Poppy (22 page)

Poppy looked at him quickly, and Cyril returned her look with one of limpid innocence.

Annabelle came bounding up to them, wearing a quite horrid dress. It was of purple silk, and pleated and gored and flounced so much that it had no particular line at all. Beads of perspiration stood out on her bulging forehead, and her protruding eyes glistened with pleasure.

“Isn’t this jolly?” she cried. “All of us here. Of course Hugo
would
turn up with that long, disapproving face, but we won’t pay any attention to
him
.”

Poppy turned quite white. She knew suddenly where he was, and slowly turned around and found herself looking straight at him. He was leaning against a pillar, looking at her steadily, and she blushed and turned away.

“Oh, here he comes. Rats!” said Annabelle. “Never mind. Let’s all rush into the supper room before he reaches us.”

But somehow the duke was beside them before they could move. “I would like to speak to you, Mrs. Plummett,” he said coldly.

“Of course you would,” said Cyril with an ingratiating smile. “Annabelle and I will await you in the supper room.” That possessive grasp of his was now on Annabelle’s arm. But the duke and Poppy were not to be left alone. Lady Epton came bustling up, shooing a party of guests in front of her. “And this is Mrs. Plummett,” she said. “
The
Mrs. Plummett. Mrs. Plummett, this is—”

“Go away,” said the duke.

“Well, really!” Lady Epton bridled. “I—”

The duke put his hand firmly in the small of Poppy’s back and pushed her unresistingly across the room, leaving Lady Epton staring angrily after them.

“Leave me alone,” pleaded Poppy. “You had your revenge. Haven’t you done enough damage?”

“I can’t hear you,” he said with a return of his old manner. “Speak up!”

“Oooh!” Poppy marched in front of him and out into the garden.

He followed close behind her. She stood with her back to him, staring into the sooty bushes. He came up behind her. “What did you say just now?” he demanded harshly.

His hands came down on her shoulders, his fingers biting into her skin.

“I said that you’d had your revenge,” repeated Poppy, standing very still.

“
My
revenge?” he grated, giving her a little shake. “What about that filthy—that obscene and callous note you left pinned to the pillow?”

“What did you expect me to do?” said Poppy wearily. “I saw your plan of campaign in those notes on your desk; your plan for revenge. Well, you had it, mate. What more do you want? Tears? Blood?”

He swung her around to face him, his face hard and tense in the light from the windows.

“There you are!” cried Lady Epton, bearing down on them. “Now, my dear Duke, you must not monopolize Mrs. Plummett. Come, my dear. So many people wish to meet you.”

The duke was still looking stunned, his brain turning over what she had told him. Poppy was borne off into the music room, and he stood alone in the garden. He had forgotten all about those wretched notes. He had half glanced at them the day after Poppy had fled Everton, and had torn them up. But never once had it occurred to him that she might have read them.

Through the long winter months he had tried and tried to forget her, for he trembled with hate every time her image floated through his mind. Why did he always believe the worst of her?

And then he thought he knew. He remembered her saying that his lot would never really forgive her for her background. And that was why he had thought the worst—apart from that dreadful note. That was why he had never asked her for an explanation. She came from the gutter as far as he was concerned, and therefore he had been expecting the manners of the gutter.

He walked for a long time in the garden, turning the problem over in his mind until, with a sudden feeling of elation, he realized that she had not meant what she had written in that note after all. He must make her see reason. He must make her understand.

The duke walked quickly back to the party, only to find Annabelle and Cyril, without Poppy, in close conversation in the supper room. She had left, they said, breaking off their conversation with obvious reluctance.

Without pausing to collect his hat and cloak, he summoned his carriage, and fretted on the doorstep until it was brought around.

“Mrs. Plummett. St. John’s Wood!” he called to the coachman.

Freda von Dierksen, who was making a late arrival, turned to watch him go. She was engulfed with such hate and jealousy of Poppy that she thought she would die. For Freda had fallen deeply and irrevocably in love for the first time in her life—with the duke. At the beginning of their affair, she had planned to marry him only because she wanted to be Duchess of Guildham, and to recover some of her lost respectability. She had not stopped to consider that her feelings might be deeper, for she had never become emotionally involved with any of her victims before. Now she blamed Poppy bitterly for her failed liaison. If that little tramp had not entered upon the scene, with her open-pored, blowsy beauty, to entice the duke away, then he would surely have married Freda.

