The Classic Mystery Novel

by Dorothy Cameron Disney

“I think any girl ’ud be very lucky.…” she began. I bowed, and as I did so an imp of mischief took possession of her tongue. “…very lucky indeed—to engage your roving affection.”

  “That wasn’t what you started to say.”

  “I never know what I am going to say. That’s why I’m so good on a platform.”

  “Shall I take the ring off?”

  “I prefer to win it in fair fight.”

  “If you can,” I rejoined, as we pressed our way into the bright warmth of the ball-room.

  My charges appeared to be profiting by my absence. Couple after couple floated by with touching heads and dreamy eyes; half-way down the room Philip was whispering in Gladys’ ear and making her smile; I caught a glimpse of Robin and Cynthia; then Sylvia and the Seraph glided past.

  “Don’t they look sweet together?” said Joyce, half to herself, as our faces were subjected to a quick, searching glance.

  “What about a turn before supper?” I suggested.

  “Am I having it with you?”

  “If you will.”

  “I should like to.”

  We started round the room, half-way through the waltz. Joyce was a beautiful dancer, easy, light, and rhythmical. It was too good to spoil with talking; I contented myself with one final remark.

  “After all,” I said, “you may as well start getting used to me.”

  CHAPTER VI

  The Second Round

  “One sleeps, indeed, and wakes at intervals,

  We know, but waking’s the main part with us,

  And my provision’s for life’s waking part.

  Accordingly, I use heart, head and hand

  All day, I build, scheme, study and make friends;

  And when night overtakes me, down I lie,

  Sleep, dream a little, and get done with it,

  The sooner the better, to begin afresh.

  What’s midnight doubt before the dayspring’s faith?

  You, the philosopher that disbelieve,

  That recognise the night, give dreams their weight—

  To be consistent—you should keep your bed,

  Abstain from healthy acts that prove you man,

  For fear you drowse perhaps at unawares!

  And certainly at night you’ll sleep and dream,

  Live through the day and bustle as you please.

  And so you live to sleep as I to wake,

  To unbelieve as I to still believe?

  Well, and the common sense o’ the world calls you

  Bedridden,—and its good things come to me.”

  —Robert Browning

  “Bishop Blougram’s Apology.”

  The Bullingdon Ball took place on the Tuesday night, and Joyce returned to town the following morning. Her brother may have mentioned the time, or it may have been pure coincidence that I should be buying papers and watching the trains when she arrived at the station with the girl she was chaperoning. We met as friends and exchanged papers: I gave her the Morning Post and received the New Militant in return. As the train slipped away from the platform, she waved farewell with a carefully gloved left hand. Then Dick and I strolled back to the House.

  In drowsy, darkened chamber Robin was sleeping the sleep of the just. As I voyaged round his rooms, I reflected that undergraduate humour changes little through the ages, and in Oxford as elsewhere the unsuspecting just falls easy prey to wakeful, prowling injustice. An enemy had visited that peaceful home of slumber. Half-hidden by disordered bed-clothes, a cold bath prematurely awaited Robin’s foot, and on his table was spread a repast such as no right-thinking man orders for himself after two nights’ heavy dancing. Moist, indecorous slabs of cold boiled beef, beer for six, two jars of piccalilli and a round of over-ripe Gorgonzola cheese, offered piteous appeal to a jaded, untasting palate. Suspended from the overmantel—that soul might start on equal terms with body—hung the pious aspiration—“God Bless our Home.”

  “Garton, for a bob!” Robin exclaimed when I described the condition of his rooms.

  Flinging the bed-clothes aside, he fell heavily into the bath, extricated himself to the accompaniment of low, vehement muttering that may have been a prayer, and bounded across the landing to render unto Garton the things that were Garton’s. I followed at a non-committal distance, and watched the disposal of two pounds of boiled beef in unsuspected corners of Garton’s rooms. Three slices were hidden in the tobacco jar, the rest impartially distributed behind Garton’s books—to mature and strengthen during sixteen weeks of Long Vacation. Balancing the jug of beer on the door-top—whence it fell and caved in the fraudulent white head of a venerable scout—Robin hastened back to his own quarters and sported the oak.

  “I was thinking of a touch of lunch on the Cher,” he observed, exchanging his dripping pyjamas for a dressing-gown and making for a window-seat commanding Canterbury Gate, a cigarette in one hand and a Gorgonzola cheese in the other. “If you wouldn’t mind toddling round to Phil and the Seraph and routing the girls out, we might all meet at the House barge at one. I’ll cut along and dress as soon as I’ve given Garton a little nourishment. I suppose the pickles ’ud kill him,” he added with a regretful glance at the two-pound glass jars.

  I communicated the rendezvous to Philip, threw an eye over the “Where is Miss Rawnsley?” article as I crossed the Quad, and dropped anchor in the Seraph’s rooms. His quaint streak of femininity showed itself in the bowls of “White Enchantress” carnations with which the tables and mantelpiece were adorned. A neat pile of foolscap covered with shorthand characters indicated early rising and studious method. I found him working his way through the Times and Westminster Gazette for the last three days.

  “I suppose there is no news?” I said when I had told him Robin’s arrangements for the day and described the Battle of the Beef.

