," he said, every tone in the request indicating
that she and everyone else in the world exasperated him unbearably.
"Shut the door behind you. I've asked Mr Campion round here to talk. You
don't mind, do you? We shan't be long."

Anna Fitch went out obediently and Ferdie got up and shook his loose
clothes.

"You're taking that engagement bust of yours too hard," he said. "I was
talking to Georgia on the phone just now. She said Val seemed to be very
worried about you. Still, that's your affair," he added hastily as his
visitor prepared to rise. "I didn't phone all over London simply to tell
you that no woman's worth it. You'll discover that in your own time.
I've got my hands full at the moment. This is all pretty nasty, Campion,
isn't it? Where's it going to end? We're in the soup, aren't we?"

Mr Campion sighed. "It's comforting to find that someone realises that,"
he said bitterly. "These silly women don't see what's stewing up for
them. They haven't savoured the Hakapopulous variety of stink. They
don't know what it's like. Their innocent little snouts don't register
anything stronger than cheating at bridge. The home secretary is
considering the exhumation petition now, I believe."

"Oh, he is, is he? I was afraid that was coming." Ferdie spoke gloomily
but his eyes were still bright with interest. "I've been trying to pull
a few strings myself, as a matter of fact, but there's an ominous
frigidity on all sides which doesn't feel too healthy. Still, supposing
the police do get the order through, what can they expect to find?
Wasn't there a P.M. at the time?"

"Yes, but the police aren't satisfied." Mr Campion made the statement
wearily. "They've got the report of the first P.M. and in it there's a
mention of a hypodermic puncture in the left upper arm, yet the analysis
found nothing to account for this. Not unnaturally, the police feel
they'd like their own man to go over the ground again. They've got the
viscera from Richmond now, as a matter of fact, and it's in Wryothsley's
lab, but he wants to see the rest of the cadaver." He laughed briefly at
the other man's expression. "I'm sorry to be so forthright, but there
you are. That's the sort of detail which next Sunday's press is going to
dish up with comment. Meanwhile, if there is anything in the body which
was overlooked in the first P.M., Wryothsley will find it."

Ferdie looked up. "There's always a chance that there's nothing to
find," he observed but his optimism was not convincing.

"The 'unknown drug'?" Mr Campion sounded derisive. "Don't you believe
it, guv'nor. There ain't no such thing. What they don't find they'll
deduce, same as I have, and that deduction, if it doesn't give them
proof, will certainly give them the lead they want. It's going to be an
almighty mess."

Ferdie Paul wandered about the big cold room. His body looked heavier
than usual as his shoulders drooped and his chin rested thoughtfully on
his chest. After a while he came to a pause before Campion's chair and
stood looking down at him.

"_I_ haven't any illusions, you know, Campion," he said at last. "_I_
see the danger. _I've_ got the wind up all right. But, if you don't mind
me saying so, my business has trained me to keep a bit quieter about it
than yours has. Also, of course, I'm not personally touched by it as you
are. I'm not a fool, though. I've lived with it for over three weeks and
I've had my mind working. It's a question of proof now, isn't it?"

"Practically." Mr Campion met the other man's eyes and seemed to make
the reservation unwillingly.

"You mean you don't actually _know_. Is that it?" Ferdie was merciless
and Mr Campion was forced to hedge badly.

"Well," he said, "since Val is so closely involved the police don't
trust me entirely. Why should they? Then this row of my own broke on
Friday and, frankly, I made a fool of myself, got tight and that sort of
thing, and after the exhibition I put up I fancy the super may be
wondering if I'm the white-headed boy after all. Still, I'm fairly well
acquainted with police movements. Just now they're concentrating on the
Hakapopulous pair. Inspector Pullen has worked it out that whoever
murdered Miss Adamson must have known the restaurant very well or had at
least used the back entrance before. They've decided that she was killed
about eight in the evening. Just now he is spending his time trying to
get the Greeks to identify photographs of everyone who has ever had
anything to do with the poor wretched girl. Jock Hakapopulous is still
as resilient as a sphere of solid rubber, but Andreas, I understand, is
showing signs of wear and tear. Those two are holding out because of the
accessory-after-the-fact charge, of course."

Ferdie perched himself on the edge of the table and the light behind his
thin hair made his curls look forlorn and inadequate.

"Campion," he said quietly, "who do you think it is? Does your idea
coincide with mine?"

Mr Campion raised his weary eyes.

"That's a very delicate question," he murmured cautiously.

"Because it involves a friend of mine, you mean?" Ferdie's driving force
was tremendous. The air seemed to quiver with it.

"Well, yes, there is that aspect, isn't there?"

"My dear chap"--the other man was exasperated--"I have many friends but
I don't stand for 'em through thick and thin. I'm not superhuman nor am
I a sentimental bloody fool. What put you on?"

