Date with Death. Leslie Ford
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jump from the newspaper incident to goiter to Elizabeth Darrell as his office assistant and receptionist, looked over at her. For once her poise had deserted her completely. She was sitting forward on the edge of the love seat, staring at Miss Olive with appalled embarrassment, scarlet-faced.
“Why, Miss Olive!” she gasped.
Miss Olive looked blankly around at everybody, and back at Elizabeth.
“Didn’t Dr. Smith want you in the position? You said you were going to apply for it. I’m very sure you said it to me right here in this room, Elizabeth. I was sitting where Miss Van Holt—”
“Oh, Miss Olive, please! That was before—”
“Before you saw he was so young and handsome, dear?”
Philippa Van Holt raised her eyebrows, uncrossed one shapely leg and crossed it with the other.
“And unmarried? I should think that would be the chief reason—”
“I’d be delighted to have Miss Darrell for my assistant,” Jonas said. He grinned cheerfully over at her. “I think it’s a wonderful idea. If your grandfather can spare you…”
“If she wants a job she can have it, and I don’t see it’s anybody’s business but her own.”
“It’s all set, then.” Jonas grinned at Elizabeth again. “Tomorrow at nine, Miss Darrell.”
“You know she was one of the best nurse’s aides. Dr. French signalled her out for—”
“Miss Olive—please be quiet!”
“Oh, let her go on, Elizabeth,” Philippa Van Holt said. It seemed to Jonas to be little short of refined malice. “I think it’s fascinating and if Dr. Smith’s going to hire you, he certainly has a right to know your qualifications—if any.”
Elizabeth Darrell had got to her feet. She was looking past Philippa Van Holt, through the long window behind her into the Court. The scarlet was gone from her face. Jonas saw her lips part a little, the pulse throb in her throat. Philippa Van Holt turned her head to look too.
“Oh, midshipmen,” she said indifferently. She brightened at once. “Or is it Tom? Most midshipmen are so young, but I adore Tom.”
Jonas took out his pipe and began to fill it carefully.—Midshipmen? Tom Darrell was a midshipman, yet he had worn the uniform of a commissioned officer the night before. He had been out long after midshipman hours. No wonder his sister had said he was already in trouble… if he got caught.
“Tom’s a fine boy.”
Professor Darrell glared about him. Then his old eyes brightened. He looked like a man who had been travelling a month in the desert and come at last upon an oasis that was no mirage.
“Ha! Here we are. Where in hell have you been, Wetherby?”
The white-haired old Negro crossed the room to him, bearing his silver tray and its handsome burden of white-frosted silver julep cups.
“Ain’ been nowhere, Professor, sir,” he said serenely.
Professor Darrell sniffed, tasted, and approved. He waved the old man around to the others.
“Wetherby makes the best damned julep in Maryland,” he said. “And get some cokes and milk out for the boys. Never give a midshipman a drink in this house. Against regulations. Not my own son when he was at the Academy, nor my own grandson. Let ’em wait till they graduate. I began drinking when I was fourteen. ’S too early.”
“They don’t want no milk, Professor, sir,” the old man said patiently. “They talkin’ to Miss Jenny. They ain’ comin’ in.”
“What do you mean, they’re not coming in?” Professor Darrell set his julep down on the mantel. “Jennifer!”
“I’m coming, sir.”
The girl appeared in the doorway, as bloodless as a small ghost.
“Where’s Tom?”
“He’s… not coming out today.”
Her blue-grey eyes were fixed on him unwaveringly, as if in some fascination of despair. “That was George. He came to tell us… to tell us Tom won’t be out today. He’s going to come back later. George, I mean. Tom…Tom has the duty.”
Professor Darrell stared at her coldly. “That’s a falsehood. He had the duty yesterday.”
He picked up his julep and drained it down. “And come in, or go away somewhere. Quit standing there shaking.”
“Yes, sir.”
She crossed the room quickly to her sister and sat down by her. Jonas, intent on his own julep, glanced over. The girl was shaking, as if chilled to the marrow of her bones or badly shocked. Elizabeth had taken her hand and was holding it tightly, as deeply alarmed, Jonas thought, as she was.
“And it’s too bad we can’t get poor Gordon Darcy any more,” Miss Olive said cheerfully. “He was such a handsome and attractive young man.”
She paused to sip her drink.
“This is very nice, Tinsley, although my father always thought it indelicate for ladies to drink anything but an occasional glass of sherry, or a little port. He allowed my mother a glass of port on Sunday evening. My father was famous for his juleps, Dr. Smith.”
Jonas nodded politely. He kept his eyes carefully fixed on her. She was prattling on happily, like a child unconscious that it has left its playmates far behind and is alone in a deep and all-encompassing forest of silence.
“Your father’s juleps weren’t fit to drink, Olive.” Professor Darrell’s fey eyes gleamed at her savagely. “And what the hell do you mean about Gordon Darcy? Why can’t we get him any more? Go phone him, Elizabeth, and tell him we want him over here right away. Do you hear—”
“There’s no earthly use of phoning Mr. Darcy,” Miss Olive said. “None whatsoever.” A brief cloud obscured the bright happy candor of her china blue eyes. “Mr. Darcy committed suicide last night. I would have mentioned it earlier, but my father—”
Philippa Van Holt’s silver cup crashed to the bare pine floor at her feet.
CHAPTER 5
Whatever further item of paternal wisdom Miss Olive was about to impart died unborn in the silent room. Her voice faded away. The cup rolled on the floor until it hit a chair leg and stopped. Jonas could have put a foot out and stopped it. He was intent on the problem of keeping his own grip firm on the damask napkin around the bottom of his own cup. When he recovered enough to look at the woman on the sofa beside him, Philippa was staring across at Miss Olive, her eyes distended, her red mouth stupidly open. The brown stain of applejack and bourbon whisky was spreading rapidly over her lap. She opened her mouth to speak. The color was drained out of her face as she got slowly to her feet and stood there, swaying.
Her voice was a gasping whisper that rose to a hysterical cry.
“Miss Olive… what are you saying!”
“For God’s sake, Philippa!” Professor Darrell was not too steady on his own feet. “Smith—do something. For God’s sake what’s the matter with everybody?”
Jonas caught the girl’s shaking arm firmly and pushed her back onto the sofa. “Take it easy. Here—drink this.”
He put his julep to her lips. She gulped part of it down and pushed the cup away.
“Miss Olive—what happened?”
“Yes, for God’s sake, Olive, you old fool, don’t just sit there! What happened?”
Jonas glanced for an instant at the two girls across the room. They were motionless, their faces blank unrevealing masks, curiously isolated, as if they were not there at all.
“I can’t