“Last night. About eleven. They carried him into the house and sent for the doctor.”
“But what did they say? How could there have been an accident?”
“They said he was cleaning a gun.” Anna’s eyes wavered and went back to Drue’s.
“At eleven o’clock at night?” said Drue. “In the garden? Craig!”
Anna said nothing. The rain swished gently against the window behind her. It was then perhaps three o’clock in the afternoon, but it seemed later because of the dark day. Finally, Drue said, “Who brought him in? Who found him?”
The maid swallowed. “Beevens-you remember him-the butler…”
“Beevens! Yes, I remember. Who else?”
“Mr. Nicky and Mr. Peter Huber. You wouldn’t know him. He’s a friend, an old school friend of Mr. Craig’s.”
“I don’t remember him.” Drue was frowning. “Is he here, do you mean? Staying in the house?”
“Yes, Miss Drue. He and Mr. Nicky and Beevens heard the shot; they were in the morning room, and Beevens was locking up for the night. Mr. Craig called for help, and they found him-he’d fainted by that time. The doctor was called at once. Mr. Brent-oh, you must go! You can’t stay.”
Drue paid no attention to the maid’s pleading. “Who’s been taking care of him? You?”
“Yes, Miss Drue. And Mrs. Chivery. She came right away-as she always does when we need her. She stayed all night. She helped the doctor get the bullet out.”
“Bullet…” whispered Drue after a moment and seemed to shiver a little, and I looked at the tablet in my hand.
Drue waited while I read it. I knew she was watching me to see what I thought of what I read there and I knew, too, that she was counting on my skill and experience. That was why she had made me come with her.
Well, it was serious enough but not necessarily fatal. The bullet had entered his shoulder; they had got it out, without benefit of x-ray or operating room. It must have been a fairly ticklish task for the local doctor. I frowned, reading and weighing my patient’s chances. Drue said whispering, “Will he live?”
“I hope so. I’ll take night watch.”
“That’s the hardest,” she said. She put her hands on my arm and, with pleading in her eyes, said, “Let me take it. I’ll call you if anything goes wrong.”
“All right. I’ll sleep with one eye open. There’s really nothing we can do now except watch his pulse and his breathing. If he takes a bad turn…” I stopped. In that case there would be plenty to do and that quickly. I said to Anna, “Stay with him, please, while I get into my uniform.”
Anna nodded and I turned into the bedroom and a woman had quietly entered the room and was standing beside the bed, leaning over the unconscious man, and she had placed one white pointed hand upon his forehead.
Well, of course that particular gesture has much the same effect upon me that a red rag is said to have upon a bull. Soothing the fevered brow is a peculiarly revolting idea of nursing. I said in a low but perfectly clear voice, “I’ll have to ask you not to disturb my patient,” and the woman looked up, coolly, at me. “Oh,” she said. “You’re the nurse.”
She was a young woman of about medium height and beautiful; she had a pointed, delicate face, a slender, fine nose, and a small yet deeply curved mouth with a full underlip which looked, oddly, both sensitive and cruel. Her hair was a misty, dark cloud, very short, so it molded her small, fine head in a way that made me think of a Greek statue of a boy. Her eyelashes shaded her eyes softly, so you caught only the lights back of them, not a full candid glimpse of her eyes. She reminded me then irresistibly and always after that of a medieval portrait beside a Greek statue, which sounds confusing, but may have been a slight indication of our Alexia’s rather remarkable versatility; but there was the same fineness and the same fragile beauty and the same lurking comprehension of cruelty that one catches a faint chilling glimpse of below the beauty and satins and pearls of ancient portraits. Italian, I should say-certainly there was no buxom old-time Flemish or German beauty here. But there was beauty. A watchful, wary beauty. She wore a crimson suit and a white blouse and a string of real pearls. And I didn’t like her.
Having looked me up and down, she turned again, deliberately, to the bed and straightened the bed clothing a little and put her hand against Craig Brent’s brown cheek for an instant. She did it very possessively, intending, clearly, to put me in my place. Before I could reciprocate (for if it was my case, it was my case), Drue walked out of the dressing room, followed closely by the little terrier and by Anna. The first thing I noticed was that the terrier ducked swiftly back into the dressing room, and Anna made an abortive motion to do so too but misjudged direction and brought up with a bump against the wall.
The woman in the red suit was looking at Drue. Drue stopped. It was rather curious I suppose that they faced each other over Craig. Quite slowly the woman’s white, pointed hand went to her long, white throat, and she said in a clear and imperative voice, “Drue Cable! How dare you enter my house?”
2
DRUE WHISPERED, “ALEXIA…”
Well, I didn’t know who Alexia was (unless, by the look on her face, a descendant of one of the more expert Borgias), but it looked as if she might leap straight across the bed, tigerlike, for Drue’s throat instead of her own, where her lovely hand still clung to her pearls quite as if one of us intended to snatch them.
I disliked her even more strongly. I said abruptly, “Be quiet!”
Neither woman looked at me and neither spoke or moved, although Anna got a good three inches smaller and made an earnest but unsuccessful attempt to shrink into the wall. I went across to the door into the hall, opened it and made a sweeping gesture which must have been rather imperative, for Drue walked toward me, and the woman, Alexia, her eyes still fixed upon Drue, came too. There was an instant when it looked as if they would meet at the door with something of the effect of gasoline and a match in careless juxtaposition, but they didn’t, for Drue came quickly into the hall and Alexia followed. I closed the door (it seemed to be my only function so far in the Brent house) and, possibly with some further idea of clarifying things, I said as I had said to Anna, “I am Nurse Sarah Keate. Miss Cable and I were sent here…”
The woman in red interrupted, still looking at Drue. “Oh, yes,” she said, with a little scorn in her voice, “I’d forgotten you were a nurse. So that’s the way you got into the house. These seem to be your tactics. Craig was sick when you got hold of him in the first place, wasn’t he? It will be different this time. I’m here and this is my house.”
Drue went as white as paper. “But he didn’t marry you. I watched the papers. He didn’t marry anyone.”
There was a gleam of triumph in Alexia’s eyes. She said, “You didn’t read them thoroughly enough. I’m Mrs. Brent.” She added slowly, smiling, watching Drue, “Now you know how I felt the night you came back here with Craig.”
“Alexia…” Drue said stiffly, and stopped. And Alexia, still smiling, said, “But I’m not Mrs. Craig Brent. I married Conrad, instead. It was a very quiet wedding-Conrad wished it so. But now, you see, this is my house, and I have every right to protect Craig from you now…”
“Conrad!” cried Drue. “Craig’s father!” Color came back into her lips.
Alexia said sharply, “Naturally. For your own good I’m telling you you’d better leave. Craig doesn’t want you. Conrad won’t have you here.”
Up to that point the interview had been candid to an embarrassing degree. But just then there was a kind of secret shifting of the emotions which had been hurtling around my defenseless (but I must say heartily listening) ears. Drue said slowly and thoughtfully, “I came here, Alexia, because they said Craig might die. But now that I’m here, if I can, I-I’m going to find out what really happened.”