The hand left Sally’s shoulder, and she sat waiting for whatever new brick Jocko was going to drop. His talent in this direction had been from childhood exceptional. Sally had never been quite sure whether he did it on purpose or not.
“Hush—not a word!” he was saying. “I never promised I wouldn’t tell, so here goes. Of course, I can’t ask you to promise not to repeat any of it. I can only leave it to your own discretion and—er delicate feelings and all that sort of thing.”
Sally felt cold to her very spine. What on earth was Jocko going to say?
“I’ll just tell you, and you can use your own judgment. I can only say that I’m quite sure that it’s all perfectly true. I believe every word of it.”
He leaned sideways and thrust suddenly at the charring log on the low fire with his balled fist. The log broke and fell, sending up a shower of sparks and a rush of brilliant flame. For a moment every face was illuminated, standing out with startling clarity against the shadowy background of the big unlit room.
“You’re not getting on with it, darling,” said Elspeth in a soft, complaining voice.
“I’m going to,” said Jocko. “You’ll hear it quite soon enough. Lucia, darling, if you’d like to hold my hand, I’ve got one to spare.”
“Gerald’s got two,” said Lucia. “And you haven’t made anyone’s flesh creep yet, so you needn’t give yourself airs.”
“All right,” said Jocko. “It was a perfectly good offer. You may be sorry you didn’t take it. Well, as I said before, I believe this story, and here it is. My great-aunt Clementa, she was a Rere, and she married Tolhache about fifty years ago. Well, my said Aunt Clementa—by the way, this was after Tolhache died and all the other Reres, and she’d come into Rere Place and was living there—”
“Darling,” said Elspeth mournfully, “you really aren’t getting on with it.”
“Yes, I am, but you keep interrupting. Well, Aunt Clementa woke up one night in the dark at Rere Place. Just at first she didn’t know why she had waked, because she never did wake up till Annie came in with the tea. Then she knew it was because she had heard something. But she didn’t know what she had heard. She only knew that it had frightened her awake. She said she did know that.”
The broken log sent up its tongues of fire. They rose, flickered, and fell. There was no more sudden light on every face, but a glow that caught first one and then another—the nape of Daphne’s neck with its fair clustering curls; Henri’s hand, very long and thin, with a signet ring deeply engraved; the scarlet of Elspeth’s lips.
“What was it?” said Lucia a little breathlessly.
Jocko went on.
“She waited. She began to tell herself that it was all a dream. She shook up her pillow and lay down. And then it came again. She told me it was the most horrible sound. It seemed to begin low down with a kind of moan and jump up into a scream.”
“Cats?” suggested Bonzo in his quiet, dry voice.
“Certainly not. Aunt Clementa said she had only once in all her life heard anything like it before.”
“When?” This was Lucia again.
“Years, and years, and years before. And she said it had frightened her so much then that it had nearly made her ill, and her old nurse told her that it meant trouble, black trouble, for someone in the house. And then it came for the third time.”
Behind Sally James Elliot was getting to his feet, and Sally spoke because she was afraid of what he might be going to say.
“What trouble?” she said, and in spite of all she could do her voice shook.
From behind her came James’s cheerful laugh.
“The trouble of washing the kitchen floor, I should say. I’ve waked up myself and heard the sweep yodelling round the house because the cook’s alarum hadn’t gone off or she’d slept through it—only at Rere Place it would have been the kitchen-maid, I suppose.”
He reached the switch by the service door and pulled it down with a click. The light in the Victorian chandelier came on, and all its many lustres twinkled as brightly as Daphne’s diamonds. Daphne’s eyes were nearly as bright above her flushed cheeks. Gerald Crane was laughing, and so was Henri. But had he been laughing before the light came on? James wasn’t sure. Bonzo was looking at Daphne, and Lucia had been holding her husband’s hand. Elspeth lifted her head from Jocko’s shoulder without haste, and said with slow reproach,
“Oh, darling—what a shame! It wasn’t—”
James laughed again.
