The Pursued

by C. S. Forester

  Mrs Clair had no notion in her head about what would happen to the children – there was pain in her head as she thought about them – but she spoke as firmly and as reassuringly as she could.

  ‘And there’s George, Mother! What happened to him?’

  ‘I don’t know, dear. But don’t worry. Go to sleep, dear.’

  ‘Did – did they get him?’

  ‘Perhaps they did, dear. Perhaps not. We’ll know tomorrow. Go to sleep now, there’s a good girl.’

  Later the chill of the night struck through the newspapers with which Mrs Clair had tried to keep her daughter warm.

  ‘I’m so cold, Mother. I’m shivering.’

  Marjorie was more like a little child Mrs Clair had once held to her bosom than ever.

  ‘Poor lamb!’ she said. ‘There! Never mind.’

  Mrs Clair took off her jacket and wrapped it round her daughter’s feet and legs.

  ‘What about you, Mother?’

  ‘Me? I’m all right. Shut your eyes now, and you’ll be asleep before you can say Jack Robinson.’

  The gentle surf continued to beat upon the beach. There was a time when Marjorie actually slept, despite her shivering limbs and chatting teeth, her mother sat upright watching over her, grimly refusing to allow herself to shiver or her teeth to chatter.

  Slowly the dawn came into the sky, and the landscape turned from black to grey before Marjorie awoke again.

  ‘It’s daytime now, Mother. Can’t we go yet?’

  ‘No, not yet, dear.’

  They were less conspicuous, in Mrs Clair’s opinion, sitting still in the shelter than walking through the town where there would be nothing for them to do as yet and where there would by now be a few people in the street. The hardy before-breakfast bathers began to descend, crossing the promenade on the way to the beach. The women watched them with dull eyes as they entered the water, some timid and some bold. It was past eight o’clock before Mrs Clair decided that it was safe to move.

  ‘I think we can go now, dear. We can find some breakfast, I daresay. Put your hair straight first, my lamb. Here – use my comb and mirror.’

  She looked Marjorie over anxiously to make sure that she showed as few traces as possible of the night she had been through.

  ‘It’s a pity,’ said Mrs Clair, ‘that I haven’t got any make-up stuff for you to use. That’ll be one of the first things we’ll buy. Now let’s come and find a cup of tea somewhere.’

  The posters were already up outside the newspaper shops. A batch of them stared them in the face as they turned a corner. Suddenly while they were ascending into the town again Marjorie stopped and clutched at her mother’s arm.

  ‘SUBURBAN DEATH MYSTERY. MAN DETAINED.’ They read, and on another – ‘LONDON RAILWAYSIDE CRIME.’

  ‘You mustn’t jump like that,’ said Mrs Clair. ‘You mustn’t, really, dear.’

  She nerved herself to walk on without faltering in her step, certainly without looking round to see if anyone had noticed them; she forced herself grimly to read the last poster in this line –

  ‘SUSPECTED MURDER IN LONDON SUBURB.’

  ‘Come along, dear. Walk properly,’ said Mrs Clair, as if she were still bringing a restive five-year-old Marjorie home from church.

  There were a few people breakfasting in the multiple-branch restaurant which they found – Mrs Clair peeped through the door to make sure of that before going in. In the women’s lavatory Marjorie asked the question she had had on her lips for some minutes now.

  ‘Mother, is George the man they’ve detained?’

  Mrs Clair looked quickly round the empty washroom, saw with relief that the two doors beside her were both marked ‘Vacant,’ and then turned upon her daughter.

  ‘You mustn’t ask questions like that at all,’ she said, with surprising vehemence considering that she was speaking low. ‘Don’t say anything about it to me ever unless I’ve said something first. Or first thing you know you’ll be detained next.’

  Marjorie’s lower lip began to tremble.

  ‘Stop that!’ snapped Mrs Clair.

  Cup after cup of hot strong tea in the restaurant helped to revive both of them. They could neither of them eat anything.

  ‘Well,’ said Mrs Clair with a glance at the clock. ‘We can start our shopping now.’

