Ladies’ Bane

CHAPTER 23

For the moment all that Geoffrey Trent could feel was relief. Flaxman was gone. He had not to take any immediate decision. He was being blackmailed-skilfully, delicately, and respectfully blackmailed. There were severe penalties for blackmail, but if he were to ring up the police at this moment and accuse Flaxman, it would only be one man’s word against another. He had no doubt at all that Flaxman would keep his head and produce the perfect explanation. He and Mrs. Flaxman had been at least two years with Mr. Trent. They hoped that they had given satisfaction, and they considered that they were due for a rise. As for the matter of Miss Margot saying that about the rope, he would not have dreamed of bringing it up if Mr. Trent had not done so.

It would have been brought up. If he sent for the police he would have brought it up himself, and once it had been spoken aloud it could never be taken back. “Miss Margot, she said, ‘Geoffrey says I can have it.’ ” Hearsay words, but just what Margot might have said, making a mischievous face and throwing the words at Humphreys as he stormed at her. Chance, idle words-just something to throw at Humphreys-but once they were repeated they would never be forgotten. The whispers would follow him everywhere. “That poor girl, his ward, she went climbing with a crazy rope and was killed. They say she told the gardener she had Trent ’s leave to take it. She had quite a lot of money, and he came in for it.” Nothing that would hold water in a court of law perhaps, but enough to damn him socially from one end of his world to the other. That sort of thing stuck. He began to know inside his own mind that he couldn’t face it.

Flaxman went out to the kitchen. He was whistling, and he looked pleased. Mrs. Flaxman wondered what had pleased him. She was mixing a cake without hurry. Cooking done in a hurry was cooking spoiled in her opinion. She could have taken a job as a chef, but it wouldn’t have suited her-not all that rush and bustle. She liked to have her mind easy, and all her ingredients of the best. She looked up from her smooth, creamy mixture and said,

“What’s got into you? I don’t know when I heard you whistle.”

He said good-humouredly,

“Inquisitive, aren’t you, old dear?”

She went on stirring.

“Meaning I’d better not ask?”

“That’s your meaning, not mine.” He picked up a sultana from the table and nibbled it.

She began to put in the fruit. When she had the consistency to her liking she turned the mixture into a buttered cake-tin and slid it into the oven. Then she came back to her place at the table, wiping her hands upon her apron.

“I hope you’re not up to nothing, Fred.”

He put his hand in his pocket, jingled some money that was there, and said,

“Why should I be?” Then, sharply, “Where’s that girl Florrie?”

She stared at him.

“It’s her half day-you know that as well as I do. She’s been gone this quarter of an hour.”

There were two more doors to the kitchen. He opened them both and came back laughing.

“Nothing like making sure. And now, Mary, you just listen to me! I’m not up to anything, and you’ll be careful you don’t as much as think that I am! We’ve been two years with Mr. Trent, and I’ve asked him for a rise, and that’s all there is to it-you can just remember that!”

She was a very large woman. Everything about her lacked colour-her hair, her skin, her eyes, the short thick lashes which had been sandy when she was young. She looked steadily at her husband for a while before she said,

“You’re up to something, and I don’t like it.”

“Now, Mary, I ask you-have I been a good husband to you, or haven’t I?”

Remembering a number of times when she hadn’t thought so, but not being wishful to bring them up, Mrs. Flaxman made brief reply.

“In reason.”

“Well, there you are! What more do you want? I never ran off and left you, did I?”

“Men don’t run off and leave a woman that can cook the way I can. They are fools, but they’re not such fools as that. Leastways I never heard of one that was.” She dropped her voice to an almost indistinguishable mutter, but he thought what she said was, “More’s the pity.”

“What’s that?” he said sharply.

“Oh, nothing, Fred.”

“Do you think I didn’t hear? Want me to clear out, do you?”

She shook her head.

“I wouldn’t go as far as that. All I’ve got to say is, if you’re up to anything, you can leave me out of it. Crooked ways and crooked plans, they come to crooked ends, and I’m not getting mixed up in any of it, Fred Flaxman!”

He laughed.

“Now you’re trying to get me angry with you. But not today, my girl, not today. You see, you’ve done me a good turn without knowing it, so I don’t mind letting you have the run of your tongue.”

“I’ve done you a good turn?” The words came out slowly, as if she could hardly believe in them.

“Yes, you. And it only goes to show you never can tell. Many’s the time I’ve put it across you over that stupid jealousy of yours-couldn’t see me speaking to a good-looking woman without thinking all sorts of things you didn’t ought to!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about you being jealous, my dear, and the day Miss Margot had that accident and we had to wait for the bus on account of its being held up at West Eldon. You wasn’t going to let me have the chance of talking to Nellie Humphreys for that twenty minutes-was you? So you had to say your coat was too thick and you wouldn’t be wanting your raincoat now the weather was clearing, and had to ask me in front of all those people to go off up to the house and bring you something light. Well, I couldn’t say no, could I-not with everyone listening. But I was going to take it out of you afterwards. Didn’t you ever wonder why I didn’t? You must have known you’d got it coming to you-doing a thing like that to me! But as it happened, you done me a good turn, and you needn’t ask how, because I’m not telling.”

She sat there at the kitchen table, rubbing a finger up and down on it. Her face had a brooding look.

“That Nellie Humphreys is no better than she ought to be.”

“She’s a handsome woman, my dear, which is more than anyone could ever have said of you.”

Mrs. Flaxman flared suddenly.

“Then why didn’t she marry and get a man of her own? Forty if she’s a day! And Miss Humphreys here, and Miss Humphreys there! She did ought to have had a wedding-ring on her finger these twenty years, bringing up a family respectable like other people! But no, she stays on with her father and keeps herself free to turn anyone’s head that’s fool enough to let her! A bad lot-that’s what your Nellie Humphreys is, and I wouldn’t mind telling her so if I got the chance!”

He walked over to her and slapped her across her face. It was a hard stinging blow and it left her dizzy. She blinked up at him as he stood over her.

“That’s all for now!” he said. “Because you’ve done me a good turn-see? But you keep your tongue off Nellie Humphreys!”

He went out of the kitchen whistling.

Mrs. Flaxman put up her floury hands and covered her face.