“Then what do you mean?” said Moira Herne. “Do you know?”
Miss Bray was twisting her long jet chain. She said in a nervous hurry,
“I was really thinking about the Ball. I don’t know whether anything has been decided yet, but of course with all those people coming-”
Moira said, “There is nothing to decide.”
Miss Bray tried a second look at Lucius Bellingdon and found him frowning still. He said with some accentuation of his usually decided manner,
“There can be no question about the Ball. It will take place as arranged. The date is still a month away. No one could possibly expect us to call it off.”
“No-no-of course not. I only thought we ought to know what is going to happen. I wasn’t really suggesting-Naturally, as you say, a month is quite a long time.”
He laughed.
“Did I? I don’t remember. Anyhow there is nothing to worry about.”
Hubert Garratt had taken no part in this interchange. He crumbled the slice of bread beside him and drank from a glass of water. The arrangements might have had nothing to do with him at all, yet the brunt of the work in connection with the Ball would fall to his share. As soon as lunch was over he disappeared.
The rest of the party adjourned to the drawing-room for coffee. Miss Silver found herself next to Mrs. Scott. She was about to remark on the view from the windows, where a smooth green lawn sloped gently to the windings of a stream, the banks all set with daffodils, when Moira Herne walked up to them coffee-cup in hand and said,
“I shall have to get another dress for the Ball. What a bore!”
Annabel laughed.
“Why should getting a new dress be a bore? And why do you have to get one anyway?”
Moira just stood there.
“The other dress was a copy of one Marie Antoinette really wore. I’m not going to wear it without the necklace-why should I! Anyway they say her things are unlucky.”
Annabel Scott looked up at her appraisingly. It was rather as if she were looking at a picture or a statue.
“I don’t know about unlucky, but definitely not in your line.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
The appraising look vanished. A wide flashing smile took its place.
“But, darling-with your colouring! Why smother it with powder? Fancy having hair like yours and covering it up with a wig!”
Moira frowned.
“I didn’t think about that. I wanted to wear the necklace. If it’s gone, there doesn’t seem to be much point about the rest of it. Now I don’t know what to wear.”
“Oh, you must be Undine! I didn’t say anything before, because you’d got it all settled.”
“Who was she? I’ve never heard of her.”
Miss Silver was shocked. She was aware that the classic authors of her youth were now mere shadows from the past, but that La Motte Fouqué should have ceased to be even a shadow shook her. It appeared that Mrs. Scott at least knew something of his most famous creation.
“Undine was a water spirit. It’s a German legend. She fell in love with an earthly knight and married him, but in the end he was false to her and she disappeared in a cloud of spray from a fountain. One of the Chopin ballades puts the story into music.”
“You do know a lot, don’t you?” said Moira Herne. And then, “What would she wear?”
Miss Silver considered that Mrs. Scott showed an amiable temper in her reply. Mrs. Herne’s manner had been abrupt to the point of rudeness, but Annabel only laughed and said,
“Undine? Well, it might be rather enchanting, I think. Transparent green draperies like water flowing, and your hair brushed out into a sort of cloud like spray. Lucius, give me a pencil and paper and I’ll show her.”
There were both on an ornamental table in the window. She took them, drew rapidly, and held up the result to Moira. The sketch had caught a likeness, but it was a likeness with a twist on it. It was, in fact, Undine with her unearthly lightness and grace, her hair blown by some wind of glamour, her dress flowing with the lines of flowing water. Moira studied it attentively. In the end she enquired,
“Green chiffon?”
“Green and grey-very pale grey, to get the water effect. You could have crystal drops where the points of the dress come down. No, not diamonds-they mustn’t be too bright.”
She went across to the piano at the far end of the room and began to play the Undine ballade.
“Listen-this will give you the idea.”
She had an exquisite touch. The rocking melody came on the air with real enchantment. When the storm of Kühleborn’s anger broke she gave it only a few wild chords and dropped her hands from the keys.
“Lovely, isn’t it?”
Moira Herne said in a grudging tone,
“It mightn’t be bad, but no one will have the foggiest idea what it’s meant for.”
As Annabel Scott came back to her seat she was saying to herself, “She hasn’t a spark of imagination. Why did I suggest Undine?”
Chapter 11
GOING through the hall, Lucius Bellingdon picked up a letter or two lying ready for the post. The one on the top attracted his attention. It was addressed to Miss Sally Foster, 13 Porlock Square. He stuck there, frowning at the number and the name of the square. In the end he called Moira and waited for her to come to him. She arrived without hurry, stared, and said,
“What are you doing with my letter?”
“I was going to post it-I’m going down into the village. Who is Sally Foster?”
Those curious light eyes of hers dwelt upon him without affection. She said,
“Why?”
He had been used to her for so many years that he was conscious of no fresh chill. There was no warmth in her, no kindness. You couldn’t get blood from a stone. What he meant to get was an answer. He said,
“I know the address-that is all. I couldn’t help seeing it. Who is this girl?”
“She was at school with me. Why do you want to know?”
“I have a reason. It’s some time since you left school. Have you seen anything of her since?”
“She is Marigold Marchbank’s secretary. One of the girls married Freddy Ambleton. I see quite a lot of them. Sally is a friend of theirs-I met her again like that.”
“Do you know her well enough to ask her down here?”
She gave an odd laugh with a flavour of contempt,
“There’s no harm in asking!”
He had continued to frown at the letter. Now he turned the same look on her.
“What is she like?”
“Very much the same as other people.”
“About your age?”
She shrugged.
“More or less.”
“And you know her fairly well. What were you writing to her about?”
“She asked me to make a four to go dancing. I said I couldn’t.”
He said, “Look here, I want you to ring her up and ask her down for the week-end.”
She opened her eyes so widely that the dark line about the iris showed clear.
“But I don’t want to.”
His voice roughened.
“She needn’t be in your way.”
“Why do you want her?”
He said,
“Too long to go into. She comes from the same house as David Moray. I told you I’d asked him for the week-end-that is why I was struck by the address on your letter. She can help to entertain him, and to prevent your being bothered.”
Moira considered the question in a leisurely manner. She didn’t want Sally down at Merefields, but she didn’t want this David Moray person either. She wanted Wilfrid, and she didn’t really trust Wilfrid where Sally was concerned. On the other hand it might be a good plan to have a show-down. There would have to be one soon anyway. If Wilfrid was in the same house with her and Sally he would have to show his hand. If David Moray was at all presentable he might come in usefully, either to distract Sally’s attention or to flirt with herself and put Wilfrid on his mettle. Because the one thing she was really sure of in the whole situation was that, Sally or no Sally, Wilfrid had no intention of letting himself be cut out with Moira Herne. That was a development which he simply couldn’t afford, and he knew it. Having reached this point, she said in a flat uninterested voice,