The Paw in the Bottle
- Автор: Чейз Джеймс Хэдли
- Год: 1949
- Язык: английский
- Год: Jarrolds
- Жанр: Криминальные детективы
Электронная книга - «The Paw in the Bottle». Краткое содержание книги:
Julie considered all men were alike. They were different only in their approach. As far as she was concerned they wanted only one thing. She found Wesley attractive, and when he insisted on staying with her in the new flat she was prepared to accept him as a lover. But it came as a shock to her pride when Wesley made no attempt nor showed any desire to be intimate with her. He was friendly and kind but impersonal, and it worried her. With other men she had always known where she was and could anticipate each move, but with Wesley she was mystified and frustrated, and as the days passed she began to hate him, suspecting that he could not forget that she was his wife’s maid and that was the reason why he was so cold to her.
To punish him she demanded expensive presents, but instead of being annoyed he seemed pleased and urged her to greater extravagance. He took her to Asprey’s in New Bond Street and bought her a gold and enamelled toilet set. He bought her a gold cigarette-case and lighter. He took her to the Savoy for lunch, the Berkeley to dinner and to Ciro’s to dance. They went riding in the Row. They went to cinemas and theatres. But all the time she was aware of this impersonal barrier between them, and raged against it.
Since the night of the murder she hadn’t had a moment to think of Harry Gleb. Wesley saw to that. Her days and nights were fully occupied in reckless spending, visits to night clubs, theatres and cinemas. There was no radio in that flat and no newspapers were delivered. She had no means of learning of Harry’s remand or that Mrs. French and Dana hadn’t yet been caught. She was kept so busy that she didn’t even suspect that to all intents and purposes she was a prisoner. No news of the outside world reached her. No one telephoned nor wrote to her. Wesley never left her for a moment.
She was quick to realize, however, that Wesley was willing to give her anything she wanted, and for some days now she had been hankering after Blanche’s wardrobe.
She decided it was time to broach the subject.
Before doing so she took care to make herself look as lovely as she knew how. She was in pyjamas and a polka-spotted red and white silk dressing-gown that Wesley had given her the day before. She looked attractive and she knew it, but Wesley was unmoved. He sat in an arm-chair before the fire and studied her without interest.
‘What particular mischief are you up to now?’
She smiled and made to sit on his lap but he pushed her gently away.
‘Go and stand by the fire where I can see you.’
He was exasperating, she thought, but it was no use letting him see how angry he made her.
‘I want some clothes,’ she began. A cigarette hung from her carefully painted lips and she had her hands in her pockets, drawing the thin silk tight across her small buttocks. She squinted a little as the smoke of the cigarette drifted past her nose and she surveyed Wesley with calculating shrewdness.
‘But surely you have enough clothes for the present. Aren’t you ever contented, Julie? As soon as you have one thing you want something else.’
‘I don’t like the clothes you’ve bought me. I’ve been thinking. There are all those clothes at the flat. They fit me. Why shouldn’t I make use of them?’
Wesley stared at her fixedly. She expected opposition and was braced for it.
‘They are Blanche’s clothes.’
‘She doesn’t need them now; I do.’
‘I merely mentioned the fact to remind you that she has worn them. I thought perhaps you would feel squeamish to wear the clothes of a dead woman.’
She was genuinely astonished.
‘But why? Of course, I wouldn’t wish to wear the dress she was murdered in — that’d be horrible, but the other clothes, why not? Why should they be wasted?’
‘Has it occurred to you that I might dislike to see you in my wife’s clothes?’
‘Why should you? She had hundreds of dresses. There must be dozens she wore when you were blind. Why should it matter to you if you don’t know them?’
He suddenly laughed.
‘You have an answer for everything. What a little ghoul you are. All right, Julie, have them by all means. I want you to be happy.’
She was quick to seize that opportunity.
‘Why?’
He stretched his legs towards the fire and smiled at her.
‘Why not? Why shouldn’t I try to make someone happy?’
‘And what do you get out of it?’
‘I have a charming companion, and besides, it interests me to see you emerging from your chrysalis. Why do you look so suspicious? Don’t you believe people help others without an ulterior motive?’
‘Men don’t help me without a motive. You said you wanted me to be your mistress. You have a funny idea of a mistress, haven’t you?’
‘I don’t recollect saying anything of the kind. I have no intention of making you my mistress, as you so crudely put it. I offered you a home, security and a thousand a year. I made no conditions. It is you who are interpreting the terms, and wrongly. I want nothing from you except to know you are happy.’ He paused to light a cigarette, went on: ‘Suppose you run along and change? If you want those dresses we’d better go over to the flat and get them.’
‘You don’t have to come. I can get them without bothering you.’
‘Don’t deprive me of your company, Julie; and besides, the hall porter might think you were stealing them.’
She felt colour rise in her cheeks.
‘Aren’t you going to the factory anymore?’ she asked, to change the subject. ‘Should you spend so much time with me?’
‘I can manage the factory quite well from here, Julie. Are you anxious that I shall run out of money? There’s no need to be worried. I have very able assistants.’ He was obviously laughing at her. ‘Will you get changed now? I wouldn’t like you to catch cold.’
She slammed the door as she left the room. It was the only way in which she could express her feelings.
She didn’t notice how pale he was as they rode up in the lift to the flat in Park Way. She was far too excited at the thought of possessing all those lovely clothes even to look at him. She had no misgivings about entering the flat again. Even the faint brown stain on the carpet meant nothing to her. Blanche might never have existed, and Harry was but a vague uneasy stirring of conscience far at the back of her mind.
While she was choosing the dresses Wesley paced up and down, his hands deep in his pockets, his chin on his chest. And when she selected one particular dress and held it up for inspection, he said suddenly with a rasp in his voice: ‘No! Not that one. Put it back!’
‘But I like it,’ she said, and her mouth set obstinately. ‘It’s just right for my colouring. Why shouldn’t I have it?’
‘Put it back!’
She saw the lines of pain on his face and the glitter in his eyes and recognized the danger signals. There were plenty of other dresses to choose from and with a little shrug she put the dress back.
‘Aren’t you nearly ready?’ he demanded impatiently. ‘You’ll never wear all those things.’
‘Oh yes, I will. You don’t think I’m going to miss an opportunity like this? All my life I’ve longed to have masses of clothes: I’ve got them now.’
At last she was ready to leave. She had packed two large suitcases with the clothes she had chosen, but even then she wasn’t satisfied. The room, she knew, contained jewellery and furs. She was reluctant to leave without some of them.
‘Couldn’t I have some jewellery?’ she asked, and smiled coaxingly. ‘Those dresses will look awfully bare without something to set them off.’