Going It Alone by Michael Innes Read Free Book Online

can be taken for granted. And was famous. Everything that Tim was doing, everybody must already know.
    Tea was over – including that cherry cake with a superabundance of cherries that it had been recalled Uncle Gilbert peculiarly approved of. Averell felt what a fool he had been not to see more of these girls. At the same time he was quite glad when they jumped simultaneously to their feet and departed on the various appointed tasks of the late afternoon. It was clear that, in the domestic way, they backed up their mother with all necessary vigour. Perhaps for the first time, it came vividly to Gilbert Averell that through long school terms, and for many years, Ruth and Smoky Joe had been coping with Boxes alone.
    ‘Ruth,’ Averell said, ‘I’m wondering more and more about Tim. Tell me now.’

 
     
6
     
    ‘It’s rather vague,’ Ruth Barcroft said. She spoke hesitantly, and a small rattle of china came from the tray on which she was stacking the tea things for removal. Both these phenomena surprised Averell. ‘I don’t even know,’ she said, ‘where Tim is.’
    This remark too – or the tone of it – was puzzling. No doubt a mother likes to be kept informed about the movements of her children, but it had to be supposed that a twenty-two-year-old son might reasonably drop out of contact for brief periods now and then.
    ‘He wouldn’t tell me,’ Ruth said.
    This, if it accounted for the manner of Ruth’s last speech, was perplexing in itself, and Averell waited for some further information. But Ruth was silent, her attention being apparently given up to the neat brushing of crumbs from one plate to another.
    ‘Was this in a letter?’ Averell asked cautiously.
    ‘He rang up.’ Ruth made yet another pause. ‘Gilbert, do they let you ring up from – from police-stations, and places like that?’
    ‘Good heavens, Ruth! But, yes. At least I expect that in some cases they do. Are you afraid Tim has been arrested again?’
    ‘It might be that, mightn’t it? Or he may even be in gaol by now. The telephone call came just before I rang you up in Paris.’
    ‘I see. But he made no secret of that last affair, did he? I seem to remember your hearing about it at once, and his coming home to Boxes as soon as they bailed him out.’
    ‘Yes, and it was even rather funny. Tim had to go and report himself to Constable Capper in the village, and it embarrassed Capper frightfully. But this may be different.’
    ‘It may be altogether different, Ruth, and have nothing to do with the police at all.’ Averell was astonished by the extent to which his sister appeared to be upset by Tim’s disappearance, which was still for no longer than the inside of a week. ‘Let’s face it, my dear. The boy may have all sorts of reasons for being a bit coy about his whereabouts for a time. For instance, there may be a girl in the case.’
    ‘He’d tell me, wouldn’t he, if there was a girl?’
    ‘In some circumstances he might.’ Averell was astonished this time by such a flight of maternal innocence. ‘But he’d be no more likely to tell you than to tell his sisters if he were having a shot – perhaps even a first shot – at something strictly dishonourable. Having a quiet weekend, say, with his vice-chancellor’s well-preserved siren of a wife.’ Averell checked himself, aware of having a very uncertain touch at this sort of thing, and doubting whether it was appropriate in face of his sister’s evident forebodings. ‘No point,’ he ended briefly, ‘in ducking such perfectly normal things.’
    ‘It didn’t sound like that.’
    ‘Well, Ruth, you haven’t told me how it did sound.’
    ‘Like something I didn’t like. I’m glad I’m getting the girls away.’
    ‘In heaven’s name, my dear! You haven’t arranged this trip for them because of how Tim sounded on a telephone?’
    ‘Of course not. Rome was all arranged months ago. It’s just fortunate it’s now, if something really bad is turning up.