Part 3 (1/2)
THE SPECTRE AT THE FEAST
Merriton, clad in his evening clothes and looking exceedingly handsome, stood by the smoking room door, with Tony West, short and thickset, wearing a suit that fitted badly and a collar which looked sizes too large for him (Merriton had long given up hope of making him visit a decent tailor) and waited for the sound of motor wheels which would announce the arrival of further guests.
It was the memorable Tuesday dinner, given in the first place for Dacre Wynne, as a sort of send off before he left for Cairo. In the second Merriton intended to break it gently to the other chaps that he was shortly to become a Benedict.
Lester Stark and Tony West, very loyal and proven friends of Nigel Merriton, had arrived the evening before. Dacre Wynne was coming down by the seven o'clock train, d.i.c.ky Fordyce, Reginald Lefroy-both fellow officers of Merriton's regiment, and home on leave from India-and mild old Dr. Bartholomew, whom everyone respected and few did not love, and who was in attendance at most of the bachelor spreads in London and out of it, as being a dry old body with a wit as fine as a rapier-thrust, and a fund of delicate, subtle humour, made up the little party.
The solemn front door bell of Merriton Towers clanged, and Borkins, very pompous and elegant, flung wide the door. Merriton saw Wynne's big, broad-shouldered figure swathed in the black evening cloak which he affected upon such occasions, and which became him mightily, and with an opera hat set at the correct angle upon his closely-clipped dark hair, step into the lighted hallway, and begin taking off his gloves.
Tony West's raspy voice chimed out a welcome, as Merriton went forward, his hand outstretched.
”h.e.l.lo, old man!” said Tony. ”How goes it? Lookin' a bit white about the gills, aren't you, eh?... Whew! Merriton, old chap, that's my ribs, if you don't mind. I've no penchant for your bayonet-like elbow to go prodding into 'em!”
Merriton raised an eyebrow, frowned heavily, and by every other method under the sun tried to make it plain to West that the topic was taboo. Wherefore West raised his eyebrows, began to make a hasty exclamation, thought better of it, and then clapping his hand over his mouth broke into whistling the latest jazz tune, as though he had completely extricated both feet from the unfortunate mire he had planted them in-but with very little success.
Wynne was a frowning Hercules as he entered the pleasant smoke-filled room. Merriton's arm lay upon his sleeve, and he endured because he had to-that was all.
”h.e.l.lo!” he said, to Lester Stark's rather half-hearted greeting-Lester Stark never had liked Dacre Wynne and they both knew it. ”You here as well? Merriton's giving me a send-off and no mistake. Gad! you chaps will be envying me this time next week, I'll swear! Out on the briny for a decently long trip; plenty of pretty women-on which I'm bankin' of course”-he gave Merriton a sudden, searching look, ”and not a care in the world. And the white lights of Cairo starin' at me across the water. Some picture, isn't it?”
”You may keep it!” said Tony West with a shudder. ”When you've smelled Cairo, Wynne, old boy, you'll come skulkin' home with your tail between your legs. A 'rose by any other name would smell as sweet,' but Cairo-parts of it mind you-well, Cairo's the stinkin'st rose I ever put my nose into, that's all!”
”There are some things which offend the nostrils more than-odours!” threw back Wynne with a black look in Nigel's direction, and with a sort of slur in his voice that showed he had been drinking more than was good for him that night. ”I think I can endure the smells of Cairo after-other things. Eh, Nigel?” He forced a laugh which was mirthless and unpleasant, and Merriton, with a quick glance into his friends' faces, saw that they too had seen. Wynne was in one of his ”devil” humours, and all the fun and joking and merriment in the world would never get him out of it. His pity for the man suddenly died a natural death. The very evident fact that Wynne had been drinking rather heavily merely added a further distaste to it all. He wished heartily that he had never ventured upon this act of unwanted friendliness and given a dinner in his honour. Wynne was going to be the spectre at the feast, and it looked like being a poor sort of show after all.
”Come, buck up, old chap!” broke out Tony West, the irrepressible. ”Try to look a little less like a soured lemon, if you can! Or we'll begin to think that you've been and gone and done something you're sorry for, and are trying to work it off on us instead.”
”h.e.l.lo, here's Doctor Johnson,” as the venerable Bartholomew entered the room. ”How goes it to-night, sir? A fine night, what? Behold the king of the feast, his serene and mighty-oh extremely mighty!-highness Prince Dacre Wynne, world explorer and soon to be lord-high-sniffer of Cairo's smells! Don't envy him the task, do you?”
He bowed with a flourish to the doctor who chuckled and his keen eyes, fringed with snow-white lashes, danced. He wore a rather long, extremely untidy beard, and his s.h.i.+rt-front as always was crumpled and worn. Anything more unlike a doctor it would be hard to imagine. But he was a clever one, nevertheless.
”Well, my talkative young parrot,” he greeted West affectionately, ”and how are you?... And who's party is this, anyhow? Yours or Merriton's? You seem to be putting yourself rather more to the fore than usual.”
”Well, I'll soon be goin' aft,” retorted West with a wide grin. ”When old Nigel gets his innings. He's as chockful of news as an egg is of meat.” West was one of the chosen few who had already heard of Nigel's engagement, and he was rather like a gossipy old woman-but his friends forgave it in him.
Merriton gave him a shove, and he fell back upon Wynne, emitting a portentous groan.
”What the devil-?” began that gentleman, in a testy voice.
Tony grinned.
”Nigel was ever thus!” he murmured, with uplifted eyes.
”Shut up!” thundered Stark, clapping a hand over West's mouth, and he subsided as the doorbell rang again, and Borkins ushered in Fordyce and Lefroy, two slim-hipped, dapper young gentlemen with the stamp of the army all over them. The party thus complete, Borkins gravely withdrew, and some fifteen minutes later the great gong in the hallway clanged out its summons. They streamed into the dining room, Doctor Bartholomew upon Tony West's fat little arm; Fordyce and Lefroy, side by side, hands in pockets and closely cropped heads nodding vigorously; Merriton and Lester Stark sauntering one slightly behind the other, and exchanging pleasantries as they went; and just in front of them, Dacre Wynne, solitary, huge, sinister, and overbearing.
Wynne sat in the seat of honour on Merriton's right. The rest sorted themselves out as they wished, and made a good deal of noise and fun about it, too. Down the length of the long, exquisitely decorated table Merriton looked at his guests and thought it wasn't going to be so dismal after all.
Champagne ran like water and spirits ran high. They joyfully toasted Wynne, and later on the news that Merriton imparted to them. In vain Dacre Wynne's low spirits were apparent. He must get over his grouch, that was all. Then once again the spirit of evil descended upon the gathering and it was Stark who precipitated its flight. ”By the way, Nigel,” he asked suddenly, ”isn't there some ghost story or other pertaining to your district? Give us a recital of it, old boy. Walnuts and wine and ghost stories, you know, are just the right sort of thing after a dinner like this. Tony, switch off the lights. This old house of yours is the very place for ghosts. Now let us have it.”
”Hold on,” Nigel remonstrated. ”Give me a chance to digest my dinner, and-dash it all, the thing's so deuced uncanny that it doesn't bear too much laughing at either!”
”Come along!” Six voices echoed the cry. ”We're waiting, Nigel.”