Chapter One

It was apparent to Miss Fawcett within one minute of her arrival at the Grange that her host was not in the best of tempers. He met her in the hall, not, she believed, of design, and favoured her with a nod. "It's you, is it?" he said ungraciously. "Somewhat unexpected, this visit, I must say. Hope you had a good journey."

Miss Fawcett was a young lady not easily discouraged.

Moreover, she had been General Sir Arthur Billington-Smith's sister-in-law for five years, and cherished no illusions about him. She shook him briskly by the hand, and replied with perfect equanimity: "You know quite well it's impossible to have a good journey on this rotten line, Arthur. And how you can say I'm unexpected when I sent an expensive telegram to prepare you both for the joy in store for you -"

The General's scowl deepened. "Short notice, you'll admit!" he said. "I suppose you've brought a ridiculous quantity of baggage?"

"Something tells me," remarked Miss Fawcett intelligently, "that I'm not really welcome."

"Oh, I've no doubt Fay's delighted!" replied the general, with a short laugh. "Though where she is I don't know. She packs the house with visitors, but can't trouble herself to be here when they arrive."

At this moment his erring wife came down the stairs. "Oh, darling!" she said in a voice that held a plaintive note. "How lovely to see you! How are you?"

Miss Fawcett embraced her warmly. "Hullo, Fay! Why didn't you send a wire to put me off? Arthur's all upset about it."

The large, rather strained blue eyes flew apprehensively to the General's face. "Oh, no!" Fay said. "Arthur doesn't mind having you, Dinah. Do you, Arthur dear?"

"Oh, not at all!" said the General. "You'd better take her up to her room instead of keeping her standing about in the hall."

"Yes, of course," Fay said. "You'd like to come up, wouldn't you, Dinah?"

This was said a trifle beseechingly, and Miss Fawcett, who wore all the signs of one about to do battle, relaxed, and agreed that she would like to go up to her room.

"I've had to put you in the little west room," Fay told her. "I knew you wouldn't mind. We're — we're rather full up."

"Yes, so I gathered," said Dinah, rounding the bend of the staircase. "It seems to be worrying little Arthur."

She had a clear, carrying voice. Fay glanced quickly down the stairs. "Dinah, please!" she begged.

Dinah threw her a glance of slightly scornful affection, and replied incorrigibly: "All right, but it's putting an awful strain on me."

They ascended the remaining stairs in silence, but as soon as the door of the west room was securely shut on them Dinah demanded to know what was the matter with Arthur.

Lady Billington-Smith sank down on to a chair, and put up one of her thin hands to her head, pushing the pale gold hair off her brow in a nervous gesture peculiar to her. "Something dreadful has happened," she answered. "It has upset Arthur terribly."

"Ha!" said Dinah, casting her hat on to the bed. "The cook burned his Sacred Porridge, I suppose."

A slight smile flickered across her sister's face. "Oh, don't be an ass, Dinah, for heaven's sake!"

"Well, that was it the last time I came," said Dinah, hunting in her dressing-case for a comb.

"This is much worse. It's Geoffrey."

"Dipped again?" inquired Miss Fawcett sympathetically.

"Worse than that, even. He's engaged to be married. At least, he says he is."

Miss Fawcett combed out her short brown locks, and began to powder her nose. "Barmaid, or tobacconist's assistant?" she asked, as one versed in the follies of young men.

"Neither. She's a cabaret dancer."

Miss Fawcett gave a crow of laughter. "Oh, no! No cabaret dancer would fall for Geoffrey."

"Well, this one has. And it isn't even as though she's English. She's a Mexican." Lady Billington-Smith allowed this piece of information to sink in, and followed it up by a final announcement. "And he's bringing her here to spend the week-end."

"But how rich! how luscious!" exclaimed Dinah. "I wouldn't have missed it for anything. Has Geoffrey gone mad, do you suppose? Who is the girl?"

"Her name," replied Fay, "is Lola de Silva. It sounds awfully improbable, doesn't it? It — it put Arthur off right away. I've had rather a dreadful time with him, because Geoffrey wrote to me, not to his father, and — and asked me to break the news. I'm afraid Geoffrey's quite infatuated. He seems to think Arthur has only to see this Lola person and he'll fall for her."

"The joys of being a stepmother," commented Dinah. "Is that what Arthur meant when he said that you'd packed the house full of people?"

"Partly, I expect. But he's blaming me for having the Hallidays now, just because he'd rather they weren't here when Geoffrey comes."

"And who," asked Dinah, "are the Hallidays? Kindly enumerate."

"People we met in the south of France," replied Fay, a little guardedly. "He was knocked up in the War, and she's — she's rather pretty, and smart." She raised her eyes to her sister's face and coloured faintly. "Well, you're bound to see it. Arthur flirts with her. That's why they're here."

"More fool you to invite them," said Dinah sternly. "You don't understand. Arthur made me." Dinah snorted.

"It's no good, Dinah. You're the fighting sort, and I'm not. Anyway, it doesn't matter. He doesn't mean anything serious, and if it keeps him in a good temper I don't mind."

"Anyone else here?" asked Dinah, abandoning a hopeless topic.

"Yes, Francis. He arrived in time for lunch."

Dinah grimaced. "If I'd known he was going to be here, I wouldn't have come. What's he turned up for? To touch dear Uncle Arthur? That'll make it a very merry party. Anyone else?"

Fay got up, apparently to rearrange the flowers that stood in a vase on the dressing-table. "Only Stephen Guest," she replied. "He said he'd be here in time for tea."

"Oh!" said Dinah.

It was a disinterested monosyllable, but it did not seem to satisfy Fay. She looked up into the mirror, and met her sister's frank gaze. "There's no reason why he shouldn't come here," she said. "After all, he's a connection of Arthur's, isn't he?"

Dinah dug her hands into the pockets of her severely tailored coat. "Who said he shouldn't come?"

"I know what you think."

"I think you're a blighted ass. Always did."

Fay tried to remember that she was five years older than Dinah, and failed rather miserably. Her lip trembled; she sank back into the chair. "It's no use, Dinah. You don't know what it's like, being married to Arthur. You don't know what it is to care for anyone, and never to see them. It isn't as though Stephen and I as though we… I mean, I wouldn't, and — and of course he wouldn't, but we can at least see each other sometimes."

"Is Arthur being noisome?" inquired Dinah, not much moved by this incoherent speech.

"I suppose he's no worse than usual," Fay replied listlessly. "It's me. My nerves are all to pieces. Probably there are some women who wouldn't mind his temper and the way he blusters and the things he says. You wouldn't. You'd shout back."

"No. Delicately nurtured female. Wouldn't have married him," said Dinah decidedly.

"I was a fool. Only I thought he was different."

"Personally, I didn't. We knew his first wife walked out on him, and she must have had some reason."

"Oh, she ran off with another man. It wasn't anything to do with Arthur's temper; or, anyway, if it was, I couldn't have guessed that. Only I was too young. I ought never to have been allowed to marry him. If mother had had any sense by the way, where is mother? I haven't heard from her for ages."

Dinah selected a cigarette from her case and lit it. "At home, trying a new treatment."

"Oh, lord!" sighed Fay, momentarily diverted. "I thought she'd taken up Christian Science?"

"It didn't last. She read a bit in some evening paper about proper dieting, and she's gone all lettucey. Nuts, too. That's why I'm here. There's a filthy beverage you drink for breakfast instead of coffee. I thought not, so I cleared out."

"Well, I do hope she won't make herself ill," said Fay.

"Not she. By the time I get back she'll have got religion, or something, and we shall have grace before meals, but not before lettuces, so to speak. As for her having sense enough to stop you marrying Arthur — well, pull yourself together, Fay!"

Fay smiled rather wanly. "I know. Now, say I made my bed and must lie on it."

"I shouldn't think anyone could possibly lie on any bed you ever made, ducky. Cut loose." "Cut loose?"

Dinah blew smoke rings, one through the other. "Isn't Barkis willing? I thought he was frightfully willing."

Fay coloured. "Yes, but I couldn't. You don't know what you're talking about. I'd sooner die than face the scandal, and the Divorce Court, and all that hatefulness."

"All right," said Dinah equably. "Have it your own way. Do we have tea in this well-run establishment, or are you slimming?"

Fay cast a startled glance at the clock, and sprang up. "Heaven's, it's past four! I must fly or Arthur will have a fit. He can't bear unpunctuality. Are you ready?"

"I'm ready," said Dinah, "but I shall dawdle for ten minutes for the good of Arthur's soul."

She began in a leisurely way, as soon as her sister had left the room, to unpack her dressing-case, and it was quite a quarter of an hour later when she at last prepared to join the tea-party on the terrace. A slight frown puckered her brow. It did not seem to her that the weekend promised well. Obviously Fay was overwrought and in no condition to manage an ill-assorted gathering; while Arthur, who belonged to that class of soldier who believes that much is accomplished by rudeness, was already in a thunderous mood.

Miss Fawcett had never, even at the impressionable age of twenty, succumbed to the General's personality. He was a well-preserved man, with handsome features and hair only slightly grizzled above the temples. He was large, rich, and masterful, and when he chose, he could make himself extremely pleasant. He was convinced of the inferiority of the female, and his way of laughing indulgrently at the foibles of the fair sex induced Fay to imagine that in him she had found the wise, omnipotent hero usually to be discovered only in the pages of romance.

Fay was helpless and malleable, as pretty as a picture drawn in soft pastels, and the General asked her to marry him. He had retired from the army; he wanted to settle down in England. A wife was clearly necessary. Discrepancy of age did not weigh with him: he liked women to be young and pretty and inexperienced.

Nor did it weigh with Mrs. Fawcett. She said that the General was such a distinguished man, and she was quite sure he would be the ideal husband for her little Fay. And since Fay was also sure of it, and neither she nor her mother was likely to pay any heed to the indignant protests of twenty-year-old Dinah, the marriage took place with a good deal of pomp and ceremony, and Fay departed with her Arthur for a honeymoon on the Italian Riviera. She was to discover during the years that followed that a man who had bullied one woman into deserting him and ridden rough-shod over all his inferiors for quite twenty years, was not likely to change his ways thus late in life.

Between him and his sister-in-law there raged a guerrilla warfare which both enjoyed. They disliked one another with equal cordiality. The General said that Dinah was an impudent hussy. Whereas Dinah drove him to the verge of an apoplexy by remarking with an air of naive wonder: "What odd expressions people of your generation do use! I remember my grandfather…'

The explosion which had cut short this reminiscence had made Fay wince and shrink into herself; it produced in Dinah nothing but a kind of bright-eyed interest.

She was quite ready to spar with the General, if he felt like that, which apparently he did, but it sounded, from what Fay had told her, that there would be trouble enough during the week-end already. She strolled downstairs to tea, whistling softly to herself, still dressed in the severely tailored grey flannel coat and skirt which so admirably became her.

The terrace was at the back of the house, facing south, find was reached either by way of the drawing-room or the billiard-room, both of which apartments had several long windows opening on to it. Fay was seated behind a table which seemed almost too frail to support its expensive and ponderous load of silver ware. An enormous silver tray quite covered it, and the embossed teapot, which Fay had picked up, shook in her weak bold.

As Dinah stepped out on to the terrace a big man in rough tweeds got up from his seat and took the teapot from Fay, saying in a deep voice that somehow matched his tweeds: "Let me do that for you. It's too heavy for you to hold."

Dinah recognised Stephen Guest, and smiled. In repose her face had a youthful gravity; her smile dispelled that completely. It was a friendly, infectious smile, crinkling the corners of her eyes. If Dinah smiled you had to smile back, as Stephen Guest did now. His rugged, curiously square face softened. "Hullo, Dinah!" He said, and went back to his task of pouring out the tea for Fay.

A tall and slender young man with sleekly shining black hair, thin lips under a tiny moustache, and quite incredibly immaculate tennis flannels, got up with the grace of muscles under perfect control, and pulled forward another chair. "Ah, Dinah, light of my eyes!" he drawled. "Come and sit beside me, darling, and comfort me."

"Hullo!" said Dinah discouragingly.

There were two other people on the terrace, to whom Fay proceeded to make her sister known. Basil Halliday was a thin man in the late thirties, with a face prematurely lined through ill health. He had very deepset, almost sunken eyes and a way of twitching his brows over them that indicated nerves on edge. His wife Dinah regarded with more interest. Camilla Halliday was a pretty woman. She had corn-coloured hair, shingled and perfectly waved, a pair of shallow blue eyes, and a predatory little mouth sharply outlined by scarlet lipstick. She was lounging in a long chair, a cigarette between her lips, and made no effort to get up. Removing the cigarette with one hand, she extended the other towards Dinah. "Oh, how do you do? Do forgive me, but I'm quite too exhausted to move."

Dinah noticed that the pointed finger-nails were polished lacquer red. She shook hands, and turned to receive her cup and saucer from Fay. "What exhausted you?" she inquired.

Francis Billington-Smith, who had exerted himself to bring a plate of sandwiches to Dinah, raised his brows. "My dear, didn't you hear me ask you to comfort me? I have been ignominiously beaten at tennis. It's what people write letters to the Daily Mirror about. "What is wrong with the Men of Today?" So belittling."

"Oh, but you let me win!" said Camilla, throwing him a glance which Dinah felt to be mechanically provocative.

"Rubbish!" pronounced Sir Arthur loudly. "No stamina in these modern young men. You play a fine game, Camilla. Pleasure to watch you! Now what do you say to taking me on after tea?"

Camilla smiled up at him. "Tisn't fair to make fun of poor little me. You know you could give me thirty and beat me with your horribly terrifying service."

"Oh, come, come!" said Sir Arthur, visibly gratified. "It isn't as terrifying as that, surely?"

"Why not have a mixed doubles?" suggested Fay in her gentle voice. "You'll play, won't you, Dinah?" She looked across at her husband, and said timidly: "Francis and Dinah against Camilla and Basil, don't you think, Arthur? You haven't forgotten that Geoffrey and — and Miss de Silva are coming?"

"Whether they come or do not is not my affair," said Sir Arthur. "I may remind you, my dear, that you asked them, and I suggest that it is for you to entertain them when they are to arrive. Dinah, you can play with Francis against Camilla here, and me. How will that be, Camilla?"

"You'll have to be very kind to me, then, and takee all the difficult balls," said Camilla. "But perhaps Miss Fawcett doesn't want to play?"

"As a matter of fact I don't, much," replied Dinah, accepting another sandwich.

"Hm! I suppose this is a specimen of the modern frankness we hear so much about!" remarked Sir Arthur I belligerently. "Personally, I should have thought that common politeness -"

"You wouldn't," interrupted Dinah, quite unperturbed. "You told me last time I came that you'd ceased to expect ordinary courtesy from me."

"Upon my word -!"began the General.

Camilla laid a hand on his arm. "Oh, but I do frightfully agree with Miss Fawcett. I know I offend lots of people, I'm so dreadfully outspoken myself."

"I'm quite sure," said the General gallantly, "that you could never offend anyone, my dear lady. But you shall have your tennis. My wife will play instead of her sister."

"Arthur, really I'd rather not!" Fay said. "I've got things to do before dinner, and — and one of us must be ready to receive Miss de Silva."

This slightly tactless reference to his son's betrothed provoked the General into saying with a rasp in his voice: "I've already told you I've no interest in the young woman, and I don't want her name dinned in my ears all day long. Go and put your tennis shoes on, and for God's sake consider your guests' wishes for once in a way!"

There was a moment's uncomfortable silence. Fay got up, her cheeks flushed, and her eyes downcast to hide the sudden, startled tears. Stephen Guest rose also, his gaze fixed on her.

Camilla gave an affected little shriek. "Really, you are the most dreadfully masterful man I've ever met!" she said. "I should be terrified of being your partner now. I know you'd bark at me in that paralysing parade voice of yours every time I missed a shot, and I should be simply petrified with fear. And it isn't I who want to play at all. I'm completely exhausted, and I'd far rather stay where I am, and — now don't be cross with me! Promise you won't be?"

"That's a very easy promise," said the General.

"Then I'll confess that I'm simply dying to meet the de Silva!" said Camilla audaciously. "I think it's just too thrilling!"

"Who is this Miss de Silva?" asked Stephen Guest in a low voice.

"Geoffrey's intended," replied Dinah, finishing what was left of her tea. "Cabaret dancer. Said to be Mexican."

"Good heavens! Is he bringing her here? Young fool!" He glanced towards Fay, who had seated herself again behind the tea-table, and added, almost beneath his breath: "I suppose you realise who it is who will be made to suffer?"

"Let us go and look at the roses," said Dinah. "Come on!"

He looked down at her, his eyes still smouldering, but considerably puzzled. "What?"

"Go and look at the roses," repeated Dinah firmly, and got up. "We're going for a stroll in the rose garden, Fay."

Mrs. Halliday overheard this, and gave her brittle laugh. "How too romantic!"

"My husband is a very keen gardener," Fay said. "You must get him to show you round some time."

Camilla Halliday sent her a quick look under her lashes, weighing her. "I should adore it!" she murmured. "Will you, dear Sir Arthur?"

"Delighted!" he assured her. "Any time! I can only say that I should like my roses to see you."

Dinah looked back over her shoulder. "And even that isn't original," she said pensively. "Come on, Stephen."

They descended the shallow steps on to the lawn, and began to stroll across it. Once they were out of earshot Dinah said: "You were an awful ass to come, you know."

"Maybe."

"It's no use trying to shut me up," said Dinah. "Ask Arthur. And if you don't mind my saying so, you won't make matters any better by doing the strong, silent man stuff whenever Arthur goes for Fay."

He smiled rather reluctantly. "Do I?"

"Rather! Like a western hero."

"I've been out west," he remarked inconsequently.

"I should think you were a huge success," said Dinah with great cordiality.

"Africa too," he ruminated. "Then I struck Australia for a spell. It's a great country."

"So I've been told. Is there anywhere you haven't been?"

"I've knocked round most of the tough spots in this world," he admitted. "You learn quite a lot, rolling round."

"What you don't seem to learn," said Dinah, "is a little ordinary sense. It's just dam' silliness to come and stay here. All it does is to make you want to take Arthur into a wide, open space and knock his teeth down his throat. I know."

Stephen Guest's large,, capable hands clenched slowly. "By God, it does!" he said, and drew a long breath.

"Well, you can't go knocking people's teeth out when they're as old as Arthur," Dinah pointed out.

"I don't know that that would worry me a lot," replied Guest. "It wouldn't take much from him to make me see red."

"Then you jolly well oughtn't to come here."

"Fay wanted me," he said.

"Your job," said Dinah, "is to make Fay want you much more than that. I've been advising her to run away with you."

He reddened under his tan, and said gruffly: "You're a good sort, Dinah. She won't, though."

"No, not while she can get you to come down here every time she feels like it."

Stephen Guest considered this. "I see," he said presently. "Thanks for the advice. Don't know that I shall take it." He paused under an arbour, and frowningly regarded a cluster of pink blooms. "Ever seen Lola de Silva?"

"That pleasure is yet to come. Have you?"

"M'm." A gleam of satisfaction shone in his eye. "Saw her at the Cafe Grecque once."

Dinah waited for more, but as Guest seemed to have relapsed into his habitual taciturnity she urged him kindly not to keep anything back.

Thus adjured, he replied: "Oh, I don't know anything about her! I only thought she'd be a bit out of place here — from what I saw."

Nothing further could be elicited from him. Dinah gave it up, and led the way back to the terrace.

Chapter Two

It was not until nearly six o'clock that the sound of a car driving up the long gravel sweep heralded the arrival of Geoffrey Billington-Smith and his proposed bride. Stephen Guest and Basil Halliday had gone into the billiard-room, and through the open windows at the other end of the terrace came the intermittent click of the balls. Fay also had left the terrace, on some murmured pretext. There remained Camilla, languorous in her long chair, holding an idly flirtatious conversation with the General, and Dinah, talking in a desultory fashion to Captain Billington-Smith.

"Would you like me to make love to you, darling?" inquired Francis.

"Do just as you like; I needn't listen," replied Dinah.

"It seems to be the order of the day," he said softly."You don't like me a bit, do you, my sweet?"

"No, not much."

He accepted this with his faintly mocking smile, and continued to smoke for a minute or two in silence. "I'm not entirely sure that I like you," he remarked presently. "I've been trying to make up my mind about it. Let us change the subject. This is really very tiresome of Geoffrey, don't you agree?"

"Yes, but it ought to be rather good value. Do you know Lola?"

"I haven't taken her out to dinner, if that is what you mean. I've seen her dance. She wore feathers — not very many of them, but so artfully placed. No, I don't think Uncle will be pleased." He glanced towards her, and added affably: "How right you are, darling! Naturally I should be delighted if Geoffrey were disinherited in favour of me, but one must never bank on the future, must one? It is so like Geoffrey to put his father in a bad temper just when I want him mellow. Do not look so warningly at me: neither of them is paying the least heed to us. I am always careful not to offend Uncle."

"I thought you must have come to make a touch," said Dinah.

"You mustn't pride yourself on your intuition, however. It was quite obvious. I cannot conceive any other reason for wishing to come here. Or rather I can, of course, but there's a law — Mosaic, I fancy — against making love to one's aunts."

It was at this moment that the car-wheels were heard. They did not penetrate to the General's consciousness, but in another few minutes Fay came out on to the terrace from the drawing-room and interrupted his tête-a-tête with the news that Geoffrey had arrived.

"Well, what of it?" demanded the General. "Does he expect me to wait for him on the door-step?"

"Arthur — Miss de Silva!" said Fay, on a note of entreaty.

The General turned as his son's betrothed stepped out on to the terrace.

Miss de Silva made her entrance as one accustomed to being received by volleys of applause.

It was not difficult to see why Geoffrey, who was standing smiling nervously and a little fatuously over her shoulder, had fallen in love with her. She was a most striking lady, even beautiful, with enormous dark eyes, an enchanting nose, a lovely, petulant mouth, and clusters of black curls springing from under the very latest thing in hats — a tiny confection, daringly worn over one-half of her head.

Her orange and black and jade suit (though labelled "Sports Wear" by the genius who designed it) might have been considered by some people to be unsuitable for a drive into the country, nor, on a warm June afternoon, did an immensely long stole of silver fox furs all clipped together, heads to tails, seem really necessary. But no one could deny that Miss de Silva carried these well.

Until her arrival Camilla Halliday had seemed a little overdressed, a little too heavily made up, but no other woman's dress or make-up could appear remarkable when Miss de Silva was present.

The General got up, blinking, and his prospective daughter-in-law at once introduced herself, "I am Lola," she said. "You know me, perhaps, but still I present myself."

The General shook hands with her, as one in honour bound. "No, I can't say that I do," he replied stiffly.

A slightly austere look crept over Miss de Silva's face. "That is to me extraordinary," she said. "But it is seen that you live retired, and I am not at all offended. I have a mind extremely large. It is impossible to offend me. But I must tell you that I find myself in great distraction, and at once the affair must be arranged, if you please."

"What affair?" said the General, casting a goaded look towards his wife.

"It's all right, Arthur. I've given orders about it," Fay said placatingly. "There wasn't room in Geoffrey's car for Miss de Silva's maid, and she is coming by train. Miss de Silva wants her to be met."

"And if she has not arrived on the train, which is a thing one must fear, for she is a great fool, Geoffrey must go at once to London, for it is quite his fault, and he has behaved with a stupidity which is remarkable, to think that my luggage can be put in his little car."

"Shouldn't have thought there was the least difficulty about it myself," said Sir Arthur. "Ridiculous nonsense!"

