into the house to phone the police.
He saw his job lost, a conviction recorded against him for a criminal offence. But be reasonable, keep your head, the man hadn’t seen his car, hadn’t taken a note of the number. Philip’s hands shook on the wheel but he steadied them—he made a mammoth effort and steadied them. He began to drive, took the left-hand turn, then a right. There was no one behind him and no one ahead. Out on the big road, heading for Barkingside, he heard the siren of a police car. But why assume it was for him, that it had anything to do with him? A police car with a howling siren wouldn’t turn out because a man had been seen coming out of a garden with something in a plastic bag. They would be more likely to send an officer round on a bike.
Perhaps because his mother was so helpless and his sisters often liable to irrational fears, Philip had grown up a cool-headed person. He was like his father, who had been a practical man, and though endowed with plenty of imagination, he had learned to keep it in check. Therefore, he didn’t let himself become a prey to all kinds of unreal speculations, and by the time he reached Gants Hill and the big roundabout on the A. 12, he was quite calm again.
Flora had bounced about a bit on the backseat. When he reached the Ilford showroom, where he was due to call on his way back to the office, he transferred Flora from the back of the car to the boot, wedging her comfortably between the spare wheel and a cardboard crate of wallpaper sample books he was carrying with him. There in the car park at the back of the showroom, he was unable to prevent himself taking a look at her.
He pierced the plastic with the tip of his pen, his fingernails having failed to do it, and made a split long enough to reveal her face. She still gazed into Olympian distances, still maintained that grave but serene expression. Well, it would be something to get steamed up about if she didn’t, thought Philip.
Driving home rather later than usual—because Roy had handed him a list of customers, some of them angry or indignant, to telephone and placate—Philip reflected on his act of the morning. Why had he taken the marble girl? Supposedly because he felt she was rightly his or his family’s. It was as if Arnham had perpetrated some kind of con trick in order to gain possession of her. People shouldn’t be allowed to profit from their deceit.
But having taken her, what was he going to do with her now? Not replace her in the garden at Glenallan Close. Too many explanations would be required if he were to do that. And there was Christine to consider. He would have to tell Christine where Arnham now lived and how he had seen Flora there. It was dangerous ground this, an area he continuously shied away from. Could he perhaps say she wasn’t Flora but a Flora look-alike he had happened to see in a shop or garden centre and had bought? Hopeless, with that chip out of her ear and that green stain.
Even getting her into the house without being seen and questioned would be a problem. They weren’t one of those families whose individual members led their own private secret lives, unnoticed by and of little interest to the others. They were a close-knit family, each concerned about the others, prepared to enquire into any oddity of behaviour, each knowing pretty well where the others were at any given time and what they were likely to be doing. He imagined himself encountering Cheryl on the stairs with his arms full of Flora and her amazement and her questions.
As he thought that, while waiting in a queue of cars in the Edgware Road, watching the red light, he glanced to the right side of the street and saw Cheryl. Her name and a kind of vague picture of her had been in his mind, and then he saw her. She was coming out of what looked to him—he couldn’t see very clearly, only a crowded glittering conglomeration of colours and shapes—like a video shop or music centre. So much for always
He saw his job lost, a conviction recorded against him for a criminal offence. But be reasonable, keep your head, the man hadn’t seen his car, hadn’t taken a note of the number. Philip’s hands shook on the wheel but he steadied them—he made a mammoth effort and steadied them. He began to drive, took the left-hand turn, then a right. There was no one behind him and no one ahead. Out on the big road, heading for Barkingside, he heard the siren of a police car. But why assume it was for him, that it had anything to do with him? A police car with a howling siren wouldn’t turn out because a man had been seen coming out of a garden with something in a plastic bag. They would be more likely to send an officer round on a bike.
Perhaps because his mother was so helpless and his sisters often liable to irrational fears, Philip had grown up a cool-headed person. He was like his father, who had been a practical man, and though endowed with plenty of imagination, he had learned to keep it in check. Therefore, he didn’t let himself become a prey to all kinds of unreal speculations, and by the time he reached Gants Hill and the big roundabout on the A. 12, he was quite calm again.
Flora had bounced about a bit on the backseat. When he reached the Ilford showroom, where he was due to call on his way back to the office, he transferred Flora from the back of the car to the boot, wedging her comfortably between the spare wheel and a cardboard crate of wallpaper sample books he was carrying with him. There in the car park at the back of the showroom, he was unable to prevent himself taking a look at her.
He pierced the plastic with the tip of his pen, his fingernails having failed to do it, and made a split long enough to reveal her face. She still gazed into Olympian distances, still maintained that grave but serene expression. Well, it would be something to get steamed up about if she didn’t, thought Philip.
Driving home rather later than usual—because Roy had handed him a list of customers, some of them angry or indignant, to telephone and placate—Philip reflected on his act of the morning. Why had he taken the marble girl? Supposedly because he felt she was rightly his or his family’s. It was as if Arnham had perpetrated some kind of con trick in order to gain possession of her. People shouldn’t be allowed to profit from their deceit.
But having taken her, what was he going to do with her now? Not replace her in the garden at Glenallan Close. Too many explanations would be required if he were to do that. And there was Christine to consider. He would have to tell Christine where Arnham now lived and how he had seen Flora there. It was dangerous ground this, an area he continuously shied away from. Could he perhaps say she wasn’t Flora but a Flora look-alike he had happened to see in a shop or garden centre and had bought? Hopeless, with that chip out of her ear and that green stain.
Even getting her into the house without being seen and questioned would be a problem. They weren’t one of those families whose individual members led their own private secret lives, unnoticed by and of little interest to the others. They were a close-knit family, each concerned about the others, prepared to enquire into any oddity of behaviour, each knowing pretty well where the others were at any given time and what they were likely to be doing. He imagined himself encountering Cheryl on the stairs with his arms full of Flora and her amazement and her questions.
As he thought that, while waiting in a queue of cars in the Edgware Road, watching the red light, he glanced to the right side of the street and saw Cheryl. Her name and a kind of vague picture of her had been in his mind, and then he saw her. She was coming out of what looked to him—he couldn’t see very clearly, only a crowded glittering conglomeration of colours and shapes—like a video shop or music centre. So much for always
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