Dance to Your Daddy mb-42

by Gladys Mitchell

  'Oh, well, yes, so they did, but Romilly told me something more. According to him, if it could be proved that I was unfit to handle the money either before or after I inherit it, it would all be taken out of my hands and administered for me. I know what that would mean. In effect, Romilly would have it. He's my guardian.'

  'Let me get this clear,' said Dame Beatrice, testing the girl. 'To inherit your grandfather's fortune, you must reach your twenty-fifth birthday. Should you die before that birthday, the money would go to an old woman named Bradley, whom you do not know. If you reach that birthday, and then either die or are considered incapable of managing your affairs, the fortune goes to Romilly Lestrange.'

  'Or if I'm considered incapable before I'm twenty-five. Why did he ask you to come here?'

  'I understand I am not to be the only guest,' said Dame Beatrice, side-stepping the question. 'Is there not to be quite a large houseparty?'

  'Oh, I believe so. Why should all these idiotic relations come to Galliard Hall?'

  'Perhaps Romilly thinks that Miss Judith is in need of young society.'

  'I think she's Mrs Judith. I think they're married. And do you know what else I'm beginning to think? I think he dare not kill me himself, and he's going to sound out these others, and find which one can be bribed to do it for him. I suppose he's brought you here as a second string to his bow, in case the killing doesn't come off. You're a psychiatrist, he tells me, and your name is Professor Beatrice Adler. Are you related to the famous Adler, by any chance?'

  'There are two famous Adlers,' Dame Beatrice responded. 'There is Alfred Adler, the pupil of, and, later, the dissentient from, Sigmund Freud, who, to my mind, was inestimably the greater man, and there is also, of course, the musician Larry Adler, of whom I hear good reports from my younger relatives.'

  'Oh, yes, I adore him and his harmonica-playing. I think he's wonderful,' said Rosamund.

  'They allow you a radioset, then,' said Dame Beatrice, deciding to shelve the question of her name. In Romilly Lestrange, she was beginning to think, she had hit what Laura would call 'a new high' in her catalogue of smooth villains. She was also beginning to wonder whether Rosamund was quite what she seemed.

  'Well, they did, until they took it out of my room and threw it away. From that time they haven't let me have any proper clothes. That's to stop me running away again, of course,' said the girl.

  'And you did not throw the radio set into the sea?'

  'Of course I didn't! I wanted it. I miss it terribly.'

  'Nor did you drown the gramophone records, the cat, and the monkey?'

  'Of course I didn't. They made it all up. They've also got some silly story about a baby doll. It's all such a lot of nonsense-but it's very wicked, all the same. I'm in a trap, and I'm dreadfully frightened.'

  'Were you ever pregnant?'

  'How could I be? Surely they didn't tell you that! I'm not even married.'

  'That, of course, is not necessarily an obstacle to a pregnancy.'

  'You're not on their side, are you? I thought you were my friend! Have you brought me out here to kill me? I've got a pistol in my pocket, you know!'

  George spoke for the first time since the car had moved away from the house.

  'Don't be silly, miss,' he said, in a severely avuncular tone. 'I beg your pardon, madam. I ought to tell you, though, that ever since we turned off B3351 I've had an idea I was being followed, and now I'm sure I am. Would there be any instructions?'

  'No, George. Just carry on to Swanage, as planned.' She turned to her charge. 'What was your grandfather's name?'

  'Felix Napoleon Lestrange. He died in April, 1966.'

  'So you are a Lestrange by birth? Most interesting.'

  As they passed the obelisk on Ballard Down, George reported that the other car had turned off to the left for Studland.

  'Was it Romilly's car?' asked Rosamund.

  'To the best of my knowledge and belief, miss, it was the old Standard I've seen in the garage. The colour was the same, but they've been keeping far enough away-I've lost them now and again on the bends-for me not to be able to read the number plate, so, of course, I couldn't take my oath on it.'

  (2)

  'Do we dare to ask how you got on this afternoon, my dear Beatrice?' asked Romilly, when they were gathered ready for tea.

