Page 65 of The Hollow of Fear
“Why?” She was not nervous at all. “You must have done this hundreds of times—at least.”
“Not with you.”
“The process should be the same.”
He glanced out of the window, his strong, sharp profile to her. “It’s impossible to talk to you, sometimes.”
“You mean,allthe time? Or at least the vast majority? That’s why we wisely did not bother with conversation when we were children.”
He drew the curtains shut. It wasn’t six o’clock yet, but it was almost pitch-black outside. “What will we be to each other afterward?”
“What we have always been. Friends.”
“And you think this”—the word was accompanied by a gesture toward the bed—“won’t have repercussions?”
“So... you think we’ve had an easy, uncomplicated rapport and you don’t want it to become thorny and convoluted?”
He snorted. “Can I want it not to becomemorethorny and convoluted?”
“Why does it have to be? Why can’t things become simpler? Surely some of the difficulty we’ve experienced in our friendship could be attributed to the fact that we wanted to sleep together but you wouldn’t permit it.”
“Well, if you’re going to put it like that.”
“How would you put it, if not like that?”
He didn’t reply but crossed the room, pulled out his pocket watch, and set it down on the nightstand. She liked the sight of it—his watch on her nightstand, his person leaning against the side of her bed. She went up to him and placed her hands on his chest.
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For the apple tart, of course. For remembering it after all these years.”
“I’ve never forgotten—and I absolutely will not have it said that Bancroft feeds you better than I do.”
She smiled, cupped his face, and kissed him. He stood still and let her. And then he wrapped his arms around her and lifted her into bed.
Over supper,Chief Inspector Fowler and Treadles listened to Sergeant Ellerby’s account of the missing padlock and crate from the lavender house, and the unused estate gate with its chain and lock gone.
Treadles, who had been picking at his food until Sergeant Ellerby joined them, experienced a surge of appetite—so Miss Holmes had been making some progress of her own, after all. Thank goodness.
He attacked his steak and kidney pie with renewed vigor.
“And then we returned to the icehouse for another look. And that’s when Mr. Holmes asked me whether any bodies have turned up recently in these parts. I said no, not that I’ve heard of, and he asked me to keep an eye out for a well-dressed woman with her face bashed in and a man, not so well-dressed, who might have soiled himself before he died.”
“Is that so?” said Fowler sharply. “Did Mr. Holmes say why?”
“I asked who they were and how they were related to Lady Ingram’s death,” said Sergeant Ellerby. “Mr. Holmes said that he didn’t know enough to speak with complete confidence. Only that those bodies must be there—or at least the woman’s must be there, according to his deductions.”
Treadles remembered the strands of hair that Miss Holmes had found, some six feet away from where Lady Ingram had lain.
Fowler asked several more questions. When it became clear that the sergeant had nothing else to tell them, he thanked him gravely and wished him a good evening. Sergeant Ellerby saluted and left for his room at the constabulary, pushing open the door of the inn with some difficulty.
A high wind lashed. The night promised to be intolerable.
Treadles hesitated before he asked the chief inspector. “What do you think of the two bodies Mr. Holmes spoke of, sir?”
“A fishy thing to ask about, isn’t it? I can’t decide whether it’s pure chicanery. Hard to think it could be anything else, when he must know word would get back to us.”
