Ten Star Clues (26 page)

“Bertram's ever so frightened,” she said. “I mean about Anne marrying him. He doesn't want to one bit. You can't imagine how scared he is.”

“Well, he hasn't got to if he doesn't want,” Bobby remarked, and Sophy surveyed him with quiet contempt. “You don't know Anne,” she said simply.

“Oh, well,” Bobby muttered.

“I heard Lord Wych say once that Anne was like Parliament,” Sophy went on, “and I asked Lady Wych why, and she said it was because Parliament can do anything except turn a woman into a man, and Anne can do anything except turn herself into a man. If she's made up her mind, Bertram just simply hasn't got a chance, and he knows it, and it makes him most awfully sick. Because he is slack all through, and Anne won't have that. He's tremendously upset now he knows what she means. He was upset before, I mean about being the new Earl Wych. He didn't know there was such a lot to it. Being Earl Wych, I mean. He thought it was just being rich and having a good time. And it isn't. Not a bit.”

“Being an Earl Wych is a whole-time job,” Bobby agreed. “You've got to live up to it—in person, too.”

“I showed him Earl Wych's appointment book,” Sophy said. “All dinners and speeches and meetings and one thing and another. And Anne to see he didn't shirk. He said it would be like gaol, only in gaol you did get some time to yourself. I don't know if earls are necessary,” Sophy added musingly. “Our socialist club in Poplar used to call them an excrescence, only a lot of adjectives as well, but they are kept on the go. And with Anne—”

“Rubbed that in, did you?” Bobby asked when she paused.

“I don't know what you mean,” she answered with dignity. “I was only telling him. And he doesn't like the idea of going to the war, either. There's a picture in one of the rooms of an Earl Wych leading a charge or something, and looking awfully fierce, and waving his sword about, and telling the rest to come on. I used to think it was the charge of the Light Brigade at Waterloo or somewhere, but it was only practising in the park really.”

“Show it to Bertram?” Bobby asked.

“Well, I did happen to be looking at it while he was there,” Sophy admitted, “and I asked him if he thought they were all killed, and then he went away. That's all.”

“Rubbing it in?” asked Bobby again.

“I don't know why you keep saying that,” Sophy answered with still greater dignity. “He's got to know, hasn't he? It's the Wychwood Dragoon Regiment, only they use motor cars now instead of horses, but it's really all the same, and they say they are going to be the very first to be sent to France.”

“Did you tell him that, too?” Bobby asked.

“I think it was mentioned,” Sophy admitted again. “He's got to know, hasn't he? What with going to the war, and Anne going to marry him, and having to live up to being Earl Wych, I don't think he is feeling awfully happy.”

“Well, thanks for telling me,” Bobby said. “Most interesting. Especially why.”

“Why what?”

“Why you told me,” he explained, and she looked at him doubtfully, as if she understood but was not quite certain that he did. He added:— “I see you are a psychologist.”

“What's that?” Sophy asked suspiciously.

“You,” said Bobby.

“Oh,” said Sophy. “Well, I hope a what's-its-name is nice.”

“Generally bald and stuffy and awfully old clothes and big spectacles and a nose in a book,” Bobby told her.

“Oh!” said Sophy again, and contemplated this picture without pleasure. “Sike—what is it yourself,” she said, and then asked abruptly:— “Why does Mr. Clinton Wells want to know where the Charles the Second oak is?” Bobby blinked, bewildered by this sudden change of subject. Then he asked:—

“What is the Charles the Second oak?”

“It's where he hid once when there had been a battle and he was running away or something,” Sophy explained. “There's all about it in the Midwych County History— it's an awfully dry book and I read it all, at least nearly all except what I skipped—when we came here first—and it says doubts have been thrown on the story, but it doesn't say why. I think it's an awfully nice story, and besides it's still there—the oak, I mean—only Mr. Clinton Wells didn't know and Mr. Bertram didn't either, though nearly every one does, so they asked me, and I told them. But why did Mr. Clinton Wells want to know?”

“There's quite a lot of things I don't know,” Bobby answered, “and that's one of them.”