  'Certainly. We spent a short time-twenty minutes, perhaps-gazing at the sea. We also had our first session.'

  'Were other people there?' asked Judith. 'If so, didn't they stare?'

  'Why should they stare?'

  'Oh, well, surely they would think Trilby's get-up rather unusual.'

  'Have you been in London recently?'

  'No, I haven't. Why?'

  'If you had, you would see nothing unusual in the way Mrs Romilly was dressed. The latest fashions for the young are so bizarre that even a Georgian costume, complete with jabot, lace ruffles, knee-breeches and buckled shoes, would be considered rather unenterprising, and, in any case, Rosamund had covered her finery with a heavy, caped coat.' She thought it unnecessary to mention that she and Rosamund had not left the car. They had lowered the windows and sat warmly wrapped up in the car rugs.

  'Really!' said Judith. 'I wonder how Trilby has learnt about the London fashions, then?'

  'Oh, they are pictured in the newspapers, no doubt,' said Dame Beatrice. 'I suppose you allow her to see a newspaper from time to time?'

  'Never mind the fashions,' said Romilly. 'How did she behave?'

  'She was no trouble, if that is what you mean. Of course, I have yet to gain her full confidence.'

  'But you have already had an effect on her?'

  'Very possibly. I should have even more effect on her if I could remove her from this house for a time.'

  'She made no attempt to throw anything into the sea?' pursued Romilly, completely ignoring the suggestion.

  'Certainly not; neither did we make any attempt to drown one another.'

  'You are being facetious, my dear Beatrice.'

  'In my opinion, you yourself have been treating matters all too seriously. There is nothing more debilitating for any invalid than to allow her to think she is worse than is really the case.'

  'Well,' said Judith, 'I hardly see how Trilby could be worse than we think her. To change the subject, Uncle Romilly, our guests begin to arrive tomorrow. I wonder, Dame Beatrice, whether you would care to see what arrangements I have made for them? I imagine that you will not take the after-tea session Uncle Romilly had arranged, as you have been with Trilby all the afternoon?'

  'No, I shall not need to see her again today.'

  'While you are showing Beatrice over the house, I think I would like to talk to Trilby myself,' said Romilly. 'I am interested to find out what she thought of her afternoon out.'

  'Not if you wish me to continue the treatment. Any interference at present would set her back, I'm afraid,' said Dame Beatrice. 'I do beg of you not to question her.'

  'I am her husband.'

  Dame Beatrice shrugged her thin shoulders.

  'I have no desire, of course, to make an issue of it,' she said, 'but, after all, you may be her husband in name, yet you neither have her at your table nor in your bed.'

  'Plain speaking!' Romilly looked surprised and amused.

  'There are times in every doctor's life when there is nothing else for it. The professional, not the individual, speaks, so you must bear with me and allow me to give the orders where my patient is concerned.'

  'Very well.' They were seated in front of one of the two fireplaces in the great hall. 'Shall we go into the drawing-room?'

  'No, let's have tea in here,' said Judith. 'I'm warm and comfortable by this beautiful log fire. It seems a pity to move. Ring the bell, Uncle.' Romilly did this, but the bell was not answered quickly enough to please Judith, who spoke sharply when Amabel's sister, at the end of five minutes, appeared from the corridor which Dame Beatrice had traversed twice that afternoon
. 'You've been a long time coming, Violet!'

  'Sorry, Messus Judeth, Oi'm sure. Us ben looken after Messus Trelby. Such a lovely tea her've etten, ee'd hardly credet, her haven such a poor appetoite as a rule.'

  'Really!' said Romilly. 'That is excellent news, Violet. She's found an appetite, has she? I'm delighted.'

  'Tea in here, and at once,' said Judith. 'Bring that small table forward, and we may need another one. You and Amabel can carry it here from the drawing-room.'

  'Ee can have Messus Trelby's trolley. That ud be best, Oi reckon.'

  Violet, having proved her independence, retired to bring in the tea.

  'You'll have to speak severely to that girl,' said Judith, flushing until her face looked as round and as red as an apple. 'She is becoming quite impossible.'

