A Spear of Summer Grass - By Deanna Raybourn Page 0,107
it was for me,” she said with a half laugh.
“I know how bad it is. I just think a person has a right to do what she wants with her own body.”
She opened her mouth, then closed it again. She drank deeply of the gin, holding it in her mouth before swallowing it down. “Thank you for that. That’s the worst part of not being entirely well, you know. Everyone thinks they know what’s best for you. But they’re wrong. This is good for me, living is good for me.” She hesitated. “I suppose Rex told you.”
“He did.”
She lifted her chin. “He’s fond of you. I don’t mind. You mustn’t think that I mind. I won’t be here forever, you know. And when I’m gone maybe the two of you—”
“Don’t,” I said. My tone was sharp but she merely smiled.
“What’s the matter? Don’t you like the thought of wearing a dead woman’s shoes? You’d like the pink quartz bathtub. And don’t be so quick to dismiss Rex. He’s a devil in bed.”
I smiled in spite of myself and she laughed aloud. “Oh, I do love talking to you, Delilah. You’re one of the few people I know who is genuinely incapable of being shocked. I mean it, you know. I don’t mind about Rex. He’s a good man. I like to think that he might not be alone when I’m gone. It’s being replaced while I’m still here that I mind.”
I leveled my gaze at her. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Kit Parrymore,” she said succinctly. Her smile faltered, but she pasted it firmly in place. Only her eyes pleaded. “I know it’s a bore, but I really am quite fond of him. Don’t take him away from me, will you? I get such a kick out of misbehaving with him, and you know, darling, I’ve so few kicks left.”
I said nothing. She rose. “That gin went right through me. Point me to the bathroom and then we’ll open another bottle and show these natives how it’s done.”
I waved her in the direction of my room and she disappeared. She was gone a long while, but I didn’t follow her, and when she returned, I was glad I hadn’t. There was fresh powder on her nose and her eyes were rimmed in pink. It would take a crueler woman than I had ever been to poke that. She poured us each a fresh glass and settled in for a long evening. We talked about Mossy and old friends; we put on the gramophone and danced a wobbly foxtrot. We toasted the moon and when she left, it felt as if the light had gone out of the room. There had always been glamour to Helen, real glamour, and I lifted my glass to her as she fired up her engine and stomped hard on the accelerator. The room was empty and cold without her, without Dodo. I wound up the gramophone and finished the gin. When it was done, I went to work on the whisky. It was almost dawn before I fell asleep on the sofa, and when I woke it was to Ryder putting a hand to my throat.
“What are you doing?” My voice came out as a hoarse croak.
“Checking for a pulse. You look like hell.”
“Feel like it, too.” I sat up. I was still wearing the clothes I had worn when I had found Moses in the barn. They were crusted with blood and stained with dirt. My hair was snarled and my fingernails were packed with earth and dried blood.
Ryder put out his hand. “Come with me.”
I didn’t even bother to ask where we were going. He put me gently into the truck and drove away from Fairlight. He could have driven us off a cliff at that moment for all I cared. I had assumed we were going to his little boma, but he took a different road, and after a while he parked the truck behind a cluster of bushes next to a small lake. We walked a little distance away into a lugga and from there into a thicket of trees. Tucked up against one was a narrow ladder, and he motioned for me to climb it. I did, feeling as if my legs and arms didn’t belong to me. They were disjointed as my mind, and I wasn’t sure how I managed to make them work except that Ryder was directly behind me, urging me upwards.