‘Poor gentleman,’ whispered Susan, ‘he’s passed away. And while the words were still on her lips a great bellow of laughter burst forth from somewhere on the floor below. It was monstrous, gargantuan, fantastic; it was an outrage upon the silent house. Susan started back, and the snuffer, jerking from the candlestick, leaped into the air and went ringing and rolling down the oak staircase to land with a brazen clang on the flags below.
Somewhere a door burst open and a loud voice, with a hint of that preposterous mirth still lurking in its depths, bawled out:
‘What’s that? What the devil’s that? Jarrock! Did you make that filthy noise?’
‘I beg your pardon, sir,’ said Susan, advancing in some alarm to the stairhead. ‘It was my fault, sir. I shook the candlestick and the snuffer fell down. I am very sorry, sir.’
‘You?’ said the man. ‘Who the devil are you? Come down and let’s have a look at you. Oh!’ as Susan’s black dress and muslin apron came into his view at the turn of the stair, ‘the new housemaid, hey! That’s a pretty way to announce yourself. A damned good beginning! Don’t you do it again, that’s all. I won’t have noise, d’you understand? All the noise in this house is made by me. That’s my prerogative, if you know what the word means. Hey? Do you understand?’
‘Yes, sir. I won’t let it happen again, sir.’
‘That’s right. And look here. If you’ve made a dent in those boards, d’you know what I’ll do? Hey? I’ll have the insides out of you, d’you hear?’ He jerked back his big, bearded head, and his great guffaw seemed to shake the old house like a gust of wind. ‘Come on, girl, I won’t eat you this time. Let’s see your face. Your legs are all right, anyway. I won’t have a housemaid with thick legs. Come in here and be vetted. Sidonia, here’s the new girl, chucking the furniture all over the place the minute she’s in the house. Did you hear it? Did you ever hear anything like it? Hey? Ha, ha!’
He pushed Susan in front of him into a sitting-room furnished in deep orange and rich blues and greens like a peacock’s tail, and with white walls that caught and flung back the yellow lamplight. The windows were closely shuttered and barred.
On a couch drawn up near the fire a girl was lying. She had a little, white, heart-shaped face, framed and almost drowned in a mass of heavy red hair, and on her long fingers were several old and heavy rings. At her husband’s boisterous entry she rose rather awkwardly and uncertainly.
‘Walter, dear, don’t shout so. My head aches, and you’ll frighten the poor girl. So you’re Susan. How are you? I hope you had a good journey. Are Mr and Mrs Jarrock looking after you?’
‘Yes, thank you, madam.’
‘Oh! then that’s all right.’ She looked a little helplessly at her husband, and then back to Susan. ‘I hope you’ll be a good girl, Susan.’
‘I shall try to give satisfaction, madam.’
‘Yes, yes, I’m sure you will.’ She laughed, on a high, silver note like a bird’s call. ‘Mrs Jarrock will put you in the way of things. I hope you’ll be happy and stay with us.’ Her pretty, aimless laughter tinkled out again.
‘I hope Susan won’t disappear like the last one,’ said Mr Wispell. Susan caught a quick glance darted at him by his wife, but before she could decide whether it was one of fear or of warning, they were interrupted. A bell pealed sharply with a jangling of wires, and in the silence that followed the two Wispells stared uneasily at each other.
‘What the devil’s that?’ said Mr Wispell. ‘I only hope to heaven—’
Jarrock came in. He held a telegram in his hand. Wispell snatched it from him and tore it open. With an exclamation of distaste and alarm he handed it to his wife, who uttered a sharp cry.
‘Walter, we can’t! She mustn’t. Can’t we stop her?’
‘Don’t be a fool, Sidonia. How can we stop her?’
‘Yes, Walter. But don’t you understand? She’ll expect to find Helen here.’
‘Oh, lord!’ said Mr Wispell.
Susan went early to bed. Dinner had been a strained and melancholy meal. Mrs Wispell talked embarrassed nothings at intervals; Mr Wispell seemed sunk in a savage gloom, from which he only roused himself to bark at Susan for more potatoes or another slice of bread. Nor were things much better in the kitchen, for it seemed that a visitor was expected.
‘Motoring down from York,’ muttered Mrs Jarrock. ‘Goodness knows when they’ll get here. But that’s her all over. No consideration, and never had. I’m sorry for the mistress, that’s all.’
Jarrock’s distorted mouth twisted into a still more ghastly semblance of a grin.