He noticed that Sophy was looking hard out of the window. Bertram was strolling along one of the garden paths with his hands in his pockets, and certainly he looked very depressed. Sophy looked away from him at Bobby and then back at Bertram, and Bobby received the conviction that he had been given a hint. He said:—

“Well, if you don't mind, I'll go and have a talk with him.”

“I think that would be a very good idea,” Sophy approved gravely.

On his way, however, to obey the unspoken hint he felt he had received, Bobby, in crossing the hall, met Martin, busy about some of a butler's duties. Moved by a sudden impulse, Bobby stopped.

“Martin,” he said, “can you tell me—you know I'm a newcomer about here—where there's an oak they call the Charles the Second oak, after some old story or another?”

Martin did not answer for a moment, and the look he gave Bobby was sly, calculating, puzzled. That he saw some significance in the question was plain, equally plain that he did not know what that significance could be.

“The Charles the Second oak, sir?” he repeated, obviously trying to gain time.

“Well,” said Bobby sharply. “Where is it?”

“Very well-known spot, sir,” Martin answered then. “In the forest, sir. Fine view from the top of the nearby hill. Favourite place for picnics.”

He proceeded to give directions for finding it. It was about seven miles by road, but by paths through fields and the outskirts of the forest not more than four miles, if as much. Bobby listened attentively, and when Martin had finished, thanked him and remarked casually:—

“I shall be able to tell Mr. Clinton Wells now where it is, if he asks me.”

“Oh, Mr. Wells would be sure to know,” Martin answered. “Born and bred about here, sir. He's sure to have been there for a picnic or something.”

“Apparently he doesn't know, for he was asking about it,” Bobby said.

“Well, sir, that's funny, very funny indeed,” said Martin, and once more the look he gave Bobby was sly and wondering and suspicious.

“Very funny,” Bobby agreed and walked on, aware that he had nearly said:—“Very fishy.”

Clear, he thought, that Martin did not believe in Clinton Wells's ignorance of the position of so well known a local landmark, and equally clear that in this pretence of ignorance Martin felt there was some significance about which he was anything but clear.

Nor was that significance clear to Bobby, who was still turning the problem over and over in his mind when he joined the new earl, who, hands in pockets, looking very glum and depressed, had slumped down on one of the seats with which the castle grounds were well provided. He looked up as he heard Bobby approaching and favoured him with an ugly scowl.

“Oh, it's you, is it?” he snarled. “Well, better a cop than any more of that blasted lawyer.”

“Has your lordship—?” began Bobby, and Bertram interrupted him angrily.

“Oh, can the lordship,” he snapped. “I used to think I would be tickled to death getting called ‘my lord', and now I only want to reach for a club. Strikes me being ‘my lord' in this damn old country just means being odd-job man about the house. That old stick of a lawyer—”

He paused, apparently for lack of words to express himself, and Bobby said:—

“I suppose Mr. Blacklock has a lot of business to discuss with you?”

“Business?” almost wailed Bertram. “Business? You ought to hear the old geeser.” He tried to mimic an old, dry, precise voice. ‘“It's due to your lordship's position.' ‘Your lordship carries heavy responsibilities.' ‘Your lordship will be expected—'” Bertram threw up both hands in an almost comical gesture of despair. “Seems to me the whole blessed country isn't doing a thing but expect my lordship. A chain gang isn't in it.”

“The duties and responsibilities of an Earl Wych—” began Bobby formally, and then dropped into the vernacular. “There's a hell of a lot he's jolly well got to do.”

“You've said it,” grunted Bertram, and looked gloomier and more depressed than ever, as though he saw nothing before him but a life of toil, trouble, and hardship. “Speeches, too,” he added, as mentioning the last straw.

“Speeches? oh, rather,” agreed Bobby warmly. “Part of the job.”

Bertram had taken out his handkerchief and was wiping his forehead on which had gathered small drops of perspiration, as at the very thought of speeches he might have to make.

“Couldn't get a word out,” he muttered, “not me.”

“Oh, Miss Anne will help,” Bobby told him cheerfully, and Bertram put his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands in an attitude of the most complete dejection.

