Nothing Venture (19 page)

“What'll you do if I tell you?”

“I won't tell
anyone.
”

“Certain sure?”

“I won't—really.”

Ferdinand had another look about him. Jervis and Rosamund had disappeared. The coffee was half way across the lawn. Lady Tetterley was flirting with Mr Leonard. Sir George had retired behind
The Times
.

He began to speak in the sort of voice that barely carries a yard:

“About a month before he'd copped me, Mr Pedro Ramirez had brought off a mighty useful little coup. He was carrying on operations in the Madalena district and harassing the government quite a bit. Then they turned nasty and sent up some real troops—and that's where he brought off his coup. There were three trains, and they left Madalena at three-hour intervals. The first of them ran off the line on the edge of the big pass where it enters the hills. It went down a couple of hundred feet, and there weren't any survivors. The second train crashed through the parapet of the bridge over the Madalena River about five miles short of the hills. And the third ran off the track only ten miles out of Madalena.”

“How?” said Nan.

“Eisenthal,” said Ferdinand.

“Yes—but
how
?”

F.F. waved his hand toward the sea.

“I'm not a chemist, but I got away with the idea that Eisenthal had invented a thing that disintegrated certain substances. The man who told me said he'd seen the sleepers where those three trains left the line, and they were just mush.”

Nan looked at him with eyes like saucers.

“But, F.F.—the first train got as far as the hills.”

He nodded.

“Why didn't it crash sooner? It must have run over the places where the other two trains went off, and the second train must have run over the bit of line where the third one crashed.”

“Yes. You're bright—aren't you? I was bright too. I said to the man who told me, ‘Look here, what are you giving me?' He said, ‘I don't know—but as I told you, so it happened.' Afterwards I asked Eisenthal. I'm not an inquisitive man, but I kind of like to know how things happen, so when I got a chance I asked him, and he told me it was all a matter of careful timing. You spray the stuff on, and it takes just so long to make a thing dicky, and so much longer to rot it right through. It must all be calculated very carefully—so much stuff to the square inch, and it takes just so long to work. Well, the place where the first train crashed was done first. It ran over the other two places before they'd got dangerous. He said he'd experimented most carefully and timed the whole show to the minute.”

Nan looked away to the distant blue of the sea. She said under her breath,

“The stuff made wood rotten?”

“So I'm given to understand.”

“Jervis' bridge was rotten.”

“That's when I began to think about Eisenthal.”

Nan turned round quickly.

“What happened to Eisenthal?”

“I'm not quite sure. I think he's dead.”

“He's not …?”

“Leonard? Not on your life! It's not so easy as that. The nearest I've got to it at present is that they were both in the South American continent at the same time—but that's not very incriminating for Mr Leonard.”

“Will you tell Jervis?”

He shook his head.

“Not a bit of good telling Jervis. I shall keep my eyes open. Don't you want any coffee? I've got a hunch we've been admiring the view just about as long as we'd better.”

They crossed the grass slowly. Ferdinand talked about Constantinople. South America was a long way away. Eisenthal was dead. They came out of the sun into the shade.

Robert Leonard was sipping his coffee. He looked cool and comfortable. He smiled pleasantly at Nan and engaged her in conversation whilst Lady Tetterley transferred her attentions to Ferdinand. Sir George kept
The Times
firmly between himself and the outside world. After a little while he ceased to turn the pages; the sheets crumpled and sank lower, and a steady rhythmical sound came from behind them.

XXV

The path under the rhododendrons was cool and dark; a faint breath of damp rose up from between the twisted stems. There was water not very far away. Jervis walked beside Rosamund Carew, but he didn't look at her; he looked into the green gloom ahead of them. When they came to the place where a couple of planks crossed a runnel of water, he stood still and said,

“What do you want to say to me?”

“Quite a lot of things.”

“Well, suppose you get down to it.”

“I'm not in any hurry.”

Jervis looked at her in order to ensure the direction of the portentous frown.

“If you've really got anything to say to me, I think this would be a good place to say it, and then we can go back and join the others.”