“Come on J.J.—confess! Your bluff’s called all right.”
Jocko got up and stretched himself.
“I told you it was a true story,” he said. “Anyone who believes in ghosts can think it was a ghost, and anyone who doesn’t can say it was the sweep.”
“It might have been a sweep’s ghost,” murmured Elspeth.
They were all getting up now. James put out a casual hand and pulled Sally to her feet, but the hard clasp was not as careless as it appeared. It said, “Buck up, Sally—it’s all right.”
And then Jocko perpetrated a final indiscretion.
“That’s the worst of old James,” he said—“he always sees through everything. You can’t fox him.”
XXIII
James was out for most of the following morning. When he turned up after lunch Miss Callender beckoned him into the office.
“Oh, Mr. Elliot, what day are you delivering Colonel Pomeroy’s car?”
“Well, he could have it any day. There was some talk of his fetching it himself, but he was to let us know.”
“Well, that’s just it,” said Miss Callender. “His man came in this morning while you were out, and he asked when it would be ready, and he said Colonel Pomeroy was most particular the same driver should bring it down.” She giggled and rolled her eyes. “He said the Colonel had taken ever such a fancy to you. Funny—isn’t it?”
James frowned a little. Colonel Pomeroy knew him well enough—had known him when he was ten years old. There seemed to be something odd about his man’s references to “the same driver.” Or perhaps that was just Daisy Callender. It must be, because the chauffeur knew his name perfectly well. He said, still frowning,
“Did he say ‘the same driver’?”
“Oh, yes, he did. Why, Mr. Elliot?”
“Well, he knows me quite well. Are you sure he didn’t say Elliot?”
Daisy Callender shook her fluffy head.
“Oh, no. He didn’t know your name till I told him.”
“Oh, you told him my name?”
“Oh, yes—he asked me what it was. He said you were ever such a good driver, Mr. Elliot.”
James shut the office door and went over to the telephone, where he rang up trunks and asked for Warnley 1076. A voice said, “I’ll r-r-ring you,” and he stood by the fixture, leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets and thinking his own thoughts.
Miss Callender spun her office chair about and beguiled the time with conversation.
“Bert Simpson’s ever such a nice boy, Mr. Elliot. I’m sure you’d like him ever so much. And he’s one of six, so his mother’s only too pleased for him to be friendly. I do think only children are a mistake—don’t you? I mean if you’ve got six, you can’t bother about them all the way you would if they were only one. And he’s a clerk in a house-agent’s office—a real good-class firm—and I always think it’s a good opening. And I know they think a lot of Bert, because Mr. Ward that’s one of the partners has a working housekeeper that’s friendly with the woman Mrs. Rowbotham has to help her in the house, and she says Mr. Ward thinks ever such a lot of Bert.”
James nodded.
“And we’re going to the cinema again tonight,” said Miss Callender with a beaming smile.
The telephone bell whirred, and James put the receiver to his ear and heard a man’s voice very far away say “Hullo!”
James said, “Is that Fieldover? Can I speak to Colonel Pomeroy? Will you say it’s about his car and the name is Elliot.”
/> There was a pause. He caught Miss Callender’s interested eye. And then Colonel Pomeroy was saying,
“Hullo, James!”
“It’s about your Rolls, sir.”
“I’m not coming to town. You’ll have to bring her down. Stay the night if you can.”
“I don’t think I can, sir. Did you send Larkin here with a message about my bringing her down?”
“Larkin? Certainly not! He’s here.”
“Did you send anyone?”
“Of course not! Why should I? What are you driving at?”
“Someone came in this morning when I was out and left a message about my driving the Rolls to Fieldover.”
Colonel Pomeroy became explosive.
