Will O’ the Wisp

by Patricia Wentworth

  David put his head in his hands. The voice had softened on the piteous words until it might have been Erica herself, saying them again in hurried, shaken tones. The memory of her terror swept over him. Five years ago—the wind; the driving rain; the darkness; the slippery slanting deck; Erica clinging to him; horror of darkness; horror of shipwreck—and a girl’s frightened cry—words sobbed out and heard only because the trembling lips were so near. He had had to use force to unclasp the desperate clinging hands. It had been a very bitter thought to him that if he had let her stay, she would have been safe. “David, let me stay with you! I’d rather be drowned—” But she had been drowned because he had not let her stay.

  CHAPTER XXIII

  When at last David lifted his head, it came to him with a shock that he was not alone. There was someone sitting in the chair which Betty had drawn forward—a little silent figure sitting motionless with folded hands. There was a moment of grey uncertainty; and then he saw that it was Folly March who sat there—not Erica come back from the depths of that angry sea.

  He sat up, stiff in every limb. He had a dazed feeling of having been somewhere out of time and space, somewhere between past and present—torn. The darkness, the storm, receded; Erica’s voice died away from his straining sense. But for a moment or two the familiar objects around him were thin and insubstantial, like things seen in a dream. Folly might have been some little wandering wraith of herself. She sat mournfully still and mournfully silent, her dark fur coat open over a darker dress, her face very pale and smudged beneath the eyes with a black shadow that looked like a bruise.

  He made a great effort and said: “What is it?”

  Folly did not speak. She gave a little sigh with a catch in it.

  The sound of his own voice steadied David. The past was the past again. The things about him became more solid. He repeated his question:

  “What is it? Is anything the matter?”

  She shook her head.

  “Did you want to see me?”

  She spoke then in a ghost of a little husky voice.

  “I wanted to see someone.”

  She seemed so quenched that he turned from his own affairs.

  “Where’s Eleanor?”

  “Grandmamma sent for her.”

  “What for?”

  “A pie-jaw, I expect.” There was a momentary green flicker in the mournful eyes. “It’s generally a pie-jaw when Grandmamma sends for anyone, isn’t it? I expect it’s about me.”

  “What’s the matter, Folly?”

  Folly shivered as if she were cold.

  “Feeling lost dog,” she said. “I do sometimes. It’s perfectly beastly.” She paused, looked down at her folded hands, and said in a stiff little voice: “George is married.”

  “George!”

  “’M—George. She’s a Mrs. Hadding. I knew he’d do it the minute he got away from me. They got married yesterday. I got his letter just after Eleanor went to be pie-jawed. That’s why I had to come here.”

  “I say, I’m awfully sorry.”

  “I expect it’s quite a good thing really. She’s all right. I couldn’t live with her—that’s all. That’s why I’m feeling lost dog.”

  “Perhaps you’ll feel different about it after a bit. It was bound to knock you over at first.”

  She shook her head.

  “No—I shouldn’t ever feel any different. There are people you can live with, and people you can’t live with. She’s one of the cant’s. I shall probably go and live with Floss”—David suppressed an exclamation—“but of course, I don’t know that she wants me. Floss is only fond of me in patches, you know—when there isn’t a man. And George isn’t fond of me at all.”

  “Folly! Don’t!”

  It was the dispassionate tone in which she said these things that made them rather dreadful.

  “George told me once that he didn’t believe I was really his daughter,” she said in the same matter-of-fact voice, only on the last word it suddenly failed and she sat dumb.

  David looked away. There was something incredibly painful in the conviction with which she spoke.

  He said: “Eleanor—” and stuck. And then:

  “Eleanor likes having you.”

  “Eleanor will get married,” said Folly. “And if I tried to live with Aunt Milly, I should blow right up.”

  “She’s an awfully good sort.”

  “’M—she is. But she’d make me carry parcels and go to mothers’ meetings, and I should blow right up. I’ve never seen Aunt Milly with less than five parcels; and they have things like red flannel and mustard plasters in them. I should blow up.”

