'Oh, for God's sake!'
'It's no use blustering, Joe. That's the trouble with you. You come roaring into people's lives and wanting to snatch them up on your saddlebow and you think that's all there is to it. I can't go through the rest of my life hating and despising myself. If I let Adrian down, I should feel as if I had deserted a puppy with a broken paw.'
'This is absolute insanity.'
'It's how I feel, now I've read his letter.'
'I believe you're still in love with him.'
'No. I don't think so. And yet I may be. There are little things about him, little things he does, the way he looks sometimes— Oh, you must know what it's like when someone has once got under your skin. It must have happened to you. There must be some woman before you met me whom you can never really get out of your thoughts.'
'There was one in San Francisco.'
'Well, there you are. However long you live, you will always remember her.'
'You bet I will. Especially in frosty weather. She dug two inches of a hat-pin into my leg. Talk about getting under the skin!'
'You make a joke of everything.'
'And you laugh at it. And if there's a better recipe than that for living happily ever after, name it. Don't you see that that's just why we belong to each other, because we can laugh together? Jane, my lovely Jane, in heaven's name what sort of a foundation to build your life on is a sloppy pity?'
'It's more than that.'
The twilight wind had dropped. Stars were peeping out above the trees. In the valley below, the river gleamed like dull silver. Joe turned and stood looking down at it, his hands resting on the terrace wall.
He gave himself a little shake.
'So you're really going back to him?'
'I must.'
He laughed.
'So it's all over. I had a feeling all along that it couldn't be real. Just summer moonshine. Poor old Joe! And we thought we were going to get him off this season!'
'Joe, won't you try to make this not quite so difficult for me?'
He moved back to the wall. Cato, resplendent in his gambler's moustache, gazed at him with sightless eyes. He pointed.
'I never did finish those statues. I shall have to leave them to you.'
'Joe, don't!'
He shook himself again, like a dog coming out of the water.
'I'm sorry. I'm ashamed of myself. I don't know where you ever got the idea that I was tough. I'm just a kid, kicking and screaming because he can't get the moon. I've no right to try to make you unhappy. This is not the old Vanringham stoicism. All right, I can take it. It's just one of those jams where somebody's got to suffer, and I'm the one. Good-bye, Jane.'
'Are you going already?'
'I have packing to do. J. B. Attwater's cab is calling for me in a few minutes.'
'Can't I drive you?'
He laughed.
'No. Thank you very much, but no. There are limits to my fortitude. If I found myself alone in your car with you, I couldn't answer for the consequences. Jane, may I say something?'
'What, Joe?'
'If ever you feel differently, let me know.'
She nodded.
'But I don't think I shall, Joe.'
'You may. If you do, telephone me any hour of the day or night. If I've left, cable me. I'll come running. Good-bye.'
'Good-bye, Joe.'
He turned abruptly and started toward the house. Jane moved to the wall and stood looking down at the river. Its silver had changed to grey.
There came the sound of wheels on the gravel behind her. She looked over her shoulder. The cab from Walsingford station had drawn up at the front door and Sir Buckstone Abbott was getting out.
CHAPTER 22
LADY Abbott lay on the settee in her boudoir with her shoes off – her habit when at rest. She was doing a crossword puzzle. Through the open window at her side, the cool evening air poured in, refreshing to a brain which was becoming a little heated as it sought to discover the identity of an Italian composer in nine letters beginning with p. She had just regretfully rejected Irving Berlin because, despite his other merits, too numerous to mention here, he had twelve letters, began with an i, and was not an Italian composer, when there was a sound outside like a mighty rushing wind and Sir Buckstone came bursting in. His face was red, his eyes bulging and his grizzled hair was disordered, for he had been passing his fingers through it in the stress of his emotions.
'Toots!' he cried.
Lady Abbott looked up fondly.
'Oh, hello, Buck, dear. When did you get back? Buck, do you know an Italian composer in nine letters beginning with p?'
Sir Buckstone dismissed the whole musical world with a fevered wave of the hand.