“Pack of rubbish!” he said. “What are you talking about? Someone’s been pulling your leg. Look out it isn’t car thieves.… No, I shan’t be coming down now, so I’d like her as soon as possible. And mind you come yourself. I don’t like that smarmy fellow who kept trying to butt in when I was talking to you—what’s his name—Jackson? Thinks too much of himself. Tell Atwells I won’t have him! What about tomorrow?”
James said, “That’ll be all right, sir,” and hung up the receiver.
There was a shrewd look in Miss Callender’s pretty eyes.
“What did he say, Mr. Elliot?”
“I thought you could always hear.”
“Not always—not when it’s long distance. But I thought he said he hadn’t sent any message about the Rolls.”
“Well, I should keep that to myself, Daisy,” said James with his hand on the door.
Miss Callender swung round so that she faced it.
“What’s it all about, Mr. Elliot? Seems funny to me. What’s all this about who drove that car the day you went to Warnley? What does it matter who drove it? Seems to me there’s something funny going on.”
“Well, I shouldn’t talk about it,” said James, opening the door.
She ran after him and put a hand on his arm.
“You’re taking the Rolls down to him tomorrow—I heard you say so. Oh, Mr. Elliot, you’ll be careful on the road—extra careful, I mean—because—” She paused and choked a little. “I mean to say we don’t want any more accidents like Mr. Jackson’s, and—and—well, you’ll be careful, won’t you, Mr. Elliot?”
“I’m always careful,” said James.
XXIV
As James walked home that evening, he thought about a number of things which he had not been allowing himself to think about all day. He had a list of them in his mind like a poster hanging in a badly lighted room. The simile flashed into his mind and out again, but it was an apt one. He had his list of happenings, but he wanted more light on them—he wanted it badly.
He contemplated the list with a dubious frown:
Two shots fired from an empty house in the dark of a foggy afternoon, and a girl who caught him by the arm and said “Run!”
Meeting with Sally, and Sally practically saying “Run!” again, and the Sylvesters talking to Daphne.
First enquiry as to the driver of the Rolls. Jackson butting in.
Jackson found dead, run over in a Surrey lane.
Sally’s story about Aunt Clementa and a hidden something.
Sally’s story about Aunt Clementa’s letter to Jocko.
Sally’s story about Jocko’s accident and the disappearance of the letter.
(N.B. The Sylvesters linked with these three stories.)
Sally’s ridiculous story of an engagement, or semi-engagement, to Henri Niemeyer.
Jocko’s return. Jocko’s intention of opening Rere Place.
Daphne’s party. Daphne’s story about Giles Rere and the Queen’s necklace, leading up to an assertion that Rere Place was haunted by a ghost who fired real or quasi-real bullets. Real enough, that is, to be picked up by Daphne and put into her bag, but unreal enough to have vanished an hour or two later when she wanted to convince a sceptical dinner-party. And the sceptics included Ambrose and Hildegarde Sylvester and Henri Niemeyer.
(N.B. They do keep cropping up, don’t they?)
Second enquiry as to who drove the Rolls to Warnley, the enquiry purporting to come from Colonel Pomeroy’s chauffeur.
A queer list of items, and the last the queerest of all. The man who impersonated Larkin ran the risk of being exposed if he, James, had been in the shop instead of out with a car. On the other hand, if the fellow had watched him off the premises, there wouldn’t have been any risk at all, so that was probably what had been done. There emerged from this incident the conviction that someone was no longer certain that it was Jackson who had driven the Rolls to Warnley and subsequently blundered into Rere Place in the fog, that this someone was deeply interested in ascertaining when the Rolls was to be delivered and ensuring that the same driver would be in charge. Why?
