Duck Season Death (3 page)

Miss Bryce dismissed the extraordinary notion that he had been looking over her shoulder. “Why, good morning, Mr Wilson! Going out walking again? And it's such a wet day! Good weather for ducks, as so we hope. But you have a raincoat, haven't you?” Unlike her brother, who maliciously delighted in engaging him in conversation, she always kept to questions which required only a
nod or shake of Wilson's head. When he had gone, she turned back to the letter. “Ellis, I don't like the sound of this young woman Jerry wants to bring home for the weekend. Who is she?”

“A m-m-model.”

“Shh, he'll hear you. And you shouldn't tease him like that. It's most unkind. How would you like—it's a pity you don't pay more attention to your children instead of—it was an artist last time—at least she called herself an artist. I'm sure I couldn't make head nor tail of that painting she gave you. It looked to me as though one of the dogs had got to it. Still, I'm not sure I wouldn't prefer an artist to a model. Why does Jerry get entangled with such females?”

Ellis gave a sudden guffaw. “Not that sort of model. This one's paid to wear clothes.”

“I think it is high time you behaved as a father should and not let your children run wild.”

“Wild? Shelagh? Now, come, come!”

“Yes, Shelagh is all right, though I must say it doesn't seem right for a girl of twenty-two to be so certain of herself and so—well, sort of unfeeling, even if she is a nurse.”

“Yes, I know,” said Ellis, yawning. “At least Jerry's females are amusing.”

“Ellis, you are the most unnatural father. You've allowed those two to grow up anyhow. It is easy to see whom Jerry takes after. But Shelagh is a good girl. At least she is conscious of her duties and comes home to help at this busy time. That finishes the rooms, thank goodness.” Miss Bryce marked a room for Margot Stainsbury as far from Jerry's as possible. “Now for the seating arrangements.”

“All this organisation has worn me out,” said Ellis. “I think I'll go and open the bar.”

“Oh no, you don't. You must decide what we are going to do about Mr Sefton and Major Dougall.”

“What about them?”

“We can't have a repetition of last year. In fact, if I had my way we would send a polite letter to Mr Sefton telling him we are
booked out this year. He is the most unpleasant man I have ever met—a real trouble-maker for all his grand manner. He was downright insulting to poor Major Dougall. And Mrs Dougall was telling me how he'd deliberately misled them over some investments.”

“Put Athol next to Jerry's model,” suggested Ellis. “That will keep him occupied.”

“And have Jerry making scenes like he did over that artist creature?” she asked scornfully. “Not that it wasn't a very good thing for him that she did get off with Mr Sefton, but—oh dear, how difficult it all is! And you're no help, Ellis. You're as malicious as Mr Sefton. I declare you enjoy seeing everything uncomfortable.”

“I admit I find Athol at work not unamusing.”

“No doubt you'll still find him amusing when the other guests refuse to stay with him in the house.”

“They won't,” he said lazily. “The drinks are too good and so is the shooting—and so is your cooking, Grace.”

She tried not to look mollified and retorted tartly, “Well, don't blame me if your amusing Mr Sefton one day causes trouble that even you won't find entertaining, Ellis.”

II

A cocktail party, Charles Carmichael reflected, is one of the drearier rituals of modern social and commercial life. It was no wonder that critics became either inflated with carbohydrates and self-importance or soul-cynical and dyspeptic. Charles told himself that he belonged to the latter class and smothered a corroborating belch.

The motive of the present day's party was the launching of a first novel, and the press, book sellers and other interested representatives had been invited to eat, drink and make merry in its honour. They were always being invited to the Moonbeam Room or
the Persian Room or this, that or other Room to honour something and knew what was expected of them in return.

A man from the publisher's publicity department hovered attentively around Charles, wondering if his attention was a waste of time.
Culture and Critic
rarely gave good reviews to anyone or anything. Even its faintest praise was made more damnable by an inevitable sting in the tail. Intellectual smearing was Athol Sefton's policy, and as he was proprietor, publisher and editor in chief, there was little Charles could do in return for the martinis and the canapés.

Culture and Critic
was a small but influential quarterly, the main office of which was situated in Sydney. It ran a few world syndicated articles and commentaries dealing with music, art and literature, but its main concern was the local artistic scene. With the aid of a secretary, a broken-down journalist and frequent abusive wires, letters and phone calls from Athol, Charles looked after the Melbourne office. The only section in the magazine where he was allowed carte blanche was the detective story review. He was a peaceable young man and this salve to his self-respect evidently enabled him to put up with the tantrums of his uncle by marriage.

Catching sight of Charles across the crowded, smoke-misted room, Margot Stainsbury gave a little shriek of recognition, excused herself ruthlessly to her companion, a dark and dour young man in crumpled corduroy trousers, and began to weave her lovely synthetic body through the drinking groups. Several tired businessmen looked at her with prawn-eyed expectancy, but although she automatically flashed her twenty-guinea-a-shot smile at them, she kept on to the place where Charles was listening to the publisher's representative expounding on the book of the year.

“Darling!” she shrieked again, and flung butterfly arms around his neck, lifting up out of the two suede straps and pencil-like heels which constituted her shoes.

Charles had not seen Margot for nearly a year, at which time he had been brought to the sudden and shattering realisation that she was the sort of girl you only took out to dine and dance.

“Oh—hello!” he said feebly. “What are you doing here?”

She shone a perfunctory smile on his companion, then linked arms affectionately. “Oh, you know me—always around. Angel, I can't tell you how relieved I am to see you. There's something most frightfully important I want to tell you.”