"A quotation from a letter of Sterne's," said Mr Campion. He spoke
dreamily and when his host stared at him went on, his tired voice
precise and almost expressionless. "Lugg of all people produced it at
four o'clock in the morning. All through this business I've been
bewildered by a curious hand-of-fate quality which has pervaded the
whole thing. I noticed it first when I found young Portland-Smith so
very conveniently dead and yet lying in the one spot where no murderer
could possibly have put him. I said something about it being 'like
Providence' and Lugg suddenly produced the key. This is the quotation.
It gives it to you in one. The truth is startlingly obvious when you
consider it. 'Providence, having the advantage of knowing both the
strengths and the weaknesses of men, has a facility for unostentatious
organisation undreamed of by our generals.' It's a smart-type remark and
just like a sophisticated parson, but it contains the key of this
business. See it? 'Unostentatious organisation.' That's the operative
phrase, while the recipe for same is given earlier: 'knowing both the
strengths and the weaknesses.' That is how it was all done."

"My God, you've got it, Campion!" Ferdie was watching him with
fascinated interest. "I think you're right. I thought you were three
parts fool but I take it back. This is what I've been groping for. This
explains _how_. Yes, I see it in the main, but I thought when you were
talking yesterday you said that Portland-Smith's suicide was not
intended?"

Mr Campion rose.

"It wasn't," he said. "The intention was merely to get him out of the
way of Georgia. He was round her feet. No one knew they were married,
remember. You didn't yourself, even. In the beginning it was simply a
little intrigue to break up an engagement of which Georgia was obviously
tired and yet which, for some reason or other, she refused to dissolve.
There was no great underlying scheme about it. It was just a little plot
to end an unwise alliance. Portland-Smith was evidently nuts about the
woman and I fancy the idea was either to get it into his head that he
could never afford to marry her or, failing that, to get it into _her_
head that he was unfaithful and not worth worrying about. Anyway, the
original plan was merely to make a decisive sort of row between them.
Unfortunately the 'unostentatious organisation' technique was not then
perfected and, as with many beginners, the tendency was to work too
large, while of course the unknown fact that the two were married
altered the whole scale of the thing. However, it provides a fine
example of the method itself. The recipe lies in the strengths and the
weaknesses, remember. A frame-up was arranged. Portland-Smith was in
love with Georgia and she was unkind. Therefore a girl who resembled
Georgia had a chance with him. That was a weakness in him. He was a
barrister and therefore unable to take any real advantage of the
anonymity law, so that he was peculiarly susceptible to blackmail. That
was another weakness. Of the two women employed to do the dirty work the
elder, who arranged the whole thing and who in my opinion needed no more
than to have the idea as a money-making scheme put up to her, had a
passion for money and that particular type of mind which can see the
sufferings of others and regard them without comprehension, seeing them
only as an interesting spectacle. That in her was a strength.
Unfortunately, however, the blindness which made it possible for her to
have undertaken the project at all was too much for the scheme
altogether. Unconscious of the effect she was really having on
Portland-Smith, she hounded the poor beast to death, and her boss, the
original perpetrator of the little row, found Georgia's unwanted fiancé
permanently removed. Whether this astounding success encouraged him or
not I don't like to think, but I imagine that, once one has accustomed
oneself to the idea of causing death, the convenient finality of that
means of disposing of an obstacle might outweigh all other
considerations. Anyhow, when Ramillies became a howling nuisance, the
'unostentatious organisation' method was put into practice again. Again
the strengths and the weaknesses of men were all carefully utilised.
Ramillies was so afraid of flying that he believed in the perfectly
preposterous story of a drug which would make him feel seedy for four
hours and magnificent for twenty-four. That was a weakness. Caesar's
Court is one of the few places in England where the organisation is so
perfect that, should anything arise there which the manager desired to
hush up, every possible facility for doing so could be instantly
afforded him. That was a strength. Then there were interested government
officials there who could lend their influence to avoid any scandal if
there seemed no real cause for one. That was the strength of the
occasion. It was all very prettily thought out. Think of the doctor.
Buxton-Coltness is an unmitigated snob and he was flattered by the
invitation to Caesar's Court and availed himself of it promptly. That
was a weakness in him. He is anxious to please all important people and
is in the peculiar position of having the kind of fashionable practice
which permits him to take little risks which an ordinary G.P. might
hesitate about. That is a strength. See what I mean?"

"Yes, I do. You're right, thunderingly right." Ferdie was trembling in
his interest. "What about the last case?"

"Caroline? Oh, that was the same thing. I mean it was done in the same
way. But it was a murder of necessity. Caroline attempted to blackmail
her old colleague of the Portland-Smith business and, since anything
that involved that elder woman would of necessity also involve the man,
the old original god in the machine, she had to be silenced. This time
the strengths and the weaknesses were brilliantly employed. He was
becoming more experienced, I suppose. Caroline needed money badly. She
had no job, no protector. This need blinded her to the tremendous danger
of going alone to the Hakapopulous restaurant. However, she had been
there before with her colleague to interview Portland-Smith and she
thought she was going to meet a woman, the woman who had stood by the
telephone while the wretched girl rang me up as a threat. Still, real
need of money was her weakness. Then the Hakapopulous brothers could not
afford an enquiry into their business. They were people who simply could
not risk a murder investigation on their premises. That was their
weakness. But their strengths were equally useful. Those two are crooks
with the real crook temperament which half enjoys a tremendous risk.
Also they are experienced. They've cleared up a mess and destroyed
evidence before. Added to this, they're both used to police
cross-examination and they know all the answers.

