III

The Hon. Joanna Southwood said:

“Darling, I think it’s going to be all perfectly¹ marvellous!”

She was sitting in Linnet Ridgeway’s bedroom at Wode Hall.

From the window the eye passed over the gardens to open country with blue shadows ofwoodlands.

“It’s rather perfect, isn’t it?” said Linnet.

She leaned her arms on the window sill. Her face was eager, alive, dynamic. Beside her, JoannaSouthwood seemed, somehow, a little dim—a tall thin young woman of twenty-seven, with a longclever face and freakishly plucked eyebrows².

“And you’ve done so much in the time! Did you have lots of architects and things?”

“Three.”

“What are architects like? I don’t think I’ve ever seen any.”

“They were all right. I found them rather unpractical sometimes.”

“Darling, you soon put that right! You are the most practical creature!”

Joanna picked up a string of pearls from the dressing³ table.

“I suppose these are real, aren’t they, Linnet?”

“Of course.”

“I know it’s ‘of course’ to you, my sweet, but it wouldn’t be to most people. Heavily cultured oreven Woolworth! Darling, they really are incredible, so exquisitely⁴ matched. They must be worththe most fabulous⁵ sum!”

“Rather vulgar, you think?”

“No, not at all—just pure beauty. What are they worth?”

“About fifty thousand.”

“What a lovely lot of money! Aren’t you afraid of having them stolen?”

“No, I always wear them—and anyway they’re insured.”

“Let me wear them till dinnertime, will you, darling? It would give me such a thrill.”

Linnet laughed.

“Of course, if you like.”

“You know, Linnet, I really do envy you. You’ve simply got everything. Here you are attwenty, your own mistress, with any amount of money, looks, superb health. You’ve even gotbrains! When are you twenty-one?”

“Next June. I shall have a grand coming-of-age party in London.”

“And then are you going to marry Charles Windlesham? All the dreadful little gossip writers aregetting so excited about it. And he really is frightfully devoted⁶.”

Linnet shrugged⁷ her shoulders.

“I don’t know. I don’t really want to marry anyone yet.”

“Darling, how right you are! It’s never quite the same afterwards, is it?”

The telephone shrilled⁸ and Linnet went to it.

“Yes? Yes?”

The butler’s voice answered her:

“Miss de Bellefort is on the line. Shall I put her through?”

“Bellefort? Oh, of course, yes, put her through.”

A click and a voice, an eager, soft, slightly breathless voice: “Hullo, is that Miss Ridgeway?

Linnet!”

“Jackie darling! I haven’t heard anything of you for ages and ages!”

“I know. It’s awful. Linnet, I want to see you terribly.”

“Darling, can’t you come down here? My new toy. I’d love to show it to you.”

“That’s just what I want to do.”

“Well, jump into a train or a car.”

“Right, I will. A frightfully dilapidated two-seater. I bought it for fifteen pounds, and some daysit goes beautifully. But it has moods. If I haven’t arrived by teatime you’ll know it’s had a mood.

So long, my sweet.”

Linnet replaced the receiver. She crossed back to Joanna.

“That’s my oldest friend, Jacqueline de Bellefort. We were together at a convent in Paris. She’shad the most terrible bad luck. Her father was a French Count, her mother was American—aSoutherner. The father went off with some woman, and her mother lost all her money in the WallStreet crash. Jackie was left absolutely broke. I don’t know how she’s managed to get along thelast two years.”

Joanna was polishing her deep-blood-coloured nails with her friend’s nail pad. She leant backwith her head on one side scrutinizing⁹ the effect.

“Darling,” she drawled, “won’t that be rather tiresome¹⁰? If any misfortunes happen to my friendsI always drop them at once! It sounds heartless, but it saves such a lot of trouble later! Theyalways want to borrow money off you, or else they start a dressmaking business and you have toget the most terrible clothes from them. Or they paint lampshades, or do batik scarves.”

“So, if I lost all my money, you’d drop me tomorrow?”

“Yes, darling, I would. You can’t say I’m not honest about it! I only like successful people. Andyou’ll find that’s true of nearly everybody—only most people won’t admit it. They just say thatreally they can’t put up with Mary or Emily or Pamela anymore! ‘Her troubles have made her sobitter and peculiar¹¹, poor dear!’”

“How beastly you are, Joanna!”

“I’m only on the make, like everyone else.”

“I’m not on the make!”

“For obvious reasons! You don’t have to be sordid¹² when good-looking, middle-aged¹³ Americantrustees pay you over a vast allowance every quarter.”

“And you’re wrong about Jacqueline,” said Linnet. “She’s not a sponge. I’ve wanted to helpher, but she won’t let me. She’s as proud as the devil.”

“What’s she in such a hurry to see you for? I’ll bet she wants something! You just wait andsee.”

“She sounded excited about something,” admitted Linnet. “Jackie always did get frightfullyworked up over things. She once stuck a penknife into someone!”

“Darling, how thrilling!”

“A boy was teasing a dog. Jackie tried to get him to stop. He wouldn’t. She pulled him andshook him, but he was much stronger than she was, and at last she whipped out a penknife andplunged it right into him. There was the most awful row!”

“I should think so. It sounds most uncomfortable!”

Linnet’s maid entered the room. With a murmured word of apology, she took down a dressfrom the wardrobe and went out of the room with it.

“What’s the matter with Marie?” asked Joanna.

“She’s been crying.”

“Poor thing! You know I told you she wanted to marry a man who has a job in Egypt. Shedidn’t know much about him, so I thought I’d better make sure he was all right. It turned out thathe had a wife already—and three children.”

“What a lot of enemies you must make, Linnet.”

“Enemies?” Linnet looked surprised.

Joanna nodded and helped herself to a cigarette.

“Enemies, my sweet. You’re so devastatingly¹⁴ efficient. And you’re so frightfully good at doingthe right thing.”

Linnet laughed.

“Why, I haven’t got an enemy in the world.”

 

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