The Girl in Blue (13 page)

‘While
mine,’ he added, ‘arranged for Vera to meet this man you speak of who has a lot
more money than me. And now that you have terminated the trust I am in a
position to get some action with the girl I love.’

‘Oh, my
God. Are you in love again?’

‘Yes,
but this time it’s the real thing.’

‘Somebody
unsuitable, of course?’

‘On the
contrary, she’s a millionairess. And that was the whole trouble, apart from
being engaged to Vera. As long as I was poor I couldn’t make a move, because
you know what people think of a man without any money who goes after a girl
with between one and two million. They sneer their heads off at him, taking it
for granted that he’s a contemptible fortune hunter who’s simply out for a
chance of getting a snug billet on Easy Street and three square meals a day.’

Willoughby’s
eyes widened. He was a man who could put two and two together, and the
expression ‘between one and two million’, coupled with the recollection of
Jerry’s telephone call asking for her name, seemed to point in the direction of
the late Mr Donahue’s heiress.

‘Is it
young Jane Hunnicut you’re in love with?’

Amazement
at his uncle’s perspicacity held Jerry dumb for an instant, and Willoughby
continued.

‘But
you’ve only met her once.’

Twice
actually, though once would have been enough.’

‘Yes, I
can see how it might. She’s an attractive young prune.’

‘Must
you call her that?’

‘Certainly
I must. A girl is either an attractive young prune or she is not an attractive
young prune. If she is an attractive young prune, why not say so? And she’s got
all that money.

‘If you
knew how I wish she hadn’t.’

‘Yes, I
believe you really do. But have you considered that it means that you’re going
to have a good deal of competition? Once the news of it gets around,
contemptible fortune hunters with a taste for three square meals a day will
start blooming like the flowers in spring.’

‘I
know. That’s why I’ve got to see her immediately.’

‘But I’m
afraid you can’t. You’re off this evening for Mellingham.’

“What!’

‘Yes, I
forgot to mention that there is a small condition attached to the termination
of the trust. Before I hand you the cash I have a little job I want you to do
for me. Do you remember that miniature I was showing you at that lunch?’

The one
of your great-great-grandmother?’

‘Or
possibly great-great-great. Yes, that’s the one,
The Girl in Blue.
And
do you remember a Mrs Clayborne who was at our lunch?’

‘Of
course. You called her Barney.’

‘I’d
hate to tell you what I’d like to call her now. She’s pinched
The Girl in
Blue
and taken it with her to Mellingham.’

‘You’re
joking.’

‘I wish
I were.’

‘But a
woman like that can’t be a thief.’

That’s
what I said to her brother when he was warning me against her, and he told me
that in New York department stores tremble like aspens when they see her coming
their way, and I have no doubt her circle of friends always count the spoons
carefully after they have had her to dinner. And even then I refused to believe
that she would rob me when she was my guest and bursting with my salt. Had I
but known, as they say in the mystery novels.’

Jerry
was profoundly shocked. His acquaintance with Bernadette Clayborne had been
only a brief one, but he had taken an instantaneous liking to her and even when
confronted with evidence like this he could not believe in her guilt.

‘But
are you sure?’

‘Of
course I’m sure. Who else could have taken the thing? No, she’s got it all
right, and you’re going to Mellingham to search her room.’

‘Good
Lord, I can’t do that.’

‘You’ll
have to if you want me to terminate the trust. I believe in reciprocity. Each
helping each.’

‘But I’ve
got a dinner date with Jane Hunnicut on Saturday.’

‘It’ll
have to be postponed. Send the girl a wire saying you have been suddenly called
away to the country.’

‘I don’t
know her address.’

‘I’ve
got it at the office. Write out the wire and I’ll send it off tomorrow morning.’

‘I don’t
know how to search a room.’

‘You’ll
pick it up as you go along. For heaven’s sake stop making all this heavy
weather over an absurdly simple task well within the scope of a mentally
retarded child of six. You’d think I was asking you to climb Mount Everest. You
ought to be able to go through Barney Clayborne’s effects in twenty minutes.’

A
strong suspicion presented itself to Jerry that this was an underestimate, and
his flesh crept briskly at the thought of what awaited him at Mellingham Hall,
Mellingham-in-the-Vale, telephone number Mellingham 631, but he could see that
it was useless to oppose his uncle’s wishes.

‘All
right,’ he said tonelessly.

‘Splendid,’
said Willoughby. ‘There’s an excellent train at about seven. I’ll tell Crispin
to expect you.’

CHAPTER ELEVEN

1

Jerry caught the excellent
train without any difficulty, and on the following afternoon Vera Upshaw
returned from Brussels, her lips tightly set and a frown on her lovely
forehead.

It was
only on very rare occasions that Vera frowned, for her mother had warned her
that it led to wrinkles, but as she entered the flat in Eaton Square her brow
was definitely knitted, and the discovery that Dame Flora Faye was out deepened
her displeasure. Problems arise in a girl’s life which only a heart-to-heart
talk with an understanding parent can solve, and one of these had been vexing
her for some days.

Fortunately
before any great progress had been made by the wrinkles a latch key clicked in
the door and Dame Flora came in, and having greeted her child sank into a chair
with the announcement that her little body was a-weary of this great world.

