Listerdale Mystery - Agatha Christie [12]
‘And it must be done at nine o’clock precisely,’ said Alix teasingly.
Gerald looked a little vexed.
‘My dear girl,’ he said, with a shade of testiness in his manner, ‘one should always plan a thing for a definite time. Then one gets through one’s work properly.’
Alix sat for a minute or two in silence, watching her husband as he lay in his chair smoking, his dark head flung back and the clear-cut lines of his clean-shaven face showing up against the sombre background. And suddenly, from some unknown source, a wave of panic surged over her, so that she cried out before she could stop herself, ‘Oh, Gerald, I wish I knew more about you!’
Her husband turned an astonished face upon her.
‘But, my dear Alix, you do know all about me. I’ve told you of my boyhood in Northumberland, of my life in South Africa, and these last ten years in Canada which have brought me success.’
‘Oh! business!’ said Alix scornfully.
Gerald laughed suddenly.
‘I know what you mean–love affairs. You women are all the same. Nothing interests you but the personal element.’
Alix felt her throat go dry, as she muttered indistinctly: ‘Well, but there must have been–love affairs. I mean–if I only knew–’
There was silence again for a minute or two. Gerald Martin was frowning, a look of indecision on his face. When he spoke it was gravely, without a trace of his former bantering manner.
‘Do you think it wise, Alix–this–Bluebeard’s chamber business? There have been women in my life; yes, I don’t deny it. You wouldn’t believe me if I denied it. But I can swear to you truthfully that not one of them meant anything to me.’
There was a ring of sincerity in his voice which comforted the listening wife.
‘Satisfied, Alix?’ he asked, with a smile. Then he looked at her with a shade of curiosity.
‘What has turned your mind on to these unpleasant subjects, tonight of all nights?’
Alix got up, and began to walk about restlessly.
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I’ve been nervy all day.’
‘That’s odd,’ said Gerald, in a low voice, as though speaking to himself. ‘That’s very odd.’
‘Why it it odd?’
‘Oh, my dear girl, don’t flash out at me so. I only said it was odd, because, as a rule, you’re so sweet and serene.’
Alix forced a smile.
‘Everything’s conspired to annoy me today,’ she confessed. ‘Even old George had got some ridiculous idea into his head that we were going away to London. He said you had told him so.’
‘Where did you see him?’ asked Gerald sharply.
‘He came to work today instead of Friday.’
‘Damned old fool,’ said Gerald angrily.
Alix stared in surprise. Her husband’s face was convulsed with rage. She had never seen him so angry. Seeing her astonishment Gerald made an effort to regain control of himself.
‘Well, he is a damned old fool,’ he protested.
‘What can you have said to make him think that?’
‘I? I never said anything. At least–oh, yes, I remember; I made some weak joke about being “off to London in the morning,” and I suppose he took it seriously. Or else he didn’t hear properly. You undeceived him, of course?’
He waited anxiously for her reply.
‘Of course, but he’s the sort of old man who if once he gets an idea in his head–well, it isn’t so easy to get it out again.’
Then she told him of George’s insistence on the sum asked for the cottage.
Gerald was silent for a minute or two, then he said slowly:
‘Ames was willing to take two thousand in cash and the remaining thousand on mortgage. That’s the origin of that mistake, I fancy.’
‘Very likely,’ agreed Alix.
Then she looked up at the clock, and pointed to it with a mischievous finger.
‘We ought to be getting down to it, Gerald. Five minutes behind schedule.’
A very peculiar smile came over Gerald Martin’s face.
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ he said quietly; ‘I shan’t do any photography tonight.’
A woman’s mind is a curious thing. When she went to bed that Wednesday night Alix’s mind was contented and at rest. Her momentarily assailed happiness reasserted itself, triumphant as of yore.
But by the evening of the following day she realized that some subtle forces were at