A Presumption of Death by Dorothy L. Sayers, Jill Paton Walsh Page A

Really deep stuff. So I rather think the dance was a good opportunity to meet him somewhere quiet; here, for example. We were all going to the dance; he would come over in the vans from the base with all the others, and slip away quietly to meet her. Then when the dance was over the air-raid practice would give them plenty of warning, because you can hear the sirens from here. He would rejoin his mates, and she would scamper along to the shelter.’
    ‘She was dressed for the dance,’ remarked Harriet.
    ‘If she hadn’t dressed up, we’d all have noticed,’ said Rita. ‘That was a very nice frock to put on for him, and take off for him.’
    ‘But surely she wouldn’t have liked to be quite alone with a man . . .’ said a young rather pallid-looking girl, with an Alice band holding back mousy hair.
    ‘Mistake,’ said Rita tartly. ‘ You wouldn’t like to be quite alone with a man. Most of us would grab the chance if we fancied the fellow in question.’
    ‘But . . .’
    ‘It isn’t entirely respectable? Your mother wouldn’t like it? Gentlemen prefer virgins? For lord’s sake, there’s a war on.’
    ‘I don’t see what the war’s got to do with things like that,’ said the girl, who was blushing crimson under Rita’s assault.
    ‘You don’t see what difference it makes that those airmen are about to be slaughtered by the enemy? That none of us may live to see our next birthday? You really don’t?’
    Rita turned her back on the company and took to stirring a pan of soup on the primus stove. Harriet thanked them all, including Rita’s back, for helpful information, and took her leave. She was followed across the yard by Muriel. ‘Lady Peter, could you, I mean if you can, would you keep us abreast with things? With the investigation? Even if we can’t help any further?’
    ‘Yes, of course I will,’ said Harriet. There was a just perceptible glint of tears in Muriel’s pallid blue eyes. Wicked Wendy had had a friend after all.
    Returning to her house, Harriet found her nephew Charlie Parker and Lord St George, heads bent, absorbed in a task which had covered the sofa table in the drawing-room with bits and pieces. Charlie looked up with shining eyes.
    ‘Aunt Harriet, guess what!’ he cried. ‘Uncle Jerry has bought me a crystal set kit and we’re just putting it together now! Wait till I show Sam Bateson – he’ll be green with envy!’
    ‘Don’t gloat over your friends, young Charles,’ said Jerry firmly. ‘The best people don’t do that. Besides, you might need his help. I’m not putting it together for you, I’m just showing you how it goes and how to work it. You’ll have to assemble it yourself.’
    ‘But you’ll help me?’
    ‘Sorry, chum, I have to be off in a mo. As soon as I’ve said goodbye to your aunt here.’
    ‘Oh, Uncle Jerry,’ groaned Charlie. ‘Can’t you stay till tomorrow?’
    ‘Wish I could, old man, but duty calls,’ said Jerry. ‘You just clear all this stuff off the table back into the box, and take it upstairs and get going on it.’
    When the boy had departed, arms full, and shunted the door closed behind him with his left foot, Jerry said to Harriet, ‘Are you getting involved with this murder, Aunt Harriet?’
    ‘Somewhat, Jerry. Do you think I shouldn’t?’
    ‘Well, if Uncle Peter were here . . .’
    ‘Precisely.’
    ‘You don’t think it might be dangerous?’
    ‘A village mystery? Hardly . . . Compared to the general danger . . .’
    ‘It might not be unrelated.’
    ‘Well, the victim wouldn’t have been here apart from the war. The land would have been worked by Peter Gurney, Harry Hawk, Old Uncle Tom Cobleigh and all, and Wicked Wendy would have been – I wonder what she would have been? Working as a school-teacher perhaps?’
    ‘Hardly. She wasn’t the type. She was drinking in the Crown last time I was here on leave, and vamping all the chaps, Aunt Harriet,’ he said. ‘If I weren’t hopelessly infatuated