The Breaking Point by Daphne du Maurier Page B

understand. She would know in an instant if he had sensed anything wrong himself. She would ring the bell, make a pretext of asking Nurse Ansel some question, and then, by the expression on his face, by the tone of his voice, she would discover whether he saw what she saw herself.
    The taxi came at last. She heard it slow down, and then the door slammed and, blessedly, Jim’s voice rang out in the street below. The taxi went away. He would be coming up in the lift. Her heart began to beat fast, and she watched the door. She heard his footstep outside, and then his voice again - he must be saying something to the snake. She would know at once if he had seen the head. He would come into the room either startled, not believing his eyes, or laughing, declaring it a joke, a pantomime. Why did he not hurry? Why must they linger there, talking, their voices hushed?
    The door opened, the familiar umbrella and bowler hat the first objects to appear round the corner, then the comforting burly figure, but - God . . . no . . . please God, not Jim too, not Jim, forced into a mask, forced into an organization of devils, of liars . . . Jim had a vulture’s head. She could not mistake it. The brooding eye, the blood-tipped beak, the flabby folds of flesh. As she lay in sick and speechless horror, he stood the umbrella in a corner and put down the bowler hat and the folded overcoat.
    ‘I gather you’re not too well,’ he said, turning his vulture’s head and staring at her, ‘feeling a bit sick and out of sorts. I won’t stay long. A good night’s rest will put you right.’
    She was too numb to answer. She lay quite still as he approached the bed and bent to kiss her. The vulture’s beak was sharp.
    ‘It’s reaction, Nurse Ansel says,’ he went on, ‘the sudden shock of being able to see again. It works differently with different people. She says it will be much better when we get you home.’
    We . . . Nurse Ansel and Jim. The plan still held, then.
    ‘I don’t know,’ she said faintly, ‘that I want Nurse Ansel to come home.’
    ‘Not want Nurse Ansel?’ He sounded startled. ‘But it was you who suggested it. You can’t suddenly chop and change.’
    There was no time to reply. She had not rung the bell, but Nurse Ansel herself came into the room.‘Cup of coffee, Mr West?’ she said. It was the evening routine.Yet tonight it sounded strange, as though it had been arranged outside the door.
    ‘Thanks, Nurse, I’d love some. What’s this nonsense about not coming home with us?’ The vulture turned to the snake, the snake’s head wriggled, and Marda West knew, as she watched them, the snake with darting tongue, the vulture with his head hunched between his man’s shoulders, that the plan for Nurse Ansel to come home had not been her own after all; she remembered now that the first suggestion had come from Nurse Ansel herself. It had been Nurse Ansel who had said that Marda West needed care during convalescence. The suggestion had come after Jim had spent the evening laughing and joking and his wife had listened, her eyes bandaged, happy to hear him. Now, watching the smooth snake whose adder’s V was hidden beneath the nurse’s cap, she knew why Nurse Ansel wanted to return with her, and she knew too why Jim had not opposed it, why in fact he had accepted the plan at once, had declared it a good one.
    The vulture opened its blood-stained beak. ‘Don’t say you two have fallen out?’
    ‘Impossible.’The snake twisted its neck, looked sideways at the vulture, and added, ‘Mrs West is just a little bit tired tonight. She’s had a trying day, haven’t you, dear?’
    How best to answer? Neither must know. Neither the vulture, nor the snake, nor any of the hooded beasts surrounding her and closing in, must ever guess, must ever know.
    ‘I’m all right,’ she said. ‘A bit mixed-up. As Nurse Ansel says, I’ll be better in the morning.’
    The two communicated in silence, sympathy between them. That, she