The Ivory Dagger (4 page)

‘Lady Dryden is asking for you.’

Herbert Whitall was in his study, which was so exactly like what a study ought to be that there was very little more to be said about it. The only thing it lacked was that indefinable something which suggests that a room has been lived and worked in for many generations. So far as the actual structure was concerned, this was true enough. It was one of the eighteenth century rooms, well proportioned and well lighted, and it had had time to mellow. Adrian Grey, who had had a hand in assembling the furniture, came to the conclusion that everything was a little too much of one period, with none of these treasured shabby survivals which are generally to be found in a room where a man expects to take his ease. The handsome curtains were as new as yesterday. There wasn’t so much as a rubbed place on arm or seat of any of the leather-covered chairs. It was a good room, a perfectly suitable room, but it missed the touch of familiar comfort.

But then no one would have called Herbert Whitall a comfortable person. His grandfather, shrewd and coarse, had made one of the large mid-Victorian fortunes. Railways, iron, steel— whatever he touched just turned to gold. His son achieved a baronetcy. Herbert Whitall, a competent business man, confirmed the family fortunes, and was understood to have political ambitions. The best tailor in Savile Row had conferred elegance upon a tall, spare frame. He had the high, thin nose and the straight, thin lips of the FitzAscelins. His mother was Adela FitzAscelin, in direct descent from the Ascelin of Ghent who had come over with the Conquerer. If it was this strain which gave him his taste for curious ivories, the stubborn Whitall stock declared itself in the ruthless zest with which the taste was pursued. To lose to another collector was unimaginable. What he fancied he must have, no matter what the effort or the cost. He had a cold acquisitive eye, and the long, thin hands of his mother’s family. But whereas the FitzAscelins had for many generations been letting everything slip, Herbert Whitall could pride himself on the fact that he got what he wanted and knew how to keep it.

He stood in front of the hearth and spread those long fingers to the fire which had just been lighted—a wood fire, as befitted a country house. It gave out a pleasant smell, and he savoured it. They had been cutting down some old apple trees, and Adrian had given orders for the wood to be kept for this room and the drawing-room. Very knowledgeable fellow Adrian—useful.

He turned round as Miss Whitaker came in, and spoke to her, his tone easy and familiar.

‘Sybil Dryden says we had better have some people in tonight. The less of the tête-à-tête business the better. Lila has nerves, it appears. You had better do some ringing up.’

She moved to the writing-table.

‘Who do you want asked?’

‘Well, Eric Haile was coming anyhow. You don’t like him— do you?’

Her carefully arched eyebrows rose a little.

‘It isn’t my business to like—or dislike—either your guests or your relations.’

‘Oh, he’s not such a near relation. My great-aunt Emily’s grandson—what does that make him?’

‘Second cousin, I believe.’

‘You know everything! What a treasure you are, Milly! Why don’t you like Eric Haile?‘

‘I don’t either like or dislike him.’

Herbert Whitall laughed.

‘He is considered charming—the life and soul of every party. That is why I chose him to be my best man. Also he’s about the only relation I’ve got, thank God. Let us hope he will add to the gaiety of tonight’s proceedings. At the moment the prospects are a trifle on the gloomy side.’

She took all this without any sign—any secretary waiting for her employer to come to the point. When he had finished she repeated her former question with the slightest possible variation.

‘Who do you want me to ask?’

‘The Considines—they are friends of Sybil’s. Old Richardson —I’d like to show him that ivory-handled dagger and see if it doesn’t make his mouth water. How is that for numbers?’

‘Five men and three women.’

‘You’d better come in. It’s the best we can do. Richardson has no social feelings, and Sybil will be an excuse for the Considines, but the notice is too short for anyone else. Just say we came down here on the spur of the moment. Say Lila was being overdone in town.’

She lifted the receiver of the table instrument. He turned back to the fire and to his thoughts. The thin lips smiled. He spread his hands to what was now a cheerful blaze.

Millicent Whitaker was being quiet and competent at the telephone. Presently she hung up and said,

‘That’s all right—they’ll come. I said a quarter to eight.’

‘Good. Richardson will be late—he always is.’

She had been sitting at the table. Now she got up.

‘I had better let Marsham know.’

‘If you will.’

She had taken her way towards the door. She stopped now and said,

‘Have you done anything about filling my place?’

He was leaning against the mantelshelf, looking at her without appearing to give very much attention to what she said. There was no grey in his dark hair, but it was beginning to recede from the temples, and he looked his age. When she repeated her question a little sharply he smiled and said,

‘Certainly not.’

