A Graveyard to Let

4

As another peal of thunder exploded over the house, some five minutes before a dinner arranged for eight o'clock, Crystal Manning paced up and down the drawing room.

Outside the rain was a deluge. The long, low frame house, painted white with green window trimmings, comfortable yet unpretentious, might scarcely have been visible through that rain to anyone who walked up Elm Road from the station. Maralarch, commuters may have noted, is the station between Larchmont and Mamaroneck on the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad.

Lightning threw a ghostly shimmer at the windows of the drawing room where Crystal Manning paced. All the lights were on here, as in the rest of the house.

"Now, really!" Crystal murmured impatiently.

She was shapely and not too tall, understanding well how to use the maturity of body which accompanied a maturity of veiled dark blue eyes. Her hair was dark brown; under light it seemed black. The great Adolphe said he had created a hair style for her—though the average person, seeing the broad parting and hair drawn down almost past the cheekbones, would have said it was the style of our female ancestors a hundred years ago.

With the names of her three husbands we need not trouble. But we may follow some, if not perhaps all, of Crystal's thoughts.

"Oh, hell!" murmured Crystal.

She hoped, in this storm, that the lights wouldn't go out With a sense of humiliation she wished they had a butler. Admittedly there wouldn't be anything for a butler to do here; but it looked so well.

It was all Dad's fault, of course. Dad could have bought one of those estates which lay eastwards behind the house—beyond the swimming pool and the woods and the baseball field and the old graveyard—one of those estates facing out over the waters of the Sound.

Why not? Dad could afford it! Instead he had even cheated her out of seeing the guest of honour. She remembered meeting Dad on the staircase less than two hours ago.

"Of course," Crystal had murmured, as though mentioning an obvious fact, "we're dressing for dinner tonight?"

"No, my dear. Why should we? We don't dress ordinarily."

Crystal could have screamed.

"You may not remember' she said, half veiling the dark blue eyes, "that we're entertaining rather a distinguished guest?"

"Sir Henry? He can't dress for dinner anyway. I understand he lost all his clothes in a riot at Grand Central."

Crystal wished her father wouldn't make these tedious jokes. She remembered him standing on the stairs a little way up, his face lobster pink from the sun, a twinkle in his eye, his white suit outlined against the panelling.

"He's taking a nap, Crystal, and snoring like a lion full of luminal. Don't disturb him, please. I gave you your instructions over the phone."

Crystal's fingers, with their scarlet nails, began to tap on the newel post of the stairs.

"I don't in the least," she said, "mind acting as your hostess..."

"Thank you, my dear." (Irony there?)

"But I think you might give me a little more consideration than Jean. This—this Anglo-American newspaperman. He's socially presentable, of course?"

"He is," Manning replied grimly. "What is more, he loves books."

It was another sore point, which (thought Crystal) the impressive old devil had deliberately brought up. Across the broad hall from the drawing room was the library, three of its walls lined to the ceiling with second-hand books. If Manning had collected first editions, Crystal could have understood. But they were merely old and often half-ruined books, because her father said he could never be comfortable with a new book in his hands.

Crystal wondered what Sir Henry Merrivale would think of this horrible collection.

‘I shall dress for dinner," she murmured, "of course."

And she did. Crystal wore the black and silver gown which, with her inordinate sex appeal, would have disturbed a Trappist monk.

Now, with the rain sluicing down the windows, in the blue-and-yellow drawing room decorated by another kind of Adolphe, she was at the last point of wrath. She had distinctly let it be known that there would be cocktails and canapes at half-past seven. She had pictured a languid half-hour before dinner, while Sir Henry Merrivale, in flawless evening clothes, sipped a cocktail and spoke lightly of his adventures with tigers in the Simla.

And not a soul had yet turned up.

"Oh, so-and-so!" murmured Crystal, surpassing her previous efforts.

There was a clack of footsteps on the stairs outside in the hall. Crystal stiffened, and languidly settled her gown.

But it was only her brother.

Robert Manning, a pleasant-faced and rather too tall young man, with sandy hair and a touch of freckles, slouched into the room with an air of vague preoccupation. Bob had not troubled to dress for dinner, and the colours of his tie would have knocked out your eye at ten yards.

"Good evening, Bob."

'"Lo, Crys."

Crystal's sweet smile was not hypocritical; she really was well-meaning, but sometimes it grew strained. She indicated the big cocktail shaker, moist-gleaming, and the plates of canapes.

"Have a cocktail, Bob?" invited Crystal.

Bob considered this proposal for a moment.

"Better not," he decided, shaking his head gloomily. "In training, Crys."

"Then have a canape?" Crystal suggested sweetly. "Surely that won't prevent you from hitting a bunt for three hundred feet?"

"Look, Crys, don't you even know what a bunt is?" Bob asked. Automatically his fingers closed round the grip of an imaginary bat, and his brown eye gleamed. "You lay it down, like this, so that the runner on first can ..."

