Hide in the Dark Page 12

  She said, “I am your property. Not Douglas nor any other man that breathes means as much to me as your shadow on the wall.…” She laid her hand against it, and asked in a still voice of wonder, “Are you jealous of Doug, Kit?”

  There was a swift gleam of teeth, but his eyes, fast on the shadow, did not soften.

  “Lord, I don’t know!” He lit a cigarette with one dextrous move, drew a deep breath, and smiled at her again through the blue haze. “I’m not a connoisseur on jealousy. How does it strike you?”

  She answered in that same still voice, “It strikes me as—rather wonderful. Let’s—let’s pretend that you’re jealous of Doug, Kit.”

  He said through the smoke in that careless drawl that missed insolence only because of its complete indifference, “I can think of better ways of spending a week-end.”

  Lindy, stretching up to rest an ineffably gentle finger against the cheek of the haughty shadow, murmured with a sidelong sweep of lashes, “Oh, and so can I!”

  And suddenly the man and the shadow relaxed, and his careless laughter filled the room.

  “God help us, you’re beyond redemption! D’you know that you fooled me completely this evening, you small minx? And I’d have sworn that Eve herself couldn’t do it, let alone her youngest daughter.”

  “Fooled you? You mean you thought that I was flirting with Doug? Oh, Kit, I really was frightfully worried that you might do something idiotic, and he’s been drinking far too much all evening.”

  “Doug, Sapphira mia? It wasn’t your rather tame performance with Doug that got the wind up—though since we’re going to put all our hands on the table from now on, I’ll own that the fine proprietary way that he’s been swashbuckling around you all evening and your meek acquiescence have come closer to making me lose my temper than anything that’s happened to me in the last twenty-four years, when I took a licking that I didn’t deserve. Just between the two of us, if you won’t tell a soul, I did lose my temper. But that was only because I was still suffering from delusions of grandeur. My apologies—and congratulations.”

  “Kit, if you’re trying to be hateful, you’ll have to be just a little clearer. What is it that you’re congratulating me on?”

  “Let’s call it your—conquest of King. Are your intentions honourable, Lindy?”

  She said nothing, leaning against the shadow, her eyes fixed on his in a strange look of wonder and despair.

  Kit inquired with dangerous smoothness, “I’m asking if you intend to marry Doug King?”

  She shook her head, voiceless.

  “Surely, even he would hardly assume such authority without reasonable encouragement! Are you assuring me that he has lacked even that?”

  She said, “Kit, I’ve known Doug for years. He is one of my oldest friends, as he is one of yours.”

  Kit, lighting another cigarette, remarked evenly, “You flatter me. Douglas is no old friend of mine.”

  “Since when? Since to-night? Oh, Kit, you can see that he hardly knows what he’s doing.”

  “And even that fails to endear him to me, callous dolt that I am. No, that old friendship of ours flickered and waned a good two minutes after we met. How long has this little romance of yours been going on, by the way? Is it pre-war, or do we date it from that enchanted four weeks on the Starling?”

  Lindy took her hand from the shadow, and came slowly toward him. When she was a handbreadth off she halted, and said in a small, sickened voice, “There has been no romance between us. Doug hardly looked at me on the Starling—why should he, when he had Hanna to look at? He was mad about her… Doug has flirted with me, as he has with every fairly pretty woman that he meets. It has never occurred to me to take him seriously for one moment. He knows every rule of the game perfectly, and if I took any of his declarations seriously, he would consider that it was I who had broken them.”

  “I wonder now! So he makes declarations, does he? You never flirt with Douglas, naturally?”

  She cried, “Oh, of course, of course I have flirted with Douglas. I have flirted with half a hundred men. I have told you so—I tell you so again. What have you and I to do with flirting?”

  “Ah, what, indeed? That’s precisely what I was about to ask you on my way out. Why not save these uncontested beguilements for some worthier lad?”

  “You thought that I was flirting with you, Kit?”

