The Devil's Caress

by June Wright

  A sleek grey coupé, not unlike Simon Morrow himself, was drawn up waiting for them. He smiled a little when Dr. Waring introduced Marsh, but made no mention of the incident at the Tom Thumb. He was a man born with a pleasant easy flow of small talk, and while Marsh was inclined to examine his remarks for a double meaning there was nothing she could put her finger on. Katherine Waring’s attitude towards him was unimpeachable.

  Marsh went through her part in the proceedings lifelessly. It was, as Dr. Waring had foreseen, a simple business. There was only one disturbing thought in her mind as she sat with Morrow in the local constable’s office and waited for Walker to fill in papers; a minor recollection because she was beyond fighting against the major stream of events. And that was what Shane might do or say when he knew an inquest had been held without his being called as a witness.

  From the police-station they went back to Reliance for the funerals.

  The little cemetery lay over the rolling countryside away from the strong ocean winds. It was typical of a hundred others adjoining Australian townships, a lonely half-neglected spot where the earliest settlers in the district had been buried.

  A place where lizards basked undisturbed on crumbling headstones in summer, and the long brown grass rustled as the copper-headed snake slid on its sinister way.

  Occasionally a freshly constructed monument could be seen, when people like Kingsley Waring chose to lie among the pioneers, united to them by sheer possessive love of one small corner of the earth.

  “How nice for Dr. Kate!” Laurence Gair murmured to Marsh when he saw Morrow. “So comforting to have an old friend on hand at a time like this.”

  The girl ignored the thrust as Katherine beckoned to her.

  “She must have remembered suddenly how King and Simon hated each other,” Gair observed. “Your job is to hold him off while Katherine weeps at the graveside.”

  “Unapproachable and irreproachable,” Simon Morrow said gently, as he permitted himself to be led aside. “I did not know that gate-crashing at a funeral was such a crime. I see I’m not the only offender, however.”

  Marsh paused as he did and glanced in the same direction. A tall heavy figure stood under one of the pine trees some distance away. It was Shane.

  “Do you know that man?” Morrow asked.

  “No,” the girl replied shortly.

  “Neither do I,” he went on, “but there is something vaguely familiar about him. I tried ever so tactfully to find out yesterday at the hotel. A very reticent gentleman. Does Katherine know him?”

  “I don’t know. I think Mr Waring did.”

  “So he has come to pay his last respects. Very proper. So have I. I like to be proper, Dr. Mowbray.” There was a faintly mocking tone in his voice.

  The others were grouped around the graves as the coffins were lowered, but Marsh still detained Morrow aside. He pursued a soft commentary.

  “They always say the most unnerving part of the burial ceremony is the thud of earth on the coffin. Where did Katherine find the reverend gentleman? ‘Dust unto dust.’ Katherine is always punctilious, but how Kingsley would have disliked it. He prided himself upon being a complete agnostic. Why are we proud of such an unproductive title, I wonder? The more most people see of death, the more they are convinced of eschatology. However, not Kingsley, I fear. Perhaps we doctors are inclined to deify ourselves. What do you think, Dr. Mowbray? We have such powers over life and death that remain unquestioned by the ignorant. Perhaps that is bad for us.”

  “Mr Waring said something like that,” Marsh said suddenly. She had not intended to make conversation with this smoothly spoken, provocative man. “He said the illusion of infallibility should be destroyed because mistakes do occur in most careers.”

  “What an extraordinary admission,” commented Simon Morrow, after a slight pause. “King had a certain genius for—er—beating others to the punch.”

  Marsh asked him quickly what he meant, but his reply was just as ambiguous and barbed. “My dear Dr. Mowbray, how intensely you speak! If you had known King as well as Katherine did, you would not ask me what I meant. Excuse me, I see that dissolute young boor creating a scene. His tortuous mind amuses me.”

  Michael Waring had not once gone near his mother during the ceremony. He had taken up a position at Sam’s grave and his face was sad and bitter as he watched it being filled in. At the end he ostentatiously removed one of the wreaths from his father’s grave and placed it on the imbecile’s.

