No Love Lost (14 page)

He sighed. ‘I'm so glad,' he said simply. ‘I did so fear you might have formed a wrong impression. My clients were merely anxious to make certain that nothing of – er – how shall I say? … an unfortunate nature would appear about Miss Forde in the very same newspapers which had arranged to carry their advertisements. You do see, Doctor, that would have been most embarrassing?'

‘Do you know how near it might have happened?' I felt unkind as soon as I had spoken. He looked both intelligent and appalled.

‘I gathered it,' he said earnestly. ‘I've been on tenterhooks, believe me. But my position was particularly difficult since the lady was in the care, and not the very good care, I fear, of her husband.'

My heart jumped violently but I didn't understand him. I stood looking at him blankly until he said primly: ‘Miss Forde was married to Mr Gastineau some years ago in Sweden. We have verified that.' He conveyed that as far as he knew a marriage in Sweden was legal, but not of course so good as it would be in England.

Even in my shaking-kneed condition I felt that he and Percy should have met.

‘Are you sure of this?'

‘Oh, without a doubt,' said Mr Bluett firmly. ‘Otherwise my position would have been so much easier, wouldn't it? You would have found me at the front door, Doctor, not the back. It was the return of Mr Gastineau, virtually from the dead, which has made most of our trouble.'

‘But I thought Miss Forde was married to – to someone else,' I said huskily.

He regarded me with horror and said the last thing I had expected.

‘Now that really would be intolerable. I know there was an unfortunate publicity story which appeared before she was famous, about some runaway – er – escapade in Italy, but believe me, that was pure fiction. Miss Forde herself assured my clients when they were checking her credentials that there was
nothing in it. They understood that she was a widow, Mr Gastineau's widow. When they learnt that she had vanished after going to dine with her husband, who had so suddenly reappeared, they were naturally anxious, so they put matters in our hands.'

‘Because they feared that she might be on the verge of a breakdown?' I murmured cruelly.

He met my eyes very steadily.

‘On the verge of a breakdown,' he repeated meekly, and the vague expression crept over his eyes again.

I said nothing. My mind was seething with a thousand questions and it was some seconds before I heard his polite inquiry.

‘When do you think she will be well enough for me to take her back, Doctor?'

When it did sink in I nearly fell over.

‘Take her back?' I whispered.

‘Naturally.' He was surprised by my stupidity. ‘Quite frankly, now that I have found her I have no intention of leaving her side. My clients are in the process of spending two million pounds in publicizing their product in advertisements which – er – incorporate her face. Now that Mr Gastineau has gone, she will hardly want to stay here. I should like to take her back to her flat in London.'

I didn't know what to do. I stood there shaking, wondering whether to tell John at once, wondering whether to clasp dear Mr Bluett by the hand, wondering whether to sit down and cry with relief. The thing that settled the matter was the most unexpected incident in the whole of that hectic week-end.

Downstairs in the front hall somebody coughed loudly and, looking over the banisters, I found myself facing Percy Ludlow and Sergeant Archer. They were both cold and miserable and Percy looked furious. As he saw me he heaved a noisy sigh.

‘Ann! Thank God for somebody sensible. Come down, can you? Give this feller some sort of statement'

Mr Bluett had faded into the background like a shadow so I went down to them alone. Percy had his hands in his coat pockets and was stamping on the tiles to keep his feet warm.
It was clear that he had been dragged out of bed, for he was unshaven and there was a muffler round his throat.

Archer was in much the same state, except that his uniform hid his lack of collar, and both men were covered with mud. The sergeant was more quiet and paler than I had ever seen him, and it took me some minutes to grasp that this new attitude of his was partly deference and partly shock. Percy surprised me by taking my arm.

‘You look tired. Had a bad night? Patient doing?'

‘Not bad,' I assured him. ‘Sitting up.'

‘Eating?'

‘A little.'

‘That's all right, then. Sorry to bring you more trouble, but we can't get on without you. The two survivors can't speak anything but monkey talk.'

‘Survivors?'

