Read Online 1950 - Mallory by James Hadley Chase - Free Book Online

the death of his mother when he was four years old. Quarrelled with his father and they seldom met. In spite of this, his father made him his heir and left him a considerable sum of money at his death.
    Corridon yawned. He wasn’t interested, and although there was a considerable amount more in this vein he couldn’t be bothered to go on with it. Rolling the sheets of paper into a hard, tight ball, he flipped it into the empty fireplace.
    In a moment or so he would get up and undress and go to bed, he told himself, and sighed contentedly, closing his eyes.
    Minutes ticked by and he still lay there, breathing lightly, the hard lines in his face softening, his mind floating in the half-world of sleep and wakefulness.
     
    II
     
    H e dreamed that Maria Hauptmann was sitting on the end of the bed, her slim white hands folded in her lap and her face smashed and bleeding as he had seen it when she lay at his feet after he had shot her. She seemed to be trying to say something to him, but she hadn’t a mouth; only two staring eyes above a black cavity in her face from which he could see a few teeth protruding. But he was sure she was trying to say something. It wasn’t the first time he had had this dream, and he always had the impression she was about to say something important, but she never did. She just sat on his bed and filled him with horror and wouldn’t go away.
    A knock on the front door wakened him. He raised his head from the pillow, aware that his jaws ached and that he had been grinding his teeth in his sleep, and listened. A minute ticked by and the knock was repeated. He swung his legs off the bed and sat up. Moving softly, he went into the sitting room, and without turning on the light, pulled aside the curtain and looked into the mews. She was standing there in the moonlight, still wearing the black sweater and slacks, bareheaded, her hands in her trouser pockets, a cigarette in her lips.
    He stood for a moment watching her, then turned on the light and went down the steep stairs. He had no idea why she had come at this hour to see him, but he had no misgivings as he slid back the bolt and opened the door.
    ‘Come in,’ he said. ‘Are you alone?’
    ‘Yes,’ she returned and walked past him into the tiny hall.
    ‘Straight upstairs,’ he told her, closing the door, but not before he looked into the darkness, wondering if Jan or Ranleigh were out there somewhere, hiding in the shadows. He saw no one.
    She climbed the steep stairs, and he followed her, his eyes on her straight back, seeing the movement of her hips as she stepped from one stair to the next. She went into the sitting room, to the hearth, turned and faced him. He stood just inside the doorway.
    ‘What brings you here?’ he asked, rubbing his face with his hand. ‘I was just going to bed. I didn’t get much sleep last night.’
    She looked away from him and said nothing and began examining the room, taking in every detail, missing nothing.
    Watching her he was aware for the first time of the shabbiness of the room, of the threadbare carpet, the armchair with the protruding spring, the scarred, stained table, Landseer’s ‘Stag At Bay’ over the mantelpiece.
    ‘Have a drink?’ he went on abruptly and picked up a bottle of gin from the sideboard. ‘There’s some vermouth somewhere.’ He wandered into the kitchen, irritated to find he needed an excuse to get away from her silent, disturbing presence. By the time he had found the vermouth and returned, the feeling had passed, but a slight uneasiness remained.
    She was still standing by the hearth, silent, motionless and watchful. He mixed the drinks, whistling under his breath and put a glass on the table near her.
    ‘Sit down and make yourself at home; not that this dump is much of a home, but it’s the best I could get.’ He flopped into the armchair that creaked under his weight. ‘Well, bung-ho.’
    He drank some of the gin and vermouth and grimaced. ‘This gin isn’t