CHAPTER IX
NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH
§ 1
“CLAREMONT,” the Ridgeway, was a corner detached house well set back from the road. A high evergreen hedge impeded the view from the footpath, and a curving carriage drive overhung with rhododendron bushes hid all suggestion of a house until the last possible moment. Then all that you saw was a tiny porch and a panorama of low-hanging eaves, diamond window-panes and russet-brown roofs of immense steepness. A telephone bracket affixed to one of the rafters and an electric bell in the porch convinced you that all this parade of antiquarianism was really the most aggressive modernity. A motor-garage, suitably disguised, stood at one side of the house. Behind was a vista of tennis-courts, conservatories, and an Italian pergola.
Beneath the tiny porch in the middle of a hot Sunday afternoon Catherine paused and pressed the button of the bell. She was excited. Her visit savoured of the miraculous. This was the house of the famous Emil Razounov The famous Emil Razounov had arranged this appointment to meet her. She was actually ringing the bell of Emil Razounov’s house. In another minute she and Emil Razounov would be face to face.
A maid opened the door. “What name, please?” she asked pertly, and Catherine replied.
Catherine passed into a wide hall, furnished with all sorts of queer furniture that she contrasted mentally with the bamboo hall-stand and the circular barometer that had graced the hall of No. 24, Kitchener Road. At one side a door was half open, and through this Catherine was ushered into what was apparently the front room of the house.
It was a long, low-roofed apartment, with dark panelling along the walls and rafters across the ceiling. The furniture was sparse, but bore signs of opulence: there were several huge leather armchairs and a couple of settees. Apart from these there was nothing in the room save a small table littered with music in manuscript, and a full-size grand piano. At first Catherine thought the room was unoccupied, but two winding coils of smoke rising upwards from two of the armchairs—the backs of which were towards her—seemed to proclaim the presence of men.
“Miss Weston,” announced the maid, and closed the door behind her.
One of the coils of smoke gyrated from the perpendicular. This was the preliminary to a slow creaking of one of the armchairs. A figure rose from the depths, and its back view was the first that Catherine saw of it. It was tall, attired in a light tweed jacket, grey flannel trousers, and carpet slippers of a self-congratulatory hue. Altogether, it was most disreputable for a Sabbath afternoon. It was difficult to recognize in this the spruce, well-groomed man of the world who had pushed his way into the Forest Hotel on the previous night. Yet Catherine did recognize him, and was rather astonished at her own perception in so doing. He faced her with the graceless langour of one who has just got out of bed at an early hour. Yet in his extreme ungainliness perhaps there was a certain charm. And as for his face—Catherine decided that it was not only lacking in positive good looks, but was also well endowed with extremely negative characteristics. To begin with, the lie of his features was not symmetrical. His hair was black and wiry, lustreless and devoid of interest. The whole plan and elevation of his face was so unconventional that he would probably have passed for being intellectual....
He bowed to her slightly. There was no doubt of his ability to bow. Whether he were ungainly or not, his bowing was so elegant as to savour of the professional. It was consciously a performance of exquisite artistry, as if he were thinking: “I know I’m ugly, but I’ve mastered the art of bowing, anyway. Put me in evening clothes, and I’ll pass for an ambassador or a head-waiter.”