‘Yes.' He blew the word into a bubble. ‘Another blessed road smash. And I tell you what, Ann, and I don't mind saying it in front of a policeman, he can take it down if he likes, it's solely the fault of that fool woman.'

‘What woman?'

He exploded. ‘Why, Lizzie! She was the only woman on the road. Lizzie Luffkin, silly old besom. She admitted to running out to a fast-moving car and shining a torch in the eyes of the driver. I ask you! I hope she gets a reprimand from the court – in fact I'll see she gets it. Car turned clean over. One man died instantly.'

‘Who?' I asked, although I think I knew.

Percy patted me. ‘Your patient, my dear. Sorry, but there you are. I think I'm right. Osteoarthritis, far advanced.'

‘Yes, that's Gastineau.'

‘That's all I want to know, Doctor.' Archer was gentle. ‘Just the name and approximate age. I can't get a word of sense out of the others.'

Percy stayed with me and when the policeman had gone tried to comfort me, I don't quite know why.

‘Poor feller,' he murmured, standing on the doorstep, his legs wide apart, his old eyes roaming the morning scene. ‘Poor, poor
feller. But still, arthritis. Joints badly affected. He hadn't much to look forward to, had he?'

‘No.' I spoke more softly than I had intended. ‘No, he hadn't. Nothing at all,'

Nurse and Mr Bluett stayed with Francia, and before I left Peacocks I rang Mr Robins again and arranged for the Mapleford ambulance to take her back to London but not to Barton Square. Mr Bluett, who revealed a remarkable resource, fixed for a London nurse to travel with her.

No one appeared to notice that it was a little odd that Gastineau and his servants should have decided to go driving in the dawn with a earful of luggage. Mapleford was so aghast at the accident, and so intrigued by its cause, that it missed the obvious, and the only person who would have been certain to seize on it was not saying very much just then. Poor Miss Luff kin had taken to her bed with the outspoken Wells as her medical attendant.

I took John home to breakfast and Rhoda met us with a look which said plainly as words that we could tell her what we liked, but as she saw it we'd been out all night. However, since John was so thin, she spread herself over breakfast, and while she was cooking and singing ‘Careless Hands' with expression, I snatched a bath and he telephoned Grundesberg.

We sat in the sunny window with coffee, home-made bread, and the butter which Rhoda had given her by a woman who knows a cow, and we did not look at each other. The world was quiet and warm and green and I was happy and hungry and curious.

John was happy too. It glowed in him and made him different and exciting, and not at all as I had known him as a boy.

After a long time he said abruptly:

‘I had a talk with Mr Bluett, and if he's right about Francia Gastineau you'll have to have me led around by a keeper, Ann. Choose someone kind.'

‘Is he right?'

‘I don't know.' He spoke very slowly, putting out his hand to find mine. ‘The thing that makes it credible is the otherwise unbelievable attitude of Messrs Moonlight and Company.'

‘Why?'

‘Well, my dear girl, a concern of that size doesn't merely choose a pretty face, however famous. It's a serious business, that sort of advertising. They must have examined her record very carefully before they risked using her in a scheme as vast as that. If she said she was Gastineau's widow they'd have spotted any legal second marriage, or so I should have thought.'

I turned round to him, put my hands on his shoulders and looked into his face.

‘It's time I had that story, John.'

His face was close to mine, but there was no deeper colour in it and his eyes were thoughtful rather than ashamed.

‘Now we've saved her silly little life for her, I don't seem anywhere near so sore,' he observed unexpectedly. ‘That was why I was so thrilled when I saw her reviving, I suppose. My God, she made a monkey out of me.'

‘What was this?' I burst out with some asperity. ‘A shotgun wedding?'

That annoyed him and his arms closed round me to make certain of me while he talked. In some ways he had not changed since he was ten.

‘I didn't write and tell you about the film offer because I knew that you'd never approve of my giving up medicine, and I wanted to get it all fixed before you could advise against it,' he announced with all the peculiar irritability of a man making a confession.

‘Very wise,' I murmured.