‘Rich folks must have their way,’ he said. ‘Four years ago it was the same thing. A minute’s notice and woe betide if everything’s not right. But we’ll be ready for her, oh! we’ll be ready for her, you’ll see.’ He chuckled gently to himself.
Mrs Jarrock gave a curious, sly smile. ‘You’ll have to help me with the spare the room, Susan,’ she said.
Later, coming down into the scullery to fill a hot-water bottle, Susan found the Jarrocks in close confabulation beside the sink.
‘And see you make no noise about it,’ the cook was saying. ‘These girls have long tongues, and I wouldn’t trust—’
She turned and saw Susan.
‘If you’ve finished,’ she said, taking the bottle from her, ‘you’d best be off to bed. You’ve had a long journey.’
The words were softly spoken, but they had an undertone of command. Susan took up her candlestick from the kitchen. As she passed the scullery on her way upstairs, she heard the Jarrocks whispering together and noticed, just inside the back door, two spades standing, with an empty sack beside them. They had not been there before, and she wondered idly what Jarrock could be wanting with them.
She fell asleep quickly, for she was tired; but an hour or two later she woke with a start and a feeling that people were talking in the room. The rain had ceased, for through the window she could see a star shining, and the attic was lit by the diffused greyness of moonlight. Nobody was there, but the voices were no dream. She could hear their low rumble, close beside her head. She sat up and lit her candle; then slipped out of bed and crept across to the door.
The landing was empty; from the room next her own she could hear the deep and regular snoring of the cook. She came back and stood for a moment, puzzled. In the middle of the room she could hear nothing, but as she returned to the bed, she heard the voices again, smothered, as though the speakers were at the bottom of a well. Stooping, she put her ear to the empty fireplace. At once the voices became more distinct, and she realised that the great chimney was acting as a speaking-tube from the room below. Mr Wispell was talking. ‘. . . better be getting on with it . . . here at any time . . .’
‘The ground’s soft enough.’ That was Jarrock speaking. She lost a few words, and then:
‘. . . bury her four feet deep, because of the rose-trees.’
There came a silence. Then came the muffled echo of Mr Wispell’s great laugh; it rumbled with a goblin sound in the hollow chimney.
Susan crouched by the fireplace, feeling herself grow rigid with cold. The voices dropped to a subdued murmur. Then she heard a door shut and there was complete silence. She stretched her cramped limbs and stood a moment listening. Then, with fumbling haste she began to drag on her clothes. She must get out of this horrible house.
Suddenly a soft step sounded on the gravel beneath her window; it was followed by the chink of iron. Then a man’s voice said: ‘Here, between Betty Uprichard and Evelyn Thornton.’ There followed the thick sound of a spade driven into heavy soil.
Susan stole to the window and looked out. Down below, in the moonlight, Mr Wispell and Jarrock were digging, fast and feverishly, flinging up the soil about a shallow trench. A rose-tree was lifted and laid to one side, and as she watched them, the trench deepened and widened to a sinister shape.
She huddled on the last of her clothing, pulled on her coat and hat, sought for and found the handbag that held her money
and set the door gently ajar. There was no sound but the deep snoring from the next-door room.
She picked up her suit-case, which she had not unpacked before tumbling into bed. She hesitated a moment; then, as swiftly and silently as she could, she tiptoed across the landing and down the steep stair. The words of Mr Wispell came back to her with sudden sinister import. ‘I hope she won’t disappear like the last one.’ Had the last one, also, seen that which she was not meant to see, and scuttled on trembling feet down the stair with its twisted black banisters? Or had she disappeared still more strangely, to lie forever four feet deep under the rose-trees? The old boards creaked beneath her weight; on the lower landing the door of Mr Alistair’s room stood ajar, and a faint light came from within it. Was he to be the tenant of the grave in the garden? Or was it meant for her, or for the visitor who was expected that night?
Her flickering candle-flame showed her the front door chained and bolted. With a caution and control inspired by sheer terror, she pulled back the complaining bolts, lowered the chain with her hand, so that it should not jangle against the door, and turned the heavy key. The garden lay still and sodden under the moonlight. Drawing the door very gently to behind her, she stood on the threshold, free. She took a deep breath and slipped down the path as silently as a shadow.
A few yards down the hill road she came to a clump of thick bushes. Inside this she thrust the suit-case. Then, relieved of its weight, she ran.
At four o’clock the next morning a young policeman was repeating a curious tale to the police-sergeant at Dedcaster.
‘The young woman is pretty badly frightened,’ he said, ‘but she tells her story straight enough. Do you think we ought to look into it?’
