Jane touched her glass with her lips and set it down again. Everyone drank except Freddy Thorpe-Ennington, sitting slumped in his chair and quite obviously dead to the world.
Jacob’s bright malicious glance travelled down the table. He repeated the words of the toast, “The Family,” and added, “May it never be less.” Then he went on briskly,
“Well, now I know you all, and you know each other.”
Jane thought, “How much does he know-how much do any of us know? I know Jeremy, and Jeremy knows me. He’s raging under that polite look. What he’d really like to do is to drag me out of the room and beat me, but he can’t, poor lamb. Too bad. I shall have to make it up to him somehow. I always know just what he’s thinking-now. But the others… Something’s the matter with Florence, but I don’t know what. She looks as if someone had hit her over the head and she hadn’t quite come to. Al’s drunk, and he wants Eily. Mildred”-a little inward laughter shook her-“in a way she’s hating every moment- Al on one side of her and Freddy on the other-two drunk men, and she’s miles and miles away from her little fancy work shop. But in a way she’s thrilled. I don’t suppose anything has ever happened to her before, and I don’t suppose anything will ever happen to her again, so she’s simply got to make the most of it… I wonder what Geoffrey’s thinking about. Perhaps a slogan introducing the word Family-‘Our Potato-peeler-every Family needs one.’…”
Marian… No need to guess about Marian. There she was, magnificent in Parisian black with three rows of pearls dripping down into her lap and her beautiful eyes gazing soulfully at Jacob. She had in fact taken the stage and was discoursing richly.
“My dear man, I couldn’t agree more-I really couldn’t. We all need to get closer together, don’t we? After all, if we can help each other-that’s what we’re here for, isn’t it? I’ve always said so. And as to wills, we don’t need to talk about them, because everybody lives to a simply incredible age nowadays if they don’t get killed by a bomb or something. My first husband, Morgenstern, would have been alive now if he hadn’t insisted on flying over to the States in the middle of all those air attacks. That’s why I really do feel a little prejudiced about wills, because, you know, he left simply everything to charities and to his secretary, a horse-faced woman with streaky hair. It only shows you never can tell-doesn’t it? Nobody could have imagined she wasn’t perfectly safe.”
“My dear Marian, I am supposed to be making a speech.”
She gave him a warm, indulgent smile.
“You were doing it so well too. Men are so good at that sort of thing. René used to make wonderful speeches-my second husband-after he had won a trophy or something. But I always knew he would kill himself racing, and of course he did. So there I was-a widow for the second time and not a penny.”
Florence Duke on Jacob’s other side said deep and slow,
“Some people have all the luck.”
Marian Thorpe-Ennington took no notice. It is doubtful if she even heard. She flowed on.
“So you see why I don’t like wills-so dreadfully undependable. Of course René hadn’t any money at all, and now Freddy isn’t going to have any either. And what I always think is, how much better to see what a lot of pleasure you are giving whilst you are here to enjoy it, instead of waiting until you are dead. I mean-”
Jacob’s smile became suddenly malignant. He said softly and coldly,
“Thank you-I know exactly what you mean. And I am now going to go on with my speech.”
He leaned forward and rapped upon the table.
“Now that you have all had a breathing-space I will go on. I am sorry if you thought it was all over, but I’m going to be brief, and I’m not going to be dull-at least I hope not, but of course you never can tell. I expect you have all noticed that I have asked a good many questions as to how much you know about the old inn. All your grandfathers and grandmothers seem to have known something about its smuggling past.” He paused for a moment to address Castell. “All right, Fogarty, go on- serve the ice-pudding. Annie will never forgive us if we let it melt.” Then, turning back, he resumed. “They could hardly have helped knowing something, since they were born and brought up here, and had the advantage for a good many years of old Jeremiah’s company and example. What I have wanted to find out was how much of what they knew they had handed on. Anybody got any contributions to make?”
The ice-pudding was quite terribly good-all the food was terribly good. Jane felt really sorry for Freddy, who was missing it. She looked sideways at Jeremy, and found him giving a polite attention to his host. She wasn’t sure if there wasn’t a momentary flicker in her direction, or whether it was merely that she knew with what energy he was saying, “No!” to the question which had just been put to them all. She transferred an innocent gaze to Jacob’s face.
Nobody answered, nobody stirred. Mildred Taverner divided a small piece of her ice-pudding into three. Delicious-really delicious. She savoured the mouthfuls slowly, laid down a thin old silver spoon, and said in her high voice,
“There used to be a passage from the shore.”
Her brother Geoffrey looked across the table and said,
“Those old stories!” His tone was bored and contemptuous.
Jane had the oddest conviction that behind the coolness and the boredom there was a sharp edge of anger. Yet Mildred had really said nothing that had not been said before by one or another of them.
Jacob grinned his monkey grin.
“I wondered whether the old stories hadn’t been handed down, and it seems they have. Now just how much did my Uncle Matthew tell you, Mildred?”
Mildred Taverner said in a confused voice,
“Oh, I don’t know-there was a passage-the smugglers used it-”
“Is that all?”
“I think-” she broke off-“yes, I think so.”
The grin became more pronounced.
“Well, that’s pretty vague, isn’t it? I can do better than that, because I can show you the passage.”
Everyone moved or made some involuntary sound-a shifting of the balance, a leaning forward or back, the faint rattle of fork or spoon, as a hand released its hold, a quick involuntary intake of the breath. Jane saw Geoffrey Taverner’s hand close hard and then very deliberately relax.
Jacob nodded, delighted with his effect.
“Surprised-aren’t you? I thought you would be!” He chuckled. “I could see you all thinking you’d got hold of a shocking family secret, and all the time it wasn’t a secret at all. As soon as everyone has finished, come along and I’ll show you. We’ll go and look at the passage while Annie is sending the coffee up, but before we go- We’ve drunk to the Family, and now we’ll drink to the Family Secret, its smuggling past, and its harmless present- The Secret!”
CHAPTER 10
They went trooping through a green baize door at the back of the hall, to find themselves in a confusing rabbit-warren of stone-floored passages. There was a smell of cooking, and of mould from old walls which held the damp. One passage ran straight ahead, not narrow like the one which had led from the front door, but wide enough for two men to walk abreast and carry a load between them. All the passages here had this convenience of width-and no difficulty in guessing why. The smell of food came from a half open door on the left, carried out and away by the heat of a noble fire.