Her voice was tight and slightly shrill.
He raised an eyebrow. She held out a hand towards him.
“And I found this!”
Under his nose she thrust a light, frothy scarf from which a faint, remembered fragrance arose. “It’s hers! You kept it!”
For a moment he regarded her with a long, dark stare. She returned it without flinching until, at length, he broke into a sardonic chuckle.
“It occurred to me,” he murmured, “it might serve as a memento of a very remarkable woman, my dear Miss Frayle——”
“It occurs to me it will be more appropriate in Inspector Hood’s keeping at Scotland Yard,” she snapped. “And I’ll see he gets it! Myself!”
She whipped the scarf away from him and marched back to her desk, features glowing, eyes glinting behind her horn-rims. For a moment there was silence as she sat down and began industriously to busy herself with the correspondence. Then, from the shadowed depths of his armchair, the Doctor’s voice came, bitter, sardonic.
“Kindly advise me if there is anything of importance among that accumulated mail.”
“Yes, Doctor.”
She was her prim, secretarial self once more. Fussily she opened envelopes, read out the contents: invitations to lecture, a request to attend a medical conference, then read a note which brought from her an exclamation of pleasure.
“Dear Miss Frayle [she read it very loudly].
“Hugh is going on marvellously and we plan to be married in a few weeks’ time and do hope you will come to the wedding. I am wondering if you can possibly persuade Doctor Morelle to be best man——”
A muffled snort from the armchair.
“Emphatically not!”
Miss Frayle sighed wistfully, her expression softening as she drew a mental picture of cloudy-white wedding-dresses, smiling bridesmaids and cherubic pages and immaculately attired bridegroom. She could almost smell the orange blossom and hear the great organ pealing out the Wedding March. If only the Doctor would show an interest in such romantic diversions. If only he could be prevailed upon to leave his case-books and macabre exhibits for a while and refresh his spirit in an atmosphere of blissful happiness. You never know, he might enjoy it, she told herself, allowing a roseate optimism to wing her on loftier flights of fancy. He might even make a habit of attending weddings, like those other people who became inveterate theatrical first-nighters. And if only she could inveigle him into interesting himself to that extent, who knows, but one day—— She broke off, a blush suffusing her cheek, her heart beating quickly.
“What are you mooning over now, my dear Miss Frayle? Surely I may be permitted to know the nature of the remainder of the correspondence? Or is it addressed entirely and privately to you?”
His icy tones cracked her reverie like a pickaxe driving through ice.
“I—I——” she stammered.
“Kindly deal with the rest of the mail!” he snapped.
“Yes, Doctor.”
She took up an envelope, heavily crested. “An invitation to another party,” she exclaimed. “From the Dowager Duchess of——”
“Most emphatically not!”
Doctor Morelle’s voice rose in a positive snarl as he went on: “I would rather act as a best man—whatever extraordinary function that might be!”
Miss Frayle darted a sudden, eager look towards him, and with hope renewed her romantic dreams began roseately to shape themselves in her mind once more.
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Menace for Dr. Morelle Page 24