Freda was unescorted. She had known the duke to be at the concert and had planned a late entrance.

Now it was too late.

Or was it?

She had money from her late husband, a wealthy German beer baron. Money bought power. Money helped one elude justice. Money bought revenge. There had to be a way.…

A thin, pearly mist was floating through the trees as the duke’s carriage pulled up outside Poppy’s house.

The villa looked dark and deserted, and the night air was hushed and still, heavy with the scent of lilacs. The duke found his heart was beating hard, and his hands were clammy.

He pulled out his watch and stared down at the white face, but could not make out the time in the darkness. It was probably about one in the morning. He should wait.

He shrugged impatiently and went forward and rapped on the door, and then stood back. Light appeared and blossomed in one of the attics upstairs. Mrs. Abberley. Damn! He had woken the servants.

There was a long silence, and he was just beginning to wonder whether he should knock again when through the stained-glass panes of the door he saw the wavering light of a candle descending the stairs. Then a voice called softly from the other side of the door, “Who’s there?” Poppy’s voice.

“Hugo,” he said urgently. “Let me in. I must speak to you.”

“No! Go away!”

“Poppy!” he said in a level voice. “If you do not let me in this minute, I shall create a scene your neighbors and servants will never forget.”

There was a long silence while he waited, tense.

Then he heard the bolts being drawn back softly, and she opened the door and stood looking at him.

She was wearing a long lace oyster-white satin nightdress with a heavy satin peignoir of the same color, lavishly trimmed with lace. Her hair was loose and flowing down her back, gleaming in the wavering light of the candle.

She stood aside, and he walked past her into the small hall. He noticed that her hand, which held the candle, was trembling so much that it wavered dangerously, so he took it from her and pushed open the door of the sitting room, setting the candle down on the mantel and waiting for her to be seated.

“If you plan on a very long visit, then I had better go and change,” said Poppy with a pathetic attempt at humor, but he replied grimly, “Don’t bother,” and she sat, staring at the floor, waiting for him to speak.

“It’s like this, Poppy,” he said quietly. “When you went back to the theater I thought you had merely been acting… that you felt nothing for me at all… that you had been amusing yourself. I was hurt, hurt badly. I wanted revenge. I made those silly notes and unfortunately took them down to Everton with me and left them on my desk. When I made love to you at Everton it was after I had realized that you had not been acting, that you might have cared for me as I cared for you.

“I do care for you, Poppy, so much, so very deeply. I am in love with you, my dear, and there is nothing I can do about it. I want to marry you more than anything else in the world. Don’t give me your answer now, please, not now. Please think carefully.”

“It’s no use,” said Poppy in a voice drained of emotion. “There’s always Cutler’s Fields, isn’t there? You’ll always be fearing the worst, thinking the worst because of my background.”

“I have given you little reason to trust me,” he said earnestly. “Please try. Your background means nothing to me. I am in love with you.”

“What if this is a trick?” she said, her eyes glistening with tears. If only he would take her in his arms and hug her fears away. But the duke was determined to behave like a gentleman—not realizing that it was hardly the time and moment for correct formal behavior.

“Don’t say anything more,” he urged. “I will call on you in the morning. Not too early. Say, at eleven, and we can go driving.”

She gave a sad little nod, and he stood, irresolute, looking down at her.

“Good-bye, my dear,” he said softly. And then he was gone.

She sat still for a long time after he had left. She would not allow herself to hope. She had been so terribly hurt before. But surely there would be no harm in driving out with him.

Poor Poppy thought and thought about all the things she might have said, all the things she might have done, to keep him longer, so that he might have convinced her absolutely of his love, so that he might have taken away her fears.

At last she went to bed and slept uneasily until dawn, when she suddenly fell into a deep and dreamless sleep, not awakening until nine o’clock when Mrs. Abberley entered with the tea and Osborne biscuits. Poppy informed the woman of her plans for the day.

