Evil Under the Sun. Agatha Christie
‘Yes.’
‘You’ve not changed much, Rosamund.’
‘Yes, I have. I’ve changed enormously.’
‘You’ve been very successful and you’re rich and all that, but you’re the same old Rosamund.’
Rosamund murmured:
‘I wish I were.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Nothing. It’s a pity, isn’t it, Kenneth, that we can’t keep the nice natures and high ideals that we had when we were young?’
‘I don’t know that your nature was ever particularly nice, my child. You used to get into the most frightful rages. You half-choked me once when you flew at me in a temper.’
Rosamund laughed. She said:
‘Do you remember the day that we took Toby down to get water rats?’
They spent some minutes in recalling old adventures.
Then there came a pause.
Rosamund’s fingers played with the clasp of her bag. She said at last:
‘Kenneth?’
‘Um.’ His reply was indistinct. He was still lying on his face on the turf.
‘If I say something to you that is probably outrageously impertinent will you never speak to me again?’
He rolled over and sat up.
‘I don’t think,’ he said seriously, ‘that I would ever regard anything you said as impertinent. You see, you belong.’
She nodded in acceptance of all that last phrase meant. She concealed only the pleasure it gave her.
‘Kenneth, why don’t you get a divorce from your wife?’
His face altered. It hardened—the happy expression died out of it. He took a pipe from his pocket and began filling it.
Rosamund said:
‘I’m sorry if I’ve offended you.’
He said quietly:
‘You haven’t offended me.’
‘Well then, why don’t you?’
‘You don’t understand, my dear girl.’
‘Are you—so frightfully fond of her?’
‘It’s not just a question of that. You see, I married her.’
‘I know. But she’s—pretty notorious.’
He considered that for a moment, ramming in the tobacco carefully.
‘Is she? I suppose she is.’
‘You could divorce her, Ken.’
‘My dear girl, you’ve got no business to say a thing like that. Just because men lose their heads about her a bit isn’t to say that she loses hers.’
Rosamund bit off a rejoinder. Then she said:
‘You could fix it so that she divorced you—if you prefer it that way.’
‘I dare say I could.’
‘You ought to, Ken. Really, I mean it. There’s the child.’
‘Linda?’
‘Yes, Linda.’
‘What’s Linda to do with it?’
‘Arlena’s not good for Linda. She isn’t really. Linda, I think, feels things a good deal.’
Kenneth Marshall applied a match to his pipe. Between puffs he said:
‘Yes—there’s something in that. I suppose Arlena and Linda aren’t very good for each other. Not the right thing for a girl perhaps. It’s a bit worrying.’
Rosamund said:
‘I like Linda—very much. There’s something—fine about her.’
Kenneth said:
‘She’s like her mother. She takes things hard like Ruth did.’
Rosamund said:
‘Then don’t you think—really—that you ought to get rid of Arlena?’
‘Fix up a divorce?’
‘Yes. People are doing that all the time.’
Kenneth Marshall said with sudden vehemence:
‘Yes, and that’s just what I hate.’
‘Hate?’ She was startled.
‘Yes. Sort of attitude to life there is nowadays. If you take on a thing and don’t like it, then you get yourself out of it as quick as possible! Dash it all, there’s got to be such a thing as good faith. If you marry a woman and engage yourself to look after her, well, it’s up to you to do it. It’s your show. You’ve taken it on. I’m sick of quick marriage and easy divorce. Arlena’s my wife, that’s all there is to it.’
Rosamund leaned forward. She said in a low voice:
‘So it’s like that with you? “Till death do us part”?’
Kenneth Marshall nodded his head.
He said:
‘That’s just it.’
Rosamund said:
‘I see.’
II
Mr Horace Blatt, returning to Leathercombe Bay down a narrow twisting lane, nearly ran down Mrs Redfern at a corner.
As she flattened herself into the hedge, Mr Blatt brought his Sunbeam to a halt by applying the brakes vigorously.
‘Hullo-ullo-ullo,’ said Mr Blatt cheerfully.
He was a large man with a red face and a fringe of reddish hair round a shining bald spot.
It was Mr Blatt’s apparent ambition to be the life and soul of any place he happened to be in. The Jolly Roger Hotel, in his opinion, given somewhat loudly, needed brightening up. He was puzzled at the way people seemed to melt and disappear when he himself arrived on the scene.
‘Nearly made you into strawberry jam, didn’t I?’ said Mr Blatt gaily.
Christine Redfern said:
‘Yes, you did.’
‘Jump in,’ said Mr Blatt.
‘Oh, thanks—I think I’ll walk.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Mr Blatt. ‘What’s a car for?’
Yielding to necessity Christine Redfern got in.
Mr Blatt restarted the engine, which had stopped owing to the suddenness with which he had previously pulled up.
Mr Blatt inquired:
‘And what are you doing walking about all alone? That’s all wrong, a nice-looking girl like you.’
Christine said hurriedly:
‘Oh! I like being alone.’
Mr Blatt gave her a terrific dig with his elbow, nearly sending the car into the hedge at the same time.
‘Girls always say that,’ he said. ‘They don’t mean it. You know, that place, the Jolly Roger, wants a bit of livening up. Nothing jolly about it. No life in it. Of course there’s a good amount of duds staying there. A lot of kids, to begin with, and a lot of old fogeys