  'It is only her country manner,' said Romilly soothingly, yet with a note of warning in his voice. 'I think we must overlook it, especially as maids are difficult to obtain. We don't want her giving notice. If she goes, I'm pretty sure that Amabel will go with her, and they're very clean, good workers. You've said as much yourself.'

  'That girl is on the verge of insolence!'

  'Oh, no, I think not, my dear. And if she brings the things in on a trolley, there really is no need for a second table.'

  'She'll have to do as she's told when our visitors come. I won't have her insolent to them. I'm sure Dame Beatrice doesn't take insolence from her servants. I've noticed how very respectful her chauffeur is.'

  'George has been with me for many years,' said Dame Beatrice, 'and my other servants, except for the kitchenmaid, who is a country girl from Warwickshire, are French.'

  'That might account for it,' said Judith. She looked balefully at Romilly. 'Uncle can't manage servants, anyway. He's much too soft with them.'

  Romilly traced a pattern on the handsome rug with the toe of his shoe. Without looking up, he said:

  'You are right, of course, my dear, but, if you can understand a syllogism, think of this: all housekeepers are servants. You are a housekeeper, therefore you are a servant.'

  'How can you talk like that, when you have me call you Uncle?'

  'Wait. I have not finished. I cannot manage servants, therefore I cannot manage you. And, of course, I cannot, but, at any rate, I can continue to try. I forbid you, utterly and absolutely, to attempt to take Violet to task for what she said about the tea-trolley. Think, my dear girl, think! How could you run a house this size without the help of the maids?' He raised his eyes and looked her straight in the face. There was an awkward moment of silence before Judith said sullenly:

  'All right. You're only storing up trouble for yourself, but I suppose you must have your own way.' She made an attempt to smile, and added, in a light and playful tone, 'You're a very wicked old man!'

  Dame Beatrice, who had been casually working at an indeterminate piece of knitting, dropped it on the rug as the tea-trolley made its noisy approach to them across the tiled floor.

  'How nice to have a cup of tea,' she said. What she thought was a different matter. It was that, in this particular household, even impudent servants had to be conciliated.

  (3)

  Dame Beatrice that night wrote to Laura.

  'The situation here is fascinating, macabre and in many ways incredible. I am living in a world of Sheridan Le Fanu, Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins and the Brontes. Imagine-a simple matter for a romantic such as yourself-a house inhabited by a smiling villain, a light-of-love who calls him her uncle, a sinister manservant, two country maidens of unblemished character, and an heiress who is permitted to wear nothing but fancy dress for fear she will elude the villain and his paramour and make her escape from their clutches!

  'Of course, I do not know how much I should believe of the victim's story, but I have so little liking for her (alleged) persecutors that, when you have leisure to spare from attendance upon Eiladh, I wish you would make a few enquiries for me.

  'I want to know details of the Will of a certain Felix Napoleon Lestrange, who died in April, 1966. I do not know where he lived, but, with that sufficiently unusual name, identification should be a reasonably simple matter.

  'You will wish to know what has befallen me since my arrival in this house. I was made welcome with an effusiveness which aroused my suspicions. My bedroom, which, I have been informed, must also be my consulting-room, has had an interior wall breached so that a foot-square hole communicates with the adjoining room. Any conversations I may have with my patient, therefore, can be overheard. I have circumvented this invasion of our privacy, so far, by taking the patient out in my car and holding a conversation with her during the drive. We went to Swanage, and were followed. This added to the general impression of what I feel sure you would refer to as Rosamund being trapped in the Den of the Secret Nine. I feel that my move to talk with my patient in private has scarcely found favour with her captors, who were most anxious to accompany us on our outing, a policy with which I found myself unable to agree. Their attempt to follow us was indicative, I thought, of their state of mind.

  'I have also discovered why I was sent for at this particular time when, according to Romilly's own statement, it would have been better, from the patient's point of view, to have called me in a year or more ago, but, when I have mastered the contents of the Will, I shall know whether my interpretation of the evidence is justified and what is the best course to pursue. My patient appears to have no idea of my identity. I have been recommended to her, it seems, under the name of Professor Beatrice Adler. I mention this because, if what she has told me is correct, something in the terms of Felix Napoleon's bequest may surprise you.

