The Mysterious Mr Quin

After this somewhat cryptic utterance, Lady Cynthia was silent for a moment, ruminating on the Unkertons’ meanness as displayed to herself.

‘If I’d still been running the show for them,’ she went on presently, ‘I should have said quite firmly and plainly: “You can’t ask Mrs Staverton with the Richard Scotts. She and he were once–”’

She stopped eloquently.

‘But were they once?’ asked Mr Satterthwaite.

‘My dear man! It’s well known. That trip into the Interior! I’m surprised the woman had the face to accept the invitation.’

‘Perhaps she didn’t know the others were coming?’ suggested Mr Satterthwaite.

‘Perhaps she did. That’s far more likely.’

‘You think–?’

‘She’s what I call a dangerous woman–the sort of woman who’d stick at nothing. I wouldn’t be in Richard Scott’s shoes this week-end.’

‘And his wife knows nothing, you think?’

‘I’m certain of it. But I suppose some kind friend will enlighten her sooner or later. Here’s Jimmy Allenson. Such a nice boy. He saved my life in Egypt last winter–I was so bored, you know. Hullo, Jimmy, come here at once.’

Captain Allenson obeyed, dropping down on the turf beside her. He was a handsome young fellow of thirty, with white teeth and an infectious smile.

‘I’m glad somebody wants me,’ he observed. ‘The Scotts are doing the turtle dove stunt, two required, not three, Porter’s devouring the Field, and I’ve been in mortal danger of being entertained by my hostess.’

He laughed. Lady Cynthia laughed with him. Mr Satterthwaite, who was in some ways a little old-fashioned, so much so that he seldom made fun of his host and hostess until after he had left their house, remained grave.

‘Poor Jimmy,’ said Lady Cynthia.

‘Mine not to reason why, mine but to swiftly fly. I had a narrow escape of being told the family ghost story.’

‘An Unkerton ghost,’ said Lady Cynthia. ‘How screaming.’

‘Not an Unkerton ghost,’ said Mr Satterthwaite. ‘A Greenways ghost. They bought it with the house.’

‘Of course,’ said Lady Cynthia. ‘I remember now. But it doesn’t clank chains, does it? It’s only something to do with a window.’

Jimmy Allenson looked up quickly.

‘A window?’

But for the moment Mr Satterthwaite did not answer. He was looking over Jimmy’s head at three figures approaching from the direction of the house–a slim girl between two men. There was a superficial resemblance between the men, both were tall and dark with bronzed faces and quick eyes, but looked at more closely the resemblance vanished. Richard Scott, hunter and explorer, was a man of extraordinarily vivid personality. He had a manner that radiated magnetism. John Porter, his friend and fellow hunter, was a man of squarer build with an impassive, rather wooden face, and very thoughtful grey eyes. He was a quiet man, content always to play second fiddle to his friend.

And between these two walked Moira Scott who, until three months ago, had been Moira O’Connell. A slender figure, big wistful brown eyes, and golden red hair that stood out round her small face like a saint’s halo.

‘That child mustn’t be hurt,’ said Mr Satterthwaite to himself. ‘It would be abominable that a child like that should be hurt.’

Lady Cynthia greeted the newcomers with a wave of the latest thing in parasols.

‘Sit down, and don’t interrupt,’ she said. ‘Mr Satterthwaite is telling us a ghost story.’

‘I love ghost stories,’ said Moira Scott. She dropped down on the grass.

‘The ghost of Greenways House?’ asked Richard Scott.

‘Yes. You know about it?’

Scott nodded.

‘I used to stay here in the old days,’ he explained. ‘Before the Elliots had to sell up. The Watching Cavalier, that’s it, isn’t it?’

‘The Watching Cavalier,’ said his wife softly. ‘I like that. It sounds interesting. Please go on.’

But Mr Satterthwaite seemed somewhat loath to do so. He assured her that it was not really interesting at all.

‘Now you’ve done it, Satterthwaite,’ said Richard Scott sardonically. ‘That hint of reluctance clinches it.’

In response to popular clamour, Mr Satterthwaite was forced to speak.

‘It’s really very uninteresting,’ he said apologetically. ‘I believe the original story centres round a Cavalier ancestor of the Elliot family. His wife had a Roundhead lover. The husband was killed by the lover in an upstairs room, and the guilty pair fled, but as they fled, they looked back at the house, and saw the face of the dead husband at the window, watching them. That is the legend, but the ghost story is only concerned with a pane of glass in the window of that particular room on which is an irregular stain, almost imperceptible from near at hand, but which from far away certainly gives the effect of a man’s face looking out.’

‘Which window is it?’ asked Mrs Scott, looking up at the house.

‘You can’t see it from here,’ said Mr Satterthwaite. ‘It is round the other side but was boarded up from the inside some years ago–forty years ago, I think, to be accurate.’

‘What did they do that for? I thought you said the ghost didn’t walk.’

‘It doesn’t,’ Mr Satterthwaite assured her. ‘I suppose–well, I suppose there grew to be a superstitious feeling about it, that’s all.’

Then, deftly enough, he succeeded in turning the conversation. Jimmy Allenson was perfectly ready to hold forth upon Egyptian sand diviners.

‘Frauds, most of them. Ready enough to tell you vague things about the past, but won’t commit themselves as to the future.’

‘I should have thought it was usually the other way about,’ remarked John Porter.

‘It’s illegal to tell the future in this country, isn’t it?’ said Richard Scott. ‘Moira persuaded a gypsy into telling her fortune, but the woman gave her her shilling back, and said there was nothing doing, or words to that effect.’

‘Perhaps she saw something so frightful that she didn’t like to tell it me,’ said Moira.

‘Don’t pile on the agony, Mrs Scott,’ said Allenson lightly. ‘I, for one, refuse to believe that an unlucky fate is hanging over you.’

‘I wonder,’ thought Mr Satterthwaite to himself. ‘I wonder…’

Then he looked up sharply. Two women were coming from the house, a short stout woman with black hair, inappropriately dressed in jade green, and a tall slim figure in creamy white. The first woman was his hostess, Mrs Unkerton, the second was a woman he had often heard of, but never met.

‘Here’s Mrs Staverton,’ announced Mrs Unkerton, in a tone of great satisfaction. ‘All friends here, I think.’

‘These people have an uncanny gift for saying just the most awful things they can,’ murmured Lady Cynthia, but Mr Satterthwaite was not listening. He was watching Mrs Staverton.