Thirteen Guests (7 page)

She looked at him with provocative inquiry. He shoved aside a sudden wonder whether, after all—behind everything—she were laughing at him. He knew the wonder was not worthy, or genuine, and that it was merely another protective device. He decided that the most protective thing to do would be to go on idealising her.

“I believe I'm a little bit out of my depth,” he said.

“Most of us are,” she answered.

“Yes, perhaps. Life's a puzzle. But what I meant was—I may as well admit it—I haven't had time yet to become a man of much experience.” Was he talking idiotically? Like a small boy? He had no notion, but he plunged on, “Things still seem rather wonderful to me, you know. Probably I'll grow out of that, only I don't want to. I thought I'd grown out of it this morning. Now—I'm not quite sure.” He stopped, arrested by a thought. Instinctively she bent a little closer, following his mind rather than hers. He continued hurriedly, “That was an extraordinary guess of yours just now. About my trouble. I mean. I don't know which is more extraordinary—your guessing it, or my not minding. I didn't think I could ever talk about it to anybody. When a fellow's been turned down—”

“Don't say more than you mean to—”

“No, it's all right. Well, he generally keeps it pretty well inside him. Or so I should imagine. Doesn't want people to be sorry for him. Gets into a sort of—mental loneliness that no one must disturb. You know, I believe it's a sort of silly, self-pitying exaltation. But, whatever it is—I say, I'm getting a bit tied up! What's happening to me? I'm just talking rot!”

Something almost uncontrollable surged through him, surprising him by its force. He stared at her, keeping very still. His forehead became damp in a moment. Then he found Nadine's lips against his.

Nadine had kissed many men in her life, but she had never kissed any man as she now kissed John Foss. There was not only passion, there was something maternal in her kiss.

“I didn't mean to do that,” she said. “I'm sorry, John.”

She turned her head suddenly. Mr. Chater stood in the doorway.

“I beg your pardon,” he said. “I was looking for Lord Aveling.”

He closed the door again, and was gone.

“Well?” asked Nadine. “What do we do to Mr. Chater?”

Chapter IX

Largely Concerning Chater

“That man's dangerous,” said Nadine. “Let's be practical. Two points stick out. One, I've been a beast. Two, Mr. Chater knows all about it.”

“Do you think I care a damn about Mr. Chater?” replied John, through the whirl of his mind.

“Don't you?”

“Why should I?”

Nadine smiled rather ironically, and he misinterpreted her expression.

“No, I'm the beast,” he exclaimed. “I meant I didn't care a damn about Mr. Chater for myself—I forgot about you.”

“I wasn't thinking of that,” she answered. “You needn't worry about me. I'm case-hardened—”

“
Don't
!”

“What?”

He looked at her almost angrily.

“I can't bear it when you talk about yourself as though—as though you were—”

“The world's worst woman? No, John, I'm not that. I generally play the game—however dangerous—and I generally choose players who know all about the risks. I'm being quite honest with you. Virtues and vices alike. But just sit on that impulse to idealise me. Men like you do that much too easily. The reason I said I was a beast was because I've taken you at a disadvantage and got you into a mess.”

“I don't admit that!”

“No, you wouldn't. You're even better than your old school tie.”

“Are you idealising
me
?”

“Heavens, no! I could tell you something that would make you wince! But I want to get you out of the mess. If I could do it by saying good-night and walking out of the room, I'd leave you this moment.”

“That wouldn't help,” he agreed.

“What will?” she asked. “Have you any suggestion?”

“Yes.”

“Is it a good one?”

“It's the only one—and if you know me as well as you think you do, you'll realise it.”

“Go on, then.”

“It's the continuation of your honesty with me. You can't do the David Garrick stunt, you know.”

“David Garrick?”

“He got drunk to cure Ada Ingot of her love for him.”

“I won't get drunk,” she smiled. “But I still don't see your solution?”

“I think it resolves itself into the answer to a simple question.”

“That sounds horribly risky!”

“Yes—perhaps. But this time I
do
know all about the risk, so you'll be playing fair.”

“You're not going to ask me what I know about you that would make you wince?”

“No. You can tell me that voluntarily, if ever you want to. May I put the question?”

“Yes.”

“Well, here goes. It'll show you, anyhow, that I'm not idealising you.” She wondered. “When you kissed me just now, did you feel as though you were beginning another ‘affair'?”

For an instant she almost decided to cheat. But for his reference to David Garrick, she might have. That reference had weakened her defences, however, for she doubted now, as she saw his eyes watching her for every informative little sign, whether she could cheat him. For once in her life, she had the sense that she was being beaten.

