The most attractive spectacle was that of two litters which were held high above the dragons and contained a girl apiece—two little creatures so lovely that it would have been difficult to match their beauty. They wore lotus flowers in their long black hair and one had a silk gown of delicate lilac color, the other was in pink.

Lottie called to me from the next rickshaw. “You see… you see.”

I nodded.

“The girls,” she told me, “are from Chan Cho Lan’s.”

I said to Joliffe: “Poor little things, what will their lives be?”

“Very pleasant, I imagine.”

“I believe they will be sold.”

“To a man who can afford to keep them and will give them the life of ease which they have been brought up to expect.”

“And when he is tired of them?”

“He will keep them. He will not let them want. That would be to lose face.”

“I’m sorry for them.”

Joliffe said: “When you are in a foreign country you must adjust your ideas to those of that country.”

“I still say poor children.”

I started. One of the participants in the procession had come very close.

It was a man in a red robe and over his face was a mask.

I felt my heart begin to beat uncomfortably. I had seen that costume before—or something so similar that it might be a replica.

As he looked up at me I shrank back into my seat.

Joliffe said: “It’s all right. Only part of the revelry.”

“What a hideous mask,” I said.

“Oh that,” said Joliffe. “They call it the Mask of Death.”


* * *

I had been well for some days. I had given up drinking tea since Jason’s illness. I was certain now that what damage had been done had come through the tea.

It was a horrible realization. What should I do? I asked myself. If someone was trying to poison me through the tea and that someone realized that I had discovered this, would not the medium be changed? Would they not try something else?

I was in acute danger. I must turn to somebody. To whom? To my husband?

I shivered. There were times when I laughed my suspicions to scorn. That was when I was with him. It was only when he was not there and I looked facts in the face that I said to myself: He had the motive.

How is it possible to love someone and fear him at the same time? How is it possible to be so intimate and not to know the innermost thoughts of the other? We were lovers; our passion had not abated; ours was an intensely physical relationship. Yet in my heart the haunting suspicion persisted. Someone is trying to harm me, to kill me perhaps, but first to render me helpless, useless, to undermine my health. So that when I die no one is very surprised. And if this was indeed Joliffe how could he play the lover so wholeheartedly, so sincerely and devotedly.

Perhaps our need of each other was a thing apart—complete in itself. Perhaps our bodily union was quite separate from that of our minds. Our attraction in the first place I suppose had been a physical one, for my part at least it had been what is called love at first sight and that happens before one knows the other as an individual. Had our love remained on that level all the time? Was it indeed a fact that I did not know Joliffe any more than he knew me? It must have been so for I could suspect him of unimaginable horror. And he… could he really be capable of it?

Sometimes these theories seemed quite absurd. But at others they were rational.

And now that I was feeling better they remained with me, in fact were intensified. I had told myself that it was because I was sick in body that my thoughts had been sick too. My fevered imagination had built up a situation which could not possibly exist.

But I was better and the stronger I grew the more convinced I was that I was in acute danger.

The old Jane was back in command. Jane with two feet on the ground—logical Jane who liked to look life straight between the eyes.

And what she saw was this: Someone is trying to harm you, perhaps to kill you. And the reason could only be because your death will give that one something that he wants.

Joliffe on your death becomes the arbiter of a great fortune. But Joliffe loves you, at least he says he does. He was not too scrupulous as to how he discovered trade secrets. Remember his prowling in Sylvester’s Treasure Room? He was married to Bella and told you nothing of this. Bella came back and you parted and then Bella died. He lied to you about the manner of her dying. You married him and changed Sylvester’s instructions that Adam should hold his fortune in trust for Jason. And then you began to be ill.

The case is black against him except for one thing: he is your husband and he loves you. He says he does a hundred times a week; he acts as though he does; at times there is a perfect accord between you and when he is not there life loses its savor.

It is not Joliffe. I won’t believe it is Joliffe. It isn’t possible.

It is someone else.

There is Adam. Adam, of the stern integrity. And what has he to gain? He does not know that the will has been changed and that it is Joliffe now who will take over. There would be no motive… if Adam knew. But Adam does not know.

How had you felt about Adam when you first knew him? There was something repellent about him. You disliked him. A cold man, you thought; but that changed. He wanted to marry you. He didn’t say so but you sensed it. And if it had not been that you had loved Joliffe would you have considered Adam?

And now you are considering Adam. He was in the house when Sylvester died. Joliffe was not. But Adam does not live in the house now. No, but he is a frequent caller. And how did Sylvester die? It all seemed natural then… an aging man who had had a bad accident and gradually faded away, going into a decline until he died. And Adam had been in the house. But I could not believe that Adam was a murderer.

Surely Adam would have guessed that I would not allow anyone but Jason’s own father to be his guardian. Yes, he certainly would; but he would also believe that Sylvester’s wishes that he should be in control of the business until Jason was of age should be respected.

And Joliffe? I had made my will. If I died Joliffe would be in control.

Whichever way I looked it came back to Joliffe.


* * *

Each day I awoke to a sense of impending danger. I wished that I could have confided in someone, but who was there?

