Read Online The Case Is Closed by Patricia Wentworth - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Patricia Wentworth
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been out half an hour instead of ten minutes. They brought in the same verdict:
Wilful murder against Geoffrey Grey.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The sitting-room clock struck three. Hilary was asleep, her head tilted against the back of the chair, the file still heavy across her knees. The light stared down at her and took all the colour out of her face. The birds and flowers of Marion’s chintz were bright, but Hilary was pale and very deeply asleep. The light shone on her closed eyelids without reaching her. One moment she was there, full of trouble for Geoffrey and for Marion, and then quite suddenly one of those doors in the long, smooth wall of her city of sleep had opened and let her through.
She came into a queer place. It was a very queer place indeed, a long dark passage running crooked all the way, and because she was in a dream the darkness did not prevent her from seeing the walls of the passage, and they were all made of black looking-glass. She could see herself reflected in them, and two Hilarys walking one on either side of her. In the dream that seemed quite natural and comforting, but when she had gone a little way the reflections began to change, not all at once, but slowly, slowly, slowly, until the two who walked with her were not Hilary, but two strangers. She could not see who they were, but she knew that they were strangers. If she could have turned her head she would have been able to see, but she couldn’t turn her head. A cold fear gripped the back of her neck and held it rigid. Something in her began to feel lost child and not wanting to dream this dream any more. Something in her melted, and wept, and cried for Henry, because in her dream she had forgotten about Henry’s Atrocious Behaviour and only remembered that he wouldn’t let anything hurt her.
The light shone on her closed eyelids, and the tears of her dream welled up and ran down over her pale cheeks tear by tear. They wetted the bright pattern of the chintz, soaking into the blue bird-feathers and the rose-coloured paeony-petals. One of the tears wandered into the deep crinkle at the corner of her mouth. The salt taste of it came through into the dream.
In the next room Marion Grey lay in the dark and slept. She did not dream at all. All day long she turned a courageous mask upon the world. She had her living to earn. She earned it as a mannequin. All day long she stood, walked, and postured in clothes that were sometimes beautiful and sometimes hideous, but always staggeringly expensive. The long graceful lines of her body and the fact that she was Geoffrey Grey’s wife gave her a certain value. All day long she endured that knowledge. She had got the job through a friend, and Harriet St. Just had been completely frank. ‘You will change your name of course. Equally, of course, it will be known who you are. I am taking a risk — it may be good for trade, it may be bad. With my particular clientele, I think it will be good. If it is bad, you will go. At once. I am taking a big risk.’ The risk had justified itself. She earned her living and she earned it hard. Tomorrow she would be back at Harriet’s — she would be Vanya. Tonight she was not even Marion Grey. She was sunk in so deep a trance of fatigue that she had lost herself, lost Geoffrey, lost the cold sorrow which lay always like ice upon her heart.
Geoffrey Grey slept, too. He lay on his narrow bed, as his mother had seen him lie when he was a baby, as he had lain on his almost equally hard school bed, as Marion had watched him lie in the moonlight, in the breaking dawn, one arm thrown over his head and the hand of the other under his cheek. He was asleep and dreaming with a furious zest of all those things from which he was shut away. His body was in prison, but his mind went free. He was running in his school sports, winning the hundred yards again, breasting the tape, hearing the applause break out. And then all in a flash he was flying with Elvery. A roar of sound — stars
Wilful murder against Geoffrey Grey.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The sitting-room clock struck three. Hilary was asleep, her head tilted against the back of the chair, the file still heavy across her knees. The light stared down at her and took all the colour out of her face. The birds and flowers of Marion’s chintz were bright, but Hilary was pale and very deeply asleep. The light shone on her closed eyelids without reaching her. One moment she was there, full of trouble for Geoffrey and for Marion, and then quite suddenly one of those doors in the long, smooth wall of her city of sleep had opened and let her through.
She came into a queer place. It was a very queer place indeed, a long dark passage running crooked all the way, and because she was in a dream the darkness did not prevent her from seeing the walls of the passage, and they were all made of black looking-glass. She could see herself reflected in them, and two Hilarys walking one on either side of her. In the dream that seemed quite natural and comforting, but when she had gone a little way the reflections began to change, not all at once, but slowly, slowly, slowly, until the two who walked with her were not Hilary, but two strangers. She could not see who they were, but she knew that they were strangers. If she could have turned her head she would have been able to see, but she couldn’t turn her head. A cold fear gripped the back of her neck and held it rigid. Something in her began to feel lost child and not wanting to dream this dream any more. Something in her melted, and wept, and cried for Henry, because in her dream she had forgotten about Henry’s Atrocious Behaviour and only remembered that he wouldn’t let anything hurt her.
The light shone on her closed eyelids, and the tears of her dream welled up and ran down over her pale cheeks tear by tear. They wetted the bright pattern of the chintz, soaking into the blue bird-feathers and the rose-coloured paeony-petals. One of the tears wandered into the deep crinkle at the corner of her mouth. The salt taste of it came through into the dream.
In the next room Marion Grey lay in the dark and slept. She did not dream at all. All day long she turned a courageous mask upon the world. She had her living to earn. She earned it as a mannequin. All day long she stood, walked, and postured in clothes that were sometimes beautiful and sometimes hideous, but always staggeringly expensive. The long graceful lines of her body and the fact that she was Geoffrey Grey’s wife gave her a certain value. All day long she endured that knowledge. She had got the job through a friend, and Harriet St. Just had been completely frank. ‘You will change your name of course. Equally, of course, it will be known who you are. I am taking a risk — it may be good for trade, it may be bad. With my particular clientele, I think it will be good. If it is bad, you will go. At once. I am taking a big risk.’ The risk had justified itself. She earned her living and she earned it hard. Tomorrow she would be back at Harriet’s — she would be Vanya. Tonight she was not even Marion Grey. She was sunk in so deep a trance of fatigue that she had lost herself, lost Geoffrey, lost the cold sorrow which lay always like ice upon her heart.
Geoffrey Grey slept, too. He lay on his narrow bed, as his mother had seen him lie when he was a baby, as he had lain on his almost equally hard school bed, as Marion had watched him lie in the moonlight, in the breaking dawn, one arm thrown over his head and the hand of the other under his cheek. He was asleep and dreaming with a furious zest of all those things from which he was shut away. His body was in prison, but his mind went free. He was running in his school sports, winning the hundred yards again, breasting the tape, hearing the applause break out. And then all in a flash he was flying with Elvery. A roar of sound — stars
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