Patricia Wentworth - Anna, Where Are You?

These thoughts were present in her mind without any passage of time. It was, in fact, no more than three minutes since she had closed the door of Emily Craddock’s room. She looked down the passage now and saw a door on the left. Behind that door someone moved. She switched off her torch again, went forward, and turned the handle.

She had promised Frank Abbott that she would run no risks. It did not really occur to her that she was running one now. Afterwards, when reproached on this head, she merely remarked soberly that she had not thought of it in that light.

“Then you were not being as intelligent as usual.”

“My dear Frank!”

“Well, what did you expect to find behind that door? Logically, it could only be one person-the murderer.”

At the time, though this probability was certainly present to her mind, it did not occur to her that it constituted a risk. She felt completely confident and able to deal with anything she might encounter.

She turned the handle and opened the door upon a lighted room. There was a writing-table, there were chairs, there were books. There were comfortable curtains, a good carpet, and a warm electric fire. The carpet showed a spreading stain of blood.

The blood came from the body of Peveril Craddock. It lay in front of the writing-table. A chair had been pushed over. There was a revolver beside the outflung right hand.

Mr. Peter Brandon was stooping over the body.

When that blinding light struck her in the face Thomasina gasped and flung up a hand to shield her eyes. Most girls would have screamed, but she had a good deal of self-control. A scream might have been heard, but not that choking gasp.

She flung up her hand, and at once someone caught her by the wrist and pulled her into the room. The person who was holding the electric lamp turned it away from her eyes and kicked the door shut. It slammed, and with the sound, sharp in the empty room and echoing from the empty walls, there came another sound, sharper, more definite, more horrifying-the sound of a shot.

At the time Thomasina did not disentangle the sounds. She was startled out of any capacity for thought. She stared, and caught her breath, and exclaimed,

“Anna!”

The grip on her wrist tightened.

“Quick-quick-we haven’t a minute!”

She was being pulled towards a door on the other side of the room. There was dust everywhere-its muffling softness under their feet, a choking cloud of it upon the air, the lamp dazzling upon a million floating specks-Anna’s voice in her ears, Anna’s hand on her wrist.

Just for a moment her mind was shocke4 into numbness. She had come here to find Anna Ball, and she had found her. It ought not to have been a shock, but it was. Afterwards she knew that she had not really thought that Anna was at Deepe House- she had not really expected to find her. She had quarrelled with Peter because he wanted her to go away. And because she wanted to stay she had built up a ridiculous imagination about Anna being shut up in a cellar. And then she had dared herself to come and see if it was true. She had taken the dare, but she hadn’t expected to find anything.

And now it was true. Not the cellar part of it, but Anna- Anna hurrying her along-Anna’s voice hard and urgent.

“Quick-quick-we can’t talk here! We haven’t a moment! We’ve got to talk!”

And then another dusty room, a passage, a door that was opened and slammed, and they were in Peveril Craddock’s garage.

Anna Ball put down the electric lamp and switched on an overhead light. They had come out of the dilapidation and decay of the house into what might have been any suburban garage-a cemented floor, fresh whitewash on the walls, a bench with tools, tins of petrol and lubricant, a couple of spare tyres, a small ordinary car. Nothing could have been more commonplace.

But when Anna turned from switching on the light everything changed. Because this was an Anna whom she had never seen before. It wasn’t only the clothes-and Anna in slacks and a flaming jersey was something very unlike anything that came to her out of the past which they had shared-it was Anna herself. The heavy, sallow, drooping creature who had hung on Thomasina like a weight was gone. Here was a taut young woman vibrant with energy, her hair standing out in a bush from a recent perm, her face made up to a smooth pallor, her mouth as scarlet as a pillar-box, and her eyes blazing. Anna’s eyes had always been her best feature. Peter had libelled them when he said they had a cast. They were good dark grey eyes with strongly growing lashes and a rather brooding way of looking at you. They were not brooding now. The thing that had smouldered in them was flaring. And it was hate-sheer ungovernable hatred.

It is one of the things which nobody can mistake. For a moment Thomasina felt nothing except surprise. Anna to look at her like that! When they had always been friends! When Anna had never had any other friend at all! She had carried the weight of being Anna’s only friend through all the years of being at school and college with her, through all the self-pity, the hurt feelings, the jealousies, the emotional scenes which were Anna’s idea of friendship. But that Anna should look at her like this! And for what?

She was to know. Insensibly she moved back until she stood against the wall. Anna stood where she was, a yard or two away, with the hatred in her eyes. She spoke now with something in her voice which Thomasina had never heard in it before. Enjoyment. Anna was enjoying herself-enjoying hating her, enjoying telling her about it. Because that was what she was doing.

“I always hated you-always-always- always ! Why? Are you really such a fool as not to know? You had everything, and I had nothing-except your damned charity! You had all the things I wanted, and every now and then you would toss me one of them-a dress you were tired of, or a hat you didn’t want! And thinking all the time how generous you were-how grateful I ought to be!”

Thomasina lifted her head and met those hating eyes.

“No, Anna! Oh, no!”

Anna Ball laughed.

“Of course you did! It’s a lovely part to play. And it doesn’t cost too much-just a few things you don’t want, and there you are, on the top of the world, feeling ever so noble and magnanimous! ‘Poor Anna-I must be kind to her.’ Do you think I haven’t seen you thinking that a thousand times? And how nice to be poor Anna whom nobody cares about, and have rich, fortunate Thomasina being kind to you!”

“Anna- please ! You don’t know what you are saying.”

Anna gave that horrid laugh again.

“My dear Thomasina, I know very well what I’m saying! I’ve had it saved up for a very long time, and I’m enjoying every minute of it! You’re going to listen to me now! I’ve had to listen to you often enough-preaching and talking pi!”

Thomasina said in a low shocked voice,

“I didn’t mean to preach.”

“Oh, no, of course not-you only did it! Now it’s my turn! It never occurred to you that poor Anna might make something out of her life after all-that she might have a lover and a life that was really worth living-excitement, adventure, and a man who could give them to her!”

“Mr. Sandrow,” said Thomasina gravely.

“I suppose that poor fool Emily Craddock talked!”

“Anna, we thought you were dead. Why did you let me think so? Why didn’t you write?”

“Because it didn’t suit me. Because Mr. Sandrow-” she gave the name a mocking twist-“Mr. Sandrow and I were having a very good time, and didn’t want you muddling and meddling in my affairs. I’ve got clothes of my own now, and money of my own, and a man of my own! Do you think that I didn’t know that you used to ask your friends to dance with me? If I forgave you for all the rest of it I’d never forgive you for that!” Her face was distorted by fury. Then the triumphant look came back to it. “But you see, you’re not wanted any more!”