Palmer-Jones 03 - Murder in Paradise Read Online Free Page B

but had put on a good enough show of being pleased that she was there.
    James had not been able to forget her. He had used every excuse to get to Baltasay to see her. He had dressed up in the suit which was too big for him and sat in the hotel bar waiting to catch a glimpse of her. Very often she was there before him. Sometimes the Englishman was with her, loud and showing her off to his friends. Usually she was on her own. She looked around her with big black eyes, made up in a way he had never seen before, staring out of her tiny white face. Then one night he had arrived at the hotel and she had been different. She was in her place at the bar but the smudges under her eyes were caused not by make-up but by tears.
    “I’ve got to leave tomorrow,” she said. “He’s told me that I’ve got to go. He’s found some other fancy woman.” She never spoke of the Englishman by name.
    “What will you do?”
    “I don’t know.” She had never spoken of her past. She seemed to belong nowhere.
    “Have you friends to go to? Family?”
    “No.”
    “Come home with me. You know I would have asked you anyway if you’d been free. We’ll be married.” Then, as she hesitated: “Or I’ll come with you. Wherever you like.”
    She had been his obsession. He had dreamed of touching her, of knowing her. While he waited for her to give her reply he thought that the whole thing was impossible. He had frightened her away.
    “No,” she had said at last. “I’ll come with you. To Kinness.”
    At that time he had never kissed her. He had only touched her to take her arm on that first day, by the harbour, to take her to the hotel.
    “And we will be married?”
    “If that’s what you want.” It really had not mattered to her one way or the other.
    They were married quietly on the island. There had been none of the fuss of balloons and flowers. They had been happy, intensely happy until, he thought, she began to crave for a child, in the same way as he craved for her.
    She was still lovely. She still had the fine features and big, dark eyes.
    “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve let you down again.”
    “Don’t be silly,” he said.
    She was sitting on a stool in the bedroom, in front of the dressing table mirror. He knelt behind her and put his arms around her, so that he was holding her tight against him. She let herself melt back into his body until he touched her breast. Then he felt her shrink away from him, though she tried not to do it. He stood up and started to get ready to go out alone, to the party.
    Jim was woken by the sound of Alec’s generator. Sarah was still asleep. He could hear her breathing and feel her hair on his cheek. She thought it would all be so easy. He had never meant to come back. He had always thought that the island men who went to the mainland for a spell to find themselves a wife were no better than Viking raiders. But she had tempted him with her enthusiasm. Perhaps he should never have listened to her. He looked at his watch and shook her gently.
    “Hey. We’ll have to get ready. Dad will be here in half an hour.”
    There were thin blue curtains at the window. She had drawn them before they went to bed. She wrapped herself in a blanket, went to the window, and looked out. It was dusk. The sun had gone but there was light enough to see the beach and the silhouettes of the upturned boats pulled up there.
    Jim was pulling clothes from suitcases. She could not understand the urgency. She went up to him and kissed him.
    “You can switch on the light,” Jim said. “Alec’s put on the generator. The light will work now.”
    She switched on the light and the magic of the beach and the grey sky disappeared.
    “I’ll heat some water for washing,” Jim said. “Maggie said that your dress is in the wardrobe. They cleaned it for you. Apparently one of the seams had split. She got someone to mend it for you.” He went into the kitchen.
    It was the tradition to wear the wedding dress at the