With All My Worldly Goods (14 page)

There was silence again, and then Martin said, rather awkwardly:

“Lora dear, you do realize, don’t you, that it might be really dangerous to—to try to shield anybody?”

“What do you
mean?
You’ve no right to say such things!” She knew she was getting hysterical again, but felt almost powerless to help herself. “I know what it is. You
want
to find Bruce guilty. You want to believe he—he is after my money. If you only knew! If you could only have heard him say how he would never touch my money—not a penny of it so long—”

She stopped suddenly. I was as though something had blown an icy draught down her spine. For she had remembered the end of the sentence now—the particular form of protestation that Bruce had used.

“Not a penny
—so long as you are alive
.”

With a feeling of despair like nothing she had ever known, Leonora buried her face in her hands.

“What is it, my dear?” Martin’s voice was very gentle. She didn’t answer at once. She was madly collecting her thoughts after the last frightful blow.

“Nothing, Martin.” She looked up again now, quite calm again, for didn’t Bruce’s liberty perhaps depend on her calmness? “At least, it’s just—just the whole idea, you know. Do you think we might stop this ghastly inquisition now? I don’t feel I can stand any more.”

Martin looked at the doctor, who nodded very slightly. “I don’t know that we can do anything but rag Mrs. Mickleham’s nerves by continuing the discussion just now,” he said.

“But is it safe?—I mean, I hate the very idea of her going back into that house,” Martin said.

“All right, Martin.” Leonora even managed a smile. “I’ve—I’ve got my wits about me now, you know. I’ll take every possible precaution.”

“I will come and see you—at the house—tomorrow,” Dr. Brindbent said. “And I’ll make it perfectly clear that you are under my care, and that I am keeping the closest watch on any symptoms of further illness.”

“Oh yes.” Martin seemed tremendously relieved. “I wish to God you would, Brindbent.”

“And, meanwhile,” the doctor put a kindly hand on Leonora’s shoulder, “just take the simple precaution of refusing anything—
anything,
mind, either to eat or drink—which is offered specially to you by anyone. Only have whatever the rest of the family are having.”

“Yes, I promise. I’ll be very careful.”

Dr. Brindbent came with them both to the door.

“It’s not much good telling you not to worry,” he said. “But try not to upset yourself too much about this business. Remember that you are not in any immediate danger, now that Martin and I are keeping sort of watch on you, and there is no need to panic.”

“No. Thank you very much. You’re very kind.”

That was all Leonora could manage.

Martin and she were outside at last, and as she drew quick breaths of cold, fresh air, Leonora had the illogical feeling of having escaped.

“I’m afraid it’s a good while past lunch-time, Lora.” Martin was making a gallant attempt to sound completely natural. “But let’s go and have some sort of meal now. You must be starving.”

“No thank you, Martin, really. I’m not a bit hungry.” Leonora felt that food would choke her.

“It’s not good for you to go without anything,” Martin protested.

“I’ll have something at home—” she began. Their eyes met without either of them quite intending that they should.

There was a slight and very uncomfortable pause. “Well—well perhaps just a snack,” stammered Leonora at last And, without any further comment, he hailed a passing taxi.

It was a miserable meal. No good pretending anything else. The place was very empty since it was long past lunch-time, and there seemed to be nothing about which they could make casual conversation.

But it was over at last, and then Martin took her home “Would you care to have me—come in at all?—speak to anybody for you?”

“No, no, thank you.” She could scarcely get the words out fast enough. “I shall be perfectly all right.”

He gave way at once, perhaps guessing a little of her feeling. And, to her unspeakable relief, he indulged in no comforting platitudes or heavy warnings when they said good-bye. He just asked her to ring him up some time the next day, and let him know if the doctor said anything of interest when he came.

With a sense of relief even more acute than that with which she had left the doctor’s office, Leonora opened the heavy front door and went into the house.

No one was about, and instinctively keeping as quiet as possible, she ran upstairs and gained the sanctuary of her own room.

Once in there, she locked the door and flung herself on the bed.

She lay very still, letting the facts marshall themselves in her mind.

Someone was poisoning her—or so Dr. Brindbent said—and, if she faced the facts squarely, suspicion pointed every time to Bruce.

It didn’t matter, saying it to herself. At least, in a way, it didn’t matter. It wasn’t dangerous for Bruce.

Funny, how she kept on thinking about
his
danger. If she believed this awful thing of him—and in her heart she was practically sure she did—she ought to hate him, shrink from the very thought of him.

But that was not how she felt at all.

It was not that infatuation was blinding her again. It was not even a question of thinking out a lot of sob-stuff about his wanting Farron. It was—

She sat up slowly. She knew at last how it seemed to her. It was as though the dearest person in the world had been attacked by a deadly disease—and
she
must help him to find health and sanity again.

Perfectly calm now, Leonora got off the bed, brushed her hair, changed her dress, added the slightest touch of make-up to hide her unusual pallor, and prepared to go downstairs.

Bruce was in when she got downstairs, and he turned at once from his conversation with Agatha.

“Hallo, darling.” He didn’t often call her “darling”, or indeed anything so endearing, but just now he seemed pleased and excited about something.

She returned his greeting. She not only sounded calm—she felt calm. Her thoughts should have run: “This is Bruce—my husband. He’s a potential murderer and I must be very careful that he doesn’t make any further attempt to poison me.”

But, instead, she just thought: “How nice Bruce looks in grey. I’ve never seen him in anything light before. It does suit him. And when he is happy and interested, how his eyes do sparkle.”

