Berry And Co. (4 page)

“I was and shall be. For the nonce–” He turned to a tall dark girl who was leaning against the chimney-piece, watching us curiously. “Let me introduce my brother-in-law. Carefully kept from me before marriage and by me ever since. Both the ablative case, I believe, but what a difference? So rich is the English tongue.”

The girl threw back her head and laughed. I observed that she had nice teeth.

“Name of Childe,” she said in a sweet voice. “After all, we can’t expect him to remember everything. Wasn’t my brother in your regiment?”

“I knew I’d seen you somewhere,” said I. “The last time you were on a towel, leaning against a bottle of hairwash. That was in Flanders in 1916.”

“That,” said Berry, “will do. Miss Childe and I came here to lunch, not to listen to maudlin memories of the Great War. Did I ever tell you that a Spaniard once compared me to that elusive bloom to be found only upon the ungathered apricot?”

“How much did you lend him? “said I.

“Perhaps he knew more about ferns,” said Miss Childe.

“Blind from birth, I suppose,” said Jonah’s voice.

My brother-in-law rose to his feet and looked about him with the expression of one who has detected an offensive odour.

“He was a man of singular insight and fine feeling,” he said. “At the time of his outburst I was giving evidence against him for cruelty to a bullock. And now, for goodness’ sake, somebody collect Jill and let’s have some lunch.”

“As a matter of fact,” said Miss Childe, “I’ve come down to get some butter and eggs. They’re usually sent, but the housekeeper’s ill, and, as I was going spare, father suggested I should run down and pick them up.”

Her voice sounded as if she was speaking from afar, and I knew that I must call up all my reserves of willpower if I was to remain awake.

“But Berry’s with you, isn’t he?”

“Yes. Your sister came to lunch yesterday and happened to mention that he wanted to go to Pistol today, so I offered him a lift. He’s much nicer than any chauffeur.”

“But whatever did he want to come to Pistol for?”

“Ah.” From a great distance I watched Miss Childe’s brown eyes take on a look of mischief that seemed at home in its bright setting. “He wouldn’t tell you and he didn’t tell Captain Mansel the truth, so I shan’t give him away.” She looked at a tiny wristwatch. “And now I must be going. We want to start back at half-past three, and I’ve twenty-five miles to do before then.”

“May I come with you?”

“Certainly. But—”

I stepped to where Jill was scribbling a note.

“We needn’t start before half-past three,” I said. “Will you wait for me?”

She nodded abstractedly.

Jonah was dozing over a cigarette. Berry had disappeared.

Three minutes later I was sitting in a comfortable coupé, which Miss Childe was driving at an unlawful speed in the direction of Colt.

“You drive a lot, don’t you?” flashed my companion.

“A good deal.”

“Then I expect you hate being driven by a stranger?”

“Not at all. Sometimes, of course–” I waited for us to emerge from between two motor-lorries and a traction-engine. As we were doing over forty-five, the pause was but momentary. “I mean—”

“That you’re being frightened to death?”

“Not to death. I’ve still got some feeling in my right arm.” We dropped down one of the steepest hills I have ever seen, with two bends in it, at an increased speed. “You keep your guardian angel pretty busy, don’t you?”

A suspicion of a smile played for a second about my lady’s lips.

“The only thing I’m really frightened of is a hansom cab,” she affirmed.

“Try and imagine that there are half a dozen round the next corner, will you?”

The smile deepened.

“Is your heart all right?” she demanded.

“It was when we started.”

“But I know this road backwards.”

“You needn’t tell me that,” said I. “We should have been killed long ago if you didn’t. Seriously, I don’t want to abuse your hospitality, but we’re going to have kidneys for breakfast tomorrow, and I should be sorry to miss them.”

“Are you fond of kidneys?”

“Passionately. I used to go out and gather them as a child. In the morning and the meadows. Or were we talking of haddock?”

Miss Childe hesitated before replying.

“I used to, too. But I was always afraid of their being toadstools. They’re poisonous, aren’t they?”

“Deadly. By the way, there are six hansoms full of toadstools at the crossroads which I observe we are approaching.”

“I don’t believe you.”

