The Judas Pair l-1 Page 17

  "On …?"

  "Oh, just things." Her vagueness was deliberate, yet there was a hint of a reflective smile in her expression. Oh-ho. I began to ask about Eric.

  Society's cynicism clouds our minds sometimes. When a younger woman marries or cohabits with a much older man, it's supposed to be only for money. Conversely, when an old woman takes up with a much younger man, she's blamed for wanting physical gratification and is condemned on those grounds. This is one of the few occasions women come off worst. Society says they're cheap chiselers or sex-crazed. On the other hand the old chap's regarded as a sly old dog, and the young chap's seen simply as having just struck lucky getting sex and a steady income together in one parcel, as it were. So as Muriel chatted happily on about her elderly husband, I found my treacherous mind wondering what possible motive she'd dreamed up for marrying Eric Field in the first place. Naturally under the influence of Muriel's undoubted attractiveness and charm I was stern with myself and forced these unbecoming suspicions out as best I could.

  "He had a real sense of fun," she was saying, smiling.

  "I suppose it's a lot quieter now," I put in.

  "Oh…" For some reason she was hesitant.

  "I mean, fewer visitors," I hurried to explain. She seemed to become upset at the slightest thing. "You won't have dealers and collectors bothering you quite so much, seeing we only go for antiques."

  "No." She saw my cup was empty and rose a little too quickly. "You haven't really seen the house, have you?"

  "Er… no, but—" I was taken a little by surprise.

  "Come on. I'll show you." Mystified by these sudden changes of course, I followed her in from the terrace.

  The house wasn't quite the age I'd expected. Despite that, it was only just beginning to feel lived-in. Muriel had taste. Flowers matched the house colors and weren't too obtrusive the way some people have them, though you couldn't help thinking what a terrible fate it was to be scythed off in your prime and stuck in a pot to decay.

  "Could I please… ?"

  "Yes?" We were on the stairs, apparently about to tour upstairs.

  "Would you mind very much if I asked to see where Eric was found?" To my surprise she was unperturbed.

  "Not at all." We descended together. "I thought you might."

  The room led off the marble-floored hall and was beautifully oak-paneled, done about 1860 or so at a quick guess. Muriel's unfaltering taste had enabled it to be exposed to more daylight than others could have allowed. She'd used long heavy velvet curtains drawn well back from the tall windows to draw attention to their height.

  "I like it."

  "Eric used it for a collecting room and his study. I never came in much when he was alive." She wandered about touching things rather absently, a book, the desk, adjusting a reading lamp. The carpet was Afghan but pleasing for all that. A small Wilson oil, the right size for that missing Italian waterfall painting he did, hung facing the desk, setting my chest clanging. However, care was needed, so I filed the facts and said nothing.

  "I warned you about interlopers," I said.

  "I know what you collectors are like. All Eric's things have gone, as I said, so I've no reason to fear."

  "Do you see any of Eric's acquaintances still?"

  "No," she said firmly.

  "No collectors?" She paused at that, then again told me no. I shrugged mentally. It was none of my business. "If one does turn up," I said, chancing my arm, "tell him I'd rather like to see him."

  We gazed at the lawns and admired the sweeping landscaped gardens. Muriel was eager to explain her plans for the coming flower show. I let her prattle on and, adopting an idiot smile, stared toward the flower beds.

  In the window was the reflection of a small occasional table, mahogany drop-leaf with a single stem leg, quite good but Victorian. I couldn't see the top surface because it was covered with a neat new tablecloth. On it were mats and the essentials for starting the inevitable tea ceremony. I never came in it much when Eric was alive were her words. Therefore she did use it now, and fairly frequently from the way she had spoken. And whoever the visitor was must be a fairly regular customer. He rated the cozy intimacy of a sophisticated room from which all sour memories had been happily erased. I only rated the terrace. Hey-ho.

  That would account for her reflective smile when I'd asked if she would keep the house on. It depended on just things, she'd said. Maybe it would also explain her displeasure when my miscued remark had suggested that collectors were hardly interested in people. Was he therefore a collector? I wondered about her holy friend. Older, but age doesn't really matter. Never mind what people say.

