‘Paula… Paula! ’
Mrs Askham whirled to her feet. He was standing with his hands outstretched towards her.
Was it altogether real, the tableau enacting in that room, painfully extending itself to moments, a scene in which every actor had dried? The spindly man with his appealing hands and tears rolling down his cheeks, the thunderstruck woman with ghost-seeing eyes, the staring young man backed against the cabinet? It seemed to hang breathlessly on the brink of unbeing, as though a sudden movement might sweep it away: dissolved and cut by its own emotion like a celluloid shadow from the screen.
Then slowly Mrs Askham turned her back on Kincaid.
‘Paula!’
The movement drew him after it. But he seemed to be shackled, he could advance only one foot. He stopped. He became as motionless as before.
‘Paula. Oh, look at me!’
She wouldn’t. Her face was bitter. She wasn’t seeing Gently, though her eyes faced straight towards him.
‘Paula, I love you. It’s never changed. I love you, Paula. I love you!’
Her mouth opened before she spoke. Finally she said:
‘It’s no use, Reg.’
‘But, Paula, I love you. I want you!’
‘No, Reg. It’s no use.’
‘Paula, listen to me. I’m rich now…’
Her lips twisted. ‘And I’m poor!’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ He came another step. ‘I’m rich, Paula. Don’t you hear? We’ve got money now. A hundred thousand! I brought it back with me from Tibet.’
A hundred thousand…! Gently saw the pitying expression that passed over her face. What was a hundred thousand to Mrs Askham: would it melt one splinter of her ice? She’d tossed the sum away on trifles, some fresh bloodstock, a new yacht; and that little man in his scrubby suit thought he was going to tempt her with such a bagatelle! The anger blazed. She swung on Kincaid:
‘Are you blind to what you’ve done?’
‘Paula…!’ Her rage pushed him backwards, his lips quivered and fell dumb.
‘Don’t you realize you’ve made me a pauper — me, a millionairess; stripped this very gown from my back; taken the ring off my finger?’
‘But Paula, listen…’
‘Listen. Listen! Will that do any good now? Will it make me Harry’s widow again? Confirm my title to his estate? You’ve ruined me, Reg, that’s what you’ve done. You’ve practically tossed me into the street. And now you insult me with your pretty charity, your childish sentiment and your hundred thousand! What must I do about it — kiss you? Throw my arms round your neck?’
‘Paula… I don’t understand…’
Her savage laugh made him wince.
‘Don’t you? But Dicky Askham will understand, and so too will his lawyers. I had to fight that wastrel before, Reg. He contested the will right through the courts. And what sort of case do you think I’ll have now — as Harry’s mistress, with Henry his bastard? I’ll be fortunate to get a pittance: a beggarly percentage of your wonderful fortune. And Harry’s son can sweat in the works while his uncle squanders his father’s money…! And you’ve done it by walking in here, Reg, only by looking at me and saying, ‘Paula.’ Paula was dead and Paula was buried — and you, you’re the stranger who’s made me poor!’
She flung away again with vehement passion, her eyes sparkling and blind. Kincaid stood as though entranced; crushed, broken by her piercing anger. For several seconds he couldn’t speak. He seemed to have died inside his body. Then insensibly something began to return, the lamp of his glazed eyes lit again.
‘Paula…’
Her shoulders snatched at him, willing him to have done.
‘Paula, I didn’t know… I couldn’t guess that I would do you an injury.’
‘But you have, Reg. And I hate you for it.’
‘No, Paula. You mustn’t hate me.’
‘But I do. I do.’
‘You’re angry with me. Only angry.’
She stamped her foot, and to Gently’s surprise he could see a tear trembling under her lashes. But her lips were pressing tight and her chin thrust well forward.
‘I want you to go now, simply go.’
‘Not without you, Paula. Never.’
‘Reg, you must.’
‘Don’t ask it of me. I love you, Paula. You’re all my life.’
‘I’ve not been faithful.’
‘I understand that.’
‘You must suspect me.’
‘No. I can’t.’
‘I’m a hard bitch, Reg. You can ask my son,’
‘You’re Paula Kincaid. You’re my wife.’
What had come over him? He had suddenly transcended the eccentric character by which they had known him; even his voice had a deeper tone and his weedy figure appeared more substantial. And as his stature grew, Mrs Askham’s lessened, her commanding presence was whittled away. From being a priceless doll with a vice-royal manner, she was rapidly diminishing into something like a woman…
‘Listen, Paula. Why is this money important? What have you ever bought with it that has helped you to be happy? Has it made people love you? Has it made you less lonely? Has it stood to you as a husband since the man who took you died? If I’ve lost that for you, I’ve brought you something else, Paula. I’ve brought you a love that’s never altered, through all the bitter times past. And I’ve all the money we can ever need, more than we need with each other. Then why is your money so important? Why does losing it seem so hard?’
‘It’s no use, Reg; we’re strangers. You don’t know me now.’
‘I do know you.’ He came closer, standing right by her side.
‘I’m unforgivable. I know that.’
‘No, Paula. You’re always forgiven.’
‘I’ve got to hate you…’
‘You can’t do it.’
‘I must hate you. I must…’
Then the tears came. Quietly, without any sobbing. Making her feel unseeingly for her handkerchief to dab to her eyes.
‘You’re not to touch me,’ she said. ‘You’re not to touch me, Reg …’
She didn’t break down at all. But that would probably come later.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
In the middle of the proceedings arrived the Caernarvonshire Chief Constable, who had been warned by his spies that some development was afoot. He was a tall ex-Army man and the owner of a finely waxed moustache, and he evidently knew Mrs Askham and looked rather perturbed at finding her there. She gave no sign of knowing him, however; it was left to Evans to acknowledge his entry. Then after some whispering he took a chair in the background, there to make what he could of the goings-on.
Gently was questioning; that was inevitable. His slow, flat voice laid query to query. He was covering ground unfamiliar to the Chief Constable and having apparently small connection with Fleece’s murder. Really, the only
