Джорджетт Хейер - The Quiet Gentleman

She wished then that she had not said this, for the Earl moved his head in a gesture of dissent, and his lips framed the one word: “No.”

Martin saw it too, and said sharply: “St. Erth, you can’t mean — St. Erth, you’ll let me come and see you tomorrow, surely!”

“No. You can have nothing more to say to me. Keep away from this room! When I am on my feet again — we will see.”

A frightened look, almost one of panic, came into Martin’s face. He started forward involuntarily, exclaiming: “Gervase, you don’t mean, to accuse me of this? You can’t think I would commit murder!”

A queer little smile flitted across the Earl’s eyes. “You haven’t murdered me.”

“I never tried to! You must believe me! We’re — we’re half-brothers! Only think of the scandal!”

“I have thought of it. I told Theo I had caught a glimpse of a thick-set fellow, dressed in homespuns, hiding in the thicket.”

Martin drew a shuddering sigh. “I knew you could not — did you see such a fellow?”

“I saw no one.”

“Are you sure of that?” Martin asked, frowning down at him. “Because — Well, never mind!” He caught Miss Morville’s eye, and said: “Oh, very well! I’m going! Only if you are afraid to let me enter your room, and I am to have Chard standing guard over me in this way — ”

“You shall be relieved of Chard. Before you go, tell me how that panel works!”

“I wonder you should never have been shown! I remember when my father first showed it to me: I can’t have been more than ten years old.”

“Very likely. I had not the felicity of standing upon such easy terms with him. How is it opened?”

“Oh, it is quite a knacky thing! It has a queer latch upon the inside, with a stop on it, so that when it is down the panel cannot slide back. You may open it from this side by twisting one of the bosses at the head of that pillar.” He stepped up to the wall, and laid his hand on the boss. “This one. It has a device which lifts the latch, if you turn it — like this!”

“Ingenious! May I ask now the panel is secured from this room?”

“It ain’t. You may only secure it from the inside. That’s very simply done: you have only to thrust a wedge between the latch and the guard, so that it can’t be raised. If that’s done, the boss won’t move, of course. I daresay that when they came spying out priests’ holes, in the old days, they used to try if any of the mouldings of the wainscots could be moved. This would have baffled them!”

“No doubt. Is there no means of securing the entrance at the bottom of the stair?”

“No, but the cupboard is kept locked. We don’t use it nowadays.”

The Earl held out his hand. “The key, if you please!”

“I was going to lock the cupboard, and put the key back!”

“Thank you, I prefer to keep it in my own possession. Where, in general, is it to be found?”

“In the steward’s room. Perran has all the keys hanging in a cupboard there.”

“It is not an arrangement which recommends itself to me.”

“Oh, as you please!” Martin said, and gave an old-fashioned key into his hand.

“Thank you. Now go back to your own room, and tell Chard I wish to see him, if you please!”

“Very well. And you don’t think — you don’t believe that — ”

“Forgive me! I am too tired to discuss this matter further tonight.”

“Then I’ll say good-night!” Martin said stiffly. “I beg your pardon for disturbing you!”

Gervase did not answer. Miss Morville waited until Martin had left the room before she said: “I hope, my lord, that you mean Chard to lock that door immediately!”

“Why, yes!”

“I trust I am not one to refine too much upon trifles, but I do not like the notion of having a secret stair leading to your room!”

“Nor I,” he said, regarding her in some amusement.

“To own the truth,” she confessed, “my blood ran cold when I saw that panel begin to slide open!”

“Indeed, I was afraid that you would call Turvey in, which I particularly did not wish.”

“No, I had made up my mind not to do that before you grasped my wrist. While I was present you were safe, I knew.”

“You are a remarkable woman, Miss Morville.”

“On the contrary, I am sadly commonplace,” she replied. “I shall say no more to you tonight on what has occurred. I can see it has teased you very much, and I wish you will try to put it out of your mind until you are stronger.” She straightened the quilt as she spoke, and after a moment’s hesitation said, in a colourless tone: “Your medicine I keep in my own charge, and you may like to know, my lord, that all the nourishment you partake of passes from the head-cook’s hands to Turvey’s only.”

“Yes, I had not considered the chances of poison,” he said thoughtfully. “Thank you! This is your doing, I collect.”

“By no means. I fancy it was concerted between Turvey, Abney, and the head-cook himself. Whatever may be the sentiments of certain members of your family, sir, you have trustworthy guards in your servants.”

“It seems so indeed! I cannot conceive why they should concern themselves with my welfare!”