  Still, where was the harm? It was quite some time ago since her husband had died. Sooner or later she was going to meet somebody new, as the song says. You couldn't blame her—or him, come to that. I honestly felt a twinge of jealousy. I couldn't help starting to work out how much I could buy with Muriel's wealth. I'd start with a group of Wedgwood jaspers. Then I'd— No good, Lovejoy.

  "Come and see me off," I asked.

  She agreed. "I'll get my coat and ride with you to the gate."

  I strolled out onto the drive. The gardeners were grumbling with the endurance of their kind. As I approached I heard one saying, "That swine never grew those leeks himself. The bastard bought them, I'll bet." And I grinned inwardly at the politics of village competitions. At that moment his companion, detecting the presence of an observer, made a cautionary gesture, at which both turned to greet me with rearranged faces. Seeing my slipshod frame, they relaxed and grinned. I nodded affably and strolled on. They'd thought perhaps I was Muriel. Or Lagrange?

  She was in the car when I returned. I'd get no kiss today. You can tell a woman enraptured by someone else. The delight isn't delight with you. Her vivacity's pleasure at what's to come, and in case you miss the point it's you that's departing. The minute it took to drive her to the gate I used to good effect, being as secure and companionable as other characters of the landscape. She blew me a kiss from the gate.

  A child, I thought, just a child. Everything must be kind and happy for her. And in her protective shell of opulence she would instinctively make the whole world appear so. Lucky bloke, whoever he was.

  The White Hart quietened a bit as I entered, but when a raving nut goes anywhere people behave circumspectly no matter how hard they try to look normal. Tinker bravely came along the bar for a chat, but Jimmo and Harry Bateman were obviously preoccupied and couldn't manage a nod. I was calm, easily innocent, and merely eager to talk about antiques. Jane, cautious on her stool, was relaxed enough to offer me a couple of rare book bindings—though I wouldn't normally touch them with a barge pole and she knew it—and Adrian gave me welcome only a little less effusive than usual.

  Tinker had a source of antique violins—no, don't laugh, they're not the trick they used to be—for me, owned by a costermonger of all things. He had found as well a collector of old bicycles who was in the market for price-adjusted swaps, wanting assorted domestic Victoriana, poor misguided soul; and his third offer was some collector after old barrows. You know, the sort you use in gardens. At a pinch this last character would buy antique shovels if the antique wheelbarrow market was a little weak.

  "An exotic crew, Tinker," I commented over my pale ale.

  "It's the way it's happening, Lovejoy," he said. "I don't know whether I'm coming or going these days, honest. No two alike."

  "Good."

  "I wish it was." Drummers like Tinker are notorious moaners, worse than farmers.

  "Better for business when tastes vary," I said, nodding to Dick, who'd just come in with traces of the boatyard still on him. Dick waved and gave me the thumbs-up sign.

  "I like things tidy," said Tinker, except for Dandy Jack the untidiest man I knew.

  "I like collectors," I answered just to goad him and get a mouthful of invective for my trouble.

  A couple of new dealers were in from the West Country and, unaware of my recent history, latched affabl
y on to me and we did a couple of provisional deals after a while. I earmarked for them a small folio of antiquary data, drawings of excavations in Asia Minor and suchlike, done by an industrious clergyman from York about 1820. It was supported by abstracts from the modern literature, photographs, and articles, plus the diary of a late-Victorian lady who'd spent a lengthy sojourn near the excavations and described them in detail. All good desirable script. They in their turn came up with a Forsyth scent-bottle lock, which they showed me there and then, an early set of theodolites they'd bring to the pub next day, and what sounded a weird collection of early sports equipment I'd have to travel to see. Knowing nothing about early sports gear, I fell back on my thoughtful introverted expression and said I was definitely interested but I'd have to think about it. They asked after a Pauly air gun, but I said how difficult it was to find such rarities and I'd see what I could do. I might let them have a Durs air gun in part exchange.