Bobby surveyed him, not without satisfaction, nor did he offer the reminder that these duties, responsibilities, public appearances, any Earl Wych would be expected to undertake, could only be enforced by public opinion; and could be, and indeed sometimes were, utterly neglected by those called upon to accept them. But then Bobby, thinking of those weak, scowling, uncertain features, did not much think they showed the degree of resolution that would, after all, be needed to resist such general pressure. Besides, those who set themselves against the current of public opinion and expectation, defying all tradition, must feel their own position secure.

But was this man's position sufficiently secure for a display of such defiance of public opinion, when already legal action to test his claim was threatened? A jury would not be favourably impressed by the claims of a man to a great position when he was refusing or neglecting to carry out the duties and responsibilities belonging to it.

These reflections Bobby kept carefully to himself and said instead in his most cheerful voice:—

“Oh, that'll be all right. Miss Hoyle will always be there to see you don't forget or overlook any of your duties.”

Bertram fairly jerked himself upright in his seat.

“What do you mean by that?” he almost shouted.

“Well, I understood your engagement—”

“Engagement nothing,” snarled the other. “See?”

Bobby tried to look very bewildered.

“But Miss Hoyle...” he began.

Bertram interrupted with a volley of picturesque and most unseemly comment on that young lady, her appearance, her manners, everything about her. Then suddenly he broke off and looked inclined to cry.

“Do you think she really means it?” he asked.

“I do,” Bobby answered with all the emphasis he could command. “From what I've seen of her, when she means a thing, she means it, and she gets it.”

Bertram looked round so wildly that for the moment Bobby almost thought he contemplated flight.

“I don't deny I made a pass or two at her,” he said moodily. “She's a good looker all right, a high stepper from the word ‘Go', but, lordy, if I had known her as well as I do now I'd as soon have made a pass at a rattlesnake.”

“Oh, come,” protested Bobby, “she's not as bad as all that surely.”

“Worse,” Bertram declared. “Well, not rattlesnake. Boa constrictor.” He seemed rather pleased with this comparison. “Boa constrictor,” he repeated, and looked up at Bobby as one seeking sympathy. In a voice trembling with resentment and sorrow he said:—

“She's cut down on the drinks already.”

“You don't say,” murmured Bobby.

“Take my solemn oath,” said Bertram. “If I tell that sneaking butler fellow I want another, he says ‘Yes, sir' and off he goes. But,” said Bertram impressively, “it don't come.”

“Too bad,” said Bobby.

“I know it's her,” declared Bertram moodily, and Bobby could not resist saying:—

“It's all for your own good, you know.”

Bertram indulged in another outburst of picturesque and most improper comment, reflecting, by the way, in passing, on all Anne's ancestors, who were, if his story was true, his ancestors, too. Possibly, however, he hadn't thought of that. When he had exhausted his available stock of adjectives, he paused, sighed, and, in a meek little tone contrasting oddly with the violence of his outburst of the moment before, he said:—

“She's got me scared. That girl—slave-driving is as natural to her as swallowing a highball. There's a way she has of looking at you—”

He broke off, seeking a suitable comparison, and Bobby supplied it.

“Like a cat at the mouse she's cornered.”

Bertram nodded in gloomy agreement. 

“All the same,” he muttered, as one whistling to keep up his courage, “she can't make a fellow.”

“She doesn't have to,” Bobby told him. “She just sees that things happen the way she wants them to happen and they do.”

Bertram made no comment on this, but looked more depressed than ever. Bobby sat down beside him, lighted a cigarette, and smoked in silence, leaving Bertram to muse in equal silence on the fate before him. When Bobby thought these musings had lasted long enough, he remarked as by way of making conversation:—

“I was interested to read in one of the Midwych papers about you taking your place in the ranks of the Wychshire Dragoons, and hoping presently, like your heroic ancestors, to lead them into action.”

Bertram turned and gave Bobby an even more malevolent glare.

“I'm joining no Wychshire Dragoons,” he announced. “Not me. That was a lot of guff I pumped into the fellow because he seemed to expect it. This isn't my war. Nothing to do with me.”