How cold he looks, she thought. But it can't be as cold as that outside. It's Henrietta!
What has she said to him?
'Bring your chair nearer, Edward. Come close to the fire.'
'What?'
'Your chair. To the fire.'
She was talking to him now, loudly and slowly, as though to a deaf person.
And suddenly, so suddenly that her heart turned over with relief, Edward, the real Edward, was there again. Smiling at her gently.
'Have you been talking to me. Midge?
I'm sorry. I'm afraid I was-thinking of something.'
'Oh, it was nothing. Just the fire.'
The sticks were crackling and some fir cones were burning with a bright clear flame.
Edward looked at them. He said:
'Ifs a nice fire.'
He stretched out his long thin hands to the blaze, aware of relief from tension.
Midge said, 'We always had fir cones at Ainswick…'
'I still do. A basket of them is brought in every day and put by the grate.'
Edward at Ainswick… Midge half closed her eyes, picturing it. He would sit, she thought, in the library, on the west side of the house. There was a magnolia that almost covered one window and which filled the room with a golden green light in the afternoons. Through the other window you looked out on the lawn and a tall Wellingtonia stood up like a sentinel. And to the right was the big copper beech, Oh, Ainswick-Ainswick…
She could smell the soft air that drifted in from the magnolia which would still, in September, have some great, white, sweetsmelling, waxy flowers on it… And the pine cones on the fire… and a faintly musty smell from the kind of book that Edward was sure to be reading… He would be sitting in the saddle-back chair, and occasionally, perhaps, his eyes would go from the book to the fire, and he would think, just for a minute, of Henrietta…
Midge stirred and asked:
'Where is Henrietta?'
'She went to the swimming pool.'
Midge stared. 'Why?'
Her voice, abrupt and deep, roused Edward a little.
'My dear Midge, surely you knew-oh, well-guessed. She knew Christow pretty well…'
'Oh, of course, one knew that! But I don't see why she should go mooning off to where he was shot. That's not at all like Henrietta. She's never melodramatic.'
'Do any of us know what anyone else is like? Henrietta, for instance…'
Midge frowned. She said:
'After all, Edward, you and I have known Henrietta all our lives.'
'She has changed.'
'Not really. I don't think one changes.'
'Henrietta has changed.' Midge looked at him curiously.
'More than we have, you and I?'
'Oh, I have stood still, I know that well enough. And you-'
His eyes, suddenly focussing, looked at her where she knelt by the fender. It was as though he was looking at her from a long way off, taking in the square chin, the dark eyes, the resolute mouth. He said:
'I wish I saw you more often. Midge my dear.'
She smiled up at him. She said:
'I know. It isn't easy, these days, to keep touch.'
There was a sound outside and Edward got up.
'Lucy was right,' he said. 'It has been a tiring day-one's first introduction to murder! I shall go to bed. Good night.'
He had left the room when Henrietta came through the window.
Midge turned on her.
'What have you done to Edward?'
'Edward?' Henrietta was vague. Her forehead was puckered. She seemed to be thinking of something far away.
'Yes, Edward. He came in looking dreadful-so cold and grey.'
'If you care about Edward so much, Midge, why don't you do something about him?'
'Do something? What do you mean?'
'I don't know. Stand on a chair and shout! Draw attention to yourself. Don't you know that's the only hope with a man like Edward?'
'Edward will never care about anyone but you, Henrietta. He never has.'
'Then it's very unintelligent of him.' She threw a quick glance at Midge's white face. 'I've hurt you. I'm sorry. But I hate Edward tonight-'
'Hate Edward? You can't…'
'Oh, yes, I can! You don't know-'
'What?'
Henrietta said slowly:
'He reminds me of such a lot of things I would like to forget.'
'What things?'
'Well, Ainswick, for instance.'
'Ainswick? You want to forget Ainswick?'
Midge's tone was incredulous.
'Yes, yes, yes! I was happy there. I can't stand, just now, being reminded of happiness… Don't you understand? A time when one didn't know what was coming. When one said confidently, everything is going to be lovely! Some people are wise-they never expect to be happy. I did.'
She said abruptly:
'I shall never go back to Ainswick.'
Midge said slowly:
«I wonder…'
Chapter XIV
Midge woke up abruptly on Monday morning.
For a moment she lay there bemused, her eyes going confusedly towards the door, for she half expected Lady Angkatell to appear-What was it Lucy had said when she came drifting in that first morning?
A difficult week-end? She had been worried … had thought that something unpleasant might happen.
Yes, and something unpleasant had happened-something that was lying now upon Midge's heart and spirits like a thick black cloud. Something that she didn't want to think about-didn't want to remember.
Something, surely, that frightened her…
Something to do with Edward…
Memory came with a rush. One ugly stark word-murder!
Oh, no, thought Midge, it can't be true.
It's a dream I've been having. John Christow, murdered, shot-lying there by the pool. Blood and blue water- like the jacket of a detective story… Fantastic, unreal … The sort of thing that doesn't happen to oneself… If we were at Ainswick, now.
It couldn't have happened at Ainswick.
The black weight moved from her forehead.
