Hand in Glove by Ngaio Marsh Read Free Book Online Page B

thrown up; derisively, she might almost have thought, by one of the workmen, invisible in the trench.
    “Never mind,” she said. “We’ll find it. Don’t worry.”
    “I hope so, I’m sure, Miss. It’s a valuable object.”
    “I know.”
    They were staring doubtfully at each other when Mr. Period came in looking exceedingly rattled.
    “Nicola, my dear: Andrew Bantling on the telephone, for you.
Would
you mind taking it in the hall? We are
un peu occupé
, in the study. I’m so sorry.”
    “Oh dear!” Nicola said. “So am I — that you’ve been bothered. Mr. Period, your cigarette case isn’t in here, I’m afraid.”
    “But I distinctly remember—” Mr. Period began. “Well, never mind. Your telephone call, child.”
    Nicola went into the hall.
    Andrew Bantling said: “Oh, there you are at last! What goes on in the Lay-by? P.P. sounded most peculiar.”
    “He’s awfully busy.”
    “You’re being discreet and trustworthy. Never mind, I shall gimlet it out of you in the train. You couldn’t make the 3:30, I suppose?”
    “Not possibly.”
    “Then I shall simply have to lurk in the lane like a follower. There’s nowhere for me to be in this district. Baynesholme has become uninhabitable on account—” He lowered his voice and evidently put his mouth very close to the receiver, so that consonants popped and sibilants hissed in Nicola’s eardrum.
    “What did you say?”
    “I said
the Moppett
and her
Leonard
have arrived in a smashing Scorpion under pretense of wanting to see the family portraits. What’s the matter?”
    “I’ve got to go. Sorry. Good-bye,” Nicola said, and rushed to the library.
    Mr. Cartell and Mr. Period broke off their conversation as she entered. Sergeant Noakes was dialling a number.
    She said: “I thought I should tell you at once. They’re at Baynesholme. They’ve driven there in the Scorpion.”
    Mr. Cartell went into action. “Noakes,” he said, “tell Copper I want him here immediately in the car.”
    “Which car, sir?” Noakes asked, startled, the receiver at his ear.
    “The Bloodbath,” Mr. Period said impatiently. “What else? Really, Noakes!”
    “He’s to drive me to Baynesholme as fast as the thing will go. At once, Noakes.”
    Sergeant Noakes began talking into the telephone.
    “Be quick,” Mr. Cartell said, “and you’d better come too.”
    “Yes, George,” said Sergeant Noakes into the telephone. “That’s correct. Now.”
    “Come along, Noakes. My hat and coat!” Mr. Cartell went out. “
Alfred
! My topcoat.”
    “And you might ask them, Harold, while you’re about it,” Mr. Period quite shouted after him, “what they did with my cigarette case.”
    “What?” the retreating voice asked.
    “Lady Barsington’s cardcase. Cigarettes.”
    There was a shocked pause. Mr. Cartell returned, half in and half out of an overcoat, a tweed hat cocked over one eye.
    “What do you mean, P.P.? Surely you don’t suggest…?”
    “God knows! But ask them.
Ask
!”
    Désirée, Lady Bantling (ex-Cartell, factually Dodds), sat smiling to herself in her drawing-room.
    She smoked incessantly and listened to Moppett Ralston and Leonard Leiss, and it would have been impossible for anyone to say what she thought of them. Her ravaged face, with its extravagant make-up, and her mop of orange hair made a flagrant statement against the green background of her chair. She was possibly not unamused.
    Moppett was explaining how interested Leonard was in art and what a lot he knew about the great portrait painters.
    “So I do hope,” Moppett was saying, “you don’t think it too boring and bold of us to ask if we may look. Leonard said you would, but I said we’d risk it and if we might just see the pictures and creep away again…?”
    “Yes, do,” Désirée said. “They’re all Bantling ancestors. Gentlemen in skin-tight breeches, and ladies with high foreheads and smashing bosoms. Andrew could tell you all about them, but he seems to have