  Under the stimulus of conversation Folly was reviving a little. There was a certain zest in her voice, and a faint gleam in her eye. “Of course it’s a pity I can’t come and live with you. Grandmamma and the Aunts always say that what I want is a chaperon; I think you’d make such an awfully good one. Strict! Ooh!” said Folly. An authentic imp looked out of her eyes for an instant.

  It is to be doubted whether any man is really pleased at being told that he would make a good chaperon. David was not pleased; also he was far from certain of his ability to sustain the part.

  “Well, Eleanor isn’t married yet.”

  Folly looked at him sideways. Then her lashes dropped.

  “Don’t let’s talk about me. Let’s talk about you.” She leaned forward and asked eagerly: “Have you heard from Miss Smith?”

  “Yes, I heard yesterday.”

  “What did she say?”

  The letter was lying on the table in front of him. He took it up and gave it to Folly, and heard her draw a very quick breath.

  “What does she mean?”

  David found her looking at him in a surprise that was tinged with fear.

  “I don’t know, Folly. That’s just it—I don’t know.”

  “David, what does she mean? She didn’t have another niece; she only had Erica. She told me so her very own self. She told me Erica was the only relation she’d got left in the world—she told me so.” Folly’s voice sounded rather frightened; she held the arms of her chair very tightly.

  David looked straight in front of him and said, “I don’t know;” and there was a strained, unquiet silence.

  Folly broke it.

  “She says—someone will write. She says—her niece will write. Has—anyone written?”

  David made an abrupt movement.

  “Someone’s been telephoning to me.”

  “Oh!” said Folly on a little gasping breath; and then: “Who?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know the voice. I don’t know anything.” He flung round and faced her. “It’s a woman who rings me up—from a public call office. She has a beastly voice—hard, mocking; and she seems to know everything that I said or did when I was with Erica. It’s damnable.”

  A look of terror swept over Folly’s face. It was like a quick cloud passing. She said in a whisper:

  “Who is she?”

  David lifted his hand and let it fall in a gesture of helpless negation.

  “Is it—Erica?”

  The whisper was hardly sound at all; but it reached David and shocked him to his feet. He got up with a jerk. That hard, mocking voice—and Erica, whose piteous wail still beat against his ears: “David, don’t make me—don’t make me go!” Yet it was that hard voice which had called up the piteous one and, repeating the piteous words, had softened and become piteous too. He felt a horror that he had never felt before. If this was Erica, if it was Erica’s voice that had mocked him, what had the years made of her; what searing, hardening change had passed upon the child that he remembered?

  Folly got up slowly and came slowly a step nearer to him. Then she stopped, her eyes wide and full of fear. She looked, not at David, but at the space between them; and she looked at the empty space as if some bodily presence filled it.

  She said “Erica!” in a faint gasp; and then: “David—was it Erica?”

  David felt cold.
The room was cold, as if a cold wind were blowing through it. He turned away from Folly’s eyes. Neither of them spoke. After a moment Folly began to move towards the door. She walked very slowly and stiffly, and it took her a long time to turn the handle, and a long time to close the door between her and David.

  CHAPTER XXIV

  Eleanor meanwhile had gone to have tea with Grandmamma and the Aunts, arriving, as bidden by Aunt Editha, not later than half-past three—“as Grandmamma is anxious to have a little talk with you, dear girl, and she does not care about talking much immediately after a meal.”

  Eleanor was met in the hall of Mrs. Fordyce’s house by Aunt Editha, who embraced her warmly.

  “My dear girl! So nice to see you! We haven’t had a real talk yet. But, of course, you must go to Grandmamma now—she’s expecting you and—yes, my dear girl, we must have our little talk; only just now Grandmamma will have heard the bell ring, and she mustn’t be kept waiting.”

  At the top of the stairs, Aunt Mary:

  “Eleanor, you’re a little late. And—oh, my dear, flowers again!”

  Eleanor laughed.

  “Did they take you in, Aunt Mary? I didn’t forget. And my violets aren’t real this time.”

