Read Online Ripley's Game by Patricia Highsmith - Free Book Online

another check-up.’ Jonathan said. ‘The report’s about the same.’ Jonathan was used to these clichés, which were like saying, ‘Very well, thank you,’ when someone asked you how you felt. What Jonathan said seemed to satisfy Gerard, so evidently Simone had not said much.
    Yvonne and Simone were talking about linoleum. The kitchen linoleum was wearing out in front of the stove and the sink. It hadn’t been new when they bought the house.
    ‘You’re really feeling all right, darling?’ Simone asked Jonathan, when the Foussadiers had left.
    ‘Better than all right. I even attacked the boiler-room. The soot.’ Jonathan smiled.
    ‘You are mad. – Tonight you’ll have a decent dinner at least. Mama insisted that I bring home three paupiettes from lunch and they’re delicious!’
    Then close to 11 p.m., as they were about to go to bed, Jonathan felt a sudden depression, as if his legs, his whole body had sunk into something viscous – as if he were walking hip-deep in mud. Was he simply tired? But it seemed more mental than physical. He was glad when the light was turned out, when he could relax with his arms around Simone, her arms around him, as they always lay when they fell asleep. He thought of Stephen Wister (or was that his real name?) maybe flying eastward now, his thin figure stretched out in an aeroplane seat. Jonathan imagined Wister’s face with the pinkish scar, puzzled, tense, but Wister would no longer be thinking of Jonathan Trevanny. He’d be thinking of someone else. He must have two or three more prospects, Jonathan thought.
    The morning was chill and foggy. Just after 8 a.m., Simone went off with Georges to the Ecole Maternelle, and Jonathan stood in the kitchen, warming his fingers on a second bowl of cafi au kit. The heating system wasn’t adequate. They’d got rather uncomfortably through another winter, and even now in spring the house was chilly in the mornings. The furnace had been in the house when they bought it, adequate for the five radiators downstairs. but not for the other five upstairs which they had installed hopefully. They’d been warned, Jonathan remembered, but a bigger furnace would have cost three thousand new francs, and they hadn’t had the money.
    Three letters had fallen through the slot in the front door. One was an electricity bill. Jonathan turned a square white envelope over and saw Hôtel de 1’Aigle Noir on its back. He opened the envelope. A business card fell out and dropped. Jonathan picked it up and read ‘Stephen Wister. chez’, which had been written above:
    Reeves Minot
    159 Agnesstrasse
    Winterhude (Alster)
    Hamburg 56
    629-6757
    There was a letter also.
    1 Apr. 19—
    Dear Mr Trevanny,
    I was sorry not to hear from you this morning or so far this afternoon. But in case you change your mind, I enclose a card with my address in Hamburg. If you have second thoughts about my proposition, please telephone me collect at any hour. Or come to talk to me in Hamburg. Your round-trip transportation can be wired to you at once when I hear from you.
    In fact, wouldn’t it be a good idea to see a Hamburg specialist about your blood condition and get another opinion? This might make you feel more comfortable.
    I am returning to Hamburg Sunday night.
    Yours sincerely,
Stephen Wister
    Jonathan was surprised, amused, annoyed all at once. More comfortable. That was a bit funny, since Wister was sure he was going to die soon. If a Hamburg specialist said, ‘Ach, ja, you have just one or two more months.’ would that make him feel more comfortable? Jonathan pushed the letter and the card into a back pocket of his trousers. A return trip to Hamburg gratis. Wister was thinking of every enticement. Interesting that he’d sent the letter Saturday afternoon, so he would receive it early Monday, though Jonathan might have rung him at any time Sunday. But there was no collection from post boxes in town on Sunday.
    It was 8.’2 a.m. Jonathan thought of what he had to