Lottie was no help. I loved the girl but it was so difficult for us to understand each other. I wished that I had a woman friend. There was Elspeth Grantham but she was scarcely that and I knew she disapproved of Joliffe if for no other reason than that I had married him instead of Toby.

It was indicative of my relationship with Toby that he was the one to whom I came nearest to confiding.

One day when we had finished our business he said to me: “You are better since the doctor’s visit.”

“Yes.” I hesitated.

He looked at me earnestly and I felt a wave of affection for this calm self-effacing man, who was genuinely anxious about me.

“Sometimes,” he said, “it is difficult to adjust oneself to a new environment.”

“I have been here for some time now, Toby” I said. “I think I have adjusted myself.”

“Then…”

My defenses weakened. I had to talk to someone and there were few I trusted as I trusted Toby.

He was waiting and I felt the words rushing out.

“I think something I’d taken was perhaps making me ill.”

“Something you’d taken!” He repeated the words and there was incredulity in his voice.

“Jason was ill,” I said. “He had drunk my tea. It seemed strange that he should have been ill after that. He had nightmares… and I am sure that his symptoms were the same as those which have been affecting me.”

“Do you mean that there was something in the tea?”

I looked at him.

“It seems the last thing,” he said, “unless…”

He did not need to say any more.

“I have always felt that strange things can happen in The House of a Thousand Lanterns,” I went on. “The house affects me in an odd way. There are so many servants and even now I find it difficult to tell them all apart. Sometimes I think I am resented, Toby. Perhaps Sylvester was resented too.”

“Who would resent him?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “You would think me fanciful if I said The House, wouldn’t you?”

“Yes,” he answered. His eyes were serious. “If it was the tea then you are in danger. For if you no longer take tea might something else not be used?”

“I can’t really believe it, Toby. I think I’ve been run down and imagining things.”

“And Jason?”

“Children have these sudden upsets.”

“You’ve talked this over with Joliffe?”

I shook my head.

I could see that he was puzzled. “It’s a lot of imagination,” I said quickly. “I feel ashamed of my thoughts. I haven’t told anyone.”

I knew I had made some sort of a confession. My relationship with Joliffe was not what it should have been between husband and wife. If a woman feared she was being threatened wouldn’t the first person she turned to be her husband?

“Don’t treat this lightly, Jane,” he said.

“No. I’ll be careful. But I’m sure there’s a logical explanation. I’ve been run down as they say. I’ve had bad dreams and even walked in my sleep. It happens to lots of people. All one needs is a tonic and one returns to normal.”

“If something had been put in your tea,” said Toby, “who could have done this? You don’t think it could be one of the servants who has some crazy notion that you as a woman have no right to own the house? It’s possible that one of them could get such an idea. I know how their minds work. Who would profit from your death, Jane? There may be someone who would. It sounds mad. I wouldn’t say this to anyone else. But you’ve got to be watchful. You’ve got to protect yourself. If you died Adam would get control of the business in trust for Jason. Adam could want that. Business is not good with him. I do know that. I think it would be very advantageous for him if he could get his hands on your affairs, which, of course, he would do in the event of…”

My heart was beating fast. I said: “I don’t believe it. I don’t believe it for an instant.”

“Of course not. I’m sorry I mentioned it. It was just that I was looking for a reason…”

He trailed off miserably. He was worried about me. He would have been more so I know had I told him that I had brought about a change and that it was Joliffe who would now have control, Joliffe who would have the motive.

He said that Elspeth had mentioned the fact that she hadn’t seen me for a long time. Would I call in to see her?

I said I would go now. Elspeth was a stern and practical woman; it was impossible to indulge in flights of fancy in her presence. I felt she would have a sobering effect.

“Ee,” she said when we arrived, “so you’ve come for a cup of tea.”

I said it would be delightful and she set about brewing it.

She had baked a batch of scones and Scotch baps. She made the tea at the table with her spirit kettle.

I drank it with relish.

“I wouldn’t have any of the servants making it,” said Elspeth. “There’s only one way to make a good cup of tea and nobody seems to be able to do it here.”

“Jane was saying the same,” added Toby. “She likes to make her own tea. Have you got that spirit lamp you brought with you from Edinburgh? She could have that and make a cup when she fancied it.”

“She’s welcome,” said Elspeth. “I don’t use it now. But they never will give it time to infuse. Only the Scots and mayhap the English…” she added grudgingly, “seem to know how to make a cup of tea.”

She said she had heard I had not been well. She pursed her lips in the familiar manner. She was suggesting of course that I must expect ailments if I was so unable to take care of myself.

While we were having tea a visitor arrived. To my dismay and Elspeth’s scarcely concealed annoyance it was Lilian Lang.

“I knew it was teatime,” cried Lilian, “to tell the truth I couldn’t resist coming. Those heavenly scones! And the shortbreads. What a cook you are, Miss Grantham, and isn’t Toby the luckiest man to be so well looked after.”

“I doubt he thinks so,” said Elspeth, at which Toby assured her that he did.