"There you are. That's how the whole thing was done: by brilliant,
unostentatious organisation. He organised his crimes and relied on the
strengths and the weaknesses of other people, none of whom had the least
idea of the way in which they were being used, to protect him. The fact
that he could do it shows the sort of chap he is: shrewd, sophisticated,
quite without conscience and probably under the impression that he's
superhuman, in which respect he's insane, of course."

His voice died away and there was silence in the room.

"The man's a genius," said Ferdie presently and sighed. "Look how he
runs that place," he added. "What a pity, Campion. What a cracking
pity!"

Mr Campion lay back in his chair again. He looked exhausted.

"Have you known this long?" he enquired at last.

"It's been forcing in on me for a bit. I've been afraid of it, yes.
After all, when you're in the thick of a thing like this you can't help
your mind working on it, can you?"

"Got any ideas?"

"I don't know. I've been thinking." Ferdie paused and looked at his
visitor. "Forgive me, old chap, but I haven't really taken you seriously
before. I've been working on an idea of my own. I didn't know _how_ he'd
done it, you see; all I knew was that he _must_ have done it, and of
course I saw why."

"You did? I didn't. I don't. That's the thing I don't understand now. I
can't see why on earth he should get rid of two of Georgia's boy
friends, one after the other, simply because she'd set her heart on
someone new. It's not feasible. That's where the whole case goes to
pieces and becomes fantastic."

Ferdie laughed softly.

"You haven't got the full story, old boy. You've got some of your facts
wrong," he said. "All he did was to remove two men who were dangerous to
Georgia's career. That was the thing Ramillies and Portland-Smith had in
common. Damn it, Georgia's had plenty of love affairs which didn't end
fatally! Look at that fellow Dell. Portland-Smith was a strong-minded
chap who'd set his heart on being a county court judge. You never met
him, did you? I did. I can't describe that chap. He was one of those
pompous, pigheaded, thick-skinned fellows. You knew he'd get his own way
if it was only by nagging for it or simply sitting next it until it
became his by squatter's rights. You saw that in his eyes. If he hadn't
been removed he'd have removed Georgia in the end. He just happened to
be that sort of chap. Ramillies was a different bloke but just as
dangerous. He was the 'scatty beaver' breed; you know, half-built dams
in every square foot of stream. He wanted Georgia out on that swamp of
his and when he got her there he played old Harry with her. Did you see
her when she came back last time? Oh, terrible. Half frightened, half
demoralised, figure going, God knows what. Ramillies was wild, you know,
reckless, slightly crackers. He'd have ruined her if she'd stayed out
there any length of time. Besides, she was terrified of him."

He hesitated.

"Just before the flight excitement he'd got some hold on her too, I
fancy. I think he got some information out of that girl."

"Out of Caroline Adamson?"

"Yes, I think so."

"About the fleecing of Portland-Smith?"

"Yes. I imagine he was using it to get Georgia out to his infernal swamp
and to keep her there for some time. At least that's what I think."

"I see." Mr Campion's hollow eyes were hard. "But why?" he demanded.
"Why this concern for Georgia and her career? Why Georgia?"

Ferdie slid off the table and walked down the room. He looked unhappy
and embarrassed but there was still a hint of amusement on his shining
rococo face.

"She's a considerable artist, you know," he said. "She makes a lot of
money. He didn't see he was running any risk, and he wasn't until he had
to wipe out Caroline. She's a valuable property, Campion; a great
possession."

"To _him_?" Campion was insistent.

"I think Gaiogi Laminoff had better tell you about that himself, old
boy," said Ferdie Paul. "Good heavens, haven't you ever looked at 'em?"

"Do you mean that she's his daughter?" Mr Campion seemed taken
completely off his balance.

"You talk to him, old boy," said Ferdie Paul.

There was a long pause during which Mr Campion lay back in his chair,
his face blank. Ferdie was more practical.

"Campion," he said suddenly, "look here, this is a jam. We're all in it.
None of us want any more of a row than we can possibly help. I'm not
asking you to shield anybody. That's too darned dangerous, I see that.
But if we could avoid the worst it would at least be something. We might
at least save ourselves the flood of dirt in the newspapers. Let's get
hold of him. Let's get him up here and get the whole truth out of him
and then put it to him plainly. He's up in the clouds. He doesn't see
where he stands. I bet you he doesn't realise the danger. He's probably
thinking about table decorations or illuminating the bed of the river by
the swimming pool. His sense of proportion has gone to pot. If we got
him here, in this room, and talked to him we could get the facts into
his head."

Mr Campion passed his fine hands over his face.

"Get him to sign something, you mean?" he said dubiously. "Sign
something and go to Mexico or some other place uncovered by the
extradition agreement?"

"Well, yes," said Ferdie slowly, "unless, of course, he has some other
idea.... After all, that would be better than the police way," he
added defensively.

"I think perhaps we ought to see him," agreed Mr Campion hesitantly.
"Between us we've got quite enough to prove the truth to him, if not to
a jury. What did he use in that hypodermic on Ramillies? Did he get
Caroline to do that? She may have swallowed the whole story, as did
Ramillies himself, of course. Women will believe anything about
medicine. It was a hell of a risk."

