It was a pity, from Ilse’s point of view, that before she had time to use the letter, Linda died.
CHAPTER 8
Edmund, juggling all the cold irons in his fire, found one after another dropped away. He was beginning to realize that he could not hope to hold Genevieve forever in this precarious manner. He must find some way to bind her to his side more securely. It was not so much that he feared to lose the delights of her person but all that she represented to him of dazzling wealth. It was all this that he longed to possess, with Genevieve the supreme titbit like the fairy at the top of the Christmas tree.
He really felt for Linda a murderous rage when he thought of it, not violent, but a steady fermenting bitterness like ichor in his veins.
He developed a queer habit, half fantasy, half earnest, of inventing elaborate plans for getting rid of someone who lay inconveniently in your path of life. He thought, if this was a detective story now... For he had heard that it was often the practice of detective novelists to work out their plots by imagining a method of ridding themselves of some real acquaintance they happened to dislike. So he used to sit hour after hour in a rigid trance at one of the writing desks in his club, a pen in his hand that never made a mark on the crested sheet of writing paper before him. He would think, if I wanted to get rid of Linda in a story how would I set about it? And of course the first thing of all would be to establish an alibi, because naturally the husband would be the first suspect. Yes, it would quickly be discovered that he had quarrelled with his wife or was not living at home; then they would probably rake out that he had a mistress, a very desirably rich woman, and he in desperate need of money...
In the cheaper newspapers he began to study the accounts of fatal accidents. He made it a practice whenever possible to attend the inquests of these reported accidents and kept account of the verdicts, noting with particularity how many were recorded as “Death by Misadventure,” how many were “Open Verdicts,” and how many received a graver decision. It was astonishing how many people died from a fall in a bathtub or down area steps on a dark night, and how many people went to sleep with the gas on, or drank out of the wrong bottle, or took the telephone into the bathroom to make a call while they lay in the bath: all things that could so easily happen to a person through someone else’s dexterity.
Only, for that, you had to be present on the scene yourself. And then where was your alibi? No, he must have – that is, the hero of his book must have a method absolutely fool proof. The hero – or was he a villain? No, a hero, because he was not going to be discovered of course. Very well, then, the hero must lay the trap in such a manner that it sprang when he was not there. The difficulty there would be to make certain that it was sprung by the right victim.
He would prefer to meet her face to face and kill her openly; in some queer way, it seemed fairer. Or was it that he wanted her to see his hatred, he wanted to acknowledge his guilt to her?
The major snag in this plan was the disposal of the body. He knew how difficult that was and how often it had proved the undoing of many a hapless murderer.
It would be easy enough to get her to come for a drive in the car with him on one pretext or another; then the shot, or the blow on the head – but after? It had been daylight a moment ago while they drove through the Common, but now it was suddenly night and the car bumped in the dark over the tussocks, driving toward the quarry. (It would look as though she had fallen... Or in the river, her clothes swirling about her, her hair like weeds…or buried beneath the floor of a deserted house...) But he knew that although these places sounded so cunning and safe, it was only a delusion. After weeks or months the body would turn up and small dreadful signs would lead the police inexorably toward its destroyer. “The Girl in the Quarry” discovered under all that limestone and bracken; he could see her broken face with the hair blinding it, and the wedding ring spinning on her finger bone... “A Body in the River,” caught in the roots of the willow below the weir, a body of grotesque white coral with pearly eyeballs... Or “Corpse in Cellar,” when they took up the rotted floorboards and found, on a bed of quicklime, teeth...and a silver watch with an inscription in the back...
Genevieve amused herself pretty well in London, all things considered, even though she was condemned to an oddly solitary sort of existence. At present it was still a glorious adventure. It was delicious not to feel the photographer’s “eye” ever on you, to let go one’s highly trained social sense and be simply, deliciously oneself: a woman in love. She half believed it could last forever, just as it was, on these unreal terms.
Then that came to an abrupt stop.
For some days she had felt a little strangely, as if she were sickening for gastric flu, which was prevalent that September – not ill enough to want to see a doctor, not ill enough even to mention it to Edmund: just not her usual radiant health. She had an idea what the matter was, and it gave her thought. She would have to see a doctor, of course, there was no bucking that. She particularly did not want to ask Edmund for a doctor’s name. It would be better for him to know nothing about it. And really all she need do was pick a name out of the telephone directory with a pin, the way people chose horses to bet on, if they knew no other way.
Then like a gentle beam of light illuminating her mind she recollected the comical drunk she had knocked down the first evening of her arrival. She had not given him a thought from that day to this, but she was glad enough to remember him now. He might not be very competent but he would do for a consultation of this nature, or if not he would recommend her to someone else. Dr. Paul, that was the name! She had noticed at the time that it was easy for her to remember because it was the name of her dead husband. Dr. Paul, somewhere in Harley Street, wasn’t it?
She made an appointment for the following day.
He stood at the door of his glossy bower to greet her courteously as she entered.
“Mrs. Hamilton?”
“I see you don’t remember me, Dr. Paul,” she said with a smile.
