Dance to Your Daddy

an apple. 'She is becoming quite impossible.'

'It is only her country manner,' said Romilly soothingly, yet with a note of warning in his voice. 'I think we must overlook it, especially as maids are difficult to obtain. We don't want her giving notice. If she goes, I'm pretty sure that Amabel will go with her, and they're very clean, good workers. You've said as much yourself.'

'That girl is on the verge of insolence!'

'Oh, no, I think not, my dear. And if she brings the things in on a trolley, there really is no need for a second table.'

'She'll have to do as she's told when our visitors come. I won't have her insolent to them. I'm sure Dame Beatrice doesn't take insolence from her servants. I've noticed how very respectful her chauffeur is.'

'George has been with me for many years,' said Dame Beatrice, 'and my other servants, except for the kitchenmaid, who is a country girl from Warwickshire, are French.'

'That might account for it,' said Judith. She looked balefully at Romilly. 'Uncle can't manage servants, anyway. He's much too soft with them.'

Romilly traced a pattern on the handsome rug with the toe of his shoe. Without looking up, he said:

'You are right, of course, my dear, but, if you can understand a syllogism, think of this: all housekeepers are servants. You are a housekeeper, therefore you are a servant.'

'How can you talk like that, when you have me call you Uncle?'

'Wait. I have not finished. I cannot manage servants, therefore I cannot manage you. And, of course, I cannot, but, at any rate, I can continue to try. I forbid you, utterly and absolutely, to attempt to take Violet to task for what she said about the tea-trolley. Think, my dear girl, think! How could you run a house this size without the help of the maids?' He raised his eyes and looked her straight in the face. There was an awkward moment of silence before Judith said sullenly:

'All right. You're only storing up trouble for yourself, but I suppose you must have your own way.' She made an attempt to smile, and added, in a light and playful tone, 'You're a very wicked old man!'

Dame Beatrice, who had been casually working at an indeterminate piece of knitting, dropped it on the rug as the tea-trolley made its noisy approach to them across the tiled floor.

'How nice to have a cup of tea,' she said. What she thought was a different matter. It was that, in this particular household, even impudent servants had to be conciliated.

(3)

Dame Beatrice that night wrote to Laura.

'The situation here is fascinating, macabre and in many ways incredible. I am living in a world of Sheridan Le Fanu, Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins and the Brontes. Imagine-a simple matter for a romantic such as yourself-a house inhabited by a smiling villain, a light-of-love who calls him her uncle, a sinister manservant, two country maidens of unblemished character, and an heiress who is permitted to wear nothing but fancy dress for fear she will elude the villain and his paramour and make her escape from their clutches!

'Of course, I do not know how much I should believe of the victim's story, but I have so little liking for her (alleged) persecutors that, when you have leisure to spare from attendance upon Eiladh, I wish you would make a few enquiries for me.

'I want to know details of the Will of a certain Felix Napoleon Lestrange, who died in April, 1966. I do not know where he lived, but, with that sufficiently unusual name, identification should be a reasonably simple matter.

'You will wish to know what has befallen me since my arrival in this house. I was made welcome with an effusiveness which aroused my suspicions. My bedroom, which, I have been informed, must also be my consulting- room, has had an interior wall breached so that a foot-square hole communicates with the adjoining room. Any conversations I may have with my patient, therefore, can be overheard. I have circumvented this invasion of our privacy, so far, by taking the patient out in my car and holding a conversation with her during the drive. We went to Swanage, and were followed. This added to the general impression of what I feel sure you would refer to as Rosamund being trapped in the Den of the Secret Nine. I feel that my move to talk with my patient in private has scarcely found favour with her captors, who were most anxious to accompany us on our outing, a policy with which I found myself unable to agree. Their attempt to follow us was indicative, I thought, of their state of mind.

'I have also discovered why I was sent for at this particular time when, according to Romilly's own statement, it would have been better, from the patient's point of view, to have called me in a year or more ago, but, when I have mastered the contents of the Will, I shall know whether my interpretation of the evidence is justified and what is the best course to pursue. My patient appears to have no idea of my identity. I have been recommended to her, it seems, under the name of Professor Beatrice Adler. I mention this because, if what she has told me is correct, something in the terms of Felix Napoleon's bequest may surprise you.

'I would not trouble you so soon did I not think (as she herself does) that my patient is in extreme danger either of death or (which appears to be my role) found incapable of managing her affairs and so losing all control of her fortune. I hasten to assure you that I myself am in no danger whatsoever. I am thought far too valuable to be liquidated, and George, the good, reliable fellow, is alive to the nuances (if I may put it in that way) of the situation as they strike both of us at present, and is prepared to cope with anything untoward which may crop up.'

Having closed and stamped her letter, Dame Beatrice descended to the great hall with the intention of walking to the end of the drive and putting it into Galliard Hall's own post office collecting box, a neat affair affixed to the outside of the wall which abutted on to the road. She had reached the hall door when she was intercepted by Romilly.

'You are surely not thinking of taking a walk in the dark, my dear Beatrice?' he said.

'A walk? No, that is an exaggeration,' she replied. 'I am going as far as the postbox at your gate.'

'A letter? Oh, I see. You had better give it to me. We let the dogs loose at night.'

'You are nervous of being burgled?'