Fay, resolutely refusing to catch her sister's eye, laid a hand on Miss de Silva's arm. "Please don't worry about it!" she begged. "I'm sure she will arrive quite safely. I want to introduce you to Mrs. Halliday, and to my sister, Miss Fawcett." Miss de Silva summed up both these ladies in one cursory glance, and bestowed on them her hashing smile. "And to my husband's nephew, Captain Billington-Smith," added Fay.

Francis rose superbly to the occasion and gracefully kissed the fair Lola's hand. "Need I say that this is a much-longed-for moment?" he said. "I have had the inestimable pleasure of seeing you dance."

Miss de Silva accepted this. "I dance very well," she stated. "All over the world people say how well I dance."

"I'm afraid we don't go in for that sort of thing down here," said Sir Arthur crushingly. "Though I've seen the Russians. Marvellous! Most perfect dancing!"

"I dance better than the Russians," said Miss de Silva simply.

Once more Fay intervened. "We shall hope to see you one day. But won't you sit down? I'm sure you'd like some tea after your drive, wouldn't you?"

Lola disposed herself in one of the wicker-chairs, and allowed the silver fox stole to fall to the ground. "I do not drink tea, and it is too late now. I will have instead one little cocktail."

This was too much for Sir Arthur, growing steadily redder in the face. "In this house, my dear young lady, cocktails are not served at six o'clock," he announced.

"Then it is better that Geoffrey shall mix it for me," decided Lola, quite unruffled. "I shall not make any trouble for you then, and besides Geoffrey knows how it is I like my cocktail, and that is important too."

Sir Arthur's voice took on a peculiarly harsh note. "Cocktails," he said, "will be served in the drawing-room at a quarter to eight, and not, let me assure you, one moment earlier."

At this moment, before Lola, who was gazing at her host in an inquiring and quite uncomprehending manner, could reply, Guest and Halliday came out of the billiard-room, and a diversion was thus created. Under cover of fresh introductions Dinah whispered to Geoffrey that he must take Lola into the house. She had discovered that her week-end was to be a strenuous one, but she was not the girl to shirk an obvious duty. Since Geoffrey seemed incapable of moving Lola from the terrace, she announced that she was sure she had caught the sound of a car. "It's probably your maid," she told Lola. "Shall we go and see?"

"Ah yes, that I must see at once," agreed Miss de Silva.

"I'm if it is not Concetta, Geoffrey must instantly go to find her."

"Yes, of course," nodded Dinah, and shepherded her into the house. Geoffrey followed, bringing the silver fox stole.

"The future Mrs. Billington-Smith," murmured Francis, taking a cigarette from his flat gold case.

The General rounded on him. "Hold your tongue, sir!"

"Of course, I think she's too marvellous!" said Camilla, giggling. "But I do utterly understand how you feel, Sir Arthur. I think it's terribly sweet of you to let him bring her."

"He won't bring her a second time," said the General grimly. "Brazen, painted hussy! Cocktails! Fay, you'll kindly make that young woman understand that in this house my word is law! I don't want to have any unpleasantness, so I'm warning you! You asked her here, and I'll thank you to see that she conforms to the rules of the place. Now I don't want to hear another word on the subject, and I'm sure your guests don't either. Come, Camilla, let me take you round the gardens: the roses are at their best, I flatter myself."

Once inside the house Dinah tried to explain to Lola. At first Lola could not be brought to heed anything beyond the fact that Concetta had not yet arrived, but when it had been made plain to her that the train from London was not due at Ralton Station for another ten minutes, she consented to postpone Geoffrey's departure a little longer, and to go up to her bedroom with Dinah.

"It is very well thought of," she approved. "Geoffrey has been very selfish to bring me in an open car which will not take my luggage, and perhaps I am untidy from the wind. I shall arrange myself, and Geoffrey shall bring my cocktail up to me. And there must not be any gin, Geoffrey, but absinthe, for gin is a thing that makes me completely sick."

"I shouldn't think there's any absinthe in the house," said Dinah. "Still, I daresay Finch will think of something.

I'll carry the fur, Geoffrey: you attend to the drink question. I wonder which room you're having, Miss de Silva? We'd better inspect."

Happily there was a housemaid on the landing who had just finished unpacking Miss de Silva's advance baggage, and she was able to direct them. She eyed Lola with the envious admiration she accorded only to film stars, and when Dinah saw the results of her unpacking she was not surprised. The dressing-table was loaded with innumerable toilet jars, scent flagons, brushes, rouge-pots, and powder-bowls, all with opulent enamel fittings. A negligee, very like the one worn by Dawson's favourite star in her last film, was laid reverently over a chair, and in the big mahogany wardrobe was hanging an evening frock that might have come straight from Hollywood.

"Oh, I'm sure she's on the films!" Dawson breathed to Mrs. Moxon in the kitchen. "You never saw anything to equal the dresses she's got. Oh, they're lovely, Mrs. Moxon! they are really! She's like Lupe Velez, that's who she's like. Oo, I wonder if it could be her, under an assumed name — you know how they do?"

"Films!" snorted Mrs. Moxon, banging the rolling-pin on the board with unnecessary force. "She's one of them good-for-nothing cabaret girls, that's what she is. And when you've been in service a bit longer nor what you live, Joan Dawson, you'll have more sense than to go goggling at her sort. Get out of my way, do!"

Upstairs in the sunny bedroom Miss de Silva had thrown the negligee on to the bed, tossed her hat after it, and sat herself down at the dressing-table, anxiously surveying her face in the mirror. "It is terrible!" she announced, and snatched the lid from one of the powder-bowls. "It is not polite to make a complaint, and I therefore I say nothing, for I have very good manners, I assure you, but it should not be permitted that a man should demand of anyone that they motor in an open car. Naturally there must be a wind. I am not unreasonable, and I do not expect there to be no wind, but Geoffrey should have a car which is not open and which will take Concetta as well."

Dinah curled herself up on the window-seat, frankly enjoying Miss de Silva. "I know," she said sympathetically. "Men are so thoughtless, aren't they? I don't suppose he explained about his father either."

"But no: you mistake," Lola corrected her. "It is all explained to me. He is of a type difficult to manage. That one sees."

"Yes," said Dinah, "but — but I'm afraid Geoffrey's father is a little more than difficult."

"There is no need that I should disturb myself," replied Lola, attending carefully to her eyelashes. "I do not know where is Geoffrey, and why he does not bring me my cocktail?"

There did not seem to be much hope of impressing upon Miss de Silva the need to deal tactfully with her host, so Dinah, never one to waste time in pursuing lost causes, abandoned the subject, and asked curiously: "Are you very fond of Geoffrey?"

She was right in supposing that Lola would not in the least resent so personal a question. Lola replied with great promptitude: "Naturally, I love him extremely. I love very often, you understand, and always passionately. It is not so with the English, I find, for you have in general very cold hearts. It is not at all so with me. I have a very warm heart, very profound."

A knock on the door interrupted her. Geoffrey appeared carrying a tray, with glasses and shaker on it. "I say, we shall have to keep this dark," he said. "Father would have a fit if he knew. Darling, I'm so frightfizlly sorry, but there's no absinthe."

The look of rigidity which Dinah had noticed before instantly possessed Lola's face. "But it is to me incomprehensible that when you know that I wish absinthe in my cocktail you do not at once arrange it, my dear Geoffrey. Perhaps it is that you do not concern yourself with what I like, but only with what you like?"

"It's sickeningly careless of me, sweetheart," Geoffrey apologised. "Of course I ought to have brought a bottle down with me, but when I get near you I clean forget everything else. Darling, do forgive me, and just taste this mixture. Finch made it, and he's sure you'll like it."

"I do not know Finch, and it is not at all clear to me how it is that he can know what I like. I am quite unhappy, quite wounded that you can love me so little you wish to make me sick with gin."

"There isn't a drop of gin in it, Lola. I swear there isn't! Of course I wouldn't give you gin. Good God, if anything happened to you through my fault I should be fit to shoot myself."

"Well, I will taste your cocktail," Lola said, relenting, "Because I do not wish to make trouble, and I see that through the fault of your papa this house is not well-run. But when you have told him that I wish absinthe he will attend to it. Only you are to tell him with tact, my dear Geoffrey, for I do not desire him to feel uncomfortable."

Dinah gave a sudden gurgle, hastily choked, and began to pour out a delicately pink liquid from the shaker. Lola looked inquiringly at her, but she shook her head. "Nothing. I only coughed. What do you call this roseate mixture, Geoffrey?"

Inspired, Geoffrey said: "It's a brand-new cocktail, a super-cocktail, made for the most beautiful creature in the world, and I'm calling it La Lola."

Lola was so much pleased by this compliment that she held out her hand to Geoffrey, and said that it was a pretty idea, and he should tell her how the cocktail was made so that she herself (supposing that she liked it) could adopt it. After two cautious sips she said graciously that it was quite agreeable, and would be a very good cocktail indeed if a little absinthe were added.

Then the missing Concetta erupted into the room with many voluble ejaculations delivered in a foreign tongue. She was followed by a train of dress-boxes, and Lola at once became extremely animated, and ordained that everything should be unpacked at once, and her bath prepared, and a certain box of powder found immediately.

"I think we'd better leave her now," Geoffrey said reverently. "You'd like us to clear out, wouldn't you, darling?"

Yes, Lola would like them to go at once; it was terrible that her trunks had arrived so late; there was no time at all to make a suitable toilette for dinner.

Geoffrey signed to Dinah to go, and followed her, very softly closing the door behind them.

On the landing Dinah leaned against an oak chest, and rather thoughtfully regarded him. A lock of his long, fair hair hung over his brow, and his face was flushed with nervous excitement. He was a handsome, slightly effeminate youth with large eyes, and a mouth that quivered a little when he was at all agitated. He affected a style of dress which was considered by his set to be artistic, and was addicted to large-brimmed hats, polo sweaters, and pleated dress shirts. He had always been delicate, a subject in his boyhood to nerve-storms, which were the dread of all who came in contact with him. He was frightened of his father, and except amongst his chosen intimates he was not very popular with other men. His air of highly strung fragility, and a certain charm of manner, however, appealed to a great many women, and quite a number of sympathetic matrons felt a distinct desire to mother him.

Not being of these, Dinah felt no such desire, but she was sorry for him, and treated him with a mixture of forbearance and bracing common sense.

He turned to her now in his impetuous way, and stammered: "Isn't she wonderful? Isn't she lovely? Have you ever seen anything so enchanting as the way she looks at one?"

"Never," said Dinah accommodatingly.

"I knew you'd say so! I knew you'd only to set eyes on her! There are hundreds of men absolutely mad about her, and she's going to marry me! I tell you, Dinah, I can hardly believe it's true. Everything's changed for me; I feel like a different person since she said yes."

"I expect you do," agreed Dinah.

"Of course you know she's simply throwing herself away on me." Geoffrey said anxiously. "I mean, her career, and all that, because she's practically a genius at dancing — everybody who knows anything at all about it says so. It's the most ridiculous rot for Fay to talk about Father not liking it. Why, when he realises —"

"Look here, Geoffrey," interposed Dinah, "I expect it's all just as you say; in fact, I can see Lola's a stupendous person; but you ought to pull yourself together. It's no use, waffling about your father in that idiotic way, because you know perfectly well he's a stinker, and he won't realise anything at all."

Geoffrey's face fell. "But now he's seen her? I knew it would be no good just telling him, but when he sees her for himself, and talks to her — why, she'll twist him round her little finger! She can twist anybody!"

"She won't twist Arthur," said Dinah flatly. "She isn't in the least his type. Besides, he's got off with the Halliday wench."

"Who?" asked Geoffrey vacantly.

"The blonde woman. You saw her on the terrace."

"Oh, did I? I don't know. I was looking at Lola. She has a way of dropping her eyelids, Dinah —"

"Stop being maudlin!" commanded Dinah. "She's got a way of saying the wrong thing too, and that's the way Arthur will notice, let me tell you."

"But you don't understand!" said Geoffrey. "She's utterly natural. That's part of her fascination."

"All I can say is that it didn't seem to be fascinating Arthur — noticeably."

Geoffrey's underlip began to quiver. "If Father tries to stop it — if he's foul to Lola — if he's beast enough to — well, look out, that's all! He's been rotten to me ever since I was a kid, and if he thinks he's going to muck up my life now by refusing to consent to my marrying Lola — not that he can do it, because he can't — but if he does — well, I shall do something desperate, and he may as well know it!"

"Don't get so excited," said Dinah severely. "Do you think there's any hope of persuading Lola to do the shy violet act? I know it's a bit late in the day, but it might keep him fairly cool. I'm chiefly concerned for Fay. You know, it really is rather asinine of you to bring Lola down here, and it'll all react on Fay. Can't you have a talk with Lola? I did try myself, but I daresay you'd be able to do it better. Tell her what'll go down with Arthur and what won't."

"I couldn't possibly," said Geoffrey. "She'd be most frightfully hurt. She simply wouldn't understand. Of course you're only a girl, and probably you wouldn't see it, but Lola's the type of woman who drives men absolutely mad about her."

"Well, if she goes on as she's started, I should say she'd drive Arthur mad enough to be put into a looney-bin," said Dinah with asperity, and withdrew to her own room.

Chapter Three

In their several bedrooms at the Grange eight people were engaged in dressing for dinner, and perhaps only one of these bore a mind untroubled by worry, or vexations. That one was surely Miss Lola de Silva, and even she experienced feelings of slight annoyance at finding that not only had she to share her bathroom with Miss Fawcett and Mr. Guest, but that it was unprovided with a shower, further proof of Sir Arthur's incompetence.

Stephen Guest, occupying the bathroom after her, found it full of steam, rather damp underfoot, and redolent of an exotic perfume. It repulsed him; he found it impossible to enter the bath until he had washed any lingering taint of scent away, and since he was never one to require another to wait on him, he performed this disagreeable task himself. It did not improve his temper, which was already gloomy.

He had loved Fay for two years, at first in silence and from a distance, but with the unwavering tenacity of the very taciturn. With the exception of an incident in his youth, there had been no other woman in his life; he knew beyond need of averring it, that there would never be another. For Fay, so fragile and helpless, he had all a naturally rugged man's devotion, and without attempting to put such feelings into impassioned words he had long made up his mind that there could not be — indeed, must not be — anything that he would not do for her.

Accustomed during a life spent largely, as he himself said, in the tough spots still remaining in the world, to grasping what he wanted with a strong hand, he found himself now enmeshed by a net of conventions. This he would have torn ruthlessly down for his own ends, but he served not them, but Fay, and she had a shy woman's respect for conventions. To come as a guest into her husband's house and to remain passive in sight of her unhappiness was a greater test of his power of self-control than anyone merely observing his doggedly calm front could have imagined. He came because Fay wanted him. He did not accuse her even in his heart of selfishness; he was untroubled by qualms of conscience; if he could persuade her to it he would steal her from under her husband's very nose, and never, in the future, look back with the least sentiment of remorse.

But she seemed as far as ever from consenting to a step that seemed to her so dreadful, and ahead lay a week-end likely to be worse than any he had spent at the Grange. As he wrestled with a collar stud he wondered how best he could help Fay, whether by monopolising Lola, a prospect that filled him with alarm, or by trying to interpose his own solid person between Sir Arthur and the immediate scapegoat of his wrath. He thought perhaps Dinah would help: she was a good sort, Dinah.

Dinah too, slipping an evening frock off its hanger, foresaw a stormy week-end, but an irrepressible sense of humour prevented her from looking forward to it with unreasonable dread. Saving only her protective affection for Fay she could have enjoyed the situation provoked by Geoffy. and would have sat with folded hands, as an appreciative onlooker. But since Fay, incapable of fighting her own battles, would be the chief sufferer it behoved her to do what she could, even if the best she could do was only to draw Sir Arthur's fire.

Stalking through the communicating door between his room and Fay's, Sir Arthur was, in his own phrase, clearing the air. Every annoyance of this disastrous weekend was Fay's fault, from the unwelcome arrival of Dinah to the ill-assorted party assembled for dinner in half an hour's time. Anyone but a fool would have had the wit to wire regrets both to Dinah and to Guest. No otic but a fool would have invited the Vicar and his wife to dine on this of all evenings.

She faltered that the invitation had been given a week before; he snarled at her, and she thought, with a frightened leap of her heart, that he looked at her almost with dislike. She was wrong. He did not dislike her; he was even, in a contemptuous way, fond of her, but she had lost her charm and become instead of the blushing, adoring girl he had married, a shrinking, exasperatingly virginal woman who tried nervously to placate him, and whom it was impossible not to bully. Her worst crime in his eyes was that she had brought him no children, no promising son to console him for the disappointment of Geoffrey, that thorn in his flesh, child of the wife who had dragged his name through the mud twenty-one years ago, running off with some worthless civilian who had not even married her when it was all over.

There was his nephew too to annoy him. He was fond of Francis; Francis had gone into the Cavalry, just as all decent young fellows should, and his colonel spoke well of him. He wore the right clothes, looked a sahib, rode to hounds, and was a good man to ask down for a day's shooting. No damned humanitarian nonsense about Francis; he came of the right stock, not a doubt of that. But he was extravagant; seemed to think his uncle had nothing to do but to pay his debts. That would have to be stopped. If Master Francis had come to beg he would be taught a sharp lesson for once.

He could not blame Fay for Francis's visit. Francis had arrived without invitation. It irritated him that Fay should be blameless. He asked her why the devil she could not put some stuff on her face as other women did instead of going about looking pasty and colourless.

If Geoffrey and Francis and Dinah had only chosen some other week-end he would not have minded so much. But he had looked forward to the Hallidays' visit, and it was all spoiled. He had no objection to Guest's presence. Guest could sit and adore Fay as much as he liked; she was too damned chaste to let harm come of that; knew which side her bread was buttered on, too. He would have entertained Fay while her husband engaged in flirtation with Camilla. She was a seductive little woman, Camilla; out for what she could get, probably, but ready (or he was much mistaken) to pay for what she wanted. That husband of hers was a dull dog. Hadn't the sense to get a man's job, and blamed the War for it. Just like this damned puling generation, always grumbling at fate; no guts to 'em; he'd like to have a few of 'em in his old regiment.

And Basil Halliday, unhappily brushing his coat, Trying to think that his dress trousers were not so shiny after all, was despising Sir Arthur — hating him too, the libidinous old swine — and wondering what Camilla was up to. She couldn't like the man; of course she couldn't likes him. It was just her way to flirt with anyone who was handy, and it was no use worrying about that. It wasn't that he didn't trust her. Lord, hadn't she stuck by him when, God knew, she'd had chances enough to chuck him over? But he did wish he hadn't let her persuade him into coming down here. It was all very well to talk about free board and lodging, and naturally he saw the force of that argument, for that was the way one lived nowadays, making oneself agreeable to people for the sake of a dinner that hadn't been prepared by a slut of a cook who ruined everything she touched. If you liked soft living and pretty things you had to swallow your pride to get them when you were saddled with a rotten crock of a husband who couldn't earn more than five hundred a year if he lived to be ninety. He didn't blame Camilla; only this bloody soldier, with his money-bags and his loud voice and his greedy hands longing to paw her was surely coming it a bit thick. The man was stupid, too; one of those officers — he'd seen a lot of them during the war who thought the whole world was bounded by the British Army.

He cast a worried glance towards the door that led out of the dressing-room into the bedroom, where Camilla sat before the dressing-table, making up her face. He could just see her, absorbed, plucking a hair from the thin line of her brows. He didn't know what was in her mind; didn't like to ask. There was a little nagging ache behind his eyes. If he said anything to Camilla now it would lead to one of their frequent quarrels. Better to keep quiet; not play the jealous husband.

Camilla was making an elaborate toilet, determined to put Lola in the shade. She had chosen to wear the pink chiffon frock which wasn't paid for yet, but which might be soon — with luck. It had bands of pink sequins that glittered when she moved, and was cut very low across her breasts. Really it was rather too low; she had to pin a piece of silver lace inside it. All the other women would know that it was the wrong frock to wear at a country dinner party, but she didn't care what the women thought. The General would like it; it would make him want to fondle her (amorous old idiot!) and he could if he felt like that. It was a damned nuisance that this wretched cabaret dancer had turned up, putting the old boy in a bad temper. She'd need to handle him carefully, leading him on, listening to his ghastly stories about India, which always began "When I was at Peshawar," or Wellington, or some other damned place, and always ended with a hearty laugh. She'd have to give him a chance to mess her about a bit. She rather hated being kissed by men with toothbrush moustaches, but it couldn't be helped, and anyway in these days, when half the men you met arrived at kissing terms within half an hour, you soon got over that kind of squeamishness. In a way he was fairly easy to deal with. That was the best of these conceited men. She'd only got to play up to him for him to start hinting at things, and if she couldn't touch him for something handsome then she must be a pretty good fool. Only she'd have to take care not to let him give her some rotten trinket. Jewellery was no good these days; you got nothing for it, and God knew if she didn't lay her hands on solid cash soon she'd be in a nasty mess.

If only Basil would be sensible, everything would be all right. But he'd been looking like a sick herring the whole afternoon, poor old thing, and it would be just like him to get into one of his jealous rages and muck the whole show. He ought to know by now that her head was screwed on the right way. The trouble with him was that he'd got a lot of prewar ideas about women and honour. It was rather sweet of him, of course, but utterly pathetic in these hard times. Damn! it was ten to eight already, and she hadn't done her eyelashes. Oh, well, they'd have to stay as they were: no sense in putting the old man's brick up by being late for his filthy dinner-party.

Downstairs, in the long white-paneled drawing-room, Fay, drilled into punctuality, had been awaiting her guests since twenty minutes to eight. She was looking tired, but pretty, in a flowered frock that was like the chintzes on the chairs — cool, and mistily tinted. Stephen Guest had come into the drawing-room behind her. She smiled at him, that wistful smile that tore at his heart, and put her hands to arrange his tie — a lamentable bow, already askew.

"Dear Stephen!" she murmured, the hint of a tender laugh in her voice. "Why don't you buy one with broad ends? It would be so much easier to tie."

He couldn't bear it when she stood so close to him, looking up at him with her gentle blue eyes. Suddenly he put his arms round her, holding her tightly to him. "Fay, you've got to come to it. We can't go on like this. I'm only n mortal, you know." His voice was thickened and rough, his mouth was seeking hers.

"Please don't, Stephen!" she said faintly. "Oh, please don't! Arthur — the servants. Stephen, be kind to me; be patient with me!"

He let her go, breathing rather fast, his square face flushed. "See here, Fay! You love me, and I love you. We're all hedged in here by these God-darned conventions. One of these days things'll get too much for me, and I'll go plumb through the lot of them, and there'll be one fine show-down. Can't you make up your mind to face the music, and come away with me? We won't stay in England — the Lord knows I've had enough of the place. Too much stiff shirt and kid gloves about it. I'll take you any place you say. We won't defend the case; you don't need to set foot inside the Divorce Courts."

"I couldn't. It's wicked of us! I oughtn't to have asked you to come, only I wanted you so. Dinah thinks it was rotten of me, and she's right. It is rotten; only if I'm never even to see you I might as well be dead."

At sight of her distress the angry colour in his face died. He took her hand and patted it clumsily. "I'm sorry. Didn't mean to upset you, dear. You've got enough to worry you without me adding to it. Only, we've got to find some solution, haven't we? But we won't talk about it now. I'm just here to be leaned on, and to help you any way I can."

Her eyes filled. "You're so good to me, Stephen. I'm a rotter to let you waste your life for my sake."

