Ngaio Marsh - When in Rome

They danced: not saying very much, but with pleasure.

Giovanni appeared and Lady Braceley danced with him. They did intricate things with great expertise.

The Van der Veghels, half-smiling, closely embraced, swayed and turned on sixpence, keeping to the darkened perimeter of the floor.

Major Sweet, who had made a willing but belated attempt upon Sophy, sank back in his chair, drank champagne and moodily discoursed with Alleyn. He was, Alleyn concluded, the sort of practiced drinker who, while far from being sober, would remain more or less in control for a long time. “Lovely little girl, that,” he said. “Natural. Sweet. But plenty of spunk, mind you. Looks you bang in the eye, what?” He maundered on rather gloomily: “Just a nice, sweet natural little girl — as I was saying.”

“Are you going on to this other show?” Alleyn asked.

“What about yourself?” countered the Major. “Fair’s fair. No names,” he added more obscurely, “no pack-drill that I’m aware of. Other things being equal.”

“I’m going, yes.”

“Shake,” invited the Major extending his hand. But finding that it encountered the champagne bottle he refilled his glass. He leant across the table.

“I’ve seen some curious things in my time,” he confided. “You’re a broadminded man. Everyone to his own taste and it all adds up to experience. Not a word to the ladies: what they can’t grieve about they won’t see. How old am I? Come on. You say. How old jer say I am?”

“Sixty?”

“—and ten. Allotted span, though that’s all my eye. See the rest of you out tonight, my boy.” He leant forward and looked dolefully at Alleyn with unfocussed eyes. “I say,” he said. “ She’s not going on, is she?”

“Who?”

“Old Bracegirdle.”

“I believe so.”

“Gawd!”

“It’s pretty steep,” Alleyn suggested. “Fifteen thousand lire.”

“Better be good, what? I’m full of hopes,” leered the Major. “And I don’t mind telling you, old boy, I wouldn’t have been within coo-ee of this show tonight in the orinry way. You know what? Flutter. Green baize. Monte. And — phew!” He made a wild gesture with both arms. “Thassall — phew!”

“A big win?”

“Phew!”

“Splendid.”

And that, Alleyn supposed, explained the Major. Or did it?

“Funny thing about Mailer, don’t you think?” he asked.

“Phew!” said the Major, who seemed to be stuck with this ejaculation. “ ’Strordinary conduct,” he added. “Conduct unbecoming if you ask me but let it go.” He slumped into a moody silence for some moments and then shouted so loudly that people at the neighbouring table stared at him: “Bloody good riddance. ’Skuse language.”

After this he seemed disinclined for conversation and Alleyn joined Kenneth Dorne.

With the departure of the soul singer, Kenneth had slumped back into what seemed to be chronic inertia interrupted by fidgets. He made no attempt to dance but fiddled with his shirt ruffles and repeatedly looked towards the entrance as if he expected some new arrival. He gave Alleyn one of his restless, speculative glances. “You look marvellous,” he said. “Are you having a gay time?”

“An interesting time, at least. This sort of thing is quite out of my line. It’s an experience.”

“Oh!” Kenneth said impatiently. “This!” He shuffled his feet about. “I thought you were terrific,” he said. “You know. The way you managed everybody after Seb vanished. Look. Do you think he’s — you know — I mean to say — what do you think?”

“I’ve no notion,” Alleyn said. “I’ve never set eyes on the man before. You seem to be quite friendly with him.”

“Me?”

“You call him Seb, don’t you?”

“Oh well. You know. Just one of those things. Why not?”

“You find him helpful perhaps.”

“How d’you mean?” Kenneth said, eyeing him.

“In Rome. I rather hoped — I may be quite wrong, of course.” Alleyn broke off. “Are you going on to this late party?” he asked.

“Of course. And I don’t care how soon.”

“Really?” Alleyn said. And hoping he introduced the jargon correctly and with the right inflexion, he asked: “May one expect to meet ‘a Scene?’ ”

Kenneth swept his hair from his eyes with a finger tip.

“What sort of a scene?” he said cautiously.

“A group — a — have I got it wrong? I’m not turned on — is that right? — as yet. I want to ‘experience.’ You know?”

Kenneth now undisguisedly inspected him. “You look fabulous, of course,” he said. “You know: way up there. But—” He drew a rectangle with his forefingers in the air. “Let’s face it. Square, sweetheart. Square.”

“Sorry about that,” Alleyn said. “I was depending on Mr. Mailer to make the change.”

“Don’t let that trouble you. Toni’s terrific.”

“Toni?”

“Where we’re going, Toni’s pad. It’s the greatest. Groovy. You know? Grass, hard stuff, the lot. Mind you, he plays it cool. There’ll be a freak-out.”

“A—?”

“A happening. Psychedelic.”

“A floor show?”

“If you like — but way-out. Ever so trendy. Some people just go for giggles and come away. But if it sends you, which is what it’s for , you move on to the buzz.”

“Obviously you’ve been there before?”

“Not to decieve you, I have. Seb took us.”

“Us?”

“Auntie came too. She’s all for experience. She’s fabulous — honestly. I mean it.”

With considerable effort Alleyn said casually, “Did Seb — turn you on?”

“That’s right. In Perugia. I’m thinking,” Kenneth said, “of making the move.”

“To—?”

“The big leap. Pothead to mainliner. Well, as a matter of fact I’ve had a taste. You know. Mind you, I’m not hooked. Just the odd pop. Only a fun thing.”

Alleyn looked at a face that not so long ago might have been attractive. Policemen are as wary of reading character into other people’s faces as they are of betraying their thoughts in their own, but it occurred to him that if Kenneth were a less repellent colour and if he would shut his mouth instead of letting it droop open in a flaccid smirk he wouldn’t be a bad-looking specimen. He might, even at this stage, be less dissolute than his general behaviour suggested. “And whatever has happened or is about to happen to Mr. Sebastian Mailer,” Alleyn thought, “it cannot be one millionth fraction of what he most richly deserves.”

Kenneth broke the silence that had fallen between them.

“I say,” he said, “it’s idiotic of course but wouldn’t it be a yell if after being on about Seb and Toni’s pad and all that bit, you were The Man?”

“The Man?”

“Yes. You know. A plain-clothes fuzz.”

“Do I look like it?”

“Nobody less. You look gorgeous. That might be your cunning, though, mightn’t it? Still, you couldn’t have me busted when we’re not on British soil. Or could you?”

“ I don’t know,” Alleyn said. “Ask a policeman.”

Kenneth gave an emaciated little laugh. “Honestly, you kill me,” he said, and after another pause: “If it’s not going too far, what do you do?”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t know. Something frightfully high-powered and discreet. Like diplomacy. Or has that gone out with the lord chamberlain?”

“Has the lord chamberlain gone out?”

“Gone in, then. I suppose he still potters about palatial corridors with a key on his bottom.” A disturbing thought seemed to strike Kenneth. “Oh God!” he said faintly. “Don’t tell me you are the lord chamberlain.”

“I am not the lord chamberlain.”