"I suppose it was. It all depends what it was. The police may never find
out."

"That's so, but they'll do their best." Mr Campion spoke bitterly.
"They'll go round to our pet chemists, our doctors, our personal
friends, making what they consider are discreet enquiries, until no one
will give us so much as a packet of bicarbonate of soda without looking
at us as if we were buying prussic acid. That's what I mean. The police
are so damnably thorough. Our lives won't be worth living."

Ferdie took a deep breath.

"We'll get him up here," he said. "After all, Campion, once the police
are satisfied about him they'll stop hounding the rest of us. We must do
it. There's no other way, is there?"

"We could try. Is he suspicious?"

"I'm not sure." Ferdie stood considering the practical aspects of the
project. Now that the moment had come it was he who took command. Mr
Campion remained in his chair, his head sunk between his shoulders,
weary disillusionment in every line of his thin body. "He's at home
tonight," said Ferdie at last. "He rang me up just before you came. I
don't think we'll beard him there. We don't want a row down there if we
can help it. We've all got too much precious cash in the darned place.
Look here, I'll go down now and fetch him. You'd better not come. If he
sees you he'll spot something. I'll bring him back here and we'll have
it out, alone, where we can't be disturbed. How's that?"

"I'll leave it to you." Mr Campion sounded listless. "The Lagonda's in
the yard. You can take it if you like."

"My dear good chap, pull yourself together." Ferdie was reproachful. His
own energy was boundless. All trace of his old lackadaisical manner had
vanished and he seemed possessed of an enthusiasm which might have been
undergraduate had it not been for its obviously nervous origin. "Never
lend your car, your shoes or your girl friend. I've got my bus in the
garage. I say, Campion?"

"Yes."

"I think we're going to pull this off with luck."

"I hope so."

Ferdie stood looking at him.

"I don't want to offend you," he said, "but I'm an experienced sort of
bloke, you know. I know a lot about women. That girl of yours is going
to Sweden tomorrow, isn't she? Do you know what train?"

"They're going from Harwich. They'll motor over. It's not far from their
place. It's the early boat, I think." Mr Campion made the confidence
unwillingly and Ferdie did not move. He made an odd, uncouth figure
standing there looking down, a quizzical expression on his face.

"Send her some flowers."

Mr Campion began to laugh. He laughed with savage amusement for quite a
long time. Ferdie appeared hurt.

"Women like that sort of thing," he said.

"I'm sorry." Mr Campion sat up. "Forgive me. It's got its damnably
amusing side. In fact it's not a bad idea. If there was time I'd do it.
I could phone them, of course, couldn't I?"

"Send some from the Court. They've got the best florist in England down
there. I'll do it for you myself when I collect Gaiogi, if you like."
Ferdie seemed completely oblivious of any incongruity in the two
errands. "What will you have? Roses?"

"A pot of basil would be nice." Mr Campion's interest in life seemed to
have revived for an instant and his smile had a curious intensity of
derision.

"You're a fool, you know." Ferdie was perfectly serious. "Send a
straight armful of red roses and a card with a sentimental message down
to the boat and it'll work miracles. Women are like that. Their minds
run on those sort of lines. Give me the card and I'll send it with the
flowers. She's sailing for Sweden from Harwich tomorrow early? That's
all I need know. They'll do the rest. Her name's Fitton, isn't it?
Right."

Mr Campion took out his wallet and found a card.

"You think a message, do you?" he said, a trickle of amusement in his
voice.

"I do, and not a rude one either." Ferdie was emphatic. "Say 'A happy
journey, my dear' or something of that sort."

Mr Campion wrote obediently and looked up, his pencil poised.

"You're an extraordinary chap, aren't you?" he said. "You keep your mind
very mobile, what with one thing and another. A murderer to be
apprehended here, an engagement to be patched up there. It's amusing how
you find the time, really."

Ferdie took up the card.

"You're too conscious of the personal angles, my dear fellow," he said.
"You let yourself be obsessed. 'Amanda--You'll never forget me--Albert.'
That's all right. Bit didactic but not bad. You know the girl, after
all. Very well then, I'll send the roses from the Court, collect Gaiogi
and persuade him to come back here. We shall be back before eleven.
You'll wait, will you? Good man. We'll put it to him."

He hurried out, and Mr Campion, his plans made for him, was left alone
with his thoughts. The room was very quiet and still cold and the noise
of the traffic below sounded far away, a remote sea in another world. He
heard the front door of the flat shut behind Ferdie and then, after a
long pause, Mrs Fitch came in.

She did not speak but moved quietly about the room, tidying up odds and
ends, replacing books in their shelves and plumping up the cushions on
the couch. There was an indefinable air of neatness about her, a
suggestion of making all safe in her very walk, and a finality in the
pat of her plump hands on the upholstery.

When she came to Campion's side in her tour of orderliness she looked
down at his glass.

"You haven't touched your drink," she said. "Would you like a nice cup
of tea?"

"No, thanks. I'm all right."

"You don't look it. Been to bed lately?"

"No, not for a night or two."