He would have answered her, but Sir Arthur's voice sounded in the hall, and in another moment he had entered the room, followed by Finch, with a tray of cocktails which he set down on a table against the wall. Somewhere in the distance an electric bell rang, and Fay said with forced brightness: "I expect that's the Chudleighs. They're always on time."

It was not the Chudleighs, however, but Mrs. Twining who was presently announced.

Mrs. Twining was a widow who might have been any age between forty-five and sixty. She lived rather less than five miles away and was a frequent visitor at the Grange. She said that, having been acquainted with Arthur for so many years, she considered herself a privileged person. She was in the habit of making this observation with a faintly mocking lift of her arched brows, but the General, possibly because he knew her so well, usually refused to be drawn.

When she first took up her abode in the neighbourhood she was eyed a little suspiciously. She was so perfectly dressed that naturally people felt that she might nut be quite the type of person one wanted to know. She was obviously in comfortable circumstances, but she seemed to have no tangible roots. This was presently explained by the knowledge that she had spent the greater part of her life abroad, some of it in India, where she was understood to have buried the late Colonel Twining, and some of it in well-known military stations like Egypt and Malta. All this was perfectly respectable, and when it was made apparent that she was on terms of long-standing acquaintance with Sir Arthur Billington-Smith several ladies called upon her. She was found to be perfectly well-bred, though rather clever, and was in due course accepted by all the best people.

She came in now in her graceful, assured way, and shook hands with Fay, saying lightly: "I am so glad that I'm not late after all. I am told that every clock in my house is wrong, so I feared I might arrive to find you at dinner. How do you do, Arthur?"

"You remember Mr. Guest, don't you?" Fay said.

"Yes, perfectly," replied Mrs. Twining, smiling at him. "He told me a great deal that I didn't know about the western States."

"I hope I didn't bore you?" said Stephen, rather conscience-stricken.

Mrs. Twining sat down in a bergere chair, letting one hand rest upon its arm. "No. You interested me, Mr. Guest. Till then my knowledge of that part of the world had all been culled from various films it has been my misfortune to see. I never felt that they were really reliable."

The entrance of the Hallidays and Dinah interrupted Stephen in his assurance that the films Mrs. Twining had seen were probably quite inaccurate. Francis came in a minute later, looking rather sleeker than before, and Sir Arthur began — while his wife performed introductions to hand round cocktails. He took up a commanding position in front of the empty grate, when Francis relieved him of this duty, and set the ball of conversation rolling by remarking that it didn't look as if they were going to get any rain yet; he didn't know about Julia's garden, but his own wanted it badly.

Every one had some contribution to make on this subject, from Camilla, who begged Sir Arthur not to wish for rain till Monday, to Stephen Guest, who observed that the country needed it.

Geoffrey slipped guiltily into the room in the middle of this discussion, but if he hoped to make his tardy entrance unnoticed he was disappointed. His father stood facing the door, and said in a bluff voice, through which lay an unmistakably threatening undercurrent: "A trifle late, my boy, aren't you? We were ready to receive our guests in my young days."

Geoffrey coloured angrily. It was just like Father to treat him as though he were a schoolboy in front of a roomful of people. He mumbled: "Sorry!" and walked over to the cocktail tray.

Sir Arthur said sharply: "Good God, sir, where have you left your manners? Say how do you do to Mrs. Twining!"

Geoffrey grew redder than ever. "I didn't see you, Aunt Julia. How do you do?"

Mrs. Twining patted a chair beside her. "Come and sit down, Geoffrey. It seems a long time since I saw you. I hear you are engaged to be married?" Something between a snort and a scornful laugh from the General made her turn her well-coiffed head. "I beg your pardon, Arthur?" she said smoothly.

"Time enough to talk of being married when he's done cutting his second teeth," said the General, moving away towards Camilla.

"The Reverend and Mrs. Chudleigh," announced Finch from the doorway.

The Vicar and his wife came in.

The Rev. Hilary Chudleigh was a man of late middle age, with a gentle austere countenance, and a permanent stoop to his shoulders. He had been vicar of the parish for only four years. The best years of his life had been spent working in the worst slums imaginable, and it was only when his health at last cracked that he consented to accept a living in the country. He was not really fitted to be a country vicar, for he disapproved of fox-hunting and pheasant-shooting, and was not at all fond of social intercourse. The General said that he was a namby-pamby fellow with a bee in his bonnet. The Vicar said, sadly but with conviction, that the General was living in sin. If it had not been for the arguments of his wife, and the advice of his very tactful bishop, Mr. Chudleigh would never have set foot inside the General's house. He did not recognise divorce. This, not unnaturally, was apt to produce a somewhat strained atmosphere on the rare occasions when, in duty bound, he visited the Grange. He had tried once to bring Sir Arthur to a realisation of his error. The result had not been happy, and it had taken six months to heal the breach. Left to himself, the Vicar would never again have approached Sir Arthur, but he was not left to himself. His bishop came to lunch one day, and was more tactful and persuasive than ever. The Rev. Hilary, who was growing old and rather tired, saw that the situation was too difficult for him to cope with. The bishop apparently recognised divorce and remarriage, and the bishop pointed out that Sir Arthur was not only one of the more influential landowners in the district, but a churchwarden as well. It seemed one could not ostracise rich men who occupied front pews every Sunday, contributed to the church restoration funds, and took leading parts in parochial meetings.

So he gave way, troubled in his conscience, and at least three times a year he and his wife dined at the Grange. It was certainly a little unfortunate that one of these dinners should occur when Miss de Silva was in the house. It annoyed the General very much to think that the Rev. Hilary (who had the impertinence to condemn his morals) was to be brought face to face with the abominable young woman Geoffrey had had the affrontery to bring down to the Grange. Lola would give the fellow a fine handle; she would give Mrs. Chudleigh something to talk about too, for weeks to come.

Mrs. Chudleigh was engaged at the moment in shaking hands with Fay, and explaining how she feared they might be a little late on account of their having walked up from the vicarage this lovely evening. She was a thin woman of about fifty, with a weather-beaten complection, and hair of that pepper-and-salt variety that might in her youth have been almost any colour. Kindly people said that she must have been pretty once, but she had not worn well, and did nothing now to improve her appearance. She wore pincenez, despised face powder and curling-tongs, and had a genius for acquiring frocks made according to the last fashion but one. Her weak sighted eyes had a trick of peering, which gave her an inquisitive air, and she had a voice that had probably, in her girlhood, been a childish treble, and had become, in the process of time, merely sharp.

Both she and her husband refused cocktails, but the Vicar accepted instead a glass of sherry, remarking to Dinah that he had never learned to like the modern apperitif. His mild gaze travelled to Camilla, who was talking to Francis, and had given vent to her rather empty laugh. He blinked a little, as well he might, for the pink sequins sparkled dazzlingly as the light caught them, and inclined his head a little towards Dinah. "I am afraid I did not catch that lady's name," he said apologetically. "My wife tells me that it is quite a tiresome failing of mine, but I am a little deaf, you know."

"I think most people mumble introductions," replied Dinah. "That is Mrs. Halliday."

"Ah, indeed?" The Vicar looked at Camilla with renewed interest. "I knew a Halliday once. A dear fellow; we were at Lincoln together. But I dare say he would be no relation."

The sound of the grandfather clock in the hall striking the hour penetrated to the drawing-room. The General consulted his wrist-watch, as though to verify it.

"You see, we were not late after all, Hilary," said Mrs. Chudleigh, with an air of self-congratulation.

Dinah slipped unobtrusively towards Geoffrey, who was standing moodily behind Mrs. Twining's chair. "If you don't want Arthur to start making gobbling noises, go and hurry your betrothed," she said in an urgent undertone.

Geoffrey spoke from a wider experience of Lola. "She's always late," he said simply.

Mrs. Twining turned her head. Her cool grey eyes held a gleam of amusement. "Of course!" she said softly. "Gobbling noises!"

Dinah blushed. "You weren't meant to hear that, Mrs. Twining. But he does, you know."

"He always did," replied Mrs. Twining. "Geoffrey, my dear, I really think you would be wise to take Dinah's advice. Already this party seems to me to be showing signs of wear."

"It wouldn't be any good," said Geoffrey. "She doesn't like to be hurried."

His voice, breaking a momentary lull in the noise of conversation, attracted the attention of Mrs. Chudleigh. She came towards him immediately, various gold chains which she wore about her neck chinking together as she exclaimed. "Why, here is Geoffrey!" she exclaimed, holding out her hand. "I actually didn't see you. I must really have my glasses seen to. And how are you? What a long time it seems since we met!"

"Yes, I've been in town," said Geoffrey, shaking hands.

"Very busy with your writing, I expect," nodded Mrs. Chudleigh. "I read a little verse of yours in a magazine not so long ago. Of course I didn't understand it, but it was very clever, I'm sure. I used to scribble verses myself when I was young — not that they were ever good enough to be printed. We used to write them in one another's autograph albums, but I believe that has quite gone out of fashion."

Geoffrey, who perpetrated, very seriously, fugitive poems without rhyme or (said the uninitiated), reason, shuddered visibly and mumbled something in his throat.

"You must tell me all about yourself," invited Mrs. Chudleigh paralysingly. "I expect you meet a great many interesting people up in London and have quite a gay time with all your writing friends."

The General's voice interrupted her. "I don't know how long your — fiancée — intends to keep us waiting for dinner, but I should like to point out to you that it is now ten minutes past eight," he said with awful emphasis.

At that Mrs. Chudleigh's eyes gleamed with interest, and she said: "Well! So you're engaged to be married, Geoffrey! I had no idea! And is your fiancée actually staying here? This is quite an occasion, then! An engagement-party!"

"Nothing of the sort!" said Sir Arthur, who had been betrayed into divulging Lola's identity through his inability to bring himself to utter her confounded outlandish name.

Mrs. Chudleigh looked sharply from him to Geoffrey, scenting discord. "Well, I am sure this is a great surprise," she declared. "Quite unexpected! I am most anxious to meet her, though I feel quite sorry for her having to enter a roomful of people all staring at her."

The door was flung open; there was just a moment's pause, sufficient to allow every one time to turn their heads, and Miss de Silva swam into the room.

It was easy to see what had made her late. Her raven locks, which she had worn earlier in the day in ringlets low on her neck, had all been curled and frizzed into a stiff mass up the back of her head to form a sort of halo for her face. She was made up in the Parisian style — a dead white with vivid red lips and heavily blacked eyelashes. She wore a frock of black velvet rising to a point at the base of her throat and held there by a diamond collar. It fitted her like a glove; it was utterly plain, with a long train lined with scarlet, and no back at all until her trim waist was reached. A quantity of diamond (or, as Mrs. Chudleigh strongly suspected, paste) bracelets glittered up each arm, and in one hand she carried a fan of cock's feathers dyed scarlet. She was arresting, magnificent, and quite incongruous, and her appearance rendered her host speechless.

"I am late, that is certain," she announced, "but I shall not be blamed, because it was the fault of Geoffrey, who was so stupid to bring me in a little car that would not take my luggage. And I do not drink cocktails with gin: they are to me quite abominable. So there is not the need to wait any longer for dinner, and I do not disarrange my one at all."

The Vicar bent towards Dinah's ear, and, with an intonation of incredulity, inquired in the peculiarly penetrating whisper of all deaf persons: "I beg your pardon. Did I understand you to say that it was Geoffrey's fiancée?"

"Yes," said Dinah, carefully averting her gaze from Mrs. Chudleigh's stiffening form. "Er — yes." Then she unwisely allowed herself to look at Sir Arthur, and felt uncontrollable laughter bubbling up. She retired hastily into the background.

Fay was introducing Lola to the assembled company with an air of spurious brightness. Mrs. Twining said in her faintly drawling way: "My dear, I am sure there is no need to introduce Miss de Silva, for we must all have heard of her, and of her dancing."

"It is true," agreed Lola affably. "I am very famous, not only in England, but everywhere."

"Dinner is served, my lady," said Finch, enacting Providence from the doorway.

The General wheeled round, and, still speechless, offered his arm to Mrs. Twining.

Behind them, in sedate couples, the rest of the guests walked in to dinner.

The dining-room lay at the end of the hall, and was on the opposite side of the front door to the study. It was a large, somewhat sombre apartment, with mahogany furniture and crimson hangings. A number of dark-looking oil paintings in very massive gilt frames hung on the walls, and to one of these, unfortunately placed in her direct line of vision, Lola took instant exception. It depicted, with faithful verisimilitude, a large assortment of garden produce, scattered most unsuitably round a brace of pheasants and a dead hare. Lola had hardly seated herself when she caught sight of this masterpiece, and she at once uttered an outraged cry and got up again. "Ah, but it is impossible that I should sit opposite to that picture, which I find entirely disgusting. There is a dead animal with blood on it, and I shall immediately faint if I must look at it."

"It's only a hare, darling," said Geoffrey, feeling that it was for him to smooth over this breach.

"But naturally I can see that it is a hare. I am not blind. And I must tell you that to see a hare is extremely unlucky. I am already quite upset, but I perceive that it is not possible to remove such a big picture. It will be better if I sit where I cannot look at it."

The General found his voice. "Upon my soul!" he burst out. "Do you imagine, young woman, that I am going to remove my pictures to please -"

Dinah sprang up. "All right," she said hurriedly. "Change places with me, Miss de Silva."

Lola walked composedly round the table and sat down between Francis and the Vicar. "So it arranges itself," she said.

The Vicar, who had turned round to study the offending picture in all its detail, addressed her with an interested and more kindly light in his eye. "You do not like things to be killed, Miss de Silva? I am sure we must all sympathise with you."

"I do not mind that they should be killed, but I do not at all like to see a picture of a dead hare with blood on its nose when I am to eat my dinner," replied Lola firmly.

Since the Vicar was a vegetarian and a pacifist this remark was not a happy one, and he drew back, disappointed and perturbed. His wife, always his champion, bucklering him against the world with a kind of fierce protectiveness, at once entered into the discussion and said across the table: "We do not all consider it folly to disapprove of bloodshed, I can assure you, Miss de Silva. A great many people today consider all bloodshed to be wrong."

"In my country," said Lola, applying herself to her soup, "we do not think that."

"Lola is a Mexican, you know," confided Geoffrey, seated next to Mrs. Chudleigh.

"A Mexican!" echoed Mrs. Chudleigh. "Oh, dear me! Of course that would account for it. Such a dreadful country! One feels that something ought to be done about it, but then they're all Roman Catholics, aren't they? And so Miss de Silva is a dancer, I think you said? On the stage, of course? Well, I always say it takes all sorts to make a world, and I hope I am sufficiently broad-minded… I see you have Mr. Guest staying with you again. He is quite a frequent visitor, is he not?"

Fay, overhearing this remark, coloured faintly, and lost the thread of the Vicar's painstaking conversation. Beyond him Lola was recounting the tale of her triumphs to Francis, while Camilla Halliday, seated on his left, sought doggedly to capture his attention. The General addressed himself solely to Mrs. Twining and Mrs. Chudleigh, but occasionally sent a smouldering look down the table towards Lola. Stephen Guest said nothing in particular; Geoffrey listened in adoring silence to what Lola was saying to his cousin, and Dinah pursued a futile conversation with Basil Halliday.

It was not a comfortable dinner-party, and at times it was in danger of becoming quite cataclysmic, as, for instance, when Lola produced a tiny Russian cigarette between the entree and the bird, and requested Francis to light it for her. The General looked daggers at his wife, and since she felt herself powerless to intervene, began to say in his most unpleasant voice: "Would you have the goodness to refrain —"

"A foreign custom, my dear Arthur," interposed Mrs. Twining, and took her own case out of her bag. Under her host's astonished glare she drew out a cigarette, and placed it between her lips. "A match, please," she said calmly.

"What the devil's the matter with you, Julia?" demanded Sir Arthur. "Since when have you taken to that disgusting habit?"

She raised her brows. "You ought to know by now that I am eminently adaptable," she said. "Ah, thank you, Mr. Guest. So kind of you."

Mrs. Chudleigh gave a shrill laugh. "I must say I did not expect to see you smoking at table, Julia," she remarked. "We live and learn. I wonder what Hilary would have to say to me if I were suddenly to light a cigarette in the middle of dinner?"

"Oh, every one does it nowadays," Geoffrey assured her. "I do myself, you know."

"In this house," said his father, "you do nothing of the kind, let me tell you!"

"I'm sure it can't be good for you," Mrs. Chudleigh said earnestly. "I always say tobacco is the curse of the modern generation. It goes through all classes. You would hardly believe it possible, but I actually discovered a housemaid of mine smoking in her bedroom once. I had suspected that she did, and I managed to catch her red-handed!"

This recollection was received by Geoffrey in gloomy silence, but provoked Camilla, who was ruffled by her failure to lure Francis away from Lola, to say lightly: "Poor wretch, why shouldn't she? Live and let live is my motto!"

"Indeed!" said Mrs. Chudleigh, her eyes snapping dangerously. "We all have our own ideas, of course. Personally I always consider myself directly responsible for the moral tone of any servant under my roof."

"Moral tone?" repeated Camilla. "It sounds as though they were going to have a baby, or something."

Mrs. Chudleigh turned quite scarlet and sat very straight in her chair. "Really, if you will excuse me, I think it is time we ceased this conversation, Mrs. — er — Halliday. No doubt I am old-fashioned, but there are some subjects I was brought up to consider unfit for dinner-table discussion."

As she enunciated this speech with great precision, it not unnaturally caught the ears of nearly everybody in the room. There was a moment's awkward silence. Lola's voice filled it. "And I must tell you that when I danced in Rio I had a success quite enormous, and a man shot himself outside my hotel, which was a compliment of the most distinguished, and also," she added practically, "very good publicity, in Rio."

"How very romantic!" said Fay, in a shattered voice. "Do have a salted almond, Mr. Chudleigh!"

The Vicar was regarding Lola in shocked amazement. "My dear Miss de Silva, you speak very calmly of this dreadful tragedy! It must surely have appalled you to know that this unfortunate man had committed the terrible sin of taking his own life for — one might almost say — your sake!"

"Yes, truly I was sorry for him," agreed Lola, "but I had my picture in all the papers, and one is forced to think of these things."

"Talking of newspapers," said Stephen Guest, coming staunchly to the rescue, "I saw a queer thing in one the other day…"

With one accord those at the bottom end of the table turned gratefully towards him, greeting his laboured reminiscence with extravagant enthusiasm.

"You see!" said the General to Mrs. Twining, in a furious undertone. "Insufferable! In my own house! The young whippersnapper having the damnable effrontery to bring the woman here. Not by my invitation, mark you! Well, I flatter myself it will be the last time my fine son makes a fool of himself under this roof! I've no doubt you'll have a great deal to say on his behalf. You're very fond of taking his part, aren't you? But I don't want to hear it! Do you understand? I don't want to hear it!"

"Perfectly," said Mrs. Twining. "I always did understand you, Arthur, and you have not changed in the least."

The General's already high colour darkened. He opened his mouth to retort, and became aware of Mrs. Chudleigh, avidly listening to his confidences. By a superhuman effort of will he changed what he was about to say into a rasping cough.

The long dinner seemed interminable, but it came to an end at last, and Fay rose, and the women went out in procession.

The worst must be over, thought Dinah, bringing up the rear. But all the same when they reached the drawing-room she walked over to one of the open windows, and drew back the curtains, saying: "It's a gorgeous night. Do come on to the terrace, Miss de Silva!"

"Dinah," said Mrs. Twining emphatically, as Lola followed Miss Fawcett out, "deserves a good husband and I hope she finds one."

"What a ghastly reward!" remarked Camilla, busily powdering her face. "I didn't know there were such things."

Mrs. Chudleigh, who had not forgiven her for her behaviour at dinner, said with a steely brightness; "That is a very cynical remark, and one that I am sure I hope you don't mean. I am proud to say that I have a husband who is more than good."

"You are fortunate, Emmy," said Mrs. Twining dryly. She moved towards the sofa, and sat down, disposing her long skirt with one practised hand. "Well, Fay, I am sorry for you, but you may console yourself with the reflection that Geoffrey is not, after all, your son. For once, I am almost sorry for Arthur. A most unnerving young woman."

"But it is dreadful!" exclaimed Mrs. Chudleigh, her eyes gleaming through her glasses. "To think of that poor boy in the clutches of such a woman! You must forgive me, Lady Billington-Smith, but I feel most strongly on the subject, and I do trust that some effort will be made to rescue him from such a disastrous entanglement! In my position as a clergyman's wife I do feel that I have some right to speak. And my husband and I have always been most fond of Geoffrey. I am sure we should both of us be quite distressed to think of him ruining his life like this."

"I don't think you need worry," said Mrs. Twining. "Long experience of Arthur induces me to think that he will place every conceivable obstacle in the way of the marriage."

"Well, I must say I hope he will manage to stop it," said Mrs. Chudleigh. "But one can't help feeling that it needs tact. I am sure Hilary would be only too glad to have a little talk with Geoffrey."

"It's very kind of you, but I think it would be much better to let it die a natural death," replied Fay with quiet dignity.

Mrs. Chudleigh gave a tight-lipped smile. "Ah, you are young, Lady Billington-Smith, and naturally optimistic. I am afraid I have lived too long in the world to share your optimism. From what I can see of that woman she exercises a Fatal Fascination for men. Of course, if you admire that bold kind of good looks, I suppose you might call her pretty. Personally, I never trust people with brown eyes, and I should not be at all surprised to hear that she was no better than she should be. And you heard for yourself what she had to say. Really, I was never more shocked in my life! About that unfortunate man who committed suicide."

"I hope you are not suggesting, Emmy, that Geoffrey is likely to follow his example?" inquired Mrs. Twining, idly surveying her rings.

"If you don't mind my saying so, I shouldn't think he'd have the guts," said Camilla negligently.

Mrs. Chudleigh's thin bosom swelled. "If by that expression — which, I must confess, I imagined till now to be confined to schoolboys' use — you mean that he would not have the courage, I am afraid you betray your ignorance of human nature, Mrs. Halliday. Not that I wish to imply for an instant that Geoffrey would even contemplate doing such a dreadful thing."

"Surely we are taking this a little too seriously?" suggested Mrs. Twining. "I for one am not led to suppose that Miss de Silva's affections are of a very permanent mature. I wish you would tell me, Fay, what you do to your roses to make them so much more perfect than i nine."

"It isn't me," Fay answered, sitting down beside her. "Arthur looks after the garden, you know. He is very keen on it."

"Ah, yes, of course," said Mrs. Twining, watching Camilla stroll out on to the terrace. "My dear, will you allow a very old friend of your husband to suggest that if you can induce him to take this affair calmly it might be a very excellent thing?"

"I know," Fay said unhappily. "I — I will try, only — it isn't always easy — when Arthur's annoyed — to — to manage him, you know." She flushed a little, and turned with relief as Dinah came in through the French window. "Oh, darling, there you are! Did you manage to make her understand at all?"

"It isn't possible," said Dinah despairingly. "We shall have to make up our minds to it. She's going to be the life and soul of the party."

"Oh, dear, how awful! What on earth shall I do?" demanded Fay helplessly.

"You can't do anything. I warned her there'd be bridge, but she says it will be better if we dance to the radio." She paused, and delivered her final bombshell. "And she thinks Francis looks as though he could tango, and she is going to do an exhibition tango with him for us all to watch. And I should think," concluded Miss Fawcett thoughtfully, "that it'll be pretty lush, what's more."

Chapter Four

Miss Fawcett, awaking betimes on Monday morning, flirted for a while with the idea of staying in bed to breakfast. Her better self won, however, and she got up in time to breakfast at half past right, thus deliberately courting a tete-d-tete with the General, ever an early riser.

