The Silent Pool by Patricia Wentworth Page B

she had known any need to defend herself a trick of entry, a way to beguile her from her guard. She said in the most matter-of-fact tone she could manage,
    ‘When it comes to taking a flat, it will be for the girl who is going to live in it to say whether she likes it or not.’
    ‘Naturally. But I would like you to see it.’
    ‘I have Stella to look after.’
    ‘She can stay at the Vicarage for lunch. She always does when Nanny has a day off. Star has an arrangement with Mrs Lenton. We can catch the nine-thirty and be back by half past four. You see, it really is important for you to see if the flat will do. He wants to leave some things like linoleum, and a lot of curtains which haven’t got an earthly chance of fitting the place they are going to in Edinburgh. It’s part of an aunt’s house, and he says the windows are nine foot high.’
    A heartening flash of anger enabled Janet to face him with colour in her cheeks.
    ‘I told you before I don’t like that sort of talk!’
    ‘But, darling, we’ll have to have linoleum and curtains, and suppose I got them and you said you couldn’t live with them—’
    ‘I have no intention of living with them.’
    His face changed suddenly. His hand caught hers.
    ‘Haven’t you, Janet – haven’t you?’
    ‘Why should I?’
    His laugh shook a little.
    ‘Part of the worldly goods I’ll be endowing you with. No, that’s out of date. The last wedding I went to the chap said “share”. Rather a pity, don’t you think? I rather like the sound of that “I thee endow”. A bit archaic of course, but so is marriage.’
    ‘No one was talking about marriage.’
    ‘Oh, yes, darling, I was – definitely. I’ve been laying my pay-packet and the linoleum and things at your feet for at least ten minutes. Hadn’t you noticed it?’
    She said, ‘No.’ At least she went through the right movements for saying ‘No’, but they didn’t seem to result in any recognizable sound.
    Ninian said, ‘Come again!’ still in that laughing, shaking voice. And then all at once his black head was bent down over the hand he was holding and he was kissing it as if he would never let it go.
    There was a moment when everything seemed to go round, there was a moment when everything stood still. With the touch of his lips on her hand Janet knew very well that she couldn’t go on saying no. But she could at least stop herself from saying yes. It was, in fact, not really possible to say anything at all.
    And then someone spoke on the other side of the screen which divided them from the nook on their right. It was Geoffrey Ford, and he could not have been more than a yard away from them. He said comfortably, ‘Well, no one is going to see us here,’ and a woman laughed.
    Janet snatched away her hand, and Ninian presented the unmistakable appearance of a young man who is saying, ‘Damn!’ Not aloud of course, but with a good deal of feeling. On the other side of the screen two people could be heard settling themselves.
    Janet got up, collected her bag, and skirted the table. Ninian followed her, put a hand on her arm, and was shaken off. As they emerged into the general gloom, the woman who had laughed said in a low but perfectly distinct voice,
    ‘I’m not going on like this, and you needn’t think so.’
    Chapter Fourteen
    Janet woke up in the night. She had been dreaming, and the feel of the dream came with her out of her sleep like water dripping as you come up out of a stream. She sat up in bed and waited for the feeling to go. It was an old dream, but she hadn’t had it for a long time now. It came when her mind was troubled, but she did not know what had troubled it tonight. Didn’t she? Ninian and this talk of all the things she had told herself she must and would forget! In sober earnest, how much of it did he mean? Nothing – something – anything? And what kind of fool would she be to be lured back into the passionate moments, the light uncertainties, the day-in, day-out