Eye of the Needle - Ken Follett [117]
Jo went out. Lucy looked back to Henry. His eyes were open, and he was smiling. He said, “Kiss Henry, then.”
She leaned over him and kissed his battered face. Then carefully she cut away his underpants.
The heat from the fire would quickly dry his naked skin. She went into the kitchen and filled a bowl with warm water and a little antiseptic to bathe his wounds. She found a roll of absorbent cotton and returned to the living room.
“This is the second time you’ve turned up on the doorstep half dead,” she said as she set about her task.
“The usual signal,” Henry said. The words came abruptly.
“What?”
“Waiting-at-Calais-for-a-phantom-army…”
“Henry, what are you talking about?”
“Every-Friday-and-Monday…”
She finally realized he was delirious. “Don’t try to talk,” she said. She lifted his head slightly to clean away the dried blood from around the bump.
Suddenly he sat upright, looked fiercely at her, and said, “What day is it? What day is it?”
“It’s Sunday, relax.”
“Okay.”
He was quiet after that, and he let her remove the knife. She bathed his face, bandaged his finger where he had lost the nail and put a dressing on his ankle. When she had finished she stood looking at him for a while. He seemed to be sleeping. She touched the long scar on his chest, and the star-shaped mark on his hip. The star was a birthmark, she decided.
She went through his pockets before throwing the lacerated clothes away. There wasn’t much: some money, his papers, a leather wallet and a film can. She put them all in a little pile on the mantelpiece beside his fish knife. He would have to have some of David’s clothes.
She left him and went upstairs to see to Jo. The boy was asleep, lying on his teddy bear with his arms outflung. She kissed his soft cheek and tucked him in. She went outside and put the jeep in the barn.
She made herself a drink in the kitchen, then sat watching Henry, wishing he would wake up and make love to her again.
IT WAS ALMOST MIDNIGHT when he woke. He opened his eyes, and his face showed the series of expressions that were now familiar to her: first the fear, then the wary survey of the room, then the relaxation. On impulse, she asked him, “What are you afraid of, Henry?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You always look frightened when you wake up.”
“I don’t know.” He shrugged, and the movement seemed to hurt. “God, I’m battered.”
“Do you want to tell me what happened?”
“Yes, if you’ll give me a drink of brandy.”
She got the brandy out of the cupboard. “You can have some of David’s clothes.”
“In a minute…unless you’re embarrassed.”
She handed him the glass, smiling. “I’m afraid I’m enjoying it.”
“What happened to my clothes?”
“I had to cut them off you. I’ve thrown them away.”
“Not my papers, I hope.” He smiled, but there was some other emotion just below the surface.
“On the mantelpiece.” She pointed. “Is the knife for cleaning fish or something?”
His right hand went to his left forearm, where the sheath had been. “Something like that,” he said. He seemed uneasy for a moment, then relaxed with an effort and sipped his drink. “That’s good.”
After a moment she said, “Well?”
“What?”
“How did you manage to lose my husband and crash my jeep?”
“David decided to stay over at Tom’s for the night. Some of the sheep got into trouble in a place they call The Gully—”
“I know it.”
“—and six or seven of them were injured. They’re all in Tom’s kitchen being bandaged up and making a terrible row. Anyway, David suggested I come back to tell you he would be staying. I don’t really know how I managed to crash. The car is unfamiliar, there’s no real road, I hit something and went into a skid and the jeep ended up on its side. The details…” He shrugged.
“You must have been going quite fast—you were in an awful mess when you got here.”
“I suppose I rattled around inside the jeep a bit. Banged my head, twisted my ankle…”
“Lost a fingernail, bashed your face, and almost caught pneumonia. You must be accident-prone.”
He swung his legs to the floor, stood up and went to the mantelpiece.
“Your powers of recuperation