The Shadow In The House

by Maxwell March

  It was a terrifying experience, comparable, Mary thought suddenly, with being held up in the hands of giants. Afterwards she remembered with a sort of awe that even then, at that moment when she saw them frankly revealed in their true colours, she was conscious of their charm.

  Baron’s Tye would have been a beautiful house even at the moment when a murder was committed in it: so it was with its owners. Even at the moment when Mrs de Liane calmly suggested that Mary should take a principal part in depriving Marie-Elizabeth’s heirs of their heritage and Richard smilingly abetted her, they remained delightful people.

  Mrs de Liane was still gentle, still frail and gracious; Richard was still gallant, still handsome and still curiously and disarmingly friendly.

  Mary felt that she was drowning, that her natural honesty, her scruples, her very personality were being slowly submerged and overwhelmed by an irresponsible but charming force. She made a desperate stand, but it was the old woman herself who gave her the cue.

  “My dear,” she said, “look at Richard. You’ve tricked him into marrying you and he’s not angry with you—not in the least. He finds you delightful, and so do I. You two dear young people should be most happy together. Why do you want to go and spoil everything? Look at this beautiful house, think of the lovely garden. What a place to live and make love!”

  “But it was you,” said Mary, gripping reality with the frenzied urgency of the drowning. “It was you. You persuaded me to marry Richard. You told me he was going to die, you made me believe he was going to die. You tricked the clergyman, the stretcher bearers, everybody. … How can you hope to keep up the lie?”

  “My dear!—In the hall, where everyone can hear you? Think of my poor servants.”

  Mrs de Liane’s tone was only mildly reproving. She did not seem in the least perturbed by the reproaches.

  “But I want them to hear me,” said Mary. “I want everybody to hear me. You married me to Richard thinking I was an heiress, and now you find that I’m not——”

  “I still find you a very acceptable daughter-in-law, my dear,” said the old lady calmly. “I am a very reasonable woman, and I hold marriage vows sacred. I am very hurt to find that you don’t. There there, my dear, you’re overwrought. You must go and lie down.”

  She led the girl slowly towards the stairs as she spoke, and it was only at the last moment that the girl seemed to realize what was happening and wrenched herself away.

  “You can’t keep me here by force,” she said. “You wouldn’t dare.”

  The old woman looked down at herself and laughed.

  “Child, child,” she protested, “aren’t you being rather absurd. You are a nice, strong, healthy young woman, and I am very old. No, my dear, you shall go if you want to. Force doesn’t come into it. But what are you going to do? You’re married. The vows you made to Richard this morning are binding. Marriage is a very serious contract, you know.”

  Mary put her hands over her ears.

  “I won’t listen to you,” she said. “I shall go to the police and explain who I am.”

  Somewhat to her surprise neither the old woman nor Richard made any attempt to bar her passage to the door. Instead Mrs de Liane smiled.

  “And what makes you think they will believe you?”

  The question was put quietly, but Mary caught the sense of it and the gentle tone sent a thrill of terror through her heart.

  “I shall explain to them how I was tricked into this marriage, and they’ll help me to get it annulled. Marriage in circumstances like that can’t be binding.”

  “I think you may find the circumstances a little hard to prove. Richard is so well, you see.”

  Mrs de Liane was smiling frankly.

  “Don’t let me dissuade you from any project you may have in mind, my dear,” she went on. “But I feel it’s my duty to point out that if you, a friendless, unprotected girl, go to our local police or even to the London people with the story which you insist on believing is the truth, I can’t help feeling that what they will do is to ask you to sit in one of their offices very quietly until your husband—your lawful husband, my dear—very kindly comes and promises to take care of you until you are feeling more yourself. The police are very reasonable and deferential towards husbands. I’ve always thought that one of their nicest attributes.”

  The quiet words uttered in the reasonable, conversational tone had the awful ring of truth, and Mary began to realize just how far the great wing of the shadow had swept over her, and for the first time she saw herself in the pitiless trap which had been prepared for her.

