Смерть на Ниле / Death on the Nile
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But she put the unworthy thought away from her, and decided, as ever, to behave like a gentlewoman.
‘Is Joanna enjoying life?’ she asked.
‘So so. Says she thinks of opening a delicatessen shop in Mayfair.’
‘She always talks about being hard up,’ said Mrs Allerton with a tinge of spite, ‘but she goes about everywhere and her clothes must cost her a lot. She’s always beautifully dressed.’
‘Ah, well,’ said Tim, ‘she probably doesn’t pay for them. No, mother, I don’t mean what your Edwardian mind suggests to you. I just mean quite literally that she leaves her bills unpaid.’
Mrs Allerton sighed.
‘I never know how people manage to do that.’
‘It’s a kind of special gift,’ said Tim. ‘If only you have sufficiently extravagant tastes, and absolutely no sense of money values, people will give you any amount of credit.’
‘Yes, but you come to the Bankruptcy Court in the end like poor Sir George Wode.’
‘You have a soft spot for that old horse coper – probably because he called you a rosebud in 1879 at a dance.’
‘I wasn’t born in 1879,’ Mrs Allerton retorted with spirit. ‘Sir George has charming manners, and I won’t have you calling him a horse coper.’
‘I’ve heard funny stories about him from people that know.’
‘You and Joanna don’t mind what you say about people; anything will do so long as it’s sufficiently illnatured.’
Tim raised his eyebrows.
‘My dear, you’re quite heated. I didn’t know old Wode was such a favourite of yours.’
‘You don’t realize how hard it was for him, having to sell Wode Hall. He cared terribly about that place.’
Tim suppressed the easy retort. After all, who was he to judge? Instead he said thoughtfully:
‘You know, I think you’re not far wrong there. Linnet asked him to come down and see what she’d done to the place, and he refused quite rudely.’
‘Of course. She ought to have known better than to ask him.’
‘And I believe he’s quite venomous about her – mutters things under his breath whenever he sees her. Can’t forgive her for having given him an absolutely top price for the worm-eaten family estate.’
‘And you can’t understand that?’ Mrs Allerton spoke sharply.
‘Frankly,’ said Tim calmly, ‘I can’t. Why live in the past? Why cling on to things that have been?’
‘What are you going to put in their place?’
He shrugged his shoulders.
‘Excitement, perhaps. Novelty. The joy of never knowing what may turn up from day to day. Instead of inheriting a useless tract of land, the pleasure of making money for yourself – by your own brains and skill.’
‘A successful deal on the Stock Exchange, in fact!’
He laughed:
‘Why not?’
‘And what about an equal loss on the Stock Exchange?’
‘That, dear, is rather tactless. And quite inappropriate today… What about this Egypt plan?’
‘Well-’
He cut in smiling at her:
‘That’s settled. We’ve both always wanted to see Egypt.’
‘When do you suggest?’
‘Oh, next month. January’s about the best time there. We’ll enjoy the delightful society in this hotel a few weeks longer.’
‘Tim,’ said Mrs Allerton reproachfully. Then she added guiltily: ‘I’m afraid I promised Mrs Leech that you’d go with her to the police station. She doesn’t understand any Spanish.’
Tim made a grimace.
‘About her ring? The blood-red ruby of the horseleech’s daughter? Does she still persist in thinking it’s been stolen? I’ll go if you like, but it’s a waste of time. She’ll only get some wretched chambermaid into trouble. I distinctly saw it on her finger when she went into the sea that day. It came off in the water and she never noticed.’
‘She says she is quite sure she took it off and left it on her dressing table.’
‘Well, she didn’t. I saw it with my own eyes. The woman’s a fool. Any woman’s a fool who goes prancing into the sea in December, pretending the water’s quite warm just because the sun happens to be shining rather brightly at the moment. Stout women oughtn’t to be allowed to bathe anyway; they look so revolting in bathing dresses.’
Mrs Allerton murmured:
‘I really feel I ought to give up bathing.’
Tim gave a shout of laughter.
‘You? You can give most of the young things points and to spare.’
Mrs Allerton sighed and said,
‘I wish there were a few more young people for you here.’
Tim Allerton shook his head decidedly.
‘I don’t. You and I get along rather comfortably without outside distractions.’
‘You’d like it if Joanna were here.’
‘I wouldn’t.’ His tone was unexpectedly resolute. ‘You’re all wrong there. Joanna amuses me, but I don’t really like her, and to have her around much gets on my nerves. I’m thankful she isn’t here. I should be quite resigned if I were never to see Joanna again.’ He added, almost below his breath: ‘There’s only one woman in the world I’ve got a real respect and admiration for, and I think, Mrs Allerton, you know very well who that woman is.’
His mother blushed and looked quite confused.
Tim said gravely:
‘There aren’t very many really nice women in the world. You happen to be one of them.’
Chapter 9
In an apartment overlooking Central Park in New York Mrs Robson exclaimed:
‘If that isn’t just too lovely! You really are the luckiest girl, Cornelia.’
Cornelia Robson flushed responsively. She was a big clumsy-looking girl with brown doglike eyes.
‘Oh, it will be wonderful!’ she gasped.
Old Miss Van Schuyler inclined her head in a satisfied fashion at this correct attitude on the part of poor relations.
‘I’ve always dreamed of a trip to Europe,’ sighed Cornelia, ‘but I just didn’t feel I’d ever get there.’
‘Miss Bowers will come with me as usual, of course,’ said Miss Van Schuyler, ‘but as a social companion I find her limited – very limited. There are many little things that Cornelia can do for me.’