A Deadly Marriage
Roderic Jeffries
© Roderic Jeffries 1967
Roderic Jeffries has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in 1967 by Collins Press
This edition published in 2015 by Endeavour Press Ltd.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER X
CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XVI
CHAPTER XVII
CHAPTER I
Catalina’s voice was high and strident. “Where did you go yesterday afternoon and last night?”
“To London, as I’ve told you a dozen times,” replied David, her husband.
“You’re lying.”
“Am I?”
“I telephoned your club and all the hotels you’ve ever stayed at. You weren’t anywhere. You were with her all night.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“I knew what you were going to do. I could tell. Why haven’t you even the courage to tell me the truth?”
“The last time I did, you got very hysterical.”
“Can you wonder at that, when you treat me like a bit of dirt?”
“I don’t.”
“Just because I’m a foreigner...”
“You are not a foreigner.”
“And I’m not some milk and water Englishwoman with a nasty smell under her nose,” she shouted, careless of any illogicality. She crossed the sitting-room to the cocktail cabinet and poured out a very large gin to which she added only a dash of French.
He lit a cigarette. It needed an act of faith, almost a belief in the impossible, to recall the newly divorced woman he had met on the cruise ship. Gay, exotic, striking, beautiful, he had called her.
Catalina turned round. “I suppose she spends all her time laughing and jeering at me?”
“I doubt it. She’s too busy.”
“Doing what? Trying to act as everybody’s fairy god-mother? Buying saintliness at the expense of the peasants’ dignity?”
He laughed.
She swore in Spanish and he failed to understand a single word. She finished the drink and poured herself another. Before long, he thought, she would be thick tongued and still more bitter, until the acid inside her poured out as a flood of tears.
He stood up. “I’m going to the works. Afterwards, I’m up to London for a meeting.”
“You’re going to see her again. You can’t keep away from her.”
“Have it whichever way you like.”
He left the room, crossed the hall, opened the front door and then looked back for a brief moment. The curved staircase, reputedly by Adam, gave an immediate air of charm and grace. The banisters were delicate scrolls in iron work, lute-shaped, and the rails curved out to give more room for panniered skirts. This style of airy elegance, with just the right amount of ornamentation, was reflected throughout the house. It was a tragedy that Catalina lived there and so destroyed so much of this charm and taste.
The Aston Martin was parked in front of the circular flower bed. He climbed into the driving seat and drove off, almost immediately recovering some peace of mind. He loved the feel of power that came with this hand-built sports car even though, somewhat paradoxically, he rarely drove fast. The car and the house were the only two real luxuries he had allowed himself, being a man who had no use for luxury solely for luxury’s sake.
His factory was situated on the outskirts of Borisham and as he drove through the gateway and under the sign “Frogsfeet Limited,” he smiled. He never ceased to feel an inner satisfaction when he saw that sign — which probably meant he suffered from some grave defect of character! Yet, out of experience, by way of an inquiring mind, he had first dreamed up and then transferred into a practical proposition an entirely new system of milking parlours. Against the advice of his best friends and his bank manager, he had decided to produce the equipment for these parlour-sheds. When the overdraft stood at four thousand five hundred pounds and the bank manager read him the riot act, it had seemed as if the defeatists had been right after all. But he possessed a stubborn streak which refused to admit defeat and he had talked the bank manager into letting him continue. The tide had turned quite suddenly and almost before he had realised it his biggest headache had been how to fill all the orders — not whether there were going to be any orders to fill. Success had meant money, which to him was far less important than the knowledge of his achievement. Money had meant Catalina. So perhaps his invention of the new system was a rotten invention after all! He suddenly laughed. He could still sometimes see the lighter side of things.
He parked his car and went into his office. His secretary brought him the afternoon mail and after dealing with that he studied the latest set of production figures and read through three reports. That done, he leaned back in his chair and lit a cigarette. He could still find it odd that he should be chairman and managing director and responsible for the working lives of a number of men — it was almost as if at times he were playing a part in a charade. Patricia said he enjoyed life too much and cared too little about the monetary side of success to be good executive material. Perhaps she was right. Often, when his middle-aged secretary came in, looking as if she had swallowed something disagreeable, he felt a schoolboyish desire to ask her to go with him to Paris for the week-end just to see her reactions.
At a quarter to four, he left the office and went across to the works. He spoke to the men at the benches and listened carefully to one of them who suggested an improvement in the milk pipe-line. The men worked hard and were very ready to suggest improvements in the equipment — not because he was in any way a father-figure, but because he paid top wages, a percentage of profits, and a considerable sum for any worthwhile and workable idea. His factory was a product of the sixties, where loyalty of work had to be bought.
