The Hidden Man by Robin Blake Read Free Book Online Page B

I glanced through before looking back at the preamble, and to the clause in which Pimbo’s executors were named. Here I read that, ‘I hereby appoint Mr Zadok Moon of Liverpool and Mr Titus Cragg of Preston to be my executors.’
    *   *   *
    â€˜What would you think of this case?’ I asked Elizabeth as we sat at our supper of cold meats and buttered cauliflower. ‘A testator leaves a bequest to his spinster housekeeper, on the sole condition that she does not marry. Is it that he thinks, if she were married, she’d have no need of the bequest and it would be better employed elsewhere?’
    Elizabeth considered the matter, chewing prettily and dabbing her shapely lips with a napkin.
    â€˜That’s possible, I suppose. But Titus, my heart, how like you only to see the more benign case! That would not be my first thought at all.’
    â€˜Am I naive, my dear?’
    â€˜Sometimes. But I do honour it in you.’
    â€˜Then what is your first thought?’
    â€˜That he wants to bind her to spinsterdom. That he wants dominion over her, even from the grave.’
    â€˜Why would he want that?’
    Elizabeth laughed.
    â€˜Really Titus – that you are a lawyer and can ask such a question!’
    â€˜What is the answer, though?’ I said, with lawyerly persistence.
    â€˜Because she was his mistress, of course, and he was passionately jealous, even from the grave, at the thought of another man touching her. Happen we’re speaking of the will of poor Phillip Pimbo, Titus.’
    I conceded that we were and went on,
    â€˜And I asked Miss Peel, who is the housekeeper in question, whether Phillip Pimbo’s manner had recently changed, hoping it might explain his unexpected death, and she answered in an oddly personal way: not towards her ,she said.’
    â€˜Tell me how did she say it, Titus. In regret? In anger, or bitterness?’
    I chewed the last of my meat for a few moments, as I recalled the conversation with Miss Peel more sharply.
    â€˜She spoke it with spirit, I would say. Almost in defiance.’
    â€˜Against what?’
    â€˜Let’s say Fortune.’
    Elizabeth rose and went to the dresser, where there lay a cold asparagus tart to finish off our meal.
    â€˜In that case there may be another explanation, I think.’
    She cut me a slice of tart, placed it in front of me, and watched while I ate it.
    â€˜You are not having any tart?’ I said.
    Evidently not, for she stuck to her theme.
    â€˜I mean that the case may have been the perfect opposite: not love, but animosity that led him to bind her.’
    â€˜Does not animosity sunder, rather than bind?’
    â€˜Delilah wanted Samson bound, because he had rejected her – so she hated him. That could be the case here.’
    That was my Elizabeth – clever and to the point. She stretched down and picked the last piece of tart from my plate and put it in her mouth. She took up my empty plate, laid it with her own on a tray, and carried them towards the door on her way to the scullery. I followed her.
    â€˜That is very possible,’ I said. ‘But how can I tell which it is, love or hate?’
    â€˜Ask Miss Peel.’
    â€˜She may not choose to say. She can be a very – imperious woman.’
    â€˜What precisely was Mr Pimbo’s bequest?’
    â€˜His four-acre orchard, and beehives.’
    And now Elizabeth was laughing as she clattered the plates into the stone sink.
    â€˜Why are you laughing?’
    â€˜Don’t you see?’
    â€˜Not I.’
    â€˜She was being made to play the part of Eve, Titus. He’s given her a garden to be hers alone, just so long as she does not sin against him. But if she should sin – well, then she is cast out for ever and ever, Amen.’
    â€˜He was playing God?’
    â€˜Yes, the God of the Pentateuch. The God who devises tests. The Jealous God. There was something between them,