She came nearer.

‘Herbert, I will not stay here once you are married. I told you that a month ago.’

‘Forget it, my dear.’

‘I meant what I said. Whether you’ve got anyone else or not, I shall go.’

‘Oh, I think not. It would be so very foolish, and you are a sensible person.’

She shook her head.

‘I won’t stay.’

All at once his expression changed. The hard eyes, the fine nose, the forward thrust of the head, gave him a predatory air.

‘My dear Millicent, you are being not only foolish but tiresome. You are an excellent secretary, and I propose to retain your services. If you want a rise you can have it.’

She shook her head.

‘I won’t stay.’

He laughed.

‘Consider your salary doubled!’

The colour blazed in her cheeks.

‘Take care, Herbert—you may go too far!’

‘And so may you, my dear. There is such a thing as knowing which side your bread is buttered. I shall be signing a new will next week. Under the old one you benefit—quite substantially. Long and faithful service—ten years, isn’t it? Well, it depends entirely on yourself whether that legacy goes into the new will or not. I have always told you that I would make provision for you and the child, and I am prepared to carry out my promise. But if you leave my service the legacy comes out.’

She stood for a moment, mastering herself. At last she said in a quiet voice,

‘Why do you want me to stay?’

‘I don’t like changes. I should never get a more efficient secretary.’

‘I can’t do it. You mustn’t ask me.’

He said, ‘Come here, Milly! I don’t want to hear any more of this nonsense. You’ll stay! If I have any more trouble I’m afraid I shall have to do something you wouldn’t like—I’m really afraid you wouldn’t like it at all. You see, I kept that cheque.’

All the colour drained out of her face. ‘It’s not true. I saw you burn it.’

‘You saw me burn a blank cheque which cost me twopence—a little comedy, just to set your mind at rest. The cheque you, shall we say altered, is—you’d like to know where it is, wouldn’t you? But you just go on guessing. It won’t do you any harm so long as you behave yourself and don’t let me have any more of this nonsense.’

There was only a matter of six feet between them. Neither of them moved to make the distance less. She stood looking at him until every shade of the angry colour had slowly drained away, leaving her dreadfully pale. She seemed as if she were going to speak, but though her lips moved, there were no words. Words wouldn’t butter her bread or keep her child.

He said in that easy, familiar tone, ‘Run along and tell Marsham.’ And then, just as she had reached the door and was going out, he called after her, ‘Tell him who is coming, and then send him along here to me. There was something I meant to have drawn his attention to.’

She stood there, her hand on the door, a little surprised. ‘And you forgot?’

‘My dear Milly, I never forget anything—you ought to know that. Let us say I—saved it up.’

She gave him a long, hard look before she turned and went.

It was between half past six and seven o’clock when Bill Waring drove his old rattletrap of a car under the pillared portico of Vineyards. He jumped out and rang the bell with a good deal of vigour. He had, as a matter of fact, run well out of any stock of patience which he may originally have possessed. Rumbold had kept him and kept him, breaking off in the middle of their session to go and see somebody else, and only coming back to insist that they lunch together before going on with their talk. By the time he finally got away it wasn’t going to be possible to make Vineyards by daylight. Since he neither knew nor wished to know Herbert Whitall, and could hardly expect a welcome from him or from Lady Dryden, not only the conventions but common prudence might have suggested that he would be well advised to find somewhere to put up for the night and defer any attempt to see Lila until the morning. Prudence had never been his strongest point, and he was far beyond caring for the conventions.

He flung up the drive of Vineyards as if it belonged to him, rang the bell with a will, and stood champing on the top step. Marsham being busy with his silver, the door was opened by the lad Frederick, a tall, well-grown boy who was putting in time and saving money between leaving school and being called up for his military service. He knew that it was pretty late for a visitor, but he didn’t feel equal to saying so. The impatient gentleman who was asking for Miss Dryden might be a relation, or he might have been invited and Mr. Marsham hadn’t happened to mention it. When Bill Waring stepped past him into the hall he therefore showed him into the small room immediately to the left of the front door, turned on the ceiling light, and having inquired what name he should say, departed in search of Miss Lila. Having ascertained that she was not in the drawing-room, he was about to look elsewhere, when he encountered Lady Dryden.

‘If you please, my lady, there’s a gentleman asking for Miss Dryden.’

Her eyebrows rose.

‘A gentleman? What name did he give?’

‘Mr. Waring, my lady.’