I was wrong. But there was a waggon full of logs and a limousine full of children, which were rather worse.

We proceeded amid faint cries of indignation.

“What do you do,” said I, “when you come to a level-crossing with the gates shut?”

“I don’t,” said Miss Childe.

I was still working this out, when my companion slowed down and brought the car to a standstill in front of a high white gate bearing the legend “Private,” and keeping a thin brown road that ran for a little way between fair meadows before plunging into a swaying beechwood.

“Anything the matter?” I asked.

Miss Childe laid a hand on my arm.

“Be an angel,” she said in a caressing voice.

“Certainly,” said I. “With or without wings?”

“And open the gate, so that—”

“I know,” I cried, “I know. Don’t tell me. ‘So that the automobile may pass unobstructed between the gate-posts.’ Am I right?”

“How on earth did you know?”

“Instinct.” I opened the door and stepped backwards into the road. “I’m always like this before eating kidneys,” I added.

As I re-entered the car—

“Now we can let her out,” said Miss Childe contentedly. “It’s such a relief to feel there’s no speed limit,” she added, with a ravishing smile.

As soon as I could trust my voice—

“I shouldn’t think your chauffeurs live very long, do they?”

“On the contrary, they grow old in our service.”

“I can believe you,” said I heartily. “I myself have aged considerably since we left Highlands.”

By this time we had flung through and out of the beechwood, and the car was storming past stretches of gleaming bracken, all red and gold and stuck with spreading oak trees, that stood sometimes alone, sometimes in groups of two or three together, and made you think of staring cattle standing knee-deep in a golden flood.

The car tore on.

“We’re coming to where I used to gather the mushrooms,” my companion announced.

“Barefoot?”

“Sometimes.”

“Because of the dew?”

She nodded.

I sighed. Then—

“Up to now I’ve been feeling like a large brandy and a small soda,” I said. “Now I feel like a sonnet. What is your name, and who gave you that name?”

“I’m sure that’s not necessary. I’ve seen a sonnet ‘To a lady upon her birthday.’”

“As you please. Shall I post it to you or pin it to a tree in Battersea Park?”

Miss Childe nodded her head in the direction in which we were going.

“That,” she said, “is the house.”

At the end of a long avenue of elms I could see the bold flash of windows which the afternoon sun had set afire, and a moment later we swept by the front of an old red mansion and round into a paved court that lay on its farther side.

Here was a door open, and in front of this my companion brought the car to a standstill.

I handed her out. She rang the bell and entered. I followed her in.

“Like to look round the house?” said Miss Childe. “We’ve given up showing it since the Suffragettes, but if you could give me a reference—”

“Messrs Salmon and Gluckstein,” said I, “are my solicitors.”

My lady pointed to a door at the end of the flagged passage in which we stood.

“That’ll take you into the hall,” she said. “I’ll come and find you when I’ve seen the servants.”

I saluted and broke away in the direction she had indicated.

There was a closet that opened out of the great gallery. No door hung in the doorway, and I could see china ranged orderly against the panelling of the walls. I descended its two stairs, expecting to find it devoted to china and nothing else. But I was wrong. Facing the window and the sunshine was a facsimile of the tallboy chest which I had coveted so fiercely two hours before.

I gazed at it spellbound.

“It’s very rude to stare,” said a voice.

I turned to see Miss Childe framed in the doorway.

Her gown was of apricot, with the bodice cut low and the skirt gathered in loops to show her white silk petticoat, which swelled from under a flowered stomacher so monstrously, that the tiny blue-heeled slipper upon the second stair seemed smaller than ever. Deep frills of lace fell from her short sleeves and a little lace cap was set on her thick dark hair.

I swallowed before replying. Then—

“It’s a lovely chest,” I said lamely.

“Picked wood,” said Miss Childe. “Flogged once a week for years, that tree was.”

“Flogged?”

“Certainly.”

Suddenly the air was full of music, and a jubilant chorus of voices was singing lustily—

“
A woman, a spaniel, and a walnut tree,

The more you beat them, the better they be.”

As the melody faded—

“I told you so,” said Miss Childe. “What about the butter and eggs? Will you pay for them, or shall I have them sent?”

I handed her the largest one pound note I have ever seen.