When he reached the end of the main shed, he saw Harris in the smaller of the two offices. He turned to leave by one of the side doors, but Harris had seen him and came running out of the office.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Plesence. Isn’t it a really lovely day?”
“Wonderful.” Harris always reminded him of a piece of lard, moulded into human shape by an Almighty who was feeling satirically bitter.
“I’m only just back from Taunton, Bristol, and Gloucester, Mr. Plesence.”
“Are you? Good trip?”
“I’d call it good, Mr. Plesence. I’ve returned with firm orders for three parlour-sheds.”
“Well done.”
“What’s more, I’ve another four large farms nibbling and nibbling to no mean measure.” Harris rubbed his large, flabby hands together. “That’ll put the old graph up, won’t it, Mr. Plesence?”
“Graph?”
“The sales graph. That’ll keep the line right up, won’t it?”
And put something over a hundred and fifty quid in your pocket, thought David. Harris worshipped money almost as much as did Catalina, which was probably why he was a first-class salesman.
“It’s a real break through, Mr. Plesence. Two of those three orders were taken from under the noses of our big rivals.”
“They didn’t stand a chance, not with you batting.”
Harris smirked, pleased with the compliment. He looked as if he was about to declaim on the art of salesmanship, so David looked at his watch, said he was late,
and hurried out of the building.
He stood in the sunshine and stared at the stores sheds, buildings of concrete and asbestos sheeting. It was, almost certainly, ridiculous to feel as he did, but he was almost sorry that the business was running quite so smoothly. His was a character which thrived on the challenge of difficulties and always felt a trifle uneasy when things were going too well because that meant there was no battle to fight. Perhaps, he thought, he should turn to pig farming and how to make that pay.
He walked round to his car and sat down. From a business point of view, it was far too early to be leaving work, but he needed to see Patricia in order to erase some of the sourness in his mind that Catalina had planted there. Catalina had the unfortunate ability to fill him with some of her bitterness so that after any scene with her it took him a long time fully to recover his normal good humour. In any case, he told himself and grinned, as a boss who was worrying because there weren’t any worries, he was surely entitled to some relaxation?
He drove through Borisham, a large market town, and out on to the Borisham/Folkestone road. At Thornton Lees cross-roads, he turned left and went along the winding lanes to Thornton Lees, a small village rapidly growing as a large council house estate was built.
Patricia’s house was half a mile beyond the village. It was a farmhouse, once half-timbered but at some time overbricked, with the typical long sloping roof and chunky central chimneystack. He parked in the drive, then banged on the heavily studded wooden door. There was no answer. He walked round to the back and felt in the guttering, at head level because of the length of the roof, for the key. He unlocked the door and went into the kitchen. On the small central table was a note to say that Patricia had gone out to a committee meeting, but would be back by five should there by any chance be any callers. There were several exclamation marks at the end and he could imagine her smile as she made them.
He walked into the sitting-room which was, as usual, untidy in a pleasant, lived-in kind of a way. He lit a cigarette. As incredible as it might seem, it was only a year ago that he and Patricia had first met. She was a widow, her husband having died in a car accident that was entirely the fault of the other driver. She had been pregnant at the time and the shock had caused a miscarriage. In a flash, her comfortable life and world had been shattered. With a very great courage, not always appreciated because of her somewhat carefree attitude, she fought her way out of her grief and back into the world. She joined in much of the village life, not because she especially enjoyed it, but because this gave her something useful to do. One of the committees on which she’d been had organised a dance, in aid of church funds, and that was where she and he had first met. Catalina had been dressed in a manner that might, with a woman half her age, charitably have been called exotic. At her age, she looked both vulgar and slightly absurd. In sharp contrast, Patricia had looked freshly attractive. He’d danced with her and after the third gin had said she irresistibly reminded him of an English rose. She had looked at him in perplexed amazement until she saw the gleam of amusement in his eyes and then she’d laughed with a freedom that she’d not known for a long time.
When he’d called at her house and invited himself inside, she’d tried to make it quite clear that their few moments together at the dance did not qualify him for anything. He’d called her prissy whereupon, instead of becoming indignant, she’d once more laughed. There was much about him that reminded her of Michael, her late husband.
He saw her frequently after that and they went out together. Inevitably, “friends” saw them and hurried to pass on the news to Catalina. Catalina immediately accused him of committing adultery. She repeated the charge again and again. Once, the row was so heated and her tongue so active that when he reached Marshbourne Farm he was still angry, shamed, and bitter. When Patricia demanded to know what on earth was the trouble, he told her. Her reply had been typically direct. “If she’s so certain you’re committing adultery, isn’t it a pity to go on disappointing her?”
