Emma Page - Element of Chance

Harper An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain in 1975 by Collins Crime

Copyright © Emma Page 1975

Emma Page asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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HarperCollins Publishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.

Source ISBN: 9780008175948

Ebook Edition © MARCH 2016 ISBN: 9780008175955

Version [2016-02-18]

DEDICATION Dedication Copyright Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 About the Author By Emma Page About the Publisher

For Ginge

Poet Extraordinary

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Dedication DEDICATION Dedication Copyright Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 About the Author By Emma Page About the Publisher For Ginge Poet Extraordinary

Copyright

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

About the Author

By Emma Page

About the Publisher

CHAPTER 1

SEVEN-FIFTEEN on a calm, palely golden Friday morning in October. Andrew Rolt – Area Manager of CeeJay Plant Hire Limited – came slowly down the stairs of his large Victorian house on the outskirts of Barbourne. He was already dressed for work in a dark business suit; the skilful cut of the jacket concealed his thickening waistline, the beginnings of a paunch. Although he was not much over forty his brown hair was liberally streaked with grey. He was still passably good-looking in a boyish way; his features retained something of a vulnerable air.

He reached the front hall and went slowly towards the rear of the house. He had slept badly again, felt little appetite at the thought of toast or coffee. He halted in the doorway of the big silent kitchen and turned his head in the direction of the dining room with its store of bottles discreetly housed in the sideboard. He felt jittery, apprehensive. Surely the letter must come by this morning’s post. It had reached his ears in the gossipy interchanges of the trade that the interviews for the Kain Engineering job were scheduled for next Monday afternoon. If his name was on the short list they must surely let him know by today.

He had expected to hear yesterday morning, had come downstairs confident that he’d find the letter in the wire cage on the inside of the front door. He’d sent off two previous applications for jobs in September, both unsuccessful; when the second application had come to nothing he realized what was holding him back. This time he had corrected the error. He hadn’t put ‘Living apart’ in the box opposite ‘Marital status’; this time he had simply written: ‘Married.’

But yesterday there had been no word from Kain Engineering. There is still Friday, he had told himself, rallying almost at once from the old feeling of hopelessness that rose in him at the sight of the empty letter cage; there is no need yet for despair. It was despair that threatened him nowadays, a sense of failure and isolation that confronted him in unexpected moments, leaping out from behind a word, a look. He had to break out now from the barriers closing round him. In a couple of years he would be forty-five; he must make the push without delay – and must succeed in it – if he was to escape the insidious downward slope.

He glanced at his watch. Seven twenty-two. The post was scarcely ever later than seven-thirty. He turned from the kitchen and walked hesitantly towards the dining room. Nothing wrong with just one drink, it would make bearable the next few minutes of waiting.

In the large dining room with its tall windows framed in long drapes of plum-coloured velvet, he stooped to open the sideboard cupboard, paused with one hand already reaching for a bottle and stood for a moment with his eyes closed. No, he would not take a drink. He straightened up, sighed deeply and closed the cupboard.

He went quickly into the hall and let himself out into the garden, kept in trim by a jobbing gardener and glowing now with the deep rich colours of autumn. Chrysanthemums, dahlias, asters; shrubs with their soaring sprays and thick clusters of berries, white, scarlet and purple.

He wandered along the neat paths, contemplated the drift of yellow leaves in the shrubbery, ran a finger over the creamy ruffles of a late rose. He had gone to a nursery five years ago when Alison had said she would marry him. He had been astounded at his good fortune, had felt a great surge of optimism, a fierce late blossoming of the romantic impulse. He had selected twenty-one rose bushes – one for every year of Alison’s life. He had created this pretty little rose garden with a vision of the two of them strolling beside it in warm summer evenings.

By the time the bushes had established themselves, when they had been in the ground scarcely more than two years, Alison had turned her back on the marriage, had walked out on him, had returned to secretarial work.

She hadn’t mentioned divorce. She had no legal grounds for such a step and it was certainly the last thing he wanted. In the first few months after her departure he had telephoned, written, gone to see her, made a succession of appeals for her return. By degrees the appeals grew less frequent, died away. He no longer cherished any very strong hope that they would succeed and now that they had lived apart for over two years he was afraid to approach her again. His action might make her realize that sufficient time had gone by to allow a petition for divorce by consent.

Out on the road, some little distance away, he heard the sound of a vehicle. A light sweat broke out on his forehead. He began to walk back towards the house with an air of casualness. The vehicle slowed to make the turn in through the gates. It came up the drive, disclosing itself as a red mail van; it halted when Rolt stepped into view. He took the letters from the postman and flipped them apart.