John Creasey - Meet The Baron

“My dear,” gasped Lady Kenton, “I just can’t — it’s too much — I don’t really know — how . . .”

“But it needn’t worry you,” said Lorna soothingly, realising what the trouble was. “It’s Marie’s loss, not yours.”

“It’s the principle of the thing,” mourned Lady Kenton. “Lorna dear, could you pop in for half an hour? It’s all so upsetting, and your mother . . .”

“I’ll come,” said Lorna.

“Good girl,” said Lady Kenton.

At the other end of the line Lord Fauntley’s very strong-willed daughter sat looking bleakly ahead of her. Many people who knew her would have said that she was in a “black” mood, which meant that she would probably retire to the Chelsea studio for days on end, and paint or mope.

She did nothing of the kind this morning.

After replacing the receiver she rang for her maid, and half an hour later was ready for the visit to Lady Kenton. She was not looking forward to it, but it presented one possible way out of a difficulty — and an unforeseen difficulty. Lorna laughed, a high-pitched, rather defiant laugh. She looked overpoweringly beautiful at that moment, but her eyes, dark, probing, restless, held uneasiness.

“If Mr Mannering should call,” she told her maid, “I expect to be back for lunch.”

“Very good, ma’am.”

Lorna left the Langford Terrace house and walked briskly to Regent’s Park, where she found Lady Kenton — whose home was one of the most imposing in that district — distracted almost to tears.

“It’s such a deliberate affront,” complained Lady Kenton for the fourth time in ten minutes. “I always did know that foolish policeman wasn’t any good, but this is too much. It’s the last word, my dear.”

“You can’t very well blame the policeman,” said Lorna, with a quick smile. “He’s probably feeling as badly about this as you. Or worse.”

“Worse! I should think that he feels the smallest thing on — on — I should think he feels insignificant. If I see him again I’ll let him know . . . Oh, bother die girl! What is it, Morgan?”

My lady’s maid was used to the differing tempers of her mistress, and kept a straight face as she entered the room and announced Inspector Bristow.

Lorna also contrived not to smile while Lady Kenton swallowed hard, straightened the shawl she insisted on wearing in the privacy of her home, and said, “Send him up.”

Lorna could see the light of battle in the older woman’s eyes; she was amused, but not so much as she would have been if she could have forgotten the fact that she wanted something desperately from Lady Kenton. She was anxious to humour Emma, but her sympathies in the coming interview would be with the Inspector, who would doubtless get through a trying half-hour with admirable patience.

The Inspector looked sprucer than ever. His shoes were polished until they were almost blue, his suit was perfectly cut, his tie, socks, and shirt matched well, and his trim moustache, yellowed in the centre with the smoke of his interminable cigarettes, was freshly cropped.

He bowed to the two ladies so punctiliously that the older woman was slightly appeased, and he addressed himself to Emma Kenton. The smile on his lips was exactly right.

“I very much dislike bothering you, m’lady, but there are one or two points . . .”

Lady Kenton’s brow was dark, and the question she had been preparing from the moment that Bristow had been announced seemed to burst from her.

“Why wasn’t I told, Inspector?”

Bristow obviously expected something of the sort, and he answered quickly.

“You mean about the robbery, m’lady?”

“What else could I mean?” demanded Lady Kenton. “It’s outrageous, Inspector, outrageous! I should have been told immediately — immediately!”

“I don’t quite see,” said Bristow gently, “how it was necessary to worry you before, m’lady.”

Lorna silently applauded him, and her regard for his diplomacy rose considerably. Bristow, as Mannering could have told her, was a likeable man.

“But why . . .” began Lady Kenton.

Bristow interrupted, without apparent intent to stop her.

“I understand it was a gift from you to Mrs Wagnall,” he said, and Lorna had a slight shock; it was the first time she had heard Marie Overndon given her new tide. “And as it was that lady’s property, it was not a matter I could very well report to you, m’lady.”

Lady Kenton looked at him doubtfully. Her chief complaint was that she had not been consulted the moment the robbery had been discovered, and now Bristow had disarmed her completely. But she would not give in without a fight.

“My interest was obvious,” she said coldly.

The next move was plainly Bristow’s, and he handled it deftly.

“Of course,” he said, “and I am hoping you will be able to help me a great deal. It’s just possible,” he added before the Dowager could interrupt, “that the robbery took place while — or immediately after — you were in the room with the presents, m’lady. There are one or two questions . . .”

“Questions?” snapped Lady Kenton.

“That I would appreciate your answering,” said the Inspector, gently but firmly.

Looking at the other woman, Lorna told herself that Emma was getting old. The Dowager looked careworn and a little faded at that moment. The questions threatened to bother her.

The Inspector was wondering whether it was possible that this little old woman could be the Baron. He was also beginning to tell himself that it wasn’t, and he doubted even whether he had ever seriously thought so.

“Just what happened when you slipped against the table?” he asked.

Lady Kenton clasped her hands together, and her expression was acid.

“Surely you’ve heard all that could be said about that?”

“It’s necessary,” said Bristow, “to check up on every statement, m’lady. A slight difference between two separate statements might mean a great deal. You appreciate that, I am sure.”

Her ladyship nodded now, as if to suggest that she fully understood the reason for the Inspector’s call, but didn’t consider it a sufficient one.

“I slipped,” she said.

“Against what?”

“The table, of course.”

Bristow accepted the words patiently.

“What made you slip?” he asked next.

“I don’t know,” said her ladyship. “I just slipped.”

“But it isn’t likely that you fell over without striking something first,” said Bristow.

“I stubbed my foot on the table-leg,” said Lady Kenton, bristling.

The Inspector rubbed his chin, and Lorna thought that he was beginning to feel exasperated.

“That was what I understood,” he said, “but I don’t quite see how it was possible, Lady Kenton. We have examined the table, and there was nothing projecting from it to cause you to stumble. It is a period piece, supported by a centre leg only,”

“It might have been the carpet,” said Lady Kenton, annoyed beyond measure at discovering that the policeman knew a period piece when he saw one.

“It’s parquet flooring,” said the Inspector, “and it was not carpeted that day,”

Her ladyship glared at him.

“Are you suggesting that I’m lying?” she demanded, and her voice sounded very strident in the small room.

Bristow’s doubts came back with a rush. His manner grew more placating than ever, but he was on the alert for the slightest slip she might make.

“Nothing of the kind,” he assured her quickly. “It is just possible that you slipped on the polished floor, m’lady.”

“It is,” snapped Lady Kenton.

“Yet you remember stubbing your foot against something,” persisted Bristow.