  When Katherine Waring remonstrated he turned on her savagely. Then Morrow intervened and he strode out of the cemetery without waiting for the cars. The rest of the party drove back in silence.

  III

  Marsh went straight to her room with the intention of doping herself into some sort of sleep, so as to stop her mind from revolving and to ease the continuous ache near her left temple. She had drawn the shade to shut out the bright sunlight when a tap came at the door.

  “Come in,” she called unwillingly, and Evelyn Peterson entered. She regarded Marsh curiously.

  “What happened? I saw the bruise.” She pointed to Marsh’s forehead.

  Although she had not known until that moment that the skirmish in the laboratory had left some mark, she answered at once. “I ran into a door. The bathroom door—in the dark,” she added, wondering if anyone else had noticed the bruise.

  Evelyn said drily, “I suggest you comb that front curl down into a bang and no one will see it.” She sat on the end of the bed and pulled a cigarette-case from the pocket of her exquisitely cut black suit.

  Marsh watched her settle herself more comfortably. “What do you want?” she asked.

  Evelyn turned the case over in her scarlet-tipped fingers. It was made of thin gold with her initials boldly inscribed in one corner. “King gave it to me,” she announced, with a quick upward glance. “Shocked?”

  “Not terribly. Your relations seem to have been fairly common knowledge.”

  The girl shook back her dark cloud of hair. “Not as common as you might think,” she corrected. “Although I should hate it to become too well known. I wouldn’t like to hurt dear Katherine’s career.”

  Marsh had been experimenting with the comb. It was a new experience, but she turned away from the mirror at the nurse’s ominously casual remark.

  “What are you driving at?” she demanded.

  Evelyn opened the case and took out a cigarette. “I have been in the medical game long enough now to realize that big-time doctors like to keep their peccadillos quiet. Scandal can ruin many an established position. I could blow the gaff so hard that Katherine Waring wouldn’t have a patient left after the sensation hunters had left her. Furthermore—”

  “Well?” said Marsh. The girl had paused and was looking at her under her lashes, the smoke from her cigarette spiralling about her head.

  “Not only the established career. The up-and-coming doctor cannot be too careful. Supposing now I put it about that your attention at King’s sick-bed hadn’t been as good as it should; that King might not have died had a little more care been exercised?”

  “What do you want?” Marsh asked, gripping the rail of the bed with both hands.

  “As I can’t have King back, I want the next best thing. My good name. Dr. Kate has some papers belonging to me. She stole them from King. I want them back.”

  Marsh let go the railing. “Why don’t you ask Dr. Kate for them yourself?”

  Evelyn sat up slowly, flicking particles of ash from her suit. “She is so damned sublime she probably wouldn’t think I could ruin her. But you cannot afford to lose her patronage or risk a scandal. You realize the damage I could do. I want you to get those papers from her. Make her understand I mean business.”

  She stood up and looked Marsh over. “You’re a fool, Doctor, to stick by that woman. She’ll suck the blood from you. I know what she is. King t
old me.”

  “Just a minute,” Marsh said, as she moved to the door with her graceful cat-like walk. “If I promise to do what I can, will you do something for me?”

  The nurse looked back over her shoulder. “It depends on what you want.”

  “I want you to answer a few questions. Nothing important really.”

  Evelyn eyed her warily. “All right,” she agreed, coming back, “but I’ve been around too much to be beaten by a double bluff. If you had been born in the slums and had to fight every moment of the way to get somewhere, you’d know I meant every word I said.”

  “I believe you,” Marsh said coldly. “Your type hates everyone.”

  For a moment the girl’s eyes glittered. Then she smiled. “And you most of all, Mowbray. Do you think I have forgotten the way you pushed me out of King’s room? I hate you because you have never had to fight and snatch at every opportunity that came your way. When King died I thought it would be all up with me, but my type, as you call us, has learned never to give in. There will be other opportunities.”

