Stage Fright (30 page)

She nodded. ‘Something like that.'

‘But wouldn't even that have been a risk? How could you be sure I wouldn't give the game away? That I won't give it away even now.'

‘I can't be sure, but—'

She didn't have to finish her sentence. I did it for her.

‘But I'm a mother, too.'

‘Kevin was a monster, you know.'

‘What are you trying to say? The end justifies the means?'

‘Sometimes it does. What it comes down to here is something very simple in the end. Agnes. You would have done the same for Grace.'

Was this true? I thought of the satisfaction with which I'd kneed Kevin in the balls. What if I'd had a knife in my hand? That was different from actually planning to kill him, but even so … What was it Nietzsche had written?
He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.

‘I'm very fond of you, Cass,' Melissa was saying. ‘I don't suppose we'll meet again, though, will we?'

‘Better not.' I didn't say it unkindly.

‘I'm not going unpunished, you know. I'll never act again. At least—'

‘Not on the stage.'

‘Exactly.'

I pushed my coffee away undrunk and got up.

‘Better go, I've got a long drive home.'

Melissa got to her feet, too. She walked me to the door. We stood on the threshold and looked at each other.

‘What about Stephen?' Melissa asked.

‘He doesn't know. Or at least he can't admit that he knows. He's a lawyer after all. He'd feel he had to do something about it. I'll find a way of sharing it with him without actually telling him.'

She nodded.

‘The police,' I said. ‘They might still tumble to it…'

‘I know … that's part of it.' Part of her punishment, I guessed that she meant. ‘But every day it goes on is one more day I've had with Agnes.'

We walked out to my car. I got in and started the engine. Now at the last moment I somehow felt reluctant to say goodbye. I wound the window down. Melissa bent down.

‘What are you going to tell Agnes when she grows up?' I asked.

A shadow fell across her face. ‘Am I going to go on pretending not to be her mother? I don't know. Mother, but not mother. It's a bit like
East Lynne,
isn't it?'

I nodded and wound up the window.

As the car jolted down the track, I kept glancing into the rearview mirror. Melissa was standing alone in the middle of the farmyard. She raised her arm in a gesture of farewell. I raised my own arm, though I wasn't sure if she could see it.

Then the track turned and she disappeared from view.

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin's Press.

STAGE FRIGHT.
Copyright © 2003 by Christine Poulson. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.minotaurbooks.com

ISBN 0-312-34074-5

EAN 978-0312-34074-2

First published in Great Britain by Robert Hale Limited

First U.S. Edition: May 2005

eISBN 9781466842076

First eBook edition: March 2013