Marnie (25 page)

We went up to change and went out for the evening in very much this mood. We didn’t speak to each other all the way there. I looked at his face sometimes and thought, he’s a sticker,
he’s a fighter, but he’s got to give in now.

The Newton-Smiths lived in a big house in the country, and when we got there we were surprised to find that there were going to be twelve to dinner. I thought, well, this is a funny idea, having
us here for an evening with the Holbrooks apparently to talk about the firm, and then they invite outsiders. But perhaps that was true to intention; that was what they’d said, just a social
evening. They were a well-meaning couple but not awfully bright. Terry was there before us looking just shaved and yellow-haired, but a bit furtive and hot as if something hadn’t turned out
the way he expected it. The MacDonalds were there too and a Mr and Mrs Malcolm Leicester were introduced to me, and I couldn’t make out where I’d heard the name before. But all that was
suddenly swallowed up because through the open drawing-room door I saw another couple arriving, and he was somebody I
did
know, a man called Arthur Strutt.

He was a partner in a firm of Turf Accountants called Crombie & Strutt who had a branch office in Birmingham. It was at the branch office in Birmingham that a Miss Marion Holland had once
been employed as a confidential clerk.

Well, there it was, suddenly staring me in the face like the muzzle of a gun. At first it didn’t really knock me out at all because as usual I had the feeling that the
gun was pointing at Marion Holland, not me. We were different people.

But it was going to be quite embarrassing if it turned out we both had the same face.

Mr Strutt had travelled up from London once a month while Marion Holland worked there. That meant he’d seen a lot of her. He usually spent a whole day in the office going through things
with the branch manager, Mr Pringle. Twice he spent more than an hour at a time with Marion Holland.

When I could get my tongue away from the roof of my mouth I clutched Mark’s arm. He’d been talking to Mrs Holbrook and he looked surprised.

I said: ‘Could I – have a word with you. I’ve just remembered something.’ When he’d excused himself I went on, ‘I’ve just remembered I’ve left the
oven on.’

‘What oven? At home?’

‘Yes.’ I laughed weakly. ‘I put it on about five and quite forgot it. I think I’d better go back and—’

‘Oh, it’ll be all right, surely.’

‘No, it won’t, Mark. I put something in the oven and wrapped it in grease-proof paper. I was cooking a cake, experimenting. If it gets too hot it might catch fire. It might set the
house on fire.’

‘If you’re that worried, ring Mrs Leonard and ask her to come up from the village. It’ll only take her ten minutes.’

‘She can’t get in.’

‘Yes, she can. You know she always has a spare key.’

‘She told me yesterday she’d lost it. I – really, Mark, I think I’d better go.’

‘My dear, you
can’t
. It would take you an hour and a half to get back here. It’s impossible. Why if—’

‘Mark, I have to get
out
.’

‘Why—’

‘At once. In five minutes it’ll be too late. I’ll explain later. Please, please trust me.’

Terry came up. ‘Hello, my dear, you’re looking quite ravishing. But pale, I think. Pale. Is Mark treating you badly?’

‘No. Very well,’ I said, and took two steps and then saw it was too late. Mr and Mrs Strutt had come into the room.

Rex was making the introductions. I saw Arthur Strutt smiling at Gail MacDonald, and I thought, perhaps I have changed myself enough. You can never tell. Colour of my hair’s different, of
course, and the style quite; I was wearing my hair behind my ears in those days. And it was two years. Maybe he never really looked at me. He was a fat little man, and his wife was thin and faded,
and—

He saw me and his face changed.

Rex said: ‘And this is my cousin and his wife, Mr and Mrs Mark Rutland.’

We said the usual things. I didn’t look at him much but I could see Strutt blinking behind his library spectacles the way he did when he was excited.

After what seemed about an hour he cleared his throat and said: ‘I think we have met before, haven’t we?’

I stared at him in surprise and then smiled. ‘I don’t think so. At least I don’t remember. Where was it?’

‘In Birmingham. With Mr Pringle?’

I shook my head. ‘I’m awfully sorry. I haven’t often been up there. How long ago?’

‘Two years. Rather less.’

His wife was looking at him suspiciously.

‘No,’ I said, ‘I lived in Cardiff two years ago. I’m sorry.’

