A Pocket Full of Rye by Agatha Christie Read Free Book Online

somehow.”
    “But it wouldn't have done him any good? It was paid into your account.”
    “I know. So it doesn't make sense, does it?”
    Pat turned sharply towards him.
    “You mean - he did it to get you chucked out of the firm?”
    “I wondered. Oh well - it's a rotten thing to say. Forget it. I wonder what old Percy will say when he sees the Prodigal returned. Those pale, boiled gooseberry eyes of his will pop right out of his head!”
    “Does he know you are coming?”
    “I shouldn't be surprised if he didn't know a damned thing! The old man's got rather a funny sense of humour, you know.”
    “But what has your brother done to upset your father so much?”
    “That's what I'd like to know. Something must have made the old man livid. Writing off to me the way he did.”
    “When was it you got his first letter?”
    “Must be four - no five months ago. A cagey letter, but a distinct holding out of the olive branch. 'Your elder brother has proved himself unsatisfactory in many ways.' 'You seem to have sown your wild oats and settled down.' 'I can promise you that it will be well worth your while financially.' 'Shall welcome you and your wife.' You know, darling, I think my marrying you had a lot to do with it. The old boy was impressed that I'd married into a class above me.”
    Pat laughed.
    “What? Into the aristocratic riff-raff?”
    He grinned. “That's right. But riff-raff didn't register and aristocracy did. You should see Percival's wife. She's the kind who says 'Pass the preserves, please' and talks about a postage stamp.”
    Pat did not laugh. She was considering the women of the family into which she had married. It was a point of view which Lance had not taken into account.
    “And your sister?” she asked.
    “Elaine? Oh she's all right. She was pretty young when I left home. Sort of an earnest girl - but probably she's grown out of that. Very intense over things.”
    It did not sound very reassuring. Pat said:
    “She never wrote to you - after you went away?”
    “I didn't leave an address. But she wouldn't have, anyway. We're not a devoted family.”
    “No.”
    He shot a quick look at her.
    “Got the wind up? About my family? You needn't. We're not going to live with them, or anything like that. We'll have our own little place somewhere. Horses, dogs, anything you like.”
    “But there will still be the 5:18.”
    “For me, yes. To and fro to the city, all logged up. But don't worry, sweet - there are rural pockets, even round London. And lately I've felt the sap of financial affairs rising in me. After all, it's in my blood - from both sides of the family.”
    “You hardly remember your mother, do you?”
    “She always seemed to me incredibly old. She was old, of course. Nearly fifty when Elaine was born. She wore lots of clinking things and lay on a sofa and used to read me stories about knights and ladies which bored me stiff. Tennyson's 'Idylls of the King.' I suppose I was fond other... She was very colourless, you know. I realise that, looking back.”
    “You don't seem to have been particularly fond of anybody,” said Pat disapprovingly.
    Lance grasped and squeezed her arm.
    “I'm fond of you,” he said.

A Pocket of Rye

Chapter 7
    Inspector Neele was still holding the telegraph message in his hand when he heard a car drive up to the front door and stop with a careless scrunching of brakes.
    Mary Dove said, “That will be Mrs Fortescue now.”
    Inspector Neele moved forwards to the front door. Out of the tail of his eye, he saw Mary Dove melt unobtrusively into the background and disappear. Clearly she intended to take no part in the forthcoming scene. A remarkable display of tact and discretion - and also a rather remarkable lack of curiosity. Most women. Inspector Neele decided, would have remained...
    As he reached the front door he was aware of the butler. Crump, coming forward from the back of the hall. So he had heard the car.
    The car was a Rolls Bentley sports model