This act of heroism was induced by the events of the week-end. Someone, Miss Fawcett thought gloomily, must try to smooth the General down before he actually flung his son out of the house.

Her prognostications on Saturday had not been false. Miss de Silva had indeed been the life and soul of the party, even going so far as to offer to perform a dance for the edification of the assembled company. Only the General's rigid notions of Christian conduct had prevented him disowning his son the first thing on Sunday morning.

But in spite of the fact that Sir Arthur's principles forbade him to quarrel on the Sabbath, Sunday had not been a happy day. Yet every effort was made to please the General. With the exception of Lola, who, it appeared, never rose before eleven, the whole party went dutifully to church, and Francis, who had blandly announced that Geoffrey's lamentable lack of tact was interfering with his own schemes, made elaborate arrangements for the rest of the day. He banished Geoffrey and Lola on an expedition to Clayton-on-Sea, provided his uncle with every opportunity of flirting with Camilla Halliday, and ended the day by inviting his uncle (by this time almost mellow) to recount some of his Indian experiences. By the time Lola and Geoffrey returned from Clayton-on-Sea the air was thick with shikaris, chuckkas, Pathans, Sikhs, sahibs, bazaars, mahouts, and jinrickshas, and the General midway through an anecdote about a fellah who was a Gunner, a minor Rajah, and a Kabul pony.

But from the moment of Miss de Silva's appearance the General's amiability waned. It was plain that Geoffrey had made an attempt to impress upon Lola the necessity of placating his father, for she broke into the anecdote just as the sail was shampooing the Kabul pony's legs before the first chukka, and announced her firm intention of talking to Geoffrey's papa. The General was a ruthless conversationalist, but he was no match for Miss de Silva, whose twenty-three years in the world had provided her with a larger stock of egotistic reminiscences than he had acquired in all his sixty summers. Russian grand dukes, Polish counts, Spanish anarchists, and Mexican bandits took the place of the Pathans, and the Sikhs, and the Gurkhas, and the scene shifted with bewildering rapidity from Rio de Janeiro to New York, Paris, London, and Monte Carlo, the saga being strung together by the principal motif of Miss de Silva's amazing successes in these different cities.

By supper-time the General was in a state of bottled emotion that seemed to put him in danger of explosion at any moment. The sight of his son watching Miss de Silva with an expression of rapt, uncritical adniration was the last straw. The sanctity of the day prevented an immediate outburst, but, as the house party, in various stages of nervous exhaustion, went limply in to supper, he informed Geoffrey that he had just one or two things to say to him, and would see him in his study at half past nine next morning without fail.

Therefore Miss Fawcett arose betimes.

On her way to the bath she passed Fay's room, and the sound of a military voice upraised in furious monologue induced her, as soon as she had dressed, to visit her sister before she went down to breakfast. She found Fay weeping hysterically over the brushes on her dressing table and put her back to bed and dosed her with aspirin. As far as she could gather from a choked and incoherent explanation, Fay had tried to persuade the General not to take his son's engagement too seriously. Whereupon it seemed (but the story was lost in a maze of sobs, I-saids and he-saids) that Sir Arthur had not only called his wife a soft-headed, meddlesome fool, but had laid the blame of every mishap occurring within the last five years at her door, and declared his intention of cutting Geoffrey off with a shilling immediately after breakfast.

Miss Fawcett recommended her sister to pull herself together, promised to order a tray to be sent up to her mom, and went off downstairs to have it out with the General.

She found him eating a solitary breakfast, and wasted no time in skirmishing preliminaries. "Look here, Arthur," she said forcibly, "you've been upsetting Fay. That's a cad's trick, and you know it."

The General bent upon her the famous glare that had caused so many adjutants to shiver in their shoes, and said menacingly: "Will-you-have-the-goodness-to-mind-your-own-business?"

"No," said Dinah, "I will not. You've been throwing your weight about ever since I entered this house, and now it's my turn. If you want to bully anybody, try bullying me! It wasn't Fay's fault that Geoffrey got himself engaged to Lola, and it isn't fair to take it out of her just because you're feeling sore. I quite see that it's very annoying for you to have to put up with Lola, but good Lord, Arthur, you don't suppose it'll last, do you?"

"That's enough!" thundered the General. "By God, haven't I enough whining and puling to put up with from your damned fool of a sister without having your impertinence added to it?"

"No, you haven't," replied Miss Fawcett. She sat down at the table and resolutely forced herself to speak without rancour. "Do try and be sensible, Arthur. You'll look utterly silly if you throw Geoffrey out; you will really. And you know what he is. He's quite likely to go and do something idiotic if he gets into one of his worked-up moods."

Sir Arthur banged his fist on the table with such violence that all the crockery shuddered. "He can go to the devil his own way!" he barked. "A fine son he is! What did he do at Eton? Slacked! No good at games, no good at his work! Delicate! Faugh! What did he do at Oxford? Got himself into a mess with a girl in a tobacconist's shop, that's what he did at Oxford, and a damned fool I was to buy her off. What's he doing now? Wasting his time with a set of long-haired nincompoops and disgracing my name! That's all he's doing, and it's going to stop. Do you hear me? It's going to stop!"

"They can probably hear you all over the house," said Dinah calmly. "Cutting Geoffrey off with a shilling won't stop him disgracing your name; it's much more likely to make him do something worse. But I'm not particularly interested in his affairs, or, in fact, in anyone's except Fay's. You may not realise it, but you're fast driving her into a nervous breakdown."

"Nerves!" ejaculated Sir Arthur with a scornful crack of Lutghter. "That's all you modern women think about — nerves! My God, I've no patience with it!"

"All right," said Dinah, a gleam in her eye. "Put it like this, since you will have it! If you go on making Fay's life a hell for her you'll find yourself with another wife who's deserted you!"

The General's face grew purple; his eyes protruded; words jostled one another in his throat.

"In the meantime," said Dinah, picking up her knife and fork, "I'm sending for the doctor to come and prescribe a tonic for her."

Anything the General might have been moved to say in answer to this was put a stop to by the entrance of Francis and Stephen Guest. They were followed in a few minutes by the Hallidays, who also betrayed signs of muffled tempers. Basil Halliday was looking strained, and kept glancing towards his wife with a mixture of anger end entreaty in his sunken eyes; Camilla was faintly flushed, and talked and laughed in a determined manner that seemed to Dinah to be largely defiant.

It had been decided that, since the only through train to town in the morning left Ralton Station, six miles away, at ten minutes to ten the Hallidays were to put off their departure until after lunch. Camilla reminded Sir Arthur that he had promised to take her over to the keeper's cottage to see a litter of springer pups. She said that she was dying to see them, and pouted prettily when he told her that he must first drive in to Ralton on business.

The pout and the look that went with it had the effect of making Sir Arthur unbend a little. He surveyed the charmer with the eye of an epicure, but it would have taken more than Camilla's wiles to interfere with the routine which governed his life. Assuring her that he would take her to see the puppies before she left, he explained that, the day being the first of the month, he had to go through his accounts, and draw a cheque to pay all the wages and the household bills before he could do anything else.

"Method, my dear Camilla! I pride myself upon being methodical. The Army teaches one to lay down certain rules and to stick to them. I pay all the staff, including the outdoor servants, regularly as clockwork, directly after lunch on the first day of the month. My wife has to have her household books ready for inspection by nine o'clock in the morning. Then I find my total, go to the bank, draw what money I want, and by tea-time the whole business is finished. No hanging about, no paying wages every other day of the month. No. I fix a regular pay-day and stick to it, and in that way, Camilla, I know to a farthing what is being spent in the house. It's the only way."

It seemed to Camilla an appalling way, but she said brightly: "I call that such a good idea! I know I'm dreadfully unbusiness-like myself. I wish you could teach me some of your method, Sir Arthur."

He rose, smiling indulgently down at her. "Oh, we don't expect the fair sex to be business-like! Never met a woman yet who had any notion of method, and, by Gad, I hope I never do! Now what is the time? Nine o'clock! Very well, then. I shall leave for Ralton at ten, and I shall I be back here at eleven, and you and I will go off to see the pups. How will that be?"

"It's too sweet of you!" said Camilla. "I shall be all ready to the tick, just to show you how methodical I can be!"

Francis got up. "I shall have left before you get back from Ralton, Uncle," he said. "Are you busy just now? I should like to have a word with you before I go, if I may."

Sir Arthur looked at him rather grimly. "H'm! If you think it worth while I can spare you five minutes; not a moment more."

They left the room together. Stephen Guest bent towards Dinah. "Is Fay staying in bed to breakfast?" he asked in a low voice.

"Yes," replied Dinah matter-of-factly. "She's not feeling frightfully fit. She doesn't sleep well, you know."

Basil Halliday raised his eyes from his plate. "I'm sorry. I know what it is to suffer from insomnia. It would be much better if we left by the nine-fifty, Camilla. We can easily catch it. Lady Billington-Smith won't want us hanging about all the morning."

"Oh, we can't possibly!" said Camilla quickly. "Of course, I'm dreadfully sorry about Fay, but do beg her, Miss Fawcett, not to bother about us in the least."

"Camilla, I would prefer to catch the nine-fifty," said Halliday, the fingers of his right hand working a little.

Camilla paid no attention to this, and, observing a pulse throbbing in Halliday's temple, Dinah interposed: "There's no need for anyone to hurry away on Fay's account. She'll be down presently. Stephen, are you catching the morning train?"

"No," he said, after a moment's deliberation. "I think I'll wait over till the afternoon."

Dinah got up. "Well, I'll go and see if Fay wants anything done for her," she said, and went out.

Stephen followed her, and stopped her as she was about to go up the stairs." Just a moment, Dinah."

She glanced sharply round at him, and saw that his face was more than ordinarily grim. "Well?"

He came to the foot of the staircase, and laid his hand on the rail. "Fay's upset?" he demanded abruptly.

"She's all right. For goodness' sake don't you start being dramatic! Why on earth don't you go by the train you said you were going by?"

"I'm seeing Fay before I go."

Dinah sighed. "I suppose you heard Arthur making himself felt before breakfast."

"Yes, I did hear him," replied Guest in a level voice. "And I don't leave till I've seen Fay."

"All right, you needn't be so emphatic about it. But it's no use thinking you'll get her to run away with you, Stephen, because she won't. I know Fay, and she's just the sort of person who'd rather be a martyr than start a scandal."

He looked at her for a moment. "Maybe you're right," he said, and turned away, pausing by the hall table to pick up a newspaper.

Dinah found her sister fairly calm, but very pale and heavy-eyed. She was speaking to Mrs. Moxon, the cook, when Dinah came in, and started nervously at the sound of the opening door. Since the between-maid had been sweeping the landing when it happened, the entire indoor staff knew by this time that the General and her ladyship had been having words again. There was an air of dark sympathy about Mrs. Moxon. She said: "You leave it to me, m'lady," and "I was going to speak to you about that Janet. But there, it'll do some other time."

She departed presently, full of good intentions about the remains of the joint, and spread the news below stairs that her ladyship was looking like death so that it made her heart fair bleed to see her. She further expressed a desire to give His-High-and-Mightiness a piece of her mind. "Let him come poking his bad-tempered nose into my kitchen, that's all, Mr Finch!" she said delphically.

Upstairs Fay smiled wanly at her sister, and said: "Sorry to make such a fool of myself. I don't think I can be very well. I probably need a change or a tonic, or something."

"Yes, that's what I told Arthur. I propose to ring up your doctor, if you'll tell me what his name is."

"I have Dr Raymond, but I don't know that -"

"Then we'll send for him," said Dinah. "It'll put the wind up Arthur. By the way, Arthur's quite determined to cast Geoffrey off. He's the sort of man who'd cut off his nose to spite his face and then argue that it looked better that way."

Fay raised herself on her elbow. "Dinah, I'm terribly worried about Geoffrey. It's all very well for you — you're not his stepmother; but I feel it's my duty to try and stand between him and Arthur. And if Arthur turns him out it'll look as though I'd been working against him."

"Don't confuse the issues," said Dinah. "Let Arthur turn him out. He'll take him back again fast enough."

"That's just what he won't do!" Fay said urgently. "You think Arthur's just a joke. He isn't. He's dreadful. Right down inside him he's hard; hard as nails, Dinah! He likes to hurt people, and bully them, and make their lives a misery for them. And if once he says he won't have Geoffrey in his house again it'll be final. I tell you I know what I'm talking about! Haven't you heard Arthur say that when he says a thing he means it, once and for all? That's true. He does mean it. He thinks that's being strong and iron-willed. He'd do anything sooner than go back on what he's once said."

"Steady!" recommended Dinah. "You keep cool. Shall I tip the wink to the Halliday wench to pour oil. I rather loathe the idea, but she does seem to go down very smoothly with him."

A look of distaste crossed Fay's face. " I think I'd rather you, didn't," she said. "I mean — no, I can't confide in a person like that. I'd better get up. Stephcn hasn't gone, has he?"

"No," said Dinah shortly. "I wish he had."

As she descended the stairs again five minutes later she was met by Finch, with the information that Mrs. Twining was on the telephone, and would like to speak either to her ladyship or to Miss Fawcett .

The only extension of the telephone which the General had allowed was to his own study, so anyone else wishing to use the instrument had to do so in the hall, quite the most public place that could possibly have been chosen.

Dinah picked up the receiver. "Hullo? Dinah Fawcett speaking."

"Good morning, my dear," said Mrs. Twining's voice tranquilly. "I am merely curious, you know. How have you weathered the week-end?"

"Well, it's all pretty grim," said Dinah.

"I was afraid perhaps it might be. Arthur had such an irreligious face in church. Has he disowned poor Geoffrey yet?"

"I think he's doing it now," replied Dinah, with a glance down the long hall to the study door, from behind which came the sound of a loud voice booming and roaring.

There was a slight pause. "I see," said Mrs. Twining thoughtfully. "Do you know, I think I will come and have a little chat with Arthur."

"Do you think you can do anything with him?" asked Dinah hopefully. "Fay quite definitely can't."

"I have no idea," said Mrs. Twining. "I think I have a little — a very little — influence over him. Tell Fay that I will look in at lunch-time. Good-bye, my dear."

Dinah put the receiver down as Finch came into the hall through the door that led to the servants' wing. "Mrs. Twining will be here for lunch," she said. "I think perhaps I'd better do the flowers for Lady Billington-Smith. What is the time, Finch?"

The butler stepped back to get a view of the grandfather clock. "It is just on the quarter, miss. To be exact, I should say it is sixteen minutes to ten, since I believe we are a little fast."

"We should be," murmured Dinah. "Has Captain Billington-Smith gone, do you know?"

"No, miss. Captain Billington-Smith was with Sir Arthur until twenty minutes past nine, and has, I believe, gone up to his room."

"Oh, well, I suppose I'd better wait to see him off," reflected Dinah, and wandered into the morning-room, a somewhat gloomy apartment behind the study with windows that faced, inappropriately, west.

She sat down to glance through a picture paper, and had just passed from "Dramatic Outburst in Court' by way of "Boy Hero Saves Kitten's Life' to "Four Killed in Air Liner Disaster' when a door was slammed violently, and hasty footsteps passed the morning-room and went up the stairs two at a time.

Geoffrey, thought Miss Fawcett. What does a helpful spinster do now? Nothing. (Answer adjudged incorrect.)

The grandfather clock began to whir alarmingly, and presently struck ten in the brittle manner peculiar to all genuine models. Simultaneously, the General's voice was to be heard, demanding in stentorian tones why the devil that fellow Peacock hadn't brought the car round yet. "When I say ten o'clock I mean ten o'clock, and the sooner you all realise that the better it will be for you!" he rasped.

Dinah did not catch the butler's quiet answer, but in about half a minute Peacock apparently arrived with the General's car, for the echoes of a harangue on punctuality delivered on the doorstep reached her ears. Miss Fawcett reflected that to live continually with that over-loud, nagging voice might conceivably wear down nerves less delicate than her sister's.

It ceased at last, and gave place to a prodigious series of explosions from the car, and a jarring of gears too hastily changed. Miss Fawcett emerged from the morning-room in time to hear Peacock, still standing in the porch, say sullenly to Finch: "Good place or not, I'm giving in my notice when he pays me, and that's that."

Shortly before half past ten Francis came down the stairs in a leisurely fashion. It was never an easy matter to read the thought behind his eyes, and Dinah, frankly surveying him now, was unable to decide whether he had succeeded in his mission to Sir Arthur or not. A not very pleasant smile curled his thin lips, and when he caught sight of Dinah he remarked in his usual languidly cynical way: "Such a pathetic sight, my pet. Do go up and look. My poor little cousin waiting on the mat outside Lola's door! He looks just like the Weak Young Man Driven to Despair in a Raffles play. I am quite sorry to be leaving, for the party is beginning to be almost amusing. Do say good-bye to Fay for me, and thank her for a perfectly bloody week-end. Do I kiss you, or not?"

"Not," replied Miss Fawcett decidedly. "Good-bye. Try not to get had up for speeding. Arthur's very hot against that about now."

Upstairs, Geoffrey, regardless of appearances, had flung himself down on a chair against the wall on the landing, and was sitting with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands awaiting Miss de Silva's pleasure. Miss de Silva, like Sir Arthur, held to certain fixed rules, one of these being an immovable resolve not to be disturbed by anyone but the faithful Concetta until eleven o'clock in the morning. She had already intimated to Geoffrey, through Concetta, her mouthpiece, that it was impossible, quite impossible, to admit him into her room, so there was nothing for him to do but to wait, which he did, under the sympathetic eye of Dawson, engaged in turning out Captain Billington-Smith's late bedroom. Dawson was stirred to the depths of her romantic soul by Geoffrey's pose of utter dejection, but she did not really want his troubles to vanish. She had a passion for drama, and had already in her mind condemned Geoffrey to be shot through the head by his own hand. As she folded sheets and shook up pillows she was silently rehearsing the evidence she would give at the inquest. Miss Joan Dawson, "a slim, youthful figure in a brown dress and close-fitting hat' — her new black crinoline straw which Ted liked was nicer, really, but they always wore close-fitting hats — "gave her evidence in a low, clear voice…'

Peckham, the head housemaid, came up the back stairs with her starched skirts crackling to give due warning of her approach. There was no nonsense about Peckham; she never went to the pictures, or kept company with a boy, or weaved stories about her employers. She knew her place, knew it far too well to cast more than one detached, incurious glance at Geoffrey, still holding his head in his hands. Her brisk, severe voice cut through all lurid imaginings, like a sharp pair of scissors ripping up lengths of gossamer. "Now then, Dawson, are you going to be all day over one room? Pick up those sheets and take them along to the linen basket; I'll finish this off, thank you."

Camilla Halliday came out of her bedroom at the back of the house, and opened her eyes rather at sight of Geoffrey. She was wearing a large hat, in readiness for her trip to the keeper's cottage. It had a becoming tilt to its brim, and she knew that it made her look young and appealing. She went towards the head of the staircase, but paused before going down, and said, with a kind of tolerant, half-scornful concern: "You look pretty, rotten. Are you ill, or something? Has anything gone wrong?"

Geoffrey raised his head, and gave a bitter laugh. "Oh, something! I've only had my whole life ruined!"

"Help!" said Camilla. "As bad as that? I suppose there's nothing I can do?"

"No one can do anything," said Geoffrey. "Not that I want anyone to try. I at least have my pen left to me, and after the things that have been said to me today I wouldn't enter this house again if Father begged me to on his bended knees. In fact, I won't answer for myself if l have to see him again."

"Oh, well!" said Camilla, shrugging her shoulders. "If there's nothing I can do I think I'll be going downstairs." It's just my rotten luck, she thought, that ghastly fool of a boy putting the old man's back up just when I want him in a good mood. 0 God, I suppose I shall have to let him gas about India again, and slobber all over me.

Then she heard the General's voice in the hall, and the weary, discontented look vanished as though by magic from her face, and she ran down the remaining stairs, calling to the General: "Oh, Sir Arthur, you really are too terribly punctual for words! How can you manage it? I think you must be some kind of wizard. And I meant to be on the doorstep waiting for you, just to show you!"

Geoffrey heard his father say, with ponderous playfulness: "Ah, you won't steal a march on me in a hurry, fair lady! I told you I should be back on the stroke of eleven, and here I am, you see, all my business done, and entirely at your disposal just as soon as I've deposited this little packet in my safe."

The door of Miss de Silva's room opened, and Concetta appeared. "It is permitted that you see the Signora now," she said kindly.

There did not seem to be very much reason why Geoffrey should not have seen the Signora at any time during the past half-hour, for she could not have been in the throes of her toilet since she was still in bed when he at last entered the room.

She was wearing a very low-cut elaborate nightgown, and her black curls, though brushed till they shone, had not been crimped into any of the styles of coiffure that she affected.

Geoffrey stopped short just inside the room, gazing at her hungrily. "God, how lovely you are!" he said, a trifle thickly, and plunged forward to the bedside, grasping at her.

Lola submitted to his rather greedy embrace with a smile of satisfaction. She allowed him to kiss her, on her mouth, and her throat, and up her white arms, but she did not betray any sign of being much stirred by his ardour. She seemed to find it pleasant but incidental, and as soon as she was tired of it she pushed him away, though quite gently, and said: "It is enough. In a minute Concetta will come back to dress me and you must at once go away. And I must tell you that I have not slept at all, not one instant, because it is impossible that I should sleep when cocks are permitted to crow all night. It is a thing that I find very badly arranged, quite insupportable."

"Darling!" Geoffrey said, trying to seine her hands. "I ought never to have brought you! But you shan't spend another moment in this house. I'm going to take you away at once, my poor angel!"

"But what are you talking about? It's not at all sensible. Naturally I shall spend a great many moments in this house, for I am not dressed yet, and besides, I do not go away until I have eaten lunch," said Lola, always practical.

"I know a little place on the road to town where we can lunch," began Geoffrey.

"I, too," said Lola coldly. "I prefer that I should eat my lunch here."

"I won't eat another meal in this house! I couldn't!" said Geoffrey, with suppressed violence. "I may as well tell you, Lola, that I've had the hell of a row with Father. In fact, it's all over between us two, and I hope I never set eyes on him again!"

Miss de Silva regarded him with sudden suspicion. "What is this you are saying?" she demanded. "But tell me at once, if you please, for I do not at all understand you!"

"We've quarrelled — irrevocably!" announced Geoffrey, giving a somewhat inaccurate description of the one-sided scene enacted in the study at half past nine. "Of course it was bound to come. We're oil and water. I've always known it. Only I did think that Father -"

Miss de Silva sat up. "You are talking quite ridiculously, my dear Geoffrey. It is not oil and water, but, on the contrary, oil and vinegar. I am not so ignorant that I do not know that. But I do not see why you must quarrel with your papa for such a stupid reason, which I find is not a reason at all, in fact, but a great piece of folly."

"You don't understand, darling. I said we were oil and water — not vinegar. It's an expression — an idiom."

"It is entirely without sense," replied Lola scornfully.

"It means we don't mix. Well, anyway, it's just a saying. It doesn't really matter. The point is that Father's behaving like an absolute cad. Simply because you're a professional dancer he's trying to do everything he can to stop us being married. I simply hate telling you this, darling, because I'd die sooner than let you be hurt. But there it is. He's one of those hide-bound, utterly disgusting Victorians. One simply can't argue with him. He's always hated me. I expect it's because of my mother. She ran off with some other man when I was a kid. I don't really know much about it, but I believe there was a perfectly ghastly scandal at the time. Anyway, Father's been an absolute beast to me all my life — it's a pity he didn't have Francis for a son, though as a matter of fact he wouldn't think so jolly well of him if he knew some of the things I know about him — and this is just the last straw. Because nothing would induce me to give you up. He needn't think I care about his filthy money. Money simply means nothing to me, and in any case I happen to be able to write, and though he chooses to sneer at my work there are other people who know far more about it than he does who think I'm going to go a long way. I couldn't help smiling when he talked about me starving in the gutter for all he cared. Of course he'd never believe that anyone could make any money by writing, but he'll just see, that's all!"