  “Nothing today,” he answered. “Have you seen yesterday’s Times?”

  I had been far too busy with Joyce and my three wards to spare a moment for the papers. I now read for the first time that the Prime Minister had moved for the appropriation of all Private Members’ days. The Poor Law Reform Bill would engage the attention of the House for the remainder of the Session, to the exclusion of Female Suffrage and every other subject.

  “That’s Rawnsley’s answer to this,” I said, giving the Seraph my copy of the New Militant.

  “I wonder what the answer of the New Militant will be to Rawnsley,” he murmured when he had read the article.

  “That is for you to say,” I told him. “You read the Heavens and interpret dreams and forecast the future.…”

  “Fortunately I can’t.”

  This was an unexpected point of view.

  “Wouldn’t you if you could?” I asked.

  “Would any one go on living if he didn’t cheat himself into believing the future was not going to be quite as black as the present?”

  This was not the right frame of mind for a man who had spent two nights dancing with Sylvia—to the exclusion of every one else, and I told him so.

  “Come along to the Randolph,” he exclaimed impatiently. “Today, tonight; and tomorrow all will be over. I was a fool to come. I don’t know why I did.”

  We picked up our hats and strolled into King Edward Street.

  “You came because Sylvia invited you,” I reminded him. “I heard the invitation. Young Rawnsley was not there, but Culling and Gartside were, and a dozen more I don’t know by name. Any of them might have been chosen instead, but—they weren’t. You should be more grateful for your advantages, my young friend.”

  “I’m not.”

  I linked my arm in his, and tried to find out what was upsetting him.

  “You’ve been having some senseless, needless quarrel with her.…” I hazarded.

  “How can two people quarrel when they’ve not a single poi
nt in common? Our lives are on parallel lines, continue them indefinitely and they’ll never meet. Therefore—it’s a mistake to bring the parallels so close together that one can see the other.”

  For a moment I wondered whether he had put his fortune to the test and received a rebuff.

  “Does Sylvia think your lives are on parallel lines?” I asked.

  “What experience or imagination do you think a girl like that’s got? It never occurs to them that everybody’s not turned out of the same machine as themselves, with the same ideas, beliefs, upbringing, position, means. D’you suppose Sylvia appreciates that she spends more money on dress in six months than I earn in a year? Can she imagine that I hate and despise all the little conventions that she wouldn’t transgress for all the wealth of the Indies? The doctrines she’s learnt from her mother, the doctrines she’ll want to teach her children—can she imagine that I regard them as so much witchcraft that I wouldn’t imperil my soul by asking any sane child to believe? I’m an infidel, a penniless, unconventional Bohemian, and she—well, you know the atmosphere of Brandon Court. What’s the good of our going on meeting?”

  “Nigel is neither infidel, unconventional, nor Bohemian,” I said. “Moreover, he stands on the threshold of a big career.…”

  “I daresay,” said the Seraph as I paused.

  “Nigel was not invited. Gartside may be an infidel if he ever troubles to think of such things; he is certainly not penniless or Bohemian. He is a large-framed, large-hearted hero, with every worldly advantage a girl could desire. Gartside was not invited. No more were the others. You were.”

  “She hadn’t known me two days; perhaps two days aren’t long enough to find me out.”

  “Feminine intuition.…” I began.

  “Feminine intuition’s a woman’s power of jumping to wrong conclusions quicker than men. Unless you want to get yourself into trouble, you’d better not march into Sylvia’s presence with a New Militant in your hand.”

  I thanked him for the reminder, and bequeathed the offending sheet to the Martyrs’ Memorial. The heavy type of the headline, “Where is Miss Rawnsley?” reminded me of our earlier conversation.

  “I shan’t be sorry to get rid of my charges,” I remarked. “They’re a responsibility in these troublous times.”

  “Sylvia’s in no danger,” he answered with great confidence.

  “I’m not so sure.”

  “She’s absolutely safe.”

  “How do you know?”

  He looked at me doubtfully, and the confidence died out of his eyes.

  “I don’t. It’s—just an opinion.”

  “Even if you’re right, there’s still Gladys,” I said.

  “I’d forgotten her.”

  “She’s a fair mark.”

  “I suppose so.”

  “Though not as good as Sylvia.”

  “I assure you Sylvia’s in no danger.”

  “But how do you know?” I repeated.

  “I tell you; it’s only an opinion.”

  “But you don’t express any opinion about Gladys.”

  “How could I?”

  “How can you about Sylvia?”

  He hesitated, flushed, opened his lips and shut them again in his old tantalising way.

  “I don’t know,” he answered as we entered the Randolph, and walked to the end of the hall where the three girls were awaiting us.

  Robin had provided an imposing flotilla for our accommodation. His own punt was reserved for Cynthia, himself, and the luncheon-baskets; a mysterious reconciliation had placed Garton’s at the disposal of Philip, Gladys, and myself, while Sylvia and the Seraph were stowed away in a Canadian canoe, detached by act of sheer piracy from the adjoining Univ. barge. We took the old course through Mesopotamia and over the Rollers, mooring for luncheon half a mile above the Cherwell Hotel. Hunger and a sense of duty secured my presence for that meal and tea; in the interval I retired for a siesta. Distance, I find, lends enchantment to a chaperon.