"What a pity you lost that girl." Mrs Fitch had gone past him now and
had reached the untidy muddle on the end of the sofa table. Her tone was
conversational. "She was a nice little thing. No sense of humour but
very good class. Pretty hair, too, but I don't expect you want to talk
about her. Now look here, the whisky is there on the side. There's some
gin and French and a little Advocaat and some more siphons in the
cupboard underneath. If you want more glasses ring for them and the Jap
will bring them in. There's plenty of cigarettes in that red box on the
shelf."

"You're not staying to meet Gaiogi?" Mr Campion put the question idly
but she looked at him sharply, her glance unnecessarily square.

"No," she said. "No, I don't think so. I'll just get my coat and then
I'm off."

He heard her giving some last instructions to the Japanese boy in the
kitchen and then she popped in again, a dyed ermine coat hanging from
her shoulders.

"Good-bye," she said.

"Good-bye. I'll give your love to Gaiogi, shall I, or haven't you
forgiven him?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." She was smiling at him boldly.
"Gaiogi's always been very kind to me. I worked for him long ago at the
Old Beaulieu. He was very generous to work for. Always putting me on to
things. He's not a bad old stick."

"Yet he lost your money for you at the Poire d'Or. It was quite a
packet, wasn't it? Two or three thousand pounds. Unlucky money."

She stared at him and for a moment he thought he was going to see her
angry. Bright patches appeared in her cheeks and her mouth was pale
round its make-up. Suddenly, however, she laughed and a flash of the
insouciance which is the keystone of her profession appeared in her
smile.

"I've learnt a thing or two since then, ducky," she said.

She did not display her hands but his eyes were drawn to them. They were
ablaze with stones. Her square ugly neck was alight, too, and the clips
on her dress shone with the unmistakable watery gleam of the true
diamond.

"Well, I'm off," she said and paused abruptly as the phone began to
ring. She took up the receiver and listened for a moment. "Yes, all
right, all right," she said. "What's the matter? I see, dear. It's Mr
Paul," she added, holding the instrument out to Campion. "He wants you.
Something seems to be up."

"Hullo, Campion, is that you?" Ferdie's voice sounded loud and unsteady
in his ear. "I say, can you come down here at once? Yes, I'm at Caesar's
Court. I've just arrived. Look here, I can't tell you over the phone
because of the girl on the house exchange. You understand? You come
down, will you? Yes, just as soon as you can. There's an unexpected
development in that business we were discussing. Very unexpected. I
don't know what we'd better do, quite. What's the name of that man you
know at Scotland Yard?"

"Oates?"

"Yes. I wondered if I'd ring him and tell him to come down here. No, I
tell you what, you come down yourself first and then we'll have a
conference. Hurry, old man, won't you? It's a question of time, I'm
afraid. You'll be down at once, will you? Righto. I won't do a thing
till you come."

"What is it?" The woman put the question as he hung up the receiver.

"I don't know." Campion sounded puzzled. "He seems upset about
something. He wants me down there at once. I'd better go, I suppose."

"It's not like him to get windy," said Mrs Fitch and led the way into
the hall. As they went down the stairs together she sighed. "It's a nice
old flat," she said. "Are you going by car?"

"Yes, I've got the bus down here."

"Give me a lift as far as Marble Arch, or aren't you going that way?
It's just as quick this time of night. Would you mind?"

"Not at all." Mr Campion seemed almost bored.

She scrambled into the front seat beside him and he swung the car out of
the dark yard into the blazing Circus. He drove recklessly and she
gripped the side.

"Here, don't break _my_ neck," she said, laughing. "Put me down at the
cinema, will you?"

"Got a date?" he enquired.

"You mind your own business," she said. "There we are. Pull right up.
What do you expect me to do? Jump for it?"

"I'm sorry." He stopped outside the cinema and the commissionaire opened
the door and helped the woman out. Her jewels flashed in the lamplight
and he touched his cap respectfully at the tip she gave him.

"Well, good-bye," she shouted. "Cheer up."

Campion did not answer her but let in the clutch and swung out from the
curb, missing a bus by inches.

The Lagonda continued her breathless speed through the town, which was
enjoying a temporary lull in the traffic before the theatres closed.
Campion sat at the wheel, the light from the dashboard shining up on his
expressionless face. The hooded car was like a little quiet universe
inside the larger world. It possessed the same atmosphere which had been
so noticeable in Ferdie's flat, a cold loneliness, an air of going away.
It seemed very doubtful if Mr Campion was thinking at all. He drove
brilliantly but apparently without interest and if he was consumed with
a burning interest to discover what new disaster Ferdie might have
brought to light in Gaiogi Laminoff's tight little kingdom he showed no
sign of it.

He left London behind and travelled through those little townships which
crowd on tiptoe round her skirts, jostling each other in their efforts
to get close, and yet each retaining its essential characteristics,
never merging either with a neighbour or with the mother city. He shot
through Maidenhead at last and came swiftly into darker Berkshire. There
was less than half a mile to go now. He had one long straight strip of
tree-hung road, a dip and a humpbacked bridge, and then the turning and
the long drive. This was Money's Acre: quiet reserves, well-kept
grounds, protected reaches of river, here and there a little cottage
like Amanda's built for working folk but dressed expensively and kept
for pleasure, here and there a club or a discreet roadhouse, but country
air and cool, unobscured starlit sky.