He sighed and pushed my head down on his shoulder.

‘I told you. I fell for the movie offer and I helped push the thing through with the army. The company was going to make a film with the old French stage star, Mme Duse, a wonderful old dear, Ann. She had a face like a duck but she could make you laugh or cry at will. I was to be the young army officer, bursting with charm and verisimilitude, who was to make hay with her daughter's heart as I came charging in with my men to liberate 'em all.'

‘Yes, I see all that.'

‘I don't think you do,' he said grimly. ‘I was so dead keen
and so were all my buddies in the regiment. Some of 'em were to be loaned for small parts, and we were like kids about it all. The war was over and this was the first pleasant thing to happen to us for years. Unfortunately I was teacher's pet and I didn't know the ropes at all. There's a hell of a lot of jealousy in that business, Ann.'

‘I believe you,' I laughed and he pushed my head down again.

‘It's not quite as you think, all the same. The movies are a much more chancy business than most, and publicity seems to mean such a hell of lot to everybody. You see, until the little director chap discovered me, and got a story with me about my being given indefinite leave because I was just what they wanted and typical and all that, until then the
daughter
was supposed to be the second most important person in the show.'

‘Oh, I see. And she was to be played by Francia?'

‘Exactly. Francia had been spotted playing “bits” in Sweden and had been sent over for the part. She was a go-getter in her way. At least she wouldn't let anything stand in it. But unfortunately when she arrived I had appeared on the scene, and seemed all set to steal her thunder.'

He paused. ‘Mind you, there was not a great deal of thunder to go round. We only had what Mme Duse left. However, the director had become sold on me and he had the script-writers enlarge my part. The result was that it didn't look as if Francia's big chance was going to get her very far.'

‘Did she make it clear that she resented that?'

He grinned. ‘Not to me. I suppose I was the only soul in the outfit who had no notion what was happening. My idea was to act. I didn't know there was any more to the job. God, I was green! Francia began by snubbing me, and then, after she'd had a good look around, suddenly made a dead set at me. I wasn't attracted and I kept out of her way. That's why what happened took me completely by surprise.'

He hesitated. ‘I think I exasperated her,' he said at last. ‘Anyway, just as all the preliminary publicity was going out she gave a party. I couldn't get out of going. I drank what I was handed and after that it was the Bristol Splice trick pure and simple.'

I wriggled my head round to look at him and sat up.

‘What's that?'

He was sneering, his fastidious nose contemptuous.

‘The Bristol Splice is the trick that in the seventeenth century the ladies of the town used to play on those prudent sailors who had left their pay with the mate, my dear. I didn't remember the end of the party, and when I did wake, with my head on fire, it was the day after tomorrow so to speak. I was in a country hotel bedroom, Francia was dancing about in a negligee, and a friend of hers – one of the lads who wrote publicity – was showing a pack of Italians, who he said were newspapermen, a picture of Francia in a wedding dress and an Italian civil marriage certificate. Everybody was drinking our health.'

‘What did you do?'

He smiled angrily. ‘Oh, same like the sailors, I'm afraid. It's a time-honoured reaction, except that I had the presence of mind not to talk. I knocked out the publicity writer and, while Francia was reviving him, dressed hurriedly in the bathroom and lit out of the window. So ended my movie career.'

‘But, darling,' I protested, ‘didn't you go back to the film people at all?'

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Where was the use? I'd got it into my head that the certificate was genuine. I made certain I was trapped. If I made a row I damned myself and the film, and if I didn't, well, I had Francia on my hands. Besides …'

‘Besides what?'

He gave me a curiously timid glance from under his lids.

‘I thought I was probably better at medicine. Oh, have a heart, Ann! I'd come smartly out of the rose-pink fog. I was sick to death of the whole lot of 'em.'

I sat thinking. He might at least have told me. And yet I knew a little of the odd mental conditions which appeared in men who had suddenly been released from years of active service. For a time some of them had developed the self-consciousness which would have been considered excessive in a Victorian miss of seventeen.

We were still holding hands and I moved a little nearer to him.