The Judgement of Strangers. Andrew Taylor

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СКАЧАТЬ a few paragraphs in here.’ Vanessa tapped the envelope containing the typescript. ‘Quite a sensational character, by all accounts.’

      ‘Audrey does mention him, but she’s very circumspect about what she says.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘There’s a member of the family still living in Roth. I think her husband was the poet’s great-nephew. Audrey didn’t want to give people the wrong idea about him.’

      ‘Defile their judgement, as it were.’ Vanessa smiled across the table at me. Then she quoted two lines from the poem that had found its way into several anthologies. It was usually the only poem of his that anyone had read.

      ‘Then darkness descended; and whispers defiled

      The judgement of stranger, and widow, and child.’

      ‘Just so.’

      ‘Does anyone remember him in the village?’

      ‘Roth isn’t that sort of place. There aren’t that many people left who lived there before the last war. And Francis Youlgreave died before the First World War. Have you a particular reason for asking?’

      She shrugged. ‘I read quite a lot of his verse when I was up at Oxford. Not a very good poet, to be frank – all those jog-trot rhythms can be rather wearing. But he was interesting more for what he was and for who he knew than for what he wrote.’

      ‘Not a very nice man, by all accounts. Unbalanced.’

      ‘Yes, but rather fascinating.’ She looked at her watch. ‘I’m awfully sorry, David, but I’ve got to rush.’

      I concealed my disappointment. I paid the bill and walked with her back to the office where I had left my car.

      ‘Would you like to telephone me tomorrow?’ she asked. ‘I should have had time to look at the book by then.’

      ‘Of course. At the office?’

      ‘I’ll probably read it at home, actually.’

      ‘What time would suit you?’

      ‘About seven?’

      She gave me her number. We said goodbye and I drove back to Roth, feeling profoundly dissatisfied. I had made a fool of myself in more ways than one. I had expected more, much more, from my lunch with Vanessa – though quite what, I did not know. I was aware, too, that there was something absurd in a middle-aged widower acting in the way that I was doing. It was clear that she saw me as an acquaintance and that by looking at the typescript she was merely doing me – and Audrey – a good turn from the kindness of her heart.

      Still, I thought, at least I had a reason to telephone Vanessa tomorrow evening.

      In the event, however, I did not telephone Vanessa on Tuesday evening. This was because on Tuesday afternoon I received an unexpected and unpleasant visit from Cynthia Trask.

       4

      Cynthia arrived without warning in the late afternoon.

      ‘I hope I’m not disturbing you,’ she said briskly. ‘But I happened to be passing, and I thought this might be a good opportunity to drop in those odds and ends from my niece.’

      In the back of her Mini Traveller were two suitcases and a faded army kitbag containing the lacrosse stick and other sporting impedimenta. I carried them into the house and called Rosemary, who was reading in her room. She did not appear to hear.

      ‘I won’t disturb her, if you don’t mind,’ I said. ‘She’s working quite hard this holiday. Would you like some tea?’ It would have been churlish not to offer Cynthia tea but I was mildly surprised that she so readily accepted. She followed me into the kitchen which, like the rest of the house, was cramped, characterless and modern.

      ‘Anything I can do to help?’

      ‘Everything’s under control, thank you.’

      ‘This is the first time I’ve been inside the new vicarage. You must be so relieved.’

      ‘It’s certainly easier to keep warm and clean than the old one was.’

      It was partly due to Ronald’s influence that the old vicarage – a large, gracious and completely impractical Queen Anne house – had been demolished last year. The new vicarage was a four-bedroomed, centrally heated box. Its garden occupied the site of the old tennis court and vegetable garden. The rest of the old garden and the site of the old house itself now contained a curving cul-de-sac and six more boxes, each rather more spacious than the new vicarage.

      ‘Of course, you didn’t really need all that space. You and Rosemary must have felt you were camping in a barrack.’

      ‘Rather an elegant barrack,’ I said. ‘Do you take sugar?’

      I carried the tea tray into the sitting room. Having a stranger in your home makes you see it with fresh eyes, and the result is rarely reassuring. I imagined that Cynthia was taking in the shabby furniture, the cobwebs in the corner of the ceiling and the unswept grate.

      ‘Much cosier,’ Cynthia said approvingly, as though she herself were responsible for this. ‘Do you have someone who comes in to do for you?’

      I nodded, resenting the catechism. ‘One of my parishioners acts as a sort of housekeeper.’ I handed Cynthia a cup of tea. ‘Your house is pretty big,’ I said, trying to change the subject, ‘but it always seems very homely.’

      She smiled wistfully. ‘Yes, I’ve enjoyed living there.’

      ‘Are you moving?’

      ‘Almost certainly.’

      ‘How wonderful.’ I felt a sudden stab of envy. ‘You must be very proud of Ronald.’

      Cynthia frowned. ‘Proud?’

      ‘I assumed you meant he’s been offered preferment. Well deserved, I’m sure.’

      Cynthia flushed. She was sitting, pink and foursquare in my own armchair. ‘No, I didn’t mean preferment. I meant that, when Ronald marries, I shall naturally move out. It will be time to make a home of my own. It wouldn’t be fair to any of us if I stayed.’

      ‘I didn’t realize that he was getting married.’ I guessed that Cynthia and her brother had shared a house for nearly twenty years, for I remembered hearing that Ronald’s first wife had died soon after their marriage. I wondered how Cynthia felt at the prospect of being uprooted from her home. ‘I hope they will be very happy.’

      ‘There hasn’t been a formal announcement yet. They haven’t sorted out the timing. I know Ronald nearly said something on Friday evening, but they decided it would be better to wait.’

      A suspicion mushroomed in my mind. Suddenly everything began to make sense.

      ‘They are ideally suited,’ Cynthia was saying, talking rapidly. ‘And Vanessa СКАЧАТЬ