‘Best not,’ he said, thinking of the tedious job his father-in-law had found for him following Irene’s last intervention. But then, and not without a trace of irony, realising that an important role with more responsibility had now been unexpectedly thrust upon him in the form of fatherhood, he said, in a more conciliatory tone, ‘You should get some sleep, Irene. You need to look after yourself. I don’t know what you thought you were doing dancing all night in your condition.’
She rose from the dressing table stool and giggled, which was very unlike her – Irene wasn’t a giggler; she was always too poised for such behaviour. ‘That’s just what Mummy said to me.’
‘You told her before me?’ Arthur said, vexed that he wasn’t actually the first to know, although it shouldn’t have surprised him. Irene and her mother came as a pair; nothing happened to one that the other didn’t know about.
‘She guessed,’ Irene replied. ‘She noticed that I wasn’t eating breakfast, that the very thought of it made me feel queasy.’
Arthur hadn’t noticed that, but then he had been somewhat preoccupied. ‘I suppose your mother told your father?’ he said.
Irene pulled back the heavy eiderdown and got into bed. ‘Naturally she did. But I swore them both to secrecy until I’d told you.’ She giggled again. ‘And now that I have, the whole world can know!’
Later, when he had put out the light and the wind was howling and making the curtains sway at the draughty window, Arthur tried to take stock.
A baby. He was going to be a father.
He still could not work out just how he felt about it. He wasn’t exactly unhappy, but neither did he feel particularly pleased or excited. It would just be another burden to carry. As if he didn’t have enough on his mind.
The events of Christmas Eve were never far from his thoughts. Daily he’d searched the newspaper for a report of the death of a woman in Wembley, but had found nothing. Had Pamela’s life been of so little consequence her death wasn’t worth mentioning? Ironically, he could almost feel sorry for her, but then he would remind himself of what she’d been prepared to do.
It was possible that her body had not yet been discovered, that it was lying where he’d left it on the floor of that poky back bedroom, the curtains drawn. She had never spoken about family, or the neighbours, so perhaps there was nobody who would miss her, or mourn her passing.
In the moments immediately after bringing that ashtray crashing down on Pamela’s skull, Arthur had sat on the edge of the bed and gathered his wits. That was when the reality of what he’d done had hit home and he’d had to force himself to breathe deeply to combat the shock.
Murder; he’d committed murder. He hadn’t intended to. All he’d wanted to do was ensure the wretched woman wouldn’t extract a penny piece from him. Not ever. But looking at the gruesomely lifeless body on the floor at his feet, blood staining the rug beneath her head, he’d had to accept that this was not something he could now undo. What was done was done.
Once the worst of the shock had passed, he quickly set about covering his tracks, but more importantly, finding where Pamela had hidden the negatives of the photographs that had been taken of him on her doorstep.
It hadn’t been difficult. He’d found them in her private sanctuary, in a wooden box at the bottom of the wardrobe. They were not the only photographs he discovered. He also found a notebook containing a list of men’s names, his included. It was a client list. How sickeningly methodical she had been. Any qualms Arthur had experienced at having taken a life existed no more. In fact he’d go so far as to say he had done the world a favour in ridding it of such a vile woman.
His conviction was compounded as he continued to search through Pamela’s things and found her bank statements neatly stored in another box. A look through them showed regular amounts of money being deposited into an account for the last six months. She had been systematically blackmailing half a dozen poor devils who would very likely sigh a massive sigh of relief when they realised they would no longer be at her mercy. They would thank him if they only knew who had brought about an end to the extortion.
He could see from the bank statements that the initial request she had made of him would very probably have been only the start. It puzzled him why she had left it until now to blackmail him. Had the other men been easier targets? He would never know, and frankly he didn’t care.
He’d thought hard about his next step after sorting through Pamela’s things. Should he remove all evidence of the other men who had been blackmailed, or leave the notebook so that her death would be pinned on one of them?
In the end, and deeming it a necessary insurance policy – an echo of Pamela’s own words – he had carefully removed the page from the notebook that contained his name, putting it safely in his briefcase along with the photographs. He then went around the house meticulously wiping any surface he might have touched.
It was dark when he left, and with the brim of his hat pulled down and his coat collar up, he strolled away from the house as nonchalantly as he could in the direction of the train station.
The only fly in the ointment was that the photographer who had taken the incriminating pictures was an unknown quantity. There was no way of knowing who it was; Arthur had been unable to find any reference to him in amongst the carefully kept records. Would the partner in crime have kept copies? He had no way of knowing, and there was little point in worrying about something he had no control over.
But he’d learnt an important lesson. There would be no more visits to women to satisfy those urges that Irene would recoil from in horror; he would have to turn his back on them and satisfy himself with what his wife could provide.
It would be his New Year’s resolution, not to stray. Moreover, from here on, he would look upon the whole sordid business as a warning, and a lucky escape. If he so much as allowed a single thought to step out of line, he would have to remind himself of the wholly apposite proverb that one of the masters used to quote to the boys at school: ‘The lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword.’
Chapter Forty-Five
A week after Billy’s proposal, Florence woke to a beautiful morning with a low sun sending long shadows stretching across the glittering hoar frost that covered the garden. Whitened cobwebs hung like delicate lace doilies amongst the bushes and a blackbird pecked hungrily at the ruby-red berries on the holly.
It was truly the most glorious of mornings, and within a few hours Florence would no longer be Florence Massie, she would be Florence Minton. She could say the words a hundred times over in her head and still it wouldn’t seem real. Glory be, she was actually marrying Billy Minton!
Once she had said yes to Billy’s proposal and he had told his parents, everything had moved at lightning speed for them to be married before he returned to barracks. He would be gone tomorrow and he didn’t have a clue where he would be sent. But for now, all that mattered was that they made it through the day without Billy’s mother finding some just cause and impediment as to why her son should not take Florence as his lawful wife.
Miss Romily had been delighted at the news, but was anxious to know that Florence would still want to work at Island House. It simply hadn’t crossed Florence’s mind that she wouldn’t carry on as normal. At this stage, she and Billy both agreed, that there was no point in finding anywhere else to live, they would deal with that when they needed to.
They weren’t the only ones who were going to be married, Allegra and Elijah were also tying the knot, and with two ceremonies taking place, and at only a week’s notice, Reverend Tate had somewhat pompously taken it upon himself to propose that since there was a war on and there were economies to be made, they might like to consider a joint wedding. ‘Lazy old devil,’ Mrs Partridge had muttered. ‘The man’s too idle to conduct two weddings at such short notice, more like it.’
Florence hadn’t thought Allegra would agree – after all, she was a Devereux and had probably expected a grand affair – but she was all for it, even joked that she would be able to hide behind Florence so people couldn’t see just how big she now was.