For the first time the Lagonda had the road clear. Nothing passed her
and there was a gap in the oncoming traffic. He raced through the
tree-hung stretch, bounced over the humpbacked bridge and slowed down
for the turn. It was then, just at that moment when he was aware of the
silence, of the lonely peace of his little world, dark in the midst of
darkness, and when the brilliant lights of the Court sprang into sight
through the shrouding elms, it was then that he felt the movement so
close to him, so warm, so familiar and yet so horrible in its very
intimacy. Someone was breathing on his neck.

He trod on the brakes and brought the car up with a scream and a jerk
which stopped the engine and sent her slewing across the bend. The
steering wheel caught him in the stomach and as he turned he saw for an
instant the face captured by the upward ray of the dashboard light. The
soft glow touched the unfamiliar under-curves, the nostrils, the insides
of the arches of the eyes.

He did not speak. There was no time. The light glancing blow which, in
the illegal science of the Kempo, has a very sinister name, touched the
nerve centre behind his ear and he stiffened and slid forward. As Mr
Campion went out into the darkness a single thought ripped through his
mind with the dazzling clarity of revelation: _This is why the knife
went in at a right angle. This is why Caroline Adamson lay so still._




CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE


The headlights of the Lagonda described a wide arc over the grey meadows
and laid yellow fingers on the boles of fine old trees as the great car
swung round and crept smoothly on to the main road again.

She took the quarter mile to the winding lane with the same swift
efficiency which she would have afforded had her master been in command,
passed the white gate through which Val and Dell had come up out of the
green field together, and slid quietly to a standstill in the dark road
outside Amanda's cottage. The lights went out and the engine died away.

It was a fine night with stars and a fine rain-promising wind. The
flowers in the cottage garden nodded together like small white ghosts in
the shadows and there were whispers in the grass and in the leafy
billowings of the trees.

The small house waited with that forlorn secrecy which is the
peculiarity of all empty houses. The windows shone like beetles where
the starlight touched them and the chimneys showed squat and smokeless
against the cloudless sky.

The door of the car opened noiselessly and a figure remained motionless,
half in and half out of the driving seat, as the twin searchlights of a
traveller on the highroad behind him climbed up to the stars, sank and
disappeared again, leaving an inkier blackness behind.

The wind in the trees freshened and the whispering among the leaves grew
more intense. The figure moved. It vanished behind the car, melted into
the uncertain silhouette and reappeared an instant later on the other
side. There was a moment of tremendous noise as the door catch clicked.
The tiny alien sound seemed to silence the roar in the treetops, but
there was no other movement. The cottage remained dead and the fussy
wind busied itself about it caressingly.

There was a long pause which seemed interminable as the figure remained
wedded inextricably to the black shadow which was the car. Afterwards
came the sound of effort, breathing, muscles straining, and once the
single scrunch of a shoe on the loose flint road. Then out of the larger
shadow came the other one. It was monstrous, horrible, a nightmare
shape, topheavy and enormous, limp arms flapping, the head of an
elephant, and, when it turned, the great beak of a gigantic bird ending
incongruously in a shoe, vividly describable against the holey curtain
of the sky.

It advanced falteringly down the path until, outside the first window,
it turned miraculously into two, a long figure on the ground and a
thicker one bending over it.

There was the thin, alarming sound of splintering glass, then another
pause while the whole world seemed to listen, then breathing again and
the swift rattle of a window sash and a scrambling sound as the upright
figure pressed into the darkness of the house and was swallowed by it.

The night grew older. The wind dropped and sprang up again. On the
highroad headlights climbed to heaven and shied away again. Down in the
river an otter swam by and a rat paddled about in the mud. Amanda's
house crouched beside the figure on the path. They were both very quiet,
very lonely, very dead.

The little creak which the door made as it swung open was the creak of
wood and started no shuddering questions in the night. A cedar by the
field path opposite creaked back in answer.

The breathing had begun again and once more the monster rose up out of
the blackness and there was the clatter of a heel on tiles. The door
swung wide and the night rushed into the little house, carrying dust and
a crumpled leaf or two and a white petal in its surging drapery, which
floated over the tea-chest clock, brushed the Van Gogh and scattered the
papers on the desk. The monster struggled on. Safe within protecting
walls, it was less cautious. It moved more quickly and when it cannoned
into the table ledge it whispered an imprecation. The door of the
kitchenette stood open and a circle of glowing blue beads on the top of
the stove cast just enough light to show the way in. The monster stooped
under the lintel and bowed to the ground.

For a long time there was swift movement in the kitchen. Gloved hands
fastened the small window and drew both blinds and curtains. The heavy
mat was kicked up over the crack beneath the door and finally the inner
door, through which the night still poured, exploring every corner in
silent busyness, was closed and the blackness was almost complete.

The man lit a match and found the light switch. Mr Campion lay on the
floor. He was breathing regularly and his fair hair was tousled. He
looked as if he were sleeping after being very tired. The man who bent
over him laid a finger on his pulse and straightened himself
immediately. Then he replaced his glove and turned off the lighted gas
jet. Evidently time was precious, for he completed his arrangements
hurriedly. He stripped off Campion's jacket, folded it into a pad and
opened the oven door.

