The Hollow - Agatha Christie [92]
‘Midge,’ he thought, ‘is real. The only real thing I have ever known…’ He felt the warmth of her, and the strength–dark, positive, alive, real ! ‘Midge,’ he thought, ‘is the rock on which I can build my life.’
He said: ‘Darling Midge, I love you so, never leave me again.’
She bent down to him and he felt the warmth of her lips on his, felt her love enveloping him, shielding him, and happiness flowered in that cold desert where he had lived alone so long.
Suddenly Midge said with a shaky laugh:
‘Look, Edward, a blackbeetle has come out to look at us. Isn’t he a nice blackbeetle? I never thought I could like a blackbeetle so much!’
She added dreamily: ‘How odd life is. Here we are sitting on the floor in a kitchen that still smells of gas all amongst the blackbeetles, and feeling that it’s heaven.’
He murmured dreamily: ‘I could stay here for ever.’
‘We’d better go and get some sleep. It’s four o’clock. How on earth are we to explain that broken window to Lucy?’ Fortunately, Midge reflected, Lucy was an extraordinarily easy person to explain things to!
Taking a leaf out of Lucy’s own book, Midge went into her room at six o’clock. She made a bald statement of fact.
‘Edward went down and put his head in the gas oven in the night,’ she said. ‘Fortunately I heard him, and went down after him. I broke the window because I couldn’t get it open quickly.’
Lucy, Midge had to admit, was wonderful.
She smiled sweetly with no sign of surprise.
‘Dear Midge,’ she said, ‘you are always so practical. I’m sure you will always be the greatest comfort to Edward.’
After Midge had gone, Lady Angkatell lay thinking. Then she got up and went into her husband’s room, which for once was unlocked.
‘Henry.’
‘My dear Lucy! It’s not cockcrow yet.’
‘No, but listen, Henry, this is really important. We must have electricity installed to cook by and get rid of that gas stove.’
‘Why, it’s quite satisfactory, isn’t it?’
‘Oh, yes, dear. But it’s the sort of thing that gives people ideas, and everybody mightn’t be as practical as dear Midge.’
She flitted elusively away. Sir Henry turned over with a grunt. Presently he awoke with a start just as he was dozing off. ‘Did I dream it,’ he murmured, ‘or did Lucy come in and start talking about gas stoves?’
Outside in the passage, Lady Angkatell went into the bathroom and put a kettle on the gas ring. Sometimes, she knew, people liked an early cup of tea. Fired with self-approval, she returned to bed and lay back on her pillows, pleased with life and with herself.
Edward and Midge at Ainswick–the inquest over. She would go and talk to M. Poirot again. A nice little man…
Suddenly another idea flashed into her head. She sat upright in bed. ‘I wonder now,’ she speculated, ‘if she has thought of that.’
She got out of bed and drifted along the passage to Henrietta’s room, beginning her remarks as usual long before she was within earshot.
‘–and it suddenly came to me, dear, that you might have overlooked that.’
Henrietta murmured sleepily: ‘For heaven’s sake, Lucy, the birds aren’t up yet!’
‘Oh, I know, dear, it is rather early, but it seems to have been a very disturbed night–Edward and the gas stove and Midge and the kitchen window–and thinking of what to say to M. Poirot and everything–’
‘I’m sorry, Lucy, but everything you say sounds like complete gibberish. Can’t it wait?’
‘It was only the holster, dear. I thought, you know, that you might not have thought about the holster.’
‘Holster?’ Henrietta sat up in bed. She was suddenly wide awake. ‘What’s this about a holster?’
‘That revolver of Henry’s was in a holster, you know. And the holster hasn’t been found. And of course nobody may think of it–but on the other hand somebody might–’
Henrietta swung herself out of bed. She said:
‘One always forgets something–that’s what they say! And it’s true!’
Lady Angkatell went back to her room.
She got into