Four Strange Women (39 page)

“Here's Arthur coming. The gathering of the clans—or is it a case of the eagles and the carcase?” and Sophy thought the remark in dreadfully bad taste.

A stout, comfortable-looking, middle-aged man was walking towards them across the lawn. He was Arthur Hoyle, next in succession in the direct male line—or so till now it had been assumed—though it was four generations through which he traced descent. His grandfather was the only member of the Hoyle family who, venturing into the city, had there been not shorn but shearer—an expert shearer, too. Arthur's father had been less successful, but Arthur himself was supposed to have more than retrieved their fortunes. He was an accountant by profession, a director of many companies, engaged in various complicated financial operations, and he lived in some style in an imposing mansion known as The Thatched Cottage, presumably because it was neither thatched nor a cottage, and situated between the town of Midwych and Wych forest. He was a widower, having lost his wife some years ago, and there were no children. Rumour said there were many willing to do their best to bring him consolation for his loss, and rumour was busy, too, with the passing consolations he was supposed to be finding for himself. Fortunately rumour can generally be disbelieved, and these were no more than rumours. He was still a good-looking and in his way an imposing person, with the Hoyle blue eyes—a colder blue in his case perhaps—the fair hair, the wide mouth and the thin lips, these last more tightly pressed together than with most of the Hoyles. On the whole, belonging to the more recent Hoyle type, the supple, smiling, ready-witted type rather than to the direct and dominant type to which both Ralph and Anne belonged.

He ascended the terrace by one of the short flights of steps that led up to it from the lawn, and waved them a cheery greeting.

“Hullo! ” he called. “Thought I would drop in and hear the news. I heard Clinton Wells was bringing him along. I suppose he's here.”

Ralph nodded an assent.

“They're in the library,” he said.

“Well, you ought to be there, too,” Arthur remarked.

Ralph made no comment but looked as though he were of the same opinion.

“You're an interested party,” Arthur said. “So am I, I suppose, for that matter—or would be, if you weren't so disgustingly healthy.”

He collected a chair and sat down. Sophy, whose existence he had acknowledged with a brief nod, poured out another cup of tea for him. Silently Anne pushed over a plate of cakes. She was still turning round and round the ring on her engagement finger. Ever since her earliest childhood, it had always been understood that she and Ralph were to marry. It was, in a way, her right. That absurd sex disability whereby she was barred from her natural right of succession might have had some sense in it in days when occasionally rights had to be defended by the use of lance and battle axe. Not that Anne didn't feel perfectly capable of wielding axe and lance herself, if necessary. But in settled days of law and order, this sex disability business was a ridiculous and disgusting anachronism. Had she been the grand-daughter of an American millionaire instead of an English peer of ancient lineage, sex would not have mattered in the least. Her rights would not have been affected in any way by the totally irrelevant detail that she generally wore skirts and not trousers. True, the American millionaire could leave his money as he liked and the English peer had no say in the matter, all that being regulated by the entail. But Anne felt as fully competent to deal with supposititious American millionaires as with equally supposititious battle axes. She would have liked to see any old millionaire grandfather disinheriting her, just as she would have liked a chance to wave a battle axe in the thickest of the fray. So the engagement to Ralph, heir to title and estates by the mere accident of having been born to trousers and not skirts, had always been regarded as no more than her right, the simple compensation due to her. Turning the ring round and round, she thought:—

“Arthur's awfully rich. Money matters to-day. If you've money you've everything. Ralph wouldn't have a farthing, if he wasn't heir, and he has no profession except managing the estates. I wonder if Arthur would give him a job—five or ten pounds a week perhaps. What's the good of that?”

“You both look a bit down,” Arthur said. He helped himself to another cake. “I can remember Bertram,” he said. “I was here when we heard of his death. Cheek for this bloke to turn up now and claim to be him. Clinton Wells has seen him, hasn't he?”

“Yes. He told me there was nothing in it,” Ralph answered.

“Well, he's a lawyer and he ought to know,” Arthur remarked.

“Oh, the fellow's an impostor all right,” declared Ralph. “He's managed to get hold of poor old Bertram's papers— stole them after Bertram died most likely. Now he has his tale pat, but there are all kinds of things he ought to know that he hasn't any idea of. You could see it. When he got here he was gaping all round, like one of the Saturday shillingers. He wasn't remembering familiar things, he was noticing and trying to remember new ones. Bertram wasn't bad at cricket. The first century he made in anything like a good match was for Wych and District against an M.C.C. team. No chap ever forgets his first century in a good match. Couldn't if he tried,” pronounced Ralph, who himself bowled a good fast ball and was a fair, if somewhat impetuous, batsman, generally good for runs if he didn't get out in the first over. “But this fellow hadn't a notion what I was talking about when I tried him with it.”

“Wonder why he has waited so long?” Arthur mused, half to himself. “If he managed to get hold of Bertram's papers after his death, that's all of ten years ago, isn't it?”