Lola, who had listened to this rambling speech in complete and unusual silence, relaxed once more on to her bank of pillows, and said in a thoughtful voice: "It is true that your papa is a character extremely difficult, not at all sympathetic. It will be better perhaps if I do not marry you."

Geoffrey stared down at her, startled and incredulous. "Lola! You can't think that I'd give you up! Good God, I'm mad about you! I adore you!"

"It is very sad," agreed Lola. "I myself am quite in despair. But it is not sense to marry if you have no money. One must think of these things, though certainly it is very disagreeable."

He snatched at her wrists. "Lola, you can't mean that! Lola, don't you care for me? What does it matter about the money, if we love each other? I'll make money, I swear I will! You can't say you won't marry me!"

"Certainly I love you," replied Lola with composure. "I love with great passion always, but I am not at all a fool, and it is plain that if you have not a great deal of money it is impossible that we should marry. And I will tell you, my dear Geoffrey, what I have been thinking, that perhaps it is better that I do not engage myself to you, for I am quite young, not at all passee, and besides, I find that I do not wish to live in the country where there is no absinthe, no shower in my bathroom, and cocks that crow all night so that I cannot sleep."

"But we shouldn't live in the country! We could live anywhere you liked!" Geoffrey said desperately.

"I like always to live in the best places," said Lola with simplicity. "And I must tell you, please, that you are hurting me."

His grasp on her wrists tightened. "Lola, you're saying it to tease me! You don't mean it! Oh, my God, you couldn't be so cruel, so utterly heartless!"

The beautiful brown eyes flashed. "It is not I who am cruel, let me tell you, but entirely you, my good Geoffrey, to wish me to marry you when you have not any longer any money!"

"But Lola, I'll make money! I know I can make enough for us to live on! It won't be a fortune, but we'll manage somehow."

"I find that you are being completely selfish. You do not think of me at all," said Lola austerely. "It is quite necessary that I should have a great deal of money, a fortune, as you say. And I wish that you will instantly let go of my arms, because though I do not make complaint you are hurting me excessively. And then you will go away so that I may dress myself, and after I have eaten my lunch, but not in the least before, you will drive me back to London."

He sprang up; his face was very white, his lips trembling incontrollably. "I can't believe it! I can't believe it!" he stammered, his voice breaking on a dry sob. "I can't give you up! I tell you I can't, I won't!"

"It is for us both a great tragedy," agreed Lola. "But your papa —"

The death-like pallor grew. "It's all his fault!" Geoffrey gasped. "Ever since I was born — and now this_! devil, devil, devil!" He dashed his hand across his eyes, and stumbled over to the door. "He's ruined my life, and my happiness, and taken you away from me God, I can't bear it!" He wrenched open the door and rushed out, almost colliding with Dawson, a breathless and entranced auditor on the landing.

"And out of my way!" he says, just like that, and he gave me a push that sent me up against the wall — Oo, Mrs. Moxon, you wouldn't believe what a push he gave me; it's a wonder I didn't fall over, it is really! And then he went off down the stairs, without one backward look, and out of the house, with no hat nor nothing, and leaving the front door open behind him, which Mr Finch'll bear me out is the solid truth!"

Chapter Five

At a quarter to twelve the General's voice was once more to be heard in the hall, this time shouting or his wife. He and Camilla had just returned from their inspection of the litter of springer puppies, and, whether by her desire, or his, it had become necessary for her to take back to town with her some of his famous roses.

Fay, who had only just emerged from her bedroom, and was in consultation with Peckham upstairs, at once hurried down. "I'm here, Arthur," she said in her fluttering way.

"Oh, there you are! I want Camilla to have some roses to take home with her," decreed the General. "Tell Lester, will you? Where is the fellow? I thought I'd made it plain that I wanted the front lawn mowed this morning? I suppose you've taken him oil that job to do something for you that could quite well be done tomorrow. It's always the way! As soon as my back's turned —'

"I haven't told him to do anything," said Fay wearily. "I haven't even seen him."

"Then where the devil is he?" demanded the General balked. "I must say I do think you might see that the servants do their work when I'm out!"

"If you had told me, Arthur -"

"Oh, don't let's have any argument about it!" begged Sir Arthur. "Though I should have thought — However, doubtless I was wrong. Find out what the fellow's doing, and tell him to cut Mrs. Halliday a couple of dozen blooms."

"It's most awfully sweet of you," said Camilla. "I do hope it isn't any trouble?"

"'Trouble? Good gracious me, it's no trouble at all, my dear Camilla. It's a pleasure. Only wish the roses were more worthy of you!"

Camilla gave her empty little laugh, and said archly: "Now you're trying to flatter me, and I won't listen to a word you say! Thank you terribly, Fay — it is good of you to bother! I'll just run up and take my hat off."

The General watched her go up the stairs, and became aware of his wife, still standing beside him. Since his conscience pricked him slightly, he naturally felt annoyed with her for being there. "Well, don't hang about looking like seven bells half struck!" he said irritably. "You might at least try to behave pleasantly to your guests. And kindly understand that if anyone wants me before lunch I'm busy, and don't want to be disturbed. I've wasted quite enough of the morning as it is. Look at the time! Ten to twelve, and as far as I can make out you're only just up! I wonder what my mother would say if she were alive today and could see the way you modern women lie in bed till all hours!"

"Oh, don't, don't," Fay cried out suddenly, putting her hands to her head. "I can't bear it! You're driving me out of my mind, Arthur!"

The General stared after her, as she turned and hurried away towards the garden-hall. "More nerves!" he said, with a short laugh, and walked into his study, and shut the door loudly.

It was just as well that he did not know that Miss Fawcett, who had spent the morning "doing the flowers', had already robbed the rose-garden of its choicest blooms. Now, conscious of rectitude, she had joined Stephen Guest on the terrace, and subsided into a deep wicker-chair beside him.

"I call it more than a little sultry," she remarked. "No double entendre meant, I assure you. Does my nose want powdering?"

"It looks all right to me," said Guest, giving it his consideration.

"I mistrust your judgment profoundly," said Dinah. "However, I don't think I can be bothered to go upstairs. Though I have noticed that it's becoming quite the done thing in this house to make your face up in the full view of — Oh, hullo, Mrs. Halliday! How were the puppies?"

"Sweet," said Camilla. "I adored them. Don't say I've butted in on a tete-a-tete! Where's Basil?"

Stephen Guest, who had risen politely, looked vaguely round. "I don't know," he answered. "I think he went into the billiard-room. Shall I go and see?"

"Oh no, don't bother, thanks," said Camilla, seating herself. "We are a small party, aren't we? I always think the Monday after a weekend is frightfully depressing. don't you? I mean everybody leaving, or packing, or something. I suppose it's much too early for a cocktail?"

"It's about twelve," said Dinah, consulting her wristwatch.

This hardly seemed to be an adequate answer to the question. Camilla gave a short sigh, and said: "Oh, well!" and began to drum her fingers on the arm of her chair.

The arrival of Mrs. Twining, a few minutes later, rated a diversion. She came through the drawing room out on to the terrace, looking, as usual, cool, and perfectly dressed. "I told that inestimable Finch that I'd announce myself," she said. "Good morning, Mrs. Halliday. I have had to go to Silsbury, Dinah. Such a bore, but you see that is why I am so early. It did not seem to be worth while to go home again."

Dinah shook hands with her. "Won't you sit down? I think I saw Fay going towards the rose-garden a minute or two ago. I'll go and tell her you've arrived."

"Let us both go and tell her I have arrived," said Mrs. Twining. "I should like to see Arthur's new standards. Mine have not done at all well; I believe it is the soil."

"Do you really want to see rose trees?" Dinah asked bluntly, as they walked across the lawn to the yew hedge that shut off the rose-garden.

"Not in the least, my dear. I want you to tell me just what has happened today. There is that peculiar and plague-stricken quiet about the house that usually means that there has been a great deal of unpleasantness."

"Well, there has," admitted Dinah. "There's been a row with Fay, and then a sort of skirmish with me (but that was my doing), and then what sounded like a really super-row with Geoffrey. I don't know what happened exactly, but Francis said that Geoffrey was looking pretty sick."

"I always felt that Sunday's forced abstinence was putting too great a strain on Arthur," remarked Mrs. Twining thoughtfully. "Where is Geoffrey now?"

"Well, I don't really know. He was outside Lola's door at half past ten. He may be in her room. To tell you the truth, Mrs. Twining, I'm not awfully interested in his troubles, except when they affect Fay."

"Why should you be?" said Mrs. Twining. "I am sure I am not surprised. It was so extremely stupid of him to bring that remarkable young woman of his here. But I don't think we must let Arthur cast him on the world."

Dinah glanced curiously at her. "You're very fond of Geoffrey, aren't you?"

Mrs. Twining had stooped to smell a great crimson rose. "Too full-blown to pick. What a pity! No, my dear, I don't know that I should describe myself as being very fond of Geoffrey. I knew him when he was in his cradle, however, and I have always been sorry for the boy."

"Did you know his mother, Mrs. Twining?" asked Dinah. "I've often wondered."

Mrs. Twining put back a trailing rambler with her gloved hand. "Have you, my dear? Yes, I knew her quite well."

"What was she like? Arthur never mentions her, you know, and there isn't even a photograph."

"When Arthur puts people out of his life," said Mrs. Twining, with a faint smile, "he does it very thoroughly. She was generally thought to be pretty."

"I don't really blame her for leaving Arthur, but it was rather rotten of her to leave Geoffrey," reflected Dinah.

Mrs. Twining passed through the gap in the hedge again on to the lawn. "Yes, it was, as you say, rotten of her," she replied. "But whatever she did that was rotten, or foolish, she had to pay for. Tell me, is Arthur in, do you know?"

"Yes, I think he must be. Oh, there is Fay, coming away from the vegetable garden! Fa-ay!"

They waited for Fay to catch up with them. She gave her hand to Mrs. Twining, saying: "It's so nice of you to have come, Julia. Things are being — a little difficult. Perhaps if you spoke to him Arthur might listen."

"Listening is not his speciality, but I will try," promised Mrs. Twining. "Where is he?"

"Oh, it would never do if you disturbed him before lunch!" said Fay, looking quite flustered at the bare thought of such a thing. "He's writing letters in his study."

They ascended the steps on to the terrace. Stephen Guest pulled up a chair, his gaze on Fay's face. "Come and sit down," he said. "You look done up."

She pushed the hair away from her forehead. "I've got a headache. It's nothing." Her voice was forlorn; as she sat down she raised her eyes fleetingly to his, and he saw that they had filled with tears. She tried to smile, and said in a low, unsteady voice for his ears alone: "It's all right, Stephen. Really it's all right."

Mrs. Twining was talking in her pleasant way to Camilla Halliday; Dinah was wondering what had happened to Geoffrey and his Lola, when Finch came on to the terrace to tell Fay that Mrs. Chudleigh had called, and would like to see her.

"Oh dear!" said Fay involuntarily; then, recollecting herself, she added: "Ask her if she will come out on to the terrace, please."

"Blast and damn!" said Dinah. "What on earth can she want?"

"Dinah darling!" expostulated Fay.

"That's a lady who's mightily interested in other people's business," said Guest. "I can't say I like the type myself."

"She wants me to give a talk at the Women's Institute, said Fay. "I said I'd let her know, only I forgot."

"Mrs. Chudleigh!" announced Finch.

The Vicar's wife stepped briskly out on to the terrace. and sent one of her quick, peering glances round. She looked rather hot and more than a little crumpled in a tussore coat and skirt, and a burnt-straw hat of no particular shape; and she wore in addition to these garments a blue shirt blouse, dark brown shoes and stockings, and a pair of white wash-leather gloves. She shook hands with Fay, nodded to Mrs. Twining and to Dinah, and favoured Camilla with a stiff little bow. "I'm so sorry to come bothering you, Lady Billington-Smith, but you know I always say I do all my unpleasant tasks on a Monday! It is the Children's Holiday Fund, and I know you are always so good and generous in giving towards it."

"Don't you ever shirk your unpleasant tasks?" inquired Camilla, with an air of patronage amounting to insolence.

But Camilla was no match for the Vicar's wife. "No, Mrs. Halliday, never!" replied Mrs. Chudleigh in a steely voice. "I hope that I should never shirk jury duty, however unpleasant."

"God help us, we're for it again!" murmured Dinah to Stephen Guest.

Camilla was looking a little foolish, and had given a half-laugh, and shrugged her shoulders.

"Do come and sit down over here, Mrs. Chudleigh!" Fay intervened. "Of course my husband and I are only too glad to subscribe to the Fund."

Mrs. Chudleigh accepted the chair indicated, which was placed on the outskirts of the group, and said that she must not stop, for that would make her late for lunch. "And Hilary is so absent-minded that he would never think to begin without me," she said, her face softening as it always did when she spoke of her husband. "I really only came to beg, and to ask you whether you are going lo address us on Friday? You said you might give the Women a little talk on Gardens, and I'm sure it would be much appreciated. Only when you did not let me know," she added with a significant look, "I wondered whether perhaps you have rather too much on your hands just now?"

Fay coloured. "No, I should be pleased to speak, if you think it would interest the Club. But you know I'm not very good at giving lectures."

"Then we shall consider that settled," said Mrs. Chudleigh, ignoring the last part of this speech. "I see you still have some of your guests remaining with you. You will be glad, I expect, to have the house to yourself again. If you will allow me to say so, you are not looking at all the thing, Lady Billington-Smith."

"I have a slight headache," acknowledged Fay. "The week-end has been a little trying, as I'm afraid you were made to realise on Saturday."

"That dreadful young woman!" Mrs. Chudleigh said, drawing in her breath sharply. "I assure you I felt for you. A very difficult situation to deal with. I take the greatest interest in every member of Hilary's Parish, high or low, and I have been most distressed to think of Geoffrey, who is such a nice boy, being caught by — really, I must say an adventuress! But you know, Lady Billington-Smith, young people, and especially what I call highly-strung young people, sometimes need very careful handling. You must forgive me, but from what Sir Arthur said at the dinner-table I gathered that he was very much enraged."

"Yes," Fay said, helpless under this flood of words. "My husband is very angry indeed."

Mrs. Chudleigh shifted her chair rather closer. "How very unfortunate! I was afraid it must be so. I suppose there is no truth in the story that is going round the village that it has actually come to an open breach?"

Fay's heart sank. She said rather feebly: "I can't imagine how such a story could have got about."

"You know what servants are," replied Mrs. Chudleigh darkly.

"Always ready to gossip! The baker's man told my cook that your kitchen-maid had told him that the General had quarrelled violently with Geoffrey this morning. Of course, personally, I never pay any heed to what servants say, but I feel I know you so well, Lady Billington-Smith, that it is really my duty to let you know what is being said. And if there is no truth in it, I shall be only too glad to contradict the story whenever I hear it."

A nerve in Fay's head was throbbing unbearably. She got up. "Mrs. Chudleigh, I'm afraid I can't discuss the matter with you. Geoffrey has very seriously angered his father. I don't know what is going to come of it, so I'm not in a position to tell you anything. You must forgive me if I seem rude, but I — I am a little upset."

Dinah, obedient to a signal from Stephen Guest, who had been watching Fay with a troubled frown, turned her head, saw her sister's look of exhaustion, and promptly went to the rescue. "What is this club that Fay's going to lecture to, Mrs. Chudleigh?" she inquired, sitting down in Fay's vacated chair. "I'd no idea she could lecture!"

She listened to Mrs. Chudleigh's explanation with an air of intelligent interest, and heard not one word of it. Basil Halliday had just come out of the billiard-room, and was approaching the group with his hands thrust into his coat pockets, and his lined face rather pale and so. He jerked a bow to Mrs. Twining, and sat down near to her. Dinah saw him look at his wife for an instant, and then away again.

"I wondered what had become of you," Camilla remarked.

"I've been indoors," he said curtly.

Heavens, what a party! thought Dinah. It only needs Geoffrey doing his highly-strung act to make it complete. Even Lola would be a relief.

Stephen Guest was feeling in his pockets. Halliday said mechanically: "Tobacco? I've got some."

Guest got up, shaking his head. "Thanks, I think I'll fetch my own, if you don't mind." He went into the house, and Dinah thought, with an inward grin: Getting too much for poor old Stephen; really, it's more like a home for mental cases than a house-party.

Mrs. Chudleigh's voice recalled her wandering attention. "Your sister looks far from well, Miss Fawcett."

"Anyone who had to live with my brother-in-law would look far from well," said Dinah with incorrigible outspokenness.

"The General is not an easy man to manage, of course. Naturally we all know that. I am afraid this distressing affair of Geoffrey's has been too much for your sister."

"Well," said Dinah, of intent, "it's a fairly rotten position for her, isn't it? Geoffrey isn't her son, and she can't do anything to stop Arthur disowning him, and everybody who doesn't know her — not people like you, of course — will at once think that she's been doing the wicked stepmother."

"It is a pity," said Mrs. Chudleigh, "that Lady Billington-Smith is so much younger than the General."

"I entirely agree with you," said Dinah cordially.

Mrs. Chudleigh folded her lips in a rigid line, and rose. Fay, observing her, said: "Oh, must you go, Mrs. Chudleigh? Won't you stay and join us in a cocktail?"

"Thank you, I never touch anything before dinnertime, and then very rarely," replied Mrs. Chudleigh forbiddingly. "Now please do not dream of coming with me! Perhaps you will send me your subscription to the Fund, for I should not think of troubling you to give it to me when you are busy entertaining your guests. Dear me, it is actually half past twelve already! I must indeed hurry if I am not to keep Hilary waiting. Really, there is no need for you to go with me, Lady Billington-Smith. I will take the garden way, if I may, and that will save going through the house. Good-bye, I hope your headache will be better soon — though I do not think that I should recommend cocktails as a cure!" She smiled rather acidly, bowed to the rest of the company, and went off down the steps to the lawn, and across it to the path that led to the drive.

Camilla Halliday barely waited until she was out of hearing before she said: "For this relief much thanks"! I'm sorry for poor old Hilary."

Mrs. Twining looked her over. "You need not be," she said calmly. "Emmy Chudleigh is entirely devoted to her husband."

Camilla reddened angrily under this second snub she had received in less than half an hour. Luckily Finch came on to the terrace at that moment with a tray of cocktails, which diverted her attention. Mrs. Twining, having disposed of Camilla to her satisfaction, turned to Basil Halliday, and in the blandest manner started to talk to him. Fay lay back in her chair with her eyes half shut, and Dinah, feeling that Camilla had been harshly, though justly, used, asked her how she managed to tan so evenly. This being a conversational gambit after Camilla's own heart, she at once revived, and became most voluble. Within the space of ten crowded minutes Dinah learned just how one could acquire that particular shade of golden-brown so much admired; what oil to use, and what to avoid; how one sunbathed on the Riviera; and which shade of lipstick one ought to use when the tanning process was completed.

Then Stephen Guest reappeared, and Camilla at once transferred her attention to him. "You're very nearly too late for a cocktail!" she said. "Come and sit down beside me. Are you going on the three-ten like us, or are you one of the idle rich, with a car?"

"No, I don't run a car," he replied. "I shall be on the train all right." He stretched out his hand towards the table and picked up his glass.

"Hullo, have you cut yourself?" inquired Halliday, leaning forward in his chair.

Guest glanced quickly down at his hand. There was a smear of blood on his shirt-cuff. "Yes," he replied. "That's what kept me. I was opening one of those darned tobacco tins. I got the lid stuck, and like a fool tried to tear the tol off."

"Oh, I know! aren't they awful?" said Camilla. "You mean the sort you have to twist round, to cut that stupid tin-stuff? Have you put anything on it? You ought to paint it with iodine, you know. I have a friend who got a septic hand through just that sort of thing. Do let me look at it!"

"It's nothing," Guest said, pulling down his cuff.

Fay had opened her eyes. "Stephen, have you really hurt yourself? Do please put something on it! Let me see!

Guest drank his cocktail and set the glass down again. "Shucks, Fay! as we say out west. It's only a scratch."

Mrs. Twining glanced at her watch. "Fay, my dear, it is very nearly one o'clock, and high time Arthur was made to emerge from his monk-like seclusion. I will take my courage in both hands and beard him in his den." She rose as she spoke, smiled reassuringly at Fay's doubtful look, and went into the house.

Stephen Guest moved over to a chair beside Dinah. "I gather she means to try her hand on Arthur?" he said in an undertone.

"Yes, that's why she came," Dinah replied. "Heroic attempt, but I don't myself think she'll get much change out of him."

"No, I should say she wouldn't," said Guest in his deliberate way.

Mrs. Twining was not absent for long. In little more than five minutes she had returned, and stood in the window, very white and breathing unevenly. "Fay… Mr. Guest… !"

Guest got up quickly, looking at her with narrowed ryes. "Is anything the matter, Mrs. Twining? You look kind of queer."

"Yes," she said faintly. "I feel — a little sick. Arthur… I went into the study… Arthur is there — dead."

"Dead?" The shocked cry came from Fay.

Mrs. Twining moistened her lips. "Murdered!" she said. She took a step forward, putting out her hand to grasp a chair back, and they saw that her glove was wet with blood.

Chapter Six

For a moment no one moved or spoke. Then Stephen Guest broke the startled silence. "Dinah, look after Fay," he said, and strode past Mr. Twining to the window.

"I'll come with you," Halliday said, in a queer, strangled voice. As he brushed by her chair he heard his wife stammer: "But who — Oh, it's too awful! I don't believe it!"

Finch was just coming out of the dining-room when the two men crossed the hall. Guest said: "There's been some kind of an accident, Finch. You'd better come along."

The butler laid down the tray he was carrying. "An accident, sir? I hope not Mr Geoffrey, sir?"

"No. Sir Arthur," replied Guest, walking towards the study door.

It was shut, just as it had been all the morning. He opened it, and went in.

The room seemed very quiet The General was seated at his desk. He had fallen forward across it, with his head on the blotting pad, and one arm stretched out over a litter of bills and invoices. The other hung limply at his side. A curious Chinese dagger lay on the floor by the chair, its blade sticky with blood. There were no signs that any struggle had taken place. The room, a square, severely furnished apartment, was almost painfully tidy. A saddle-bag chair stood beside the empty fireplace; More bookshelves of the expanding variety filled one wall; there was a small safe behind the door, and, next to it a filing cabinet. The desk stood in a central position, facing the French windows looking on to the drive. These stood open, apparently of design, since each half was bolted to the floor to prevent slamming in any sudden draught. On the west wall another long window was securely fastened, the dun-coloured net curtains being drawn apart to admit the maximum amount of light to the room. The General was sitting in a swivel chair with a low rounded back, and placed against the wall were one or two straight chairs with leather seats. There was a Turkey carpet on the floor, and several trophies hanging on the walls. The desk itself was a large, knee-hole writing-table, with drawers. An electric reading-lamp with a green shade stood on it, the telephone, a brass inkstand, a blotter, a sheaf of accounts, a couple of pens, and a pencil which seemed to have slipped from the General's fingers. On the floor, within reach of the General's hand, was a waste-paper basket, half-full of torn and crumpled sheets of paper.

