"Spring," Leonard declared, fanning himself with his straw hat and
breathing in the ozone from the waves which rippled up to within a few
yards of our chairs, "is upon us."
"I must get some new frocks," Rose murmured absently.
"To-morrow," I reflected, "I must go through my tennis flannels."
"Jolly good-looking girl that was with the party from the Grange at the
show last night," Leonard continued reminiscently. "I liked the way her
eyelashes curled. Jolly fine figure, too."
"The tutor man is quite handsome," Rose ruminated. "He ties his black
evening bow just the way I like."
"Handsome!" I scoffed. "Why, he's got a cast in his eye! He reminds me,
more than anything, of the plaster villains in the Chamber of Horrors
at Madame Tussaud's."
"I didn't notice any cast," Rose sighed, her eyes turned dreamily
seawards. "He looked at me hard enough, too, when I was dancing."
"They're a strange crew at the Grange," I observed, lighting a cigarette
from the case which Leonard had thrown me. "I can't altogether size them
up."
Rose turned towards me reproachfully.
"You are becoming obsessed, Maurice, with your love of adventures," she
complained gently. "You think of nothing else. Surely, in this dear,
old-world place we can have a little rest; we can drop the tenseness of
the last few months and become just simple, natural human beings again."
"The chief didn't send us down here for nothing," I ventured.
"Don't forget," she reminded me, "that at our last supper at Brighton I
begged for a little rest. Only a few weeks afterwards, he sent us here.
I am quite certain that nothing ever happened at Greymarshes. If we get
into any trouble here, it will simply be because the spring is so
disturbing."
She looked at me lazily, almost affectionately. Then she looked at
Leonard. His hat was tilted over his eyes and his hands were clasped
around his knees. There was very little of his good-natured, pudgy face
to be seen.
"I wonder," she continued, with a little sigh, "why neither of you ever
make love to me. I'm very attractive."
"The situation," Leonard began, taking his hat off and sitting up----
"Oh, hang the situation!" Rose interrupted irritably. "If you can't make
up your minds which of you it is to be, you might toss up or something.
Here's spring coming on. I'm twenty-two years old, and I haven't got a
young man. You will drive me to answer some of the desperate notes which
are showered upon me by lovesick youths from the front row. I had
another last night from Arthur. I believe that he really loves me."
"I'm afraid Arthur will have to be spanked," I said.
Rose made a little grimace.
"There is such a thing, Mr. Maurice Lister," she declared, "as playing
the watchdog just a little too zealously--especially in the springtime.
See who's coming. I think I shall turn round and smile."
We both looked along the sands in the direction which she had indicated
by her parasol. A tall, weedy young man, dressed with the utmost care in
a grey flannel suit, brown shoes and linen spats, a Panama hat and a
quaintly impossible tie, came slowly towards us, swinging a stick in his
hand. As he drew near, he diffused multitudinous odours. His pimply face
was suffused with a deep flow of colour. We realised at once what was
going to happen. The young man whom we knew by repute only as Mr. Arthur
Dompers, established at the Grange with a tutor and a small company of
satellites, had evidently made up his mind to speak to us.
He came to a standstill, sidled round to the front of us, and raised his
hat.
"Good morning! I say, you'll forgive my saying so--what? Awfully jolly
show of yours! Ripping!"
Now I cannot say that any of us took to this young man, and, considering
our Bohemian manner of life, we none of us had a fancy for chance
acquaintances. The gentle rebuke which we had meditated, however, died
away, first on Rose's lips and then on mine. It became apparent to us
that the boy was horribly nervous.
"Glad you like it," I rejoined.
"So nice of you," Rose murmured.
"Quite a crowd from your place last night, wasn't there?" Leonard
observed.
"That's right," the young man acquiesced. "We all weighed in--had dinner
early on purpose. Jolly place you've got here."
"Won't you sit down?" Rose invited.
The boy squatted promptly at her feet. He wore pink socks and he reeked
of scent, yet there was something a little pathetic in his obvious
desire to be friendly.
"Are you cramming for anything in particular?" I asked him.
"I was supposed to go in for the Army," was the dubious reply, "but the
exams are so jolly difficult. I failed for Sandhurst twice. Now they're
trying to get me in at Cambridge so that I can join a cadet corps."
