Read Online Home through the Dark by Anthea Fraser - Free Book Online Page B

empty desk on which stood a covered typewriter. “Is the other girl still on holiday?” I asked casually.
    â€œNo, unfortunately she had a slight accident last week and since she had a week’s holiday in hand it seemed sensible to take it now. I’m due to go myself on Saturday, but it looks doubtful now whether I shall be able to get away. Obviously you couldn’t be left on your own so soon; it all depends on if Miss Derbyshire is well enough to come back on Monday. I’ll take you now to see Mr. Holding – Mr. Alan Holding, that is. His son, Mr. Peter, is also a partner.”
    â€œWhat happened to Messrs. Culpepper, Simpson and Clark?”
    She smiled. “Messrs. Culpepper and Clark are long since departed this life. Mr. Ernest Simpson is the senior partner, but he’s semi-retired and only comes in occasionally.”
    She tapped on the glass door in the left-hand partition and showed me into the office which lay beyond. Mr. Alan Holding rose to his feet, a rather short man in his fifties with a small moustache and boyishly rosy cheeks. “Miss Durrell? I believe you may be able to help us out? Capital, capital!”
    Twenty minutes later I was seated at the desk opposite Miss Davidson, typing out property details. So far, so good. However, if I’d expected all to be mysteriously revealed during the first few hours I spent at Culpepper’s, I was to be disappointed. A more ordinary firm would have been hard to find. Peter Holding appeared and called me into his office to take down a few letters. He was about my own age, with long hair and a penchant for purple suits.
    â€œDo you drive, Miss Durrell? Fine, then you wouldn’t object to showing clients over properties where necessary? Great. You’d better come with me once or twice first though, to learn the ropes.”
    The morning passed. At lunchtime, rather than drive back all the way to the Beeches, I merely crossed the Avenue and found a pleasant cake shop with a small restaurant above. I went up, seated myself at a window table, and stared down at the crowds of shoppers milling below. Beyond the pavement was the wide road, the gardens, and, discernible behind the fountain, the glass frontage of Culpepper’s itself. And as my eyes located it, the door opened and Marcus Sinclair came quickly out and strode away up the road. Could I go nowhere without running across Marcus Sinclair? I wondered a little uneasily what business he had with Culpepper’s and whether it could possibly have any bearing on the fact that I had started working there that very morning.
    During the afternoon some clients called and later Peter Holding and I went with them to look round an empty house. By the end of that week I seemed to have been at the office for months but there had been no cryptic phone messages for me to intercept and no suspicious characters lurking round corners. Hating every moment of it, I had steeled myself to a quick flick through desks and filing cabinets as chance offered, but nothing untoward came to light, which fact made me feel guiltier than ever. Each lunchtime I returned to the same café and usually to the same table and it was there, on the Friday, that Marcus Sinclair found me.
    â€œMind if I join you?”
    I turned quickly from the window in time to see him pulling out the chair beside me. “I saw you from the street. How are things?”
    â€œAll right, thank you.”
    â€œManaging to pass the time?”
    â€œAs a matter of fact,” I said, my eyes fixed on him with a hint of challenge, “I’ve taken a job.”
    â€œOh?” He was studying the menu.
    â€œWith Culpepper’s, across the road.”
    â€œGood for you.” If he was already aware of the fact, he was not going to admit it.
    â€œYou know the firm?” I prompted.
    â€œOh yes, they’re pretty sound, I imagine. Long-established and all that. Unlikely to fold during your temporary