All three men had paused for an instant in the doorway. The butler said in a hushed voice: "Good God, sir!" He went forward with Guest, and bent over his master's still form. "Sir Arthur!" Then he raised his head, and looked from Guest to Halliday. "Stabbed!" he said, as though the thing were barely credible.

"Yes," said Guest unemotionally. "Stabbed in the neck with this, I guess." He bent to pick up the dagger at his feet.

"Don't touch that!" Halliday said quickly. He had not moved from the doorway, where he had stood transfixed, staring at the General's body, but he took a quick step forward now and caught Guest's arm. "There may be finger-prints."

Guest straightened himself. "I was forgetting. You're right."

"Are you sure he's dead? Can't we do anything?" Halliday demanded shakily. "This is too ghastly!" He put out his hand, hesitated for the fraction of a minute, and then resolutely laid it over the slack one lying on the desk. "He's not cold."

"He's dead all right," Guest answered.

The butler, who was looking rather pale, but still quite composed, moved across to the windows, and carefully shut and bolted them and drew the net curtains across. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and passed it over his face.

"Feeling queer?" Guest asked.

"No, sir. Thank you. It gave one rather a turn for the moment. It seems so sudden. Quite unexpected, as one might say. I take it, sir, you will be ringing up the police station?"

"I suppose we ought to do that at once," Guest answered, and picked up the instrument.

"I say, this is an appalling business!" Halliday said. "Of course the police must be sent for, but I'm thinking of Lady Billington-Smith."

"Pardon me, sir, but has her ladyship been apprised of the — the accident?"

"Good God, yes! everyone knows. It was Mrs. Twining who found him."

"Oh dear, dear!" said Finch. "It is not, if I may say so, a sight for a lady."

Stephen Guest was speaking into the mouthpiece of the telephone. "I'm speaking from the Grange, from General Sir Arthur Billington-Smith's… Yes. There has been an accident… Yes, to the General. He's dead… No, not a natural death… You'll be up right now?… All right."

"What are we to do?" Halliday asked. "We can't leave him like this!"

"I think, sir, if I were to lock the door of this room it would be the best thing," said Finch. "With your permission I will do so, and keep the key until the police arrive."

"Yes, you'd better," agreed Guest. He cast a cursory glance down at the dead man. "Nothing for us to do here. We'd better be getting back to the women-folk."

At that moment a bell shrilled in the distance. Finch frowned slightly. "I think that is the front door, sir. If you will come now I will lock the room up before I answer the door."

"Never mind about that yet. Go and get rid of whoever it is," Halliday said.

The butler looked at him. "Yes, sir. If you will excuse me, I should prefer to see all locked up first."

Guest walked across to the door and took out the key, which was placed on the inside. "All right, Finch. I'll lock up," he said briefly.

"Very good, sir," Finch said, and went out.

"Give me the key!" said Halliday. "I'll do it. You get back to Lady Billington-Smith."

Stephen Guest fitted the key in again on the outside of the door. "That's all right. I shouldn't keep on looking at him, if I were you. Not a nice sight."

"No," Halliday said with a shudder. "Horrible!"

Finch came back and addressed himself to Guest. "It is Dr Raymond, sir, come to see her ladyship. I was wondering whether we should not inform the doctor of what has happened?"

"Yes, by all means," Guest answered. "Is he in the hall? I'll go out and speak to him."

The doctor was a burlyy man of about forty, with a cheerful manner and twinkling blue eyes. He was just pulling off his driving gloves when Guest came out of the study.

Guest said: "Good morning, doctor. My name's Guest. Would you mind coming into the study a moment?"

"Certainly," said Dr Raymond, looking somewhat surprised. "But I came to see Lady Billington-Smith. Is anything wrong?"

"Yes," said Guest bluntly. "Sir Arthur has just been discovered, dead."

The doctor's smile vanished. "Sir Arthur dead? Good heavens! I'll come at once."

When he stood inside the study and saw the General's body, his face changed. He shot one quick, searching look from Guest to Halliday, and then went up to the desk and bent over the still form there. He glanced up, and said in a curt, impersonal voice: "Do you know when this happened?"

"We're rather expecting you to tell us that," replied Guest.

Dr Raymond lifted the General's hand gently and tested the reflex action of the fingers. The three other nun stood silently waiting for him to finish his brief examination. Presently he straightened himself. "Have the police been notified?"

"As soon as it was discovered," replied Guest.

Halliday moved away from the door. "Have you formed any opinion as to when it could have been done, doctor?" he asked.

"It would be very hard to say with any exactness," the doctor answered. "Certainly within the last hour. Now if I may I should like to wash my hands, and then I think I had better see Lady Billington-Smith. She knows, of course, of this — tragedy?"

"Yes, she knows," Guest said. "Halliday, you might take the doctor along to the cloakroom. Nothing further you want to do here, doctor? Then Finch can shut the room up."

Halliday took him aside a moment "Look here, Guest, hadn't you or I better take the key? I mean — one can't be too careful, you know."

"I don't fancy you need worry about Finch," said Guest. "Still, you may be right. Doctor, will you take charge of the key till the police come?"

Outside they met Dinah, who had just come out of the drawing-room, looking rather pale but otherwise herself. "I say, this is pretty ghastly, isn't it?" she said. "Mrs. Twining's been telling us how she found him. What has got to be done? Can I help at all?"

"Keep everybody quiet," recommended Stephen. "This is Doctor — Don't think you told me your name, doctor?"

Dinah's face lightened. "Oh, good! My sister's feeling pretty bowled over, Dr Raymond, and I should think a strong brandy-and-soda wouldn't do Mrs. Twining any harm. In fact, that's what I came to get."

"I'll see Lady Billington-Smith in one moment," Raymond promised. "You're Miss Fawcett, I expect? If you'll lead the way, Mr — Halliday, isn't it? — I can just have a wash."

Dinah waited until he and Halliday had gone; then she turned to Guest again. "Stephen, this is going to be awful," she said. "It'll mean the police, won't it?"

"Fraid so," Guest replied. "It'll mean, unless I'm much mistaken, that no one will be catching that three-ten up to town. Think you can cope with the women?"

Finch gave a discreet cough. "If I might make a suggestion, sir, I could serve luncheon quietly in the dining-room now, for the visitors."

"It seems rather ghoulish," said Dinah dubiously. "Still — I suppose, one's got to eat, and anyway it would get Lola and Camilla out of the way."

"Has Lola come down yet?" inquired Guest.

A reluctant grin destroyed Miss Fawcett's gravity. "Yes, she has. I don't want to be flippant, but — but she's being rather good value. Only, of course, very trying for Fay. She seems to have made up her mind to be arrested for the crime. Camilla's merely hysterical. What I can't make out is where Geoffrey has got to. There's no sign of him, and it's already half past one."

Halliday and the doctor came back at that moment, and Dinah broke off to conduct Dr Raymond into the drawing-room.

Fay was seated beside Mrs. Twining on thee sofa, her hands clenched nervously together in her lap, her eyes unnaturally wide, as though she had caught a glimpse of some horror. Mrs. Twining, on the other hand, was as composed as ever, if a little white. Camilla Halliday was wrenching at a handkerchief, saying over and over again:

"I can't believe it! I simply can't believe it!" Lola, seated in a high-backed arm-chair, was looking bright-eyed and heroic. As the doctor came in, she was saying with great complacency: "For me this is an affair extremely terrible. It is known that the General — whom, however, I forgive, for I am a very good Christian, I assure you — has been most cruel to me. Certainly the police must ask themselves if it is not I who have stabbed the General."

Fay gave a shiver, but her fixed stare into space did not waver.

"Here's Dr Raymond," Dinah said, taking charge of her situation. "Mrs. Halliday, Lola — will you come into the dining-room now? Dr Raymond would like to see my sister alone, and — and — I think Finch is serving lunch."

"Lunch!" Camilla cried wildly. "How can you be so awful? I should be sick if I had to look at food!"

Mrs. Twining got up. "Nonsense!" she said. "You must try not to let your feelings run away with you, Mrs. Halliday, and to help as much as you can by behaving quite normally." She exchanged a somewhat forced smile with Dr Raymond, and led the way to the door.

Before she had time to open it, a cry from Lola stopped her. "Ah, Dios!" Lola exclaimed, and pointed dramatically to the window.

Geoffrey stood there, looking hot and dishevelled and nerve-ridden.

"Geoffrey! Where on earth have you been?" said Dinah involuntarily.

He passed a hand across his brow. "What's that got to do with you?" he said. "I don't know. Miles away." He became aware of their eyes staring at him, and said sharply: "What are you all looking at me for? It's nothing to do with you where I've been, is it?"

Dr Raymond stepped up to him, and took him by the arm. "Steady, young man. You're a bit over-done. Sit down. Something rather shocking has happened. Your father has been — well, murdered, I'm afraid."

Geoffrey looked blankly up at him. "What? Father's been murdered?" He blinked rather dazedly. "Are you going potty? I — you don't mean it, do you?" He read the answer in the doctor's face, and suddenly got up. "Good God!" he said. His mouth began to quiver; to their dismay he started to giggle, in helpless, lunatic gusts.

"Wells," Camilla gasped. "I must say!"

"Stop that!" Raymond said harshly. "Stop at once, Geoffrey: do you hear me? Now control yourself! Quite quiet!"

"Oh, I c-can't help it! Oh God, d-don't you's-see horn, f-funny it is?" wailed Geoffrey. "Your f, faces! Oh, d-don't make me laugh!"

Dinah vanished from the room, to reappear in a few moments with the brandy decanter and a glass. The doctor and Mrs. Twining were standing over Geoffrey, who had grown quieter, but who was still shaking with idiotic mirth.

Dr Raymond looked up. "Ah, thanks. Not too much — yes, that's enough. Now Geoffrey, drink this." He put the glass to Geoffrey's lips, and almost forced the spirit down his throat.

Geoffrey coughed and spluttered. The laughter died. He looked round the room, and moistened his lips.

"Sorry. I don't know what happened to me," he said in an exhausted voice. "Hul — hullo, Aunt Julia! What are you doing here? Who murdered Father?"

"We don't know, my dear," Mrs. Twining said quietly. "Dinah, if you'll take Mrs. Halliday and Miss de Silva into lunch, I think I'll stay here till Geoffrey feels more himself."

Dinah promptly held open the door for the other two to pass out. Under her compelling gaze they did so, but once in the hall Camilla gave a shudder, and declared her inability to pass the study-door. She was with difficulty induced to overcome this shrinking, and entered the dining-room in the end grasping Dinah's arm.

Both Guest and Halliday were seated at the table. Guest was stolidly eating cold beef and Halliday, opposite to him, was making a pretence of eating. They rose as the three women entered the room, and Guest pulled out a chair from the table. "That's right," he said. "Come and sit down, Mrs. Halliday."

Camilla disregarded him, but made a clutch at her husband. "Oh, Basil, isn't it awful? I feel absolutely frightful! What will the police do? Will they want to see me?"

Basil Halliday removed her hand from his coat sleeve. "There's nothing for you to feel frightful about, Camilla. It hasn't got anything to do with you. Sit down, and pull yourself together."

Camilla burst into tears. "You n-needn't talk to me in that unkind way!" she sobbed. "You don't seem to realise how upset I am. I mean, I was only with him a little while ago. What will the police ask me? I don't know anything about it!"

"Of course not. We neither of us know anything. All we have to do is to answer any questions perfectly truthfully," said Halliday, putting her into a chair. "That's right, isn't it, Guest?"

"I should think so," Guest replied. "Can't say I know much about the procedure."

Miss de Silva eyed Camilla austerely. "I do not find that there is reason for you to weep," she announced. "ll I do so that is what may be easily understood, since Sir Arthur was the father of Geoffrey. But I do not weep. because I have great courage, and, besides, I do not choose that my eyes should be red. There will bc reporters, and one must think of these things, for it is a very good thing to have one's picture in all the papers though not, I assure you, with red eyes."

This speech had the effect of stopping Camilla's rather gusty sobs. She said: "I can't think how you can be so callous! And please don't ask me to eat anything, because I simply couldn't swallow a mouthful!"

"Just a little chicken, madam," said Finch soothingly at her elbow, and put a plate down before her.

Dinah had seated herself beside Stephen Guest, and was mechanically eating a morsel of chicken. It seemed curiously tasteless, and rather difficult to swallow. She felt as though she were partaking of lunch in an unpleasant nightmare, where everything was top syturvy, and familiar people said and did ridiculous things that surprised you even in your dream. She asked, "Have the police come?" and thought at once how odd that sounded, quite unreal, as unreal as the thought of Arthur, murdered in his own study. It was the sort of macabre thing that happened to other people, and was reported in the evening papers, making you wonder whatever they could be like who got themselves into such extraordinary cases. Things like this just didn't happen in one's own family. It was no good repeating to oneself that it had happened; one just couldn't realise it.

"Yes, they arrived about five minutes ago," Guest was saying. "Four of them. They're in the study now. They'll want to interview Fay first, I expect. Is she very upset?"

"Well, naturally it's a frightful shock," Dinah said. "I've left Dr Raymond and Mrs. Twining with her. She seems more stunned than anything. Geoffrey's there too," she added.

Camilla raised her head. "I never saw anything like the way Geoffrey took it!" she announced. "It takes a lot to shock me, but I must say that about finished me. He just laughed! However badly he'd quarrelled with poor Sir Arthur I should have though he could at least have pretended to be sorry."

"Hysteria?" inquired Guest, lifting his brows.

"I'm sure I don't know. All I can say is that he came in looking quite wild. I was absolutely terrified. I thought he'd gone mad or something."

"It is for Geoffrey a good thing that his papa is killed," said Lola thoughtfully. "Naturally I cannot marry him when he has no money, but that is quite different now, and he will have a great deal of money, and also he will be Sir Geoffrey, which I find is better than Mister; more distinguished."

"Sorry," said Dinah, "but Arthur wasn't a baronet. Geoffrey will have to go on being Mister."

Miss de Silva appeared to be much chagrined by this piece of information, and slightly indignant. "I should prefer that I should be Lady Billington-Smith, like your sister," she said firmly. "I do not understand why Geoffrey is not to be Sir Geoffrey. It seems to me quite incomprehensible, but perhaps it will be arranged. I will speak to Geoffrey."

Suddenly Dinah knew that she too was going to break into hopeless laughter. She bit her lip, and tried to choke down the impulse.

The watchful Finch came round the table and poured some wine into her glass. "A little burgundy, miss," he whispered.

Dinah gulped it down gratefully. Really, Finch was wonderful: like a sick-room attendant.

Camilla, on whom food and drink seemed to have had a reviving effect, had launched into an exclamatory and rambling discussion of the morning's events with no one in particular. Her husband tried to stop her. "It's no use asking who could have done it: we can't possibly know," he said angrily. "The less we talk about it the better!"

The footman came into the room from the hall, and murmured something in Finch's ear. He was a young man, and looked somewhat scared, as though all these dramatic proceedings were to him a fearful pleasure.

Finch nodded, and went round behind Guest's chair. "The Superintendent would like to see you now, sir," he said in, a low voice. "In the morning-room, sir."

Dinah was irresistibly reminded of a dentist's waiting-room. Your name was spoken in a sepulchral voice, and out you went, feeling a little sick at the pit of your stomach.

Stephen Guest was not long gone. He came back into the room after perhaps ten minutes, and nodded to Halliday. "They want you next," he said. "Just taking statements. Apparently they can't do much till the Chief Constable turns up from Silsbury. I understand he's bringing the police surgeon along with him."

Halliday got up jerkily, and went out.

"What did they say? Will they want to see me? Do they know who did it?" asked Camilla.

Guest picked up his table-napkin and sat down again. He glanced rather contemptuously across at Camilla, and replied briefly: "Not yet. I expect they'll want to see everyone."

"Where's Fay?" asked Dinah. "Have they finished with her yet?"

"She's gone up to her room. They saw her first, I think. I spoke to Mrs. Twining. She said Fay wanted to be alone. Going to lie down, and would rather no one came up. I'm afraid there's no chance of any of us getting away today. Will that affect you, Miss de Silva?"

"At the moment, and because I choose, and not at all for any other reason, I rest," said Lola with dignity, "Certainly I do not go away, but I think it will be better if I change this frock that I am wearing, for it is green, as you see, and I am quite of the family, so that I must put on a black dress. And I remember that I brought with me a black dress that is extremely chic, moreover."

"As a matter of fact, I was wondering what one, ought to wear," said Camilla. "I mean, it doesn't seem quite right to be going about in colours, does it? Only I simply never wear black, and I can't say I want to buy anything, because it isn't as if it would be the least use to me afterwards, you see."

Dinah felt herself to be incapable of entering into this discussion, and turned instead to Guest, who was spreading butter on a cheese biscuit in a leisurely way that seemed rather incongruous. "Have they found out anything, Stephen?" she asked softly.

"I don't know," he replied. "They aren't giving much away."

Dinah sighed, wishing that he would be a little less laconic. In a moment or two Halliday came back into the room. He said in an unnaturally calm voice: "They want you, Camilla. You've got to tell them just what you were doing this morning, you know. It's only to check up on your movements, so don't get fussed and say a whole lot of things that aren't in the least relevant."

"Oh, Basil, I wish you'd come with me!" said Camilla. "Won't they let you? I simply hate going alone. I know they'll ask me all sorts of questions I don't know anything about."

"Then say you don't know! For God's sake don't behave as though you were frightened!" he said roughly. "There's nothing at all for you to be frightened of, I keep on telling you!" He held the door for her to pass out, and shut it behind her with a snap. He came back to his chair, and reached out a hand for his tumbler. "This is a bit serious for me," he said. "I suppose you know I seem to have been the last person to have seen Sir Arthur alive?"

Dinah stared at him in surprise. Lola, who was carefully peeling a peach, paid no heed. Stephen Guest folded up his napkin. "No, I can't say I did know," he replied. "Well, I was," Halliday said. "As a matter of fact I had — not exactly a row with him, but — well, call it a disagreement. One doesn't quarrel with a man in his own house; that goes without saying. It's rather unfortunate, as things have turned out." He glanced across the room to where Finch was standing. "I understand you heard me talking to Sir Arthur, Finch. You seem to have given the police the impression that we had a violent row."

"That was not my intention, sir," replied the butler gently. "When I was asked if I had heard anyone with Sir Arthur at any time between twelve o'clock and one, I could not do less than tell them the truth."

"You needn't have told them we were quarrelling," said Halliday. "It was no such thing. However, it doesn't really matter, only that it puts me into rather an awkward position."

"I am extremely sorry, sir," said Finch.

Camilla came back looking flustered. "Thank goodtiess that's over!" she said. "They want you now, Miss de Silva. Basil, if we aren't allowed to go home we'd better see about our things being unpacked again. I must say, I can't see why we should have to stay here. It's getting absolutely on my nerves, having all these policemen hanging about. There's one in the hall now. I suppose they're afraid we shall try to escape!"

"I seem to be reserved for the last," remarked Dinah, when the Hallidays had gone. "I do wish they'd hurry. I want to go up to Fay."

"I fancy, miss, that you will not be required to make a statement," said Finch, coming to her elbow with the coffee-tray. "I understand that you were on the terrace the entire time."

"Yes, I suppose I was," reflected Dinah. "Does that mean I'm not a suspect?" Even as she said the words she wished that she had not. She got up. "I'll take my coffee upstairs with me. I think this is all getting rather beastly I hadn't thought of that before. Not even when Halliday told us about being the last to see Arthur. I didn't seem to mean anything in particular, somehow. 1 suppose every one of us is more or less under suspicion.

"I shouldn't worry, if I were you," said Guest, opening the door. "Don't let Fay worry either. See?"

The afternoon was surely the most interminable ever spent at the Grange. It seemed to Dinah as though it would never end. The feeling of unreality grew. Fay remained shut in her room, and would admit no one; the Hallidays had also chosen to stay upstairs. Dawson was sobbing noisily as she went about her work. Geoflrey seemed unable to sit still; and Stephen, who sat perfectly quietly in the billiard-room and read the paper, seemed just as unnatural by reason of his very calm. Lola, after a protracted interview with the dazed but suspicioius Superintendent, had announced that it was important that she should rest between lunch and tea, and had gone upstairs for that purpose. Mrs. Twining remained in the drawing-room with Geoffrey, and Dr Raymond had been permitted to depart as soon as his statement had been carefully transcribed.

The Chief Constable, Major Grierson, arrived just before half past three in a large car with the Divisional Surgeon, a sergeant in plain clothes, and a photographer. He was a worried-looking man of about fifty, with a quick, fussy way of talking, and what appeared to be a chronic catarrh. He kept on dabbing at his thin nose with a ball of a handkerchief, and his conversation was punctuated by sniffs. He was met by the local Superintendent, and by Dinah, who happened to be in the hall when he arrived. He said: "This is a terrible business. Shocking, shocking! Knew the General quite — er — well. You're his sister-in-law? Quite. Now Superintendent, if you are ready… !"

He, and the doctor, the photographer, and the plainclothes man, who turned out to be the finger-print expert, all followed the Superintendent into the study, and remained there for a very long time.

At half past four Fay came downstairs. She had changed into a black frock, which had the effect of enhancing her pallor. Her eyes still had that strained, dilated look, as though they were haunted, but her manner was carefully controlled. She took her usual place behind the tea-tray, and said with an effort: "It was nice of you to stay, Julia. I'm afraid it has all been very — very horrid for you. I find I can't quite realise it yet. It doesn't seem to be possible, somehow. Have they — have they finished yet? Did they find anything to show — to give them any clue, do you know? I feel so certain myself that it must have been someone from outside. The windows were open, after all, and — Arthur made a great many enemies. Don't you think so, Julia? Don't you, Dinah?"

Geoffrey set down his cup and saucer with an unsteady hand. "I suppose you mean you think I did it?" he said. "Well, it may interest you to know that I wasn't anywhere near the house."

Fay looked distressed. "Oh no, no, I didn't mean that!" she said. "Of course I didn't mean that!" She looked up as Stephen Guest entered the room, and in that fleeting moment Dinah read the dread in her eyes. Then Fay said quietly: "Ah, here you are, Stephen. I was just going to ask Geoffrey to tell you tea was ready."

The Hallidays came in at that moment. Camilla had solved the problem of dress, apparently to her satisfaction, by putting on a brown frock instead of the pale blue one she had worn all the morning. She looked though she had been crying, and seemed rather subdued.

There was nothing subdued about Lola, who presently sailed into the room dressed in the deepest of mourning.

Any stranger entering the room would certainly have taken her for the widow, and not Fay. She wore a long, trailing robe of some dead-black material, without any ornament at all, and carried a handkerchief with a dark black hem. Where she could have found such a thing. in a moment's notice Dinah could not imagine. She was forced to the conclusion that either it must belong to the faithful Concetta, or the inky border had been hastily stitched to an ordinary white handkerchief.

"I am quite upset," she announced. "You can feel how my heart is beating, altogether too fast. I have seen that they have taken away the corpse of Geoffrey's papa. It has made me feel extremely sad, quite overcome. And I must tell you that it is very painful to me that the policemen who stand in the hall should stare at me as though they think it is I who have stabbed Geoffrey's papa. I have told the fat policeman that he cannot at all prove that I am an assassin, but he is, I think, a fool, since he will only open his mouth like a fish, and not answer me when I speak."

Her auditors were spared the necessity of replying to this address by the entrance of Finch, who came to tell Fay that the Chief Constable would like to speak to her and to Geoffrey.

They both went out, Geoffrey saying: "I wonder what he wants to see me for? I suppose, though I hadn't thought of it before, that now Father's dead I'm the head of the family. I suppose that's it."

