The Mystery of the Blue Train - Agatha Christie [83]
With a gesture she arrested Katherine’s reply. “I have been waiting for something of this kind. What is a secretary to a millionaire? Nine times out of ten it is a young man who likes living soft. A young man with nice manners and a taste for luxury and no brains and no enterprise, and if there is anything that is a softer job than being secretary to a millionaire it is marrying a rich woman for her money. I am not saying that you might not be some man’s fancy. But you are not young, and though you have a very good complexion you are not a beauty, and what I say to you is, don’t make a fool of yourself; but if you are determined to do so, do see that your money is properly tied up on yourself. There, now I have finished. What have you got to say?”
“Nothing,” said Katherine; “but would you mind if he did come down to see me?”
“I wash my hands of it,” said Miss Viner. “I have done my duty, and whatever happens now is on your own head. Would you like him to lunch or to dinner? I daresay Ellen could manage dinner—that is, if she didn’t lose her head.”
“Lunch would be very nice,” said Katherine. “It is awfully kind of you, Miss Viner. He asked me to ring him up, so I will do so and say that we shall be pleased if he will lunch with us. He will motor down from town.”
“Ellen does a steak with grilled tomatoes pretty fairly,” said Miss Viner. “She doesn’t do it well, but she does it better than anything else. It is no good having a tart because she is heavy-handed with pastry; but her little castle puddings are not bad, and I daresay you could find a nice piece of Stilton at Abbot’s. I have always heard that gentlemen like a nice piece of Stilton, and there is a good deal of Father’s wine left, a bottle of sparkling Moselle, perhaps.”
“Oh no, Miss Viner; that is really not necessary.”
“Nonsense, my child. No gentleman is happy unless he drinks something with his meal. There is some good prewar whisky if you think he would prefer that. Now do as I say and don’t argue. The key of the wine cellar is in the third drawer down in the dressing table, in the second pair of stockings on the left-hand side.”
Katherine went obediently to the spot indicated.
“The second pair, now mind,” said Miss Viner. “The first pair has my diamond earrings and my filigree brooch in it.”
“Oh,” said Katherine, rather taken aback, “wouldn’t you like them put in your jewel case?”
Miss Viner gave vent to a terrific and prolonged snort.
“No, indeed! I have much too much sense for that sort of thing, thank you. Dear, dear, I well remember how my poor father had a safe built in downstairs. Pleased as Punch he was with it, and he said to my mother, ‘Now, Mary, you bring me your jewels in their case every night and I will lock them away for you.’ My mother was a very tactful woman, and she knew that gentlemen like having their own way, and she brought him the jewel case to be locked up just as he said.
“And one night burglars broke in, and of course—naturally—the first thing they went for was the safe! It would be, with my father talking up and down the village and bragging about it until you might have thought he kept all King Solomon’s diamonds there. They made a clean sweep, got the tankards, the silver cups, and the presentation gold plate that my father had had presented to him, and the jewel case.”
She sighed reminiscently. “My father was in a great state over my mother’s jewels. There was the Venetian set and some very fine cameos, and some pale pink corals, and two diamond rings with quite large stones in them. And then, of course, she had to tell him that, being a sensible woman, she had kept her jewellery rolled up in a pair of corsets, and there it was still as safe as anything.”
“And the jewel case had been quite empty?”
“Oh no, dear,” said Miss Viner, “it would have been too light a weight then. My mother was a very intelligent woman; she saw to that. She kept her buttons in the jewel case, and a very handy place it was. Boot buttons in the top tray, trouser buttons in the second tray, and assorted buttons below.