  She gave a husky laugh at the look of disgust on Marsh’s face. “Not necessarily what you are thinking, you poor frigid fool. Men don’t mean a thing to you, do they? Yet Larry for one is crazy about you; just as King was crazy about Katherine. “

  “Was he?” Marsh asked, startled.

  “Sure he was. Crazy with love and hate for her.”

  “You sound like a cheap novelette,” Marsh said coldly again.

  The girl shrugged. “What is it you want to ask me?”

  Marsh tried to collect her thoughts. This talk of violent emotions was repugnant and disturbing. “The Arkwrights,” she asked directly. “What do you think of them?”

  “Blow-me-down Henry? He’s okay as long as he doesn’t paw you too much. That wife of his is enough excuse.”

  “Did they like Mr Waring? Did they get on well with him?”

  “Henry fawned a bit. I think King was attached to Delia. He certainly put up with her always treating the house and his rooms in Collins Street as her own. She’d pocket any money he gave her without a word of thanks, as if she had every right to expect it.”

  “What about Simon Morrow?” Marsh asked, without looking at her. “Did Mr Waring like him?”

  “Hated his guts,” Evelyn replied without reserve. “Did you see the way he has now started to come around Dr. Kate?”

  “Leave Dr. Waring out of this,” Marsh said swiftly.

  Evelyn’s lips curled. “She certainly has a hold on you. The few she does attract she gets properly. Betty Donne is positively besotted. That chattering fool, Jennet, is almost as bad. Though Michael tries to drag her the other way,” she added reflectively.

  “Michael treats his mother shockingly. Why?”

  The girl shrugged again. “He is a bit neurotic. She wants him to be a doctor, and he doesn’t, I think.”

  “And Mr Waring? What did he want?”

  “Naturally he had to back up his wife’s wishes.”

  “How long were you with him?” Marsh asked, nearing the climax of her questioning.

  “About five years.”

  “Did he ever tell you how he began to specialize?”

  “In a way it was your beloved Katherine’s doing, but she never dreamed or intended he should become such a success. He found the constant interfering and managing impossible. Another thing, too—if Dr. Kate found a case becoming too involved, she would drop out gracefully and leave him to shoulder the responsibility.”

  “I can’t believe that,” Marsh said. “You only know the facts from one side.”

  “You asked me,” the girl retorted. “Why don’t you ask Dr. Kate yourself?”

  Marsh was silent.

  “You dare not,” Evelyn challenged. “You have doubts about her, too. You are not quite happy about her.”

  “You are being absurd,” Marsh said, but her tone was not convincing.

  Evelyn threw out her hands. “Go and ask her for yourself. And when you do, find out how her husband happened to take too much insulin, and why he happened to be without his glucose.”

  “Be quiet! Do you want the whole house to hear you?”

  Evelyn laughed scornfully. “You poor boob! As if we all don’t think the same thing. And unless you get those papers from Dr. Kate I won’t merely be thinking.”

  She went to the door and opened it. “Everyone is rather het up in this house at the moment. Take my advice and don’t wander around in the dark or you may get a few more bruises.” She slid out of the room.

  Marsh turned back to the mirror somewhat disturbed by this parting shot. Then her hands slowly relaxed. She had got nothing of value from Evelyn in return for her promise to mediate between her and Katherine Waring, but she drew back the shades and replaced the tablets in their bottle with the intention of tackling the problem right away.

  There were voices in the library when she reached the door. She could hear Henry Arkwright. “I know, my dear, it is purely your own concern, but I do think Morrow’s attitude is a little compromising. People might talk. Don’t misunderstand me, but dear old King did not think highly of him.”

  Then Katherine Waring’s voice came calmly. “I don’t follow you, Henry. In spite of a long-standing acquaintance I barely know Simon Morrow personally. As for Kingsley’s opinion of him, it certainly would not apply to his work. Simon is a brilliant surgeon; one of the finest in Australia.”

  Arkwright coughed. “Don’t take offence, Kate, but I think it better that Delia and I stay on for a while longer. Just in case the fellow annoys you.”