  'I would not trouble you so soon did I not think (as she herself does) that my patient is in extreme danger either of death or (which appears to be my role) found incapable of managing her affairs and so losing all control of her fortune. I hasten to assure you that I myself am in no danger whatsoever. I am thought far too valuable to be liquidated, and George, the good, reliable fellow, is alive to the nuances (if I may put it in that way) of the situation as they strike both of us at present, and is prepared to cope with anything untoward which may crop up.'

  Having closed and stamped her letter, Dame Beatrice descended to the great hall with the intention of walking to the end of the drive and putting it into Galliard Hall's own post office collecting box, a neat affair affixed to the outside of the wall which abutted on to the road. She had reached the hall door when she was intercepted by Romilly.

  'You are surely not thinking of taking a walk in the dark, my dear Beatrice?' he said.

  'A walk? No, that is an exaggeration,' she replied. 'I am going as far as the postbox at your gate.'

  'A letter? Oh, I see. You had better give it to me. We let the dogs loose at night.'

  'You are nervous of being burgled?'

  'Well, you will admit that this house is in a lonely situation and there are valuables. These pictures, for example'-he waved his hand towards those which Dame Beatrice had noticed upon her arrival at Galliard Hall-'I am told are probably worth several thousand pounds, and I have treasures of my own. Then there are some quite valuable trinkets which, from time to time, I have given Judith. They, like the pictures, are insured, of course, but I should be loth to lose them, and so would she.'

  'I am not in the least afraid of dogs,' said Dame Beatrice, 'but as you will not wish me to run the risk of being attacked, you will not be averse to accompanying me as far as the gate.'

  'Oh, nonsense! Give the letter to me. I could not dream of allowing you to run your own errands when I can so easily do them for you.'

  Dame Beatrice had not the slightest intention of delivering her letter into his hands. She smiled her reptilian smile and said:

  'My only object was to study the stars. It is a singularly clear and beautiful night, but, as late as this, there will be no collection of letters. It will do equally well in the morning. It is only a note to my secretary about some work I wan
t her to do while I am away. Rosamund tells me that she has a birthday coming along. When would that be? I should wish to give her a present.'

  'She didn't tell you when it was?'

  'She merely mentioned that she would be twenty-five years old.'

  'Oh? Well, it's on the twenty-ninth of May.'

  'I must remember to wear an oak-apple in my hat,' said Dame Beatrice genially.

  'I hope she has not been stuffing you up with any nonsense?'

  'What kind of nonsense?'

  'Well, she expects to come into this money of hers when she is twenty-five, and she seems to have some manifestly absurd idea that other people are after it, and will stick at very little in order to get hold of it. All part of her aberration, of course, but I just thought I'd warn you not to take her accusations seriously, particularly if they refer to Judith and myself.'

  'Of course I shall not pay attention to her fears unless they are well-founded. The twenty-ninth of May? How interesting!' She gave him a little nod and went upstairs to her room, her letter still in her hand.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  PIEDS-EN-L'AIR-FAMILY GATHERING

  'Oh, master, if you did but hear the pedlar at the door,

  you would never dance again after a pipe and tabor.'

  The Winter's Tale.

  (1)

  The first of the guests arrived on the following day. The morning was damp and misty. Dame Beatrice, returning from dropping her letter into the pillar-box, saw that the hills behind the house were shrouded in grey and that the clouds promised rain before noon.

  She joined Romilly, as before, for breakfast, and remarked that it looked like becoming a wet day. She wondered, she added, whether he was going into Swanage for a morning paper.

  'No,' he replied. 'I'm expecting Tancred and some others. No telling when they're likely to turn up, so I had better stay in, and there's nobody I can send, unless your man would like to go.'

  'Tancred?'

  'Yes. He's a ruddy poet. I can't stand him, but he had to be asked, you know. Can't leave anybody out. Matter of fact, I can't stand any of them. Hubert might be all right, but I don't know him as well as I know the others. In any case, I have very little use for clergymen.'