  A macintosh and a hat for Marjorie, lipstick and powder, those were the first things they brought. Marjorie felt as if she were in a dream, a nightmare, so much of a nightmare that even buying a hat was a distasteful business, and the more distasteful because her mother was looking on with the eyes of a hawk to make sure that the hat she bought was inconspicuous, quiet, commonplace.

  ‘We must have a change of clothes,’ said Mrs Clair, considering. ‘And nightdresses for where we stop tonight. And a brush and a comb.’

  She was growing frightened at the inroads these purchases were making upon her money – and fifty pounds had seemed such a fortune to her frugal mind! – and yet she steeled herself to go on with it. Every one of these purchases were necessary if they were to sustain the pose of holiday makers – and that they must do, to evade capture. She left Marjorie standing on the kerb, her arms full of parcels, while she went alone into a shop and bought a shabby suitcase second hand. Otherwise the shop keeper might remember them; in a side street they were able to pack the parcels into the suitcase, which they lugged with them along the street. Fortunately it was not unusual to see women dragging suitcases through the streets of holiday towns.

  They sat down exhausted on a public bench beside a bit of green.

  ‘Now listen carefully to what I’m going to say,’ said Mrs Clair; she had looked all round her to make sure that no one could hear. ‘We’ve got to change our names. That’s something we must do. I think I’d better be Mrs James. After all, I was Mrs James Clair until your dear father died. Mrs James. Remember that. What are you going to be?’

  ‘I – I don’t know,’ said Marjorie.

  ‘Pull yourself together,’ said Mrs Clair briskly. ‘What’ll it be? Mrs Smith? Mrs Jones? No, those are too common. Mrs Robinson. That’s it. Mrs – Mrs Henry Robinson, Christian name – Adelaide. Mrs Adelaide Robinson, née James. And I’m your mother, Mrs Frances James. I think I’d better still be your mother, dear.’

  Mrs Clair forbore to explain that she could not trust her daughter to keep from calling her ‘Mother,’ unawares when they were in the hearing of others.

  ‘Yes,’ said Marjorie.

  ‘It’s no use just saying “yes”. You must fix it in your mind for good,’ said Mrs Clair.

  ‘Yes.’

  They sat still and watched the traffic flowing by on the far side of the green square.

  ‘Adelaide,’ said Mrs Clair, suddenly, and received no reply. ‘There! You see? You’re forgetting already. Don’t forget, your name’s Adelaide, and that’s what I shall call you, always.’

  ‘Oh yes, Mother.’

  Marjorie felt sick with exhaustion. She was not in the least sleepy. She had no desire to close her eyes. All she wanted to do was just to sit here indefinitely, thinking about nothing.

  20

  ‘We shall be comfortable here, Adelaide,’ said Mrs Clair, looking complacently round the little room, with the texts on the walls and ugly brass bedstead nearly filling it.

  She spoke slowly and clearly, for she suspected that the grim landlady was pausing outside the door to listen to their opening conversation; and she wanted to maintain the pose she had taken up when they had asked here for lodgings, of a widow who had seen much better days and was still self-consciously genteel. She took off her hat and jacket, allowed plenty of time for the landlady to move away, and then walked quietly round to the door again and assured herself that there was no one behind it.

  ‘We’re all right now,’ she said, coming back to her daughter. ‘Lie down now, and have a little rest.’

  They
turned down the coverlet, and Marjorie lay down under the top blanket, her skirt and her shoes removed. Mrs Clair sat under the window on the single bentwood chair and opened the evening paper she had brought in with her – the evening paper posters had haunted them since noon; as she lifted the paper to read it she still had their words before her eyes –

  ‘SUBURB MURDER MAN CHARGED’

  ‘SUBURB MURDER TWO WOMEN MISSING’

  ‘POLICE HUNT FOR TWO WOMEN’

  It was there on the front page – ‘This morning at the South Suburban Police Court George Frederick Ely aged 24 of 16 Dewsbury Road was charged this morning with the wilful murder of Edward Grainger, of 77 Harrison Way. On the advice of His Honour Judge Mason the prisoner reserved his defence until he could be legally represented. Mr Southwell, representing the police, said, in asking for a remand, that he proposed today only to offer formal evidence. There were very strong grounds for the belief that other persons besides Ely were implicated, and until these persons were apprehended (and he had no doubt that this would be only a matter of a few days) it was in the prisoner’s interests as well as in those of justice that a remand should be granted. Prisoner, a strikingly handsome youth, was accordingly remanded for a week.