“Have we met before? It hardly seems possible that I could forget.”
“It shows you suffered no ill effects afterwards, for which I’m thankful. And now that I think of it, perhaps it is just as well you don’t remember.”
He looked astonished. As well he might.
“Can you remember – nearly four months ago – one evening in June?” she began, and added wistfully, “You were awfully sweet about it then. The fact is, I’d only just arrived and I wasn’t accustomed to the left-hand drive – ”
“You knocked me down!” he exclaimed, slapping his hand on the elaborately tooled leather blotter. “Great Scott! Of course I remember, and charmed I am to renew your acquaintance... I seem to recollect that we spent the rest of the night – Oh, now it’s all coming back; there was another man with you – ”
“Much to your annoyance. You kept trying to get rid of him – ”
“Yes, I behaved shockingly – ”
“Don’t say that! You proposed to me very nicely.”
“Good heavens!” he said, laughing. “And did you accept me?”
“I told you my affections were already engaged, but you were very sweet about it.”
“Well, well, well,” he said, “well, well! I see I am to congratulate you, Mrs. Hamilton. I hope you’ll be very happy,” he said rather more formally, because after all this was in consulting hours and not a social occasion, and in half-hour consultation he could not afford to waste time in chit-chat, however delightful.
She looked at him a bit askance, saw his eye rest on her wedding ring, and realized that because she had given her name as Mrs. Hamilton he had jumped to the conclusion that she had recently married the man she had been with that night. It was hardly the moment to disabuse him of the notion, so she quietly said:
“It’s about that I’ve come to see you, Doctor.” And proceeded to describe her symptoms.
He became serious and attentive, looking very handsome and wi
se, with his pen in his hand jotting down notes from time to time and asking questions. He smiled at her, leaning back in his chair.
“Well, there doesn’t seem to be much doubt about it, Mrs. Hamilton. I shall have to examine you of course. We shall want to assure ourselves that everything is going to be quite straightforward. Unfortunately, I haven’t the time today, but you could make another appointment with my secretary, or if you prefer it I will visit you at home.”
“I’ve always hoped to have a child someday. I’m rather glad, I think.” She spoke dreamily, more to herself than to him. “I hope – I hope it’s going to be all right.”
“Why, of course it is, Mrs. Hamilton. You don’t want to worry about anything. I’ll look in on Wednesday, the day after tomorrow, just to set your mind at rest. Just carry on your normal life and try not to think of it as anything unusual.”
“All right, Doctor,” Genevieve nodded, with a wide, dazzled, inattentive smile. She was occupied with her thoughts, wondering with a sharp little pang at the heart whether it would be a small scowling freckled boy with red dish hair falling untidily into his eyes.
She was never one to make quick decisions, and she decided not to tell Edmund yet. She wanted to plan a little for herself first. She had a notion that the time had come for her to take matters into her own hands. Women always settled these things better without the interference of men.
The day following her visit to the doctor she did nothing, except pace through the flat and ponder. To arrive at a decision took much explicit thought, and her brain always felt to herself both cumbersome and shallow, so that to beat thoughts out of it and capture them was something of a painful task. She wished that she had a powerful mind, a logical and philosophical mind that would tell her all she wanted to know. As it was, she laboriously decided on the only course of action that seemed reasonably open to her, since she could never quite grasp more than one side of a question.
The next morning she dressed with great attention: a pale grey suit and a maize-coloured silk shirt and a hat of two grey wings skewered to her head with a pin ending in a great knob of topaz that was a gift from Edmund. She deliberately wore no jewellery. She looked a little pale but extremely lovely. Even Alice, the acolyte at the dressing table, said with shy reverence: “Oooh, madam, you do look lovely!”
At the back of the block was a lock-up garage where she kept the Packard. She drove it away southwards and arrived at Hawkswood about noon. Three children wandered up. The taller boy stood a little away from the others, frowning absorbedly at the car. The little girl came hopping like a robin to within a yard and then stopped. Genevieve shut off the engine.
“Hallo!” she said invitingly.
They said Hallo gravely.
“I bet I know who you are,” Genevieve said, smiling at Jane.
Jane flushed crimson with embarrassment at this attention, attempted to run away backwards, tripped, and sat down bang on the lowest step.
“You’re Jane, aren’t you?”
“She’s Jane and I’m Oliver,” said the little boy, running filthy little fingers, like pink fronds delicately uncurling, lovingly over the chromium trimmings.
“I wonder if you could find your mother for me. Could you?”
“I expect so,” said Jane not budging. And then suddenly she ran away down the path toward a young woman with a basket, and clasped her round the thighs. She must have said something, for the young woman looked up and quickened her step. Their governess, perhaps, thought Genevieve, seeing the girlishly simple cotton frock, the untidy wind-blown black hair, the bare legs thrust into muddy brogues, and wondered if even today a governess could allow herself to look so ungroomed and set her pupils such a bad example.
The girl came up with an uncertain smile.
“Did you want to see me?”
“I wanted to see Mrs. Campion,” said Genevieve in her pretty gentle voice. “Would you tell her that Mrs. Hamilton would like to see her?”
