In the Blood. Philip Loraine

of paper, and crossed to the open back door. There he paused, looked back at brother and sister, and said, ‘Fall my arse!’

      Meg Tyson was a trifle—but only a trifle—put out. ‘Men! And they call us the gossips!’

      Both Daniel and Kate had been fascinated by the old man’s parting shot. Daniel said, ‘Was there … you know—a lot of talk about her death in the village?’

      ‘In this village there’s a lot of talk if a cat has kittens.’

      ‘But your father,’ Daniel persisted, ‘seems to think she didn’t fall. What’s that supposed to mean, that she was pushed?’

      ‘Oh heavens, there wasn’t no end to the daft stories went around! But if you said, “All right, who pushed her then, and what did they stand to gain?” they’d scratch their heads and look stupid—and so they are. Then there was a lot of nonsense about thousands of pounds under the floorboards and a fortune in jewellery. I sometimes think you could certify this whole village and do no injustice.’

      ‘All the same,’ suggested Kate, ‘you just said it your-self—there does seem to have been something not quite right about the way she died.’

      Despite her little speech concerning the stupidity of her fellow villagers, Meg Tyson was by nature sensible and cautious; she considered the matter in silence for a moment, clearly wondering whether or not to go any further: which lent added weight to her words when finally she said, ‘Put it this way. I must have seen Mrs Ackland come down those stairs dozens—no hundreds—of times since she lost her sight, and never once did she ever falter.’ With which she shut her prim little mouth tightly to indicate that enough had been said.

      This piece of investigation had taken too long, and Kate, who was always back at the hotel by midday, was now late—which meant driving up and over the Cotswolds faster than she felt to be safe. She was therefore abstracted, and Daniel, sensing it, didn’t ask questions or pursue his own reasoning out loud. When they reached Woodman’s he rolled swiftly out of the car and upright on to his crutches.

      Kate said, ‘Sorry! You know what I’m like.’

      ‘It doesn’t matter—we can discuss it next week. And don’t drive too fast, you’re not that late.’

      He stood there, watching her go, and, as always, the sight of his slightly twisted figure, diminishing in the rear mirror, then lost to sight, aroused in her the usual pang of pity and admiration and love. Sometimes she dreamed he was cured—or was it a dream of their youth before the crash?—and they were running together over short springy turf, running and laughing.

      Hill Manor Hotel could hardly have been more perfectly positioned as far as Kate was concerned: only fifty miles from Woodman’s, door to door. Daniel had been right, she wasn’t that late, but swung into her parking space in front of the no-nonsense Early Victorian façade with ten minutes to spare. The first thing she saw when she went behind the desk was that Mr Stephen Callender had booked into his usual room, Number 22—there had been no prior arrangement.

      All thoughts of her grandmother’s death and of the mysterious letter, which had occupied her mind during the drive, were instantly forgotten. Her stomach dropped inside her and she could not, for a good minute, think of even one of the many duties she ought to be performing. The reaction seemed to her too extreme; it offended her sense of efficiency.

      He did not emerge for luncheon but, according to Room Service, ordered a smoked salmon omelette, green salad, and a bottle of Pils to be sent up to him. This was unusual, but Kate, going into the dining-room to check tables, didn’t altogether mind being rid of his presence which, though undemanding, demanded all her attention. The meal on this sunny Tuesday provided trouble enough, with twice the number of expected guests and everybody, for some reason, wanting Dover Sole. Many had to make do with something else because, as was well known, Alex refused to freeze fish or meat.

      But despite such preoccupations, Kate’s heart was pounding furiously when, at four o’clock, she tapped lightly on the door of Number 22 and went in. She had expected him to be working, but he was standing at the window staring down into the garden, and even though he was smiling when he turned, some trace of a previous thought, an uneasy thought, still clung to him. Kate ran into his arms and, locked in them, his demanding mouth over hers, fell on to the bed beneath him. They had not seen each other for five days—an eternity.

      But sexual satisfaction, however absolute, was one thing, that shadow of unease another. Later, when he was propped on one elbow, gazing down at his hand as it moved gently over her body, she again caught some shadow of it behind his eyes. ‘Steve, what’s wrong?’

      Still caressing her, he said, ‘This is.’

      She sat up, perturbed, but he pressed her down, leaning on her, hairy chest holding her flat. She said, ‘Look—if this is some kind of brush-off I’d rather have it straight. I’ll survive—probably.’

      He grimaced and shook his head. ‘I told you I’d never felt like this before; you didn’t believe me.’

      ‘No, I didn’t.’

      ‘It’s true.’ She saw that it well might be. ‘I want to be with you, Kate. I want us to spend time together, know each other. I don’t go for these … hurried sessions.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Five past five. Less than an hour and you’ve got to be on duty.’

      She nodded.

      ‘I was free all weekend—wanting you, not knowing what to do with myself. But you were working. Then, on Monday when you were free, I had to be in Leeds at a conference.’

      She looked away from his troubled eyes.

      ‘And even if I hadn’t been in Leeds, there’s your brother—don’t say anything, of course you have to be with him, poor sod!’

      ‘I can’t … Steve, I won’t give up my job.’

      ‘Why should you? You’ve worked damned hard to get where you are.’ He didn’t need to say that the same was true of him, she already knew it. Like her, he had seen no point in further education, and in any case, he came of a humble background and didn’t possess the qualifications for university even if he’d wanted to go to one. Also, he had a widowed mother in Hounslow who, in spite of a variety of unskilled and demeaning jobs which he hated her doing, was in reality dependent on him.

      All this had been woven into his thoughts as he’d stood at the window waiting for Kate, and the more he considered their relationship the less tenable it seemed. He’d become involved with the one girl among hundreds, thousands, whose life ran counter to his. They were fixed in different orbits, forever sweeping past each other in opposite directions.

      Steve Callender had started out as a nothing, a dogsbody in one of the larger advertising firms, but he’d been a bright lad, eager to learn, personable, clever at hiding his ambition from those who would resent it. His rise may have seemed spectacular to others, but to him, with his nose to the grindstone, it seemed exactly what it was: years and years of slogging application. The first time he changed jobs it really did look as if he’d misjudged the upward leap and would fall into the gaping abyss of failure. In the event he’d managed to claw his way upward once more and the gamble had paid off. It had also given him courage when, two years later, the opportunity arose again. Knowing he was too young and inexperienced he’d taken another, even more dangerous leap across the chasm to Boyd Electronics; exerting every iota of charm and audacity at his command, and lying through his teeth, he had managed to heave himself up and over and into an executive position: now the executive position.

      No, he wasn’t going to abandon that for any girl, not even for Kate, and because of it he understood that she wasn’t going to abandon her job either; she knew it backwards, she was good at languages, and within a year or two she could jump from the eminence of Hill Manor (highly recommended in every guide he’d ever seen) to almost any job she wanted anywhere in the world.

      Studying his face, watching the shadows of his thoughts flitting across it, she realized that after all these