Royal Purple (12 page)

Augustine looked at her in shocked defiance.

“Why should I, when she’s not out? She’s been expecting that call for days.”

“I know, I know,” the Countess von Ardrath said peevishly. “And I’ve been hoping for days that it wouldn’t come through. But what can you expect when the man is a—waiter?” She tightened her lips over the last word, and Augustine appeared considerably surprised.

“I would never have guessed it, Excellency,” she confessed. “To my mind he’s much more like a gentleman.”

“Of course he’s a gentleman,” the old lady fairly screeched at her. “And not merely is he a gentleman, he’s a gentleman of—” She banged on the floor with her ebony cane. “How stupid can you get, Augustine? Don’t you know that there are some things a man with the right parents can do, that a man with wholly undesirable parents could never get away with? A man can
stoop,
and go on
stooping,
if his background is all right; but if it’s all wrong it doesn’t matter what he does, he’ll never own the right to be described as a gentleman!”

“No, no, of course, not, Excellency,” Augustine said hastily, and soothingly. She picked up the cane that, in her sudden passion her mistress had cast right away from her, and placed it where the gnarled fingers could grasp at it easily. “And don’t you go working yourself up into a coughing spasm, Tour Highness, or I’ll have to rub you with camphor!”

I
n the hall Lucy picked up the telephone receiver with trembling fingers. She had the conviction that when she spoke her voice would be a mere husky thread of sound, her excitement was so great; but she managed to control the huskiness sufficiently to make that same voice audible.

“This is Lucy Gray,” she said. “Is that Mr. Avery?”

A low laugh answered her.

“It is. And I really must insist that you make it Paul from now on. I’ve been calling you Lucy from the moment we met—or very nearly—and you must have some means of retaliation.”

But she remained silent.

His voice came whimsically over the wire.

“Are you still there, Lucy? You sound a little aloof! I’m afraid I’ve had rather a busy interlude since I saw you last, but I’ve thought of you at least once every day.” Was there a note of laughter in his voice, or was it purely her imagination
?
“
How is the Countess? Augustine said something about her being confined to the house, and
y
ou having a dull time as a result.”

Lucy frowned. She was not sure she approved of Augustine taking it upon herself to stir up pity for her; and in any case, pity was not what she wanted
...
from him!

“The Countess has had rather a nasty chill,” she replied. “I’m afraid she’s
the one who has had cause to feel dull. But she’s better now
...
much better!”

“Splendid!” he declared drawlingly. “I’m sure she has a remarkable constitution.” There was a brief pause, and then he said: “Lucy, I was wondering whether you could be free tonight? I’ve an invitation to a party—oh, a very respectable musi
c
al party—and I’ve also been invited to take someone along with me. Would you care to be that someone?” Lucy forgot her temporary dignity, and gasped soundlessly at the thought of accompanying him anywhere
...
even if it was into a maelstrom of people she knew nothing about.

And then she suddenly recollected that this was the Countess’s first day up after nearly a week in bed.

“I’m quite sure Her Highness couldn’t spare me,” she said a little flatly.

“Go and find out,” he urged.

“She was very annoyed the last time I—”

“Went out with me? Yes, I know. But that was an offence that will not be repeated. Tell her I’ll have you back inside the house by twelve o’clock.”

“Twelve o’clock?” She gasped afresh. “But that’s terribly late!”

“My dear girl,” with the merest inflection of impatience, “you’re not an infant. It’s just possible you’ve never been allowed out until twelve o’clock before, but you’ve got to start some time. As I emphasised just now, it’s a perfectly respectable party I’ll be taking you to. Tell that to the Countess.”

But Augustine had appeared at Lucy’s elbow, and with her hands cupped over her mouth and her mouth approached close to Lucy’s free ear she whispered: “Madame says you can go. If you want to!” Lucy found it hard to take it in. Augustine was nodding her head and beaming at her and, she kept mouthing over and over again: “
...
says you can go. If you want to!”

