Five Little Pigs - Agatha Christie [54]
I said: “What’s all this? Is this business with the lovely Elsa serious then?” He said with a sort of groan:
“She is lovely, isn’t she? Sometimes I wish I’d never seen her.”
I said: “Look here, old boy, you must take a hold on yourself. You don’t want to get tied up with any more women.” He looked at me and laughed. He said: “It’s all very well for you to talk. I can’t let women alone—simply can’t do it—and if I could, they wouldn’t let me alone!” Then he shrugged those great shoulders of his, grinned at me and said: “Oh well, it will all pan out in the end, I expect. And you must admit the picture is good?”
He was referring to the portrait he was doing of Elsa, and although I had very little technical knowledge of painting, even I could see that it was going to be a work of especial power.
Whilst he was painting, Amyas was a different man. Although he would growl, groan, frown, swear extravagantly, and sometimes hurl his brushes away, he was really intensely happy.
It was only when he came back to the house for meals that the hostile atmosphere between the women got him down. That hostility came to a head on Sept. 17th. We had had an embarrassing lunch. Elsa had been particularly—really, I think insolent is the only word for it! She had ignored Caroline pointedly, persistently addressing the conversation to Amyas as though he and she were alone in the room. Caroline had talked lightly and gaily to the rest of us, cleverly contriving so that several perfectly innocent-sounding remarks should have a sting. She hadn’t got Elsa Greer’s scornful honesty—with Caroline every thing was oblique, suggested rather than said.
Things came to a head after lunch in the drawing room just as we were finishing coffee. I had commented on a carved head in highly polished beechwood—a very curious thing, and Caroline said: “That is the work of a young Norwegian sculptor. Amyas and I admire his work very much. We hope to go and see him next summer.” That calm assumption of possession was too much for Elsa. She was never one to let a challenge pass. She waited a minute or two and then she spoke in her clear, rather overemphasized voice. She said: “This would be a lovely room if it was properly fixed. It’s got far too much furniture in it. When I’m living here I shall take all the rubbish out and just leave one or two good pieces. And I shall have copper-coloured curtains, I think—so that the setting sun will just catch them through that big western window.” She turned to me and said. “Don’t you think that would be rather lovely?”
I didn’t have time to answer. Caroline spoke, and her voice was soft and silky and what I can only describe as dangerous. She said:
“Are you thinking of buying this place, Elsa?”
Elsa said: “It won’t be necessary for me to buy it.”
Caroline said: “What do you mean?” And there was no softness in her voice now. It was hard and metallic. Elsa laughed. She said: “Must we pretend? Come now, Caroline, you know very well what I mean!”
Caroline said: “I’ve no idea.”
Elsa said to that: “Don’t be such an ostrich. It’s no good pretending you don’t see and know all about it. Amyas and I care for each other. This isn’t your home. It’s his. And after we’re married I shall live here with him!”
Caroline said: “I think you’re crazy.”
Elsa said: “Oh no, I’m not, my dear, and you know it. It would be much simpler if we were honest with each other. Amyas and I love each other—you’ve seen that clearly enough. There’s only one decent thing for you to do. You’ve got to give him his freedom.”
Caroline said: “I don’t believe a word of what you are saying.”
But her voice was unconvincing. Elsa had got under her guard all right.
And at that minute Amyas Crale came into the room and Elsa said with a laugh:
“If you don’t believe me, ask him.”
And Caroline said: “I will.”
She didn’t pause at all. She said:
“Amyas, Elsa says you want to marry her. Is this true?”
Poor Amyas. I felt sorry for him. It makes a man feel a fool to have a scene of that kind forced