‘Well,’ said Sally Rutland. ‘Don’t just sit there like dummies! Let’s see some reactions.’ She gave a quick, mischievous glance at her husband, standing tall by the heavy marble mantel. ‘They reckon it’s just another of our crazy gags, honey -’
Lambert’s mouth twisted.
‘At least it shows a little more originality than the electric matchbox -’
From the fireplace, Jim Rutland spoke.
‘No fooling, Evan. What Sally says is quite true.’ Was it Jeffery’s imagination or had the deep tone the faintest undercurrent of mockery? ‘She found an old book in the library with the craziest story about this room. Believe it or not, Satan himself is supposed to have come down here, breathed on a man – and he vanished! Just like that!’ A snap of his fingers emphasised the problem.
‘Now, really, Rutland -’ It was Wilkins. In contrast to Lambert’s frank ridicule, the financier’s tone was sceptical but polite. ‘He’s not one of us,’ thought Jeffery. ‘He’s an outsider. It isn’t like the Rutland ’s to mix close friends and casual acquaintances like this.’ Then he became aware that Miss Rountree was speaking to him from across the room.
‘And just what is your opinion of this, Mr Blackburn?’ she asked archly. ‘You’ve been so quiet in your little corner I thought you were asleep.’
‘Oh, no,’ said Jeffery firmly. ‘Definitely not! But before I commit myself, I’d like to hear something more about the story.’
Rutland said levelly, ‘I’ll give it you boiled down small. Back in the year seventeen hundred and something, there was a local parson – chap named the Reverend Gideon Perman. He was accused of witchcraft, brought along here and shoved into this room. The door was locked and barred. When they opened it, two hours later, Gideon had vanished -’
‘Well?’
Rutland shrugged. ‘That’s all.’
‘Stop me if you’ve heard this one,’ crowed Elizabeth. ‘But there was a secret passage -’
Sally Rutland shook her head, ‘You get the gong darling.’
‘No secret passage?’
‘Not even a chink. Because Benson – that’s the pale looking guy who just served the cocktails – Benson said the room was searched high and low for some outlet. That wasn’t the original vanishing trick, of course. I’m talking now about the last one.’
Jeffery said quickly, ‘The last one?’
Sally nodded. ‘It happened about three years ago.’
Evan Lambert sat up, a movement like the opening of a jack-knife. ‘As recent as that?’
‘The Lattimers owned the place then,’ Rutland told him. ‘They were the people we bought it from. Benson says one of their servants was sent down to clean out the room. The door slammed shut on the poor devil. When they opened it again – hey presto! No servant!’
‘Fantastic!’ Wilkins spoke so softly Jeffery had the impression he was talking to himself. Then he looked up at his host. ‘But surely the police were informed?’
‘You bet.’ It was Sally who replied. ‘Benson says the police brought a couple of architect guys from London. They tapped and measured for weeks and all they got was housemaid’s knee.’
An uncertain little silence fell, to be broken by Elizabeth. ‘Aren’t you relying quite a lot on what Benson says? How do we know that your butler, having found the old book with the legend, isn’t having us all on toast?’
Jim Rutland stared at them. ‘I never thought of that.’
But his wife waved the suggestion aside. ‘Nonsense,’ she said crisply, ‘you’ve only got to look at Benson to see he’s got less sense of humour than Jimmy has hair.’ She paused, then added, ‘Anyway, why should he make up such a crazy story?’
The sudden appearance of the man himself precluded further discussion. He stood just inside the entrance, pale, poised, punctilious, announcing that dinner was served.
‘What those men really need,’ said Sally Rutland, ‘is a lesson.’
‘But darling -’ began Elizabeth, but her companion cut her short.
‘You and I, Beth, we’re going to give it to them.’ Sally lowered her voice and glanced towards the dining room, still alive with the murmur of masculine voices and the clink of glasses. ‘You see, I’ve got the most gorgeous idea for a laugh.’
The two women were in the reception room following dinner. Miss Rountree had sought her upstairs bedroom for a book. At her exit, Sally had motioned her friend to draw her chair closer to the fire. Elizabeth, watching the flames colour and darken Sally’s thin, eager face, had fallen into the comfortable silence born of a good dinner, a cosy fireside and a deep chair. Now she gave a deep sigh of resignation.
‘Overproduction of thyroid,’ she murmured.
‘Eh?’
‘All Americans have it,’ said Mrs Blackburn sleepily. ‘That’s why they can’t keep still. Look at Mrs Roosevelt.’
Sally tossed her half-smoked cigarette into the fireplace. ‘It makes me boil,’ she said. ‘Here we buy one of the oldest houses in England, with a dandy legend, and instead of treating it with the respect it deserves, what do those men do? Laugh at it!’
‘Have another cigarette,’ advised Elizabeth soothingly.
‘We have got a genuine mystery room where people just disappear! What’s more, I’m going to prove it. And you, Elizabeth, you’re going to help me!’
‘How?’ asked Mrs Blackburn cautiously.
‘Just suppose Jeffery, Evan and Mr Wilkins went down to investigate that room -?’
‘Yes?’
‘And found the body of the servant who was supposed to have disappeared three years ago!’ As Elizabeth suddenly sat up, Sally hurried on. ‘And don’t tell me that there’ll be no body to find. You leave that to me.’
‘My dear -’
‘I’ll borrow an old pair of overalls and a cap from Jim’s cupboard. All I have to do is to rig myself out in these things and stand against the wall. Of course, admitted Sally, I can’t hope to fool them for long, but the sight of their faces when they throw open that door and find me should be well worth the trouble of the gag.’
She paused, watching Elizabeth ’s patently dismayed face.
‘Well?’
‘You can,’ said Mrs Blackburn, ‘include me out.’
‘ Elizabeth, for Pete’s sake.’
‘No, darling, for mine. If Jeffery ever knew I’d had a hand in a thing like this, he’d have me certified.’
‘Jeffery won’t know,’ Sally persisted. ‘All you have to do is to bolt that door on the outside.’
Afterwards, reviewing the whole sinister business with Jeffery, Elizabeth could never actually explain how Sally talked her into this initial gambit. She could only confess that, despite her rooted disapproval of such an infantile scheme, ten minutes later found the two of them burdened with clothing and creeping down a winding stone staircase that threw back the sullen echoes of their footsteps.
‘There it is,’ announced Sally.
The steps flattened, widened abruptly into a passage which rose into a groined roof over their heads. This passage ended in a blank wall and in the centre, a stone door stood slightly ajar, an extremely massive portal, at least two feet thick, such rugged depth corresponding to the width of the wall in which it was slung. Heavy iron hinges laced one side, two sets of bolts, thicker than Elizabeth ’s wrist, were welded to the other. There was rust and dust and cobwebs.
Mrs Blackburn gave a little, unaccountable shiver and stopped in her tracks.
‘Over to you, darling,’ she announced.
‘Nonsense,’ said Sally briskly. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of.’
‘I’m not -’ began Elizabeth, then she stopped. Not afraid, just – well – apprehensive. She wished it was Jeffery who walked by her side instead of this keen-faced young woman who had almost been expelled from Bryn Mawr for trying to land her plane on the lacrosse field. This business of people vanishing into thin air! Up stairs with the men it had seemed too ludicrous for a second thought. But down here in this world of stone and stillness -