“Oh!” said Lettice. “I hope he isn’t. He won’t find anybody there.”
“He said you asked him.”
“I believe I did. Only that was Friday. And to-day’s Tuesday.”
“It’s Wednesday,” I said.
“Oh! how dreadful,” said Lettice. “That means that I’ve forgotten to go to lunch with some people for the third time.”
Fortunately it didn’t seem to worry her much.
“Is Griselda anywhere about?”
“I expect you’d find her in the studio in the garden – sitting to Lawrence Redding.”
“There’s been quite a shemozzle about him,” said Lettice. “With father, you know. Father’s dreadful.”
“What was the she – whatever it was about?” I inquired.
“About his painting me. Father found out about it. Why shouldn’t I be painted in my bathing dress? If I go on a beach in it, why shouldn’t I be painted in it?”
Lettice paused and then went on.
“It’s really absurd – father forbidding a young man the house. Of course, Lawrence and I simply shriek about it. I shall come and be done here in your studio.”
“No, my dear,” I said. “Not if your father forbids it.”
“Oh! dear,” said Lettice, sighing. “How tiresome every one is. I feel shattered. Definitely. If only I had some money I’d go away, but without it I can’t. If only father would be decent and die, I should be all right.”
“You must not say things like that, Lettice.”
“Well, if he doesn’t want me to want him to die, he shouldn’t be so horrible over money. I don’t wonder mother left him. Do you know, for years I believed she was dead. What sort of a young man did she run away with? Was he nice?”
“It was before your father came to live here.”
“I wonder what’s become of her. I expect Anne will have an affair with someone soon. Anne hates me – she’s quite decent to me, but she hates me. She’s getting old and she doesn’t like it. That’s the age you break out, you know.”
I wondered if Lettice was going to spend the entire afternoon in my study.
“You haven’t seen my gramophone records, have you?” she asked.
“No.”
“How tiresome. I know I’ve left them somewhere. And I’ve lost the dog. And my wrist watch is somewhere, only it doesn’t much matter because it won’t go. Oh! dear, I am so sleepy. I can’t think why, because I didn’t get up till eleven. But life’s very shattering, don’t you think? Oh! dear, I must go. I’m going to see Dr. Stone’s barrow at three o’clock.”
I glanced at the clock and remarked that it was now five-and-twenty to four.
“Oh! is it? How dreadful. I wonder if they’ve waited or if they’ve gone without me. I suppose I’d better go down and do something about it.”
She got up and drifted out again, murmuring over her shoulder:
“You’ll tell Dennis, won’t you?”
I said “Yes” mechanically, only realising too late that I had no idea what it was I was to tell Dennis. But I reflected that in all probability it did not matter. I fell to cogitating on the subject of Dr. Stone, a well-known archæologist who had recently come to stay at the Blue Boar, whilst he superintended the excavation of a barrow situated on Colonel Protheroe’s property. There had already been several disputes between him and the Colonel. I was amused at his appointment to take Lettice to see the operations.
It occurred to me that Lettice Protheroe was something of a minx. I wondered how she would get on with the archæologist’s secretary, Miss Cram. Miss Cram is a healthy young woman of twenty-five, noisy in manner, with a high colour, fine animal spirits and a mouth that always seems to have more than its full share of teeth.
Village opinion is divided as to whether she is no better than she should be, or else a young woman of iron virtue who purposes to become Mrs. Stone at an early opportunity. She is in every way a great contrast to Lettice.
I could imagine that the state of things at Old Hall might not be too happy. Colonel Protheroe had married again some five years previously. The second Mrs. Protheroe was a remarkably handsome woman in a rather unusual style. I had always guessed that the relations between her and her stepdaughter were not too happy.