That wasn't Mum, Pinkie.'
He came slowly up, watching her closely, judging.
'Who was it?'
'It was that woman. The one who used to come to Snow's asking questions.'
'What did she want?'
'She wanted me to go away from here.'
'Why?'
'Pinkie, she knows.'
'Why did you say it was your Mum?'
'I told you I didn't want you to worry.'
He was beside her, watching her; she faced him back with a worried candour, and he found that he believed her as much as he believed anyone, his restless cocky pride subsided--he felt an odd sense of peace, as if for a while he hadn't got to plan.
'But then,' Rose went anxiously on, 'I thought perhaps you ought to worry.'
'That's all right,' he said and put his hand on her shoulder in an awkward embrace.
'She said something about paying money to someone. She said she was getting warm to you.'
'I don't worry,' he said and pressed her back.
Then he stopped, looking over her shoulder. In the doorway of the room the flower lay. He had dropped it when he closed the door, and then he began at once to calculate she followed me, of course she saw the flower, she knew I knew. That explains everything, the confession.... All the while he was down there below with Dallow she had been wondering what she had to do to cover her mistake. A clean breast the phrase made him laugh a clean tart's breast, the kind of breast Sylvie sported cleaned up for use. He laughed again; the horror of the world lay like infection in his throat.
'What is it, Pinkie?'
'That flower,' he said.
'What flower?'
'The one she brought.'
'What... where...?'
Perhaps she hadn't seen it then... maybe she was straight after all... who knows? Who, he thought, will ever know? And with a kind of sad excitement what did it matter anyway? He had been a fool to think it made any difference; he couldn't afford to take risks. If she were straight and loved him it would be just so much easier, that was all. He repeated: 'I don't worry. I don't need to worry. I know what to do. Even if she got to know everything I know what to do.' He watched her shrewdly. He brought his hand round and pressed her breast. 'It won't hurt,' he said.
'What won't hurt, Pinkie?'
'The way I'll manage things....' He started agilely away from his dark suggestion. 'You don't want to leave me, do you?'
'Never,' Rose said.
'That's what I meant,' he said. 'You wrote it, didn't you. Trust me, I'll manage things if the worst comes to the worst so it won't hurt either of us. You can trust me,' he went smoothly and rapidly on, while she watched him with the dazed tricked expression of someone who has promised too much, too quickly. 'I knew,' he said, 'you'd feel like that. About us never parting. What you wrote.'
She whispered with dread. 'It's a mortal...'
'Just one more,' he said. 'What difference does it make? You can't be damned twice over, and we're damned already so they say. And anyway it's only if the worst... if she finds out about Spicer.'
'Spicer,' Rose moaned, 'you don't mean Spicer too...?'
'I only mean,' he said, 'if she finds out that I was here in the house but we don't need to worry till she does.'
'But Spicer,' Rose said.
'I was here,' he said, 'when it happened, that's all.
I didn't even see him fall, but my solicitor...'
'He was here too?' Rose said.
'Oh, yes.'
'I remember now,' Rose said. 'Of course I read the paper. They couldn't believe, could they, that he'd cover up anything really wrong? A solicitor.'
'Old Drewitt,' the Boy said, 'why' again the unused laugh came into rusty play 'he's the Soul of Honour.' He pressed her breast again and uttered his qualified encouragement. 'Oh, no, there's no cause to worry till she finds out. Even then, you see, there's that escape. But perhaps she never will. And if she doesn't, why' his fingers touched her with secret revulsion 'we'll just go on, won't we' and he tried to make the horror sound like love 'the way we are.'
But it was the Soul of Honour none the less who really worried him. If Cubitt had given that woman the idea that there was something wrong about Spicer 's death as well, whom could she go to but Mr. Drewitt?
She wouldn't attempt anything with D allow; but a man of law when he was as clever as Drewitt was was always frightened of the law. Drewitt was like a man who kept a tame lion cub in his house: he could never be quite certain that the lion to whom he had taught so many tricks, to beg and eat out of his hand, might not one day unexpectedly mature and turn on him; perhaps he might cut his cheek shaving and the law would smell the blood.
In the early afternoon he couldn't wait any longer; he set out for Drewitt's house. First he told Dallow to keep an eye on the girl in case... More than ever yet he had the sense that he was being driven further and deeper than he'd ever meant to go. A curious and cruel pleasure touched him he didn't really care so very much it was being decided for him, and all he had to do was to let himself easily go. He knew what the end might be it didn't horrify him: it was easier than life.
Mr. Drewitt's house was in a street parallel to the railway, beyond the terminus; it was shaken by shunting engines; the soot settled continuously on the glass and the brass plate. From the basement window a woman with tousled hair stared suspiciously up at him she was always there watching visitors from a hard and bitter face; she was never explained: he had always thought she was the cook, but it appeared now she was the 'spouse' twenty- five years at the game.
The door was opened by a girl with grey underground skin an unfamiliar face. 'Where's Tilly?' the Boy said.
'She's left.'
'Tell Drewitt, Pinkie's here.'
'He's not seeing anyone,' the girl said. 'This is a Sunday, ain't it?'
'He'll see me.' The Boy walked into the hall, opened a door, sat down in a room lined with filing boxes; he knew the way. 'Go on/ 7 he said, 'tell him. I know he's asleep. You wake him up.'
'You seem to be at home here,' the girl said.
'I am.' He knew what those filing boxes contained marked Rex v. Innes, Rex v. T. Collins they contained just air. A train shunted and the empty boxes quivered on the shelves; the window was open only a crack, but the radio from next door came in Radio Luxembourg.
'Shut the window,' he said. She shut it sullenly. It made no difference; the walls were so thin, you could hear the neighbour move behind the shelves like a rat.
He said: 'Does that music always play?'
'Unless it's a talk,' she said.
'What are you waiting for? Go and wake him.'
'He told me not to. He's got indigestion.'
Again the room vibrated and the music wailed through the wall.
'He's always got it after lunch. Go on and wake him.'
'It's a Sunday.'
'You'd better go quick,' he obscurely threatened her, and she slammed the door on Kim a little plaster fell.
