Spinsters in Jeopardy

A gown was laid out on the bed. Baradi took it up. ‘Will you try this? There is an unoccupied room next door with access to a bathroom. You have time for a bath and will, no doubt, be glad to take one. Since morphine has been given there is no immediate urgency but I should prefer all the same to operate as soon as possible. When you are ready, my own preparations will be complete and we can discuss final arrangements.’

Alleyn said: ‘Dr Baradi, we haven’t said anything about your fee for the operation: indeed, it is neither my business nor my wife’s, but I do feel some concern about it. I imagine Miss Truebody will at least be able …’

Baradi held up his hand. ‘Let us not discuss it,’ he said. ‘Let us assume that it is of no great moment.’

‘If you prefer to do so.’ Alleyn hesitated and then added: ‘This is an extraordinary situation. You will, I’m sure, realize that we are reluctant to take such a grave responsibility. Miss Truebody is a complete stranger to us. You yourself must feel it would be much more satisfactory if there was a relation or friend from whom we could get some kind of authority. Especially as her illness is so serious.’

‘I agree. However, she would undoubtedly die if the operation was not performed and, in my opinion, would be in the gravest danger if it was unduly postponed. As it is, I’m afraid there is a risk, a great risk, that she will not recover. We can,’ Baradi added with what Alleyn felt was a genuine, if controlled, anxiety, ‘only do our best and hope that all may be well.’

And on this note Alleyn turned to go. As he was in the doorway Baradi, with a complete change of manner, said: ‘Your enchanting wife is with her. Third door on the left. Quite enchanting. Delicious, if you will permit me.’

Alleyn looked at him and found what he saw offensive.

‘Under these unfortunate circumstances,’ he said politely, ‘I can’t do anything else.’

Evidently Dr Baradi chose to regard this observation as a pleasantry. He laughed richly. ‘Delicious!’ he repeated, but whether in reference to Alleyn’s comment or as a reiterated observation upon Troy it was impossible to determine. Alleyn, who had every reason and no inclination for keeping his temper, walked into the next room.

III

Troy had carried out her instructions and Miss Truebody had slipped again into sleep. The sound of her breathing cut the silence into irregular intervals. Her eyes were not quite closed. Segments of the eyeballs appeared under the pathetic insufficiency of her lashes. Troy was at once unwilling to leave her and anxious to return to Ricky. She heard Alleyn and Dr Baradi in the passage. Their voices were broken off by a door slam and again there was only Miss Truebody’s breathing. Troy waited, hoping that Alleyn knew where she was and would come to her. After what seemed an interminable interval there was a tap at the door. She opened it and he was there in a white gown looking tall, elegant and angry. Troy shut the door behind her and they whispered together in the passage.

‘Rum go,’ he said, ‘isn’t it?’

‘Not ’alf. When do you begin?’

‘Soon. He’s trying to make himself aseptic. A losing battle, I should think.’

‘Frightful, isn’t he?’

The bottom. I’m so sorry, darling, you have to suffer his atrocious gallantries.’

‘Well, I dare say they’re just elaborate oriental courtesy, or something.’

‘Elaborate bloody impertinence.’

‘Never mind, Rory. I’ll skip out of his way.’

‘I shouldn’t have brought you to this damn’ place.’

‘Fiddle! In any case he’s going to be too busy.’

‘Is she asleep?’

‘Sort of. I don’t like to leave her but suppose Ricky should wake?’

‘Go up to him. I’ll stay with her. Baradi’s going to give her an injection before I get going with the ether. And, Troy –’

‘Yes?’

‘It’s important these people don’t get a line on who I am.’

‘I know.’

‘I haven’t told you anything about them but I think I’ll have to come moderately clean when there’s a chance. It’s a rum set up. I’ll get you out of it as soon as possible.’

‘I’m not worrying now we know about the charades. Funny! You said there might be an explanation but we never thought of charades, did we?’

