Ngaio Marsh - False Scent

She moved down the hall to the front door. The photographer dodged round her. “Not in full glare,” she said, and placed herself.

“Mr. Dakers?” said the photographer.

“Isn’t it better as it is?” Richard muttered.

“Don’t pay any attention to him,” she said with ferocious gaiety. “Come along, Dicky.”

“There’s a new play on the skids, isn’t there? If Mr. Dakers could be showing it to you, perhaps? I’ve brought something in case.”

He produced a paperbound quarto of typescript, opened it and put it in her hands.

“Just as if you’d come to one of those sure-fire laugh lines,” the photographer said. “Pointing it out to him, you know? Right, Mr. Dakers?”

Richard, nauseated, said, “I’m photocatastrophic. Leave me out.”

“No!” said Miss Bellamy. Richard shook his head.

“You’re too modest,” said the photographer. “Just a little this way. Grand.”

She pointed to the opened script. “And the great big smile,” he said. The bulb flashed. “Wonderful. Thank you,” and he moved away.

“And now,” she said through her teeth, “I’ll talk to you.”

Richard followed her upstairs. On the landing they passed Old Ninn, who watched them go into Miss Bellamy’s room. After the door had shut she stood outside and waited.

She was joined there by Florence, who had come up by the back stairway. They communicated in a series of restrained gestures and brief whispers.

“You all right, Mrs. Plumtree?”

“Why not!” Ninn countered austerely.

“You look flushed,” Florence observed drily.

“The heat in those rooms is disgraceful.”

“Has She come up?”

“In there.”

“Trouble?” Florence asked, listening. Ninn said nothing. “It’s him, isn’t it? Mr. Richard? What’s he been up to?”

“Nothing,” Ninn said, “that wouldn’t be a credit to him, Floy, and I’ll thank you to remember it.”

“Oh, dear,” Florence said rather acidly. “He’s a man like the rest of them.”

“He’s better than most.”

In the bedroom Miss Bellamy’s voice murmured, rose sharply and died. Richard’s, scarcely audible, sounded at intervals. Then both together, urgent and expostulatory, mounted to some climax and broke off. There followed a long silence during which the two women stared at each other, and then a brief unexpected sound.

“What was that!” Florence whispered.

“Was she laughing?”

“It’s left off now.”

Ninn said nothing. “Oh well,” Florence said, and had moved away when the door opened.

Richard came out, white to the lips. He walked past without seeing them, paused at the stairhead and pressed the palms of his hands against his eyes. They heard him fetch his breath with a harsh sound that might have been a sob. He stood there for some moments like a man who had lost his bearings and then struck his closed hand twice on the newel post and went quickly downstairs.

“What did I tell you,” Florence said. She stole nearer to the door. It was not quite shut. “Trouble,” she said.

“None of his making.”

“How do you know?”

“The same way,” Ninn said, “that I know how to mind my own business.”

Inside the room, perhaps beyond it, something crashed. They stood there, irresolute, listening.

At first Miss Bellamy had not been missed. Her party had reverted to its former style, a little more confused by the circulation of champagne. It spread through the two rooms and into the conservatory and became noisier and noiser. Everybody forgot the ceremony of opening the birthday presents. Nobody noticed that Richard, too, was absent.

Gantry edged his way towards Charles, who was in the drawing-room, and stooped to make himself heard.

“Dicky,” he said, “has made off.”

“Where to?”

“I imagine to do the best he can with the girl and her uncle.”

Charles looked at him with something like despair. “There’s nothing to be done,” he said, “nothing. It was shameful.”

“Where is she?”

“I don’t know. Isn’t she in the next room?”

“I don’t know,” Gantry said.

“I wish to God this show was over.”

“She ought to get on with the present-opening. They won’t go till she does.”

Pinky had come up. “Where’s Mary?” she said.

“We don’t know,” Charles said. “She ought to be opening her presents.”

“She won’t miss her cue, my dear, you may depend upon it. Don’t you feel it’s time?”

“I’ll find her,” Charles said. “Get them mustered if you can, Gantry, will you?”

Bertie Saracen joined them, flushed and carefree. “What goes on?” he inquired.

“We’re waiting for Mary.”

“She went upstairs for running repairs,” Bertie announced and giggled. “I am a poet and don’t I know it!” he added.

“Did you see her?” Gantry demanded.

“I heard her tell Monty. She’s not uttering to poor wee me.”

Monty Marchant edged towards them. “Monty, ducky,” Bertie cried, “your speech was too poignantly right. Live forever! Oh , I’m so tiddly.”

Marchant said, “Mary’s powdering her nose, Charles. Should we do a little shepherding?”

“I thought so.”

Gantry mounted a stool and used his director’s voice, “Attention, the cast!” It was a familiar summons and was followed by an obedient hush. “To the table, please, everybody, and clear an entrance. Last act, ladies and gentlemen. Last act, please!”

They did so at once. The table with its heaped array of parcels had already been moved forward by Gracefield and the maids. The guests ranged themselves at both sides like a chorus in grand opera, leaving a passage to the principal door.

Charles said, “I’ll just see…” and went into the hall. He called up the stairs, “Oh, Florence! Tell Miss Bellamy we’re ready, will you?” and came back. “Florence’ll tell her,” he said.

There was a longish, expectant pause. Gantry drew in his breath with a familiar hiss.

“ I’ll tell her,” Charles said, and started off for the door.

Before he could reach it they all heard a door slam and running steps on the stairway. There was a relieved murmur and a little indulgent laughter.

“First time Mary’s ever missed an entrance,” someone said.

The steps ran across the hall. An irregular flutter of clapping broke out and stopped.

A figure appeared in the entrance and paused there.

It was not Mary Bellamy but Florence.

Charles said, “Florence! Where’s Miss Mary?”

Florence, breathless, mouthed at him. “Not coming.”

“Oh God!” Charles ejaculated. “Not now !”

As if to keep the scene relentlessly theatrical, Florence cried out in a shrill voice,

“A doctor. For Christ’s sake. Quick. Is there a doctor in the house!”

It might be argued that the difference between high tragedy and melodrama rests in the indisputable fact that the latter is more true to nature. People, even the larger-than-life people of the theatre, tend at moments of tension to express themselves not in unexpected or memorable phrases but in clichés.

Thus, when Florence made her entrance, one or two voices in her audience cried out, “My God, what’s happened?” Bertie Saracen cried out shrilly, “Does she mean Mary?” and somebody whose identity remained a secret said in an authoritative British voice, “Quiet, everybody. No need to panic,” as if Florence had called for a fireman rather than a physician.

The only person to remain untouched was Dr. Harkness, who was telling a long, inebriated story to Monty Marchant and whose voice droned on indecently in a far corner of the dining-room.