The publicity man chivalrously, though reluctantly, began to edge away. He felt
Culture and Critic
owed him something. With a clatter of chunky costume jewellery, Margot put out a restraining hand. “Oh, please don't go. You will make me feel dreadful. I'm sure I am breaking up some most frightfully important discussion. Chas and I can talk later, can't we, dear?”

“It's probably a toss-up which is of more frightful importance, so let's stick to neutral ground,” said Charles and introduced them.

“How do you do, Miss Stainsbury. Haven't I see—?”

“Of course you've seen her before,” interrupted Charles, with a touch of derision. “Miss Stainsbury is the most sought-after model in the country. Here is the face that launches a thousand sales.”

“Oh, Chas!” Margot fluttered her lids demurely. Then, because the publicity man wasn't, as she had first thought, a member of the press and showed an inclination to hover like an unwanted dog after a desultory pat, she said plaintively, “Do you know, I've hardly had one drink yet.”

Charles, remembering being the humiliated victim of this gambit of hers, remained unmoved. Slavering happily, the publicity man plunged away to the bar to do Margot's bidding.

“And you round off the trick by moving to another part of the room,” said Charles, guiding her through the crowds.

“You didn't mind, darling? He looked the type to cling. Such odd people one has to meet at cocktail parties. You weren't actually talking about anything frightfully important, were you, Charles?”

“He thought so, but not frightfully. He wants Athol to let me write some nice things about the novel that overgrown schoolboy in the corner there has written.”

Margot made a parade platform swivel, and surveyed the author with an expertly dispassionate eye. “Is he the cause of all this?”

“Unwittingly, poor fellow! Which reminds me—what are you doing in this commercially erudite company? Not your usual venue if I might say so?”

Her large eyes widened reproachfully, threatening to eclipse the rest of her wholly enchanting face. “I can get by anywhere, so don't act as though you're not pleased to see me. Don't I always read Athol's nasty bits about the latest novels? Oh, and yours too, darling—though I can't understand why you must get so intense about murders and blunt weapons and things.”

“The detective story is just as much an artistic expression—” began Charles defensively.

“You see what I mean, dear?” she interrupted kindly. “So boring when you become earnest. Now Athol is never boring, though I agree he can be an absolute beast sometimes. Do you know, Chas, it took me all my time to get him to take me to lunch at Manonetta's last week? He wanted to go to some ghastly out-of-the-way spot, but as I pointed out to him, I can't afford not to be seen. And even when I got him to Manonetta's,” her voice rose incredulously, “he absolutely insisted upon a side table. I might just as well have been wearing something off the peg. Don't you agree that was brutish of him?”

“Oh, quite! So you've seen Athol recently. How was he?”

“Darling, I'm just telling you. Do pay attention. A side table at Manonetta's. What I mean to say is—you know Athol! And it can't be just because of his wife's death. I know she was your aunt, Chas, but did you ever see such a drear? Anyway, she's been dead for months now.”

Charles thought of his late aunt, whom he was reputed to have resembled, and protested.

“Oh darling, she was! An out-and-out drear. How did Athol come to marry her, even though she did have money? By the way, I trust she did the decent thing by our Charles.”

“No, she didn't—at least, not to the extent of your eyeing me in that calculating way, Margot. Athol would be your better bet.”

“At the moment Athol is not very impressionable material.”

“That's unusual—both for him and for you. Losing your grip, Margot?”

Her eyes flashed momentarily. “Unusual! That's just what I'm telling you, Chas, but you don't seem the least concerned.”

“Maybe if I knew what you were talking about I could be concerned. I do wish you would be more concise. Athol is unusual, is that it? But isn't he always?”

“He's not being unusually unusual,” she said, with a gesture of impatience. “And he's not pining away after your aunt. Who would? He seems to me to be—well, I know you will just scoff—frightened.”

“Athol? Nonsense!”

She gave a little shiver. “Haunted!”

“That's even greater rubbish. I was speaking to him on the phone only this morning. He sounded just the same.”

“Yes, haunted is about the right word,” Margot nodded in agreement with herself. “We were talking about ghosts too.”

“Ghosts? Oh, now, look here—”

“It was after he came back from the telephone. But I'd already noticed how changed he was. We were having claret with our lunch, and do you know it was the first wine the waiter offered? Athol, who likes to make a thing about tasting and sending waiters scurrying! Now, do you understand, Chas?”

“What about the phone call?” asked Charles stolidly.

“Someone called him—just as they were making our Suzettes. Aren't people inconsiderate? But Athol went at once, which is odd too when one comes to think of it. When he came back he ordered a whisky and soda. After all that claret and he never drinks spirits before evening as a rule. Of course, I could see that he was most frightfully shaken about something.”

Charles frowned. He could think of only one reason for Athol's alleged change in demeanour—financial anxiety; though it had
never seemed to worry him before this.
Culture and Critic
had never been inaugurated as a money-spinning venture. An astringent influence in an uncultured society was the way Athol always referred to it. With its limited circulation and meagre advertisements, it just paid for itself, any lapses from monetary grace being covered by Athol's small private resources and his wife's larger ones. Perhaps the terms of the late Mrs Sefton's will contained some hindrance to this admirable scheme which she had been persuaded against carrying out in life. She had been a semi-invalid for as long as Charles could remember and Athol was capable of making even the strongest woman do what he wanted.

“It was then,” Margot was saying in a trilling voice, “that he asked—half-jokingly, of course—if I believed in ghosts. So you understand why I said haunted, Chas?”

“No, I'm afraid I don't. However, Athol is coming down in a day or so. I'll probably learn what the trouble is then—if there is anything and you haven't made all this up, Margot. He wants me to go bush with him—shooting ducks.”