A singular expression came into the girl’s eyes.
“I am Mrs. Campion,” she said.
“Why, I’m so sorry. I don’t know how I came to make such a stupid mistake,” said Genevieve, with a smile that Linda took for malice.
“Janey, would you carry this very carefully into the kitchen and tell Mrs. Hacker the carrots are for dinner and will she please scrape them.” She handed her the basket. “Don’t forget to say ‘please,’ Jane. Will you come in?” she said to Genevieve, preceding her up the steps. She opened a painted double door leading into an enormous shadowy room. “We never use the drawing room nowadays, so no one is likely to disturb us here...”
She herself perched watchfully on the arm of a chair, opposite but rather frigidly distant. She was wretchedly conscious, in face of the elegant creature opposite, of her unkempt hair, her hands dirty from vegetable picking, her muddy shoes. It wasn’t fair! She should have had the chance to make herself presentable. She was seized with an unreasonable fury, and thought, how dare she come here!
“I guess you know who I am,” Genevieve began. She hesitated. “I wonder if you wanted to see me as much as I wanted to see you. I thought if we could only meet and discuss the whole situation through rationally, without letting our emotions get involved in it, we might get to a solution. It isn’t fair to any of us to go on as we are, is it?”
Linda said nothing.
Genevieve said in a low voice: “I can see you blame me for having fallen in love with Edmund. But, you know, it’s a thing that can happen to anybody. You’re young and healthy; do you imagine you’ll never fall in love again in your life?”
“I know that people do fall in love with people they shouldn’t, even after they’re married; but if such a thing happened to me, I wouldn’t give in to it, I’d be ashamed. I wouldn’t pretend it was something honourable and all right and inevitable and make that an excuse to leave my husband and children. I wouldn’t leave all my responsibilities just to gratify my own lust, I can tell you. As if it was something to be proud of. As if it wasn’t a sin.”
“A sin!” echoed Genevieve puzzled. “Why do you call it a sin?”
Linda flung back her hair with a dry little laugh.
“Because adultery is a sin. Didn’t you know? Haven’t you ever heard of the seventh commandment and, of Him who said that to break one was to break them all, and even to look on a person with desire in the heart was the same as committing the act of adultery?”
“But my poor child,” Genevieve protested incredulously, “you can’t use that old stuff as a rule for life! Nobody could! Nobody in their right minds would attempt such a thing!”
Linda stared.
“But that’s – that’s blasphemy,” she whispered.
Genevieve suddenly felt as if her backbone had been taken away from her; she wanted to cry; and for the first time understood what Edmund meant when he said that arguing with Linda was like trying to explain something to a particularly dense foreigner who didn’t understand a word of your language. It had been a mistake to come. They had no common basis of understanding.
A fly buzzed and banged up and down the window.
She gave Linda a sad little smile.
“It’s hopeless, isn’t it? We just don’t understand each other.”
“I’m sorry,” said Linda sulkily, as if she were being reproved for stubbornness by her teacher. She looked down at her hands in her lap. “I don’t know what you expect me to do.”
“That’s simple,” she said. She made a little impulsive gesture with her gloved hands. “I came to ask you to divorce Edmund.”
Linda said sternly:
“Surely he’s told you I shall never do that.”
“I thought – if you knew I was going to have a baby...you might change your mind.”
Linda gazed at her stolidly, though her face had lost colour.
“Why do you imagine I should care?”
Genevieve said quietly: “I’ve never h
ad a child. I’m thirty-two. And I’d like to have Edmund’s child, more than I can say. But of course I couldn’t have it unless it was going to be legitimate, that wouldn’t be fair. It rests with you.”
“I don’t think I understand. What is it to do with me?”
“If you will divorce Edmund so that he can marry me, there’s no reason why I shouldn’t keep the baby. But if you won’t, then I shall have to get rid of it.”
“That’s murder,” said Linda breathlessly.
Genevieve went to her, took her rough little hands in hers.
“Please, Mrs. Campion,” she pleaded. “Don’t be so hard on Edmund! Try to understand. You’re young! I know what a splendid person you are really. With all that you’ve had to bear, you couldn’t be otherwise than an utterly integrated personality. Can’t we try to be adult about this thing? After all, maternity is a woman’s natural function, isn’t it? Won’t you let me have my baby?”
Linda snatched her hands away and put them behind her back like a schoolgirl. Her face was red and defiant, her eyes scared.
“And what about my baby?” she said.
“Your baby?”
“Isn’t he to have a father?” Linda asked almost pertly.
Genevieve stared at Linda for what seemed an eternity, searching those blue frightened eyes, dropping in shamefaced suspicion to her gaunt little frame in its faded blue frock. It became very difficult to stand because her legs were trembling. She said:
“Are you going to have a baby?”
Linda nodded.
“Didn’t Edmund tell you?” she asked ingenuously.
Genevieve went deathly white.
She said through stiff lips: “Then he knows?”
“Of course.”
Genevieve muttered: “I’m sorry...could you get me a little water?”
Sting of Death Page 10
