'Why not?'
Mr Bradley looked at me reprovingly.
'Clients are guaranteed complete – er – safety,' he said, 'if they obey orders.'
'What about Bournemouth? Would Bournemouth do?'
'Yes, Bournemouth would be adequate. Stay at a hotel, make a few acquaintances, be seen in their company. The blameless life – that is what we aim at. You can always go on to Torquay if you get tired of Bournemouth.'
He spoke with the affability of a travel agent. Once again I had to shake his podgy hand.
Chapter 17
I
'Are you really going to a seance at Thyrza's?' Rhoda demanded.
'Why not?'
'I never knew you were interested in that sort of thing, Mark.'
'I'm not really,' I said truthfully. 'But it's such a queer setup, those three. I'm curious to see what sort of a show they put on.'
I did not find it really easy to put on a light manner. Out of the tail of my eye, I saw Hugh Despard looking at me thoughtfully. He was a shrewd man, with an adventurous life behind him. One of those men who have a kind of sixth sense where danger is concerned. I think he scented its presence now – realized that something more important than idle curiosity was at stake.
'Then I shall come with you,' said Rhoda gleefully. 'I've always wanted to.'
'You'll do nothing of the sort, Rhoda,' growled Despard.
'But I don't really believe in spirits and all that, Hugh. You know I don't. I just want to go for the fun of it!'
'That sort of business isn't fun,' said Despard. 'There may be something genuine to it, there probably is. But it doesn't have a good effect on people who go out of 'idle curiosity.''
'Then you ought to dissuade Mark, too.'
'Mark's not my responsibility,' said Despard.
But again he gave me that quick sidelong look. He knew, I was quite sure, that I had a purpose.
Rhoda was annoyed, but she got over it, and when we chanced to meet Thyrza Grey in the village a little later that morning, Thyrza herself was blunt upon the matter.
'Hallo, Mr Easterbrook, we're expecting you this evening. Hope we can put on a good show for you. Sybil's a wonderful medium, but one never knows beforehand what results one will get. So you mustn't be disappointed. One thing I do ask you. Keep an open mind. An honest inquirer is always welcome – but a frivolous, scoffing approach is bad.'
'I wanted to come, too,' said Rhoda. 'But Hugh is so frightfully prejudiced. You know what he's like.'
'I wouldn't have had you, anyway,' said Thyrza. 'One outsider is quite enough.'
She turned to me.
'Suppose you come and have a light meal with us first,' she said. 'We never eat much before a seance. About seven o'clock? Good, we'll be expecting you.'
She nodded, smiled, and strode briskly away. I stared after her, so engrossed in my surmises, that I entirely missed what Rhoda was saying to me.
'What did you say? I'm sorry.'
'You've been very odd lately, Mark. Ever since you arrived. Is anything the matter?'
'No, of course not. What should be the matter?'
'Have you got stuck with the book? Something like that?'
'The book?' Just for a moment I couldn't remember anything about the book. Then I said hastily, 'Oh yes, the book. It's getting on more or less all right.'
'I believe you're in love,' said Rhoda accusingly. 'Yes, that's it. Being in love has a very bad effect on men – it seems to addle their wits. Now women are just the opposite – on top of the world, looking radiant and twice as good-looking as usual. Funny, isn't it, that it should suit women, and only make a man look like a sick sheep?'
'Thank you!' I said.
'Oh, don't be cross with me, Mark. I think it's a very good thing really, and I'm delighted. She's really very nice.'
'Who's nice?'
'Hermia Redcliffe, of course. You seem to think I know nothing about anything. I've seen it coming on for ages. And she really is just the person for you – good-looking and clever; absolutely suitable.'
'That,' I said, 'is one of the cattiest things you could say about anyone.'
Rhoda looked at me.
'It is, rather,' she said.
She turned away and said she had to go and give a pep talk to the butcher. I said that I would go and pay a call at the vicarage.
'But not -' I forestalled any comment – 'in order to ask the vicar to put the banns up!'
II
Coming to the vicarage was like coming home.
The front door was hospitably open, and as I stepped inside I was conscious of a burden slipping from my shoulders.
Mrs Dane Calthrop came through a door at the back of the hall, carrying for some reason unfathomable to me an enormous plastic pail of bright green.
'Hallo, it's you,' she said. 'I thought it would be.'
She handed me the pail. I had no idea what to do with it and stood looking awkward.
'Outside the door, on the step,' said Mrs Dane Calthrop impatiently as though I ought to have known.
I obeyed. Then I followed her into the same dark shabby room we had sat in before. There was a rather moribund fire there, but Mrs Dane Calthrop poked it into flame and dumped a log on it. Then she motioned me to sit down, plumped down herself, and fixed me with a bright impatient eye.
'Well?' she demanded. 'What have you done?'
From the vigour of her manner we might have had a train to catch.
'You told me to do something. I am doing something.'
'Good. What?'
I told her. I told her everything. In some unspoken way I told her things I did not quite know myself.
'Tonight?' said Mrs Dane Calthrop thoughtfully.
'Yes.'
She was silent for a minute, obviously thinking. Unable to help myself I blurted out, 'I don't like it. My God, I don't like it!'
'Why should you?'
That, of course, was unanswerable.
'I'm so horribly afraid for her.'
She looked at me kindly.
'You don't know,' I said, 'how – how brave she is. If, in some way, they manage to harm her…'
Mrs Dane Calthrop said slowly:
