Ngaio Marsh - Spinsters in Jeopardy

Robin bought a large silver goat and Ginny bought the grandest of the cribs. “Let’s take it down now,” he said. “The storm’s nearly over, I’m sure, and the car’s out. It’d save my conscience. Do come, Ginny.”

She raised her troubled face and looked at him. “I don’t know,” she said, “I suppose — I don’t know.”

“We shan’t be half-an-hour. Come on.”

He took her by the arm and hurried her into the passage-way. They ran into a world of rain, Ginny protesting and Robin shouting encouragement. With the help of his stick he broke into quite a lively sort of canter. “Do be careful!” Ginny cried. “Your dot-and-go-one leg!”

“Dot-and-go-run, you mean. Come on.”

Their faces streamed with cool water and they laughed without cause.

“It’s better out here,” Robin said. “Isn’t it, Ginny?”

The car stood out on the platform like a rock in a waterfall. He bundled her into it. “You look like — you look as you’re meant to look,” he said. “It’s better outside. Say it’s better, Ginny.”

“I don’t know what’s come over you,” Ginny said, pressing her hands to her rain-blinded face.

“I’ve got out. We’ve both got out.” He scrambled in beside her and peered into the trough behind the driver’s seat. “What are you doing?” Ginny asked hysterically. “What’s happened? We’ve gone mad. What are you looking for?”

“Nothing. A parcel for my tailor. It’s gone. Who cares! Away we go.”

He started up his engine. Water splashed up like wings on either side and cascaded across the windscreen. They roared down the steep incline and turned left above the tunnel and over the high headland, on the road to Roqueville.

High up in the hills on their vantage point in the factory road, Alleyn and Raoul waited in Raoul’s car.

“In five minutes,” Alleyn said, “it will be dark.”

“I shall still know the car, Monsieur.”

“And I. The rain’s lifting a little.”

“It will stop before the light goes, I think.”

“How tall are you, Raoul?”

“One mètre, sixty, Monsieur.”

“About five foot eight,” Alleyn muttered, “and the girl’s tall. It ought to be all right. Where was the car exactly?”

“Standing out on the platform, Monsieur. The parcel was in the trough behind the driver’s seat.”

“He’s stuck to his word so far, at least. Where did you put the note?”

“On the driver’s seat, Monsieur. He could not fail to see it.”

But Robin, driving in a state of strange exhilaration towards Roqueville, sat on the disregarded note and wondered if it was by accident or intention that Ginny leaned a little towards him.

“It will be fine on the other side of the hill,” he shouted. “What do you bet?”

“It couldn’t be.”

“You’ll see. You’ll see. You’ll jolly well see.”

“Robin, what has come over you?”

“I’ll tell you when we get to Roqueville. There you are! What did I say?”

They drove down the mountain-side into a translucent dusk, rain-washed and fragrant.

“There they go,” Alleyn said and turned his field glasses on the tiny car. “She’s with him. He’s brought it off. So far.”

“And now, Monsieur?”

Alleyn watched the car diminish. Just before it turned the point of a distant headland, Robin switched on his lamps. Alleyn lowered the glasses. “It is almost lighting-up time, Raoul. We wait a little longer. They turned as if by a shared consent and looked to the west where, above and beyond the tunnelled hill, the turrets of the Chèvre d’Argent stood black against a darkling sky.

Presently, out on Cap St. Gilles pricks of yellow began to appear. The window of a cottage in the valley showed red. Behind them the factory presented a dark front to the dusk, but higher up in its folded hills the monastery of Our Lady of Paysdoux was alive with glowing lights.

“They are late with their lamps at the Chèvre d’Argent,” said Raoul.

“Which is not surprising,” Alleyn rejoined. “Seeing that Monsieur le Commissaire has arranged that their electrical service is disconnected. The thunderstorm will have lent a happy note of credibility to the occurrence. The telephone also is still disconnected.” He used his field glasses. “Yes,” he said, “they are lighting candles. Start up your engine, Raoul. It is time to be off.”

iv

“You disturb yourself without cause,” Baradi said. “She is buying herself a silver goat. Why not? It is a good omen.”

“Already she’s been away half-an-hour.”

“She had gone for a walk, no doubt.”

“With him.”

“Again, why not? The infatuation is entirely on one side. Let it alone.”

“I am unusually interested and therefore nervous,” said Mr. Oberon. “It means more to me, this time, than ever before and besides the whole circumstance is extraordinary. The mystic association. The blood-sacrifice and then, while the victim is still here, the other, the living sacrifice. It is unique.”

Baradi looked at him with curiosity. “Tell me,” he said, “how much of all this”—he made a comprehensive gesture —“means anything to you? I mean I can understand the, what shall I call it, the factual pleasure. That is a great deal. I envy you your flair. But the esoteric window-dressing — is it possible that for you—?” He paused. Mr. Oberon’s face was as empty as a mask. He touched his lips with the tip of his tongue.

He said: “Wherein, if not in my belief, do you suppose the secret of my flair is to be found? I am what I am and I go back to beyond the dawn. I was the King of the Wood.”

Baradi examined his own shapely hands. “Ah, yes?” he said politely. “A fascinating theory.”

“You think me a poseur?”

“No, no. On the contrary. It is only as a practical man I am concerned with the hazards of the situation. You, I gather, though you have every cause, are not at all anxious on that account? The Truebody situation, I mean?”

“I find it immeasurably stimulating.”

“Indeed,” said Baradi drily.

“Only the absence of the girl disturbs me. It is almost dark. Turn on the light.”

Baradi reached out his hand to the switch. There was a click.

“No lights, it seems,” he said and opened the door. “No lights anywhere. There must be a fuse.”

“How can she be walking in the dark? And with a cripple like Robin? It is preposterous.”

“The British do these things.”

“I am British. I have my passport. Telephone the bureau in Roqueville.”

“The telephone is still out of order.”

“We must have light.”

“It may be a fault in the house. The servants will attend to it. One moment.”

He lifted the receiver from Mr. Oberon’s telephone. A voice answered.

“What is the matter with the lights?” Baradi asked.

“We cannot make out. Monsieur. There is no fault here. Perhaps the storm has brought down the lines.”

“Nothing but trouble. And the telephone? Can one telephone yet to Roqueville?”

“No, Monsieur. The centrale sent up a man. The fault is not in the Château. They are investigating. They will ring through when the line is clear.”

“Since yesterday afternoon we have been without the telephone. Unparalleled incompetence!” Baradi ejaculated, “Have Mr. Herrington and Mlle. Taylor returned?”

“I will enquire, Monsieur.”

“Do so, and ring Mr. Oberon’s apartments if they are in.”

He clapped down the receiver. “I am uneasy,” he said. “It has happened at a most tiresome moment. We have only the girl Teresa’s account of the affair at the factory. No doubt she is speaking the truth. Having found the boy, they are satisfied. All the same it is not too amusing, having had the police in the factory.”