  “My dear, you know as well as I that one of the cardinal rules of that pretty game at which you’re so adept is that one never, never for one moment admits that it’s flirting till it’s all over. Like Doug, I’m counting on you not to break the rules! If my memory went back on me for a minute this afternoon, you’ll be generous, I’m sure. I’ll own I’m rusty at it. I haven’t indulged in the drawing-room version for lo, these many moons, and candidly, I’m not going to now. So with your permission, I’ll just drift out of the picture. I’m afraid that our playmates are being determinedly discreet, so perhaps I’d better give them the signal of release.”

  She said, “Oh, God!” in a small, quiet voice of despair that was more a rebuke to that distant deity than a prayer, and locked her hands behind her, lest they betray her.

  After a moment she whispered desolately, finding no longer even a voice with which to hold him, “You don’t believe that—not for one moment, not for one second. You’re saying it because you don’t want me, and you think that the easiest way to get rid of me is to make me hate you… You can’t make me hate you; you can only make me despise myself. I do—I do despise myself.”

  He asked, suddenly paler than the little ghost before him, “Lindy, haven’t you any pride at all?”

  The little ghost said, “No, no, I haven’t time—I haven’t time for pride. Even if you stay they’ll be back any minute—and in two days you’ll be gone—out of my life again, out of my life forever. You shan’t take all my dreams and warp and twist them into cheapness and coarseness—if you don’t want them, you must give them back to me. I won’t let you leave me nothing but ugliness for a memory.”

  He asked, the hard, the bitter, the insolent blue eyes suddenly and amazingly dark with tears, “What is it that you want me to leave you, little Lindy?”

  “Don’t leave me; don’t, don’t leave me.”

  She was weeping suddenly, desperately, the small face still turned to his flooded with the unheeded tears, the treacherous hands still locked fast behind her.

  “Lindy, how can I not leave you? I’ve nothing in God’s world to give you, not even love—only its ugly bastard, jealousy. Let me go, darling.”

  “Kit, I can’t make you love me, but you mustn’t say that I don’t love you—you mustn’t. Kit, you do believe that I love you?”

  “Lindy, don’t let me believe it.”

  “You must, you must. I’ll make you. I won’t have you say again that—that… was flirting. I won’t have you leave me without knowing what you’re leaving! Kit, listen; I have every scrap of paper that you ever wrote to me, every flower that you ever sent to me, every glove that you ever touched. Are you listening?”

  He said, “Oh, Lindy, when did I write to you? I never wrote to you.”

  “You did, you did. The first week after I met you—at that garden party at the Von Thals’, don’t you remember? No, no, don’t say you don’t remember. There were little pear trees in flower all around the garden walls, and lanterns like gold bubbles in the trees, and some gypsies playing a Viennese waltz.… My fan had silver spangles on it, and you broke it, and took it away with you to mend—you said that you’d keep it as a hostage, and bring it back that Sunday in exchange for a cup of tea.… And on Saturday you met Sunny, and the fan came back all beautifully mended with three lines saying that you were so sorry that you couldn’t come with it.… I have the fan, too. How can you say you never wrote me?”

  “Even the fan I broke, my little Lindy?”

  “Even the fan you mended. And that wasn’t all—oh, you wrote me quite often; the time that Sunny couldn’t go to the party
the Argentines gave, don’t you remember? You wrote to ask if I wouldn’t go instead, and you sent me some pansies that looked like white velvet, and I wore them on my shoulder—they were the loveliest flowers I ever had. And we had supper in the patio, at little tables in green alcoves, with parrots swinging high up in the leaves, and lights like fireflies going and coming and voices singing to guitars somewhere far away. You wrote to me again. There were menu cards with wreaths of little monkeys and macaws and orchids, and you wrote our names on the back of one, and we cancelled them, just as though we were nine years old. Don’t you remember? Christopher Baird and Linda Pallisser—friendship, love, indifference, hate—kiss, court, marry. It came out ‘court’ for me and ‘friendship’ for you, and I was frightfully proud, because yours came out friendship instead of indifference or hate. I’m frightfully proud still, Kit. Don’t make it indifference or hate.”

  And at sight of the poor little smile beyond the flooding tears, he turned away his eyes.