The man at the other end of the line laughed just a little oddly.

“Of course she wants to go, Augustine,” he observed complacently. “And I’m glad your mistress realises that Miss Gray is human as well as useful. Convey my compliments to her, and add to them that I can be relied on—this time!”

Lucy met Augustine’s eyes, and she realised that the servant was positively oozing satisfaction. As soon as an arrangement had been made about picking her up, and Lucy had replaced the receiver, she wanted to know what Lucy would wear, and whether there was anything she could press for her. She also reminded her that there was time to get her hair done if she telephoned the hairdresser straight away.

But Lucy shook her head, smiling at her.

“I’ll wash it myself,” she said. “I mustn’t be extravagant.”

The Countess came thumping with her stick along the hall.

“What’s that about extravagance?” she demanded.

“Of course you’ll ring up the hairdress
er
, and you’ll do me credit tonight or I
’ll
know the reason why! But you can make it clear to that young man,” waving her stick as if it was a baton, “that I’m taking you off to Italy as soon as all the arrangements are completed, and the one thing I intend to find for you is a rich husband ... the richer the better! We’ll have no serious truck with waiters, although there are times when they have their uses.”

Augustine winked cautiously at Lucy.

“Of course,
madame
,”
she said soothingly. “Miss Gray understands perfectly, and when she marries her rich husband she’ll set us all up in luxury, and we’ll live once more like fighting-cocks as we did in the old days!”

The Countess moved drearily back to her sitting-
r
oom.

“The old days are dead,” she said, as if she was suddenly deflated.

CHAPTER XI

LUCY wore her pale pink dress that night, although she was rather afraid it might be a little too much for such an occasion. She had seen Paul Avery’s week-end cottage, and it had been a revelation to her, but she hand no idea what kind of friends he made.

Augustine helped her to dress, and she fussed over her as in the old days she must have fussed over her mistress. She had wonderfully deft fingers, and she combed Lucy’s formal hair-do into a soft and feathery style that suited her even better, and it was she who whispered into the Countess’s ear that a little touch of the right perfume...

The Countess produced an enormous flagon of flagrantly expensive Paris perfume that Lucy hadn’t even dreamed she possessed.

“Somebody sent it to me about a year ago,” she explained, for Lucy’s benefit. “Don’t ask me who it was, because I don’t know. It was a present that arrived unexpectedly, and so far as I’m concerned it was a wasted present, because I don’t use perfume nowadays. A case of champagne would have pleased me better.” She surveyed Lucy with a satisfied gleam in her eyes.

“You’ll do,” she remarked. “As I’ve said before, you pay for dressing. And remember to tell me all there is to be told about these musi
c
al friends of our musical-comedy waiter when you bring in my breakfast tray in the morning!”

But there was nothing musical-comedy about the friends of Paul Avery to whom he introduced Lucy a short while later. They belonged to a world Lucy herself knew little about, for apart from the Countess—and, more recently, Paul himself—she had hardly any contacts with the class of people who owed their distinction to generous-sized bank balances and the right sort of backgrounds.

The Countess, it is true, had been quite unable to derive any sense of security from the size of her bank balance for a number of years, but her background was unquestionab
l
y very right indeed. And whatever Paul’s background and his present job, even the autocratic old lady who ruled the roost at number twenty-four Alison Gardens accepted him without hesitation as a ‘gentleman’. So it wasn’t, perhaps, entirely surprising that his friends were of the same quality, and the impact they made on Lucy was a little shattering at first, for she hadn’t been able to make up her mind about them in advance, although knowing Paul t
his
should have been comparatively simple.