  ‘Later the police issued a statement as follows – “The police consider it desirable in the interests of justice that Mrs Marjorie Grainger of 77 Harrison Way and Mrs Martha Clair of 16 Dewsbury Road should come forward to assist by their evidence in the investigation of the murder of Edward Grainger, husband of the former. Any information regarding the whereabouts of these two persons should be given to any police station, or by telephone to Whitehall 1212.”

  ‘Our representatives on the spot understand that the police have been making enquiries regarding the purchase of a hatchet in the shops near the scene of the arrest, the hatchet in question having been discovered in the vicinity of the crime.’

  That was all. Mrs Clair read it twice, and then a third time. She had no regard for the journalistic side of it – for that typical touch which described George Ely as ‘strikingly handsome,’ nor the subtle allusion to the hatchet which would whet the interest of the public into interesting themselves in the whereabouts of Martha Clair and Marjorie Grainger. It was sufficient for her purpose that there had not yet been issued publicly any description of them. The police would have one, she supposed, but that was not so important. Tonight at least they were safe from prying landladies. She folded up the newspaper and looked across at her daughter on the bed.

  ‘I don’t think we’ll go out tonight, Adelaide,’ she said in the clear yet fussy voice she had adopted. ‘We’ve had a tiring day, haven’t we?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Marjorie. She moaned a little, and turned her head from side to side on the pillow.

  ‘I’ll get the things unpacked,’ fussed Mrs Clair.

  Later there came a thump on the door.

  ‘Your supper’s ready,’ said the landlady’s voice outside.

  Bread and cheese and tomatoes and tea – they had neither of them eaten more than a mouthful all day, and Marjorie, listlessly, had no appetite still.

  ‘Really, Adelaide dear,’ said Mrs Clair. ‘You must try to eat a little to keep your strength up.’

  Marjorie shook her head.

  ‘This bread’s nice and new. Please,’ said Mrs Clair.

  She herself ate some, although she had no more appetite than Marjorie. With difficulty she coaxed her daughter into forcing some down.

  ‘We shall be going to bed early,’ explained Mrs Clair to the landlady. ‘We are tired after our journey.’

  The landlady nodded indifferently – Mrs Clair had told her they lived in Reading.

  ‘’Alf past eight breakfast?’ was all she said. ‘And what’ll you ’ave?’

  Upstairs, as Mrs Clair shut the door, Marjorie stood looking at her with an expression of bewilderment.

  ‘I – I don’t feel very well,’ said Marjorie. Her knees were sagging under her, and Mrs Clair was just in time to catch her as she dropped. She lowered her onto the bed, undid the band of her skirt, took off her shoes, bathed her face with a flannel dipped in the jug on the washstand.

  ‘There, there, my lamb,’ said Mrs Clair soothingly. ‘You’ll be better soon. I think you’re better already. Let Mother help you into bed, darling.’

  She stripped off her daughter’s clothes. There was no false modesty between them at this juncture, no careful donning of one garment before taking off another. Marjorie’s waist was marked with the dull red corrugations left by the suspender belt she had worn continuously for thirty-six hours, but otherwise her naked body was flawless – her splendid arms and shoulders and legs still retained the tan of the recent holiday. As Mrs Clair slipped the new nightdress over her daughter’s head she thought to herself that Marjorie showed no sign of having borne two children. That was more than she could say for herself, and Mrs Clair was liberal-minded enough to attribute it to the better methods and management of the new generation. She brushed out Marjorie’s hair, and tied it back in a pigtail.

  ‘Go to sleep now, darling,’ she murmured, opening the bed and sliding Marjorie’s legs into it. ‘Sleep well, my lamb.’

  She smoothed the short hairs back from Marjorie’s forehead, before turning away to make her own preparations for bed.