  It was in my absence that Philip asked Gladys to marry him. On my reappearance at tea-time, Robin shouted the news across a not inconsiderable section of Oxfordshire. I affected the usual surprise, warned Philip that he must await my brother’s approval, and shook hands with him avuncularly. Then I watched the orgy of kissing that seems inseparable from announcements of this kind. A mathematician would work out the possible combinations in two minutes, but his calculation would, as ever, be upset by the intrusion of the personal equation, for Robin kissed Gladys not once, but many times, less with a view to welcoming her as a sister than from a reasonable belief that such ill-timed assiduity would exasperate her elder brother.

  In time it occurred to some one to make tea, and at six o’clock the flotilla started home. Robin ostentatiously transferred me from Philip’s punt to his own, and with equal ostentation announced his intention of starting last so as to round up the laggards. The Canadian canoe shot gracefully ahead, and was soon lost to view; a fast stream was running, and the boat needed little assistance from the paddle. I have no doubt that in the late afternoon sun, and with an accompaniment of rippling water gently lapping the sides of the boat, time passed all too quickly. Fragments of conversation were disinterred for my benefit in the course of the following weeks, to set me wondering anew what sympathetic nimbus I must wear that girls and boys like Sylvia and the Seraph should unlock their hearts for my inspection.

  I gather that Sylvia called for the verdict on the success of their expedition to Oxford, and that the Seraph found for her, but with reluctant, qualified judgment.

  “You’re not sorry you came?” she asked. “Well, what’s lacking? I’m responsible for bringing you here; I want everything to be quite perfect.”

  “Everything is perfect, Sylvia.”

  She shook her head.

  “Something’s wrong. You’re moody and silent and troubled, just like you were the first time we met. D’you remember that night? You looked as if you thought I was going to bite you. I don’t bite, Seraph. Tell me what’s the matter, there’s still one night more; I want to make you glad you came.”

  “You can’t make me gladder than I am. But you can’t find roses without thorns. I wish we weren’t all going back tomorrow.”

  “It’s only to London.”

  “I know, but it’ll all be different.”

  “But why?”

  “I don’t know, but it will be. These three days wouldn’t have been so glorious if I hadn’t remembered every moment of the time that they were—just three days.”

  Shipping his paddle, he lay back in the boat and plunged his arms up to the elbow in the cool, reedy water. Sylvia roused him with a challenge.

  “Four days would have bored you?”

  “Have you ever met the man who was bored by four days of your company?”

  “Don’t you sometimes fancy you know me better than most?”

  “I’ve known you since Whitsun.”

  “You’ve known me since.…”

  She stopped abruptly. The Seraph lifted a wet hand, and watched the water trickling in zigzag rivulets up his arm.

  “Shall I finish it for you?” he asked.

  “You don’t know what I was going to say.”

  “You’ve known me since the day I was born.”

  “Why do you think I was going to say that?”

  “You were, weren’t you?”

  “I stopped in the middle.”

  “You’d thought out the end.”

  “Had I?”

  “Unconsciously?”

  A hand waved in impatient protest.

  “If it was unconscious, how should I know?”

  The Seraph glanced quickly up at her face, and turned away.

  “True,” he answered absently.

  “No one could know,” she persisted.
/>   “I knew.”

  “Guessed.”

  For answer he picked up his coat from the bottom of the boat, and extracted a closely written sheet of college note-paper. Folding it so that only the last line was visible, he handed it her with the words—

  “You’ll find it there.”

  Sylvia read the line, and gazed in perplexity at her companion.

  “But I never said it,” she persisted.

  “You were going to.”

  She turned the paper over without answering.

  “What’s on the other side?” she asked.

  The Seraph extended an anxious hand.

  “Please don’t read that!” he implored her. “It’s not meant for you to see.”

  “Is it about me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why shouldn’t I see it?”

  “You may, but not now.”

  “Well, when?”

  The Seraph’s manner had grown suddenly agitated. To gain time, he produced a cigarette, but his agitation was betrayed in the trembling hand that held the match.

  “When we meet again,” he answered after a pause.

  “We meet again tonight.”

  “When we meet—after parting.”

  “We part to dress for dinner.”

  “I mean a long, serious parting,” he replied in a low voice.

  Sylvia laughed at his suddenly grave expression.

  “Are we going to quarrel?” she asked.

  He nodded without speaking.

  “Why, Seraph?” she asked more gently.

  “We can’t help it.”

  “It takes two to make a quarrel. I don’t want to.”

  “We shouldn’t—if we were the only two souls in creation.”

  Sylvia sat silent, fidgeting with a signet ring, and from time to time looking questioningly into the troubled blue eyes before her.

  “How do you know these things?” she asked at length. “You can’t know.”

  “Call it guessing, but I was right over the unfinished sentence, wasn’t I?”

  “Perhaps, but how do you know?”

  “I don’t. It’s fancy. Some people spend their lives awake, others dreaming.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I dream. And sometimes the dream’s so real that I know it must be true.”