She said gravely: “There is no understanding it, to be sure, but so it is! And here, I think, comes Chard. I shall leave you now, my lord. Pray do not vex yourself more than you need! You have been frowning ever since you heard Martin’s story, you know!”

“Have I? I beg your pardon! He has given me food for a good deal of thought.”

“You will be able to think more clearly in a day or two,” she said, and went to the door, and opened it. “You may come in, Chard: his lordship wishes to speak with you. You will not keep him wakeful overlong, I know. Goodnight, my lord!”

She went out, and Chard approached the bed cautiously. He was welcomed with a smile. “Not dead yet, Chard. What a work you must have had, driving those grays, and preventing me from falling out of the curricle!”

“Well, I did, me lord,” Chard owned, grinning at him. “And very much contra pelo it went with me not to be able to stop to catch the villain red-handed! But by the time I had them grays under control you was gone off into a swound, and bleeding so that I durstn’t do anything but drive home hell-for-leather.”

“I am very much obliged to you. You did right, and I doubt whether you would have caught my would-be assassin, even had you been able to stop.”

“I would have liked to have got just one glimpse of him, me lord,” Chard said. “I know what I know, but it ain’t enough. And I’m rare set-about that I let that young — let Mr. Martin slip through my hands tonight, so to speak! What I don’t see is how he got into your lordship’s room without me seeing him at it!”

“He got into it by way of that stair, which you may see, if you turn round.”

“Ho!” said Chard, having subjected the panel and the cavity beyond it to a close inspection. “So that’s the way it is, is it? Next thing we know we’ll be having an embascado inside this here Castle, as well as out of it! Well, me lord, that’s properly bowled me out, that has! Why, you might have been smothered in your bed, and no one the wiser!”

“I fancy that very nearly did happen to me once,” said the Earl reflectively. “I don’t mean to be approached by that stair again, so, if you will be so good, Chard, you may take a candle, and go out by the secret way, and when you come out of the cupboard, into which I understand it has access, lock it, and keep the key. Here it is!”

Chard took the key, but said: “Ay, me lord, but that ain’t enough! There’s someone as is desperate set on stashing your glim, and by what I’ve seen he won’t stop for much. Seems to me we’ll both of us be easier in our minds if I was to set here quiet during the night, while your lordship gets a bit of sleep!”

The Earl shook his head. “Thank you, no! I have something else for you to do. I fancy nothing will be attempted against me while I am confined to my bed, with Turvey in the dressing-room.”

“Him!” said Chard scornfully. “He might wake if you was to sound a trumpet outside his door — there’s no saying!”

“He would wake if I called to him. But I have a better answer for a would-be assassin than Turvey. Open the top right-hand drawer of that chest, if you please! You will find my pistol there: bring it to me! Be careful! it is loaded and primed. Thank you!” The Earl took the pistol, and laid it on the table beside his bed. “Now light a candle!” He waited until Chard had obeyed him, and then said: “Don’t mount guard outside Mr. Martin’s room!”

“Me lord!” Chard said explosively. “Mr. Martin was caught by me the best part of the way to King’s Lynn this day!”

“Yes. I know.”

“Very good, me lord, but p’raps you don’t know what sort of a Canterbury tale he saw fit to tell me!”

“I have heard it. But I do not wish him to know that he is watched. In the house, I think I stand in no danger. But in a day or two I shall be out of this bed, and when that happens, then I want you to watch Mr. Martin, once he is outside these walls. You will not always find it possible to follow him, but discover where he goes, and if he takes a gun out, follow him as close as you may.” He paused. “And if I too am outside these walls, Chard, don’t let him out of your sight!” he said deliberately.

Martin’s return to Stanyon brought about two changes in the existing arrangements at the Castle: the Dowager emerged from the seclusion of her own apartments, and Lord Ulverston postponed his departure for London. No one was much surprised at this, and although the Earl murmured that Lucy’s presence was unlikely to preserve him from harm he raised no demur to it, events having largely banished from Martin’s mind other and less immediately important issues. Indeed, it was doubtful if Martin would now have offered for Marianne, had her affections been disengaged, for when she drove over to Stanyon with her parents, to enquire after the progress of its owner, her shocked gaze informed him tolerably clearly what were her sentiments upon the occasion. That the story he had told should have met with disbelief, first, and palpably, from his half-brother, and then from the lady whom he had intended to wed, struck Martin with stunning effect, and in some measure prepared him for his reception at Mr. Warboys’s hands.