  Ted the barman, pleased at my appearance of complete normality, was only too glad to serve me when I asked for pie, pickle, and cheese. "Nice to see you up and about again, Love-joy." He beamed.

  "Thanks, Ted."

  "Completely well now, eh?"

  "A bit shaky on my pins now and again," I said.

  With transparent relief he said it was understandable. "The girl friend had one of these viruses too," he said. "She was off work a month. Time them researchers got onto things like that and left smoking alone."

  Back in my old surroundings with Dandy Jack and the rest popping in and out for the odd deal, I passed the time in utter contentment. I honestly admire antique dealers, like me. They are the last cavaliers, surviving as an extraordinary clone against fantastic odds by a mixture of devotion, philosophy, and greed. The enemy, it practically goes without saying, is the succession of malevolent governments who urbanely introduce prohibitive measures aimed at first controlling and then finally exterminating us. We don't bow to them. We don't fit neatly into their lunatic schemes for controlling even the air everyone breathes. The inevitable result is hatred, of us and of our freedom. It includes the freedom to starve, and this we do gladly when it's necessary. But we are still free, to be interested in what we do, to love what we practice and to work as and when we choose. And we work on average a good twelve hours a day every day, our every possession totally at risk every minute we live. And these poor duck eggs in the civil service actually believe they can bring us to heel! It's pathetic, honestly. Our ingenuity will always be too profound for a gaggle of twerps— I hope.

  Listening to the banter going on hour after hour in the bar, my troubles receded and my fears vanished. We ranged over subjects as far apart as Venetian gondoliers' Renaissance clothing to Kikuyu carvings, from eighteenth-century Eskimo gaming counters to relics from the early days of the American wild west. It was lovely, warm, and comfortable.

  Then I noticed it was dark outside.

  Chapter 15

  I rose and left amid a chorus of good nights, quite like old times. The two strangers promised they'd be back about noon the next day, same place, and I promised I'd fetch my stuff.

  The road to the cottage seemed endless. Worse still, it was quiet in a degree I'd never before experienced. My old car seemed very noisy. Its engine throbbed a beat out into the dark on either side of the road only to have it pulsed back to reintensify the next chug. In the center of a growing nucleus of contained deep pulsation, the motor moved on between high hedges behind its great rods of beamed headlight. A moon ducked its one eye in and out of static cloud at me. It was one of those nights where moon shadows either gather in disquieting clusters or spread across moon-bright lanes making sinister pools where the ground you have to tread is invisible.

  The probing lights turned across the hedges down by the chapel. Unfortunately nobody was about, or I could have bolstered my courage by giving them a lift. With a sinking heart I swung into the path and curved to a stop outside my door. The silence, no longer held back by the throb of the great engine, rushed close and paused nearby in the darkness. I switched my door alarm off, using the key, and went in.

  Even the cottage seemed worried. The electric light had a wan air about it as if it too was affected by concern. I examined the miniature hallway for marks but found no signs of intrusion. My unease persisted. I pulled the curtains to and flicked on the living-room lamps to make it seem cozier. Putting the TV on seemed a wise move until I realized that I would be deaf to the sound of anyone approaching as well as blinded by the darkness. Easy meat for whoever was watching out there.

  To encourage what resolution I had left, I made a rough meal I didn't want. I hit on the idea of putting the radio on for a few moments. That way, when I eventually switched it off it might seem as though I had begun preparations for bed. With another stroke of genius I turned the hall light out and cautiously opened the front door a chink, just enough to get my arm out and insert the alarm key in the raised box on the door alcove. I usually didn't bother to set the alarm when I was indoors, but it might prove one more thing to lessen my many disadvantages. With the door safely closed and barred again I felt pleased at my inventiveness. Nobody could now pierce my perimeter, so to speak, without Geoffrey being roused at his police house. It would admittedly take some while for him to come hurtling over on his pedal-cycle, but I could hold the chap until he came.

