Taken at the Flood - Agatha Christie [12]
‘Er — all that is a long time ago…’
She came quickly to the rescue of his embarrassment.
‘And we’re now a middle-aged married couple in difficulties, looking for the best way out.’
‘After what you’ve just told me, Frances, it makes it a thousand times worse that this — this disgrace — ’
She interrupted him.
‘Let us please get things clear. You are being apologetic because you’ve fallen foul of the law. You may be prosecuted — go to prison.’ (He winced.) ‘I don’t want that to happen. I’ll fight like anything to stop it, but don’t credit me with moral indignation. We’re not a moral family, remember. Father, in spite of his attractiveness, was a bit of a crook. And there was Charles — my cousin. They hushed it up and he wasn’t prosecuted, and they hustled him off to the Colonies. And there was my cousin Gerald — he forged a cheque at Oxford. But he went to fight and got a posthumous V.C. for complete bravery and devotion to his men and superhuman endurance. What I’m trying to say is people are like that — not quite bad or quite good. I don’t suppose I’m particularly straight myself — I have been because there hasn’t been any temptation to be otherwise. But what I have got is plenty of courage and’ (she smiled at him) ‘I’m loyal!’
‘My dear!’ He got up and came over to her. He stopped and put his lips to her hair.
‘And now,’ said Lord Edward Trenton’s daughter, smiling up at him, ‘what are we going to do? Raise money somehow?’
Jeremy’s face stiffened.
‘I don’t see how.’
‘A mortgage on this house. Oh, I see,’ she was quick, ‘that’s been done. I’m stupid. Of course you’ve done all the obvious things. It’s a question then of a touch? Who can we touch? I suppose there’s only one possibility. Gordon’s widow — the dark Rosaleen!’
Jeremy shook his head dubiously.
‘It would have to be a large sum…And it can’t come out of capital. The money’s only in trust for her for her life.’
‘I hadn’t realized that. I thought she had it absolutely. What happens when she dies?’
‘It comes to Gordon’s next of kin. That is to say it is divided between myself, Lionel, Adela, and Maurice’s son, Rowley.’
‘It comes to us…’ said Frances slowly.
Something seemed to pass through the room — a cold air — the shadow of a thought…
Frances said: ‘You didn’t tell me that…I thought she got it for keeps — that she could leave it to any one she liked?’
‘No. By the statute relating to intestacy of 1925…’
It is doubtful whether Frances listened to his explanation. She said when his voice stopped:
‘It hardly matters to us personally. We’ll be dead and buried, long before she’s middle-aged. How old is she? Twenty-five — twenty-six? She’ll probably live to be seventy.’
Jeremy Cloade said doubtfully:
‘We might ask her for a loan — putting it on family grounds? She may be a generous-minded girl — really we know so little of her — ’
Frances said: ‘At any rate we have been reasonably nice to her — not catty like Adela. She might respond.’
Her husband said warningly:
‘There must be no hint of — er — real urgency.’
Frances said impatiently: ‘Of course not! The trouble is that it’s not the girl herself we shall have to deal with. She’s completely under the thumb of that brother of hers.’
‘A very unattractive young man,’ said Jeremy Cloade.
Frances’ sudden smile flashed out.
‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘He’s attractive. Most attractive. Rather unscrupulous, too, I should imagine. But then as far as that goes, I’m unscrupulous too!’
Her smile hardened. She looked up at her husband.
‘We’re not going to be beaten, Jeremy,’ she said. ‘There’s bound to be some way…if I have to rob a bank!’
Chapter 3
‘Money!’ said Lynn.
Rowley Cloade nodded. He was a big square young man with a brick-red skin, thoughtful blue eyes and very fair hair. He had a slowness that seemed more purposeful than ingrained. He used deliberation as others use quickness of repartee.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘everything seems to boil down to money these days.’
‘But I thought farmers had done so well during the war?’
‘Oh, yes — but that doesn