"Well," said Mr. Vyse, "that can be put right now."
"Yes, but he's been in prison a year." And then she startled them. She turned sharply on the Duchess. "Who is that girl--that girl who has just gone out?"
"Miss Carlton-Smith," said the Duchess, "was engaged to Mr. Gerard. She--took the thing very hard."
Mr. Satterthwaite stole softly away. The snow had stopped. Naomi was sitting on the stone wall. She had a sketchbook in her hand, and some colored crayons were scattered round. Mr. Quin was standing beside her.
She held out the sketchbook to Mr. Satterthwaite. It was a very rough affair--but it had genius. A kaleidoscopic whirl of snowflakes with a figure in the center.
"Very good," said Mr. Satterthwaite.
Mr. Quin looked up at the sky. "The storm is over," he said. "The roads will be slippery, but I do not think there will be any accident--now."
"There will be no accident," said Naomi. Her voice was charged with some meaning that Mr. Satterthwaite did not understand. She turned and smiled at him--a sudden dazzling smile. "Mr. Satterthwaite can drive back with me if he likes."
He knew then to what length desperation had driven her.
"Well," said Mr. Quin, "I must bid you good-by."
He moved away.
"Where is he going?" said Mr. Satterthwaite, staring after him.
"Back where he came from, I suppose," said Naomi in an odd voice.
"But--but there isn't anything there," said Mr. Satterthwaite, for Mr. Quin was making for that spot on the edge of the cliff where they had first seen him. "You know you said yourself it was the world's end."
He handed back the sketchbook.
"It's very good," he said. "A very good likeness. But why--er--why did you put him in fancy dress?"
Her eyes met his for a brief second.
"I see him like that," said Naomi Carlton-Smith.
THE VOICE IN THE DARK
"I am a little worried about Margery," said Lady Stranleigh. "My girl, you know," she added.
She sighed pensively. "It makes one feel terribly old to have a grown-up daughter."
Mr. Satterthwaite, who was the recipient of these confidences, rose to the occasion gallantly. "No one could believe it possible," he declared with a little bow.
"Flatterer," said Lady Stranleigh, but she said it vaguely and it was clear that her mind was elsewhere.
Mr. Satterthwaite looked at the slender white-clad figure in some admiration. The Cannes sunshine was searching, but Lady Stranleigh came through the test very well. At a distance the youthful effect was really extraordinary. One almost wondered if she were grown up or not. Mr. Satterthwaite, who knew everything, knew that it was perfectly possible for Lady Stranleigh to have grown-up grandchildren. She represented the extreme triumph of art over nature. Her figure was marvelous, her complexion was marvelous. She had enriched many beauty parlors and certainly the result was astounding. Lady Stranleigh lighted a cigarette, crossed her beautiful legs, encased in the finest of nude stockings, and murmured:
"Yes, I really am rather worried about Margery."
"Dear me," said Mr. Satterthwaite, "what is the trouble?"
Lady Stranleigh turned her beautiful blue eyes upon him. "You have never met her, have you? She is Charles's daughter," she added helpfully.
If entries in _Who's Who_ were strictly truthful, the entry concerning Lady Stranleigh might have ended as follows: _hobbies: getting married_. She had floated through life shedding husbands as she went. She had lost three by divorce and one by death.
"If she had been Rudolf's child I could have understood it," mused Lady Stranleigh. "You remember Rudolf? He was always temperamental. Six months after we married I had to apply for those queer things--what do they call them? Conjugal whatnots, you know what I mean. Thank goodness it is all much simpler nowadays. I remember I had to write him the silliest kind of letter--my lawyer practically dictated it to me. Asking him to come back, you know, and that I would do all I could, etc., etc., but you never could count on Rudolf, he was so temperamental. He came rushing home at once, which was quite the wrong thing to do, and not at all what the lawyers meant."
She sighed.
"About Margery?" suggested Mr. Satterthwaite, tactfully leading her back to the subject under discussion.
"Of course. I was just going to tell you, wasn't I? Margery has been seeing things, or hearing them. Ghosts, you know, and all that. I should never have thought that Margery could be so imaginative. She is a dear good girl, always has been, but just a shade--dull."
"Impossible," murmured Mr. Satterthwaite with a confused idea of being complimentary.
