I went to the door and as I did so, he said: “You shouldn’t be so much in the country. You should be in London … getting out and about. That was what your season was for.”
“I prefer to be in the country.”
“Might you not regret it later?”
I shrugged my shoulders.
“Has something happened?” he asked.
“Something happened …” I repeated stupidly.
“You seem withdrawn lately. Brooding on something, are you?”
“I’m all right.”
“Well, if I can help …”
I shook my head.
“I really think you are making a mistake in shutting yourself away like this. What’s happened to Morwenna Cartwright? Wasn’t she supposed to launch you into society?”
“That was at the time.”
“Well, it goes on, doesn’t it?”
“I think I am supposed to be launched now.”
“It’s no good shutting yourself away in the country.”
“I assure you I’m all right.”
“If it is what you want …”
“It is.”
“Are you sure there is nothing wrong? Nothing I can do to help?”
“Thank you. There is nothing.”
He looked at me quizzically. He was trying hard to put things right between us. He would be telling himself that he ought to do it for my mother’s sake. He had now sold out of the clubs because that was what she wanted him to do. No. It was not because of that. Had he not clung to them for all these years? No, he wanted to become a Cabinet minister and as such he could not be involved in them. I must not forget that he had kept his secret papers in what was supposed to be a shrine to my mother.
In the midst of his sentimentality, Benedict would always be practical.
I went out and closed the door.
Benedict had gone to London and Celeste had not gone with him.
She had been very quiet and I was wondering whether she was seeing Oliver Gerson. I had a twinge of conscience because when Benedict had asked me if I had seen him round the place I had said no. What else could I have said? It would have been tantamount to a suggestion that there was some sort of relationship between Oliver Gerson and Celeste.
It was midmorning when Mrs. Emery came to my room. I knew something dramatic had happened by her expression.
“What is it? “I cried.
“It’s Mrs. Lansdon …”
“What of her?” I asked in alarm.
“She’s not in her room. Her bed hasn’t been slept in.”
“Could she have gone to London?”
Mrs. Emery shook her head. “It seems as if her things are all there.”
“You mean she has just walked out … taking nothing.”
“As far as I can see, Miss Rebecca.”
“I’ll come up there.”
I went to their bedroom. The room was in order. The maid had turned down the bed as she did every evening and it was as smooth as it would have been when she made it on the previous morning.
I turned to Mrs. Emery in dismay.
“She must have gone last night,” she said.
“Gone? Gone where?”
“Search me,” said Mrs. Emery. “She could have gone anywhere.”
“What has she taken with her?”
“Nothing as far as I can see. Better get that Yvette. She’s always been her personal maid. She’d know what’s going on.”
“Let’s get her right away.”
Yvette came.
“When did you last see Mrs. Lansdon?” I asked.
“Why, Mademoiselle, it was last night.”
“Do you know where she is now?”
Yvette looked blank. “She send for me when she is ready … to dress her hair … I wait till I am called. This morning … she has not call. I think she does not wish for me …”
“Did she seem all right last night?”
“A little quiet … perhaps. But then … she is so … now and then.”
“She didn’t say she was going to meet somebody?”
“No, Mademoiselle. She say nothing to me.”
“Do you not bring her something in the morning … tea … chocolate … coffee?”
“If she ask, yes. If not, I leave her. She likes to sleep late some mornings.”
“Will you look at her clothes, Yvette, and tell me if anything is missing?”
She went to the cupboard and the wardrobe; she opened the drawers.
“No … nothing … there is only the grey velvet she was wearing last night.”
“So that is the only thing that has gone?”
“Yes, Mademoiselle, and the grey shoes she wear with it.”
“Her coat?”
“There is a coat which go with the grey velvet. That here. Some of her clothes go … last week. She gave them away to people in the cottages … as she does … always. There is nothing else missing.”
“What about her handbag?”
“She have a beautiful crocodile one now. Yes, that is here.”
“It would seem that she went out without anything but what she was wearing.”
“Perhaps she take a walk.”
“Last night? And was she in the habit of taking walks?”
Yvette shook her head vigorously. “Non, non, non,” she said emphatically.
I told Yvette that she could go and when she had left I turned to Mrs. Emery. “This is very mysterious,” I said. “Where can she be?”
Mrs. Emery shook her head.
“What are we going to do?” I asked.
“Perhaps she went for a walk and has fallen and hurt herself … not able to get back to the house. Yes, that’s the most likely.”
“We’ll get Mr. Emery to organize a search. She has to be here near the house. Yvette says she did not go for a walk. But you never know. The impulse may have taken her. We’ve got to start looking without delay.”
We found Mr. Emery who immediately took charge. Tom Marner joined in. He was very efficient. When the grounds had been explored and yielded nothing the search went on farther afield.
The morning was passing and there was no trace of Celeste. We could not delay telling Benedict any longer.
A message was sent off to London explaining that his wife was missing.
I sat in Mrs. Emery’s room. I could see how worried she was.
“The servants will be talking,” she said. “This will get round. Oh, where is she? If only she’d come walking in! Emery’s worried. The papers will have a field day with this, he said. It could do Mr. Lansdon’s chances a lot of harm. The way things look, Miss Rebecca, I don’t like it at all.”
“I’m not surprised. Nor do I.”
“She’s just gone. She doesn’t seem to have taken anything. It would have been better if she had.”
“Why?”
“Well, then we should have known she had gone of her own freewill. As it is …”
“Mrs. Emery, what are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that this isn’t going to do him any good. If she’d left him for someone else … well, that’s not very nice … but he can’t be blamed for it … though the papers would try to make something out of it. You can see this is just about the worst time it could happen.”
“Last time …”
“Yes, I know all about that. When he was standing for Manorleigh for the first time. His wife died and there was a bit of a mystery about him. They blamed him and it cost him the seat.”
“I remember hearing about it.”
“If there’s a scandal about this it will all be brought up again. There will be a lot of raking over the past.”
“Mrs. Emery, she must be somewhere near. She wouldn’t have run away from him without anything … only the clothes she was standing up in.”
“I can’t think what it means.”
“Nor can I.”
Mrs. Emery went on: “It looks to me as if she didn’t leave the house of her own free will.”
“How could it be otherwise?”
“If she’d gone at night and taken a case full of some of her things with her … it would make sense. But she’s gone with nothing and we’ve searched the gardens and round about and still … no sign of her.”