The Tall House Mystery. Dorothy Fielding

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      CHAPTER 3

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      ALFREDA LONGSTAFF was not happy, and did not look it. But there were possibilities in her pale, dark face. She looked the kind to break records, had she the chance, behind a wheel, or in a 'plane. If so, Fate had not given her much of a hand to play, so far. Alfreda was the only child of the rector of Bispham, and was expected to keep house for her father and mother. She rebelled, naturally, but as no money was forthcoming for any training that would enable her to earn her own living, she had rebelled in vain—though by no means in silence, or in secret. But this last spring she had hoped for a release. Chance had brought down to Bispham a young man whose good looks attracted her immensely. She thought that he cared, too...he had come to the rectory in the first place because he heard that the rector played a good game of chess—as he did—but after that Alfreda had flattered herself that Lawrence Gilmour came because of her. He was the only marriageable man of good position and of her own age who had come into her life so far. Alfreda went all out for his capture. He liked games—well, she had a one figure handicap and a magnificent service, and gradually the links and the lawn tennis courts seemed to oust the chess board. She had shown her hand quite openly, sure of her prize. But he had gone away with only the usual civil partings. Flowers and a box of chocolates had come—once. That was over a month ago—a month of the village's open and concealed amusement or pity.

      She was thinking of Gilmour today, when the secretary of the golf club asked her to play a round with a London man whose partner had failed to turn up, as had Alfreda's. Men met on the links meant little, she had found, and this one wore a wedding ring. He had a clever face, she thought, and decided, with one of her inward sighs, that he had not lived all his life in Bispham, or he would never look like that. The rector's wife had just been rebuking her daughter that morning because the sugar basins had not been properly filled. Alfreda was expected to see to this. What a life, or rather what a death! thought Alfreda.

      She never played better, and Warner, the man from town, was two down at the ninth hole.

      "You ought to give me a stroke a hole," he said with a smile, "but then, I'm—"

      "Oh, don't say you're feeling ill!" she interrupted almost fiercely.

      "Feeling ill?" he repeated wonderingly.

      "Whenever I beat a man, he's 'got a touch of liver,'" came the retort, "or he's 'coming down with the 'flu.' Or he's 'most fearfully knocked with the heat,', or his 'wrist is wonky,' or 'one of his knees is giving him trouble again.' It's the aim of my life to live long enough to beat a really well man."

      Warner burst out laughing. "So a grouch against the world was steeling those wrists," he said placatingly. "Let's have a rest and a talk. You've got me sunk already." He held out his cigarette case.

      "But haven't you come down for a game?" She hesitated, taking one.

      He shook his head. "For quiet."

      "Good Heavens!" She sat so as to face him, her lip curling. "Fancy coming for quiet! Fancy wanting the stuff! Well, you've chosen the right tomb."

      "So that's the trouble," he murmured in a kindly tone, "ah, yes, you're straining at your bonds. We all do—did. I'm not sure—-"

      "Don't tell me that you aren't sure we're not happier when toddling round in pinafores, or lisping our prayers at mother's knee than when sitting on the Woolsack, or hobbling into the House of Lords," she interrupted again, even more hotly than before.

      Warner eyed her. He felt a bit sorry for mother. This young lady looked as though she might have an awful temper. There was frustration in her face—and bitterness. She was quite handsome in a hard, clear-cut way. He was not attracted to her. But she had arresting eyes.

      "I'm on a newspaper," he said simply, "and naturally the idea of quiet appeals."

      "On a newspaper!" She drew a long breath, and almost choked herself with her cigarette. "Heavenly job!"

      "Hardly." His eyes twinkled. "Interesting, if you like. But hardly heavenly."

      "What are you? An editor?" She regarded him with envy.

      He nodded. "Something of that sort." He was a newspaper proprietor.

      "How does one get newspaper work?" she asked breathlessly.

      "By writing clever articles," he said vaguely. Suddenly he saw an abyss opening at his feet. "That is to say—for real genius, that's the way," he corrected hastily.

      "Oh, genius!" she said heavily. "But—had you genius?" She spoke with an air of sincerity that took the rudeness out of the question.

      His shake of the head answered.

      "I suppose you had a tremendous lot of determination," she went on, looking thoughtfully at his shovel of a chin. "There's nothing like a will of one's own for getting on, they say."

      In Warner's case it had been a will of his uncle's that had deposited him in one of the high places of the newspaper in question. But he nodded. She, too, had a forceful jaw, he thought.

      "Tenacity of purpose is necessary, yes," he agreed. Then he changed the subject of his own arrival on the mountain top by saying, "But, besides genius, you know, the thing to do is to be on the look-out for a scoop. By that—" Her ironic gaze told him that even in Bispham that word was familiar.

      "I'm afraid there's not much chance of a scoop down here," she said. "My father's sermons, and my mother's chats at meetings, hardly lend themselves to that sort of thing. As for crimes—well, it's true a policeman got drunk once, and we still shudder at the tale, but that was years ago, when my father was a boy. The only dramatic happening I remember was when a woman lost her purse on the station platform, and I lent her half a crown—all my worldly possessions. As it was in this part of the world, she returned the money next day."

      He laughed too. Then he tilted his cap further over his eyes and said meditatively, "And yet, that's what first gave me my taste for newspaper work, and set me on my feet—a scoop. A body was found floating in the river. Well, it might have been suicide. I worked it up into a three weeks front page thriller." He spoke with pride.

      "Was it suicide?" she asked.

      "I believe it was." His tone implied that what it really was did not figure in the balance sheet, except as enhancing the credit of the decorations, "but it isn't the facts. It's the way they're handled—treated."

      "I see." She sat silent a moment. "But if nothing happens, what does one do to get out of the rut? I should love newspaper work," she finished, in a tone of fervor that was positively СКАЧАТЬ