'Toots, something has happened so frightful that the brain reels, contemplating it!'
It was now plain to Lady Abbott that her beloved husband was having one of his worries. She suggested a remedy which had been tried and proved many a time during the twenty-five happy years of their married life.
'Have a whisky and soda, honey.'
Sir Buckstone shook his head violently, to indicate that the time had gone for mere palliatives.
'I've just been talking to Jane.'
'Oh, yes?'
'Out there on the drive. She came up to me as I was getting out of the cab. Do you know what she has done?'
'Puccini!' cried Lady Abbott. She started to write, then checked herself with a placid 'Tut! . . . Only seven,' she said wistfully.
Sir Buckstone danced a step or two.
'I wish you would listen, instead of fooling about with that thing!'
'I'm listening, sweetie. You said Jane had done something.'
'I did. And do you know what?'
'What?'
'She has brought that brother of yours into the house. That bally plasterer. Told me so herself. After all the pains I've taken, after the sedulous care with which we have protected young Vanringham from his insidious wiles, Jane has brought him into the house.'
Lady Abbott was unquestionably interested. She did not go so far as to raise her eyebrows, but a keen observer would have seen that they quivered slightly.
'When did she do that?'
'This afternoon. She has some rambling story about finding him knocked down by a car on the Walsingford road. She brought him here, and Pollen tells me he's in the Blue Room at this very moment, drinking my beer and smoking one of my cigars. Refreshing himself! Getting himself into shape for pouncing on young Vanringham! And the Princess in the Red Room!'
Lady Abbott was tapping her teeth with the pencil. Something seemed to be perplexing her.
'Had he any clothes on?'
'Clothes? What do you mean, clothes?'
'What people wear.'
'Of course, he had clothes on. What are you talking about? Do you suppose that even your brother would go roaming about the Walsingford road in the nude?'
'Well, it's very odd,' said Lady Abbott. 'Because I stole Sam's clothes.'
Sir Buckstone's eyes, already bulging, became almost prawnlike.
'You stole his clothes?'
'Yes. This afternoon. It seemed a good idea.'
'What the devil are you talking about, Toots?'
'You see, after you had left to catch your train, I started thinking about how worried you were, and I went down to the houseboat again to have another talk with Sam and try to get him to act sensibly, and he must have been in swimming, because there was nobody on board the boat and there were clothes lying around the saloon. And I suddenly thought that if I took them away, he would have to stay on the boat and couldn't come prowling after young Vanringham. So I scooped them all up and dropped them in the river.'
Sir Buckstone's eyes lit up. He gazed at her with the loving, admiring look of a man whose helpmeet tells him that in his absence she, too, has not been idle.
'Toots! What a splendid idea!'
'Yes, wasn't it?'
'How did you happen to think of that?'
> 'Oh, it came to me.'
The light faded from Sir Buckstone's eyes. He was facing the hard facts again.
'But, dash it, how does he come to be in the Blue Room, then?'
'You said Jane brought him.'
'I know, I know. But what I mean—I suppose what you dropped in the river was just his spare suit.'
'I don't believe Sam would have a spare suit. He was never a dressy man.'
'He must have had. He was certainly wearing clothes when Jane found him. If he hadn't been, she would have mentioned it.'
'Yes, that's true.'
'At any rate, there he is, in the Blue Room, sucking down beer and biding his time. What are we to do?'
Lady Abbott thought this over.
'Oh, I guess everything will be all right,' she said.
Sir Buckstone was not a man who often thumped tables – although, like all Baronets, he had table-thumping blood in him – but he felt obliged to do so now. As a rule, he drew comfort from his wife's easy optimism, but now her favourite formula merely heightened his blood pressure to a point where only sharp physical action could bring relief. Crossing the room to a small table bearing a framed photograph of himself in the uniform of a colonel in the Berkshire Territorials, he brought his fist forcibly down upon it. It was a fragile thing of walnut, and it collapsed in ruin. Glass from the photograph frame sprayed over the carpet.
Reason returned to its throne. He stood gaping at his handiwork.
