Ellis Peters - George Felse 03 - Flight Of A Witch by Ellis Peters Page B
Authors: Ellis Peters
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her to realise it.’ He included all of them in that request, and saw the doctor’s tight, reserved face ease a little. ‘I’ve got a job to do, but it isn’t to hurt Annet. A part of it is to save whatever can be saved for her.’
‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ said the doctor.
‘Do one thing more for me, will you? With your permission, Mr Beck, I want to put a constable on guard here in your grounds. I’d be obliged, doctor, if you’d stay here with Annet until he arrives.’
They stared eye to eye for a second, then the doctor said quietly: ‘Very well, I’ll go back to her.’
Beck turned and shuffled his way to the stairs after him, a wretched, wilted figure, babbling feeble daily platitudes, trying to pretend there was a grain of normality left in his life, where there was nothing but a waste of wreckage like a battlefield.
‘I’ll be off now,’ said George, glad, if anything, to be left confronting Mrs Beck, with whom, it was clear, he would have to deal if he wanted to get sense out of anyone. ‘I shall have to take this ring with me, you understand that?’
‘Yes, I understand.’ She looked down pallidly at the thin, bright circlet. ‘Do you think – is it possible that they—?’
‘I think it very unlikely. This is a symbol, that’s all. And a promise. It isn’t so easy to get married in a hurry without a fair amount of money, and you see they can’t have had much between them.’
She flinched at that, his sound reasons for thinking so were only too clear.
‘And in the circumstances,’ he said gently, ‘I think you should hope and pray that they didn’t manage it.’
She whispered: ‘Yes!’ hardly audibly.
‘Don’t let her go to work tomorrow, even if she wants to. I want you to keep a close guard on her, and hold her available only to us. Don’t take anyone into your confidence, not yet, at any rate. Better telephone Mrs Blacklock in the morning, and say Annet has a return of her cold.’
‘Yes,’ she said again, dully, ‘I expect that would be best.’
‘And I need, if you have one, a good recent picture of her.’
Photographs of Annet were so few in the house, now Tom came to think of it, that their rarity shed light on her absence of vanity. When had he even seen her peering at her make-up in a mirror with the devoted attention of most girls? Mrs Beck brought a postcard portrait, the latest she had, and George pocketed it after one thoughtful glance again at the lovely, troubling face.
‘Thank you. You shall have it back, I promise you.’ Would she get the original back as surely? He wished he knew the answer to that. ‘I’ll leave you in peace now. And believe me, I’m sorry!’
‘I’ll see you out,’ said Tom, and followed him from the room and out through the dim hall, into the moist, mild night. The front door closed almost stealthily upon the tragedy within.
‘It can’t be true!’ said Tom, suddenly in total revolt. The rupture was too brutal and extreme between this immemorial border stability, the continuity that made nothing of wars and centuries and dissensions, and that abrupt and strident descent into the cheapest and shallowest of ephemeral crimes. A mean little incident, a quick raid and a random blow, merely for money, for the means to buy things for Annet, to take Annet about in style – everything Annet didn’t want. The offence against her, the debasing of her immoderate love, almost as capital a crime as the killing of the old man. She couldn’t have known. It was the death of everything she had wanted from love. No, she couldn’t possibly have known.
‘It can,’ said George grimly. ‘It happens all the time.’
Did he mean merely this sordid, characteristic latter-day killing for profit, or the unbelievable misunderstanding and profanation of love implied in it? There was no knowing; he was so much deeper than he seemed, you only saw the abyss when you were already falling.
‘We think we have sound relationships,’ said
‘I’ll bear it in mind,’ said the doctor.
‘Do one thing more for me, will you? With your permission, Mr Beck, I want to put a constable on guard here in your grounds. I’d be obliged, doctor, if you’d stay here with Annet until he arrives.’
They stared eye to eye for a second, then the doctor said quietly: ‘Very well, I’ll go back to her.’
Beck turned and shuffled his way to the stairs after him, a wretched, wilted figure, babbling feeble daily platitudes, trying to pretend there was a grain of normality left in his life, where there was nothing but a waste of wreckage like a battlefield.
‘I’ll be off now,’ said George, glad, if anything, to be left confronting Mrs Beck, with whom, it was clear, he would have to deal if he wanted to get sense out of anyone. ‘I shall have to take this ring with me, you understand that?’
‘Yes, I understand.’ She looked down pallidly at the thin, bright circlet. ‘Do you think – is it possible that they—?’
‘I think it very unlikely. This is a symbol, that’s all. And a promise. It isn’t so easy to get married in a hurry without a fair amount of money, and you see they can’t have had much between them.’
She flinched at that, his sound reasons for thinking so were only too clear.
‘And in the circumstances,’ he said gently, ‘I think you should hope and pray that they didn’t manage it.’
She whispered: ‘Yes!’ hardly audibly.
‘Don’t let her go to work tomorrow, even if she wants to. I want you to keep a close guard on her, and hold her available only to us. Don’t take anyone into your confidence, not yet, at any rate. Better telephone Mrs Blacklock in the morning, and say Annet has a return of her cold.’
‘Yes,’ she said again, dully, ‘I expect that would be best.’
‘And I need, if you have one, a good recent picture of her.’
Photographs of Annet were so few in the house, now Tom came to think of it, that their rarity shed light on her absence of vanity. When had he even seen her peering at her make-up in a mirror with the devoted attention of most girls? Mrs Beck brought a postcard portrait, the latest she had, and George pocketed it after one thoughtful glance again at the lovely, troubling face.
‘Thank you. You shall have it back, I promise you.’ Would she get the original back as surely? He wished he knew the answer to that. ‘I’ll leave you in peace now. And believe me, I’m sorry!’
‘I’ll see you out,’ said Tom, and followed him from the room and out through the dim hall, into the moist, mild night. The front door closed almost stealthily upon the tragedy within.
‘It can’t be true!’ said Tom, suddenly in total revolt. The rupture was too brutal and extreme between this immemorial border stability, the continuity that made nothing of wars and centuries and dissensions, and that abrupt and strident descent into the cheapest and shallowest of ephemeral crimes. A mean little incident, a quick raid and a random blow, merely for money, for the means to buy things for Annet, to take Annet about in style – everything Annet didn’t want. The offence against her, the debasing of her immoderate love, almost as capital a crime as the killing of the old man. She couldn’t have known. It was the death of everything she had wanted from love. No, she couldn’t possibly have known.
‘It can,’ said George grimly. ‘It happens all the time.’
Did he mean merely this sordid, characteristic latter-day killing for profit, or the unbelievable misunderstanding and profanation of love implied in it? There was no knowing; he was so much deeper than he seemed, you only saw the abyss when you were already falling.
‘We think we have sound relationships,’ said
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