  She stood looking at them in the great hall with the mellow stone floor and the rich dark carving, the blood slowly draining out of her face and her eyes widening.

  “But there were witnesses,” she said. “Witnesses who can’t be corrupted. Witnesses of standing whom someone must believe.”

  She paused. For a minute it seemed to her that a flicker of something vaguely resembling anxiety had appeared in Mrs de Liane’s face. It was very momentary, however. The next instant the old woman was smiling again, placid and irritatingly superior.

  But it had been there, Mary felt sure of it, and she pressed her advantage.

  “There was someone,” she said, “someone there who can prove the truth of my story.”

  The words died upon her lips, and a shadow fell across the hall as a car drove up the path and stopped at the foot of the steps.

  Mrs de Liane stepped forward with a curious half-arrested gesture as though she would wave the girl aside, and the next moment a tall, grave-faced man whom Mary had taken to be the doctor, and who had been present at the wedding, came lightly into the house.

  He paused on the threshold, and his expression of bewilderment as he caught sight of Richard was too spontaneous to be anything but genuine. Mary saw her opportunity and snatched at it. She brushed past the old woman and threw herself before the man.

  “You,” she said, “you were there! You can prove my story to the police.”

  “Mary!” Mrs de Liane’s voice expressed outraged protest. “Please go to your room. I am afraid the little bride is hysterical, Doctor.”

  “I’m not! I’m not!” Had it not been for the agony in the girl’s eyes the tears on her cheeks might have belied her words. “You must listen to me. Please—please! I’ve done a silly thing, but these people are mad. I want to get away. I want to go back to London.”

  The man stood looking down at her, astonishment on his face. He seemed too surprised to take in the full purport of her incoherent words. She caught his arm in her anxiety.

  “You’re a professional man. Your word carries weight. You must help me. You can’t stand by and see them do this to me. You’ll hear me, won’t you?”

  “Really, Mary, this is ridiculous.” Mrs de Liane sounded very tired and very gentle. She came forward and took the girl’s arm. “Dr Beron will prescribe a sedative, I’m sure. I’m afraid the strain has been too much for her, Doctor. This has been a very strenuous day, full of surprises and unusual excitement. Come with me, my dear.”

  Mary still clung to the man’s arm.

  “Listen to me. Hear me. Just hear me—you can’t refuse that.”

  In her desperation she infused a note of passionate appeal into her tone which it was very difficult to resist. The man looked at her and saw a pale, beautiful face, two grey tear-filled eyes and a tremulous mouth. He seemed to makeup his mind.

  “I think if you don’t mind, Mrs de Liane,” he said quietly, “I should like to have a little talk with this young lady.”

  He ignored Richard, although it was quite evident from his expression that he had seen the young man and was preparing himself for other explanations later on.

  Mrs de Liane uttered a gentle protest.

  “Really, Dr Beron, the little girl’s quite all right. Just slightly hysterical. Nothing more.”

  “All the same I should like to speak to her.”

  There was a command under the quiet
statement, and the girl felt rather than saw the old woman shrug her shoulders. She led the way to the library and threw open the door.

  Mary still clung to the doctor, and, as though reading her thoughts, the man cleared his throat.

  “I think if you don’t mind, Mrs de Liane,” he said, “I should like to see this young lady alone for a moment.”

  The old woman did not look at him. She swept away with considerable dignity, her rustling moiré skirts billowing behind her.

  The doctor closed the door.

  “Now, young woman,” he said sternly, as he turned to Mary, “you made an extraordinary exhibition of yourself just now. What’s the trouble?”

  The big library at Baron’s Tye was an unexpected room. Its cedar-panelled walls were interspersed with high bookcases which reached from floor to ceiling, and its three long windows were hung with heavy plum-coloured curtains. On any other occasion its quiet, gracious dignity, its sense of peace and drowsy gloom must have been impressive. But now Mary received only a confused impression of books and old furniture as she allowed her mind to be absorbed by the man in front of her.