'Good Lord, Toots! I'm sorry.'
'Never mind, darling.'
'I lost my self-control.'
'Don't give it another thought, sweetie. Ring for Pollen.'
Sir Buckstone pressed the bell, then went to the window and stood looking out, rattling his keys in his pocket. Lady Abbott, whose brow had wrinkled thoughtfully for a moment, wrote down 'Garibaldi' and rubbed it out. The door opened, and Pollen appeared.
'Oh, Pollen, some glass has become broken.'
The butler had already observed this, and was pursing his lips in respectful sympathy.
'I will bring a maid, your ladyship.'
Sir Buckstone turned, still rattling.
'Where's Mr Bulpitt, Pollen?'
'In his bedroom, Sir Buckstone.'
A very faint feeling of relief came to brighten the Baronet's sombre mood. He had expected to hear that the intruder, refreshed with beer, had left his base and was out scouring the grounds in search of Tubby.
'What's he doing?'
'When I last visited the Blue Room, Sir Buckstone, in response to the gentleman's ring, he was about to take a bath. He inquired of me whether, in my opinion, he would have time before dinner for another pitcher of beer.'
Sir Buckstone produced a sort of obligate on the keys. It was intended to convey nonchalance.
'He's coming down to dinner, then?'
'That was the impression I gathered, Sir Buckstone.'
'Thank you, Pollen.'
The butler withdrew, and Sir Buckstone turned to Lady Abbott with a wide gesture of despair.
'You see! Coming down to dinner. That means he'll plaster young Vanringham over the soup. And the Princess looking on and saying, "What the devil?" from the other side of the table. A pleasant prospect!'
Lady Abbot, who had just thought of Mussolini, poised pencil over paper for an instant, then shook her head.
'Why not stop him coming down to dinner?' she asked, absently.
A quiver ran through Sir Buckstone, and he shot a wistful glance at the wrecked table, as if regretting that it was no longer in shape to be thumped. Deprived of its co-operation, he found an outlet for his feelings in thumping his leg.
The action did him good. When he spoke, it was almost mildly.
'How?' he said.
Lady Abbott's thoughts had wandered off to Italian composers again. Then she appeared to realize that she had been asked a question.
'How? Why, steal his clothes while he's in his bath. Then he won't be able to come down to dinner.'
Sir Buckstone seemed about to speak, but he checked himself and stood staring. There are moments when words are inadequate.
Over his weatherbeaten features there began to spread a look of reverence. Twenty-five years ago, when he had whisked this woman off in a hansom cab to the registrar's to link his lot with hers, he had known that he was getting the sweetest and loveliest girl on earth, but even then, intoxicated with love though he was, he had not thought particularly highly of her intelligence. If somebody had asked him at that moment if his bride was one of America's brightest brains, he would have replied frankly that in his opinion she was not, adding that he didn't give a damn, either. What he had supposed himself to be marrying was what a future age was to call a 'dumb blonde', and he liked it.
And now he was stunned to perceive that in this mate of his the wisdom of American womanhood had come to its finest flower.
'Good God, Toots!' he said, awed.
Lady Abbott rose.
'I'll go and do it now. Then your poor little mind will be at rest.'
'But, Toots, half a minute.'
'What, honey?'
'He'll get some more.'
'Not if you tell Pollen to see that he doesn't.'
'But how can I explain to Pollen?'
'You don't have to. That's the beauty of English butlers. You just tell 'em. Sit down, sweetie, and put your feet up. I'll be back in a minute.'
Sir Buckstone did not sit down and put his feet up. He was far too emotionally stirred for that. He stood rattling his keys, and was still rattling them when Pollen returned, shepherding before him a small underhousemaid who bore brush and dustpan. Under the butler's silent supervision, she cleaned up the wreckage and was directed from the room with a jerk of the head. The butler, about to follow, was halted by a cough, and gathered that his employer desired speech with him.
'Oh – er – Pollen,' said Sir Buckstone.
He paused. The thing, he saw, wanted putting in just the right way.