The only answer that James could think of was a most unpleasant one. It was, of course, a ridiculous answer. It-was as senseless to suppose himself in any danger as to suppose that Jackson’s death had been other than accidental. You couldn’t really believe that someone was trying to murder you—not in cold blood. There were murders in the newspapers, but you didn’t somehow think of being murdered yourself. As far as he knew, no one in the Elliot family had ever been murdered—well, not since the fourteenth century anyway—and it seemed improbable that a quiet, steady-going chap like himself should start a new record. James regarded the possibility with extreme distaste. The idea of figuring in the headlines of the brighter press—You Want Better Murders And We Are Out To Give Them To You—revolted him. Also he desired to score the someone off. Also he wanted to go on living, and to marry Sally.
He turned into Little Corbyn Street, walked half way down it, and turned again into Corbyn Mews.
Gertrude Lushington had chosen a good time to be away. Her flat was the fourth on the left-hand side (she always called it a flat, though it was really two converted loose-boxes and a hayloft), and extensive and messy alterations were being carried out in No. 3. Somebody was building out a bathroom at the back and knocking a series of holes in the roof with a view to letting windows in among the slates. There was a violent smell of paint, and a lot of scaffolding, and things lying about to trip you up if you weren’t careful in the dark.
James stopped thinking about whether he was going to be murdered or not and picked his way warily. There seemed to be more scaffolding than usual. It seemed to run right over on to what he was convinced was Gertrude’s roof. It was too dark to be sure, but he made a mental note to have a look at it in the morning and tell the foreman to stick to his own pitch. He had actually to duck under the planks before he could reach his door.
He ducked, and immediately it seemed to him that the roof fell. James had said that he was careful, but no amount of being careful could have saved him. It was something else, something much more primitive and instinctive, which saved him. He ducked under the plank, and at once and without conscious thought jerked his head and his whole body backwards. His forward movement was not only checked but vehemently reversed. There was a crash and a cloud of dust. Something struck him on the shoulder. He went on going back until he was clear of the scaffolding, then he straightened up. What had made him back he didn’t know. Something had given him an order, and he had obeyed without knowing what it was. If he hadn’t obeyed, or if he had hesitated, whatever it was that had sounded like a hundred of bricks and had raised such an overpowering dust would have fallen on his head, and he would almost certainly by now have been the late James Elliot. It was quite a sobering thought. He stood there and considered it. The thing had fallen as he ducked to avoid the scaffolding. He oughtn’t to have had to avoid the scaffolding. It had no business where he must duck under it in order to reach Gertrude’s front door.
He looked up in a very doubting mind, and for an unconvincing instant he thought something moved where the black roof ridge cut the sky. There was so little light that he could never be sure that he had seen anything. He decided that it w
ould be a good plan to get under cover, and that if he kept well away to the right, he could reach the door without bumping into anything else. If someone had been placing booby-traps for him, they would be laid with an eye to his arriving from the left, since the Mews entrance was on that side. It was improbable that there would be more than one booby-trap, but he felt like being careful.
Nothing more happened. He got in safely, and ate a simple meal of fried eggs and bacon, and toasted cheese. He considered himself a good cheese-toaster. And all the time that he was frying, and toasting, and eating his supper, and washing up the supper things he was grimly determined to have it out with the builder’s foreman in the morning. He was a little red-haired man with a peppery temper, and there was pretty sure to be a sizable row. James warmed to the thought of it.
He rose next morning full of pleasurable anticipation but he had no sooner emerged upon the cobbled court of the Mews than he received a shock. Last night he had had to duck under the scaffolding to reach his front door, but this morning the nearest scaffold pole was three feet away. The red-headed foreman was coming down a ladder. He said good-morning to James, and James said,
“Why did you have your scaffolding right across my door last night?”
The foreman winked.
“There wasn’t no scaffolding across that door,” he said.
“Oh, yes, there was,” said James.
The foreman grinned.
“Well, I’ve known what it was not to be able to find me own front door, but I didn’t go advertizing it next day.”
“Look here,” said James—“when I came home last night there was scaffolding out to about here, and I had to duck under it to get to the door, and something like a chimneypot or a load of bricks smashed down off the roof and only just missed laying me out.”
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