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Though Emma Sands had been Fa
Emma had never married; and Hugh had not met her since, though he had, at strangely regular intervals, seen her: distantly at a party, in the National Gallery, from a passing bus. He had occasion, of course, abundantly to know of her, since it was after their parting that she had begun to write the detective stories which had made her by now so famous. By this inconvenient fame, if by nothing else, her image had been kept vivid and even u
We commit her body to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
Hugh fell silent in his thoughts. He was aware, in the greater stillness of attention round about him, of the steady sound of the rain, as for a brief moment all present seemed to confront the mystery of their last end. They muster steadily, the dead. Yet in such a scene the dead person is defenceless, outfaced by the sturdy solidarity of the living. Hugh had wished to think of anyone but Fa
The relaxation of the dying hand. He jumped to feel A
He turned round to know if Randall and the children were following, and saw like a shaft of light through a cloud a momentarily opened vista between the rows of dark figures. Something at the far end of that vista arrested his attention for a second before the opening was closed again by the movement of people towards the gate. Two women he had seen like bats clinging together, their glasses glinting under the black canopy, two women facing him in grotesque stillness down the rainswept vista. One of them was Emma. Hugh stopped. The vision had gone, but as if to confirm its reality he caught sight of the intent averted face of his son, and his son's hand descending after a gesture of greeting. Hugh stood still for another moment. Then he set his feet in motion.
He passed slowly along the line of cars. He passed Randall's Vauxxhall and Felix Meecham's very dark blue Mercedes. Here at last was his own clumsy capacious Standard Vanguard.
Oh, spare me a little, that I may recover my strength: before I go hence and be no more seen.
Hugh staggered slightly as he came towards the car. A
Chapter two
'I THOUGHT this lot for the refugees, said A
They were sorting out Fa
It was Sunday morning and they had all been back at Grayhallock for three days. Some pale sunshine made the soaked garden glitter and the steaming spongy lawn warm to the touch. More distantly, between the beech trees, the bleak lines of spiky rose bushes could be seen, sloping away below the house, scattered with a confetti of multicoloured points; and below and beyond there stretched towards the invisible sea the flat pale green expanse of Romney Marsh, crossed with reedy dykes and dotted with distant sheep and presenting to the, eye towards a bluer horizon a remarkable number of tree-shielded and variously shaped church towers. It was still early in the month of June.
'And I thought we might give some little thing to Clare as a memento, said A
'Whatever you think best, said Hugh. 'But what about you and Miranda?
'Somehow, I'd rather not, said A
'Why ever should I mind? said Hugh irritably. 'Everything belongs to the family. Naturally I assumed you'd have all the jewellery. There's no point in sending it out to Sarah.
'But some of it's valuable —’
'Oh, for God's sake, A
He sat down on the bed. It had been odd, coming back into this so familiar room in which he had seen the season change from winter to spring, and now finding the bed all folded and flattened. There had been the mornings when he came in fearing to find Fa