Till Death Do Us Part

‘ On your word of honour, do you promise ?'

‘Yes.’

Slowly, staring at the phone as though he hoped it might give back a secret, Dick replaced the receiver. His eyes wandered towards the diamond-paned windows. The storm had cleared away long ago: a fine night of stars showed outside, and there was a drowsy scent of wet grass and flowers to soothe bedevilled wits.

Then he swung round, with an animal-like sense of another presence, and saw Cynthia Drew looking at him from the doorway of the study.

'Hello, Dick,' smiled Cynthia.

Dick Markham had sworn to himself, had sworn a mighty oath, that he wouldn't feel uncomfortable the next time he saw this girl; that he wouldn't avoid her eye; that he wouldn't experience this exasperating sense of having done something low. But he did.

' I knocked at the front door,' she explained, 'and couldn't seem to make anyone hear. And the door was open, so I came in. You don't mind ?'

' No, of course not!'

Cynthia avoided his eye too. Conversation seemed to drop away, a dried-up gulf between them, until she decided to speak her mind.

Cynthia was one of those healthy, straightforward girls who laugh a good deal and yet sometimes seem more complex than their flightier sisters. There could be no denying her prettiness: fair hair, blue eyes, with a fine complexion and fine teeth. She stood twisting the knob of the study door, and then - click! - you saw her make up her mind.

It was no better for guessing not only what she would say, but exactly how she would say it. Cynthia looked straight at him. She drew a deep breath, her figure being set off by a pinkish-coloured jumper and a brown skirt above tan stockings and shoes. She walked forward, with a sort of calculated impulsiveness, and extended her hand.

'I've heard about you and Lesley, Dick. I'm glad, and I hope you'll both be terribly happy.'

At the same time her eyes were saying:

'I didn't think you could do this. It doesn't really matter, of course; and you see what a good sport I'm being about it; but I hope you realize you are rather low ?'

(Oh, hell!)

'Thanks, Cynthia,' he answered aloud. 'We're rather happy about it ourselves.'

Cynthia began to laugh; and immediately, as though conscious of the impropriety, checked herself.

'What I really came about,' she went on, her colour going up in spite of herself, 'is this dreadful business about Sir Harvey Gilman.'

'Yes.'

'It is Sir Harvey Gilman, isn't it?' She nodded towards the windows, and continued to speak rapidly. If Cynthia had not been such a solid girl, you would have said that there was about her a flounce and brightness.' I mean, the man who moved into Colonel Pope's old cottage a few days ago, and kept so mysteriously in the background so he could play fortune-teller. It is Sir Harvey Gilman?'

'Yes. That's right.'

' Dick, what happened this afternoon ?'

'Weren't you there?'

'No. But they say he's dying.'

On the point of speaking, Dick checked himself.

'They say there was an accident,' Cynthia continued. 'And Sir Harvey was shot near the heart. And Major Price and Dr Middlesworth picked him up and got him into a car and drove him down here. Poor Dick!'

' Why are you pitying me?'

Cynthia pressed her hands together.

'Lesley's a dear girl' - she spoke with such obvious and earnest sincerity that he could not doubt her - 'but- you shouldn't have given her that rifle. Really you shouldn't 1 She doesn't know how to deal with practical things. Major Price says Sir Harvey's in a coma and dying. Have you heard anything more from the doctor ?'

'Well-no.'

·Everybody is dreadfully upset Mrs Middlesworth says it only goes to show we shouldn't have had a shooting-range. Mrs Price took her up rather sharply, especially as the major was in charge of it. But it does seem a pity: the padre says we collected well over a hundred pounds from the whole bazaar. And people are starting the most absurd rumours.'

Cynthia was standing by the typewriter-desk, picking up scattered books only to put them down again, and talking breathlessly. She meant so well, Dick thought; she was so infernally straightforward and friendly and likeable. Yet one problem, the problem of Sir Harvey Gilman, scratched at his nerves as Cynthia's voice was beginning to scratch.

'Look here, Cynthia. I'm sorry, but I've got to go out’

'Nobody has seen Lord Ashe to ask him'what he thinks. But then we so seldom do see him, do we? By the way, why does Lord Ashe always look so oddly at poor Lesley, on the few occasions when he has seen her? Lady Ashe ...' Cynthia broke off, waking up. ‘ What did you say, Dick ?'

‘I've got to go out now.' 'To see Lesley? Of course!'

'No. To see what's happening down at the other cottage. The doctor wants to speak to me.'

Cynthia was instantly helpful. 'I'll go with you, Dick. Anything at all I can do to help -' .

' I tellyou, Cynthia. I've got to go alone!'

It was as though he had hit her in the face.

A complete swine, now. Well, let it go.

After a brief silence Cynthia laughed: the same deprecating laugh, slurring things over, he had heard her give on a tennis-court when somebody lost his temper and flung down a racket with intent to break it. She regarded him soberly, the blue eyes concerned.

' You're so temperamental, Dick,' she said fondly.

‘I'm not temperamental, curse it! It's only...'

'All writers are, I suppose. One expects it.' She dismissed the idiosyncrasy as a matter she did not understand.

' But - funny, isn't it? - one doesn't associate it with a person like you. I mean, an outdoor person, and a fine cricketer, and all that. I mean - oh, dear! There I go again! I must be pushing off.' She looked at him steadily. With colour under the blue eyes, her placid face became almost beautiful.

'But you can count on me, old boy,' she added.

Then she was gone.

It was too late to apologize now. The villain of the piece waited until she had time to get well away towards the village. Then he left the house himself.

In front of his cottage a broad country lane ran east and west, curving among trees and open fields. On one side of the lane ran the low stone wall which bounded the park of Ashe Hall; on the opposite side, set something over a hundred yards apart, were three cottages.

The first was Dick Markham's. The second stood untenanted. The third, farthest east, had been rented furnished by their enigmatic newcomer. They were intriguing to visitors, these cottages in Gallows Lane. Each stood well back from the road, and made up in picturesqueness for its shilling-in-the slot electric meter and lack of main drainage.

As Dick emerged into the lane, he could faintly hear the church clock to the west striking ten. The lane swam in dusky light, though it seemed less dark than the print of bright stars overhead, which you saw as though from a well. Night-scents and night-noises took on a peculiar -distinctness here. By the time Dick reached the last cottage, he was running blindly.

Dark.

Or almost dark.

Across the road from the Pope cottage, a thick coppice of birch-trees pressed up close inside the boundary