Dancers in Mourning by Margery Allingham

Author:Margery Allingham [Allingham, Margery]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780786703845
Publisher: Carroll & Graf Publishers
Published: 2004-05-14T23:00:00+00:00

“ ‘Chloe, why wish you that your years

Would backward run, till they meet mine?

That perfect likeness, which endears

Things unto things, might us combine? …

So, by this, I as well may be

Too old for you as you for me.’

I was tremendously pleased when I found it. I thought it was a sort of omen. And now…”

He braced himself against the stucco and stretched, as if the vigorous physical effort relieved him of some of his intolerable burden of sorrow.

“Was—was she frightfully cut about?” he demanded gruffly and settled himself with a grim stoicism, all the more difficult because it was conscious and he disliked himself for it, to hear the worst.

Mr. Campion felt out of his depth. He was shocked to discover that he could not remember if a horror was better balm than an anticlimax. He compromised, as many have done before him, by giving a faithful but not highly coloured account of the whole tragedy.

Peter Brome listened in silence, his face very white and young in the lamplight.

“Thank you,” he said at last. “Thank you. You’ve practically convinced me. I was so afraid it was suicide, you see.”

“Why? She was very happy at the theatre.”

“Oh, yes, at the theatre.” Peter Brome’s tone expressed his contempt for those material matters which are such an anxiety and yet such a comfort to those who grow wearied of their own emotions. “It was her life that was so difficult. We were in love.” He met the other man’s eyes squarely, as though defying him to show any amusement.

Mr. Campion was grave, however. He was not too old to know that love in any of its tricksy forms was not negligible.

“I wanted her to marry me,” Peter Brome continued with dignity, “but she always said no, putting up all kinds of ridiculous suggestions—the little difference in age and that sort of thing.”

“How old are you?” enquired Campion helplessly.

“Twenty-two. Quite old enough to know my own mind, God knows. Well, when these objections of hers went on I began to realise that there was something else she hadn’t told me, because she did love me. Otherwise she wouldn’t—oh, well, I know she did. We were going on the river last Sunday. We’d fixed it up and were both looking forward to it rather seriously. So when she told me she’d got to go away for the week-end I was pretty fed up and we had our first serious quarrel.”

He paused and his eyes were anguished as the enormity of his tragedy overcame him. He pulled himself up and went on.

“Well, it seemed to upset her as much as it did me. We made friends again and it all came out. She was married, you see, and the fellow had found her again after they’d parted for some years and naturally he’d found out his mistake and wanted her back. She was going down to see him to try to make him give her a divorce. She wouldn’t tell me his name. I swore I’d never mention it to a soul but it doesn’t matter now.

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