A Night of Errors Read Free Page B

her to make a critical inspection of Sherris Hall. The house was imposing enough and doubtless estimable among surrounding seats. Equally evidently it was in a state of some disrepair. Mr Greengrave, who had turned also, felt himself awkwardly involved with his hostess in a joint contemplation of this disagreeable fact. It was an attempt to suggest that he was aware only of the more permanent aspects of the building that prompted his next remark.
    ‘How sure they were of their proportions in those days! The whole effect has always seemed to me a delight to the eye. And yet I have sometimes wondered about that wing where the billiard-room and gun-room are. Had they carried it up another storey–’
    ‘But they did. I got the trustees to take it down. Those were the nurseries, you know, that were destroyed by fire. I am so sorry that Lucy is being rather a long time with your cup. You will be thirsty, dear Mr Greengrave, after walking across on this warm afternoon.’
    Mr Greengrave coughed. Having unwittingly led the conversation to painful memories he felt it incumbent upon him not to retreat upon small talk. ‘Your great sorrow,’ he said. ‘was before my time here. But I have often thought of it.’
    ‘So have I. I had been puzzled over it for years.’
    Mr Greengrave considered this doubtfully. ‘Yes,’ he said with caution; ‘the ways of Providence are often inscrutable indeed.’
    ‘Not over what happened, for that was always fairly clear to me. But over what I should have done. I was very young and I ended by doing nothing, apart from having that wing rebuilt as you see it now. I waited for Oliver to grow up.’ Lady Dromio sighed heavily. ‘But has he grown up? It is hard to say.’
    Mr Greengrave felt somewhat out of his depth. The afternoon was drowsy; the effect of his visitation was perhaps soporific; Lady Dromio seemed almost like one speaking in sleep. ‘I am sure,’ he said politely, ‘that Sir Oliver must be a great support.’
    ‘Things should be settled when they turn up. Otherwise there is uncertainty and suspense, and new problems arise before one has at all made up one’s mind about the old. Oliver has a great many problems now – business problems for which he is not perhaps very fitted by temperament. Of course my brother-in-law is a help.’
    ‘Mr Sebastian Dromio?’
    ‘Yes. My father-in-law had three sons, of whom Sebastian is the only survivor. He did not get on at all well with my husband, I am sorry to say, but after – but subsequently he was very helpful indeed. Perhaps you have never met him? He is coming down to visit us this evening. But here is Lucy with the supplies we have been waiting for.’ Lady Dromio reached out a hand for the caraway cake. ‘Lucy, have they remembered about Sebastian’s room?’
    ‘Yes, mama. Everything is being done to placate him and assuage.’
    Mr Greengrave felt that this called for a jolly laugh. ‘And is your uncle,’ he asked, ‘so formidable a man?’
    ‘He will be very cross because Oliver is not yet back. His absence was to have been for not nearly so long.’
    ‘Then let us trust that Sir Oliver is enjoying himself.’ And Mr Greengrave turned to Lady Dromio. ‘Your latest news of him is good, I hope?’
    With some deliberation Lady Dromio cut the cake. ‘Oliver,’ she said, ‘always enjoys himself abroad.’
    ‘Even on a business trip?’
    Lucy advanced the plate of sandwiches. ‘We cannot positively say that it is that.’
    ‘Oliver’s trip to America is certainly prompted by business considerations.’ Lady Dromio spoke as if this were a sort of moral extenuation for visiting so doubtful a country. ‘Although he is, of course, at the same time staying with friends.’
    ‘Or so we believe.’ Lucy took a sandwich herself. ‘Actually, we haven’t heard for nearly–’
    ‘Lucy, dear, do you know that there is neither salt nor pepper in these? How careless everybody has become.’
    ‘It is the influence of