'Oh, Pollen – er – what with one thing and another—'
He paused. Then he caught the butler's eye. It was a respectful eye, but one which intimated unmistakably that its owner would be glad if this little scene could be speeded up a trifle. In the time immediately preceding dinner, a butler's position is that of the captain of a ship in stormy weather. He wants to be on the bridge. Sir Buckstone, aware of this, came to the point without further preamble.
'Oh, Pollen, her ladyship has just stepped up to Mr Bulpitt's room and taken his clothes.'
'Yes, Sir Buckstone?'
'A joke,' explained the Baronet.
'Indeed, Sir Buckstone?'
'Yes. Just a little joke, you understand. Too long to explain now, but the point is, if Mr Bulpitt rings for you and asks for some more, don't give 'em to him.'
'No, Sir Buckstone.'
'Spoil the joke, you see.'
'Yes, Sir Buckstone.'
'On no account is he to have clothes till further notice. You understand?'
'Very good, Sir Buckstone.'
The door closed. Sir Buckstone emitted a long, deep breath. A great weight seemed to have rolled off him. He picked up the paper and scanned the crossword puzzle which his Toots had been trying to solve. An Italian composer in nine letters beginning with p' was, he gathered, what had been stumping the dear girl, and bringing to the problem the full force of his intellect, he took the pencil and in a firm hand wrote down the word 'Pagliacci.'
Each helping each, was the way Sir Buckstone looked at it.
CHAPTER 23
THE emotions of a man who comes out of a bathroom, all pink and glowing, and with a song on his lips, to find that in his absence from the bedroom adjoining it, some hidden hand has removed his clothes may be compared roughly to those of one who, sauntering along a garden path in the dusk, steps on the teeth of a rake and has the handle shoot up and hit him in the face. There is the same sense of shock, the same fleeting illusion that Judgment Day had arrived without warning.
Mr Bulpitt, re-entering the Blue Room some ten minutes after Lady Abbott had left it, experienced all these emotions – all the more poignant because his recent happy reunion with his teeth had left him with the complacent feeling that he was now safe from the molestation of Fate. And he was just singing 'Pennies from Heaven' and saying to himself, And now to put on the good old pants!' when he saw that he had been mistaken and that Fate still had weapons in its armoury. The Blue Room was equipped with every convenience; there were in it a chaise-longue, an arm-chair, two other chairs, a chest of drawers, some attractive eighteenth-century prints, a small book-case and a writing-desk with plenty of notepaper and envelopes, but it contained no pants. Nor, for the matter of that, coat, waistcoat, underwear, cravat, socks and shoes. Even the hat, designed for the use of Western American college students, had vanished. And Mr Bulpitt, though a man of infinite resource and sagacity, found himself unequal to the situation. Climbing into bed and modestly wrapping the sheet about his shoulders, he gave himself up to thought.
After some moments of meditation, he did what every visitor to a country house does when untoward things have been happening in his bedroom. He rang the bell, and presently Pollen appeared.
The interview that followed was not very satisfactory.
'Say, look,' said Mr Bulpitt. 'I don't seem to have any clothes.'
'No, sir.'
'Can you get me some more somewhere?'
'No, sir.'
'Sure you can,' urged Mr Bulpitt encouragingly. 'Hunt around.'
'No, sir,' said the butler. 'Sir Buckstone has issued instructions that you are not to be provided with clothes, sir. Thank you, sir.'
He left Mr Bulpitt perplexed in the extreme, and the latter was still between the sheets, trying to adjust his mind to these rather odd goings-on, when Sir Buckstone came bustling in, looking radiant. No more affable Baronet had ever bubbled over with geniality in a Blue Room.
'Why, hullo, Mr Bulpitt!' he cried. 'Where did you spring from? I thought you told me that you had gone to live on your houseboat. Get tired of camping out, did you, eh? Not so much of the gypsy in you as you fancied, eh, ha, what? Well, glad you changed your mind and decided to try my poor hospitality. Wasn't aware that I had invited you, but make yourself at home. This is Liberty Hall.'