Free Damsel in Distress by Carola Dunn Page B

everything, but don’t worry, I won’t without Mr. Arbuckle’s permission. I must say I’m rather surprised you didn’t telephone the police as soon as you reached the house, even before you spoke to him. You didn’t know about the threat in the first note until he arrived.”
    â€œI didn’t want to bring the local force in unnecessarily. The Chief Constable’s a pal of the pater’s.”
    â€œAha,” said Daisy understandingly.
    â€œAs a matter of fact, I thought of trying to get hold of Fletcher, but then I got through to Arbuckle and he told me not to breathe a word to a soul.”
    â€œYou haven’t told anyone at all but me?” She raised her eyebrows as he shook his head. “Not even Edgar and Geraldine, I
gather. You must have said something to them, after turning up under a hedge trussed like a chicken!”
    â€œDalrymple didn’t seem interested in the least in how I got there.”
    â€œAs you said, his head is full of butterflies. Anyway, I expect it’s a relief not to have to know what everyone is up to all the time as he did with his schoolboys. Geraldine’s another kettle of fish.”
    â€œShe didn’t see me trussed up, and all Dalrymple told her was that I’d had an accident. She assumed I’d cracked up the old bus, and that Arbuckle had caused the crash and came to set things right. Her brother and his family were here for the weekend, but luckily they left last night. I didn’t even see them.”
    â€œI wonder what happened to your car. If the police find it abandoned, they’re going to want an explanation.”
    â€œOh lord!”
    â€œWell, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. So you and I and Arbuckle are the only people who know about the kidnapping, besides the villains?”
    â€œHe told his assistant. The poor fellow was driving them and ended up tramping all over the countryside when the Studebaker disappeared. But he didn’t tell him I’m involved, in case word might get back to the kidnappers.”
    â€œThey know you’re involved,” Daisy pointed out.
    â€œThey don’t know I survived, nor that I’m going to pull out all the stops to find Gloria.”
    Ernest stuck his head around the door. “Telephone call for you, sir.”
    â€œMr. Arbuckle?”
    â€œNo, sir, a lady as won’t give her name.”
    â€œFenella,” Phillip groaned, and hurried out.
    â€œMore coffee, miss?”
    â€œNo, thanks.”
    He came in and started to clear up the coffee-things. “Cook
wants to know, miss, will you and Mr. Petrie be here for luncheon?”
    â€œYes,” Daisy said absently, her thoughts on the sudden introduction of Phillip’s young sister into the affair. Fenella knew he was at Fairacres, if no more.
    â€œVery good, miss.”
    Daisy suddenly woke up to the fact that she was no longer at home at Fairacres. “Here” for lunch, the footman had said, not “in.” “Oh, Ernest!” she said as the door closed. He reappeared. “We haven’t exactly been invited to lunch.”
    He gave her a friendly if unfootmanly grin. “Not to worry, miss. Her ladyship’s lunching out and there’s no knowing when his lordship’ll turn up. ’Sides, you’re family, miss. Luncheon for two it is.”
    She smiled at him. “Thanks!”
    Abandoning for the moment the puzzle of Fenella, Daisy turned over in her mind all she had learnt from Phillip and tried to decide how to approach the problem of Gloria’s whereabouts.
    They could go from village to village enquiring in shops and pubs as to whether any Cockneys had been sighted—heard, rather. If only one or two villages were so distinguished, that would narrow down the search area. Two would be better, in fact, since one could presume the kidnappers were hiding somewhere in between.
    It would be much easier, however, if