“What’s the excitement, Bruce?” She came and put her arm into his. “And how nice you’re looking.”

He smiled down at her.

“Thank you. You’re looking sweet yourself—as always.” He bent his head and kissed her lightly. “The excitement is that—Do you feel like a drive this afternoon and evening?”

“If you like.” It would be nice to get away just by themselves after all this miserable upset. And then that, too, struck her as absolutely illogical.

“Well, I think I’ve found a house that would do for us, and if you’d like to come down with me to see it now—”

“I’d love to,” Leonora’s eyes brightened suddenly. If he were really thinking of buying a house for them that meant he couldn’t be thinking about Farron any more. And so he wouldn’t want the money. And so—

“As a matter of fact, it would only be for a time. The place is to let, not sell. But—oh, it’s nice, Lora! Let’s go and look at it together.”

“Very well,” she said, but she spoke much more soberly this time. And then she went away, without further comment, to get ready.

He was already in the car when she came downstairs, and she saw him for a moment before he saw her. He was leaning back, smoking contentedly, and there was an air of boyish tranquillity about him that suddenly made her remember Agatha’s description of him as a child. “Quiet and determined—with a quality of restful content about him.”

She slipped into the car beside him, and he tossed away his cigarette end and smiled at her.

“Oh, Bruce,” she said, and sighed a little as she smiled back.

“What is it?” He looked faintly puzzled although amused too.

“Nothing.” She hesitated. “You look so quiet and happy this afternoon.”

“I am happy,” he said as the car purred into life.

“Are you?
Really
happy—actively happy, I mean. Not just satisfying yourself because you’re not definitely unhappy.”

He looked surprised at that.

“I am happier these days than any time since I was a boy,” he said simply. “Much, much happier than I ever thought I could be again.”

“Oh, Bruce dear—” She was profoundly touched. “I am so glad. Because you had some awful years, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

Nothing but the laconic monosyllable, but it spoke of so much that she was afraid to ask any more. And then after a silence she said:

“Tell me about this place we’re going to see.”

His face brightened at once.

“It’s quite small—”

“I like that.”

“Not much more than a large country cottage, but with a beautiful garden and a small orchard behind. It’s charmingly furnished—”

“
Furnished,
Bruce! But—do we want that? It wouldn’t seem like our place at all.” Leonora felt overwhelmingly dismayed.

“But, just a minute. Let me explain.” He frowned at being interrupted in his enthusiasm. At any other time she would have been amused, but now she was put out and—yes, frightened.

“It’s as though we only needed it for quite a short while,” she murmured, and shivered suddenly as though she were cold.

Bruce didn’t answer that. He went on with his explanations.

“The fellow who owns it has to go abroad for a year, and he wants to let the place just as it stands. He may find at the end of the time that he has to stay out there altogether and in that case he is going to have his things shipped abroad and sell the place. As the tenants of course, we should have first refusal.”

“If we still need it,” Leonora said, without being able to stop herself.

“Well—of course if we still want it. We don’t
have
to have it. What’s the matter, Lora? You can’t dislike the place before you’ve even seen it” He looked disappointed and even a little annoyed.

“No, of course not It’s only—” She hesitated. “I had thought somehow of our starting in a place that was all our own—somewhere where we were going to be always, so that we could look forward and plan for the future.” Suddenly she wanted to cry, because, actually, she dared not look into the future.

Bruce drew the car to a standstill at the side of the road and put his arm round her.

“Lora, you’re so dear when you talk like that.” His voice was very tender. “You give everything that heavenly sense of permanency again—the sort of confidence one only has as a child.
I
want us to make the kind of home that will go on always, too. I’m sorry—I didn’t make that clear. But we shall take time to settle on that, you know, and meanwhile I thought it would be nice to take this place. If it turns out to be exactly what we want and we can have it—well and good. If not, it will do very pleasantly as a temporary home while we take our time to find what we really want.”

It sounded so reasonable, put like that, especially when he spoke so tenderly and quietly.

“I’m sorry. I see. I didn’t quite understand.” She stroked the sleeve of his coat gently.

He glanced down at her hand, and for a moment his nostrils quivered slightly. Then he bent his head quickly and kissed the hand before driving on.

Leonora didn’t talk any more. She leant back in her seat, indescribably comforted. That he could talk like that—and look like that—and be contemplating the ridiculous thing that Dr. Brindbent and Martin suggested! It was beyond belief. Reassuringly beyond belief. And for a while she almost succeeded in banishing the whole nightmare from her mind.

Their suggested home proved to be a good two hours’ drive from London, the last quarter of it through extraordinary deserted country.

“I didn’t know there was any place so solitary within a hundred miles of London,” Leonora exclaimed.

“No. It took some finding.” Bruce seemed very pleased with himself about it, which made Leonora laugh a little.

And then, without another word he turned the car down a tree-bordered lane which ended in one of the loveliest little houses she had ever seen.

“
Bruce
!” Leonora got out and went slowly up the path, smiling with sheer pleasure to see the way the evening sun was reflected back from the diamond-paned windows.

He didn’t say anything—just smiled as he unlocked the thick oak door which was unevenly studded with nails.

They went through the cottage together, room after room. And at each one Leonora realized afresh that she already loved the place. It was not just a case of putting up with it because he liked it. She would really love to live here.

“Do you like it?” He was very eager about it, very anxious for her approval.