  “Grandmamma doesn’t care about artificial flowers,” said Miss Mary in a fluttered, disapproving sort of way. “I think—I really do think it would be better if you were to take them off. Grandmamma feels so strongly about things like sham jewellery, and imitation lace, and—and artificial flowers.”

  Eleanor removed the violets, and was ushered into the drawing-room. Now that the room was no longer filled by a crowd of people, Aunt Editha’s birthday chintzes had a most startling effect; they certainly made everything else look very shabby. And yet Eleanor felt how much she would have preferred the unrelieved shabbiness.

  Grandmamma sat in her usual chair by the fire. She wore a black cashmere dress with lisse frilling round the neck, and over the dress a grey golf jacket of a rather superannuated appearance. Her collar was fastened by a brooch containing the intertwined and plaited hair of her parents and nine brothers and sisters; the shades ranging from the flaxen of John, deceased as an infant, through Roger, sandy; Alexander, undeniably red; Editha, auburn; and Frederick, dark brown, to Papa and Mamma, one iron and the other silver grey.

  Eleanor received the kiss of disfavour. Grandmamma’s eyes dwelt so bleakly on her grey coat and skirt that she was glad she had left the violets outside.

  In a minute or two the full tide of august displeasure was sweeping over her. Folly had hit the mark when she announced that Eleanor was to be scolded on her account. It appeared that someone had told James Alderey, whose wife had told Milly March, who had told Aunt Editha, who, of course, had at once informed Grandmamma, that Folly had been seen dining in public with that abandoned creature, Florence.

  “I allude, Eleanor, to poor George’s former wife. And I have sent for you to ask how you can reconcile it with your conscience to allow Flora—who is, I understand, in your charge—to associate with such a person.”

  Eleanor bowed before the storm, only to find that meekness had a most disastrous effect upon Grandmamma. After ten minutes or so Mrs. Fordyce was enjoying herself, and was addressing Eleanor very much as she might have addressed the erring and impenitent Floss herself. By the time she had said all that she had to say on (a) the prevalence of immorality; (b) the proper treatment of social offenders; (c) the lightmindedness and total lack of respect for morality displayed by young persons in general, and Flora in particular; and (d) the awful responsibilities attaching to the charge of a young girl, Eleanor was rather battered. There were side excursions into the divorce laws, modern education, etc.

  When the peroration had been reached, Grandmamma pushed back her wig, which had been resting on her left eyebrow, took a fresh breath, and began on second marriages, with a very long digression into marriages between cousins, together with a few poignant expressions of opinion on the immorality of the proposal to remove the word “obey” from the marriage service. In common with all other masterful ladies who have ruled their own husbands with a rod of iron, Grandmamma held extremely strong views on this subject. She imparted them to Eleanor with fluency and vigour until the tea was brought in.

  Having talked herself out for the time being, she relaxed a little, and Eleanor was allowed to converse with the Aunts. She found them all agog over Milly’s hints that George was contemplating matrimony.

  “I do hope a wise choice, dear girl,” said Aunt Editha.

  Eleanor, aware of the catechism that would follow, refrained from saying that she knew Mrs. Hadding. She merely said she hoped so too.

  “A strong hand is what Flora needs,” said Mrs. Fordyce, speaking with so much energy that she spilt her tea. “If George can induce the right person to take charge of his far worse than motherless daughter, it will be well. Firmness and wise counsel are what Flora needs, and what you, my dear Eleanor, are yourself far too young and inexperienced to supply.”

  The tea-party proceeded upon this note of majestic gossip. Awful warnings were recalled from the family annals and from elsewhere; homilies founded upon these sad cases flowed as freely as did the tea. Aunt Editha said “Quite true,” and “Yes, indeed” at intervals. And everyone except Eleanor felt sorry when she rose to go.

  On the way downstairs Eleanor retrieved her violets. Out of the presence, she was reviving rapidly, and by the time she had pinned on her flowers in the hall, she was sufficiently herself to say:

  “Grandmamma seemed quite pleased about George marrying again.”