"One moment, dear!" said Crystal, and raised her hand. Her heart beat quickened. The guest of honour was arriving.

Three men entered the room. The first must be Mr. Norton, who (Crystal instantly decided) looked like Leslie Howard. She saw her father's silver grey hair, worn rather long but cropped up short beside the ears. Then...

At her first sight of Sir Henry Merrivale—in plus fours, with his spectacles drawn down on his broad nose—Crystal could not have been more startled if one of the Simla tigers had stuck its head round the corner of the door. But she was a clever and quick-witted girl. After all, she couldn't expect him to look like Ronald Colman. And the famous man, the scion of ancient lineage, was in her house.

"And this," her father was saying, "is my daughter Crystal. Sir Henry Merrivale."

Crystal allowed, her dark-fringed eyelids to droop, and smiled.

"Well, stab my bowels," said the scion of ancient lineage, in a voice which must have carried as far as the kitchen, "if you're not a nice-lookin' wench too! Fred, you got a monopoly on nice-lookin' wenches!"

"Oh, Crystal's not so bad," murmured Manning.

Crystal's voice stuck in her throat. She couldn't breathe. What restored something of her poise was what she imagined to be her father's disparaging remark.

"Then you approve of me, Sir Henry?" Crystal drawled.

"Approve of you?" yelled the great man. He leaned forward, and paid her what he believed to be a feverish compliment. "Lord love a duck, I'd hate to see you in an Algiers pub full of French sailors."

"Wh-wh-why?"

"Because," confided H.M., "they'd all cut each other's throats gettin' at you. And that's mass murder." His sharp little eyes fixed on her. "But wouldn't you like to have men killin' each other for your sake?"

Crystal gave H.M. a curious glance, and decided he was—interesting.

"By the way," H.M. confided. "Speakin' of a romp on the sofa..."

Frederick Manning cleared his throat loudly.

"And this is my son," he announced. Bob Manning, tall and gangling and sandy-haired, extended his hand with a sheepish smile. "How are you, sir?"

"I'm feelin' pretty fit, thanks. Looky here! Aren't you the bloke who's interested in motor cars and baseball?"

Bob's face came to life, pleased but astonished.

"Yes, sir. But—don't you play cricket? I mean, of course"—furtively Bob glanced at H.M.'s corporation—"when you were a little younger?"

A faint purplish colour was beginning to creep into H.M.'s face. But he spoke gently.

"We-el!" he said with a loftily deprecating gesture. "I did sort of toy with baseball, son, when I was a lot younger. Nothin' much."

Bob grew eager.

"Listen, sir! Could you come out to the field tomorrow? Moose Wilson's promised to be there." Bob spoke with awe. "The pitcher, you know. He's a grand guy. I know he'd throw you some easy ones if you wanted to practice hitting a little."

"And here," Crystal nodded brightly towards the door, "are Jean and Dave. How nice to see you again, Dave!" Crystal had just been introduced to Cy Norton, and thought him highly interesting— with possibilities. "This is Mr. Norton!"

Jean and Davis, neither in evening clothes, tried to make themselves inconspicuous. For some reason Jean was clutching Davis's arm. Cy Norton shook hands with Huntington Davis, finding him friendly and self-assured, the white teeth flashing against the deep tan—and Cy disliked the man at sight

"But I'm afraid.;said Crystal. Then her voice rose. "Dad!''

"Yes, my dear?"

"We must be very quick with the cocktails. I've ordered dinner for eight o'clock, and the cook is such a tyrant'"

"That doesn't matter, Crystal," said Manning. His low-pitched bass voice always caused silence and attention, when he used it as he used it now.

"Doesn't matter?"

"No, my dear." Manning spoke with polished courtesy. "/ have ordered dinner put back until nine o'clock. I have decided to thrash this matter out before dinner."

A long run of thunder rolled and exploded distantly, but with no less heavy rain. There was nothing in the least ominous in Manning's tone. Yet Jean gripped Davis's arm more tightly, and Crystal opened wide eyes of astonishment Bob, his expression wooden again, did not appear to listen.

"Will you all sit down, please?" requested Manning.

He moved across the blue and yellow room, with its heavy carpet and sat down in a chair under a reading lamp. The particular M. Adolphe who designed this room had included some very peculiar furniture.

Cy sat down not far from young Bob Manning. H.M. swelled his bulk from an out-of-shape armchair. Jean and Davis sat very close together at one end of a sofa; Crystal sat at the other end, near a lamp, so that the light could make the best of white skin and shadows against a low-cut black-and-silver gown.

"No," said Manning, as Crystal made a move. "Don't ring for Stuffy. We can omit the cocktails and canapes for the moment"

Cy Norton, remembering what they had talked about that afternoon, felt a stronger twinge of uneasiness.

"I address myself," said Manning, "to my three children. Naturally I should prefer to do so in private. But there is a reason, which I shall keep to myself, why we must have witnesses."

Manning put his fingertips together, and spoke like a judge from the bench.

