Parker Pyne Investigates - Agatha Christie [79]
Eve Leathern came dancing up to them, her lank fair hair bobbing excitedly. She was fifteen–an awkward child–but full of vitality.
‘I’m going to be married by the time I’m seventeen,’ she exclaimed breathlessly. ‘To a very rich man and we’re going to have six children and Tuesdays and Thursdays are my lucky days and I ought always to wear green or blue and an emerald is my lucky stone and–’
‘Why, pet, I think we ought to be getting along,’ said her father.
Mr Leathern was a tall, fair, dyspeptic-looking man with a somewhat mournful expression.
Mr Pointz and Mr Stein were turning away from the darts. Mr Pointz was chuckling and Mr Stein was looking somewhat rueful.
‘It’s all a matter of luck,’ he was saying.
Mr Pointz slapped his pocket cheerfully.
‘Took a fiver off you all right. Skill, my boy, skill. My old Dad was a first class darts player. Well, folks, let’s be getting along. Had your fortune told, Eve? Did they tell you to beware of a dark man?’
‘A dark woman,’ corrected Eve. ‘She’s got a cast in her eye and she’ll be real mean to me if I give her a chance. And I’m to be married by the time I’m seventeen…’
She ran on happily as the party steered its way to the Royal George.
Dinner had been ordered beforehand by the forethought of Mr Pointz and a bowing waiter led them upstairs and into a private room on the first floor. Here a round table was ready laid. The big bulging bow-window opened on the harbour square and was open. The noise of the fair came up to them, and the raucous squeal of three roundabouts each blaring a different tune.
‘Best shut that if we’re to hear ourselves speak,’ observed Mr Pointz drily, and suited the action to the word.
They took their seats round the table and Mr Pointz beamed affectionately at his guests. He felt he was doing them well and he liked to do people well. His eye rested on one after another. Lady Marroway–fine woman–not quite the goods, of course, he knew that–he was perfectly well aware that what he had called all his life the crême de la crême would have very little to do with the Marroways–but then the crême de la crême were supremely unaware of his own existence. Anyway, Lady Marroway was a damned smart-looking woman–and he didn’t mind if she did rook him at Bridge. Didn’t enjoy it quite so much from Sir George. Fishy eye the fellow had. Brazenly on the make. But he wouldn’t make too much out of Isaac Pointz. He’d see to that all right.
Old Leathern wasn’t a bad fellow–longwinded, of course, like most Americans–fond of telling endless long stories. And he had that disconcerting habit of requiring precise information. What was the population of Dartmouth? In what year had the Naval College been built? And so on. Expected his host to be a kind of walking Baedeker. Eve was a nice cheery kid–he enjoyed chaffing her. Voice rather like a corncake, but she had all her wits about her. A bright kid.
Young Llewellyn–he seemed a bit quiet. Looked as though he had something on his mind. Hard up, probably. These writing fellows usually were. Looked as though he might be keen on Janet Rustington. A nice woman–attractive and clever, too. But she didn’t ram her writing down your throat. Highbrow sort of stuff she wrote but you’d never think it to hear her talk. And old Leo! He wasn’t getting younger or thinner. And blissfully unaware that his partner was at that moment thinking precisely the same thing about him, Mr Pointz corrected Mr Leathern as to pilchards being connected with Devon and not Cornwall, and prepared to enjoy his dinner.
‘Mr Pointz,’ said Eve when plates of hot mackerel had been set before them and the waiters had left the room.
‘Yes, young lady.’
‘Have you got that big diamond with you right now? The one you showed us last night and said you always took about with you?’
Mr Pointz chuckled.
‘That’s right. My mascot, I call it. Yes, I’ve got it with me all right.’
‘I think that’s awfully dangerous. Somebody might get it away from you in the crowd at the