‘One of
those ghastly literary lunches,’ she explained. ‘I don’t know why I go to them.
It isn’t as if I were like Jimmy Fothergill, fighting for a knighthood and not
wanting to miss a trick. This one was to honour Emma Lucille Agee, who wrote
that dirty novel that’s been selling in millions in America. Her publishers got
up the lunch as part of the campaign for inflicting it on England. Chicken vol-au-vents,
fruit salad and about fifteen of the dullest speeches I ever heard. The Agee
woman told us for three quarters of an hour how she came to write her beastly
book, when a simple apology was all that was required, and Jimmy replied for
the visitors, which alone would have been enough to give the show a black eye,
and eventually we were allowed to totter out into the sunshine. But why am I
telling you all this, as I have so often said to subhuman leading men somewhere
in the second act? It’s the story of your life I want to hear. What have you to
report?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Nothing?’

‘Well,
I saw Brussels and lots of delegates from the Balkans, and there was a
charabanc expedition to Malines and a carillon concert and an inspection of
Antwerp harbour by motor launch and a state banquet —’

‘Don’t
be an ass, my chickabiddy. You know what I mean. You got my cable saying that I
had given your house painter his two weeks’ notice: go on from there. Get to
what I may loosely call the love interest. Am I about to lose a daughter but
gain a son? By the way, I met a man at the reception at the American Embassy
the other night who knows all about Homer Pyle, and he said that any time Homer
makes less than a hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year he clicks his
tongue and mutters “Why this strange weakness?”. You could be very happy on a
hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year.

Vera laughed
the bitter little laugh with which she had greeted the statement that the
Flannery and Martin book shop had not got a copy of
Daffodil Days.

‘I
could,’ she agreed, ‘but it doesn’t look as if I were going to be given the
opportunity.’

Dame
Flora uttered what in a less musical voice than hers would have been a blend of
snort and squeak. Even when registering it on the stage she had never given a
more convincing exhibition of incredulity.

‘Are
you telling me that I was all wrong about Homer Pyle, that those melting looks
he was giving you meant nothing?’

‘Apparently.’

‘It isn’t
possible. I know what the trouble was. There were too many people around. How
can you expect a man to turn the conversation to bridesmaids and wedding cake
when he’s up to his knees in Balkan delegates all the time? I can see what
happened. Just as he was about to pour out his heart there would be a cheery “Hullo
there” and another Balkan delegate would come muscling in. He might as well
have tried to propose to you in Piccadilly Circus.’

Vera
was not to be comforted. The pep talk was good, but it left her cold.

‘We
were alone and uninterrupted plenty of times. We dined together every night.’

‘And
nothing happened?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Well,
you could knock me down with a lipstick,’ said Dame Flora. ‘I just don’t
understand it.’

And yet
the explanation was quite simple. What neither had taken into consideration was
the fact that Homer all his adult life had suffered from a marked inferiority
complex where women were concerned. He was a modest man. He had no illusions
regarding himself. He knew all about his horn-rimmed spectacles, his globular
face and his dullness, and it seemed to him that he had no qualities to
compensate for these. He had no doubts whatsoever of his wish to share his life
with Vera Upshaw, but he lacked the audacity to ask her views. Swineherds in
fairy stories probably had the same misgivings when they fell in love with
princesses.

The
trouble with making a steady hundred and fifty thousand dollars year after year
— as a matter of fact with Homer it was nearer two hundred thousand — is that a
man tends to take it for granted and not look on it as an asset. Homer was
vaguely aware that there were women to whom his wealth would be an attraction,
but he knew that it would carry no weight with one as spiritual as the author
of
Daffodil Days
and
Morning’s At Seven.
That was why he did not speak
his love but let concealment like a worm in the bud feed on his damask cheek,
with the result that Vera Upshaw was getting wrinkles in her forehead and Dame
Flora Faye was liable at any moment to be knocked down with a lipstick.

‘I am
dining with him tonight,’ said Vera despondently, ‘and I have no doubt he will
continue to talk of the value to international understanding of these P.E.N. outings
and what interesting people one meets on them. He won’t get more personal than
that. And tomorrow he leaves for the country to see his sister. She’s staying
at a place called Mellingham Hall in Hampshire or Sussex or somewhere.’

She
broke off Her mother had uttered a sudden cry which rang through the room like
a war whoop.

‘What
was that name again?’

‘Mellingham
Hall.’

Then
there’s still hope.’

“What
do you mean?’

Dame
Flora’s eyes were sparkling as they had so often sparkled when she won an
argument at rehearsals with a director.

‘Listen,
baby. Everything’s going to be fine. I know Mellingham Hall. Bill Scrope took
me there for the week-end twenty-five years ago. It belongs to his brother. It’s
the romantic spot to end all romantic spots, one of those old-world places full
of shady nooks and secluded walks which were in operation when knights were
bowled over by the local damsels. Well, when I tell you that it was there I met
your father and we hadn’t strolled together in a couple of shady nooks before
he was asking me to be his, you’ll understand what I mean. It was a bit
awkward,’ said Dame Flora meditatively, ‘because I was engaged to Bill Scrope
at the time and your father was engaged to somebody whose name I’ve forgotten,
but these things can always be adjusted with a little tact. Believe me, honeybunch,
you won’t have any trouble with Homer Pyle once the Mellingham Hall atmosphere
starts to work on him.’ She paused, a look of disappointment on her face. ‘You
don’t seem very exhilarated,’ she said. ‘Why aren’t you clapping your little
hands and dancing spring dances all over the room?’

Vera’s
reaction had indeed lacked the animation a mother had the right to expect.

‘It’s a
wonderful idea,’ she said unemotionally. ‘I was only thinking that you had overlooked
one small point. How am I to get into this Mellingham Hall? I can’t just walk
in and say “Hullo there” like a Balkan delegate.’

Dame
Flora would have none of this defeatism.

‘Certainly
you can if you pay the entrance fee. Didn’t I mention that? Bill Scrope’s
brother, once opulent, is now hard up and takes in paying guests. He’ll lay
down the red carpet for you.