Читать книгу The Ivory Dagger - Dora Amy Elles - Страница 10

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It was between half past six and seven o’clock when Bill Waring drove his old rattletrap of a car under the pillared portico of Vineyards. He jumped out and rang the bell with a good deal of vigour. He had, as a matter of fact, run well out of any stock of patience which he may originally have possessed. Rumbold had kept him and kept him, breaking off in the middle of their session to go and see somebody else, and only coming back to insist that they lunch together before going on with their talk. By the time he finally got away it wasn’t going to be possible to make Vineyards by daylight. Since he neither knew nor wished to know Herbert Whitall, and could hardly expect a welcome from him or from Lady Dryden, not only the conventions but common prudence might have suggested that he would be well advised to find somewhere to put up for the night and defer any attempt to see Lila until the morning. Prudence had never been his strongest point, and he was far beyond caring for the conventions.

He flung up the drive of Vineyards as if it belonged to him, rang the bell with a will, and stood champing on the top step. Marsham being busy with his silver, the door was opened by the lad Frederick, a tall, well-grown boy who was putting in time and saving money between leaving school and being called up for his military service. He knew that it was pretty late for a visitor, but he didn’t feel equal to saying so. The impatient gentleman who was asking for Miss Dryden might be a relation, or he might have been invited and Mr. Marsham hadn’t happened to mention it. When Bill Waring stepped past him into the hall he therefore showed him into the small room immediately to the left of the front door, turned on the ceiling light, and having inquired what name he should say, departed in search of Miss Lila. Having ascertained that she was not in the drawing-room, he was about to look elsewhere, when he encountered Lady Dryden.

‘If you please, my lady, there’s a gentleman asking for Miss Dryden.’

Her eyebrows rose.

‘A gentleman? What name did he give?’

‘Mr. Waring, my lady.’

Lady Dryden did not permit her feelings to appear. If it became borne in upon Frederick that she was displeased, and that her displeasure might be formidable, it was not because of anything in her look or in her voice. She said smoothly,

‘Miss Dryden is in her room. There is no need to trouble her. I will see Mr. Waring. Where is he?’

When the door began to open Bill Waring had a moment of sickening apprehension, because as soon as he saw Lila he would know what he had come here to find out. If she ran to him, if she wanted him to get her out of this mess she had somehow been pushed into, he was prepared to walk her out of the house here and now and carry her off in his old rattletrap. Ray would take her in, and they would be married as soon as it could be fixed. He thought it took three days—one clear day’s notice—at a register office. He had read that somewhere, he couldn’t remember where, but it wasn’t the sort of thing you invented. If she didn’t want him, if she was happy—

The door opened and Lady Dryden came in. Well, it was war to the knife, he could see that. No vulgar brawling—that wasn’t her line. Just a voice and a manner straight off the ice and straight to the point. There weren’t going to be any social greetings.

She stopped a yard inside the door, surveying him as if he were a solecism, and said,

‘Why have you come here, Mr. Waring?’

What you might call a rhetorical question, but he didn’t mind answering it. Do him good to put it into words, and do her good to hear it.

‘I’ve come to see Lila.’

‘I’m afraid you can’t do that.’

‘I’m afraid you can’t stop me.’

‘Really, Mr. Waring? I think you will find that you are mistaken. There is a footman and a butler in the house, as well as Mr. Grey and Sir Herbert Whitall. I think you will admit that between them they could put you out. There would be a painful and humiliating scene, and Lila would be very much upset. I prefer to believe that you will behave like a gentleman and go away quietly. I will ask her if she wishes to see you, and if she does, I will let you know in the morning. If you wish to do so you can ring up, and if she is willing to take the call she will be perfectly free to do so.’

If he had been at all inclined to undervalue his opponent, he would certainly never do so again. With an almost casual ease of manner she disclosed the strength of her position. If he wished, he could court a degrading ejection from a house to which he had not been invited—he could figure as a common gatecrasher in a common brawl. He did not need Lady Dryden to tell him what would be the effect on Lila.

Having revolved these things in a stubborn silence, he stared her straight in the face and said,

‘I will ring up in the morning. I didn’t intend to be so late. I was delayed, or I would have been here earlier. I don’t want to upset Lila, but she will have to see me.’

She met his hostile stare with unruffled calm.

‘That is for her to say.’

He went on as if she had not spoken.

‘When I left England we were engaged to be married. As far as I am concerned that is still the case. If she wishes to break off our engagement she must do it herself. I’m not taking it from anyone else.’

‘I have never admitted that there was an engagement, Mr. Waring.’

He looked, and felt, as obstinate as a mule. Lady Dryden derived some pleasure from the fact. She had always disliked him. He was now a definite menace, and the game was in her hand. To win against that stubbornness, to score against that obstinate strength, gave her an agreeable sense of power. She had Lila under her thumb, and there was nothing he could do about it. She moved aside from the door and said,

‘Good-night, Mr. Waring.’

He went because there really was nothing else that he could do—not there, not at that time.

She didn’t ring for Frederick to show him out, but stood there in the hall herself to see him go. As he went down the steps under the pillared portico he heard the key turn in the lock of the door behind him.

Well, that was that. The next move lay with him. He gave her ten minutes to get away upstairs or into the drawing-room. During this time he drove his car round the first turn of the drive. Sitting there, he took pencil and paper, wrote briefly, and addressed an envelope to Miss Lila Dryden. Then he walked back to the portico and rang the front door bell.

Again he had the good fortune to encounter Frederick. He said,

‘Sorry to bother you, but I’m afraid I left my cap.’

Even Lady Dryden could hardly marshal the chuckers-out to deal with a polite request for one’s own property. Bill was rather pleased with himself for having thought about leaving his cap. Lady Dryden had made him so angry that he might easily have forgotten everything else. Being in a rage was rather like being out in a thunderstorm—you couldn’t hear yourself think.

Frederick produced the cap, and Bill produced two pound notes.

‘Look here, I want Miss Lila Dryden to have this letter, if you can manage it.’

Frederick said, ‘Oh, yes, sir.’

All the notes changed hands. Bill nodded and stepped back. The front door shut.

Frederick, full of romantic zeal, ran up the back stairs and tapped on Miss Lila Dryden’s door. The whole thing didn’t take a minute. Nobody saw him come or go.

Lila took the note with a shaking hand. She locked the door before she dared to read it, and when she had read it she sat down on the bed, a thing Sybil Dryden never allowed, and began to cry.