Rosamund, as usual, was smoking. She withdrew her cigarette and blew out a cloud of smoke before she said,

“Won't she let you speak to me? Poor old Jervis!” There was a light drawling contempt in her voice.

Jervis smiled, that sudden, dangerous smile of his.

“You are too attractive, he said. “You always were. One must defend oneself.”

Rosamund drew at her cigarette.

“I've been wondering where on earth I'd seen her before, and I've just got there. Used she to dance at Solano's?”

Jervis nodded.

“I believe she did. Have you anything to say about it?”

“No—I just wondered whether you knew.”

“Certainly I knew. Is that all you wanted to say to me? Shall we go back and have our coffee?”

“It isn't nearly all. Your coffee will have to wait. I've got a lot of things to say to you.”

“Say them,” said Jervis.

She threw away the end of her cigarette. It fell into the water and with a little hiss went dead.

“Why did you get engaged to me?” she said suddenly.

“Why does one get engaged to anyone?”

“You weren't in love with me.”

He shrugged his shoulders very slightly.

“Or you with me. Is there any object in digging up these ancient remains?”

“Yes—I'd like to know why you ever thought of marrying me.”

She was lighting another cigarette, and she looked, not at Jervis, but at the spurting flame of the match. Jervis looked at it too. It licked the paper and blackened it; infinitesimal red points strung themselves together where the edge of the paper had been; a tiny spiral of smoke went up.

“One thinks about marrying—and when you've got as far as that you look round for someone to marry. You were adjacent, you were heavily backed by the family, and you appeared to be quite pleased with the idea.”

Rosamund threw her head back and looked at him out of half-closed eyes.

“I was thrust on you against your will? Is that what you're trying to say?”

“Not in the least! You might know by now that I don't try and say things—I say them. It was a matter of mutual convenience. We both got something out of it.”

Rosamund drew rather a long breath.

“Did you wonder why I broke it off?”

“Oh no—it was perfectly obvious.”

“You think I did it to get the money.”

Jervis' eyes met hers for a moment. Their expression was one of amusement. It stung her into a hot protest.

“What a foul mind you've got! No wonder you were livid, if you thought I'd done a beastly thing like that!”

Jervis laughed.

“Perhaps you'd like to explain why you did do it.”

“I can't. But it wasn't anything to do with the money. You can't possibly believe a thing like that!”

“Can't I?”

“No, you can't. It's not true anyway. And if you hadn't rushed off and married the first girl who vamped you, everything would have been all right.”

“It must have been a nasty jolt for you. Pretty good staff work—wasn't it?”

Rosamund swung round and stood with her back to him for a moment. Then she said over her shoulder,

“You needn't rub it in.”

“I don't want to talk about it,” said Jervis—“I never did. Don't you think we might go back to the others?”

“No.”

“Is there anything else you want to say to me? Because if not—”

“Of course there is!”

“Let's get on with it then.”

Rosamund turned round. Her face never varied from its even pallor, but a still paler line seemed to have been drawn from nose to mouth. It ran from the nostril to the corner of the lip on either side, and it made her look ten years older.

“You're as hard as nails,” she said. “It's no use trying to work on your feelings, because you haven't got any.”

“Yes?”

She made a slight gesture with her cigarette.

“Jervis—I've got to have some money. I can't go on—the situation's impossible—I owe about five hundred.”

Jervis frowned at the running water.

“You can send the bills to me. I'll settle them this time, but not again. After this you'll have to make do on your allowance.”

“Three hundred a year?”

He looked at her, and looked away again.

“If I make it four, will you keep within it?”

“No—I can't. It's no good pretending that I can. If Uncle Ambrose had meant me to live on four hundred a year, he ought to have brought me up differently.”

Jervis was smiling again.

“I think you were twenty before you were here, except on a visit. It strikes me you were pretty thoroughly brought up by then.”

“Whoever brought me up, it wasn't on the four hundred a year standard. I can't do it. If Uncle Ambrose had known you were going to marry someone else, he'd have left me properly provided for. He talked about it once before we were engaged, and he said he'd leave me twenty-five thousand.”

