Temporary Kings - Anthony Powell [49]
‘If this is true – Léon-Joseph really told you something of the kind before he died – why on earth didn’t you pass it on?’
‘Why should I?’
‘Why should you?’
‘Yes?’
Widmerpool, almost shaking now, was just able to control himself.
‘You know its importance – if true … which I doubt… the whole point of making this contact… the consequences … you know perfectly well what I mean …’
It looked as if the consequences, whatever they were likely to be, remained too awesome to put into words. Pamela turned her head away, and upward. Resting lightly the tips of her fingers on her hips, she leant slowly back on her heels, revealing to advantage the slimness of her still immensely graceful neck. She tipped her head slightly to one side, apparently lost once more in fascination by the legend of Candaules and Gyges. Widmerpool could stand this treatment no longer. He burst out.
‘What are you looking at? Answer my question. This is a serious matter, I tell you.’
Pamela did not reply at once. When she did so, she spoke in the absent strain of someone who has just made an absorbing discovery.
‘There’s a picture up there of a man exhibiting his naked wife to a friend. Have you inspected it yet?’
Widmerpool did not reply this time. His face was yellow. The look he gave her suggested that, of all things living, she was the most abhorrent to him. Pamela continued her soft, almost cooing commentary, a voice in complete contrast with her earlier sullenness.
‘I know you can’t tell one picture from another, haven’t the slightest idea what those square, flat, brightly coloured surfaces are, which people put in frames, and hang on their walls, or why they hang them there. You probably think they conceal safes with money in them, or compromising documents, possibly dirty books and postcards. The favourite things you think it better to keep hidden away. All the same, the subject of this particular picture might catch your attention – for instance remind you of those photographs shut up in the secret drawer of that desk you sometimes forget to lock. I didn’t know about them till the other day. I didn’t even know you’d taken them. Wasn’t that innocent of me? How Leon-Joseph laughed, when I told him. You were careless to forget about turning the key.’
Widmerpool had gone a pasty yellowish colour when his wife quoted Ferrand-Sénéschal’s alleged conjecture about Dr Belkin’s reasons for absenting himself from the Conference. Now the blood came back into his face, turning it brick red. He was furious. Even so, he must have grasped that whatever had to be said must wait for privacy. He made a powerful effort at self-control, which could not be concealed. Then he spoke quite soberly.
‘You don’t know how things stand, why it was necessary for me to come here. When you do, you will see you are being rather silly. There have been unfortunate developments certainly, absurd ones. Even if Belkin does not turn up, there will be a way out, but, if he is here, that will be easier. We’ll have a talk later about the best way of handling matters. This may concern you as much as me, so please do not be frivolous about it.’
Pamela was uninterested.
‘I haven’t the least idea what matters need handling. Oh, yes – the picture on the ceiling? You mean that? You want more explanation? Well, the wife there, whose husband arranged for his chum to have a peep at her in that charming manner,