The Chief Constable was looking more worried than ever. The Superintendent, who was standing beside him, with his thumbs tucked into a belt of quite enormous span, had a profoundly dissatisfied look in his eye, and stared hard at a painting over the fireplace in a glassy way that gave the impression that he had entirely dissociated himself from any subsequent proceedings.

The sight of Fay made Major Grierson dab his nose a great many times in succession. He said: "Ah, Lady Billington-Smith! Quite. Er — a very bad business. I assure you I — er —- feel for you most deeply. Now, Mr — er — Billington-Smith, we have come to the conclusion, the Superintendent and I — yes, yes, Superintendent! We have come to the conclusion, as I say, that this is a case where it will be — er — advisable to call in Scotland Yard."

"Scotland Yard?" repeated Geoffrey. "Do you mean we've got to have detectives down? But I say — I mean, is that absolutely necessary?"

The Superintendent brought his aloof gaze down from The Fighting Temeraire, and bent it sternly upon Geoffrey.

Major Grierson's manner became still more impersonal. "I should not, Mr. Billington-Smith, do anything that was in my — er — opinion unnecessary. Now you will understand, of course, that no one must enter the room where the — er — in short, the study. Quite. The Superintendent will leave two of his men — er — on duty. I understand that you have guests in the house. None of these must leave until after the — er — visit of the Yard Inspector. Yes, Superintendent, what is it?"

"In the matter of Mrs. Twining, sir," said the Superintendent woodenly, "who, if agreeable, desires to return to Blessington House, which same being her residence in the vicinity."

"Mrs. Twining, yes. Well, I think in the case of Mrs. Twining, since she lives close — er — at hand, there would be no objection. She will understand, of course, that she must hold herself in — er readiness to be here to answer any further questions which the Yard Inspector may want to put to her. Naturally." He dabbed afresh at his nose "And — er — one other matter, Mr. Billington-Smith. The Inspector will want to see the — er — safe in the study opened. That should be done by your — er — late father's solicitor. Perhaps you will arrange for him to cone down for that purpose. I think that is all at — er — present ."

"Yes, but surely it can't be necessary — I mean, it'll be a most awful nuisance having to stay cooped up here with a lot of policemen on guard," objected Geoffrey. "I shouldn't have thought it would be so frightfully diflicult to find out who murdered Father — not that I'm criticising, of course, but —"

Fay pressed his hand. "Geoffrey, if Major Grierson thinks it necessary, of course — of course it must be done." she said almost inaudibly. "We we quite understand. Major. And you want my husband's solicitor to come down. Yes, I — see. Geoffrey, you'll telephone to him, won't you?"

Chapter Seven

Inspector Harding, of Scotland Yard, arrived at Ralton shortly before two o'clock on Tuesday afternoon, and drove straight to the police station. Here he was awaited by Superintendent Lupton and Sergeant Nethersole. The Superintendent, who was fifty years of age, with scant grey locks, a red and somewhat fierce face, and a waist measurement of fifty inches, looked forward to Inspector Harding's advent with considerable hostility. It was not that he really wanted to handle this case up at the Grange. He would not go so far as to say that he thought it beyond his powers, but he could see that it was going to mean a lot of work, awkward work too, what with the General having been a big pot in the neighbourhood, and her ladyship giving away the prizes at the Police Sports only a week ago — not that he held with all these sports, and football teams and he didn't know what beside. They hadn't had them in his young days in the Force, and nobody need think he was going to encourage the young chaps in his division to waste their time over such-like nonsense, because he wasn't. A quiet set-down in a cosy bar with a mug of beer had always been good enough for him in his off time, and still was, though naturally as you got older you needed more than one mug of beer. But that was neither here nor there, and whether he approved of sports for the police or not, it would be an awkward job handling this case, a very awkward job it would be. But that wasn't to say he wanted one of those sharp Yard chaps poking his nose into everything, and trying to teach him his business. If he saw any signs of uppishness he'd put Mr Inspector Know-All in his place pretty quick, and no mistake about it.

Sergeant Nethersole, an earnest and painstaking man of thirty-seven, awaited Inspector Harding's arrival with quite different feelings. He was a diffident person, very anxious to make his way in the Force. It had never fallen to his lot to work with the Yard till now, or, in fact, to encounter anything more exciting in his career than a few road accidents, and two cases of burglary. They offered very little scope for a man with ambition, and when he found that he had been detailed to assist Inspector Harding in his inquiries he was very much gratified, and made up his mind closely to observe the methods of detection employed by one of those clever London chaps. He was a large man, with a somewhat wooden face. His round blue eyes had a trick of staring fixedly at any handy object whenever he was thinking particularly deeply. He was slow of utterance, and slower still to wrath. No one could ever remember to have seen Sergeant Nethersole give way even to a momentary annoyance, and, unlike the Superintendent, he never bullied his subordinates.

When the Inspector arrived, and was conducted to the Superintendent's Office, the Sergeant got up out of his chair, and stared at him unwaveringly for quite two minutes. He had not the least desire to offend; he was mearly getting to know Inspector Harding. His gaze might appear bovine, but his methodical mind was absorbing a number of facts about the Inspector.

Not at all what he had expected. That was the first thing he thought. One of these public-school men, he rather fancied. You could always tell. A quiet-mannered chap, good steady pair of eyes that looked at you fair and square. I like a chap who can look you in the face, thought the Sergeant, never realising that there were few with nerves hardy enough to meet unflinchingly his own stare.

He wasn't one of these testy old-stagers, either, nor yet whipper-snapper. He'd be about his own age, he wouldn't wonder. Just the sort of chap to handle the nobs at the Grange, being, as you could see, one of the gentry himself. He didn't know how it would be, working with him, he was sure, but on the whole he was bound to say he liked the look of him.

The Inspector walked across the room and shook hands with the Superintendent. "Good afternoon, Superintendent. I hope I haven't kept you waiting," he said. Then he turned, encountering the gaze of Sergeant Nethersole, and shook hands with him too, giving back stare for stare.

Well! thought the Superintendent, that's what we're coming to, is it? Nice set-out when they take to sending down la-di-da Percies from the Yard. A fat lot of use he'd be, all stuffed up with a college education, and like as not trying to come the lord over everybody. Not but what he spoke nice enough, quite respectful and polite, but you never knew.

"Well, Inspector Harding," he said patronisingly, "so you've come down to take over the case for us!"

"Not to take it over, surely, Superintendent? I understand that you are in charge of the case."

The Superintendent's eye became a shade less frosty"That's right," he said. "Naturally, me being Superintendent of the district, it's my business to have charge of the case. But of course I'm not as young as I was, and me and the Chief Constable, we put our heads together and came to the conclusion that what we wanted was someone to lend a hand, it being a lot to ask of a man of my years to take on a case like this one single-handly. That's how it is."

"My instructions are to give you all the assistance. I can," said the Inspector. "I understand it's rather a awkward case for a local man to deal with."

Really, that was very handsomely spoken, very handsomely spoken indeed that was. "Well, that's where it is" said the Superintendent, thawing almost visibly. "It is awkward, and that's the truth. Now, what we'd better do is to get down to it right away; you and me, and Sergeant Nethersole here, whom I've detailed to work with you while you're on the case."

"Right," said the Inspector, and drew up a chair and sat down.

The tale which the Superintendent began to unfold was neither concise nor easy to be followed, but the, Inspector seemed to grasp its main outlines, and except for one or two interruptions when he asked apologetically to have some point more fully explained, he heard it more or less in silence.

The Sergeant, seated with his large hands clasped between his knees, thought: Lupton's getting beyond it, that's what. Fair rigmarole it must be to anyone not acquainted with the General and his family. What's he want to go reading bits out of all them statements for? jumping from one person to the other without making it plain who any of them are, instead of telling the Inspector, quiet-like, the facts of the case, and leaving him to read the statements for himself. Patient sort of chap he seems to be; picks up points pretty quick too.

Inspector Harding allowed the Superintendent to talk himself out. Then he said: "I see. Let's be sure that I've got the main facts right — I'm afraid the identities of the various people in the case are a bit beyond me at present. General Billington-Smith entered his study at ten minutes to twelve. At five minutes past twelve the butler went through the hall to the front door, and heard what he took to be a quarrel going on between the General and a member of the house-party."

"Mr. Halliday," nodded the Superintendent. "Unhealthy looking gentleman, he is. What I call fidgety, if you know what I mean. Very much on the jump, I thought to myself. No occupation, which is fishy, if you look at it that way. Lost his job, if you ask me."

The Inspector waited until this excursion into the realms of conjecture was over. Then he said: "And he, I think you said, admits that he did enter the study somewhere about twelve o'clock, and had a disagreement with the General, on a subject which he prefers not to disclose. He doesn't know when he left the study, but thinks he was not there more than a quarter of an hour at the most. He then went up to his room, and joined the rest of the party on the terrace about ten minutes later. So far as you know, he was the last person to see the General alive. A few minutes before one o'clock Mrs. Mrs." — he glanced down at one of the many sheets of paper laid before him — "Mrs. Twining went to fetch the General to join the party on the terrace for a cocktail According to her story she found him dead at his desk. She bent over him, saw that he had been stabbed, and that there was nothing she could do, and returned to the terrace to break the news. Have I got that right?"

"You've got it right as far as it goes," replied the Superintendent disparagingly. "But there's a lot more to it than that, I can tell you. You've left out the movement of all these visitors staying in the house for one thing."

"Until I've had time to read the statements over carefully I think I'd better confine myself to the main outline. Superintendent. May I see the doctor's reports?"

The Superintendent hunted through a sheaf of documents, and handed two typewritten sheets of foolscap across the desk. "Here you are. You'll want to have thc photographs too," he added, producing these.

"Thanks." Inspector Harding took the prints, and laid them down, without raising his eyes from the report in his hand. He read in silence for a minute or two, while the Superintendent and the Sergeant watched him. Then he looked up. "I see. He was stabbed from behind as he sat at his desk, with a Chinese dagger used by him as a paper-knife, the knife entering the neck below the right ear, and severing the carotid artery. Death, in the opinion of' — he consulted the first report — "Dr Raymond, occurring within a minute, possibly less. No finger-prints?"

The Superintendent shook his head. "No, that's just what makes it difficult for us. Nowadays people are so knowing, what with story books about murders and I don't know what besides, that they're up to all the dodges. Whoever done this murder took care to wear gloves. That's all this talk of progress leads to, putting people up to them sort of tricks," he said bitterly, and opened a drawer in the desk, and extracted from it the chinese dagger. "That's it. Exhibit No. l," he said. "Nasty looking to keep lying about, I call it."

The Inspector took the knife, which was a thin blade set in a carved ivory handle, and held it for a moment in his hand. "Very nasty," he agreed, and gave it back.

"Exhibit No. 2," proceeded the Superintendent, handing over a sheet of note-paper. "Found under the deceased's hand, like as if he might have written on it just before he died."

"That's interesting," said the Inspector.

"Well, I don't know so much about that. The Divisional Surgeon, he holds to the opinion that Sir Arthur wouldn't have had time to write anything after the blow was struck. On the other hand, Dr Raymond thinks that he could. That's what it is with doctors. What with one saying one thing, and another arguing it could have happened different, you never know where you are. And it doesn't seem to me to lead anywhere, that bit of paper. Well, I mean, look at it!"

The Inspector was looking at it. Scrawled in pencil across a half-sheet of engraved note-paper was the word "There'. There was no more; the faint pencil mark tailed off, as though the pencil had dropped suddenly from nerveless fingers.

"To my mind it doesn't lead anywhere," grumbled the Superintendent. "There what? The way I look at it is this, Supposing Sir Arthur was starting out to write something when suddenly he gets stabbed from behind? There is nothing to show he wrote it after he'd been stabbed."

"Except that the word is scrawled crookedly across the paper," suggested the Inspector. "I should like to keep this, if I may, Superintendent."

"Oh, you can have it," said the Superintendent generously. "It's about all there is to have, what's more. Not but what something may turn up, because the Chief Constable was very set on having nothing disturbed in the room where the murder took place, so there hasn't been what I call a proper search."

"I see. And about the position of the study: I under stand it is in the front of the house, facing on to the drive?"

"That's right. On the right of the front door as you go in, it is, there being what they call the morning-room behind it, then the stairs, and beyond them the drawing-room, which is a big room along the back of the house next to the billiard-room."

"The terrace, I take it, is also at the back of the house.? Then the study is at a considerable distance from it? No chance of any noise in the study reaching the ears of anyone on the terrace?"

"Oh dear me, no," said the Superintendent, with a tolerant smile for one as yet unacquainted with the dimensions of the Grange. "It's a very big house. What you might call a mansion. Very well off, Sir Arthur was. and did himself proud."

"And these windows," pursued the Inspector, consulting one of the photographs. "Were they open, or shut?"

"Wide open, the front window was. The one on the west side the General never had open, it being right opposite the door, and him not liking a draught. It was the butler shut the windows after the crime was discovered, which, properly speaking, he shouldn't have done."

"No footmarks outside?"

"No, but that doesn't mean anything either, when you come to think of it. There hasn't been any rain since I don't know when, and the ground's as hard as a rock. "It isn't as though there was a flower-bed by the window either. Well, naturally, there wouldn't be, because it's one of them French windows, as you can see for yourself. There's just a bit of grass, and then the drive, which is gravel. Whoever it was that murdered the General might have come in through the window without leaving any trace, or, on the other hand, he might have come in by the door, and no one the wiser."

"That makes it rather difficult," said the Inspector. "Is it known whether the General had any enemies?" He looked up from the photographs as he spoke, and saw that both men's faces had relaxed into broad grins. His own rather grave grey eyes smiled faintly. "Oh! Have I said something funny?"

"Well, Inspector Harding, you've pretty well hit the nail on the head, that's what you've done," said the Superintendent. "I don't suppose, if you was to search the whole county, you'd find anyone who'd got more enemies than what Sir Arthur had. I don't mind going so far as to say that if you set out to find somebody who'd got a good word to say for him you'd have a job."

"That's a fact," corroborated the Sergeant, in a slow deep voice. "You'd have a job."

It was at this moment that the Chief Constable walked into the room.

"Ah, Superintendent, I see the Inspector has — er arrived. No doubt you have put him in — er — possession of the facts. Inspector Harding, isn't it? Very glad you have got down here, Inspector."

The Inspector had risen, and turned to face the newcomer. Major Grierson, who had held out his hand looked at him extremely sharply, and said: "Dear me surely we have — er — met before? Your face is very — er — familiar, yet for the moment I cannot exactly call to er — mind where we have met Do you, by any chance — remember meeting me?"

"Yes, sir, I remember you perfectly," answered the Inspector, shaking hands. "We met in Bailleul."

"Why, of course, of course!" exclaimed the Major. "Harding! Dear me! Yes! You were attached to Colonel — er — Mason! Yes, yes! Well, this is a surprise! But what are you doing in the Police Force? You were — wait. I have it! You were reading law at — er — Oxford!"

"The War rather knocked that on the head, sir, so I joined the Police Force instead."

"Well, well, well!" said Major Grierson.

The Inspector moved to the desk, and put down the photograph he was still holding in his left hand. "Superintendent Lupton has just been giving me all the facts of this case, sir," he said. "It looks like being a bit of a teaser."

The Major's face clouded over. "Very bad business. Nasty — er — case, Harding. I felt at once it was — er -a matter for Scotland Yard. Too many people in it. Have you read the — er — statements?"

"Not yet, sir. I was going to suggest to the Superintendant that he should let me take them away with me now, so that I can study them before I go up to the Grange."

"By all means! Certainly! A very good — er — plan, Superintendent. Don't you — er — agree?"

The Superintendent, who had viewed with disfavour the meeting between the Major and.Inspector Harding said that he had no objection, but that in his opinion the sooner the Inspector went up to the Grange the better it would be.

The Inspector looked at his wrist-watch. "Then shall we say in an hour's time? That will make it half past three."

"Yes, yes, do just as you —- er — think best, Harding," said the Major. "Where are you — er — putting up?"

"At the Crown, sir, if they have a room," replied the Inspector.

"You could not do better," approved the Major. "I'll put you on your — er — way."

Outside the police station he button-holed the Inspector in a confidential manner, and warned him that the Superintendent was rather a difficult man to deal with. "Between ourselves — er — Harding, not quite the man for this — er — business. Naturally — quite realise you must have — er —- a free hand. But if you could manage to er — keep on the right side of him, as it were — But I've no doubt you — er — will do your best."

"I will," promised the Inspector.

"And when we've — er — finished with this case you must come out and — er — dine with me, and we'll have a yarn. I shan't keep you now. You've got a tough — er- job there. Most unpleasant — er — affair." He dabbed at his nose. "Most unpleasant!" he repeated with conviction.

Chapter Eight

At the Grange a peculiar discomfort reigned. From the moment when it had become known that Scotland Yard was to be called in , a constraint descended on the house. Until then every one had been either shocked or ghoulishly excited, according to his or lur disposition, but with the mention of Scotland Yard a realisation of all the implications arising out of the affair was universally felt. An atmosphere of suspicion crept into the house; the murder was very guardedly discussed, and no one, except Miss de Silva, spoke the thought uppermost in mind without first considering whether it were safe.

It struck Dinah, listening to confidences, theories, discussions, that perhaps no one was speaking the whole truth. Every one had something to hide, something to tone down, or to explain away. No one seemed any longer to be quite natural, from Fay, unusually quiet and self-controlled, down to Guest, more taciturn than ever.

The mere mention of Scotland Yard had produced varied emotions. It was easy to see that Fay was dreading what lay before them all, but she would not say so even to Dinah. Geoffrey was easier still to read. He could not leave the subject alone, but harped continually on it, alternately demonstrating the folly of having detectives down, and offhandedly wondering what the detectives would want to know.

Camilla became a little shrill when she heard the news. She said it was ridiculous for anyone to ask her anything because she knew nothing; she could not see why she and Basil could not go home. Suddenly it had become very inconvenient for her to stay at the Grange; she did not think it fair to expect her to put herself out like this, and at once worked herself into an abortive hatred of the Police Force. Panic evidently possessed her shallow brain, and she displayed quite extraordinary vulgarity in the way she gave way to it. Probably, Dinah thought, she was the type of woman who shrieked wildly in moments of emergency.

Basil Halliday occasionally begged her irritably for God's sake to be quiet, but he seemed to have not the smallest influence over her. He himself asserted that he thought it clearly a case for Scotland Yard. It was absurd to make a fuss about it. Why should one mind having to answer a few questions? Yet Dinah felt, watching his twitching brows, that he did mind, perhaps more than his wife.

There was no saying what Stephen Guest thought about it. No hint of emotion disturbed the inscrutability of his countenance when he heard of the Chief Constable's decision. He folded the evening paper open at the middle page with his capable, deliberate fingers, and said: "I thought they'd call in the Yard." That was the only comment he made; he did not seem to be much interested.

I.ola was also uninterested. She said that policemen did not matter to her, and it was incredible that only a reporter on the local paper had as yet called at the house seeking a story. With him she would have nothing to do; it would perhaps be better if nothing was told to the newspapers until she had seen her press agent. "For it occurs to me," she said seriously, "that it may not be a good thing to put this in the papers. In France it would he a success of the most enormous, but England I do not know so well, and one must ask oneself whether it will make good publicity for me, or, on the contrary, not good at all, but very bad."

Lola, unlike Camilla, evinced not the slightest desire to leave the Grange. She even forbore to complain any more of the matutinal habits of cocks, though she did once announce that when she was married to Geoffrey the matter would have to be arranged.

The murder of her host was from her point of view a good thing. Geoffrey would have a great deal of money, which would enable him to marry her, and there need no longer be an inexplicable dearth of absinthe in the house. These conclusions she expressed freely, for, as she very sensibly pointed out, it was good for every one to look on the bright side.

The absinthe was procured for her by Finch, who informed Dinah apologetically that he had taken it upon himself to ring up the wine-merchant. "For, if I may say so, miss, it will be one worry the less," he said.

The other matter could not be so easily settled. Geoffrey, Lola discovered, was behaving quite absurdly, and instead of adoring her openly, showed a marked disinclination to be anywhere near her. If she caught his eye he would hurriedly avert his own glance; if she addressed him he answered her in a constrained way. and would immediately begin to talk to someone else. Even the seduction of her beauty failed to rekindle his passion, and when she tried the effect of stealing her arm, about his neck at the foot of the staircase on Mondat night, and whispering: "Kiss me. But kiss me, my Geoffrey!" the result had been anything but happy. He had almost violently disengaged himself, saying: "Don't! Can't you leave me alone? I don't want to touch you! And then, when she had opened her eyes at such odd behaviour, he had said, in a high-pitched, excited voice: "Don't keep on talking about marriage! We're not going to be married. You threw me over when you thought. I hadn't any money, and I saw what a fool I'd been about you. And it absolutely killed my love for you!"

This was very shocking, quite rude of Geoffrey, and extremely annoying besides, since he spoke in such a loud voice that every one must have been able to hear him. For a moment Lola wavered on the brink of a truly magnificent scene. It would be a splendid end to the day, and she would enjoy a quarrel where one screamed abuse, and hurled vases to the ground. But Geoffrey though excitable, was, after all, English, and probably he would not enter into the spirit of the thing, but instead of shouting too would just walk away, quite disgusted. She curbed herself therefore, and said reproachfully: "But I find you entirely cruel, my dear Geoffrey. You hurt me very much, I assure you,, ut I forgive you, because it is seen that you are not at all yourself."

After that she had gone upstairs to bed and, meeting Dinah on the landing, had asked her when it would be made known how much money Geoffrey would have.

Dinah was unable to enlighten her. Geoffrey had rung up the offices of Tremlowe, Tremlowe, Hanson and Tremlowe as soon as the Chief Constable had departed but Mr Horace Tremlowe had not returned from a long week-end, and Mr Gerald Tremlowe hardly expected to see him before eleven o'clock on Tuesday. Geoffrey had sonnewhat incoherently explained his need of Mr Horace Tremlowe, and Mr Gerald, very much shocked, had said "Tut-tut-tut", in a perturbed voice, and promised that Mr Horace Tremlowe, who was both the General's solicitor and executor, would come down to the Grange by the first available train on Wednesday.

During the course of Tuesday morning Finch was kept busy answering the front door. A great many people drove up, and handed in flowers, or a note for Fay. Nearly all these sympathetic callers told Finch how deeply shocked they were; nearly all supposed that Lady Billington-Smith was not yet receiving visitors, and upon having this guess politely confirmed, drove regretfully away.

Mrs. Chudleigh did not call, or leave flowers. She rang up instead, and she was not to be put off by a butler. She said that she would like to speak to Miss Fawcett, please, on an important matter. When Dinah went reluctantly to the telephone the important matter was disclosed. The Vicar, said Mrs. Chudleigh, had made her ring up, since he hesitated to intrude at such a moment, and yet wished to come to see Fay. Spiritual consolation, said Mrs. Chudleigh. Dinah declined it for her sister.

"No doubt you know Lady Billington-Smith's wishes, Miss Fawcett," said the sharp voice at the other end of the wire. "Though I must say I should have thought that such a time — However, I assure you neither my husband nor myself would dream of coming to see your sister unless she expressed a wish to see either of us. No doubt you have been besieged by callers? I know how vulgarly inquisitive people are, and that is why I rang up instead, of leaving a note. Of course, I suppose there will have to be an inquest?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so," said Dinah patiently.