"In fact very dull," said Lady Stranleigh. "Doesn't care for dancing or cocktails or any of the things a young girl ought to care about. She much prefers staying at home to hunt instead of coming out here with me."
"Dear, dear," said Mr. Satterthwaite. "She wouldn't come out with you, you say?"
"Well, I didn't exactly press her. Daughters have a depressing effect upon one, I find."
Mr. Satterthwaite tried to think of Lady Stranleigh accompanied by a serious-minded daughter and failed.
"I can't help wondering if Margery is going off her head," continued Margery's mother in a cheerful voice. "Hearing voices is a very bad sign, so they tell me. It is not as though Abbot's Mede were haunted. The old building was burned to the ground in 1836, and they put up a kind of early Victorian château which simply cannot be haunted. It is much too ugly and commonplace."
Mr. Satterthwaite coughed. He was wondering why he was being told all this.
"I thought perhaps," said Lady Stranleigh, smiling brilliantly upon him, "that _you_ might be able to help me."
"I?"
"Yes. You are going back to England tomorrow, aren't you?"
"I am. Yes, that is so," admitted Mr. Satterthwaite cautiously.
"And you know all these psychical research people. Of course you do, you know everybody."
Mr. Satterthwaite smiled a little. It was one of his weaknesses to know everybody.
"So what can be simpler?" continued Lady Stranleigh. "I never get on with that sort of person. You know--earnest men with beards and usually spectacles. They bore me terribly and I am quite at my worst with them."
Mr. Satterthwaite was rather taken aback. Lady Stranleigh continued to smile at him brilliantly.
"So that is all settled, isn't it?" she said brightly. "You will go down to Abbot's Mede and see Margery, and make all the arrangements. I shall be terribly grateful to you. Of course, if Margery is _really_ going off her head, I will come home. Ah! here is Bimbo."
Her smile from being brilliant became dazzling.
A young man in white tennis flannels was approaching them. He was about twenty-five years of age and extremely good-looking.
The young man said simply, "I have been looking for you everywhere, Babs."
"What has the tennis been like?"
"Septic."
Lady Stranleigh rose. She turned her head over her shoulder and murmured in dulcet tones to Mr. Satterthwaite, "It is simply marvelous of you to help me. I shall never forget it."
Mr. Satterthwaite looked after the retreating couple.
_I wonder_, he mused to himself, _if Bimbo is going to be number five_.
* * * * *
The conductor of the Train de Luxe was pointing out to Mr. Satterthwaite where an accident on the line had occurred a few years previously. As he finished his spirited narrative, the other looked up and saw a well-known face smiling at him over the conductor's shoulder.
"My dear Mr. Quin," said Mr. Satterthwaite. His little withered face broke into smiles. "What a coincidence! That we should both be returning to England on the same train. You are going there, I suppose."
"Yes," said Mr. Quin. "I have business there of rather an important nature. Are you taking the first service of dinner?"
"I always do so. Of course it is an absurd time--half-past six, but one runs less risk with the cooking."
Mr. Quin nodded comprehendingly. "I also," he said. "We might perhaps arrange to sit together."
Half-past six found Mr. Quin and Mr. Satterthwaite established opposite each other at a small table in the dining car. Mr. Satterthwaite gave due attention to the wine list and then turned to his companion.
"I have not seen you since--ah, yes--not since Corsica. You left very suddenly that day."
Mr. Quin shrugged his shoulders. "Not more so than usual. I come and go, you know. I come and go."
The words seemed to awake some echo of remembrance in Mr. Satterthwaite's mind. A little shiver passed down his spine--not a disagreeable sensation, quite the contrary. He was conscious of a pleasurable sense of anticipation.
Mr. Quin was holding up a bottle of red wine, examining the label on it. The bottle was between him and the light but for a minute or two a red glow enveloped his person.
Mr. Satterthwaite felt again that sudden stir of excitement. "I too have a kind of mission in England," he remarked, smiling broadly at the remembrance. "You know Lady Stranleigh, perhaps?"
Mr. Quin shook his head.
"It is an old title," said Mr. Satterthwaite, "a very old title. One of the few that can descend in the female line. She is a baroness in her own right. Rather a romantic history really."