“Thanks,” she said shortly. “Change at Earl’s Court.”

A peal of boy’s laughter floated in at the open window.

“Who’s that?” said I.

“Love,” said Miss Childe. “The locksmiths are here, and he’s laughing at them. I think it’s rather unkind myself. Besides—”

A burst of machine-gun fire interrupted her.

As the echoes died down—

“You smell of potpourri,” said I.

“Probably. I made three bags full this morning. Bead bags. Do you mind putting some coal on the fire? If there aren’t any tongs, use the telephone.”

There was no fireplace and no coal-scuttle, so I took off my right boot and put it in the bottom drawer of the tallboy instead.

“Number, please,” said Miss Childe, who had entered the closet and was standing a-tiptoe before a mirror to adjust a patch beneath her left eye.

“Lot 207,” said I.

“Line’s engaged,” said Miss Childe. “Didn’t you see it in
The Times
?”

By way of answer, I threw a large plate at her. She seemed more pleased than otherwise with the attention, and began to pluck the delicate flowers with which it was painted and gather them into a nosegay. In some dudgeon, I blew a small jug of great beauty on to a carved prie-dieu, to which it adhered as though made of some slimy substance.

“Cannon,” said my lady. “Shall I put you on?”

“I wish you would. It’s rather important.”

“You’re through.”

“Tallboy speaking,” said a faint voice. “Tallboy. Tallboy.”

“How d’ye do?” said I.

“Ill,” said the voice, “so ill. All these years I’ve carried it, and no one knew—”

“Pardon me,” said I. “I only put it there five minutes ago. You see, the fire was almost out and—”

“Measurements tell,” said the voice. “But they never do that. They polish my panels and lay fair linen within me, and great folk have stood about me telling each other of my elegance, and once a baby child mirrored its little face in one of my sides. And all the time measurements tell. But they never do that.”

A sigh floated to my ears, a long, long sigh, that rose into a wail of the wind, and a casement behind me blew to with a shaking clash.

Somewhere a dog was howling.

On a sudden I felt cold. The sunshine was gone, and the chamber had become grey and dismal. Misery was in the air.

A stifled exclamation made me look round.

My lady had backed shrinking into a corner, one little hand pressed to her heart, and in her hunted eyes sat Fear dominant. The sweet face was drawn and colourless, and her breath came quickly, so that it was grievous to mark the flutter of her smooth white chest.

Mechanically I turned to seek the cause of her terror. I saw a powerfully-built man standing square in the closet’s doorway. His face was coarse and red and brutal, and his small black eyes glowed with an ugly twinkle as he surveyed his quarry. Upon the thick lips there was a sinister smile, which broadened hideously as he glanced at the nosegay held betwixt his finger and thumb – the little nosegay that she had gathered so lightly from the painted plate. A wide-skirted coat of red fell nearly to his knees and hid his breeches. His short black periwig was bobbed, and a black silk tie was knotted about his neck. Stockings were rolled above his knees, and a huge tongue thrust out from each of his buckled shoes. And in his left hand was a heavy riding-whip whose handle was wrought about with gold. This he kept clapping against his leg with a smack and a ghastly relish that there was no mistaking.

Again that phantom chorus rose up and rang in my ears—

“
A woman, a spaniel, and a walnut tree,

The more you beat them, the better they be.”

But the jubilant note was gone, and, though the tune was the same, the voices were harsh, and there was a dreadful mockery of woe in the stave that made me shudder.

My lady heard it too.

“No, no, Ralph. You do me wrong. I plucked them myself. Who is there now to send me posies? And I am sick – you know it. The last time–” The hurrying voice faltered and stumbled piteously over a sob. “The last time I was near spent, Ralph. So near. And now – You do not know your strength. Indeed – Oh, Ralph, Ralph, what have I done that you should use me so?”

The bitter cry sank into a dull moan, and, setting a frail white arm across her eyes, she bowed her head upon it, as do weeping children, and fell to sobbing with that subdued despair that spells a broken spirit.

My lord’s withers were unwrung.

For a moment he stood still, leering like some foul thing that feasts on Anguish. Then he let fall the nosegay and took the whip in his right hand…