“To explain why he has forgotten such a lot,” Ralph suggested.

“Yes, there's that,” agreed Arthur. “Handy excuse. Or he may have been screwing up his courage.”

“Grand-dad ought to send for the police,” Anne interposed sharply. “I can't think why he doesn't. Perhaps he has,” she added hopefully, “and they're just waiting for the police to get here.”

“Well, about that,” Arthur pointed out, helping himself to more cake, “I don't know what he could be charged with. I don't quite know what just saying you are someone you aren't would come under for a police charge.”

“The Roger Tichborne man was sent to prison,” Anne reminded him.

“Wasn't that for perjury committed at the first trial?” Arthur asked. “Do you know, Ralph?”

Ralph didn't answer. He didn't like Arthur's tone very much, and he liked still less the touch of mockery, of malice indeed, he felt beneath the smoothness of Arthur's voice. It has the voice Arthur used, he felt, when Arthur was explaining to someone that he, Arthur, had got the best of the bargain, and there was nothing the someone could do about it. Of course, it all made very little difference to Arthur since his prospect of inheriting had always been negligible. Ralph's expectation of life was perfectly good, he and Anne had every intention of producing a large family. Besides, when a chap was as rich and prosperous and successful as Arthur Hoyle, he had no need to worry about losing so small a chance of inheriting. There were, no doubt, those vague rumours about Arthur having dropped a packet recently on the Stock Exchange, but rumours don't amount to much, and certainly there was no sign of any change in the luxurious style of living at The Thatched Cottage, any more than there was any sign of worry to be seen overshadowing Arthur's accustomed air of plump prosperity. He was well into his fifth cake now, by the way.

Through the french windows that opened on the terrace from the small drawing-room, three men came in succession. First was old Earl Wych, aged, white-haired, erect, looking stern and intent, with so set and grim an expression indeed that Sophy found herself thinking of a soldier advancing to the attack. Not that she had ever seen a soldier advancing to the attack, but that was the thought that came into her mind. Behind the old earl was a much younger man, evidently very nervous, a nervousness that showed itself in restless eyes, an occasional twitching at the corners of the mouth, a perpetual fidgeting with handkerchief and cigarette case, and so on. Sophy remembered, too, later on, how when he stood still she could see his toes working inside his long, narrow, shiny, patent leather shoes. A natural nervousness perhaps in a man claiming to be the long-lost heir and uncertain of his reception. At the moment the thought in Sophy's mind was that if you said ‘Boo' to him very loudly and very suddenly, he would probably run away. Unfortunately, it occurred to no one to try the experiment. Besides, it may be Sophy did not quite understand the kind of timid desperation, of frightened obstinacy, some people can display.

Behind these two came a tall, very good-looking young man, athletic in build, with strong, eager features, a bronzed complexion, a general air of brisk and confident authority. He had not at all the appearance of the traditional family lawyer. But it might come to that in time, for he was still much the youngest partner in the old established firm of Wells, Clinton, Wells and Blacklock that for many years had been in charge of all the legal side of the Hoyle estates, and he would certainly not have been here to-day but for the accident that the senior partner, Mr. Blacklock, was ill, and the second partner, another Blacklock, was away on holiday. So this young man, Clinton Wells, combining in himself the original Clinton and Wells strains, found himself in full charge. Gossip whispered that he was an ambitious young man, showing no signs of settling down as a country solicitor, and even entertaining political aspirations. It was reported he had been heard to say that what a little Welsh lawyer could do, a solicitor from the Midlands could do, too. More ill-natured gossip remarked that he had the pale-blue eyes of the Hoyle family, and hinted that a certain unavowed mixing, outside legal bonds, of Hoyle and Clinton blood a generation or two back, accounted for the favour with which old Earl Wych always seemed to regard the young man. But these were only whispers none dared repeat aloud, whispers without a shred of proved foundation. True, there were always those clear, rather pale-blue eyes characteristic in the Hoyle family, showing, for example, both in Anne and in Ralph, though in Ralph's case the blue often seemed to be a grey, so that Sophy, at least, was never quite sure whether they were really blue or really grey.

There advanced slowly the little group—the tall, commanding looking old man; the nervous young man; the handsome, youthful lawyer, looking as distinguished in his way as did the old earl himself. The group by the tea table were all on their feet now. Arthur had an air of complete bewilderment. Ralph waited, utterly expressionless. Anne gave the impression of holding herself in check, of being ready to spring at any moment, of a coiled-up spring indeed that the smallest touch might release. To Sophy's mind the comparison between this advance of the three men with the advance of soldiers upon a firmly held position, grew still stronger. She became suddenly afraid. In a clear, loud voice, with little in it of the frequent shrillness of old age, Earl Wych said:—

“This is my grandson, Bertram, we all believed dead so long. I am sure you will welcome him. At first I failed to recognize him, but now I am convinced of his identity.”