  “And once at old Mrs. Tenner’s, you stole two yellow rosebuds off the table, and fastened them into the bows of my slippers—I have the slippers—and the bows—and the roses, Kit, all in a silver box. And once—”

  He cried, “Lindy, don’t! Darling, don’t!” and caught her in his arms. “You’re so small—you’re such a little, little thing … Lindy, teach me how to be gentle to you—I’ve forgotten what gentleness is.” He could feel her trembling as though she would never stop, but her voice did not tremble.

  “Kit, are you going to take me to Poland?”

  “Lindy, I can’t swing Poland. I’m an outlaw—no more, no less. I can’t run the risk of getting Larry into trouble; if anything slipped up, I’d blow my brains out. He and Joel trust me; I can’t fail them by letting them find out what a rotter I am. I’ll simply clear out again. I was off my head to even think of anything else.”

  “Then take me to Las Cayas.” She let Poland go without a sigh.

  “Las Cayas? You?” His arms tightened about her, and she smiled, heedless of the bitterness of his voice. “There’s not a white man, unless you count old Tom, and he’s streaked with the tar brush from his head to his heels. We’ll be shifting to another base in a month or so, anyway; it’s hardly more than a port of call. You in Las Cayas! “His eyes swept that fragile grace, all tulle and pearls and fragrance, with eyes both despairing and tender.

  “I’ll stay on the boat; I’d love to stay on the boat—

  “Oh, darling, before I leave you I’ve thought of a present for you. A little strait-jacket—a nice one for your very own, all trimmed with lace and frills, with pretty blue ribbons to tie under your chin. You’re mad enough to make any March Hare I ever heard of frantic with envy… On the boat, no less! I’m to be Robin Hood, I suppose, with a dozen merry men, tried and true, at my shoulder, and you pacing the decks in fine brown boots and a little green jerkin and a scarlet feather in your cap? A cross between Maid Marian and the pirate’s pet?” He held her as lightly as though he were rocking a tired child to sleep, murmuring to the small, enchanted face, still wet with tears, “What would you do without your doll, Lindy? Whom would you find to tell you fairy tales, and make you daisy chains, and sing you lullabies? Pirates lead such busy lives they haven’t any time for little girls. When they aren’t at plank-walking, they’re playing with black flags, and dividing doubloons, and shaking dice for the Circassian slaves. They haven’t time for a good game of tag from one year’s end to another.”

  She whispered, “You’re laughing at me—you think I’m just a scatterbrained little fool? Wait, wait and see. I love it when you laugh at me.”

  “Laughing, my Lindy? Look again.”

  She breathed, “Hush!” and slipped from his arms as lightly and easily as a shadow, only her eyes, enchanted and caressing, lingering to betray her. Doug King’s voice called gayly from the shadows beyond the door:

  “Honey lamb, where you hiding? Need some help in here?” The voice checked abruptly. After a moment it continued smoothly enough, but with something altered and menacing under its surface suavity, “Oh, sorry! I’d no idea that I was offering such a poor substitute in the line of entertainment. I gathered you were busy with packages, Lindy, and thought I’d offer a hand. I seem to be as superfluous as usual.”

  “Oh, Doug, don’t be so absurd. The prizes are all done—look! Kit was just fixing up the fire, and we were wondering what in the world had happened to all of you. Aren’t the others coming?”

  “So that’s what you were wondering?” The bold, insistent glance swept the softly ruffled tulle, the clear pallor of the small face, fresh as though Lindy had knelt to bathe it in dew, the dark eyes, questing and bewitched. “The fireman has a desirable job around here apparently. Since when has it counted a charming companion as one of its assets?”

  Kit, his red head bent to catch a light, said amiably over his shoulder, “Since I took it.”

  “Exactly. Modesty’s one of your strong points, isn’t it, Baird? Well, the lucky have the luck! Is it luck or good management, Lindy?”

  “Why not ask me?” inquired Kit gently. “I doubt very much whether Lindy feels the necessity of offering you any explanations whatever, while I should regard it as both a pleasure and a privilege to retire to some secluded spot and draw you up a chart, diagram, and blueprint as to the shortest way out of your obvious difficulties—such as how to withdraw gracefully and inconspicuously when you find that you’ve unconsciously intruded, for instance.”