  A braver man would have decided to be bold, perhaps take a weapon and stalk the blighter out there in all that darkness. I'm not that courageous, nor that daft. Whoever was outside would see me leave from either door, while I would be treading into the unknown. Let the cops pinch him if he tried any funny stuff, I thought. They get paid for looking after us. Geoffrey had had my break-in and two chickens with fowl pest, and that had been his lot since Michaelmas. Big deal.

  I've never really believed very much in all this subliminal learning stuff they talk about nowadays. You know the sort of thing—showing a one-second glimpse of a complex map in semidarkness and getting psychiatrists to see if you can remember its details twenty years later. Nor do I go in for this extrasensory perception and/or psychomotive force, spoon bending, and thought transference. Yet as I forced my food down and swilled tea, my discomfiture began to grow from an energy outside myself. It was almost as if the cottage had been reluctantly forced into the role of an unwelcome spectator to a crime about to be committed. That energy was, I became certain, generated by the watcher in the copse. Either I was acting as a sort of receiver of hate impulses or I was imagining the whole thing and he was at home laughing his head off, knowing I was bound to be getting hysterical. My plan to flush him out by the advertisement and my inquiries had backfired. He was now forewarned, and I was set up for reprisal.

  Humming an octave shriller than usual, I went about my chores, finished the food, and washed up. It was important not to vary my routine. I got my bed ready in the adjoining room, leaving the bedside lamp on for about half an hour to simulate my usual reading time. Then I switched it off together with the radio, and the whole place was in darkness.

  Living so far from other people—a few hundred yards seemed miles now—the cottage always had alternative lighting about: candles, a torch, two or three oil lamps. It would be safe to use the torch only if I hooded it well, say with a handkerchief or a dishcloth, and was careful to keep the beam directed downward. There was no need of it indoors, because I knew every inch of every room, but there might come an opportunity to catch him in its illumination like a plane in a searchlight. I'd get a good glimpse of him and just phone the police. Notice that my erstwhile determination and rage had now been transmuted through fear into a desire for an army of policemen to show up and enforce the established law—another instance of Lovejoy's iron will.

  The curtains were pale cream, a bad mistake. Anything pale is picked out by the moon's special radiance, even a stone paler than its fellows being visible at a considerable distance. Were I to pull them back from the kitchen window, the movement would be seen by even the most idle wat
cher. Still, it had to be risked.

  I got the torch ready in my right hand and moved stealthily toward the window. Do everything slowly if you want your movements to go unnoticed, was what they used to tell us in the army. Not fast and slick, but silent and slow. Feeling a fool, I tiptoed toward the sink. By reaching across I could pull the curtain aside. There was no way to step to one side close against the wall because of the clutter in the corner. A derelict ironing board stood there with other useless impedimenta. The slightest nudge would raise the roof.

  Holding my breath, I gently edged the curtain aside. The copse, set jet-black above a milky sheen of grass, seemed uncomfortably close. I hadn't realized it was so short a gap, not even pacing it out the previous day. Nothing moved. But I knew he was there. Exactly in the way I was peering out at him, so he was staring at me. Could he see the curtain? I'd moved it without squeaking its noisy runners, but there was the danger of the moonlight exposing a dark slit between pale material. I let the edges meet and exhaled noiselessly.

  To my surprise I was damp with sweat. Peering eyeball-to-eyeball with a murderer was no job for a growing lad. Maybe the best course would be to telephone Old Bill. Then what if Scotland Yard arrived in force only to discover an empty copse without any trace of a lurking murderer? Imagine their annoyance when discovering they'd been summoned by a frightened idiot with a recent history of a nervous breakdown. That would be crying wolf with a vengeance. I'd have to wait until I had proof he was there.

  The view from the other windows was the same quiet—too-quiet—scene. No breeze moved the trees, and shadows stayed put. I began to feel somewhat better, a little more certain of myself. No matter what he tried I was certainly a match for him. He was only one bloke. If he had a gun along with him, well I had a few too. On the other hand, if he was waiting for me to make another mistake, such as going out for a nocturnal car ride without remembering to set the alarm or something making another burglary easier, he was going to be sadly disappointed.