Danger Point

Chapter 35

LISLE sat silent in the front of Rafe’s little car. He looked sideways at her when they were clear of the town and said,

“Why so pale and wan, honey-sweet? Didn’t the shopping go well? You didn’t tell me what you were going to buy.”

A brief colour came to the cheek across which his glance had travelled – came, and went again.

“I bought a bathing-dress. Mine got torn-”

He said, “Yes – so it did.”

She saw his left hand tighten on the wheel. The knuckles showed bone-white under the brown skin. He might have been remembering twenty minutes of as hot a day as this, with her body limp and cold in a torn bathing-dress, whilst he and Dale and a stranger laboured to make reluctant lungs breathe again.

He laughed suddenly.

“Messed it up properly, didn’t you?

Are you all set on going bathing again?”

“I shan’t go out of my depth.” She felt her cheeks burn, and said in a hurry, “Did I keep you waiting? I didn’t mean to. I – I met someone.”

“So did I – one always does. I hope yours was amusing. Mine was the last girl friend but three – or four – or even more – anyhow there she was, shamelessly buxom, with twins in a double perambulator. I must say I like my lost loves to show a decent melancholy when they run into me like that.”

Lisle could not help laughing. She got a look poignant with reproach.

“Do you know, she married a fat man who jobs stocks. As Tennyson says:

Lisle’s eyes danced.

“Perhaps she was afraid your heart was going to be too wide. She might have got lost in the crowd.”

He shook his head.

“I don’t go in for crowds. I’m highly selective, like the best wireless sets. Only one station at a time – no overlapping, no jamming, no atmospherics – perfect reception. Try our 1939 ten-valve super-het and be happy ever after! You’d think some would jump at it, wouldn’t you? But no – they go off and marry butchers, and bakers, and candlestick-makers and have twins.”

“How many girls have there really been, Rafe?”

“I’ve lost count years ago. It’s the quest for the ideal, you know. I always hope I’m going to find it, but I never do. If a girl’s got one thing, she hasn’t got another. The odds are that the perfect complexion means a perfect circulation and a refrigerating plant instead of a heart, and if they dance like a dream they’re no good at soothing the brow when it’s wrung with pain and anguish. I don’t mind walking out with a hard-hearted Hannah, but I’m damned if I’m going to live with one – and that’s not swearing, it’s bed-rock fact, because I should probably get up in the night and cut her throat.”

Lisle shivered and said, “Don’t!”

“Don’t worry, darling, I’m not going to. My trouble is that I want too much – beauty, charm, delight, and all the moral virtues. And if anyone like that ever existed, someone else would have married her first.”

Lisle laughed a little and said,

“What about the girl friends? Perhaps they want an ideal too.”

“The girl friends are all right,” said Rafe. “As far as they are concerned, I am ideal to flirt with, but when it comes down to brass tacks they’re out for someone who can provide a much classier pram than it would run to with me. The female of the species is more practical than the male.”

“You are a fool, Rafe!”

“The fool died of a broken heart,” he said. His white teeth showed in a sudden grin. “I’ve made you laugh anyway. I had a bet with myself that I would – so I’ve won, and you owe me sixpence halfpenny.”

“What for?”

“Petrol, I expect. What are you going to do when my thumb is all right? I can’t keep it sprained much longer or there’ll be some harsh words flying. Dale won’t let you drive his car, will he?”

“I can get Evans.”

“Or Dale?” He waited a minute and then repeated the words – “Or Dale?”

She flushed and said without looking at him,

“He’s busy – you know he is. And he hates shopping.”

“I shall have to spin that sprain out. I say, that would make an awfully good tongue-twister, wouldn’t it? But to hark back – who was your girl friend? I’ve told you about mine.”

The oddest impulse surged up in Lisle and took charge.

“You’d love her. She quotes Tennyson too.”

“The little dumpy woman who spoke to you after the inquest?”

“Rafe! How did you know?”

“A flash of genius. Who is she?”

They had turned into Crook Lane and were slowing for the hairpin bend. She put up a hand to the window ledge and gripped it.

“Mind coming down here?” said Rafe quickly.

“A little.”

“Better do it every day until you don’t. That’s brutal common sense. You’re quite safe, you know, honey-sweet.”

Lisle said, “Am I?” in a queer flat voice. She kept her hand on the window ledge until they were round the corner where her car had smashed against Cooper’s barn. Then she drew a sighing breath and let it fall.

“Go on about the girl friend,” said Rafe. “Can’t I meet her? We could swap quotations. Who is she, and why have I never heard of her before?”

Lisle only answered one of the questions. The impulse driving her, she said,

“She’s a detective. At least she calls it ‘Private Investigations Undertaken’ on her card, but I expect that’s what it means – don’t you?”

Rafe said nothing at all. She looked at him and saw his profile rather as Miss Silver had seen it at the inquest – the brown skin tight across the line of cheek and jaw, the lips without movement, locked and inexpressive. The odd thought went through her head that if she had seen a picture of him like this she might not have recognised it. It was just as if he was not alive.

And then all in a moment the impression broke. His face was the familiar one again, quick with movement and expression. He laughed and said,

“I expect so. Where did you pick her up?”

“In a train.”

“And she leapt at you and said, ‘Let me privately investigate you.’ Was that it?”

The impulse which had carried Lisle as far as this died suddenly. She saw with relief that they were approaching the big stone pillars from which two heraldic beasts grinned down malevolently upon all who came to Tanfield Court. If she waited until they had turned in… She measured the distance along the path with her eye. No – she couldn’t wait so long as that. She must speak – say something. If she didn’t, he would think – what would he think? What did it matter what he thought? It did matter.

This was all in one flash of agonised, struggling thought. She made herself laugh and say,

“Would you like to know?”

They ran smoothly between the pillars and left the grinning beasts behind. Rafe said drily,

“Yes, I should very much. Are you going to tell me?”

“I don’t know.” Her lips smiled, but her secret thought cried in her with something like despair. “He’ll know all the same – he knows now. If I could tell him – I can’t!”

He said, “Hadn’t you better?” and caught the very faint movement of her head which said “No.”

As they drew up by the steps leading to the house, he was laughing again.

“Supposing I ask the sleuth herself – do you suppose she’d tell me?”

“There’s nothing to tell.” She opened the door and got out.

Rafe’s voice followed her.

“Shall I try my luck?”

She ought to have laughed and said something light, but she couldn’t manage it. She only shook her head again and ran up the steps and into the house.