Free Will O’ the Wisp by Patricia Wentworth

nothing of it. Suspicion—appeal—no, he couldn’t place it.
    He began, “I won’t keep you”; and then Folly said in her little purring voice:
    â€œDo you know Stingo? You ought to. Stingo, I’m sure you’re pleased to meet David. He’s my deputy chaperon.” Then she looked at David with little dancing green sparks in her eyes. “That’s what you’re here for, aren’t you? I suppose Eleanor sent you. Did she?”
    â€œWell, I’ve got a message from her.” He turned to St. Inigo. “Will you excuse Miss March for a moment? Mrs. Rayne asked me to give her a message.”
    The bright, glittering eyes shifted a point. Folly went on quickly:
    â€œHow did you know I was here?” The purr was an angry one. “Did Eleanor tell you to come after me? Did she? Did she tell you to follow me round and—and make a laughing-stock of me? I suppose she told you she’d forbidden me to come, and so she sent you to fetch me home as if I was five years old!”
    â€œPerhaps you’d better go,” said St. Inigo with a sneer.
    Folly sparkled at him.
    â€œShall I?”
    â€œOh yes—much better go with him. Always go home with your chaperon. Let him take you home and tuck you up in bye-bye.” Mr. St. Inigo’s look and voice were even more offensive than Mr. St. Inigo’s words.
    David controlled his fury and addressed himself to Miss Folly March:
    â€œFolly, Julie’s expecting you, and I think—”
    Folly had turned quite white; she was so angry that she could hardly speak. But her anger was with David. It shook her from head to foot. She was not often angry, and she did not know why she was angry now. She felt that she would kill David if he looked at her. She was one blazing flame of fury, and she did not know why. She caught St. Inigo by the arm and whirled him round.
    â€œStingo, I want to dance! We came here to dance—didn’t we?”
    David watched them plunge into the crowd of dancers. Over Folly’s shoulder St. Inigo looked at him, a long, cold, insolent look.
    He came out of the club in a black rage. Short of making a public scene he could do no more. For Eleanor’s sake he would wait at the flat until Folly came in. If St. Inigo were with her, he might possibly have the pleasure of knocking St. Inigo down.
    The air was very cold. He walked quickly. By the time he reached the entrance to the block of flats his anger had passed into disgust. If it were not for Eleanor, Folly might go her own way. What could you do with a girl who took up with a swab like St. Inigo? Disgust sharpened into contempt, and then, quick and vivid, came the picture of a child in a white frock and a coral necklace, with bobbing black curls put on to please him. The something that had tugged at his heart in the drawing-room at Ford plucked at him now, and the more shrewdly because he winced away from it.

CHAPTER X
    David stood by the entrance to the block of flats and considered gloomily that he might have to keep his eye on it for hours. He began to walk up and down Chieveley Street. Fifty yards one way with the wind in his face, and hundred yards back with the wind behind him.
    After half an hour it occurred to him that he had mentioned to Folly that Julie was expecting her. It was unlikely that she would have a spasm of sanity and go straight to the Aldereys’, but it was possible; in which case David would be walking up and down Chieveley Street till daylight overtook him.
    When he had walked for another half hour he began to wonder how long one could walk up and down the same street without attracting the attention of the police. He also wondered what he would say if he were asked what he was doing. The plain truth would hardly have convinced a child of five. “My cousin, Mrs. Rayne, has a flat up there. She’s away, and my other cousin, Miss March, who has a key, is coming there. And I’m waiting