Read Online Justice Is a Woman by Yelena Kopylova - Free Book Online

quietly, “What was all that about?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Aw, lad’ his tone was gruff “ I’m not deaf. Remember your rooms are just below. “ He pointed a
    misshapen finger down towards the floor.
    “We had a disagreement.”
    “That’s a bloody understatement, if ever I heard one. What’s up at ween you?” The
    question was
    asked quietly and with concern. Joe now walked to the window, then lowering himself
    slowly onto the
    broad sill, he leaned forward and gazed out over the gardens before he replied, “I could say it was the
    heat.”
    “But you won’t.”
    “No, no, I won’t.”
    “Things going wrong Joe now turned and looked at his father.
    “We don’t seem to be speaking the same language,” he said.
    “Huh! Well, damn it all! you didn’t really expect to, did you? You know what I said to you a while
    ago: don’t make the same mistake as me. That should have told you to start the way you mean to go on.”
    “That’s what I thought I had done.”
    “And she’s not having it?”
    “It would appear not.”
    “What was it about this time?”
    “Oh, everything and nothing.”
    Mike slowly edged himself forward in the leather chair; then twisting his body to the right, he pressed
    himself upwards until he was standing as straight as he was able to, then turned from the window and
    walked slowly towards the cabinet at the far end of the room. He took out a bottle and two glasses, and
    as he poured out the drinks, in a tone that was scarcely above a mutter, he asked, “Have you put her in
    the picture?”
    “No, of course I haven’t; nor have I any intention of doing so.”
    “What if somebody else should?”
    “That’s impossible. Who could, anyway? It would only be hearsay.”
    “Aye. Aye, hearsay.” Mike turned now and said, “Come and get this; I think you need it.”
    When Joe reached his side, Mike handed him the glass of neat whisky and, lifting up the other one, he
    gazed at it before putting it to his lips, and in one gulp he threw it off and shuddered.
    Then he put the
    glass down and turned away, saying, “It was a damn silly thing to ask.”
    “Then you shouldn’t have asked it.”
    He reached his chair and sat down before he spoke again.
    “You know what she told me the other day?” he said.
    “What did she tell you?”
    “Well, I asked her what she thought about startin’ a family and she told me you had both agreed that
    such annoying trivialities and those are the very words she used, although she laughed when she said them
    weren’t going to interrupt your life for the next two or three years. So what do you have to say about
    that?
    Is it true? “
    “No.”
    Mike looked at Joe, who was draining his glass, and he repeated, “No?”
    “That’s what I said, no.”
    “How do you mean?”
    “Well, I think that what she needs is some responsibility; she wants to run something, rule someone.
    She’s finding me difficult, so I thought the best thing’ he paused now, thrust out his lips, nodded his head
    slowly and ended ‘was to start a small army for her and as soon as possible.”
    The laughter that erupted from Mike sounded as if it was coming from a great robust
    healthy body. His
    head was back and hanging to the side, one hand was pressing against his ribs. And Joe, looking at him,
    laughed too, but his laughter was more in the nature of a deep chuckle and the essence of it was not
    caused by the admission of his own deviousness but by the sight of his father’s
    enjoyment. Mike now sat
    rubbing his face with a large mottled silk handkerchief and the laughter was still bubbling in him as he
    said, “Aye well, I’ve got to hand it to you. Talk about a cunning young bugger. Has it taken?”
    “I don’t know yet; time’s young.”
    “Well, well, there’s one thing sure, you’ve got 69 your head screwed on the right way, lad.”
    As Joe looked at his father he knew that his admission of tricking his wife into
    conceiving, if such