Problem at Pollensa Bay - Agatha Christie [64]
She went straight to the study at the back of the house. A man was pacing up and down in the room–a young man, with a handsome face and a haggard expression.
He gave an ejaculation of relief as she came in.
‘Thank God you’ve turned up, Theo. They said you’d taken your luggage with you and gone off out of town somewhere.’
‘I heard the news and came back.’
Richard Darrell put an arm about her and drew her to the couch. They sat down upon it side by side. Theo drew herself free of the encircling arm in what seemed a perfectly natural manner.
‘How bad is it, Richard?’ she asked quietly.
‘Just as bad as it can be–and that’s saying a lot.’
‘Tell me!’
He began to walk up and down again as he talked. Theo sat and watched him. He was not to know that every now and then the room went dim, and his voice faded from her hearing, while another room in a hotel at Dover came clearly before her eyes.
Nevertheless she managed to listen intelligently enough. He came back and sat down on the couch by her.
‘Fortunately,’ he ended, ‘they can’t touch your marriage settlement. The house is yours also.’
Theo nodded thoughtfully.
‘We shall have that at any rate,’ she said. ‘Then things will not be too bad? It means a fresh start, that is all.’
‘Oh! Quite so. Yes.’
But his voice did not ring true, and Theo thought suddenly: ‘There’s something else. He hasn’t told me everything.’
‘There’s nothing more, Richard?’ she said gently. ‘Nothing worse?’
He hesitated for just half a second, then: ‘Worse? What should there be?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Theo.
‘It’ll be all right,’ said Richard, speaking more as though to reassure himself than Theo. ‘Of course, it’ll be all right.’
He flung an arm about her suddenly.
‘I’m glad you’re here,’ he said. ‘It’ll be all right now that you’re here. Whatever else happens, I’ve got you, haven’t I?’
She said gently: ‘Yes, you’ve got me.’ And this time she left his arm round her.
He kissed her and held her close to him, as though in some strange way he derived comfort from her nearness.
‘I’ve got you, Theo,’ he said again presently, and she answered as before: ‘Yes, Richard.’
He slipped from the couch to the floor at her feet.
‘I’m tired out,’ he said fretfully. ‘My God, it’s been a day. Awful! I don’t know what I should do if you weren’t here. After all, one’s wife is one’s wife, isn’t she?’
She did not speak, only bowed her head in assent.
He laid his head on her lap. The sigh he gave was like that of a tired child.
Theo thought again: ‘There’s something he hasn’t told me. What is it?’
Mechanically her hand dropped to his smooth, dark head, and she stroked it gently, as a mother might comfort a child.
Richard murmured vaguely:
‘It’ll be all right now you’re here. You won’t let me down.’
His breathing grew slow and even. He slept. Her hand still smoothed his head.
But her eyes looked steadily into the darkness in front of her, seeing nothing.
‘Don’t you think, Richard,’ said Theodora, ‘that you’d better tell me everything?’
It was three days later. They were in the drawing room before dinner.
Richard started, and flushed.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ he parried.
‘Don’t you?’
He shot a quick glance at her.
‘Of course there are–well–details.’
‘I ought to know everything, don’t you think, if I am to help?’
He looked at her strangely.
‘What makes you think I want you to help?’
She was a little astonished.
‘My dear Richard, I’m your wife.’
He smiled suddenly, the old, attractive, carefree smile.
‘So you are, Theo. And a very good-looking wife, too. I never could stand ugly women.’
He began walking up and down the room, as was his custom when something was worrying him.
‘I won’t deny you’re right in a way,’ he said presently. ‘There is something.’
He broke off.
‘Yes?’
‘It’s so damned hard to explain things of this kind to women. They get hold of the wrong end of the stick–fancy a thing is–well, what it isn’t.’
Theo said nothing.
‘You see,’ went on Richard, ‘the law