She drank her tea and dressed quickly. To her surprise on descending the stairs, she was told that His Grace’s carriage was awaiting her outside.

“I thought you said eleven o’clock, madam,” said Mrs. Abberley.

“I did,” said Poppy, looking beyond Mrs. Abberley through the open front door to where an unfamiliar footman stood on the step.

The footman touched his powdered hair. “His Grace’s compliments, ma’am. He is desirous to know if you wish to go driving.”

“But I already told His Grace—” began Poppy, but broke off in impatience. “Tell His Grace I shall join him in a minute.”

She went upstairs to put on her hat and coat, wondering why he had remained in the carriage. But she realized that she wanted to see him again more than anything, and that one thought soon blocked out all others.

The day was cloudy and blustery, and Poppy hesitated slightly at the sight of the unfamiliar carriage.

Mrs. Abberley stood on the step, watching. She was puzzled by the strange carriage and strange servants, and, like Poppy, she wondered why the duke had not called at the door himself.

The footman was walking one pace behind Poppy, and as Poppy stooped to enter the carriage Mrs. Abberley saw her mistress jerk back. At the same moment the footman drew something from his pocket and struck Poppy hard on the head, and she collapsed forward through the open door of the carriage.

“Help!” screamed Mrs. Abberley, running down the path as hard as her plump little legs would take her. “Help!”

Gladys and Rose came tumbling out of the house after her, the streamers on their caps flying behind them.

But Mrs. Abberley was too late. She had no sooner reached the gate, when the carriage sped off, swaying and bumping down the road. Her screams had aroused the neighborhood, and in no time at all the portly figure of a policeman came wobbling around the corner of the street on his bicycle.

And so when His Grace, The Duke of Guildham, arrived at eleven o’clock, it was to find himself accused by three hysterical servants of abduction, rape, and murder. The policeman, who had been overcome by all these “dukes” flying around, had sent for his superior, and so His Grace found himself sitting in Poppy’s drawing room, being interrogated by a small, plump inspector while two policemen stood guard.

He told them all he knew. He gave them Poppy’s old address in Cutler’s Fields, and faithfully outlined his movements since leaving Poppy the previous night. He said his servants could vouch for his innocence. At ten o’clock he had been in his club reading the morning papers, and several members had seen him there. He was kept waiting, firmly but politely, by the inspector until his alibi was checked and until Scotland Yard arrived on the scene and took over from the local St. John’s Wood force.

And then the duke had to go through the whole thing again, and all the while his mind raced with fear. At last he was allowed to leave, and he fought his way through a horde of reporters and photographers with their magnesium flashes and plate cameras, to his carriage.

Cyril
, he thought suddenly.
Cyril’s behind this
.

He directed his carriage to the theater. The stage-door man, impressed by his title, furnished Cyril’s address, which was in Kensington.

Cyril was at home and in bed, sipping hot chocolate and looking at a folio of Beardsley drawings, when the duke and his servants burst into that young man’s bedroom.

But almost before the first accusations, before the first “What have you done withs” were out of his mouth, the duke realized Cyril was innocent. His face was a picture of puzzle and alarm and fear—fear for what would happen to his musical without Poppy.

So both men sat down to thrash out who might have wished Poppy ill. They turned over names, and then at last Cyril thought he knew who was responsible. “Elaine Pym,” he said excitedly. “She hated Poppy for getting the leading role, and she’s unstable to say the least.”

Both men drove around to Mr. Lewis’s, off the King’s Road, to find the whereabouts of Elaine Pym. But a baffled, shirt-sleeved Mr. Lewis said that Elaine had left for the continent a week ago with her latest protector, and that he had had a picture postcard from her only the other day.

And so nobody knew what to do.

With little hope the small party augmented by Mr. Lewis and Mr. Pettifor descended on Cutler’s Fields to see if Poppy had an enemy lurking there. But Alf, her old flame, who might have harbored designs of abduction, turned out to be married to a local girl, and no one could think of anyone in the wide world who would wish Poppy harm.