“Would you like to withdraw the question?”

She gave him that chance, but he did not take it. He shook his head.

“No, I didn't feel I was beginning an affair,” she answered. “So now where are we?”

He found, to his dismay, that he did not know. The exact significance of a kiss has baffled countless intelligences. His expression gave him away, and as she felt her power returning she was urged by an intense desire to use it kindly.

“Listen, John,” she said. “And you can call me Nadine.
That
doesn't mean anything these days. I'm not a silly, impulsive woman, though a few fools sometimes imagine I am, but I do react quickly to a situation when it develops. That's my true nature. I even remember the day when I found it out—consciously, I mean. A pretty foul beast kissed me, and spoilt his chance of a repetition by saying, ‘If you can't be good, be careful.' I slapped his face, but I took his advice. I asked myself whether I was ‘good.' I refused to hedge. I found I wasn't. But—you may or you may not understand this—I refused to desert myself—to become twisted, or dull, or insignificant—by living the life of some one else. It wouldn't have been life to a person like me. It would have been death. So I decided to be careful, to stick to a few rules I made, and have generally kept to, and to go through with it.”

She paused suddenly. Then gave a little shrug, and continued:

“Rather funny, telling you all this after only a few hours' acquaintance, but somehow I feel I owe it to you. And then one of my rules is to be frank—although I admit my frankness with you has been unusually rapid.…I wonder why?”

He restrained an impulse to make a suggestion. Her self-analysis fascinated him, and he did not want to interrupt it. His eyes were on the contours of her shoulder, but his attention was on the contours of her mind.

“I expect you've had something to do with it. You're not very easy to lie to. Where is all this getting us to? Perhaps nowhere, after all. I kissed you, John, because I suddenly wanted to—”

“And because you knew I wanted you to,” he interrupted her then.

“Yes. But—this is what I want to say—and what I want you to believe. That moment wasn't as important as it seemed to you, and as it may go on seeming to you for a little while. You see, you take life very seriously—don't you?” He nodded. “And everything's important to you, particularly in your present mood. That's why I feel so mean, and want to get this in its right proportion.…No good! I'm making a horrible hash of it! I wish, for your sake, that you didn't have to stay here over the week-end.”

She stared at his foot, annoyed with herself for making a hash of it.

“Well, I'm glad I'm staying,” John answered abruptly, “if it's not going to make any difficulty for you. I mean—that fellow Chater—”

“Oh, he can't hurt me!”

“If he does, I'll murder him!”

“Please don't! I'd hate to appear as a witness at the trial!” Her voice grew lighter. “After all, John, I don't think a kiss between two unattached people at a week-end party is going to excite a blackmailer!”

“Blackmailer?” repeated John with a frown.

“The word slipped out,” she responded.

“But you seemed to mean it.”

“Well, he does rather strike me as that type, though legally one isn't supposed to say so without proof.”

“Perhaps you've got the proof?”

“No.”

“You know more than you've told me, though?”

Nadine hesitated as a small incident flashed into her mind. She had tried to dismiss it, but somehow it had stuck.

“Nothing much,” she said, “only if you
have
any dark secrets, John, I wouldn't leave them about when Mr. Chater's around.”

“Please tell me,” he urged. “I've a hunch about that chap—and also a special cause for curiosity. If he
is
going to be a nuisance, I'd like to know all that's going about him.”

She looked at him curiously, then laughed.

“If I satisfy your curiosity, will you tell me the cause of it?” she bargained. “Fifty-fifty.”

“Right,” he laughed back. She was trying to steer their moods away from the personal equation, and he responded to her lead. “You first.”

“Well—it happened before dinner, just after I'd seen you moved into here,” she said. “When I left you I walked into a little comedy. Or tragedy. Miss Wilding—you've met her, haven't you?”

John nodded. “She came in here a little while ago, shortly before you did,” he answered. “Then she went off with Lord Aveling—I think to read a play to him or something.”

“Did she?” Nadine looked thoughtful for a moment, then proceeded: “She was coming down the stairs. I'd dressed, but she hadn't. Thomas—that's one of the butlers, the only one I don't like—he nearly knocked my champagne glass over at dinner—Thomas darted out of a shadow, and gave her an envelope. Then, while Miss Wilding was looking at the envelope, Mr. Chater came running from somewhere—very quietly, like a cat—and bumped into her. She dropped the envelope, and he picked it up and returned it to her, full of apologies. I noticed that he looked at the writing on the envelope before he gave it back.”

“It doesn't sound too good,” remarked John, “but there needn't have been anything in it.”

