The Bloody Wood by Michael Innes

with Dr Fell in the presence of his uncle didn’t appear. What did appear was that he had abruptly lost interest in Mrs Gillingham. Perhaps he had been rebuffed in some improper proposal advanced to her – although Appleby was inclined to think that this notion was the issue only of his own sustained professional acquaintance with human misconduct. Perhaps Bobby had somehow tumbled to the fact that Mrs Gillingham was not the sort of threat it had been possible to suppose. However this might be, after dinner Bobby had given Diana Page a somewhat perfunctory invitation to get into his car and run round one or two pubs. Whether Diana would have liked to do this it was impossible to say. She was certainly too well brought up to treat a tolerably formal party in this casual fashion, and Bobby had presently driven off alone. Appleby didn’t know when he returned. Dr Fell was certainly in the house shortly after Charles and Grace came slowly back from their small expedition. So perhaps Bobby and Fell met, after all.
    It was at least certain that Martine could not have been presented with a sudden vision of herself as her uncle Charles’ pre-emptive bride. She had ceased, indeed, to be in any way challenging towards Mrs Gillingham, but the only explanation required for this was, after all, that she had recovered her manners. To both the Martineaus her bearing was perfectly normal, and Appleby was convinced that she was not in the position of having to put any extra effort into this.
    Amid this general calm it was only Edward Pendleton who appeared a little troubled. He was a man who, if he never positively relaxed – let alone unbuttoned – commonly presented the world with the most equable of faces. But now it might have been said of him, as of another weighty character, that on his front deliberation sat and public care. Appleby was far from disposed to make any inquiry into this. But, at the end of the evening, Pendleton sought him out of his own accord.
    ‘My dear John,’ he said amiably, ‘I gather you have elicited from Charles some rather confidential matters which I felt bound to communicate to him early today.’
    ‘Scarcely that.’ Appleby wasn’t too pleased with this manner of address. ‘I came upon Charles in a state of considerable agitation, and trying to contact a strange doctor. He told me that this chap Fell had walked out on his patient. I thought it most improbable, and I was right. Fell is back on the job. But there had been a flaming row. It wasn’t very difficult for me to make the inference that you were at the bottom of it – if I may express myself in that way. And there my information ends.’
    ‘Yes, yes. It would be absurd in us to reproach each other, my dear fellow.’
    ‘I quite agree. And if I was curious at the time, it was simply out of an impulse to help Charles if I could. But he didn’t want to discuss the matter, so that’s that. And no more, Edward, have I broached it with you.’
    ‘Quite so, quite so.’ Pendleton was frowning indecisively. ‘I would like you to believe that I have been put in a peculiarly difficult position. You say Charles didn’t pass on to you–?’ Pendleton hesitated.
    ‘What you felt you had to tell him? Definitely not. He said something to the effect that he couldn’t bring himself to enter upon it.’
    ‘I see. I hope he didn’t offend you by his reticence. But it is difficult – really very difficult. It would be idle in me to pretend now that I don’t know something which must be admitted to this man’s disadvantage. But here he is, respectably and legitimately employed in his profession. And I would stress legitimately . Moreover I haven’t the slightest reason to suppose that he is not a thoroughly competent GP. And again, as far as Grace’s case goes, I have made sure that he has been securing amply adequate advice from the best consultants. I would not myself have dreamt of saying a word to Charles – particularly, as you may