A Wreath for Rivera

She made a non-committal sound. Unhappy recollections forced themselves upon her. Recollections of Félicité’s story about a correspondence with someone she had never met who had written her a “marvellous” letter. Of Rivera reading her answer to this letter and making a scene about it. Of Ned Manx’s article in Harmony. Of Félicité’s behaviour after they all met to go to the Metronome. Of her taking the flower from Ned’s coat. And of his stooping his head to listen to her as they danced together.

“Was Mr. Manx,” Alleyn’s voice asked, close beside her, “wearing his white carnation when he arrived for dinner?”

“No,” she said, too loudly. “No. Not till afterwards. There were white carnations on the table at dinner.”

“Perhaps it was one of them.”

“Then,” she said quickly, “it doesn’t fit. The letter must have been written before he ever saw the carnation. It doesn’t fit. She said the letter came by district messenger. Ned wouldn’t have known.”

“By district messenger, did she? We’ll have to check that. Perhaps we’ll find the envelope. Would you say,” Alleyn continued, “that he seemed to be very much attached to her?”

(Edward had said: “About Fée. Something very odd has occurred. I can’t explain but I’d like to think you understand.”)

“Strongly attracted, would you think?” Alleyn said.

“I don’t know. I don’t know what to think.”

“Do they see much of each other?”

“I don’t know. He — he stayed at Duke’s Gate while he was flat hunting.”

“Perhaps an attachment developed then. What do you think?”

She shook her head. Alleyn waited. Carlisle now found his unstressed persistence intolerable. She felt her moorings go and was adrift in the darkness. A wretchedness of spirit that she was unable to control or understand took possession of her. “I won’t talk about it,” she stammered, “it’s none of my business. I can’t go on like this. Let me go, please. Please let me go.”

“Of course,” Alleyn said. “I’ll take you home.”

When they arrived at Duke’s Gate, dawn was so far established that the houses with their blind windows and locked doors were clearly distinguishable in a wan half-light.

The familiar street, emerging from night, had an air of emaciation and secrecy, Carlisle thought, and she was vaguely relieved when milk bottles jingled up a side alley breaking across the blank emptiness. “Have you got a key?” Alleyn said. He and Fox and the man from the front seat waited while she groped in her bag. As she opened the door a second car drew up and four men got out. The men from the front seat joined them. She thought: “This makes us all seem very important. This is an important case. A case of murder.”

In the old days she had come back from parties once or twice with Ned Manx at this hour. The indefinable house-smell made itself felt as they entered. She turned on a lamp and it was light in the silent hall. She saw herself reflected in the inner glass doors, her face stained with tears. Alleyn came in first. Standing there, in evening dress, with his hat in his hand, he might have been seeing her home, about to wish her good-bye. The other men followed quickly. “What happens now?” she wondered. “Will he let me go now? What are they going to do?”

Alleyn had drawn a paper from his pocket. “This is a search-warrant,” he said. “I don’t want to hunt Lord Pastern out of his bed. It will do I think, if — ”

He broke off, moved quickly to the shadowed staircase and up half-a-dozen steps. Fox and the other men stood quiet inside the doors. A little French clock in the stair well ticked flurriedly. Upstairs on the first floor a door was flung open. A faint reflected light shone on Alleyn’s face. A voice, unmistakably Lord Pastern’s, said loudly: “I don’t give a damn how upset you are. You can have kittens if you like but you don’t go to bed till I’ve got my time-table worked out. Sit down.”

With a faint grin Alleyn moved upstairs and Carlisle, after a moment’s hesitation, followed him.