“Possibly there wasn't,” answered Nadine. “But Miss Wilding looked very red when she turned and went upstairs again, and Mr. Chater would have turned and followed her if I hadn't asked him for a light.”

“I see. Did he give you the light?”

“Most unwillingly.”

“And then?”

“He said, ‘Chilly evening, isn't it?' and went upstairs after Miss Wilding.…This sounds horribly like gossip, doesn't it? I don't usually poke my nose into other people's affairs. But—well, you asked for it.”

“Thank you for telling me.”

“Oh, no, I want my payment!”

John looked a little ashamed of himself.

“Well, I'm only telling you
this
because you're asking for it,” he said. “If there's nothing in your information, there's less than nothing in mine. Are you superstitious?”

“I'm wearing green.”

“Then it won't worry you to know that there are thirteen guests sleeping here to-night.”

“No, are there?” she exclaimed, and the tone of her voice rather belied her implication of immunity. “Have you counted?”

“Mr. Taverley did it for me.”

“I—I hope
you're
not superstitious?” she asked, after a little pause.

“No more than you are,” he smiled. “But even if I were, I'd be safe according to Mr. Taverley's theory. He said that, if any bad luck came, it would come to the thirteenth guest to arrive through the front door.”

“Who was the thirteenth?”

“Our friend Mr. Chater. And I'll tell you something, Nadine. There—I've said it. If our friend Mr. Chater plays any of his alleged tricks on you, he'll have the worst luck he's ever had in his life. You can remember that!”

She looked at him seriously, then rose from the pouffe on which she had been sitting.

“Be very careful, John,” she said, holding out her hand. “I should never forgive myself if anything bad happened to you. I think it's time to say good-night.”

He took her hand and pressed it.

“Good-night,” he replied. “I'm under no delusions about anything. But I mean what I said. Like hell.”

Chapter X

Movements in the Night

Many things stirred that night. The golden retriever, Haig, restless in his kennel near the locked studio and sniffing sensitively with his cool black nose, was not alone in sensing uneasy happenings. The stag destined to be roused by harbourers on the morrow from his entanglement of fern and briar, lifted his head from the ground as though momentarily conscious of his new danger as well as his new dignity. He was in his fifth year, and had just emerged from the raw designation of young male deer. Then he lowered his head to invisibility again, with antlers laid back almost parallel with his body. The cock-pheasant in the little wood near Bragley Court suddenly fluttered for no reason his sleepy mind could fathom. No stoat was near. Had Death itself, that unbelievable conception, cast a transitory shadow over the bird's wing while seeking a location for its next victim? The sly old fox, back in his burrow at Mile Bottom after a pleasant meal of mice and beetles, took longer than usual to settle in his earthy den. He missed the badger whose house he had stolen. It was a pity the badger had not taken it kindly, and that they had quarrelled over the possession of a hen. They might have been pals.

But it was Haig's uneasiness that awakened John Foss to his own. The dog barked suddenly, shooting him out of a dream he could not remember. He tried to return to it, for he felt it had been pleasant, but a low growling held him to reality, and by the time the growling had ceased the reality had got him, and the dream had slipped irreclaimably away. In its place was a dull pain in his foot.

“Damn!” he thought. “Must have lain on it.”

A clock in the hall sounded a single chime. One a.m.? Or half-past something? He struck a match and consulted his wrist-watch. Half-past midnight.

The time surprised him. It was only an hour since Nadine had left him. He had thought it was later. He lay with his eyes closed for a little while, recalling her departure; how she had looked as she walked to the door, the faint rustle of her soft green dress, the turn and the smile at the door. And then the strange silence afterwards. The music had no longer sounded from the ballroom. The hall beyond the door had been quiet, saving at odd moments when people had passed through it on their way to bed. He had heard Mr. Rowe's voice: “To-morrow we must talk about Ruth's picture.” Presumably the remark had been made to Leicester Pratt, but the artist had made no audible reply. A little later, Miss Fermoy-Jones's: “I don't expect it to sell better than
Horse-flesh
. Even I don't often exceed thirty-one editions. Yes, my dear, thirty-one. I believe it's only been beaten by
The Good Companions, Jew Suss
and
If Winter Comes
. Oh, and of course that obscene thing,
All Quiet on the Western Front
. But, well, it's a better book. More along the lines of
Wings Over Cities
. Have you read that one?…” The silence had seemed thrice-blessed as her voice had faded away up the staircase. And Mrs. Chater's: “Well, I've had enough, you can come up when you like.” And, the last of them, Taverley's: “Good-night, Anne. You look tired.” And Anne's: “Am, a bit. Good-night.”