‘Sounds queerish,’ said the sergeant. ‘Maybe you’d better go and have a look. Wait a minute, I’ll come with you myself. They’re odd people, those Wispells. Man’s an artist, isn’t he? Loose-living gentry they are, as often as not. Get the car out, Blaycock; you can drive us.’
‘What the devil is all this?’ demanded Mr Wispell. He stood upright in the light of the police lantern, leaning upon his spade, and wiped the sweat from his forehead with an earthy hand. ‘Is that our girl you’ve got with you? What’s wrong with her? Hey? Thief, hey? If you’ve been bagging the silver, you young besom, it’ll be the worse for you.’
‘This young woman’s come to us with a queer tale, Mr Wispell,’ said the sergeant. ‘I’d like to know what you’re a–digging of here for.’
Mr Wispell laughed. ‘Of here for? What should I be digging of here for? Can’t I dig in my own garden without your damned interference?’
‘Now that won’t work, Mr Wispell. That’s a grave, that is. People don’t dig graves in their gardens in the middle of the night for fun. I want that there grave opened. What’ve you got inside it? Now, be careful.’
‘There’s nobody inside it at the moment,’ said Mr Wispell, ‘and I should be obliged if you’d make rather less noise. My wife’s in a delicate state of health, and my brother-in-law, who is an invalid with an injured spine, has had a very bad turn. We’ve had to keep him under morphia and we’ve only just got him off into a natural sleep. And now you come bellowing round—’
‘What’s that there in that sack?’ interrupted the young policeman. As they all pressed forward to look, he found Susan beside him, and reassured her with a friendly pat on the arm.
‘That?’ Mr Wispell laughed again. ‘That’s Helen. Don’t damage her, I implore you – if my aunt—’
The sergeant had bent down and slit open the sacking with a pen-knife. Soiled and stained, the pale face of a woman glimmered up at him. There was earth in her eyelids.
‘Marble!’ said the sergeant. ‘Well, I’ll be hanged!’
There was the sound of a car stopping at the gate.
‘Heaven almighty!’ ejaculated Mr Wispell. ‘We’re done for! Get this into the house quickly, Jarrock.’
‘Wait a bit, sir. What I want to know—’
Steps sounded on the gravel. Mr Wispell flung his hands to heaven. ‘Too late!’ he groaned.
An elderly lady, very tall and upright, was coming round the side of the house.
‘What on earth are you up to out here, Walter?’ she demanded, in a piercing voice. ‘Policemen? A nice welcome for your aunt, I must say. And what – what is my wedding-present doing in the garden?’ she added, as her eye fell on the naked marble figure.
‘Oh, Lor’!’ said Mr Wispell. He flung down the spade and stalked away into the house.
‘I’m afraid,’ said Mrs Wispell, ‘you will have to take your month’s money and go, Susan. Mr Wispell is very much annoyed. You see, it was such a hideous statue, he wouldn’t have it in the house, and nobody would buy it, and besides, Mrs Glassover might turn up at any time, so we buried it and when she wired, of course we had to dig it up. But I’m afraid Mrs Glassover will never forgive Walter, and she’s sure to alter her will and – well, he’s very angry, and really I don’t know how you could be so silly.’
‘I’m sure I’m very sorry, madam. I was a bit nervous, somehow—’
‘Maybe,’ said Mrs Jarrock in her hoarse voice, ‘the poor girl was upset-like, by Jarrock. I did ought to have explained about him and poor Mr Alistair getting blown up in the war and you being so kind to us – but there! Being used to his poor face myself I didn’t think, somehow – and what with being all upset and one thing and another . . .’
The voice of Mr Wispell came booming down the staircase. ‘Has that fool of a girl cleared off?’
The young policeman took Susan by the arm. He had pleasant brown eyes and curly hair, and his voice was friendly.
‘Seems to me, miss,’ he said, ‘Scrawns ain’t no place for you. You’d better come along of us and eat your dinner with mother and me.’
NEBUCHADNEZZAR
You have played ‘Nebuchadnezzar’, of course – unless you are so ingenuous as never to have heard of any game but Yo-yo, or whatever the latest fad may be. ‘Nebuchadnezzar’ is so old-fashioned that only the sophisticated play it. It came back with charades, of which, of course, it is only a variation. It is called ‘Nebuchadnezzar’, I suppose, because you could not easily find a more impossible name with which to play it.
