“What had he come for?” Anelida asked rather desperately.
“Well, my dear, I suppose on behalf of his cousin and to repeat his vicarious apologies and to attempt an explanation. I felt it much better to make as little of the affair as possible. After all we don’t know Warrender and in any case it was really nothing to do with him. He meant very well, no doubt. I was, I hope, perfectly civil, but I got rid of him in a matter of seconds.”
“Yes,” Alleyn said. “I see. To sidetrack for a moment, I suppose you’re by way of being an authority on Victorian tinsel pictures, aren’t you? Do you go in for them? I seem to remember…”
“How very odd!” Octavius exclaimed. “My dear fellow, I sold one this morning to young Dakers, as a birthday present for — oh, well, there you are! — for his guardian.”
“Madame Vestris?”
“You saw it then? Charming, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Alleyn said. “Charming.”
Anelida had been watching Alleyn, as he was well aware, very closely. She now asked him the question he had expected.
“Mr. Alleyn,” Anelida said. “Do you think it was not an accident?”
He gave her the inevitable answer. “We don’t know. We’re not sure.”
“But what do you believe? In your heart? I must know. I won’t do anything silly or make a nuisance of myself. Do you believe she was murdered?”
Alleyn said, “I’m afraid I do, Anelida.”
“Have you told Richard?”
“Not in so many words.”
“But he guessed?”
“I don’t know,” Alleyn said carefully, “what he thought. I’ve left him to himself for a little.”
“Why?”
“He’s had a very bad shock. He fainted.”
She looked steadily at him and then with a quick collected movement rose to her feet.
“Unk,” she said, “don’t wait up for me and don’t worry.”
“My dear girl,” he said, in a fluster, “what do you mean? Where are you going?”
“To Richard,” she said. “Where else? Of course to Richard.”
Chapter six
On the Scent
When Anelida rang the bell at 2 Pardoner’s Place, it was answered, almost at once, by a policeman.
She said, “It’s Miss Lee. I’ve been talking to Superintendent Alleyn. He knows I’m here and I think is probably coming himself in a moment. I want to speak to Mr. Richard Dakers.”
The policeman said, “I see, Miss. Well, now, if you’ll wait a moment I’ll just find out whether that’ll be all right. Perhaps you’d take a chair.”
“No, thank you. I want to see him at once, please.”
“I’ll ascertain…” he had begun rather austerely when Alleyn himself arrived.
“Sir?”
“Yes, all right. Is Mr. Dakers still in the drawing-room? Good.” Alleyn looked at Anelida. “Come along,” he said. She lifted her chin and went to him.
She was in a state of mind she had never before experienced. It was as if her thoughts and desires and behaviour had been abruptly simplified and were governed by a single intention. She knew that somewhere within herself she must be afraid, but she also knew that fear, as things had turned out, was inadmissible.
She followed Alleyn across the hall. He said, “Here you are,” and opened a door. She went from the hall into the drawing-room.
Immediately inside the door was a tall leather screen. She walked round it and there, staring out of a window, was Richard. Anelida moved a little towards him and halted. This gave her time to realize how very much she liked the shape of his head and at once she felt an immense tenderness for him and even a kind of exultation. In a second, she would speak his name, she would put herself absolutely on his side.
“Richard,” she said.
He turned. She noticed that his face had bleached, not conventionally, over the cheekbone, but at the temples and down the jaw-line.
“Anelida?”
“I had to come. I’m trying to make up for my bad behaviour. Here, you see, I am.”
He came slowly to her and when he took her hands in his, did so doubtfully. “I can’t believe my luck,” he said. “I thought I’d lost you quite irrevocably. Cause enough, God knows.”
“On the contrary, I assure you.”
He broke into an uncertain smile. “The things you say! Such grand phrases!” His hands tightened on hers. “You know what’s happened, don’t you? About Mary?”
“Yes. Richard, I’m so terribly sorry. And what a hopeless phrase that is!”
“I shouldn’t let you stay. It’s not the place for you. This is a nightmare of a house.”
“Do you want me? Am I any good, being here?”
“I love you.” He lifted her hands to his face. “Ah no! Why did I tell you! This isn’t the time.”
“Are you all right now — to talk, I mean? To talk very seriously?”
“I’m all right. Come over here.”
They sat together on the sofa, Richard still holding her hands. “He told us you fainted,” said Anelida.
“Alleyn? Has he been worrying you?”
“Not really. But it’s because of what he did say that I’m here. And because — Richard, when I wouldn’t see you and you went away — did you come back here?”
“Yes,” he said. “I did.”
“Did you see her?”
He looked down at their clasped hands. “Yes.”
“Where?”
“In her room. Only for a few minutes. I — left her there.”
“Was anyone else with you?”
“Good God, no!” he cried out.
“And then? Then what?”
“I went away. I walked for heaven knows how long. When I came back — it was like this.”
There was a long silence. At last Richard said very calmly, “I know what you’re trying to tell me. They think Mary has been murdered and they wonder if I’m their man. Isn’t it?”
Anelida leant towards him and kissed him. “That’s it,” she said. “At least, I think so. We’ll get it tidied up and disposed of in no time. But I think that’s it.”
“It seems,” he said, “so fantastic. Too fantastic to be frightening. You mustn’t be frightened. You must go away, my darling heart, and leave me to — to do something about it.”
“I’ll go when I think it’ll make things easier for you. Not before.”
“I love you so much. I should be telling you how much, not putting this burden upon you.”
“They may not leave me with you for long. You must remember exactly what happened. Where you went. Who may have seen you. And Richard, you must tell them what she was doing when you left.”
He released her hands and pressed the palms of his own to his eyes. “She was laughing,” he said.
“Laughing? They’ll want to know why, won’t they? What you both said to make her laugh.”
“Never!” he said violently. “Never!”
“But — they’ll ask you.”
“They can ask and ask and ask again. Never!”
“You must!” she said desperately. “Think! It’s what one always reads — that innocent people hold out on the police and muddle everything up and put themselves in the wrong. Richard, think what they’ll find out anyway! That she spoke as she did to me, that you were angry, that you said you’d never forgive her. Everyone in the hall heard you. Colonel Warrender…”
“He!” Richard said bitterly. “He won’t talk. He daren’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Oh!” she cried out. “You are frightening me! What’s going to happen when they ask you about it? What’ll they think when you won’t tell them!”
“They can think what they like.” He got up and began to walk about the room. “Too much has happened. I can’t get it into perspective. You don’t know what it’s like. I’ve no right to load it on to you.”