“What's the good of talking like that?”

“Give me that twenty-five thousand and let me clear out. I don't bring you very good luck—do I? Well, let me clear out. I've got a good opening that I could take if I'd some capital. Let me go, and I've an idea that it'll be better for all of us.”

“My dear Rosamund,” said Jervis, “I'll see you at Jericho before I'll give you twenty-five thousand pounds!”

Rosamund drew at her cigarette. The pale lines were a little paler.

“Jericho?” she said, “You won't get rid of me as easily as that. You'd better think again—second thoughts are best.”

Jervis laughed.

“I'm afraid I might think forever without your getting any nearer that twenty-five thousand. And now I think we'll go back to the others.”

He turned as he spoke, and set a brisk pace back along the path. Rosamund walked beside him in silence. Just as they came to where the shade ceased, she laughed and said,

“It would have saved a lot of trouble if we had married each other—wouldn't it?”

Jervis stepped out into the sunlight.

“Do you think so?” he said.

She could not see his face.

XXVI

Nan got up to say good-bye at a quarter to three. Her heart was like a hot burning coal. She had had to sit by Robert Leonard, to take her coffee from his hand, and to listen whilst he talked. Her burning anger lit a bright colour in her cheeks and made her eyes brilliant. She felt as if anything she touched would be liable to scorch or go up in a little puff of smoke. It was a dreadful feeling of course, but it made her very sure of herself.

When she got up to go, Mr Leonard looked at his watch and exclaimed.

“I'd no idea it was so late! You've beguiled me from my duties, Mrs Jervis. I ought to be attending to my incubators at this very moment. Give me a lift as far as my gate, will you, Jervis? My car's a fixture till I can get someone out from Croyston.”

Impossible to refuse of course. Nan wondered whether Jervis would have liked to refuse.

He said, “All right,” with an air of complete indifference.

At any rate she wouldn't have to sit next to the man. F.F. would have that pleasure. F.F. wouldn't mind of course. It was only she who felt like an exploding bomb when Robert Leonard was anywhere about. She got in beside Jervis, and heard the other two settling themselves behind her, F.F. full of amiable chatter.

“Did you have a car in South America? I forgot where you were. Were you ever in Mexico? Shocking roads, but not as bad as San Pedro. The Madalena roads are pretty hard to beat. I had an old flivver there. She was a wonder. She jumped the potholes like a bird.”

They moved off, slid down the drive, and coasted as far as Mr Leonard's gate. He got out and made his farewells.

“You must come and see my place some day, Mrs Jervis. Thanks for the lift, Jervis. Good-bye, Mr Fazackerley.”

“
Av revoir,
” said Ferdinand.

The afternoon was very hot. There was nothing surprising in the fact that Robert Leonard found it necessary to pass a handkerchief across his forehead. Ferdinand, looking back, admitted this, but could not quite understand why Mr Leonard should have quite so shaky a hand. He began to speculate about Mr Leonard. The man had had his hand clenched on the seat between them. When he took hold of the handle to open the door, the hand shook—most undeniably it shook. As he stood mopping his brow and watching the car out of sight, it was still shaking. And he had drunk nothing but lemonade, so it wasn't that.

Jervis wasn't thinking about Robert Leonard. He looked once at Nan, and was aware of distinct relief. She had not golden hair, sea-blue eyes, regular features, or a statuesque figure. He was feeling a strong distaste for all these things. Nan's firm round chin, her brown hair, her steady grey eyes, and the rather childish contour of her face were as complete a contrast as could be found to the charms of his cousin Rosamund. His gaze dwelt upon his wife with approval.

They began to descend the hill, and before they came to the steepest part he put the car into bottom gear. For a couple of hundred yards the gradient was about one in seven, and the surface bad. They had on their right a high bank out of which the road had been cut, and on the left a narrow strip of rough grass with an occasional scrawny bush, and beyond that a low parapet of loose stones which defended a sheer drop to the sea below.