‘
I’m
sorry,’ he said, but he moved on. He had to be introduced to this Malcolm Leicester and his wife.

I took a gulp of the drink the maid had just given me. It was strong gin but I needed it. My hand was shaking so much I had to put the glass down before anyone noticed me.

Then someone was holding my arm. ‘Bear up,’ Mark said under his breath. ‘He’s gone. Can I help now?’

I think if anything could have warmed me to him it was that. It did me more good than the gin to know he was like that about it. I smiled at him and shook my head.

But Strutt wasn’t satisfied yet. I saw him talking to his wife, but he didn’t come over again because Mrs Leicester started talking to him, and by the time she’d got through it
was time to go in to dinner.

It was one of those good dinners, with plenty of the right food cooked the right way. You could see how the Newton-Smiths kept their strength up. Mark might think it was all a waste of time, but
I saw now that the Newton-Smiths weren’t so simple after all, because of Malcolm Leicester. Somehow by inviting him as well as Mark and as well as the Holbrooks, Rex was calling the
Holbrooks’ bluff. It was a new sort of game of poker, and afterwards I wasn’t so sure I’d have liked to play poker with fat Rex.

I had Terry on one side and a man whose name I forget on the other. Although it was all so good, everything I ate sat like an iron lump on my stomach.

Half-way through dinner I heard them talking about Rutland’s at the other end of the table. Leicester leaned across and said something to Mark and Mark said something back that made them
all laugh; but I could see Mark had taken the point all the same.

I looked across sidelong and saw Mr Strutt watching me. I lowered my eyes just as quick as he looked away. His wife was on the other side of Terry, and she wasn’t exactly being showered
with attention by Terry.

Terry said: ‘D’you mean it’s true – you can never come again to one of my little parties, my dear, my dear?’

‘I didn’t say so.’

‘We’re having a special one next Saturday. No holds barred. Think you can make it?’

‘Terry, is that Malcolm Leicester of the Glastonbury Investment Trust?’

An uneasy smile went across his face. ‘Yes. How d’you know? Did Mark tell you?’

‘No. I do it with tea-leaves.’

‘Or with reading letters? I remember my father saying once that you read personal letters when you were in the firm.’

It was the only bit of talk I recollect over that dinner, and I waited for the meal to finish. Afterwards all the women went upstairs. I knew I was in for more trouble yet, but I wasn’t
expecting Mrs Strutt to start it. She came over to me when the others were all chattering and said:

‘I understand you knew my husband some years ago?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry but he’s confusing me with someone else.’

She looked at me in the mirror while I made up my lips. I mean, it wasn’t easy to concentrate. She was a drawn sort of woman, not too old, but she’d lost her looks.

‘Arthur never forgets a face.’

‘I don’t suppose he’s forgotten it, Mrs – er – Stott. I think he’s just mistaken it. Anyway, does it matter?’

She looked over her shoulder at the others. ‘I knew he was infatuated with a woman all through 1958,’ she said in a low voice.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I could never find out her name. He used to go off on these
business
trips . . . Did you
leave
him or something?’

I screwed the lipstick back in its thing and put it in my bag. ‘Honestly, Mrs Stott—’

‘Strutt, as you well know. He tells me some story now about you being in the Birmingham office; but I know he would
never
have blurted it out if you hadn’t taken him by
surprise. He’s always so
careful
. . .’

There was a whole burst of giggles from the other women.

‘I sometimes look in his suitcases, his pockets . . . Only once in 1953, I really caught him. And even then . . .’

Well, I looked at her again in the mirror, and her eyes were brimming up with angry tears. And I suddenly felt awfully sorry for her, so I said: ‘Look, Mrs Strutt, honestly, your
husband’s never been in love with me. Really, dear. He’s making a mistake and so are you. We’ve never even
met
before. Won’t you believe me?’

Mrs Newton-Smith had come up to the table. ‘Are you girls ready to go down?’

‘Yes,’ said Mrs Strutt, and she turned away, but I didn’t know which one of us she was answering.

I knew of course he was going to have another stab at me. In a maddening sort of way his poor suspicious wife made it all the more necessary for him to prove himself right.
Apart from that, he wasn’t the type of man who’d easily part with money. I expect Mr Pringle had got it hot at the time for not making more sure of my references.

