Free Lucy by M.C. Beaton Page A

the
caisse
with MacGregor as if walking through a dream. Brightly painted faces seem to loom suddenly out of the crowd and stare at her own. And every stop of the way she had that brooding feeling of danger.
    Dizzily she watched the cashier counting out the money. Dizzily she watched MacGregor pocketing a great sheaf of notes. Waves of faintness came roaring around her ears and the people in the casino seemed to bend and sway and shiver like so many demonic water sprites.
    Lucy heard the murmur of Jeremy Brent’s voice and felt the reassuring pressure of his arm under her elbow. “Perhaps a brandy for Miss Balfour-MacGregor … ?” he asked and she heard MacGregor’s grunt of assent.
    A glass of brandy was held to her lips and Mr. Brent urged, “Drink up, Miss Harriet!” (
Harriet?
) Lucy took a great gulp and the room took a few more turns and then settled down like a gaudy carousel coming to rest.
    “Thank you very much, Mr. Brent. What are you doing here in Herrenbad?”
    Mr. Brent looked at Lucy in surprise. Her voice was strangely muffled. He winced slightly. What an ugly, fat, almost deformed face she had!
    “I came by chance, Miss Harriet. I had an opportunity to meet your beautiful sister in Monte. She does not visit the casinos like you.”
    Lucy remembered her role of future nun. “Lucy is a good girl,” she said vehemently. “Not like me. I have sinned. I shall make reparation by donating my winnings to the convent.”
    She spoke with such force that Mr. Brent blinked. Perhaps her father’s story had been true after all. Certainly such an ugly girl would probably wish to hide herself away from the world, although, in his experience, ugly girls, if they were rich, had an embarrassing habit of considering themselves irresistible. A film of gray sweat was forming on Miss Balfour-MacGregor’s upper lip and her bosom was like a great shapeless pillow. Courtship was definitely out. He fingered the pistol in his pocket.
    The massed storm clouds of drunkenness were beginning to form on the perimeter of MacGregor’s brain. He abruptly got to his feet. “We must go L—Harriet. Be a good girl and finish your brandy.” Lucy obediently drank up and led the way through the entrance hall of the casino. The black feeling of menace closed in on her again.
    Jeremy Brent was insisting on escorting them to their hotel. Lucy clutched MacGregor’s arm. “I have a feeling of danger,” she whispered.
    “Nonsense,” MacGregor whispered back. “You’re just a bit overtired.”
    But in the carriage ride back to the hotel, his brain seemed to have become unusually sharp. Lucy had won the vast sum of £35,000, a veritable fortune. He had been acquainted with enough Highland people in his lifetime to know that if they experienced feelings of danger there was bound to be danger about.
    He walked thoughtfully into the hotel foyer, his mind still wrestling with the problem of incipient danger and fighting off the effects of nearly a bottle and a half of Scotch whiskey. He found to his annoyance that Jeremy Brent was still with them. The rules of Scottish hospitality must be obeyed. “Perhaps you would care to join us in our suite for a nightcap, Mr. Brent?”
    “That’s very nice of you,” said Jeremy, accepting with alacrity.
    They walked up the red-carpeted staircase under the flaring gas chandeliers. The air smelled of wine and garlic and incipient snow—as gusts of damp-laden air rushed in with every turn of the revolving doors.
    Jeremy was impressed by the Balfour-MacGregor suite that seemed to take up the whole of the first floor. MacGregor fumbled for his key, swaying slightly as he inserted it in the lock.
    He swayed even more as he crossed the drawing room to a small table laden with bottles which served as the bar.
    “I say, you’ve got a ripping setup here,” Jeremy was saying enthusiastically. “Why, you should see my …
    His voice trailed away and MacGregor suddenly sobered. Lucy’s menace was in the