"The exams are so much stiffer since the war," Rose remarked
consolingly.
"Are any of your people down here with you?" I enquired.
The boy shook his head.
"I haven't any people to speak of," he confided, "except an uncle I have
scarcely ever seen. Another uncle--my father's brother--left me all my
money. Sometimes," the young man added, with a queer flash of
seriousness which made one forget his socks and his tie and his pimples,
"I wish he hadn't."
"It must be awfully nice, though, to feel that you've plenty of time in
life for games and all that sort of thing," Rose remarked, with a mild
attempt at consolation.
"I'm not very good at games," the young man confessed. "Mr. Duncombe and
his friends are so much better than I am, and they always laugh at me."
"That is a very untutorlike thing to do," Rose declared indignantly.
The young man looked frightened.
"Mr. Duncombe is very good to me--very kind indeed," he repeated, in
parrot-like fashion.
"Is he?" Rose queried drily.
"He has no end of people down so that we shouldn't be dull," the young
man went on. "There's his sister--she's very kind to me, too. I think I
shall have to marry her."
"Why?" Rose asked in bewilderment.
"I think Mr. Duncombe would like me to," was the resigned reply. "I am
very fond of Ella. She sings and dances beautifully."
"How old are you?" Rose enquired.
The boy seemed on the point of making another parrot-like reply. Then he
chanced to meet the kindly expression in Rose's face as she leaned
towards him. He hesitated.
"There's a sort of secret about my age," he confided. "Mr. Duncombe
likes me to tell every one that I am twenty."
"And aren't you?" I asked curiously.
He shook his head.
"I shall be twenty-one on Saturday," he said. "I shall be able to sign
cheques of my own then--and make my will."
"What do you want to make your will for?" Rose asked. "You're strong
enough, aren't you?"
"It is the duty of every one with a great deal of money to make their
will directly they are twenty-one," the boy declared, as though
repeating a lesson. "If I had my own way," he added, looking up at Rose,
"I should leave a great deal of money to you, but I don't suppose I
shall be allowed to."
"Good gracious, Mr. Dompers!" Rose exclaimed. "Why, I scarcely know
you!"
"I like your face," the young man continued earnestly. "If you saw the
faces of the people who are staying at the Grange, you would know what I
mean. They all look as though they wanted something. They remind me
sometimes of a pack of hounds. And they pretend not to, but they are
always watching me."
We had been so engrossed in the self-disclosures of this half-witted
young man that we had not noticed the approach of another promenader
along the sands. It was a very different person who now accosted us, hat
in hand and a courteous smile upon his lips. There was not a single
criticism in which the most fastidious might indulge against Hilary
Duncombe's address, his manners or his clothes.
"Good morning! I am glad to see that my young ward has been finding
friends."
The young man scrambled at once to his feet and stood, awkward and
speechless, a little apart. His tutor, the very prototype of kindly and
aristocratic ease, addressed a few kindly remarks to us.
"I am so thankful," he went on, "when Arthur finds courage to speak to
any one. He is a good boy, but he finds conversation with strangers as a
rule difficult."
"We haven't found him at all shy," Rose assured him, with a smile at the
subject of these remarks. "On the contrary, he has been entertaining us
quite nicely."
Mr. Duncombe appeared to find Rose's favourable judgment a matter for
personal gratification.
"You are very kind," he said. "I am sure that Arthur has already told
you how charmed we were with your performance last night. My guests are
agitating for a permanent change in our dinner hour, that we may be more
frequent attendants."
"How nice!" Rose murmured. "It does make quite a difference to see some
civilised people in the reserved seats."
"My sister," Duncombe continued, "would be delighted to make your
acquaintance. We may, perhaps, persuade you to pay us a little visit at
the Grange after the performance one evening. Arthur," he went on, "we
must get back now. Ella is waiting for a set of tennis."
They moved off together. The impression they left behind was an
unpleasant one.
"A second Ardalmont case," Leonard suggested.
"In which case," I reflected gloomily, "the mystery of our presence here
is solved."
We were a little depressed as we returned to the hotel--a long,
grey-stone building, once a farmhouse and still entirely unpretentious.
Our worst prognostications were promptly verified. The maidservant who
waited upon us in the coffee room brought me a note with a typewritten
address.
"This was left here by a motor-cyclist soon after you went out, sir,"
she announced.