The shining cupboard was partitioned with iron shelves and he removed
them hastily, stacking them carefully beside the sink. He arranged the
pad carefully over the sharp edge of the oven's iron surround and
returned to the man on the floor. It was not an easy operation to force
the head and one shoulder into that tiny cavity while maintaining a
fairly natural position but he accomplished it presently and settled the
long thin legs with care, drawing up one knee under the body and pulling
the loose trouser cuff into a likely fold.

He turned on the gas tap almost as an afterthought and stood back to
look at his handiwork while the thirty jets poured choking death into
the tiny space. The man he was going to kill stirred. He breathed deeply
and at one time seemed to be struggling to rise. Once, even, he spoke.
The thick voice was the first human sound in the cottage and it set the
walls quivering, but the rushing gas was louder. It swelled up into a
roar, a cascade, a relentless torrent of whispering noise. The body on
the floor grew still again, the muscles relaxed, and the leg which had
been drawn up slithered a little.

The man who stood watching with a handkerchief pressed over his nose
drew a visiting card out of his waistcoat pocket and looked at the
scribbled message it bore.

"Amanda--You won't forget me--Albert."

It seemed miraculously appropriate and he folded it in two and tucked it
into the livid hand which lay across Mr Campion's breast.

In his mind's eye he saw the headlines on the morrow. "Suicide after
Broken Engagement." "Tragic Discovery in Lady Amanda Fitton's Riverside
Cottage." That was the strength of the Press; it jumped to the obvious
scandal in all scandals. That was the weakness of the Earl of
Pontisbright's position; any scandal in his family _was_ a scandal. Mr
Campion had taken his broken heart badly; that had been his weakness.
The Lady Amanda Fitton was of sufficient social importance for everyone
concerned to sympathise with her youth and to hurry through the inquest,
with its inevitable verdict, as swiftly and decently as possible; that
was her strength.

Now, however, it was still the time to hurry. The Lagonda in which the
cinema commissionaire had seen Mr Campion leave Marble Arch alone must
remain where it was, a silent witness for the next passer-by to note,
but Caesar's Court was less than ten minutes by the field path. He took
a last look round, satisfied himself that there was no betraying sign
for the first inquisitive police constable to observe, and moved quietly
to the light switch.

His fingers were actually on the bakelite when he noticed the phenomenon
which sent the blood streaming into his face and passed a white-hot hand
over his head and spine. The door to the living room, which was not a
foot away from him, was opening inwards, very slowly, and even as he
stared at it the stubby nose of a police revolver crept quietly round
the jamb.

At the same instant there was a commotion behind him as the food
cupboard burst open, as heavy footsteps sounded in the room above, as
the garden door was flung wide, as the whole house burst into sudden
swarming life, and a young voice, savage with indignation, sounded
clearly in his very ear.

"If you've killed the old man I'll never forgive you, Ferdie Paul," said
Amanda Fitton.




CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR


"Perhaps you'd care to be sick, sir," said the plain-clothes man
helpfully.

Mr Campion declined the invitation gracefully, and Amanda grinned at
him. On the other side of the room Mr Lugg, still padding about in
stockinged feet, turned away from the Van Gogh, which seemed to
fascinate him, and leant over the superintendent's chair.

"He put a lot of faith in that solicitor of 'is, didn't 'e?" he
remarked. "It'll take more than a lawyer to explain that fancywork in
the kitchen. No wonder the pore little legal gent looked a bit on 'is
dig. It's cost the country a mint o' money, too. That'll pile it on for
Mr Paul. Still, a very nice police turnout; I will say that. If you'd
done a murder, cock, you couldn't 'ave bin looked after better. Busies
'ere, busies round the Sovereign watching Mr Paul hang about the theatre
until it was time to do 'is bit of telephoning from a call box, busies
in the yard watching Mr Paul gettin' in the back of the Lagonda, busies
phoning up the report, busies on motorcycles, busies at Caesar's Court,
busies all round the perishin' country. And yet 'e might 'ave spiked you
in that car. I don't blame you for drivin' so fast. Still, you would do
it. I 'ad a look at you first thing to see if you was dead."

"They kept as near the car as they dared." Oates looked across at
Campion apologetically. "You seemed fairly safe while you were going at
that pace. I didn't think he'd attack you, for his own sake. And don't
you talk so much," he added, glancing round at Lugg. "Mr Campion asked
for police protection and I gave it to him. The way you tell the story
it sounds as if we were all agents provocateurs."

"I knew he'd come here." Hal Fitton spoke from the fireplace. "Amanda
and I were both convinced of it. I actually saw him take the idea
yesterday. You handed it to him on a plate, of course. I thought you
were going to overdo it with that river business. He's pretty shrewd."

"He's so sharp he cut hisself." Sergeant Flood could not resist the
observation and hoped the lateness of the hour would excuse the breach
of discipline.

"That's it exactly," said Amanda, beaming at him. "That's what we hoped.
What will you do now? Will the Hakapopulous brothers split?"

Oates rose.

"They might," he said. "They'd recognise Mrs Fitch anyway. Still, I
don't think we shall have to bother much about him. He's a sick man. He
may not even come to trial."