"So painful for the family!" said Mrs. Chudleigh. "I hope there is no truth in the story that is going about that the police consider it necessary to call in Scotland Yard . I paid not the slightest attention to it when it repeated to me, but of course you know that Constable Hammond is engaged to Mrs. Darcy's under housemaid?"

"I didn't know it," said Dinah, "But —"

"Well, that is undoubtedly how it leaked out. Naturally I told Mrs. Darcy that I was surprised at her listening to mere gossip like that. I suppose it is quite untrue?"

"No," replied Dinah. "It is perfectly true. I'm sure you'll forgive me, Mrs. Chudleigh, but I'm very busy at the moment, and -"

"I quite understand!" Mrs. Chudleigh assured her. "Everything must be at sixes and sevens, I am sure. And so objectionable for you to have detectives in the house. Reporters too!"

"Yes," said Dinah. "Foul. I'll tell Fay you rang up, Mrs. Chudleigh. So kind of you! Good-bye!"

Later still Mrs. Twining rang up. She wanted merely to know how Fay was, and Geoffrey, and whether her presence had been needed.

"No, not yet," Dinah replied. "The detective hasn't turned up so far. It'll be quite a relief when he does come if you ask me. This waiting about is getting on everybody's nerves. Are you coming over today, Mrs. Twining?"

"I think perhaps I had better," said Mrs. Twining in her calm way. "I understood from Fay that I was to hold myself in readiness to answer questions the detective may want to put to me. I am really not very well versed in the etiquette of these affairs. Does a detective come to me, or do I go to him?"

"I don't know," said Dinah. "But I wish you would come. We — we rather badly want a normal person here."

"Then I will drive over this afternoon," said Mrs. Twining.

At luncheon Camilla announced that she had a splitting head, and was going to lie down all the afternoon, and if the detective did actually come at last it was no use expecting her to see him, because she was feeling far too ill to talk to anybody.

Upon which Lola turned her candid gaze upon her, and said: "I do not find that there is any reason for a detective to see you. You are not at all important, let me tell you, so it's quite foolish for you to create for us any scenes."

Camilla, pale with anger, said in a trembling voice that she wasn't going to sit there to be insulted, and flounced from the room. After a moment's uncertainty Halliday got up abruptly, and followed her.

"I am quite pleased that they have gone," said Lola composedly. "They are not at all sympathetic, and besides I am nearly sure that her hair has been dyed."

That seemed to dispose of Camilla. No one found strength to make any comment on this speech, and the meal was resumed in depressed silence.

When it was over Dinah took Fay firmly by the hand and led her upstairs to her room. "You're going to lie down till tea-time, my girl," she said. "How much sleep did you get last night?"

"Not very much," Fay said, with a forced smile. She let Dinah help her to slip off her frock, and huddled herself into a dressing-gown with a little shiver.

Dinah banked up the pillows on the bed, and patted it invitingly. "Come along, ducky. You'll feel better if you can manage to put in a little sleep."

Fay came docilely, and lay down. Her wide eyes stole to Dinah's face for a moment, and then sank. "Yes. I expect I shall. Dinah —"

Dinah took one of her cold hands. "What, darling?"

"When the detective comes," Fay said carefully, "Do you think I need be there? Of course he will want to see me; I quite realise that. But do you think I need receive him? Could you be there instead? Geoffrey isn't much good, and — and I expect he'll want someone, won't he?"

"I haven't the foggiest notion," said Dinah, "but I'll be there all right. Don't you worry about it!"

"Thank you," Fay said.

Miss Fawcett withdrew, and went downstairs to the telephone. She had remembered that no one had as yet broken the news to her mother.

Mrs. Fawcett received the tidings characteristically.After her first exclamations of horror and incredulity she said in a faint, injured voice that Dinah should not have told her over the telephone; the shock was too terrible. So Dinah knew then that her parent was enjoying a spell of shattered health, and there would not be the least necessity to dissuade her from instantly coming to Fay's side. Mrs. Fawcett had made attention to her own comfort her primary consideration for so many years that it was extremely doubtful whether anything could break a habit thus firmly embedded. In a plaintive voice that would have led any stranger to suppose her to be on the point of collapse she said that she only wished she could come down at once to be with dearest Fay. Only what, she asked sadly, was the use of her dragging herself on the long, tiring journey when she would have to go to bed the instant she arrived? It would be the sheerest folly, for she was already far from well, and Dinah must surely know how the slightest exertion prostrated her.

Dinah grinned as she put the receiver down at last. Mother will have a glorious time now, she reflected, picturing Mrs. Fawcett already tottering to the nearest sofa. She'll tell all her friends, and say how terrible it is for her to be tied to her couch, when she would give anything to be here with Fay. And she'll do it awfully well, too, thought Miss Fawcett appreciatively, and went to sit on the terrace till the detective should arrive.

It was a long time before he came, and she was once more reminded of the dentist's waiting-room. It seemed very improbable that the murder could be brought home to her, but she had all a female's unreasonable mistrust of policemen, and what she had seen of the Superintendent did not lead her to view the advent of another of his tribe with anything but the most profound foreboding. However, on one point she had quite made up her mind: if this person from Scotland Yard thought he was going to ask her questions in a rude, bullying tone he would find that he had made a great mistake.

By half-past three the feeling of the dentist's waiting room had grown considerably, and when, at a quarter to four, Finch came to inform Geoffrey, who had joined hcon the terrace not long before, that Sergeant Nethersole and the Inspector from Scotland Yard had arrived, Miss Fawcett was aware of a most curious and disagreeable sensation in the pit of her stomach.

"I suppose I'd better see the fellow, hadn't I?" said Geoffrey. "Not that I can be of any use to him as far as I can see. What's he like Finch?"

"We shall soon see what he's like for ourselves," said Dinah bracingly. "Come on, I'll go with you." She gave Geoffrey's arm a friendly squeeze. "Don't let yourself get agitated, my child. He can't eat you."

"Oh, I'm not agitated!" said Geoffrey with a laugh "Only I do hope they haven't sent some frightful bounder down. Where have you put him, Finch?"

"I showed him into the morning-room, sir. He seems if I may say so, a very quiet gentleman."

"Well, thank God for that!" said Geoffrey, putting up a nervous hand to his tie. "Come on, Dinah — if you are coming!"

There were two men in the morning-room, one dressed in a sergeant's uniform, and the other in a lounge suit that bore the indefinable stamp of a good tailor. "Inspector Harding, sir," said Finch, evidently feeling that an introduction was called for.

"Oh — er — good — afternoon, Inspector!" said Geoffrey "Good afternoon," said Harding pleasantly. He glanced towards Dinah, and found that damsel surveying him with patent surprise.

Good lord, he is a gentleman! thought Geoffrey. Well, that's something, anyway. He doesn't look such a bad chap, either.

Miss Fawcett, realising that her frank stare was being returned with a rather amused twinkle, had the grace to blush. She stepped forward, and held out her hand. "How do you do?" she said politely.

"How do you do, Miss Fawcett," said Harding, shaking hands with her.

"How on earth did you know I was Miss Fawcett?" asked Dinah, visibly impressed.

"The butler told me that he would fetch Miss Fawcett," explained Harding gravely.

"Oh!" said Dinah, disappointed. "I thought you were being hideously clever."

"No, I'm afraid I wasn't," said Harding apologetically.

This man, decided Miss Fawcett, is definitely going to be nice.

Chapter Nine

Inspector Harding was listening to Geoffrey, voluble and slightly injured. "Of course I know you've got to make inquiries," Geoffrey said, "but I do hope you'll be as quick as you can, because it's frightfully rotten for my stepmother — I mean, she's had a simply ghastly shock, you know — we both have, if it comes to that — and having the house crammed full of visitors makes it all absolutely foul for us. And naturally they don't want to hang about here either. Personally, I can't see -"

"I shall be as quick as I can be, Mr. Billington-Smith," said Harding, evidently feeling that this rambling harangue might go on indefinitely. "I should like first to inspect the study, please, and then perhaps you will let your butler show me the other rooms on this floor."

"What on earth do you want to see the other room for?" asked Geoffrey. "Of course, you can if you like, but I must say I don't quite see -"

"Thank you," said Harding. "I won't keep you am longer now, Mr. Billington-Smith." He turned to Finch, still standing by the door. "Will you take me to the study, please?"

"Yes, show the Inspector the way, will you, Finch?" said Geoffrey, "If you want me just tell Finch, Inspector — not that I can be much use to you, because I didn't happen to be here when my father was murdered, but if you do want me -"

"I'll ask Finch to fetch you if I do," said Harding, and he followed the butler out into the hall.

The constable on duty in the study rose from a chair against the wall when the door was opened, and brightened perceptibly when he saw the Sergeant. It was a dull job, keeping guard on an empty room.

The Sergeant told him he could go and wait outside, and then fixed his gaze on the Inspector, standing still by the desk, looking about him.

"Nothing has been moved, Sergeant, I take it?"

"Nothing but what the Superintendent showed you down at the station," said the Sergeant.

"I see." Harding turned. Just a minute before you go, Finch. When you entered this room with Mr. Guest and Mr. Halliday, were these windows shut, or open?"

"The front windows were open, sir. Sir Arthur never had the side window open when he sat here. I thought it best to shut them when we locked the room up, in case of anyone trying to come in for any purpose."

"Had you any reason to think that someone might wish to come into the room?"

The butler hesitated. "Not then, sir — in a manner of speaking."

"But later you had?"

"I don't know that I would go so far as to say that, sir, but it did seem to me that Mr. Halliday was not best pleased."

"What made you think that?" asked Harding.

"Well, sir, I don't know that I could give any definate reason. Mr. Halliday seemed anxious to get the key in his own hands, to my way of thinking."

Harding looked consideringly at him for a moment "Mr. Guest, however, agreed with you that the room should be shut up?"

"Oh yes, sir. It was Mr. Guest who suggested the key should be put into Dr Raymond's charge."

"And eventually you all left the room together?"

"Yes, sir."

"Who did actually lock the door?"

"Mr. Guest, sir. He gave the key to Dr Raymond at once."

"Did he or you ascertain that the door was locked?"

"Yes, sir, I did," replied Finch instantly.

"And there was no possibility that anyone could have unlocked it with any other key than the one belonging to it?"

"No, sir, none. Sir Arthur had all the locks made different when he built the house."

"I see." Harding made a note in his pocket-book. "Will you now arrange the room exactly as you found it when you first came in after the murder, please?"

"You mean the windows, sir? Everything else is just as it was."

"Yes, the windows."

The butler moved over to the front windows, pulled back the curtains and drew the bolts, fixing the windows wide. Then he walked over to the other one and parted the net curtains a little way. "They were like that, sir."

"Thank you. Before you go, I should like you to answer one or two questions. First, where did Sir Arthur keep the dagger he used as a paper-knife?"

"Always on the desk, sir."

"'There should be a sheath, I think, matching the handle. I don't see it here?"

"No, sir, the sheath was lost some years ago, when Sir Arthur had the knife abroad with him."

"Ah! I wondered about that." Harding drew a sheaf of papers from his breast-pocket, and ran through them till he found the one he wanted. "You have said that at five minutes past twelve on Monday you overheard voices in this room, one of which you identified as Mr. Halliday's."

"Yes, sir."

"You had no doubt that it was Mr. Halliday's voice?"

"No, sir, none. Mr. Halliday has what I might call a very distinctive voice."

"Did you overhear anything of what was said?"

"No, sir. The doors are very thick in this house, as you can see, and Sir Arthur was speaking at the same time."

"Angrily?"

"More what one would call blustering, sir. It was Mr. Halliday who was picking the quarrel."

Harding looked up from his notes. "You could not distinguish what was said, and yet you can positively assert that it was Mr. Halliday who picked the quarrel. Isn't that rather curious?"

"Perhaps I should not have said quite that, sir. I assumed it was Mr. Halliday who was angry, on account that Sir Arthur's partiality for Mrs. Halliday."

"Oh. Was this partiality very marked?"

"Very marked, sir. If I may say so, I had expected something in the nature of a quarrel to occur, Mr. Halliday not relishing Sir Arthur's attentions to Mrs. Halliday."

"You formed the impression that Mr. Halliday was jealous?"

"Oh yes, sir, very much so. Mr. Halliday was always watching Mrs. Halliday and Sir Arthur. It is not my place to say so, but Mrs. Halliday was what I should call flirtatious, leading Sir Arthur on. It was easy to see that Mr. Halliday did not like it."

Harding nodded, and resumed his perusal of the butler's original statement. "You did not see Mr. Halliday leave the study. Where did you go when you left the hall?"

"I went to my pantry, sir, till Mrs. Twining came."

"How long would that be?"

The butler reflected. "Well, sir, not more than five minutes, I should say, before the front door bell rang."

"When you went to admit Mrs. Twining did you still hear voices in the study?"

"No, sir, not a sound."

"And when you had shown Mrs. Twining on to the terrace — where did you go then?"

"Pardon me, sir, but I did not show Mrs. Twining on to the terrace," said Finch. "Mrs. Twining said that she would announce herself."

"Was that usual?"

"In Mrs. Twining's case, quite usual, sir. Mrs. Twining was a very old friend of Sir Arthur's. She had been motoring in an open car, and she wished to tidy her hair before going on to the terrace. There is a mirror in the hall, as you will notice, sir. Mrs. Twining went to look at herself in it, and told me I need not wait."

"So that you did not see her go out on to the terrace?"

"No, sir, I went straight back to my pantry to mix the cocktails."

"Was anyone else in the pantry?"

The butler considered for a moment. "I rather fancy that Charles — the footman, sir — was, as one might put it, between the pantry and the dining-room, laying the table for lunch. But I could not be sure on that point. When the front door bell rang again — it would be only a few minutes later, for I was in the act of cutting the orange for the cocktails — I went back to the hall."

"Again you heard no sound from the study?"

"No, sir, it was quite quiet."

"Who had rung the front door bell?"

"Mrs. Chudleigh, sir — the Vicar's wife. I showed her on to the terrace, and then went back to my pantry."

"Did you go into the hall again after that?"

"Not until I took the cocktail tray out, sir. That would be just after half past twelve, on account of my being interrupted while mixing the cocktails, and so being a few minutes later than I should otherwise have been."

"And you did not pass through the hall again until one o'clock, when you met Mr. Guest and Mr. Halliday on their way to the study?"

"No, sir. I was busy preparing for luncheon."

"In the dining-room?"

"Between the dining-room and the pantry, sir. I should tell you that there is a door leading from the dining-room to the passage outside the pantry."

"You did not show Mrs. Chudleigh out?"

"No, sir. I understand that Mrs. Chudleigh left by way of the garden."

"Oh? Which way is that?"

The butler moved towards the west window. "You may see for yourself, sir. This opens on to the path leading from the drive to the lawn at the back of the house."

Harding followed him, and looked out. "I see." He consulted the paper in his hand again. "One more question. At what hour did Mr. Billington-Smith leave the house on Monday morning?"

"I really couldn't say, sir," replied Finch, after a moment's consideration.

The grey eyes lifted to his face. "Try to remember, will you?" said Harding gently.

"I'm afraid I didn't notice the time, sir. It was before Sir Arthur came in, I know."

"Would you agree that it was half past eleven?"

"Somewhere about there, sir, I should say."

"Did it strike you that Mr. Billington-Smith was at all upset when he went out?"

"I did not notice anything unusual, sir."

"You did not consider it unusual for him to go without his hat on a hot day?"

"Oh dear me, no, sir! Mr. Billington-Smith very rarely wore a hat in the country."

"Did he appear to be in a hurry?"

"It did not strike me in that way, sir."

"He did not, in your opinion, rush out of the house as though he were quite beside himself?"

"No, sir, certainly not. But then I know Mr Geoffrey very well, and I should not set any store by him moving quickly, as one might say. Mr Geoffrey has an impetuous way of going about his business, if you understand me."

"So that you did not think it odd that he should leave the front door open behind him?"

"Oh no, not at all, sir. Mr Geoffrey is very forgetful in those ways."

Once more Harding favoured him with a long, appraising look. "Thank you," he said. "I don't think there is anything more I want to ask you at present."

The butler bowed. "No, sir. Perhaps you would touch the bell when you wish me to conduct you over the house?"

The Sergeant watched him go out of the room, carefully closing the door behind him, and transferred his gaze to Inspector Harding's face. "You got more out of him than what the Superintendent did, sir," he remarked in his deep, slow voice. "A sight more."

"A very precise witness — until we got to Mr. Billington-Smith, where I think he swerved a little from the truth," commented Harding.

"I was watching him close all the time," said the Sergeant unnecessarily. "It struck me he was being careful — I won't say more than that. Careful."

"Sergeant, will you sit down at the desk?" said Harding, going to the west window again. "I think it might help us to know whether a man seated in that chair would be visible to anyone walking down the path to the drive." He unbolted the window as he spoke, and stepped out into the garden, drawing the window to behind him. As at the front of the house, a broad grass border ran from the window to the gravel path. Harding crossed this, went a little way up the path, and then turned, and walked down it, past the window. Then he re-entered the room, and bolted the window once more. "Yes, I think perhaps Mrs. Chudleigh may be able to help us fix the time of the murder more exactly," he said. He came up to the desk. "Now, Sergeant, let us look through these papers," hc said, taking the swivel-chair which the Sergeant had just vacated. "I don't think there's anything else likely to interest us, with the possible exception of the safe. I shall want that opened, of course. Do you know if the Chief Constable warned Mr. Billington-Smith to have his father's lawyer down?"

"Yes, sir, that I do know he did, for I was in the hall at the time. But we found it just like you see, not tampered with at all."

"Any finger-prints?" inquired Harding, his eyes on the pencil that lay on the desk.

"No, nothing of that kind. Quite clean it was." He looked rather dubiously at Harding. "Were you thinking there might have been robbery, sir?"

"No, I should say most unlikely."

"That's what I thought," said the Sergeant, glad to find himself in agreement.

Harding had picked up a slip of paper on the top of tie sheaf on the desk. Some memoranda had been jotted down on it in pencil. Harding considered the pencil again for a moment.

"Looks like the General was making a list of what he had to do," suggested the Sergeant helpfully.

"It looks as though he were interrupted while he was doing so," said Harding. "He did not finish the last note he made."

"No more he did!" said the Sergeant, stooping to read the pencilled scrawl more nearly. "Speak to Lester," (that's the gardener) and then "See Barker about."

Well, that isn't sense, is it? The General wouldn't write a thing like that. He was a very methodical man. No, you're right, sir. Someone interrupted him before he had time to put down what he wanted to see Mr Barker about, and what's more he didn't finish that memo, afterwards, because he was dead."

"Well, perhaps that's leaping to conclusions a bit," said Harding. "At the same time it is just possible that he was jotting down that note when his murderer entered the room, and equally possible that at the moment when the blow was struck he was still holding the pencil in his hand."

The Sergeant turned this over in his mind. "You're thinking of that bit of writing the Superintendent showed you," he pronounced.

"I am, yes." Harding laid the slip of paper aside, and began to go through the others littered over the desk. There was nothing amongst them of any interest, and when he had glanced through them he turned to the waste-paper basket beside the chair. It was half-full of torn and crumpled letters which a cursory inspection informed Harding were either circulars or begging appeals. Under these were the scattered fragments of a cheque, torn into four pieces. Harding lifted these out and laid them on the desk, piecing them together.

The Sergeant drew nearer, watching this process. When it was finished he was silent for a moment. Then he said: "That's black, sir."

"At any rate," said Harding, "it would seem to explain Mr. Halliday's quarrel with the General."

The cheque had not been passed through a bank. It was dated July 1st, and was drawn for fifty pounds, made payable to Mrs. Camilla Halliday. The General's signature was written at the bottom of it.

There was nothing else in the waste-paper basket of importance, and after a quick glance at two circulars and the notice of a meeting of the Silsbury branch of the British Fascisti, Harding gathered together the torn cheque and rose to his feet. "I'll take a look at the position of the other rooms on this floor now, Sergeant. Keep a man on duty here till the safe's been opened, will you?"

"Yes, sir. Do you make anything of it?" inquired the Sergeant diffidently.

"Not very much yet. There are one or two points." He went to the fireplace, and pressed the bell that flanked it.

The butler came presently in answer to the bell's summons, and escorted the Inspector over the ground floor of the house rather in the manner of a guide in a historic mansion. Leading him through the dining-room to the service door outside the pantry, he brought him back again by way of the swing door shutting off the servant's wing from the hall. He then led the way to the garden-hall, like the kitchens, on the east side of the house, pointed out the back stairs, returned to the hall. and entered the billiard-room. From the windows Harding obtained a view of the terrace, where the house party was gathered for tea. He declined going into the drawing-room. "Thanks, I think I have a pretty good idea of the house now," he said. "I want to see the various people who are staying here next. Can you show me a room where I shan't be disturbed, or in the way?"

"I think the morning-room would be the most suitable. sir,". said Finch, standing aside to allow him to pass on into the hall again. "This way, if you please."

Harding nodded to the Sergeant, waiting for him at the foot of the stairs. "Will you come along too, Sergeant?" He consulted a list from his pocket-book, and glanced up at the butler. "Is Mrs. Twining by any chance in the house?" he asked.

"Yes, sir. Mrs. Twining is on the terrace now."

"Then will you ask her, please, if she will come here?" said Harding.

There was a square table in the middle of the room. When the butler had gone Harding pulled a chair out from it, and sat down with his back to the light. The westering sun was streaming into the room, and the windows stood open to admit as much air as could be obtained on this hot, windless afternoon.

Harding spread his papers out on the table, and chose from amongst them Mrs. Twining's original statement. He was running his eye over this when Finch opened the door, and announced Mrs. Twining. She came in, looking slightly bored. She was wearing a lavender frock that subtly conveyed the impression of half-mourning; and a large black straw hat with a high crown was set at an angle on her well-coiffed head. "Good afternoon, Inspector," she said, surveying him in her cool, ironic way.

Harding rose, and came round the table to pull up a chair for her. "Good afternoon," he said. "Won't you sit clown? I want you, if you will, to answer one or two questions."

She took the chair he had placed for her, and moved it a little out of the direct sunlight. "Certainly," she said. "But at my age, Inspector, one does not sit in the full glare of the sun. It is not fair to oneself." She sat down, leaning one elbow on the wooden chair-arm, and with the other hand holding her bag lightly in her lap. She became aware of the Sergeant standing by the fireplace and fixedly regarding her. Her brows rose a little, and her lips parted in a faint smile. "Ah, good afternoon, Sergeant" she said.

"Mrs. Twining, can you remember the precise time of your arrival here yesterday morning?" asked Harding.

"Perfectly," she replied. "I arrived at ten minutes past twelve."

"Thank you." Harding made a brief note. "The butler. I think admitted you. Will you describe to me just what you did after entering the house?"

"I'll try to," said Mrs. Twining. "But I trust you won't use it in evidence against me."

He smiled. "We only do that when we make arrests, Mrs. Twining. If you can carry your mind back successfully — I know it is difficult to remember exactly it would help me to check up on the various statements."

"Well, I think I laid down my sunshade first," said Mrs. Twining reflectively. "Ah, that doesn't interest you. I told Finch that I wanted to tidy my hair (a euphemism for "powder my nose", of course), and would show myself out on to the terrace."

"And you did in fact powder your nose, Mrs. Twining, at the mirror over the fireplace?"

"Most thoroughly," she agreed.

"How long did that take you?"

She looked rather amused. "When a woman powders her nose, Inspector, she loses count of time. My own estimate would be a moment or two; almost any man, I feel, would probably say, ages."

"Were you as long, perhaps, as five minutes?"

"I hope not. Let us say three — without prejudice."

"And during that time, did you hear voices in the study?"