  He was something between forty and fifty, heavily built and distinguished-looking, with dark hair greying at the temples and a grave, clever face, the forehead high and intellectual. Fierce eyebrows almost hid the sharp, dark eyes beneath them, which now peered out at the girl inquisitively.

  He did not sit down or suggest that she should do so, but placed himself on the hearthrug with his back to the blazing fire and regarded her severely as she stood nervously before him. He repeated his last words.

  “What’s the trouble?”

  Mary felt safe. Here at least was a reasonable person, someone belonging to a reasonable world untouched by the strange topsy-turvy magic of Baron’s Tye. Here was someone who would at least understand, if he could not condone.

  An intelligent person herself, she knew instinctively that it was no use prevaricating in any way, no use whitewashing her own part in the story or trying to put herself in a favourable light. The time had come for a showdown, and she was determined to go through with it.

  However, because she was frightened and because her mind was still reeling, she did not begin at the beginning but picked up the story at the point which interested her most.

  “Mrs de Liane told me her son was dying. She told me that to save the house from relations who would pull it down he must have a wife. And so I agreed to marry him, so that I could make the house over to her.”

  She paused. He was staring at her, a slightly amused expression on his face.

  “Did you believe that? It was rather an extraordinary story, wasn’t it?”

  “Was it?” she said. “I—I suppose it was in cold blood, but she made me believe it. She’s a most extraordinary person. Anyway, I did it to help her. Now I find her son’s not dying, and in fact it’s all a trick to get me to marry him because they thought I was somebody else.”

  The little dark eyes blinked at her.

  “You think I’m mad, don’t you?” she said helplessly.

  “On the contrary.” There was a new inflection in the deep voice which she had not heard there before. “I find you very interesting. Because you were somebody else?”

  “Yes,” Mary floundered on. “Because she thought I was Marie-Elizabeth Mason, her niece. And I’m not. I changed places with Marie-Elizabeth Mason. She took my identity and I took hers, because she wanted to get on the stage and I was miserable and had nowhere to go. And now she’s been killed and they want me to go on being her and that’s criminal and I won’t. You will bear witness that I thought Richard was dying when I married him? You will help me to get this dreadful marriage annulled? You will? You must …”

  Her voice broke on the last word, and the man raised his hand to silence her.

  “Did you think my patient was actually dying?”

  “Yes, of course. Didn’t you?”

  He laughed. “Why no, of course not. I may not be a very good doctor, but I’m not as bad as all that! Richard de Liane had a nasty spill, and I told him for his own sake that he ought to lie flat on his back for at least a fortnight. I don’t know what he’s doing roaming about now. I was appalled when I saw him in the hall just now. This is a very extraordinary story of yours, young lady. On your own showing you came down here as an impostor.”

  “Yes, I know I did.” Mary was very appealing in her despair. “I know I did. But I came down here to help Marie-Elizabeth, and when this extraordinary story was put up to me I went through with the marriage to help Mrs de Liane.”

  She stood looking at him, her hands stretched out in unconscious appeal, and he took a sudden decision.

  “It’s the most extraordinary thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” he said, “and if your story is true you’ve been the victim of a most outrageous trick. As a rule, you know, medical men make a point of not interfering in the private business of their patients, but this is really amazing. I’ll see what I can do.”

  Mary sank down in a chair.

  “Oh, if only you would!” she said. “I only want somebody to back me up, someone to explain that I’m telling the truth when I say that I was married to a man on a stretcher who appeared to be dying. I only want to get away. I don’t want to be revenged upon anyone. I only want to be free.”

  The man laughed. “Taken a fancy to young Richard?”

  “Oh no,” she said breathlessly. “No. Of course not.”

  “I see. You just want to get out of it as quietly as possible?”

  “Yes.”