Lady Dryden did not permit her feelings to appear. If it became borne in upon Frederick that she was displeased, and that her displeasure might be formidable, it was not because of anything in her look or in her voice. She said smoothly;

‘Miss Dryden is in her room. There is no need to trouble her. I will see Mr. Waring. Where is he?’

When the door began to open Bill Waring had a moment of sickening apprehension, because as soon as he saw Lila he would know what he had come here to find out. If she ran to him, if she wanted him to get her out of this mess she had somehow been pushed into, he was prepared to walk her out of the house here and now and carry her off in his old rattletrap. Ray would take her in, and they would be married as soon as it could be fixed. He thought it took three days—one clear day’s notice—at a register office. He had read that somewhere, he couldn’t remember where, but it wasn’t the sort of thing you invented. If she didn’t want him, if she was happy—

The door opened and Lady Dryden came in. Well, it was war to the knife, he could see that. No vulgar brawling—that wasn’t her line. Just a voice and a manner straight off the ice and straight to the point. There weren’t going to be any social greetings.

She stopped a yard inside the door, surveying him as if he were a solecism, and said,

‘Why have you come here, Mr. Waring?’

What you might call a rhetorical question, but he didn’t mind answering it. Do him good to put it into words, and do her good to hear it.

‘I’ve come to see Lila.’

‘I’m afraid you can’t do that.’

‘I’m afraid you can’t stop me.’

‘Really, Mr. Waring? I think you will find that you are mistaken. There is a footman and a butler in the house, as well as Mr. Grey and Sir Herbert Whitall. I think you will admit that between them they could put you out. There would be a painful and humiliating scene, and Lila would be very much upset. I prefer to believe that you will behave like a gentleman and go away quietly. I will ask her if she wishes to see you, and if she does, I will let you know in the morning. If you wish to do so you can ring up, and if she is willing to take the call she will be perfectly free to do so.’

If he had been at all inclined to undervalue his opponent, he would certainly never do so again. With an almost casual ease of manner she disclosed the strength of her position. If he wished, he could court a degrading ejection from a house to which he had not been invited—he could figure as a common gatecrasher in a common brawl. He did not need Lady Dryden to tell him what would be the effect on Lila.

Having revolved these things in a stubborn silence, he stared her straight in the face and said,

‘I will ring up in the morning. I didn’t intend to be so late. I was delayed, or I would have been here earlier. I don’t want to upset Lila, but she will have to see me.’

She met his hostile stare with unruffled calm.

‘That is for her to say.’

He went on as if she had not spoken.

‘When I left England we were engaged to be married. As far as I am concerned that is still the case. If she wishes to break off our engagement she must do it herself. I’m not taking it from anyone else.’

‘I have never admitted that there was an engagement, Mr. Waring.’

He looked, and felt, as obstinate as a mule. Lady Dryden derived some pleasure from the fact. She had always disliked him. He was now a definite menace, and the game was in her hand. To win against that stubbornness, to score against that obstinate strength, gave her an agreeable sense of power. She had Lila under her thumb, and there was nothing he could do about it. She moved aside from the door and said,

‘Good-night, Mr. Waring.’

He went because there really was nothing else that he could do—not there, not at that time.

She didn’t ring for Frederick to show him out, but stood there in the hall herself to see him go. As he went down the steps under the pillared portico he heard the key turn in the lock of the door behind him.

Well, that was that. The next move lay with him. He gave her ten minutes to get away upstairs or into the drawing-room.

During this time he drove his car round the first turn of the drive. Sitting there, he took pencil and paper, wrote briefly, and addressed an envelope to Miss Lila Dryden. Then he walked back to the portico and rang the front door bell.

Again he had the good fortune to encounter Frederick. He said,

‘Sorry to bother you, but I’m afraid I left my cap.’

Even Lady Dryden could hardly marshal the chuckers-out to deal with a polite request for one’s own property. Bill was rather pleased with himself for having thought about leaving his cap. Lady Dryden had made him so angry that he might easily have forgotten everything else. Being in a rage was rather like being out in a thunderstorm—you couldn’t hear yourself think.

Frederick produced the cap, and Bill produced two pound notes.

‘Look here, I want Miss Lila Dryden to have this letter, if you can manage it.’

Frederick said, ‘Oh, yes, sir.’

All the notes changed hands. Bill nodded and stepped back. The front door shut.

Frederick, full of romantic zeal, ran up the back stairs and tapped on Miss Lila Dryden’s door. The whole thing didn’t take a minute. Nobody saw him come or go.

Lila took the note with a shaking hand. She locked the door before she dared to read it, and when she had read it she sat down on the bed, a thing Sybil Dryden never allowed, and began to cry.