Timothy, concluding his telephone conversation, looked a little less cheerful than when it had begun; but he paused at the bar to buy another bottle of Nierstein.
Returning to the table, he refilled Selena’s glass. This, as it turned out, was a pity. Then he filled his own. Ragwort and I were left to fend for ourselves: a trifling discourtesy, but not like Timothy. I began to think that something must be wrong.
“That was Cantrip,” said Timothy, sitting down and addressing himself to Selena. “I’m afraid it sounds as if Julia’s in a spot of trouble.”
“She can’t be,” said Selena. “She’s still in Venice. I mean, I dare say she could be, but Cantrip couldn’t know about it.”
“Cantrip, you will remember, is working in the News Room of the
“Yes,” said Ragwort, “we know that. But what could Julia do that would interest an international news agency?”
“They seem to think,” said Timothy, looking apologetic and still addressing Selena, “that she’s stabbed someone. Fatally.”
It was, as I say, a pity that he had so recently refilled Selena’s glass, for she now released her hold on it and it dropped, almost full, on to the hard composite floor.
“I’m sorry,” said Selena. “How very clumsy of me. I don’t think, Timothy, that I have correctly understood you. What exactly do you say it said in the agency report?”
“So far as I can discover,” said Timothy, “that an English tourist has been found stabbed to death in a hotel bedroom in Venice. And that a member of the same group, Miss Julia Larwood of London, barrister, has been detained by the police for questioning.”
“Nonsense,” said Selena.
“I know,” said Timothy, still looking apologetic. “But that seems to be what it said in the report.”
“They didn’t say,” asked Ragwort, “who’s supposed to have been stabbed?”
“No. I suppose they’re waiting to tell the next of kin, if there are any. But it sounds as if it must have been one of the Art Lovers.”
“Timothy,” said Selena, “are you sure it isn’t one of Cantrip’s frightful jokes?”
“Quite sure, I’m afraid. Cantrip’s jokes, though admittedly frightful, are not as frightful as that. Besides, if it had been a joke, he would have been trying to sound serious. He wasn’t: he was trying quite hard to sound casual. He was still in the News Room, you see. I was rather confused at first. He began by asking me if I knew a bird called Julia Larwood and I said of course I knew Julia, what on earth was he talking about. To which he replied that he didn’t think I did, but he thought it was worth asking because his News Editor had suddenly got interested in her. So I gathered then that something odd was happening.”
“Are we,” asked Ragwort, “going to do anything, in particular?”
“We’re meeting in Guido’s, as arranged. Cantrip will be keeping an eye on the teleprinter, of course, and if any more news comes through before ten o’clock he’ll tell us about it.”
It is difficult, on such an occasion as I have described, to know on precisely what note to resume the conversation. We were silent for several moments.
“Dear me,” said Selena eventually. “What a very good thing, after all, Timothy, that you are going to Venice tomorrow.”
CHAPTER 4
Guido’s is not the nearest restaurant to the Corkscrew, nor the most economical in that vicinity. The superiority of its menu, however, is sufficient compensation for the short walk down Holborn Kingsway and round the back of the Aldwych Theatre; and Timothy was paying the bill.
It was not yet nine o’clock: we could not expect Cantrip for at least an hour. I proposed that in the meantime, and while eating our asparagus, we should proceed, as previously intended, with the reading of Julia’s letters. Though they might throw no direct light on the stabbing incident, it would, I suggested, be useful for Timothy, before plunging
The first began ominously.
Hotel Cytherea, Venice.
Late on Thursday night.
Dearest Selena,
I have news of a most shocking nature to impart to you. You will scarcely believe it. If anyone else had told me, I should not have believed it myself. “No, no,” I should have cried, “it is not possible. The monstrous cannot disguise itself in an angelic mask. Reason and nature prohibit it. The deformity of the mind would necessarily distort the perfection of the profile. The depravity of the soul would infect with some hideous blemish the smoothness of the complexion. No, it cannot be.”
“I suppose she’s referring,” said Timothy, “to the young man she admired so much on the aeroplane. But this is evidently written only a few hours later — what can have happened in the meantime that Julia finds so shocking? She is, after all, a tolerant woman.”
“To a fault,” said Selena.
But it is no use writing to you in this haphazard incoherent fashion, beginning at the end and ending God knows where. I will proceed clearly and chronologically, beginning at the beginning.
The beginning was not altogether auspicious, owing to my separation from my passport. We were fortunately met at the airport by our courier, a haggard, aquiline, fragile-nosed Venetian lady, who told us that her name was Graziella. It took Graziella a mere ten minutes to understand my difficulty, explain it to the Customs officer and secure my lawful entry to Italian soil. In the meantime, however, the other Art Lovers were obliged to wait for us in the motorboat which was to transport us across the lagoon to Venice. By the time we joined them, there were signs of restiveness.
The armour-plated matron, in particular, who was sitting next to the beautiful young man, made some rather wounding remarks about total imbeciles with no consideration for other people. She may not, perhaps, have intended me to hear them; but she much underestimates, in that case, the carrying power of her voice.
So fearful was I of incurring yet further disapproval, so intent on the composition of some soothing apology, that while getting into the boat I somehow missed my footing. My entry into the vessel was accordingly at an angle rather obtuse than perpendicular to the quayside and at a speed rather rapid than graceful. In short, I fell in head first.
This caused the armour-plated matron to make certain further comments reflecting on my sobriety. Still more regrettably, it enabled the Major, on the pretext of breaking my fall, to gather me in a tenacious embrace, uttering as he did so loud cries of “Whoops-a-daisy.”
By a further stroke of misfortune, my handbag, in consequence of my over-rapid descent, had become unfastened and its contents had dispersed themselves about the floor of the boat. Anxious to be as little obliged as possible to the Major for the assistance which he offered in their recovery, I set about collecting them with, as I now realize, imprudent haste and insufficient thought for the effect on my balance of an attitude of semi- genuflection. Impatient, no doubt, of further delay, the boatman now cast off. The sudden movement threw me against the side of the vessel, and brought the wooden bench, fitted thereto for the repose and comfort of passengers, into collision with my nose. My nose began to bleed.
I was thus compelled, after all, to be obliged to the Major,
