Agatha Christie - Towards Zero

"My dear girl," he said, "you can hardly see the mark. Why do you mind?"

Audrey paused before answering with evident sincerity: "It's because — because I just can't bear a blemish."

Thomas nodded. It fitted in with his knowledge of Audrey — of her instinct for perfection. She was in herself so perfectly finished an article.

He said suddenly: "You're far more beautiful than Kay."

She turned quickly.

"Oh, no, Thomas. Kay — Kay is really lovely."

"On the outside. Not underneath."

"Are you referring," said Audrey with faint amusement, "to my beautiful soul?"

Thomas knocked out the ashes of his pipe.

"No," he said. "I think I mean your bones."

Audrey laughed.

Thomas packed a new pipeful of tobacco. They were silent for quite five minutes, but Thomas glanced at Audrey more than once, though he did it so unobtrusively that she was unaware of it.

He said at last, quietly: "What's wrong, Audrey?"

"Wrong? What do you mean by wrong?"

"Wrong with you. There's something."

"No, there's nothing. Nothing at all."

"But there is."

She shook her head.

"Won't you tell me?"

"There's nothing to tell."

"I suppose I'm being a chump — but I've got to say it — " He paused. "Audrey — can't you forget about it? Can't you let it all go?"

She dug her small hands convulsively into the rock. "You don't understand — you can't begin to understand."

"But, Audrey, my dear, I do. That's just it. I know." She turned a small, doubtful face to him.

"I know exactly what you've been through. And — and what it must have meant to you."

She was very white now, white to the lips.

"I see," she said. "I didn't think — anyone knew."

"Well, I do. I — I'm not going to talk about it. But what I want to impress upon you is that it's all over — it's past and done with."

She said in a low voice: "Some things don't pass."

"Look here, Audrey, it's no good brooding and remembering. Granted you've been through Hell. It does no good to go over and over a thing in your mind. Look forward — not back. You're quite young. You've got your life to live and most of that life is in front of you. Think of to-morrow, not of yesterday."

She looked at him with a steady, wide-eyed gaze that was singularly unrevealing of her real thoughts.

"And supposing," she said, "that I can't do that?"

"But you must."

Audrey said gently: "I thought you didn't understand. I'm — I'm not quite normal about — some things, I suppose."

He broke in roughly: "Rubbish. You — " He stopped.

"I — what?"

"I was thinking of you as you were when you were a girl — before you married Nevile. Why did you marry Nevile?"

Audrey smiled. "Because I fell in love with him."

"Yes, yes, I know that. But why did you fall in love with him? What attracted you to him so much?"

She crinkled her eyes as though trying to see through the eyes of a girl now dead.

"I think," she said, "it was because he was so "positive." He was so much the opposite of what I was myself. I always felt shadowy — not quite real. Nevile was very real. And so happy and sure of himself and so — everything that I was not." She added with a smile: "And very good-looking."

Thomas Royde said bitterly: "Yes, the ideal Englishman — good at sport, modest, good-looking, always the little pukka sahib — getting everything he wanted all along the line."

Audrey sat very upright and stared at him.

"You hate him," she said slowly. "You hate him very much, don't you?"

He avoided her eyes, turning away to cup a match in his hands as he relit the pipe that had gone out.

"Wouldn't be surprising if I did, would it?" he said indistinctly. "He's got everything that I haven't. He can play games, and swim, and dance, and talk. And I'm a tongue-tied oaf with a crippled arm. He's always been brilliant and successful and I've always been a dull dog. And he married the only girl I ever cared for."

She made a faint sound. He said savagely: "You've always known that, haven't you? You knew I cared about you ever since you were fifteen. You know that I still care — "

She stopped him.

"No. Not now."

"What do you mean — not now?"

Audrey got up. She said in a quiet, reflective voice: "Because — now — I am different."

"Different in what way?"

He got up too, and stood facing her.

Audrey said in a quick, rather breathless voice: "If you don't know, I can't tell you … I'm not always sure myself. I only know — "

She broke off, and turning abruptly away she walked quickly back over the rocks towards the hotel.

Turning a corner of the cliff she came across Nevile. He was lying full length peering into a rock pool. He looked up and grinned.

"Hullo, Audrey."

"Hullo, Nevile."

"I'm watching a crab. Awfully active little beggar. Look, there he is."

She knelt down and stared where he pointed.

"See him?"

"Yes."

"Have a cigarette?"

She accepted one and he lit it for her. After a moment or two, during which she did not look at him, he said nervously: "I say, Audrey?"

"Yes?"

"It's all right, isn't it? I mean — between us."

"Yes. Yes, of course."

"I mean — we're friends and all that?"

"Oh, yes — yes, of course."

"I do want us to be friends."

He looked at her anxiously. She gave him a nervous smile.

He said conversationally: "It's been a jolly day, hasn't it? Weather good and all that?"

"Oh, yes — yes."

"Quite hot really for September."

There was a pause.

"Audrey — "

She got up.

"Your wife wants you; she's waving to you."

"Who — oh, Kay."

"I said your wife."

He scrambled to his feet and stood looking at her.

He said in a very low voice: "You're my wife, Audrey …"

She turned away. Nevile ran down on to the beach and across the sand to join Kay.

On their arrival at Gull's Point, Hurstall came out into the hall and spoke to Mary.

"Would you go up at once to her ladyship, Miss? She is feeling very upset and wanted to see you as soon as you got in."

Mary hurried up the stairs. She found Lady Tressilian looking white and shaken.

"Dear Mary, I'm so glad you have come. I am feeling most distressed. Poor Mr. Treves is dead."

"Dead?"

"Yes, isn't it terrible? So sudden. Apparently he didn't even get undressed last night. He must have collapsed as soon as he got home."

"Oh, dear, I am sorry."

"One knows, of course, that he was delicate. A weak heart. I hope nothing happened while he was here to overstrain it? There was nothing indigestible for dinner?"

"I don't think so — no, I am sure there wasn't. He seemed quite well and in good spirits."

"I am really very distressed. I wish, Mary, that you would go to the Balmoral Court and make a few inquiries of Mrs. Rogers. Ask her if there is anything we can do. And then the funeral. For Matthew's sake I would like to do anything we could. These things are so awkward at a hotel."

Mary spoke firmly.

"Dear Camilla, you really must not worry. This has been a shock to you."

"Indeed it has."

"I will go to the Balmoral Court at once and then come back and tell you all about things."

"Thank you, Mary dear; you are always so practical and understanding."

"Please try and rest now. A shock of this kind is so bad for you."

Mary Aldin left the room and came downstairs. Entering the drawing-room she exclaimed: "Old Mr. Treves is dead. He died last night after returning home."

"Poor old boy," exclaimed Nevile. "What was it?"

"Heart, apparently. He collapsed as soon as he got in."

Thomas Royde said thoughtfully: "I wonder if the stairs did him in?"