  He sighed. “Very well. You stay here for a moment, and I’ll go and see Mrs de Liane. I think with a little persuasion from me she may see what an extraordinarily dangerous game she’s playing and that I may get her to see everything quietly and satisfactorily arranged. You wait here and don’t worry.”

  He took her hand for a moment, shook it, and went out of the room, closing the door quietly behind him. Mary leant back and shut her eyes. If Peter himself had suddenly appeared and taken charge of her difficulties she could not have felt more content.

  She dared not think about Richard. She found it much easier to keep him out of her mind altogether. For the first time since she had come to Byron’s Tye she felt almost at ease. The doctor had been so sensible, such a reasonable everyday sort of person. He had not even been unduly surprised.

  It was beginning to occur to her that he had probably had his suspicions about Mrs de Liane for some time and was speculating upon the exact line he would take with the old lady, when a faint movement on the other side of the room brought her to her feet as the glass front of one of the bookcases slowly swung open to reveal that its contents were false and hid a small doorway in the panelling.

  Through the doorway came the woman in grey. She had discarded her apron but still walked quietly, with a nurselike step. She shut the bookcase door quietly behind her, locked it and slipped the key in her pocket, and then, still without speaking, sat down in the chair nearest her on the opposite side of the hearth.

  Mary did not speak immediately. Her appearance had been so unexpected and so quiet that it seemed hard to believe that she had not been sitting there by the fire all the time.

  Mary resumed her seat. She felt that she had a champion and that there was no point in entering into conversation with any member of the household.

  After a moment or two, however, the woman’s steady stare got on her nerves, and, looking up, she met her eyes deliberately.

  “You should have gone when I told you to,” said the woman in grey. Her voice was as quiet as her movement, and there was no expression in it.

  Mary shrugged her shoulders. She checked the impulse to say “Oh well, it’s going to be all right now,” but her attitude conveyed the remark as clearly as though she had spoken.

  The woman in grey smiled. It was not a pretty sight. Her upper lip rose, disclosing pale gums above her strong white teeth. There was weariness, a hint of despair and unmistakabl
e contempt in the expression.

  “You little fool,” she said, still in the quiet, inflectionless tone. “You poor wretched little fool. Dr Edmund Beron is Mrs de Liane’s eldest son. His father died in Australia, leaving most of his fortune to his sister, Theresa. Her daughter was Marie-Elizabeth Mason.

  “You think he sympathized with you,” she went on with sudden passion, doubly terrifying after the apathy she had hitherto displayed. “I tell you, Mary Coleridge—or whatever your name is—you might as well expect sympathy from a fox or kindness from a wild beast as from Edmund Beron. I ought to know. Do you know who I am? I’m Jane Beron, his wife.”

  Mary looked about her wildly. For the first time she noticed that the steel frames of the windows were locked and barred. She fled towards the door, and as she reached it the woman’s voice, placid and expressionless again, said monotonously, “He’s out there with that mother of his, deciding what they’re going to do about you. He didn’t want to give himself away until he knew how much you knew.”

  Mary’s hand closed over the doorknob, but it did not turn. She tugged at its solid panels helplessly. Behind her the woman in grey laughed.

  CHAPTER VII

  The Wife

  MARY AWOKE with a start to find herself in half-darkness. She was still in the big green leather armchair by the side of the fireplace in the library, but the blazing fire had died down to a handful of white ashes and a few glowing coals.

  She had no idea how long she had slept. Her last recollection had been of drinking a cup of coffee and nibbling a piece of buttered toast which the woman in grey had brought to her when, exhausted by her recriminations and a fit of helpless weeping, she had sunk down in the chair, weariness overcoming every other emotion.

  She lay still among the green cushions, gradually assimilating the facts of that amazing day, and then somebody sighed.

  The little sound sent a thrill of horror through her, and she remembered with a startling vividness the scene at lunch when just such another sound had produced such an amazing effect upon Jane Beron.