"That's what put you on to him, isn't it?" Hal glanced at Campion. Now
that he had shelved his tremendous dignity of the previous afternoon his
youth was very apparent.

Mr Campion stirred himself. He looked ill and exhausted.

"Oates found it," he said. "He had the list of people Ferdie Paul had
seen in Paris and one of them was Doctor Peugeot, the great diabetic
biochemist. That explained a lot. If Ferdie Paul was an insulin-taking
diabetic the death of Ramillies ceased to be so much of a mystery. It
also explained why he was so happily convinced that he was perfectly
safe."

"It's indetectable, is it?"

"Practically. A blood-sugar test must be taken within five minutes of
death to trace anything unusual even. That's what I meant when I said
he'd slipped into it, Oates. It was so abominably simple for him. Once
Ramillies had confessed his fear of flying to him, all Ferdie Paul had
to do was to tell him the kind of tale he wanted to hear. He had the
method of killing in his hand twice a day. He knew enough of Ramillies'
character to realise that the man would hang on until the last minute
and finally give way, and he prepared accordingly. He backed his
judgment as to what the other man would do. After all, that's the basis
of most business methods. If Ramillies hadn't been really so frightened,
or if he had been a stronger character, he wouldn't have gone creeping
round to Ferdie at the eleventh hour and the scheme would have fallen
through. Ferdie put his money on the chance that Ramillies was the sort
of man he thought he was, and he happened to be right. I should think he
gave him a dose of about two hundred D.S. units and after that nothing
could have saved him, unless someone had spotted the condition and dosed
him up with some sort of vasopressin, Tonephin or something. As it was,
of course, the wretched Ramillies had no idea he was dying."

"Paul's a peculiar sort of chap." The old superintendent was buttoning
himself into his coat as he spoke. It was nearly dawn and there was a
cold mist over the water meadows. "He's got exalted ideas of his own
importance. A lot of them have. It's the commonest type of what you
might call the 'elaborate' killer. I've seen it before. George Joseph
Smith was one of them. They honestly think a bit of their cash or a bit
of their convenience is worth someone else's life. I don't suppose we
shall ever know the full ins and outs of the motive, shall we?"

"We do. He told me." Mr Campion was battling with sleep. "I'll come up
in the morning and make a full report. He gave me the whole motive so
frankly that I sat there with my eyes popping; terrified out of my life
he was going to do me in on the spot. He told me the full truth and
fastened it on to Gaiogi Laminoff with a single magnificent lie. Who are
Georgia Wells's parents, by the way?"

"She's only got a father," said Amanda, who knew everything, as usual.
"He runs a touring company in Australia and is a bit low, so Georgia
keeps him dark. She sends him all her press cuttings. Ferdie didn't try
to palm Georgia off on Gaiogi, did he? The poor little man can't be more
than fifty-five. Did he?"

"He hardly committed himself." Mr Campion spoke wearily. "It was in
character, though. He told Ramillies the truth, you know, except for the
one stupendous lie."

"'After four hours you'll feel fine,'" said Amanda. "He had a sort of
sense of humour, but not very kind. What about the woman? Will she stick
to him? I wonder."

Mr Campion glanced at Oates, whose thin lips curled sourly.

"I don't think we shall hear of her again," he said. "She was on her way
when Mr Campion left her at the cinema to come here. I've seen her sort
before. They're not a wholly bad lot, but they get sort of used to
looking after themselves. Paul knew that better than anyone. Oh, he said
one funny thing, Campion. He gave me a message for you. I nearly forgot
it. He said: 'Tell Campion it's interesting to see his recipe works both
ways.' What did he mean by that?"

"The strengths and the weaknesses of man." Mr Campion laughed and there
was genuine regret in his tone. "He forgot the catch in it, poor
lunatic," he said. "It's Providence who has the advantage. The rest of
us haven't the divine facility for correct diagnosis. Providence would
hardly have fallen for our broken hearts, for instance."

"Talking of our broken hearts," said Amanda when the last of the company
had departed and the Earl of Pontisbright was assisting Mr Lugg to make
beds upstairs, "where is my ring? It was Aunt Flo's, you know, and the
stones are thought to be real if not large."

Mr Campion turned out all his pockets and discovered the missing token.
Amanda stood balancing it in the palm of her hand and he looked up at
her.

"Go on. Put it on. I'll be happy to marry you if you care for the idea,"
he said. "And then when I'm fifty, and feeling like a quiet life, you'll
go and fall with a thud for some silly chap who'll give us both hell."

Amanda hesitated. She looked very young indeed, her red hair standing
out like an aureole.

"Cake love, you mean?" she said dubiously.

"Call it what you like." He sounded irritable. "The only thing is, don't
pretend that it doesn't exist or that you're immune."

Amanda regarded him with great affection.

"Cake makes some people sick," she remarked cheerfully. "I'll tell you
what we'll do: we'll pop this tomorrow and buy some apples."

He brightened.

"And comfort ourselves," he said. "That's an idea. Do you know, Amanda,
I'm not sure that 'Comfort' isn't your middle name."






[End of The Fashion in Shrouds, by Margery Allingham]