Down Under by Patricia Wentworth Read Free Book Online Page A

fingers slid past it, touched a piece of paper folded over on itself. Ellen—Elayne—E-l-a-y-n-e. A lot of damned tomfoolery, but if she fancied her name that way, he supposed he’d got to humour her—E-l-a.… He pulled out the piece of paper all ready to take a look at it when Captain Loddon should be gone. And Captain Loddon was saying,
    â€œIsn’t there anything else at all, Abbott?”
    George turned the paper in his hand, and suddenly there it was, staring up at him, a name on a piece of paper—a name on a torn envelope. Not “Ellen,” nor “Elayne,” but “Miss Rose Anne Carew.” He held it out to Oliver, and said in a dazed voice,
    â€œShe dropped it, sir.”
    Oliver said, “What?”
    â€œShe dropped it when she was looking for her ticket.”
    Oliver stared at the name. The writing was his own—“Miss Rose Anne Carew.” There was just the name, on a torn piece of an envelope. The address was gone and the flaps. There was just a straight torn piece with Rose Anne’s name on it. He turned it over mechanically, and saw on the back what George Abbott had written there laboriously with a smudgy pencil—“E-l-a-y-n-e.”
    â€œBut, Abbott—”
    George was all hot and bothered.
    â€œI didn’t know there was any writing on it. I wanted a bit of paper and I picked it up. My young lady’s got a fancy to spell her name different, and I can’t get used to it, not anyhow.”
    Oliver said nothing. He turned the paper again and stood looking down at the name he had written three days ago.—Or was it four.… Time had stopped. He had written the name, and thought when he wrote it that it was the last time. “Next time I write I shall be writing to my wife.” It was the last time, there wasn’t going to be any next time. He stared at the torn envelope, and at the name on it:
    â€œMiss Rose Anne Carew.”

CHAPTER VII
    Mr Smith was in his library. He was, in fact, searching the top shelf for an interesting pamphlet on the Art of Malediction as Practised in the Near East . The pamphlet was fifty years old and extremely rare, and as Mr Benbow Collingwood Horatio Smith never mislaid anything, he was beginning to entertain a regretful suspicion about the learned Roumanian professor to whom he had shown it some six months previously. He turned, looked over his shoulder, and addressed the grey and rose coloured parrot who occupied a handsome perch at the far end of the room.
    â€œNot always a very honest world, Ananias?”
    Ananias blinked morosely. Of all things in the world, he disliked seeing his master climb the book-ladder and stand there taking out one book after another. He opened his beak and emitted a slight hiss of protest.
    â€œAll right, Ananias, I am coming down. I am afraid—I am very much afraid—that our pamphlet has returned to the Near East.”
    Ananias said “Awk,” and the front door bell rang.
    Mr Smith came down from the ladder and drifted over to the hearth. There was a pleasant glow from the fire. A dark afternoon—a very dark afternoon. It would really be more cheerful with the curtains drawn. Ananias liked plenty of light. He put out his hand to a switch, and the bowl in the ceiling sprang into brilliance. Miller came into the room carrying a salver with a card upon it and an envelope. Mr Smith picked up the card and read:
    Captain Oliver Loddon, R.A.
    Junior Naval and Military Club.
    The name was quite unknown to him. He lifted the envelope, which was addressed to himself, and said vaguely,
    â€œEr—the curtains, Miller—I think Ananias would prefer them drawn.”
    The envelope was addressed in a strange hand. Good writing—yes, quite good writing. Inside the envelope one of Loveday Ross’s cards—Mrs Hugo Ross—and, written all across it in pencil, “Darling Uncle Ben, please, please do everything you