The Sleeping Sphinx

way, what do I call you?'

'Call me Don Dismallo. It's as good a name as any. Lord knows I feel like it.'

Doris's sympathy increased.

'About—Celia?' she asked.

'Yes, that. And things. Just things!'

'I know,' Doris nodded wisely. She stepped softly into the cleared space under the big tree. It was as though, with those few words, a deep understanding had been established between them.

'There are other people who feel like that, Don Dismallo,' Doris said.

'Incidentally, Doris: on that night of the Murder game, you don't happen to remember what Margot was wearing?'

Doris stiffened. 'Why do you want to know that?'

'Well, Celia'—he saw her sympathy return again—'Celia said Margot bad never looked more beautiful than on that night, in what she was wearing.'

'Oh?' murmured Doris.

'So I just wondered what she was wearing. But,' he gestured, that was over six months ago, so naturally you wouldn't remember. Since you had no special reason for remembering.'

'I remember perfectly well,' Doris told him coldly. 'Mrs. Marsh was wearing some kind of silvery thing. It didn't suit her at all. I don't mean she wasn't very good looking; of course she was, for her age; I simply mean it didn't suit her.'

'A silvery dress. You're sure it wasn't a black velvet one?'

'I'm positive it wasn't Positive! But...'

A cloudy memory stirred at the back of Doris's blue eyes. Holden, with a flash of instinct, was after it

'Margot’s death must have been a great shock to Thorley,' he said. 'And to your family, since you were all such great friends. I suppose he rang up your parents, after it happened?'

'Oh, yes.' Her eyes were far away. 'Early in the morning!'

'And perhaps you all went over to Caswall?'

'Yes. Straightaway. Father and mother,' the pretty face darkened, 'didn't want me to go. Funnily enough, Don Dismallo,' she laughed a little, 'that's exactly what I was thinking about! While they were talking to—to Thorley . . .'

'Yes, Doris?'

'I ran up the back stairs and peeped into That Woman's room. Just for a second, you know. And there was a black velvet dress on a chair at the foot of the bed. And gray stockings. Nylons. I noticed them, you see; they were nylons.'

Bang had gone the shot, straight to the center of the target

Holden, trying to breathe freely and easily, glanced toward the yellowish-brown front of Caswall. The flap of a pigeon's wings, in a white flicker from the stable courtyard long disused except for one garage, rose distinctly across the field. There was a small splash and ripple from the moat.

Here was Celia's story—'unbalanced' Celia, damn them! —confirmed by a girl who doubtless had no idea she was confirming it, and who would be the one witness (for reasons of her own) to remember everything about Margot

'Thorley...' he began.

'What about Thorley?' Doris asked quickly.

(

He smiled. 'You're rather fond of Thorley, aren't you?'

'Ye-es. I dare say I am.' She spoke offhandedly, with that nineteen-year-old reluctance, combined with the rush of blood to the face, which conceals sheer adoration. It disquieted Holden and rather frightened him.

'You—you say,' Doris added, 'Thorley’s over there now. You've finished dinner?'

'Yes. And a very lavish dinner it was.'

'Of course. It would be.' Then Doris let herself go. 'Thorley knows his way about, thanks. He tells me he's got the black market lined up just like that.' She drew an invisible line in the air. 'If there's something he wants, then nothing will stop him from getting it And I don't think there's anything he can't do, either. Even to—walking on logs.'

'Even to... what?'

'If s nothing, really. But it was on the day you were talking about, the afternoon before the Murder party. You remember the trout stream that runs through our grounds?'

'I think I've seen it.'

'Well, Thorley and Ronnie and I were out after the big blue trout that hangs about in the deep pool under the sycamore.' (Now it was the girl speaking, rather than the poised, arch, alert young lady.) 'That blue trout, you can't catch him; he's too wily; but you can have some fun with him. There was a thin log over the pool. Ronnie tried nonchalantly to walk across it, and only fell in with a splash. Thorley said, 'Come, nowl' And Thorley walked across the log, and then turned around and walked back with his eyes shut Mind you, with his eyes shut.'

Holden only nodded gravely.

'I mean,' said Doris, pulling herself together, 'that’ s how I like a man to be!' She surveyed Holden. 'You know, Don Dismallo,' she said abruptly, 'you're sort of,' she groped for a word, 'sort of sympathetic.'

'Am I, Doris? Thanks.'

'And I never used to think you were.'

'Weill You've grown up now.'

'Of course I have.' Though she still held one shoulder elaborately high, as though aloof, she came closer. The blue eyes were angry. 'You—you said you were down in the dumps about Celia.'

'Yes. But you've helped me.'

'I've helped you?'

'By George, you have!'

'Anyway,' Doris disregarded this, 'I told you you weren't the only one. I mean, it was too utterly absurd of my father and mother to be absolutely livid just because I chose to go to London on my own for a few days!' Doris laughed. Her whole face and expression became genuinely, subtly mature. 'The things I could teach my own mother!' she said.

'I see. But...'

'But,' interrupted Doris, with a short gesture, 'their getting into a flat spin about a few days in town was the last straw. It was, really. And, what’s more, tonight I'm going to end it.'

'End what?'

'You'll see,' answered Doris, nodding her head in a meaning fashion. 'There are certain secrets about certain people, and maybe dead people as well, that ought to have an airing. And they're going to get one. Tonight.'

'Meaning what?'

'You'll see,' Doris promised again. 'I'm off now, Don Dismallo. You're nice.' 'Here! Doris! Stop a bit!'

But she was already running lightly through the long grass toward the house, her short skirt swinging at her knees.

There was going to be trouble, an explosion of some kind. Under that assumption of casualness Doris was in a feverish state of mind. Holden's eyes strayed toward the left. Far over there westward, hidden now by the trees of the carriage drive, lay Caswell Church of so many memories, and the churchyard sloping up into a hill; and, a mile or more beyond that hill on the road to Chippenham, the large modern house called Widestairs.

Doris Locke had stamped over here, flaming. 'It was too utterly absurd of my father and mother to be absolutely livid just because I chose to go to London on my own for a few days!' And then that look as she laughed and added: 'The things I could teach my own mother!'

Trouble!

Dusk was settling softly in clear, warm air. Caswall's narrow windows had lost their reflected light. The floor of the stone bridge across the moat, built there when the south front had been remodeled in the eighteenth century, showed whitish against darkening water.