irritation with Rolf seemed a trivial but dangerous indulgence. He was with them by choice but there had, in fact, been no choice. It was to Julian and her unborn child, and to them only, that he owed allegiance.
When he lifted his hand to press the doorbell at the huge gate in the wall he saw to his surprise that the gate was open. He beckoned Miriam and they went in together. He closed the gate behind him. The house was in darkness except for the sitting-room. The curtains were drawn but with an inch of light shining through. He saw that the garage, too, was unlocked, the door up and the dark bulk of the Renault parked inside. He was not surprised now to find the side door unlocked. He switched on the light of the hall, calling softly, but there was no reply. With Miriam at his shoulder, he walked down the passage to the sitting-room.
As soon as he pushed open the door he knew what he would find. The smell choked him, strong and evil as a contagion: blood, faeces, the stink of death. Jasper had made himself comfortable for the final act of his life. He was seated in the armchair before the empty fire, hands hanging loosely over the arms. The method he had chosen had been certain and catastrophic. He had put the muzzle of a revolver in his mouth and blown off the top of his head. What remained of it was slumped forward on his chest, where there was a stiffened bib of brown blood which looked like dried vomit. He had been left-handed and the gun lay on the floor by the chair, under a small round table which held his house and car keys, an empty glass, an empty claret bottle and a handwritten note, the first part in Latin, the last in English.
Miriam moved up to him and touched the cold fingers in an instinctive and futile gesture of compassion. She said: “Poor man. Oh, poor man.”
“Rolf would say he’s done us a service. No time wasted now in persuasion.”
“Why did he do it? What does the note say?”
“It’s a quotation from Horace. It says that there’s no pleasure in getting rid of one thorn among so many. If you can’t live well, get out. He probably found the Latin in the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.”
The English underneath was shorter and plainer. “I apologize for the mess. There is one bullet left in the gun.” Was that, Theo wondered, a warning or an invitation? And what had led Jasper to this act? Remorse, regret, loneliness, despair, or the realization that the thorn had been drawn but the pain and the hurt remained and were past healing? He said: “You’ll probably find the linen and blankets upstairs. I’ll get the stores.”
He was glad that he was wearing his long country coat. The inner pocket in the lining would easily take the revolver. He checked that there was one bullet in the chamber, removed it, and placed both gun and bullet in his pocket.
The kitchen, its working surfaces bare, a row of mugs hanging with their handles aligned, was grubby but tidy, with no sign that it had ever been used except for a tea-towel, crumpled and obviously recently washed, which had been laid across the empty draining rack to dry. The only discordant note in the ordered neatness was two rush mats rolled up and propped against the wall. Had Jasper perhaps intended to kill himself here and been concerned that the blood should be easily swabbed from the stone floor? Or had he intended once more to wash the stones and then realized the futility of this last obsessional concern for appearance?
The door of the store-room was unlocked. After twenty-five years of anxious husbandry, having no further need of his treasure store, he had left it open, as he had left open his life, to casual despoilers. Here too all was neatness and order. The wooden racks held large tin boxes, the edges sealed with tape. Each was labelled in Jasper’s elegant script: Meat, Tinned Fruit, Milk Powder, Sugar, Coffee, Rice, Tea, Flour. The sight of the labels, the letters so meticulously written, provoked in Theo a small spasm of compassion, painful and unwelcome, a surge of pity and regret, which the sight of Jasper’s splattered brains and bloody chest had been powerless to touch. He let it flow briefly over him, then concentrated on the job in hand. His immediate thought was to empty the tins over the floor and make a selection of the things they were most likely to need, at least for the first week, but he told himself there wasn’t time. Even to strip away the tape would hold him up. Better to take a selection unopened: meat, milk powder, dried fruit, coffee, sugar, tinned vegetables. The smaller tins labelled Drugs and Syringes, Water Purifying Tablets and Matches were obvious choices, as was a compass. Two paraffin stoves presented a more difficult decision. One was an old-fashioned single-burner, the other a more modern, cumbersome, triple-burner stove which he rejected as taking up too much room. He was relieved to find a tin of oil and a two-gallon tin of petrol. He hoped that the tank in the car wasn’t empty.
He could hear Miriam moving rapidly but quietly above, and as he came back from carrying out the second lot of tins to the car he met her coming down the stairs, her chin resting on four pillows.
She said: “May as well be comfortable.”
“They’ll take up quite a bit of room. Have you got all you need for the birth?”
“Plenty of towels and single sheets. We can sit on the pillows. And there’s a medicine chest in the bedroom. I’ve cleared that out, shoved everything in a pillowcase. The disinfectant will be useful but it’s mainly simple remedies—aspirin, bicarb, cough mixture. This place has got everything. Pity we can’t stay here.”
It was not, he knew, a serious suggestion, but he countered it. “Once they find I’m missing, this will be one of the very first places they’ll call. All the people I know will be visited and questioned.”
They worked together silently, methodically. The boot at last full, he closed it quietly then said: “We’ll put my car in the garage and lock it. I’ll lock the outer gate, too. It won’t keep out the SSP but it may prevent premature discovery.”
As he was locking the door of the cottage, Miriam laid a hand on his arm and said quickly: “The gun. Better not let Rolf know you’ve got it.”
There was an insistence, almost an authority in her voice which echoed his own instinctive anxiety. He said: “I’ve no intention of letting Rolf know.”
“Better not tell Julian either. Rolf would try to take it from you and Julian would want you to throw it away.”
He said curtly: “I shan’t tell either of them. And if Julian wants protection for herself and her child she’ll have to stomach the means. Does she aspire to be more virtuous than her God?”
Carefully he edged the Renault out of the gate and parked it behind the Rover. Rolf, pacing beside the car, was indignant.
“You’ve been a hell of a time. Did you have trouble?”
“No. Jasper’s dead. Suicide. We’ve collected as much as the car will hold. Drive the Rover into the garage and I’ll lock it and the gate. I’ve already locked the house.”
There was nothing worth transferring from the Rover to the Renault except his road maps and a paperback edition of Emma, which he found in the glove box. He slipped the book into his inner coat pocket, which held the revolver and his diary. Two minutes later they were together in the Renault. Theo took the driver’s seat. Rolf, after a moment’s hesitation, got in beside him. Julian sat in the back between Miriam and Luke. Theo locked the gate and tossed the key over. Nothing could be seen of the darkened house except the high black slope of the roof.
In the first hour they had to stop twice so that Miriam and Julian could disappear into the darkness. Rolf strained his eyes after them, uneasy once they were out of his sight. In reply to his obvious impatience, Miriam said: “You’ll have to get used to it. It happens in late pregnancy. Pressure on the bladder.”
At the third stop they all got out to stretch their legs and Luke too, with a muttered excuse, made off towards the hedgerow. With the car lights off and the engine still, the silence seemed absolute. The air was warm and sweet as if it were still summer; the stars were bright but high. Theo