And then John had drifted off. And now he was trying to drift off again, with less success.

“What
is
the matter with that dog?” he thought, as Haig barked once more.

A door opened somewhere. Or was he imagining it? No, for here were footsteps, softly crossing the hall. “Last up,” he reflected, as he followed them in his imagination to the staircase. “Wonder which?” But the footsteps did not go to the staircase. They came to his door. He sat up abruptly.

“Just five minutes!” came Lord Aveling's voice quietly.

The door-handle turned.

“No—really—isn't it rather late?”

That was Zena Wilding, in an anxious whisper.

“But I'd like you to see it,” answered Lord Aveling. “Han dynasty. Genuine. Two thousand years old. They imitated it in Delft—”

The door opened an inch or two, then suddenly closed.

“Can't—I forgot!” came the mutter. “Of course, Foss is in there!”

“Never mind, to-morrow!” answered Zena Wilding, and John detected the relief in her voice. “I'd adore to see it then.”

“You shall, my dear. And we'll talk some more about your play. Although I think I may say to-night—I have almost made up my mind to—”

“No, do you really mean it?”

“Would it make you happy?”

John stuffed his fingers in his ears. Something in Lord Aveling's tone had made him do it. He kept them there for a minute. Then he took them out.

But he took them out a second too soon. He heard Zena whisper—“Please—good-night!”

Then, silence.

“This won't do!” decided John unhappily. “I
must
get to sleep! Meanwhile, it's strictly understood, I've been dreaming!”

He closed his eyes tightly. He pretended not to hear the dog growling. He pretended so well that sleep began to come to him at last. But it was not peaceful sleep. Footsteps drifted through it, and Nadine's green wrap. The wrap became a large green silk boat in which he was floating first with Nadine, then with Zena Wilding, and finally with Edyth Fermoy-Jones. “Mr. Pratt has been painting my picture,” barked Edyth Fermoy-Jones, like a dog, “and it will ruin my circulation. I must smash it!” A butler brought the picture on a tray. The picture was framed, behind glass, and the enraged authoress struck it with her fist. The glass splintered all around them, and John dodged and sat up.

He was no longer in a green silk boat. He was on his couch, staring ahead of him into the darkness.

“Did I dream that glass?” he wondered. “And Edyth Fermoy-Jones's bark?”

A few moments later he knew he had not dreamt the bark, for it was repeated. Once—twice—thrice, each time a little more distant. Then, a final bark.…

A door opened. It was not the one Lord Aveling had opened; he had heard that through his own door. He heard this through his window. In a few moments there came a gasp, obviously feminine. Then steps flying across the hall. Then other steps—slower, deliberate, stealthy. And then an exclamation.

“Hallo!”

Chater's voice.

“Eh?”

He did not recognise the second speaker, but it was another male voice.

“What are you doing here?”

“Well, sir, I—I thought I—” The tone suddenly changed. “There's a door open somewhere!”

“Oh?”

“A draught—from over there—”

“Here, wait a moment!”

The order was not obeyed. A short silence was broken by the sound of hurrying feet. Then the second speaker returned.

“Did you open that door, sir?”

“I? No, certainly not!”

“Then, might I ask why
you've
come down?”

The question was asked with timid challenge.

“Well, I've no reason for not telling you,” came Chater's response, after a pause. “I came down because I thought I heard noises.”

“Ah—I see, sir.”

“And why did you come down?”

“For the same reason, sir.”

But John would have sworn they were both lying.

“Apparently we were right,” said Chater. “Or have you any other explanation of the open door?”

“I may have forgotten to lock it.”

“Is that your job?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What's your name?”

“Thomas, sir.”

“Thomas. I'll make a note of it. Well, Thomas, even an unlocked door doesn't open of its own accord.”

“The latch is defective. It might have blown open.”

“It might. And it mightn't. Now suppose you tell me the
real
reason you're here?”

“I have told you!” exclaimed Thomas, the anxiety in his voice disputing his statement. “I thought I heard noises—as you say you did yourself—”

“All right, all right! Don't raise your voice like that! Suppose we did hear noises? Is there a burglar in the house? If so, why aren't we searching for him? But perhaps it isn't a him, Thomas? Perhaps it's a lady? Or, more correctly speaking, a maid. Tell me, does Bessie sleep in the house, or in some annexe or other outside?”