  “Oh, dear girl, but George is a man!” said the scandalized Aunt Editha.

  Eleanor laughed and kissed her warmly.

  “That does make a difference—doesn’t it? But, darling, prepare for a shock—Mrs. Hadding is a widow.”

  She ran down the steps without waiting to see how Aunt Editha bore the shock.

  CHAPTER XXV

  David went round to Martagon Crescent that evening. No. 16 showed no lights. He rang and knocked for a quarter of an hour and heard no answering sound. He came away to wait for tomorrow with an increasing sense of strain. Yet to-morrow brought no relief. The telephone bell rang often enough, but the voice that had repeated Erica’s last words to him was silent.

  Friday and Saturday passed. He went again to Martagon Crescent, only to come away, as before, from a dumb, unanswering house.

  On Saturday Tommy Wingate came up to town for the week-end. Milly March, rushing into Eleanor’s flat at three o’clock in the afternoon full of her brother George’s marriage, found him there before her and “actually holding Eleanor’s silks for her to wind.”

  Milly, as usual, was encumbered by innumerable parcels. She had left the ham, the Stilton cheese, and three pounds of apples in the hall, but several minor brown-paper packages reposed in her lap and littered the carpet around her chair. She remained until half-past six, hoping against hope that Tommy would go, and then came away only because she had promised to look in on Grandmamma.

  She fluttered the Aunts a good deal by her description of Tommy and her suspicions that Eleanor was dining with him. “She said she was going out to dinner, and they were talking about plays.”

  The Aunts took it by turns to stay with Grandmamma on Sunday morning. It was Miss Mary’s turn for church next day. Neither she nor Aunt Editha commented on the fact that she was starting an hour earlier than usual; but she arrived at Chieveley Street in very good time to ask “dear Eleanor” whether she would care to accompany her to church.

  “Dear Eleanor” was not alone. At barely a quarter past ten Captain Wingate was seated at her piano picking out tunes with one finger. Eleanor had the grace to blush.

  It ended in Tommy accompanying both ladies to church, after which he and Eleanor walked Aunt Mary to Grandmamma’s door, and then went off together.

  It was after receiving Miss Mary’s report that Miss Editha St. Kern decided that she could not let the afternoon pass w
ithout going round to Chieveley Street. “The dear girl may be feeling quite embarrassed. Young men are sometimes quite impervious to hints. I shall go round, and I shall take dear Eleanor the book I promised to lend her as soon as I got it back from Bertha. Bertha enjoyed it greatly.”

  With the book neatly done up in brown paper, Miss Editha rang Eleanor’s bell. The rather stern parlourmaid who presently told her that Mrs. Rayne had gone out for the afternoon could not possibly be suspected of prevarication.

  “Gone out?” said Miss Editha.

  “For the afternoon,” said the parlourmaid.

  “Is Miss March at home?”

  The parlourmaid hesitated, and Miss Editha walked into the hall.

  “Ah, I see she is. Then you needn’t announce me—I’ll just go in.” And in she went, to find Folly curled up in a big chair with a book. Timmy lay asleep on her knee in an abandoned attitude, all stretched out and furry.

  “Don’t get up,” said Aunt Editha brightly. “I wouldn’t disturb that darling pet of a kitten for worlds. I’ll just take this chair beside you, and we can be quite cosy. Well, Flora, my dear, this is very nice. It was such a disappointment to find that dear Eleanor was out; but the next best thing to finding her is to find you, my dear. Dear Eleanor has gone out with Captain Wingate, I suppose?”

  “’M—” said Folly. “Look at Timothy, Aunt Editha! Isn’t he funny? He always yawns when I tickle his chin.”

  “I was just thinking how nice it would be to have a cosy little chat with you, Flora dear.” Aunt Editha stroked Timmy absent-mindedly with one finger. “About your father’s marriage, you know. Now tell me, was it a great surprise to you?”

  “Oh no.”

  “That is well. I am so glad of that. And now, dear child, tell me—have you met this lady?”

  Folly nodded.