"So I ask you three." He paused. "Do you consider that I've always been a reasonably good father?"

The question made Cy Norton want to crawl under a chair with embarrassment It had much the same effect on most of the others, always excepting Sir Henry Merrivale.

Rain spattered against the windows. Crystal was the first to speak.

"But of course!" she exclaimed, with open eyes of wonder under the wings of dark brown hair.

"Y-yes," said Jean, and turned her face away.

Bob Manning still sat and stared woodenly at the floor. At last, and with obvious effort, he contrived to mumble out, "Sure, Dad. You've been great."

"Another question," Manning continued relentlessly. "How many times have you heard of a really perfect marriage?"

"Oh, Dad," cried Jean, "are you going to start again about Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett?"

There was a twinkle in Manning's eye.

"You're quite right," he told Jean. "I might mention Browning or Elizabeth Barrett. But I'll put something else first. You've been kind enough all three of you"—his slight smile vanished instantly—"to give your opinion of me. Now let me tell you what I once thought of you."

He paused a moment

"When you were born, each of you," he went on, "I disliked you and at times I hated you. After your mother died, it took me years before I could become even mildly fond of you."

The shocked silence that followed was as though at the crack of a whip. Manning still spoke quietly.

"Has it ever occurred to you that a really happy marriage can be not spoiled, but badly hurt by these intruders called children? No! It hasn't occurred to you! The sugary sentiment of our day won't permit it

"In the sort of marriage I mean, husband and wife are all in all to each other. They're really in love. They want no intruders of any kind. If they need to have children to bind them together,' they were never happy in the first place. They know a perfect happiness. Well, your mother and I were like that"

There was a small clatter as Crystal upset a cocktail glass.

"My mother.she cried out.

Manning lifted his hand.

"Your mother," he said wearily, "felt much as I did. But she was conscientious. She was a good mother. Until..."

Here Manning glanced across at H.M., as though to explain.

"It was nearly eighteen years ago," he said. "We were on one of those river steamers. Happily alone for once, we thought There was a boiler explosion. Most of the passengers, including my wife, were drowned. I was left with the side of marriage which, rightly or wrongly, I didn't like."

(For God's sake stop! thought Cy Norton. Crystal wont actually care, whatever she says. Bob doesn't likeyou much any way. But Jean! Jean, with her hands over eyes and her look as though she had been struck with a whip!)

At the same moment Huntington Davis, all virtue and respectability, got up from the sofa and walked over to face Manning.

"Forgive me, sir," Davis said. "But are you sure you know just what you're saying?"

"Yes. I think so."

"When people have children," Davis floundered, "they have a duty..."

"I’ve done that duty, Mr. Davis. Three witnesses have just said so, though they're not quite sure about it."

"I mean"—Davis shook his head as though to clear it—"it's our duty to have children, isn't it? What would happen if the rest of the world thought as you do?" Manning spoke dryly.

"Ah, the old question! Don't let it trouble your sleep." "I insist!..."

"Fortunately, most people are fond of children. Admittedly I am an exception and a bounder. And yet"—Manning whacked the arm of his chair—"if twenty thousand parents could hear my words now, how many of them wouldn't secretly agree with me?"

"You..." Davis began; then checked himself in time. Manning rose slowly from his chair and faced the young man. Both were as erect as grenadiers; they looked at each other, steadily, on dead-straight eye level.

"Dave, come back here!" cried Jean. "Please! There's something I've got to know! Come back!"

Davis complied. But he moved slowly backwards, to show he could still meet the older man's eye. Manning sat down again.

"Listen, Dad!" Jean begged. "All those lovely things you said about mother awhile ago—were they true?"

Her father's voice was gentle. "Every word, Jean. And please remember: I spoke of you all as young children. Not as you are now."

Then—I tried to ask you today, but you evaded it—why must you degrade yourself with this Stanley woman?"

"Because, Jean, eighteen years make too long a time of mourning. The flowers are dead. Miss Stanley is vulgar, yes." An odd, obscure smile twisted Manning's mouth. "But I find her stimulating. Shall I give you Browning?

"What’s a man's age? He must hurry more, that's all; Cram in a day what his youth took a year to hold: When we mind labour, then only we're too old—

What age had Methuselam when he begat Saul?

"Though there will be no more begetting, I hope," Manning added politely that's rather out of its context, isn't it?" Crystal asked, with an effort at casualness. "Browning was a young man when he wrote it."

"And I am fifty-one," smiled her father. "Perhaps two or three years younger than your last husband."

Crystal's face went white. Both she and Bob had pretended not to notice when Jean referred to Irene Stanley.

"We all know, Dad dear," Crystal remarked lightly, "that we can't match you at repartee. But is it really necessary to insult us?"

"Insult you, my dear?" Manning was genuinely startled. "I was not trying to insult you, believe me."

"Then why are you telling us all this?"

"Because," answered Manning, "something will probably happen to me, by tomorrow at the very latest. I want to provide for your future, all of you, in case you never see me again."