  It was strange to her how she felt neither tired nor sleepy. She just felt old, as she put it to herself. Stiff and feeble and weak, as though the clock of her life were running down, but not a bit tired, and certainly not sleepy. It was quite an effort to climb into bed, and once there it was pleasant to lie placid and still, gazing out into the darkened room. There was no hatred now to disturb her peace. That devil Ted had met with what he deserved. She was surprised to find that she felt no regret at not having poured into his dying ear (as once she had planned) the information that his wife had been unfaithful to him – had slept joyously with the pretty boy who had killed him. That was all past and done with. Hatred was ended now. What was left was a rich, warm overmastering love for her daughter beside her. Mrs Clair could feel the welling tenderness in her bosom as she listened to Marjorie’s breathing and felt the warmth of her body. It was only for that Mrs Clair wanted to go on living. She was full of this overmastering love. In its comforting warmth she drifted imperceptibly into the light but refreshing sleep of old age.

  It was some time in the early morning that Marjorie woke her – Marjorie had slept long enough to recover from mere animal fatigue, and in that hour when vitality is at its lowest dreadful visions had awakened her. She could not face them alone in the dark.

  ‘Mother, oh Mother,’ she moaned; her writhing fingers gripped painfully at her mother’s lean thigh.

  ‘What is it, darling?’ whispered Mrs Clair, instantly awake. She took Marjorie’s hand between her own two, stroking and fondling it.

  ‘Mother, I want to know,’ said Marjorie, her mind’s eye tortured with hardly seen memories. ‘Mother – what happened to his other eye?’

  ‘Sh, dear,’ whispered Mrs Clair. ‘Sh, darling. There’s nothing to worry about. That’s all over now. We’re forgetting about that now.’

  Mrs Clair knew well what was troubling Marjorie. She had the same memory, of that dull half-opened eye with the lifeless white exposed, and she had seen, as her daughter had not, what had happened to the other eye under the edge of the hatchet wielded by Ely’s maddened strength.

  ‘Mother,’ said Marjorie feverishly, tossing herself over on to her side and reverting to another worry. ‘Mother, will they hang us, you and me?’

  ‘No, my dear, of course not. They never will. Mother is looking after you, dear. Don’t worry, my lamb. There’s nothing to worry about.’

  She prevailed over those nightmare worries in the end. She coaxed and soothed her into some kind of tranquillity, until fatigue reasserted itself and Marjorie slept again – not too well; she started and muttered even durin
g her sleep. Dot had done just the same when she was a little girl.

  Next morning was Saturday; the streets and the promenade and the pier were more crowded than yesterday, because the visitors were reinforced by the long-weekenders. And everywhere there seemed to be posters, outside the shops, and displayed by newsvendors on the promenade –

  WANTED WOMEN FULL DESCRIPTION

  It stared at them at every turn; Mrs Clair bought a newspaper.

  ‘We can hear the band from this seat, Adelaide,’ she said. ‘Let’s sit down.’

  She had no thought of paying threepence apiece for seats nearer to the band – not while the money in her handbag was dwindling at such an alarming pace. They sat, just as Marjorie had sat with George on so many promenades during that holiday that seemed so long ago, and Mrs Clair opened the newspaper with as great an appearance of casual interest as she could muster. Here were their descriptions, sure enough –

  ‘Marjorie Grainger. Aged 32. Height five feet five. Dark hair and eyes, and small hands and feet. Of athletic build, was very sunburned when last seen. Probably wearing a brown woollen jumper and skirt.

  ‘Martha Clair. Aged 59. Height five feet one or two. Grey hair nearly white, eyes hazel. Is of neat appearance and is very active for her age. Probably wearing a black coat and skirt and black hat with black bone buckle at side.’

  Mrs Clair drew a breath of relief when she read these descriptions. They were wrong in several essential details. Marjorie was wearing her red-and-grey jumper with her brown skirt. And she herself – some people might perhaps say her eyes were hazel but she would describe them as grey. The black coat and skirt and hat meant nothing. Half the women of England over fifty wore black coats and skirts; and hats answering to the description given could be seen in any street. Altogether they were not very good descriptions; Mrs Clair wondered who had provided them. The heights were probably suggested by that police sergeant, but Mrs Clair fancied that Mrs Taylor who lived next door to Marjorie must have told about the clothes. It would be like Mrs Taylor to get them wrong.