I kept near Mark all the time. It looks silly when you come to think of it, but I felt he was a protection. I felt he was on my side. I’d never felt him on my side before.

We stayed on and on talking and drinking and chatting. Then Rex came over to me and started talking about hunting. But I’ve really no idea what he said. Ten-thirty came and eleven. At half
past eleven the MacDonalds got up to go, and then there was a general stirring around. Like a dog off the lead Arthur Strutt came over to me, with his wife just behind.

He blinked and said: ‘I’m sorry to keep on about this, Mrs Rutland, but you were Miss Marion Holland before you married, weren’t you.’

It wasn’t a question at all. It was just him stating what he knew to be true.

‘No,’ I said, not politely. ‘I wasn’t.’

Strutt blinked up at Mark, then glanced at his wife. ‘The Marion Holland I mean was employed by my firm as a confidential clerk between September 1958 and February 1959. In Birmingham that
was, under my manager there, George Pringle.’

I sighed. After all, I’d every reason to be getting impatient by now. ‘Is it necessary to say it again? My maiden name was Elmer. But in 1958 and 1959 I was living with my then
husband in Cardiff. He died late in 1959. His name was Jim Taylor. I’ve only been to Birmingham twice and that was five years ago.’

He stared at me, as if any minute he was going to call me a liar. Then Mark suddenly said: ‘I can confirm that, Mr Strutt, if it will give you any satisfaction. Though I don’t know
what all the excitement’s about. I knew my wife before we were married.’ I was staggered by him coming in like this.

‘When?’ said Strutt. ‘In 1958?’

‘Yes. I met her first in Cardiff in June 1958. I’ve known her ever since. I don’t know what’s worrying you about the resemblance, but I can assure you it can only be a
resemblance.’

That really upset him. You could see the conviction, the absolute certainty, dying away, and in its place for the first time, real doubt. ‘Well I’m jiggered . . . I’ve never
seen such a resemblance, honestly. I admit, Marion Holland was a blonde, but you know how women change their hair . . .’

Someone behind us laughed. It was Terry.

Mr Strutt looked at me. ‘I beg your pardon, Mrs Rutland. I’d – you see, I’d a special reason for wanting to meet Miss Holland again. She – well, there it is, I
think I’ve made rather a fool of myself. You haven’t a twin sister, I suppose?’

‘No sisters at all,’ I said, smiling now that he was backing down.

The suspicion crept around in his eyes, like quicksilver in a saucer. ‘You even smile like her . . . Well, I promise you I’ll never disbelieve one of those
Prisoner of Zenda
stories again.’

They left soon afterwards, and we were not long behind them.

Terry came down the steps with us, and instead of going over to his own car walked with us to ours. He talked away about this and that; but one thing I was certain, he wasn’t thinking what
he was talking about. He kept darting little glances first at me and then at Mark.

He said: ‘I didn’t know Leicester was a friend of Rex’s before, did you, Mark?’

‘No.’

‘I never met him before,’ Terry said, ‘but he seems a nice chap. Powerful in his own way, too. By the by, I didn’t know either that you two knew each other as early as
1958. You weren’t ragging, were you?’

Mark said: ‘’Fraid not. You remember I was in Wales in June 1958 on that dispute with Verekers. I met Marnie then.’

‘While Estelle was alive?’

Mark hesitated. ‘I didn’t know Marnie well. We wrote once or twice.’

Terry laughed. ‘Deceitful, wasn’t it, my dears. All this business of her coming and asking for a job. Why so roundabout, eh?’

Mark hesitated again. ‘People talk, Terry. Even you. I didn’t want some silly scandal to get around.’

‘Ha, ha. Well, you see how your misdeeds find you out.’

He slammed my door and we drove off.

We drove off in one of those silences. I waited for Mark, but he said nothing at all. And his face had really nothing you could read on it.

It was freezing in the car and I leaned down to switch on the heater. It began to whirr but the engine was so cold that only cold air came in to begin with. The air swirled round my ankles and I
shivered. I pulled the collar of my coat up. There was another car on ahead that had come from the house but I couldn’t remember who had left before us. There were one or two icy patches
under the trees and once the car in front skidded. But it kept ahead of us almost half-way home. The moon was rising and sometimes it looked like a headlight coming the other way. A slight warmth
began to come through the heater.