Twisted Root - Anne Perry [88]
"I know that," she said in little above a whisper. "I should still like to know exactly how she did it."
He stood in silence for several moments.
She waited. Part of her wanted to leave before it was too late. But escaping would be only physical. Morally and emotionally, she was still trapped. And that was trivial compared with Cleo—or John Robb.
"What do you think she took?" Kristian asked at length.
She swallowed. "Morphine, for an old man who has consumption. It won’t cure him, but it gives him a little rest."
"Very understandable," he answered. "I hope she gave him some sherry in water as well?"
"I believe so."
"Good. I need a few things from the apothecary myself. I’ll go and get the keys. You can help me, if you would." And without waiting for her answer, he turned sharply and strode off.
He came back a few minutes later with the keys and opened the door. He went inside and left her to follow him. He started to unlock various cupboards and take out leaves for infusions, cordials and various powders. He passed several of them to Hester while he opened bottles and jars, then closed them again. When he had finished he ushered her out, relocked the door, took some of the medicines back from her, then thanked her and left her standing in the corridor with a small bottle of cordial and a week’s dosage of morphine, plus several small paper screws of quinine.
She put them quickly into her pockets and went back towards the front door and out of it. She felt as if dozens of eyes were boring holes in her back, but actually she passed only one nurse with a mop and bucket, and Fermin Thorpe himself, striding along with his face set, hardly recognizing her.
John Robb was delighted to see her. He had had a bad night but was a trifle better towards late afternoon, and the loneliness of sitting in his chair in the empty house, even with the sun slanting in through the windows, had made him melancholy. His face lit with a smile when he recognized her step, and even before she entered the room he was tidying the little space around him and making ready for her.
"How are you?" he said the moment she came through the door.
"I’m very well," she answered cheerfully. He must never know about Cleo if there was any way it could be prevented.
She could not warn Michael without explaining to him the reason, and that would place him in an impossible situation. He would then have either to benefit indirectly from the thefts, which he would find intolerable, or else have to testify against Cleo from his own knowledge. That would also be unbearable, for the old man’s sake as well as his own. Such disillusion and sense of betrayal might be more than his old and frail body could take. And then Michael’s guilt would be crippling.
"I’m very well indeed," she said firmly. "How are you? I hope you are well enough to share a cup of tea with me? I brought some you might like to try, and a few biscuits." She smiled back at him. "Of course, it was all an excuse so you will tell me more stories of your life at sea and the places you have been to. You were going to describe the Indies for me. You said how brilliant the water was, like a cascade of jewels, and that you had seen fishes that could fly."
"Oh, bless you, girl, I have an’ all," he agreed with a smile. "An’ more than that, too. You put the kettle on an’ I’ll tell you all you want to know."
"Of course." She walked across the room and pulled the biscuits and tea out of the bag they were in, filled the kettle from the jug and set it on the stove, then, with her back to him, took out the cordial bottle and placed it on the shelf, half behind a blue bag of sugar. Then she slipped the morphine out of her other pocket and set it underneath the two thin papers that were left from Cleo’s last