The Man in the Brown Suit
should really inspire you with confidence, my dear lady. No
self-respecting murderer would ever consent to look like one.
Crippen, now, I believe, was one of the pleasantest fellows
imaginable.”
“He was caught on a liner, wasn’t he?” murmured Mrs. Blair.
There was a slight rattle behind us. I turned quickly. Mr.
Chichester had dropped his coffee-cup.
Our party soon broke up; Mrs. Blair went below to sleep and I went
out on deck. Colonel Race followed me.
“You’re very elusive, Miss Beddingfeld. I looked for you everywhere
last night at the dance.”
“I went to bed early,” I explained.
“Are you going to run away to-night too? Or are you going to dance
with me?”
“I shall be very pleased to dance with you,” I murmured shyly. “But
Mrs. Blair——”
“Our friend, Mrs. Blair, doesn’t care for dancing.”
“And you do?”
“I care for dancing with you.”
“Oh!” I said nervously.
I was a little afraid of Colonel Race. Nevertheless I was enjoying
myself. This was better than discussing fossilized skulls with
stuffy old professors! Colonel Race was really just my ideal of a
stern silent Rhodesian. Possibly I might marry him! I hadn’t been
asked, it is true, but, as the Boy Scouts say, Be Prepared! And
all women, without in the least meaning it, consider every man they
meet as a possible husband for themselves or for their best friend.
I danced several times with him that evening. He danced well. When
the dancing was over, and I was thinking of going to bed, he
suggested a turn round the deck. We walked round three times and
finally subsided into two deck-chairs. There was nobody else in
sight. We made desultory conversation for some time.
“Do you know, Miss Beddingfeld, I think that I once met your
father? A very interesting man—on his own subject, and it’s a
subject that has a special fascination for me. In my humble way,
I’ve done a bit in that line myself. Why, when I was in the Dordogne
region——”
Our talk became technical. Colonel Race’s boast was not an idle
one. He knew a great deal. At the same time, he made one or two
curious mistakes—slips of the tongue, I might almost have thought
them. But he was quick to take his cue from me and to cover them
up. Once he spoke of the Mousterian period as succeeding the
Aurignacian—an absurd mistake for one who knew anything of the
subject.
It was twelve o’clock when I went to my cabin. I was still puzzling
over those queer discrepancies. Was it possible that he had “got
the whole subject up” for the occasion—that really he knew nothing
of archaeology? I shook my head, vaguely dissatisfied with that
solution.
Just as I was dropping off to sleep, I sat up with a sudden start
as another idea flashed into my head. Had _he_ been pumping _me?_
Were those slight inaccuracies just tests—to see whether I really
knew what I was talking about? In other words, he suspected me of
not being genuinely Anne Beddingfeld.
Why?
CHAPTER XII
_(Extract from the diary of Sir Eustace Pedler)_
There is something to be said for life on board ship. It is
peaceful. My grey hairs fortunately exempt me from the indignities
of bobbing for apples, running up and down the deck with potatoes
and eggs, and the more painful sports of “Brother Bill” and Bolster
Bar. What amusement people can find in these painful proceedings
has always been a mystery to me. But there are many fools in the
world. One praises God for their existence and keeps out of their
way.
Fortunately I am an excellent sailor. Pagett, poor fellow, is not.
He began turning green as soon as we were out of the Solent. I
presume my other so-called secretary is also sea-sick. At any rate
he has not yet made his appearance. But perhaps it is not
sea-sickness, but high diplomacy. The great thing is that I have
not been worried by him.
On the whole, the people on board are a mangy lot. Only two decent
Bridge players and one decent-looking woman—Mrs. Clarence Blair.
I’ve met her in town of course. She is one of the only women I know
who can lay claim to a sense of humour. I enjoy talking to her,
and should enjoy it more if it were not for a long-legged taciturn
ass who has attached himself to her like a limpet. I cannot think
that this Colonel Race really amuses her. He’s good-looking in his
way, but dull as ditch water. One of these strong silent men that
lady novelists and young girls always rave over.
Guy Pagett struggled up on deck after we left Madeira and began
babbling in a hollow voice about work. What the devil does any one
want to work for on board ship? It is true that I promised my
publishers my “Reminiscences” early in the summer, but what of it?
Who really reads reminiscences? Old ladies in the suburbs. And what
do my reminiscences amount to? I’ve knocked against a certain
number of so-called famous people in my lifetime. With the
assistance of Pagett, I invent insipid anecdotes about them. And,
the truth of the matter is, Pagett is too honest for the job. He
won’t let me invent anecdotes about the people I might have met
but haven’t.
I tried kindness with him.
“You look a perfect wreck still, my dear chap,” I said easily.
“What you need is a deck-chair in the sun. No—not another word.
The work must wait.”
The next thing I knew he was worrying about an extra cabin. “There’s
no room to work in your cabin, Sir Eustace. It’s full of trunks.”
From his tone, you might have thought that trunks were blackbeetles,
something that had no business to be there.
I explained to him that, though he might not be aware of the fact,
it was usual to take a change of clothing with one when travelling.
He gave the wan smile with which he always greets my attempts at
humour, and then reverted to the business in hand.
“And we could hardly work in my little hole.”
I know Pagett’s “little holes”—he usually has the best cabin on
the ship.
“I’m sorry the Captain didn’t turn out for you this time,” I said
sarcastically. “Perhaps you’d like to dump some of your extra
luggage in my cabin?”
Sarcasm is dangerous with a man like Pagett. He brightened up at
once.
