Two weeks ago he had taken her arm and led her over to a window. He had held her chin and studied her face, then said, ‘I’d like to paint you. You have amazing eyes.’ He had spoken almost clinically, as if he were a sculptor and she a promising lump of stone, but Judy’s heart had melted in her breast (A New You!) and her dreams, refurbished, gained in strength. He hadn’t mentioned it again. She had walked over a few evenings ago, seen through the window that he was working and, lacking the courage to disturb him, crept quietly away. She had not returned, afraid that an unwanted visit might try his patience and bring about what she dreaded most of all, a definite dismissal.
Trevor Lessiter watched his daughter, miles away as usual, as he folded up his Telegraph. He wondered what she was thinking and how it was possible to miss someone so much when you saw them every day. He was glad she had not been driven, despite his wife’s heavy hints, to find a flat in Pinner ‘to be nearer work’. Judy did nothing now in the house. She who had always taken such a pride in polishing her mother’s things and arranging flowers. Now whatever Mrs Holland couldn’t manage got left. And whenever he and Barbara bickered (nearly all the time lately, it seemed), he saw a relish in Judy’s eyes which he found deeply wounding. He knew she was thinking ‘serve him right’. He looked at his wife, at the heavy breasts and narrow waist, and felt dizzy with lust. Not love. He recognized now that he no longer loved her, indeed wondered if he ever had, but she still had the power. So much power. If only he could talk to Judy. Try to make her understand how he had been driven, almost tricked, into marriage. Surely now she was herself in love she would understand. But he shrank from such an attempt. Young people were invariably disturbed, even offended, by revelations of their parents’ sexuality. And her persistent indifference and unkindness were now provoking a similar reaction in him. Something he would not have believed possible a few years ago.
He remembered how, after her mother died, she would wait up for him to return from a night call and heat up some Ovaltine, then sit with him to make sure he drank it. She took all his messages neatly and accurately and listened to his patients rambling on with as much kindness as his wife would have shown. Looking across at her sad sulky face, it seemed to him that he had thrown away something of unique worth and replaced it with shoddy.
Barbara Lessiter felt the hard paper ball pressing on her thigh when she moved. She wondered, for the millionth time in the last five minutes, where the hell she was going to find five thousand pounds.
Chapter Three
‘Where to now, sir?’
‘Well, there’s Mrs Quine in Burnham Crescent . . .’
‘I thought the others were doing the council houses.’
‘I’m doing that one, she’s Miss Simpson’s cleaner. Then there’s that alarmingly smart bungalow and the next four cottages - and Trace’s farm. Or rather, Tye House.’
‘Expect to see a bit of rank, do they? Top people?’
‘I can do without the mass observation, Troy. Just keep your wits about you and your eyes open.’
‘Right, Chief.’
‘And your pencil sharp. We’ll start with the farmhouse and work down.’
There was a graceful iron white-ribbed fanlight with lacy curlicues over the main door. The magnolia was in fulsome bloom, great waxy cups in dark green saucers pressing against the windows. Sergeant Troy gave the brass pull a yank and, a long way away, a bell could be heard tinkling. Barnaby wondered if they had a glass and mahogany case in the kitchen with a row of little bells jerking imperiously under their designations. Breakfast Room. Laundry. Still Room. Nursery. No one came.
‘Must be the maid’s day off.’ Troy was unable to sustain the jokey note. The remark came out as a sour sneer. He followed Barnaby round the side of the house, fighting angry memories. His mother had always had to remove her apron before answering the door. And her headscarf. He could see her now nervously patting her hair in the hall mirror, smoothing her collar. ‘Mrs Willows to see you, my lady.’
They entered a cobbled yard at the back of the house and, as they did so, a small dog, very thin, with a grey muzzle and brindled chest, came hurrying towards them. He was an old Jack Russell and his eyes were not good. He was quite close to the two men before he realized his mistake. Troy bent down to pat the dog but it turned, inconsolably, away. Barnaby approached the back door. ‘Perhaps we’ll have more luck here.’
It stood wide open, revealing a vast kitchen. A man, facing the door, sat at a refectory table in an attitude of complete dejection, his forehead supported on one hand, his shoulders sagging. Close to him, perched on the table’s edge with her back to Barnaby, was a young girl. As Barnaby watched she leaned forward and touched the man’s shoulder. Immediately he seized her hand then, looking up, saw the two men in the doorway and leapt to his feet. The girl turned to face them more slowly.