SHE’D BEEN GONE for twenty minutes behind the closed door of the front study where Marcus kept his telephone. Joe began to pace about the drawing room straightening the pictures.
“It looks as though she’s got through,” Marcus commented. “She usually does.”
They heard Dorcas’s swift footsteps scurrying down the corridor from Marcus’s study and she came through the door looking pink and pleased. “Hurry, Joe! He wants to have a word with you. I left it off the hook.”
With sinking heart, Joe picked up the earpiece Dorcas had left on the desk and spoke crisply. “Sandilands here.”
“Sandilands! Well, this is a surprise! I wasn’t aware! No, honestly! Miss Joliffe never mentioned the relationship.”
“No reason why she should, sir. We haven’t met since she was a child, and the relationship you speak of is a rather obscure one. My sister is the one who has the connection, and it’s one of friendship, not a blood tie,” Joe heard himself saying repressively.
“I’d say any connection with Miss Joliffe is one to be valued, Sandilands,” came the mild reproof. “Lucky chap! She tells me you were instrumental in clearing up the unfortunate demise of her aunt, her German aunt, Dame Beatrice Joliffe, some years ago?”
“Sir. Dame Beatrice was half German—on her mother’s side—and her demise, as I’m sure you know, was rather fortunate for some. Not least the prime minister of the day.”
“Ah, yes!” The voice was amused, leisurely, conspiratorial. “Know what you mean! The old girl made off with the family emeralds and then bashed her own skull in with a poker, all in the comfort of a suite at the Ritz, of course. Thereby saving some blushes in Intelligence circles. Am I getting this right?” He broke off. “What’s that, Charles?” he called impatiently. “No—tell Lord Meldreth I’ll be there directly. Something urgent’s come up.
“Now, Sandilands, Miss Joliffe seems to endorse the high opinion I hear from everyone else and expresses great faith in your investigative abilities. So go to it, man! Take her along with you by all means. I’ll smooth your path with the school authorities. Leave that to me. You’ll find your companion very … insightful. But—a word of advice—don’t try to run her in blinkers and don’t patronise her if you want to get the best from Dorcas … Miss Joliffe.”
The suave voice took on a rough edge as he added uncertainly: “Don’t let her run into danger, Sandilands. I won’t have it! She’s a spirited girl and she speaks her mind without fear or favour. You may be unaware.… I ought to say.… She is very highly valued in some circles.… Look here, I hold you responsible for her welfare.”
Joe gave him a curt goodbye and slammed down the receiver. “Bloody cheek!” he muttered. And, suddenly perceptive of a presence close by—was it a suppressed snort of laughter or a waft of Arpège through the open door?—he grimaced, picked up the receiver again and slammed it down more emphatically, exclaiming loudly: “What an arsehole!”
HE RESISTED THE impulse to drag her in and box her ears. He didn’t go to join the others.
Joe closed the door firmly and went to collapse into an armchair, holding his head between his hands as though to catch and calm the whirling thoughts and confused emotions.
He—Joe—was responsible for her welfare. And none other. That much was blindingly clear to him. Not even her feckless father, certainly not this smooth politician with his over-warm interest. And Joe had always known it. He’d struggled with the notion, denied it, ridiculed it, rationalised it and finally accepted that, like a good Christmas pudding made with the very best raisins and French brandy, it simply had to be put away in the darkest recesses of a cool pantry and left to mature.
Had she seen that? Of course she had! More clearly than he had himself. The distancing had been all her idea. She’d enclosed herself in an impenetrable cocoon of learning. With many years of educational neglect to make up for, she’d kept at it through term time and vacations alike and used her studies as an excuse to avoid his company. And, despite his protests of ignorance to Lydia, he thought he understood why. She’d felt she needed the time to grow into someone he might look at eye to eye.
Silly girl! Quite unnecessary self-inflicted discomfort. They had always reverberated on the same note. She could have trusted him. The retreat had been well understood by him but none the less hurtful. And now, suddenly, it seemed she no longer needed to maintain her distance. With foreboding, he wondered why.
This interest from Truelove? What had the man been trying to say to Joe? Or trying to avoid saying?
He remembered with a flash of insight a comment Dorcas had made—lightly—when they’d been caught up in an unpleasant and murderous situation in a château in Champagne. She’d enslaved the family’s fierce old boar-hound by dropping a few honeyed if outlandish words into his ear, one of the many skills she’d acquired at gypsy fire-sides where her father liked to spend his unbuttoned moments. Noting that the young son of the house was becoming as smitten with Dorcas as his dog, Joe had jokingly asked: “That trick of whispering magic into dogs’ ears, miss—does it work on boys?”
She’d given him a strange look and replied: “Oh yes, it does. Trouble is—you can only use it once on a human. I’m saving it up.”
Oh God! If the girl had been whispering in Truelove’s ears, Joe knew with certainty that he would tear them off and feed them to Marcus’s hounds. Seven years? What entanglements might she have got into during that time without his knowledge and direction?
His dejection was not lightened by the memory of the wailing and yelling from the pantry one disastrous Christmas Eve when his mother, retrieving the pudding in preparation for dinner on the morrow, had discovered that the mice had got in and feasted before them.
CHAPTER 10
COOMBHAVEN. SUSSEX.
Nine o’clock chimed on the mantel clock and, seemingly at the signal, the dying fire below slumped and darkened in the grate, giving up the struggle. Molly Weston shuddered with foreboding and turned up the wick of the oil lamp to cheer up the mean little room.
If they’re not back with him by nine, it’s all over.
She’d set herself a limit. Now that limit was passed; what could she do next?
She strained to listen for sounds outside in the lane but heard only the quiet sobs and desultory talk of the two girls filtering through the ill-fitting floorboards and thin layer of linoleum in the bedroom above. The baby in his cot by the fireside mewed and fretted and punched the air with his tiny fists. Molly held her breath. Please, God, let him not wake up! She couldn’t cope with his screams and his hunger. A moment later he settled back into sleep.
Her eyes went again to the one photograph the sparsely furnished parlour of the brick and flint cottage contained and focussed on it with the pleading gaze of one worshipping an icon. The family group. No baby Billie when that was taken last year. She’d been two months pregnant and nothing showed as she stood looking small and quenched next to her burly husband. A fine figure of a man, Jem. Everyone said. There he stood, smiling with paternal pride. The children were ranged up in front in height order, the girls neat in their best dresses and plaited hair and their younger brother, left sock drooping, head on one side, gormlessly peering at the photographer.
Jem had wanted to leave the boy at home. He’ll only show us up! I’m not risking it. But just for once, Molly had prevailed. It had taken less than a second for the shutter to click, but in that short time the camera had recorded an undeniable fact. Plain as day: Walter wasn’t quite right in the head. He’d never be able to look after himself.
Now he was out there in the snow on a pitch-dark night. Eight years old. Molly’s daft lad.