“It doesn’t matter who started it now,” I yawned. “Honestly, I’m dead on my feet, Susan.”

“Did you know Jean Velfrey was home?”

“I didn’t. I don’t give a damn about her, and that’s the truth.”

For the first time since I’d come into the bedroom she smiled. “You went to a party at her place in London, didn’t you?”

“Nothing happened,” I said.

“I’m assured otherwise,” she said. “Aren’t you aware that there’s a phone service between Warley and London? And a postal ser­vice?” She sat up. “Not that I blame you, darling.” She pushed the bedclothes away.

I stared at her naked body for a moment, then started to undress.

She got out of bed and padded over to the door. She bolted it and came over to me.

“Jean isn’t a natural blonde, is she?” she asked. She unbuttoned my shirt. I let her help me and then took hold of her by the hair, forcing her head back.

“I’ve been lonely,” she said. “I’ve been lonely, Joe.”

I kissed her. “You deserve to be,” I said.

Her eyes dilated. “Hurt me, Joe. I deserve to be hurt. Hurt me, Joe. Kill me, I won’t stop you, Joe.” She knelt sobbing at my feet.

“I’ll hurt you,” I said. “I’ll hurt you all right.”

I had never been so excited in all my life; and I had never hated myself so deeply.

15

15

Hethersett paused when he saw me, his hand on the door of the white Porsche coupe. In his light grey mohair suit and sun­glasses he seemed an eminently suitable owner of nearly three thou­sand pounds worth of sports car. Pound sterling for pound avoirdupois, I thought, it had cost twice as much as Brown’s Bentley: as I looked at it my dissatisfaction with myself deep­ened.

“I thought you were on holiday,” I said.

“I am, old man. Off to Spain on the great silver bird first thing tomorrow. I just had a tiny loose end to tie up with your father-in-law, that’s all. It hasn’t been tied up, but now my conscience is clear.”

“That’s more than mine is,” I said. “I was going to make an early start today.”

I checked my watch by the big square clock above the entrance to the General Office. The clock bore the letters of the firm’s name instead of numerals, a clumsy advertising device which never failed to irritate me. The hour hand now pointed to L and the minute hand to R; when I calculated the time, as I always had to, my depression deepened. I wasn’t obliged to turn up at nine o’clock sharp and my salary wouldn’t be docked for my turning up at twenty past ten, but I had never been late before.