He heard a car draw up and went over to the window. A Morris 1000 was drawn up behind the Aston and Patricia was climbing out of it. She was wearing a simple cotton frock that made her look twenty-five not thirty-live, and since this effect was not deliberate, the flattery was complete and not sharp-edged.
As soon as she was inside the house, she kissed him with a warm passion. Keeping hold of him, she leaned back until she could look up into his face. “Do you know something really important? It’s two whole days since you were last here?”
“I’ve been terribly busy.”
“With something or someone far more important than just me?”
He grinned. “But of course.”
She pulled his head down and gently bit his ear. “David, sometimes I just can’t think why I love you quite as much as I do.”
“Is it because I’m so handsome?”
“Idiot,” she whispered. “Love me, David?”
“Very, very much.”
“That’s mighty generous of you.”
“I’m a very generous fellow.”
“You men are all the same. There’s nothing about yourselves you dislike.”
“Are we all the same?”
She pressed her cheek against his. “There’s no one in the whole wide world like you, David, thank God, and it’s a miracle I met you.” For a brief second, she gripped him more tightly. “I know Michael would understand.”
They never avoided talking about Michael or Catalina. Right from the beginning they had decided they had to accept all the facts, just as they were.
David spent the night at Marshbourne Farm. The next morning, he and Patricia were lying in bed, telling each other it was time to get up and doing nothing about it, when there was a ring at the front door.
“Who the hell?” said Patricia. “At this ungodly hour.”
“It’s the postman with a registered letter from Little-woods to tell you you’ve won three hundred thousand pounds.”
“And if it is?”
“I’ll be round you and your money like a bee after honey.”
“David, have you ever been really short of money?”
“So short I didn’t know where the next meal was coming from.”
“Was this when you were trying to get your firm going?”
“Yes.”
“Did it worry you to be completely hard up?”
“Not in respect of the money itself, any more than it thrills me to be well off now.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“That’s because you drank too many gins last night.”
“I had two and you had at least four, so it’s far more likely you’re just talking nonsense.”
The front-door bell rang again.
“Hell!” Patricia climbed out of bed. She was in the nude and David studied her body. “What’s got you so interested?” she asked.
“Come a bit closer and I’ll tell you all the answers.” She smiled. “And then what would happen to our poor caller downstairs?” She put on a pair of pyjamas and a dressing-gown. She and David were both of a passionate nature and they saw no reason for not accepting the fact between themselves.
David watched her leave the room. He wondered what their future was to be? He had spoken to his solicitor and asked if there was any chance of a divorce. Tullett had replied that that was entirely up to Catalina. Would she initiate the action? That was one hell of a question. Catalina’s pride had been very badly hurt because although she knew their marriage was a mistake from beginning to end, she could not bear to think he preferred another woman to her. In her mind’s eye, she was still an irresistable twenty. If Catalina knew how desperately he wanted a divorce and she could block it without hurt to herself, she would get a savage pleasure from so blocking it. Tullett had gone on to ask if David thought her co-operation could be bought — provided, he’d added very hastily, there was no suggestion of connivance. Money was the one thing that might do the trick, provided there was enough of it.
She would swallow all her pride, all her jealous anger, all her desires for revenge, if by doing so she made what she considered to be enough money.
It was an ironic exercise in life to look back in time and see the extent to which one person’s attitude towards another could change. Aboard the ship on the cruise in the Caribbean, under the bright moon which sparkled on the calm water just as the travel posters had promised, he had held Catalina in his arms and wondered how her first husband could have been such a fool as to amuse himself with a lift attendant. Couldn’t the man recognise perfection when he met it? Now, David’s only wonder was that the other had endured the marriage for as long as two years. Catalina had told him, David, over and over again how rich her first husband was. His estates in Cuba produced so much sugar that he was a millionaire God knows how many times over. She’d thought David was as rich because he’d spent money lavishly throughout the cruise, his first holiday in eight years. When she was married to him in England and she discovered he was not a millionaire, she talked bitterly about living in poverty. When he bought her a silver fox cape, she wept tears because it was not mink: when he bought her a Radford Mini, she cursed him for not buying her a Rolls-Royce.
He had resigned himself to writing off the marriage as a mistake that had to be lived with until he’d met Patricia. Then he could no longer be so philosophical.
Patricia came back into the bedroom. Her expression was one of amused excitement. “David...”
“What?”
“Guess who?”
“Don’t say it was the postman with a cheque for three hundred thousand?”
“Seriously.”
“I can’t think of anything more serious.”
“It’s an inquiry agent.”
“A what?”
“A private detective. You know, a man who smokes sixty cigarettes a day, drinks a couple of bottles of whisky before breakfast, beats up all the men, sleeps with all the women...only...only...” She began to giggle.
“You’re in a bad way, Pat!”
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