“Well, if I could get rid of the typewriter and the stationery
trunk——”
The stationery trunk weighs several solid tons. It causes endless
unpleasantness with the porters, and it is the aim of Pagett’s life
to foist it on me. It is a perpetual struggle between us. He seems
to regard it as my special personal property. I, on the other hand,
regard the charge of it as the only thing where a secretary is
really useful.
“We’ll get an extra cabin,” I said hastily.
The thing seemed simple enough, but Pagett is a person who loves
to make mysteries. He came to me the next day with a face like a
Renaissance conspirator.
“You know you told me to get Cabin 17 for an office?”
“Well, what of it? Has the stationery trunk jammed in the doorway?”
“The doorways are the same size in all the cabins,” replied Pagett
seriously. “But I tell you, Sir Eustace, there’s something very
queer about that cabin.”
Memories of reading _The Upper Berth_ floated through my mind.
“If you mean that it’s haunted,” I said, “we’re not going to sleep
there, so I don’t see that it matters. Ghosts don’t affect
typewriters.”
Pagett said that it wasn’t a ghost, and that, after all, he hadn’t
got Cabin 17. He told me a long, garbled story. Apparently he, and
a Mr. Chichester, and a girl called Beddingfeld, had almost come
to blows over the cabin. Needless to say, the girl had won, and
Pagett was apparently feeling sore over the matter.
“Both 13 and 28 are better cabins,” he reiterated. “But they
wouldn’t look at them.”
“Well,” I said, stifling a yawn, “for that matter, no more would
you, my dear Pagett.”
He gave me a reproachful look.
“You _told_ me to get Cabin 17.”
There is a touch of the “boy upon the burning deck” about Pagett.
“My dear fellow,” I said testily, “I mentioned No. 17 because I
happened to observe that it was vacant. But I didn’t mean you to
make a stand to the death about it—13 or 28 would have done us
equally well.”
He looked hurt.
“There’s something more, though,” he insisted. “Miss Beddingfeld
got the cabin, but this morning I saw Chichester coming out of it
in a furtive sort of way.”
I looked at him severely.
“If you’re trying to get up a nasty scandal about Chichester, who
is a missionary—though a perfectly poisonous person—and that
attractive child, Anne Beddingfeld, I don’t believe a word of it,”
I said coldly. “Anne Beddingfeld is an extremely nice girl—with
particularly good legs. I should say she had far and away the best
legs on board.”
Pagett did not like my reference to Anne Beddingfeld’s legs. He is
the sort of man who never notices legs himself—or, if he does,
would die sooner than say so. Also he thinks my appreciation of
such things frivolous. I like annoying Pagett, so I continued
maliciously:
“As you’ve made her acquaintance, you might ask her to dine at our
table to-morrow night. It’s the Fancy Dress dance. By the way,
you’d better go down to the barber and select a fancy costume for
me.”
“Surely you will not go in fancy dress?” said Pagett, in tones of
horror.
I could see that it was quite incompatible with his idea of my
dignity. He looked shocked and pained. I had really had no intention
of donning fancy dress, but the complete discomfiture of Pagett
was too tempting to be forborne.
“What do you mean?” I said. “Of course I shall wear fancy dress.
So will you.”
Pagett shuddered.
“So go down to the barber’s and see about it,” I finished.
“I don’t think he’ll have any out sizes,” murmured Pagett, measuring
my figure with his eye.
Without meaning it, Pagett can occasionally be extremely offensive.
“And order a table for six in the saloon,” I said. “We’ll have the
Captain, the girl with the nice legs, Mrs. Blair——”
“You won’t get Mrs. Blair without Colonel Race,” Pagett interposed.
“He’s asked her to dine with him, I know.”
Pagett always knows everything. I was justifiably annoyed.
“Who _is_ Race?” I demanded, exasperated.
As I said before, Pagett always knows everything—or thinks he does.
He looked mysterious again.
“They say he’s a Secret Service chap, Sir Eustace. Rather a great
gun too. But of course I don’t know for certain.”
“Isn’t that like the Government?” I exclaimed. “Here’s a man on
board whose business it is to carry about secret documents, and
they go giving them to a peaceful outsider, who only asks to be
let alone.”
Pagett looked even more mysterious. He came a pace nearer and
dropped his voice.
“If you ask me, the whole thing is very queer, Sir Eustace. Look
at that illness of mine before we started——”
“My dear fellow,” I interrupted brutally, “that was a bilious
attack. You’re always having bilious attacks.”
Pagett winced slightly.
“It wasn’t the usual sort of bilious attack. This time——
“For God’s sake, don’t go into the details of your condition,
Pagett. I don’t want to hear them.”
“Very well, Sir Eustace. But my belief is that I was deliberately
_poisoned!”_
“Ah!” I said. “You’ve been talking to Rayburn.”
He did not deny it.
“At any rate, Sir Eustace, _he_ thinks so—and he should be in a
position to know.”
“By the way, where is the chap?” I asked. “I’ve not set eyes on
him since we came on board.”
“He gives out that he’s ill, and stays in his cabin, Sir Eustace.”
Pagett’s voice dropped again. “But that’s _camouflage,_ I’m sure.
So that he can watch better.”
“Watch?”
“Over your safety, Sir Eustace. In case an attack should be made
upon you.”
“You’re such a cheerful fellow, Pagett,” I said. “I trust that your
imagination runs away with you. If I were you I should go to the
dance as a death’s head or an executioner. It will suit your
mournful style of beauty.”