Free The Coldstone by Patricia Wentworth Page A

pocket and fished up two large keys. She held out her hand, but he turned them over in a leisurely fashion, looking at them closely.
    â€œOh, hurry up! What are you doing?”
    Mr. O’Connell was scraping a tiny ball of wax from between the wards of one of the keys. He took his time, scrutinized them again, and handed them over.
    Mabel Collins ran downstairs with a heightened colour.
    â€œThey were right at the bottom of the box,” she explained. “Quite safe, Mr. Colstone.”
    He put the keys into Miss Arabel’s lap and started the engine.
    â€œI say, it’s hot!” he said, and looked up for a moment.
    The sun swept all the windows on that side of the street. Mabel Collins was closing her front door. The lace curtains in the room above did not quite meet. From between them someone looked down at the car, at Miss Arabel and himself. Anthony saw dark hair brushed back from a pale high brow, black eyes in a smooth oval face. He had seen the face before, looking out of a hedge. This time the eyes didn’t glare; they looked superior—they looked beastly superior. He thought he preferred the glare.
    The whole thing passed in a moment. He drove on.
    As he drove, he thought; and the more he thought, the more certain he felt that he would be a mug to waste Miss Arabel. There were a lot of things that he wanted to know very badly. If Miss Arabel couldn’t tell him all these things, she could certainly tell him some of them; and here she was, dropped upon him from the skies, positively fluttering with gratitude and unhampered by Miss Agatha’s presence.
    He drove into a nice patch of shade and stopped the car.
    â€œCousin Arabel—” he said.
    Miss Arabel looked into his pleasant sunburnt face. She thought how nice it was to be driven like this by a kind and attentive young man who behaved really as if she were his aunt instead of a distant cousin. She felt that she had it in her to become a very much attached aunt.
    â€œCousin Arabel—” said Anthony; then he smiled. “I do want to ask you some questions so badly.”
    Miss Arabel thought what very white teeth he had. He was a very fine young man, and a credit to the family.
    â€œOh, yes—anything, my dear Anthony.”
    For a fleeting moment the smile changed to a grin. “Anything” was a tall order.
    â€œWell then—I want you to tell me about the Coldstone Ring.”
    Her complacent expression instantly broke up. She looked away and said in a confused voice,
    â€œOh, I don’t think I can.”
    â€œWhy can’t you?” He turned in his seat so as to face her, and leaned forward, resting his hand and arm on the wheel. “Look here, Cousin Arabel—can’t you see my point of view? Sir Jervis has been most awfully good to me leaving me this place, and I don’t want to go against his wishes or hurt your feelings or Cousin Agatha’s, but I do want to know where I am. Only this morning I had a letter from Lord Haverton, very polite, asking me to lunch. He left a card yesterday when West and I were out. Well, he’s president of the County archæological society—”
    â€œOh yes—Papa quarrelled with him—oh dear! ”
    â€œWell, I want to know where I am. I’m not such an absolute fool as to suppose that Sir Jervis took up the position he did without having some reason for it, and I think I ought to know what the reason is. Don’t you think so yourself? Honest injun now?”
    â€œI don’t know,” said Miss Arabel in a distressed voice. “It sounds as if—”
    Anthony pursued his advantage.
    â€œCousin Agatha said something about village superstitions. Now that’s one of the things I want to know about. If there are superstitions, what are they? There can’t be any harm in telling me that.”
    â€œNo—oh no,” said Miss Arabel. She took a fine white linen handkerchief out of a shabby