‘No,’ Alleyn said, ‘we didn’t, did we?’ and suddenly kissed her. ‘Now, I suppose I’ll have to wash again,’ he added.

Raoul came down the passage with Baradi’s servant. They were carrying the improvised stretcher and were dressed in white overalls.

Raoul said: ‘Madame!’ to Troy and to Alleyn, ‘it appears, Monsieur, that M. le Docteur orders Mademoiselle to be taken to the operating room. Is that convenient for Monsieur?’

‘Of course. We are under Dr Baradi’s orders.’

‘Authority,’ Raoul observed, ‘comes to roost on strange perches, Monsieur.’

‘That,’ Alleyn said, ‘will do.’

Raoul grinned and opened the door. They took the stretcher in and laid it on the floor by the bed. When they lifted her down to it, Miss Truebody opened her eyes and said distinctly: ‘But I would prefer to stay in bed.’ Raoul deftly tucked blankets under her. She began to wail dismally.

Troy said: ‘It’s all right, dear. You’ll be all right,’ and thought: ‘But I never call people dear!’

They carried Miss Truebody into the room across the passage and put her on the table by the window. Troy went with them, holding her hand. The window coverings had been removed and a hard glare beat down on the table. The room still reeked of disinfectant. There was a second table on which a number of objects were now laid out. Troy, after one glance, did not look at them again. She held Miss Truebody’s hand and stood between her and the instrument table. A door in the wall facing her opened and Baradi appeared against a background of bathroom. He wore his gown and a white cap. Their austerity of design emphasized the opulence of his nose and eyes and teeth. He had a hypodermic syringe in his left hand.

‘So, after all, you are to assist me?’ he murmured to Troy. But it was obvious that he didn’t entertain any such notion.

Still holding the flaccid hand, she said: ‘I thought perhaps I should stay with her until …’

‘But of course! Please remain a little longer.’ He began to give instructions to Alleyn and the two men. He spoke in French presumably, Troy thought, to spare Miss Truebody’s feelings. ‘I am left-handed,’ he said. ‘If I should ask for anything to be handed to me you will please remember that. Now, Mr Allen, we will show you your equipment, isn’t it? Milano!’ Raoul brought a china dish from the instrument table. It had a bottle and a hand towel on it. Alleyn looked at it and nodded. ‘Parfaitement,’ he said.

Baradi took Miss Truebody’s other hand and pushed up the long sleeve of her nightgown. She stared at him and her mouth worked soundlessly.

Troy saw the needle slide in. The hand she held flickered momentarily and relaxed.

‘It is fortunate,’ Baradi said as he withdrew the needle, ‘that this little Dr Claudel had pentothal. A happy coincidence.’

He raised Miss Truebody’s eyelid. The pupil was out of sight. ‘Admirable,’ he said. ‘Now, Mr Allen, we will, in a moment or two, induce a more profound anaesthesia which you will continue. I shall scrub up and in a few minutes more we begin operations.’ He smiled at Troy who was already on the way to the door. ‘One of our party will join you presently on the roof-garden. Miss Locke; the Honourable Grizel Locke. I believe she has a vogue in England. Quite mad but utterly charming.’

Troy’s last impression of the room, a vivid one, was of Baradi, enormous in his white gown and cap, of Alleyn standing near the table and smiling at her, of Raoul and the Egyptian servant waiting near the instruments and of Miss Truebody’s wide-open mouth and of the sound of her breathing. Then the door shut off the picture as abruptly as the tunnel had shut off her earlier glimpse into a room in the Chèvre d’Argent.

‘Only that time,’ Troy told herself, as she made her way back to the roof-garden, ‘it was only a charade.’

CHAPTER 3 (#ulink_1f532554-d674-5814-9ea9-8e1842de4255)

Morning with Mr Oberon (#ulink_1f532554-d674-5814-9ea9-8e1842de4255)

The sun shone full on the roof-garden now, but Ricky was shielded from it by the canopy of his swinging couch. He was, as he himself might have said, lavishly asleep. Troy knew he would stay so for a long time.