You choose a name – and unless your audience is very patient, it had better be a short one – of some well-known character. Say, Job. Then you act in dumb show a character beginning with J, then one beginning with O, then one beginning with B. Then you act Job, and the spectators guess that Job is what you mean, and applaud kindly. That is all. Light-hearted people, with imagination, can get a lot of fun out of it.
Bob Lester was having a birthday party – his mother and sister and about twenty intimate friends squashed into the little flat at Hammersmith. Everybody was either a writer or a painter or an actor of sorts, or did something or the other quite entertaining for a living, and they were fairly well accustomed to amusing themselves with sing-songs and games. They could fool wittily and behave like children, and get merry on invisible quantities of claret-cup, and they were all rather clever and all knew each other extremely well. Cyril Markham felt slightly out of it, though they were all exceedingly nice to him and tried to cheer him up. It was nearly six months since Jane had died, and though they all sympathised terribly with him for her loss (they had all loved Jane), he felt that he and they were, and ever would be, strangers and aliens to one another. Dear Jane. They had found it hard to forgive him for marrying her and taking her away to Cornwall. It was terrible that she should have died – only two years later – of gastro-enteritis. Jane would have entered into all their jokes. She would have played absurd games with them and given an exquisite personal grace to the absurdest. Markham could never do that. He felt stiff, awkward, cruelly self-conscious. When Bob suggested ‘Nebuchadnezzar’, he courteously asked Markham to make one of his team of actors. Too kind; too kind. Markham said he preferred to look on, and Bob, sighing with relief, went on to pick up a side of trusted veterans. r />
The two front rooms of the flat had been thrown into one by the opening of the folding doors. Though it was November, the night was strangely close, and one of the three tall balconied windows overlooking the river had been thrown open. Across the smoke-filled room and over the heads of the guests, Markham could see the lights of the Surrey side dance in the river like tall Japanese lanterns. The smaller of the two rooms formed a stage for the players, and across the dividing doorway a pair of thick purple curtains had been hung. Outside, in the passage, the players scuffled backwards and forwards amid laughter. Waiting for the game to begin, Markham stared at the curtains. They were familiar. They were surely the curtains from his own Cornish cottage. Jane had hung them across the living room to screen off the dining part from the lounge part. How odd that Bob should have got them here. No, it wasn’t. Bob had given Jane her curtains for a wedding-present, and this must be another pair. They were old ones, he knew. Damask of that quality wasn’t made today.
Bob drew back the curtains, thrust out a dishevelled head, announced: ‘The Nebuchadnezzar has four letters,’ and disappeared again. In the distance was heard a vigorous bumping, and a voice called out, ‘There’s a clothes-line in the kitchen!’ Somebody standing near the door of the room switched off the lights, and the damask curtains were drawn aside for the acting of the first letter.
A Japanese screen at the back of the stage, above which appeared the head of Lavinia Forbes, elegantly attired in a silk scarf, bound round the forehead with a cricket-belt, caused Mrs Lester, always precipitate, to exclaim, ‘Romeo and Juliet – balcony scene!’ Everybody said ‘Hush,’ and the supposed Juliet, producing from behind the screen a mirror and lipstick, proceeded to make up her face in a very lavish manner. In the middle of this, her attention appeared to be distracted by something in the distance. She leaned over the screen and pointed eagerly in the direction of the landing, whence, indeed, some remarkable noises were proceeding. To her, amid frenzied applause, entered, on hands and knees, the twins, Peter and Paul Banaby, got up regardless of expense in fur coats worn with the hair outside, and champing furiously upon the clothes-line. Attached to them by stout luggage-straps was a basket-chair, which, after ominous hesitation and creaking between the door-posts, was propelled vigorously into the room by unseen hands, so that the charioteer – very gorgeous in scarlet dressing-gown, striped sash and military sabre, with a large gravy-strainer inverted upon his head – was nearly shot on to the backs of his steeds, and was heard to mutter an indignant ‘Steady on!’ through his forest of crêpe beard. The lady, from behind the screen, appeared to harangue the driver, who replied with a vulgar and regrettable gesture. A further brief exchange of pantomime led to the appearance of two stout parties in bathrobes and turbans, who proceeded to hoist the lady bodily over the screen. Somebody said, ‘Look out!’, the screen rocked and was hastily held up by one of the horses, and the victim was deposited on the floor with a thud, and promptly died with a considerable amount of twitching and gasping. The charioteer cracked his umbrella across the backs of his horses and was drawn round the room and off again in a masterly manner. A loud barking from the wings heralded the arrival of three savage door-mats, who, after snuffling a good deal over the corpse, started to devour it in large gulps as the curtain fell.