Thomas did not reply. John missed the flush that came into the butler's pale cheeks, and the expression of astonishment that gradually changed into mute fury. But he gathered that something emotional was happening when Chater's smooth voice droned on:

“Attend to me, my man. I'm asking no questions, but that may be because I don't need to. You didn't come here to find any burglar. And it won't help your career if anybody inquires to-morrow what you
did
come here for. So your policy is to go right back to your room, this minute, and not to let any one know that you ever left it. Whether I'll assist you will depend upon what I decide—and how you behave.”

“What do you mean?” muttered the butler.

“Ought to be clear,” answered Chater. “I know all I need to know to smash you—
and
Bessie. So if I have any little jobs for you, you'll be a good boy and do them. Well, what are you waiting for? Whoa, steady!”

Then John heard heavy breathing, and a sharp, stifled cry of pain.

“Want it broken?” inquired Chater's voice.

“Let go!” gasped Thomas.

“I wonder what Bessie would think of you if she could see you at this moment,” answered Chater. “She'd lose her good opinion of you, I'm afraid—and gain it, perhaps, for some one else. She's a pretty girl.…You know, I'm quite ready to break it, if you want me to.…Ah, that's more sensible. Now get out!”

John heard the butler's footsteps receding towards the servants' quarters. Then, after a pause, he heard Chater moving. Chater did not move towards the main staircase, but towards the passage that led to the back lawn. It was the door to this lawn, John concluded, that had been under discussion, and that he had heard opening shortly before Chater and the butler had met.

A long silence followed. John waited, his nerves frayed, for Chater's returning footsteps. The clock in the hall chimed once. Was that one, or half-past? He had lost count of time. About to switch on the lamp—not that the time mattered, but he wanted to do something to break this uncomfortable silence—he paused abruptly. Ah—Chater's footsteps, at last.

“He's been the devil of a time,” thought John. “What's his latest mischief?”

He listened to the soft tread. In the back passage—on the hall carpet—towards the staircase—no, some other direction—silence. Quite a long silence.

“What's he doing?” wondered John.

The silence continued. Then, suddenly, the steps were heard again, crossing the hall and mounting the stairs.

“Where did he go that time?” murmured John. “Nocturnal prowling, to see what else he can pick up?”

Now John switched on the light and again consulted his wrist-watch. Twenty-five minutes to two.

Well, the hall was empty at last, and now he could try once more to go to sleep. If he kept awake much longer he'd be a wreck in the morning. He began counting sheep. No good. They all had Chater's face. He concentrated on another face. Perhaps Nadine could send him off. He visualised her hair and her eyes and her lips, deliberately and unashamedly. His mind was full of little pricks, of other people's affairs, of fragments of disturbing knowledge that seemed to saddle him, somehow, with responsibility, though he had no idea how to discharge the responsibility, or who would thank him—and he wanted to escape from them to one unshifting point. And the pleasantest point he could escape to was Nadine. He wondered what it would feel like to lie in her arms.…

“Some one
is
in the hall still!” he thought suddenly. “What the blazes—!”

Chater's face drove Nadine's away. Indignation surged through him. Why didn't the fellow go to bed? He must have come down again, and probably his ear was at the keyhole.

“Well, I've had enough of it!” decided John. “I'll give the poisonous blighter a shock!”

He rolled carefully off his couch. He wrenched his foot a little, but just managed to keep back his groan. Then he rose, and using the support of furniture
en route
he hopped to the door. With his hand on the knob he paused to listen. Yes, somebody was undoubtedly there. He turned the knob, and threw the door open.

Moonlight came through a high window above the stairs, making a bright patch on the hall carpet. In the patch, her head turned towards him, and her right hand pressing the folds of her soft cerise dressing-gown, stood Anne.

Even in the surprise of the moment the thought flashed through John's mind that this was how she should have been painted. There was no trace of hardness now around her mouth. Her lips were slightly parted, and there was an expression in her eyes he could not define. It was as though her softness had been surprised and caught, and while she would not have revealed it voluntarily, something courageous in her refused to hide it again at once. The lines of her dressing-gown accentuated her slim boyish figure without detracting from her feminine appeal.

But it was something else that caused John to break the little silence suddenly and to speak first. He sensed not only her courage, but her need for it. Behind her poise, he was certain, lay fear. He wanted to eliminate himself from her oppressions.

“I'm awfully sorry,” he said. “I thought I heard something.”

His voice brought back her movement. She turned to him fully, and smiled.

“You did,” she answered. “You heard me. I'm the one to apologise.”

“Not a bit.”

“Did I wake you?”

“I'm not sure. I think I was in that state known as betwixt and between.”

He felt that she was grateful to him for his easy, uncurious attitude, even though he also felt she rewarded him with a lie.