  “I’ll settle with you in some secluded spot all right,” said Doug in a voice oddly thick, “and in the meantime I’ll thank you to keep your hands off of—”

  “Hey, you in there!” Trudi’s gay call lifted its challenge from the other side of the closed door. “Open up, will you? We’re loaded to the gunwales with water, while you blasted Sybarites while away the hours. Open up, for the love of Pete!”

  Kit, his eyes gleaming in the shadows, remarked over his shoulder as he moved toward the door, “Don’t lose heart, Doug—the night’s still young. We’ll have that chat yet. What ho, without!”

  He flung the door open, and stood aside to let the burdened and indignant crew troop by toward the two immense tubs.

  “Just what are you doing in here, Doug King?” inquired Trudi, with some asperity. “Did I tell you to report at the sink with a bucket after you finished chopping that ice, or did I not? Better men than you have missed out on apples for less than that, let me tell you, my lad. Ow—curses on you, Sherry, you’re splashing us to the bone. Lend a hand here, Kit!”

  Kit, still smiling reminiscently as he deftly shifted and emptied pails, inquired of the voiceless Lindy, “What’s the order of events? Do we start with apples?”

  “Oh, Kit, we never start with the apples!” cried Chatty, scandalized. “We start with the mirror and candle, and then the apples, and then flour and the ring and then—what comes next, Lindy?”

  “I’m not sure.” Lindy’s voice and eyes were still far off. “The apple on the string? Or fortunes in the bowl? It’s Hide in the Dark at midnight, anyway. We draw lots for the candle and mirror, don’t we? Kit, get some straws from the hearth broom.”

  “What in the world’s the mirror and the candle?” demanded Ray suspiciously.

  “Well, we lock all the doors into this room,” explained Chatty gleefully, “and put out all the lights except one candle, and then we all go out except the girl that gets the long straw. She stays behind in the dark, and she stands there holding the candle in one hand and the mirror in the other. Where in the world is that hand mirror? I put it on the table in the corner—”

  “Here!” announced Doug triumphantly.

  “Oh, good. Well, she stands there and says three times over quite loud, so that we can all hear in the hall:

  “‘Mirror, mirror, dark and bright,

  Show me the man I’ll wed to-night!’

  And the third time she says it, she sees his face in the mirror.”

  “You mean to sa
y she stays alone in the dark here with nothing but one candle?”

  Joel grinned appreciatively at the horrified incredulity depicted on his wife’s expressive countenance.

  “Ah, well, you mustn’t forget that all of us are right on the other side of the door. All the creature has to do if anything—er—agitates her is to let out one good long, ear-splitting yell and we’ll all be at her side in the well-known trice. Even you could hardly take exception to that!”

  Ray bestowed on him a shuddering glance of horror and indignation, and motioned the straw-filled hand away from her with as vehement a gesture as though it were a poisoned serpent.

  “Joel Hardy, if you think I’d put one foot in this room by myself, even if every light in the place was blazing like fireworks, you’re perfectly insane. Take those things away!”

  Hanna said gently, “But there are only two of us who are eligible anyway, aren’t there? All of us know our fates but Jill and Lindy. Let Lindy pull, Joel!”

  Lindy pulled, and stood poised to check the golden straw between her fingers with the one that Jill held out.

  “Mine, isn’t it? Oh, Jill, that’s too bad! Doug, will you light the candle? Larry, make sure that the doors are locked, will you, and Tom can start putting the lights out.”

  “I’ve got the door to the service quarters locked, but there’s no key to this one into the chapel,” announced Larry over his shoulder.

  “It isn’t there? No, I remember, I dropped it down the grating in the sink, trying to poke out some soap that got wedged in it. Now what?”

  “Well, the only way through the chapel is that door from the service quarters that Doug fell through,” said Tom reasonably. “If you lock that it cuts this room off just as well as though you locked this one. Here, Larry, you take the candle, and fix the one out there. You go with him, Joel, to see that he plays fair.”

  “Mirror, mirror, dark and bright,” hummed Lindy, pirouetting experimentally. “Children, there’s too much light from the fire; can’t you break it up, Kit, and put the screen in front of it?”