To begin with, the flat to which Paul drove her was plainly a very expensive one in an ultra-modern block. It had an impressive forecourt, and the lift was like a gilded cage plying between the lushly carpeted floors. There hostess opened the door to them herself, and Lucy ceased wondering whether her pink dress was sufficiently simple for the occasion when she saw the way the other woman was dressed. Only in fashion magazines had she seen anyone who looked remotely like her, and she actually experienced a passing sensation of dismay when it occurred to her that, by comparison with the
soignee
appearance of this poised and elegant creature, she herself was a little like the fairy on the Christmas tree. Someone too young and inexperienced and tinsel-bright to make anything in the nature of a favourable impression, and certainly without a hope of aspiring one day to look like such sheer perfection.

“Paul!” The woman held out both hands to him delightedly, and considerably to Lucy’s astonishment she flung her arms around his neck and kissed him with the greatest enthusiasm before he could even think about introducing Lucy. Then, while he was still
making
an effort to extricate himself without ruining entirely the silken flow of his tie, she caught sight of Lucy and turned and beamed at her expansively;
“
How sweet of you to come
!”
she exclaimed, and extended the same slender white hands to her.

The light behind her was soft and golden, there were flowers in the hall that seemed to be arranged in masses, and because it was a chill evening the atmosphere was warm and perfumed and inviting. Lucy was drawn across the threshold into the light, and her hostess surveyed her with large and faintly amused brown eyes that were like brown velvet flowers, while the diamonds in her ears set out shafts of fire, and the embroidery on her cream satin dress shimmered like powdered gold.

“So this is the little Miss Gray you’ve been telling me about, Paul,” she said, and sent him a mildly quizzical glance. Paul seized the opportunity to make them formally known to one another, and Lu
c
y gathered that the owner of the lively pair of brown eyes was someone he was accustomed to addressing as Ulla, and to distant acquaintances she was a Mrs. Peter Renshaw.

Peter Renshaw was going round with a bottle in his hand and refilling glasses when they joined the rest of the guests in a huge room that was filled with as many flowers as the hall. Lucy couldn’t help being impressed by the quantity of flowers, for it was a time of year when flowers were expensive, and most of these were hot-house. One or two of the female guests had the exotic appearance of hot-house blooms too, for they were coiffured, dressed and groomed by people to whom they probably paid a small fortune in a year in order to look the way they did.

The room itself was more like a stage set to the bewildered Lucy’s eyes, and the only things she actually noticed in detail were the richness of the brocade hangings and the loveliness of the pale violet carpet.

A glass was thrust into her hand by the hospitable Peter Renshaw, and his eyebrows flew up when she confessed that she had never tasted vodka in her life, and didn’t think she wanted to do so now. Paul said quickly, “That’s all right, Lucy. I’m sure there’s
some sherry or gin somewhere that you’ll find more to your taste. Or would you prefer an orange squash, if I can find one for you
?
”

“Oh yes, please,” Lucy said quickly, and Peter’s eyebrows flew up even more comically.

“Suffering cats!” he exclaimed. “How do you expect to get the party spirit if you stick to orange squash? But everyone to
hi
s or her taste.” He treated her to a display of
hi
s excellent white teeth—he was a good-looking young man with very fair hair—and then darted to the side of another of
hi
s guests whose glass appeared to be empty. But before he left them he adjured Paul to look after the abstemious little lady he had brought with
him
, and Paul put her into the corner of a pale satin-covered settee, where the crush of people was not too great, and then went in search of her orange squash.

But if Lucy had imagined that Paul would be free to devote much of his attention to her that evening she had been hugging a hope to herself that soon proved futile. At the moment of their entry into the room there had been an almost continuous buzz of conversation and laughter, but shortly after their entry the conversation in certain quarters became more disconnected, and practically every pair of feminine eyes in the room found some excuse to wander and to fix themselves upon Paul. It was not the kind of party where people are introduced, but sitting in splendid isolation on her settee, Lucy received the impression that the owners of those pairs of eyes were either hoping for an introduction, or—if acquaintance had already been established—some sign from Paul that he remembered their existence, and was eager to acknowledge them in front of all the rest.