  There was a slight pause before Dr. Waring answered. “Very well, Henry. If that is to be your excuse, so be it. Would you mind? I have some letters to write.”

  “Certainly, certainly, my dear. Are you sure I can’t help you at all? Were the funeral arrangements satisfactory?”

  “Very satisfactory, thank you. Please close the door as you go out.”

  She looked up and saw Marsh standing on the threshold. “Do you want me, Marsh? Come in, my dear.”

  The girl edged past Arkwright, avoiding his straying hand. It just brushed her shoulder. She closed the door in his face and went over to the desk. “I am sorry to bother you, Dr. Kate.”

  “No bother at all. I am rather relieved to see you.”

  She got up gracefully. She had changed from her black dress into a thin grey linen, for it was now quite warm. “Will you have some sherry with me? You look pale. Is anything worrying you?”

  The girl’s lips twisted ironically, but the older woman had her back turned. She waited until Dr. Waring handed her the glass and then stood turning it round to catch the light on the diamond cuts.

  “Go on, Marsh,” Dr. Waring said, sitting down again. “What is the trouble?”

  The sherry was dry and mellow. Marsh sipped at it quickly. “I have been talking to Miss Peterson,” she said with an effort. “She came to my room.”

  “Yes?”

  “She wants some papers you have which belong to her,”

  Marsh blurted out. “She won’t leave Reliance until she has them. And if you don’t let her have them she’ll—she will—”

  “Will what?”

  Marsh raised her eyes. “She thinks she can blackmail you,” she replied in a low voice.

  Katherine Waring was quiet. She got up and came slowly round the desk to Marsh.

  “Dr. Kate,” the girl said desperately. “Don’t rely on knowledge of your own integrity. Peterson means what she says. I found her searching your room. Give her the papers.”

  “Did Miss Peterson say what was in those papers?”

  Marsh shook her head.

  “No, I didn’t think she would. I will tell you. Evelyn Peterson once did something which, should it be known, would not only kill her chances as a nurse, but would a
lso involve her with the law.” She turned away and said vehemently: “Do you think I am going to let that girl go back to nursing again? No, Marsh. Tell her the answer is no.”

  “Dr. Kate—”

  She raised one hand in remonstration. “Your career is an important affair, Marsh. I can help you a great deal. Please do not spoil your chances by listening to low gossip and innuendoes. Trust me, Marsh. You need me as much as I need you.”

  “You know I will always trust you,” Marsh said quietly. She put down her glass on the desk. “Forgive my intrusion on this unpleasant business. Perhaps I should leave, after all.”

  Dr. Waring turned swiftly. “You heard me,” she said, with the same undertone of vehemence. “I need you, Marsh.”

  Then she gave a little embarrassed laugh and her face went back to its usual impassive expression. She sat down at her desk and took up her pen.

  Marsh stared at her bent head for a moment and then left the room.

  She was wandering aimlessly along the passage when the telephone rang. As there was no one nearby she lifted the receiver. A man’s voice asked for Michael Waring.

  “I’ll see if he is in.” She went along to the living-room and put her head in the door. The Arkwrights were sitting there. Delia did not look up from her knitting, but Henry rose at once.

  “Has Michael come in? He is wanted on the ’phone.”

  “He is not here,” Arkwright told her. “He set off to walk home from the cemetery.”

  “Such an ill-mannered boy,” Mrs Arkwright commented. “I can’t understand how Katherine lets him behave as he does. He was never like that with King.”

  Marsh went back to the telephone. “He is not in. Can he call you back?” “No message,” said the man’s voice, and he rang off.

  IV

  After luncheon Marsh escaped from the house and wandered along the sloping cliff path on the village side of Reliance, where the golf-course ran down to the sea. During the meal Arkwright had extended an invitation to go sailing.

  “I hope you don’t mind, my dear,” he said, in an audible aside to Katherine Waring. “It is more in the nature of medical treatment than a jaunt. Our young friend looks as though a good blow on the briny would do her good.”