Barbara Erskine 3-Book Collection: Lady of Hay, Time’s Legacy, Sands of Time. Barbara Erskine
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I’m sure they were real.’ He walked to the window and glanced down into the street.
‘But you think they were of hysterical origin?’ Sarah’s voice was hushed. ‘She’s not the type, surely?’
‘Who can tell who is the type?’ he replied thoughtfully. ‘Who can ever tell? And if she isn’t the type, and the bruises were there …’ He paused.
‘If she isn’t,’ Sarah echoed quietly, ‘then the man she was with really did try to strangle her.’
As arranged, Jo met Sam on Wednesday evening at Luigi’s. He took one look at her and grinned across the table. ‘Let’s order before you hit me with your handbag, Jo.’
‘I’ll hit you with more than a handbag if you try a trick like that again,’ Jo said. Her voice was cool as she glanced at him over the menu. ‘I absolutely forbid you to talk to Carl Bennet about me. What I do is none of your business. I am not your patient. I have never been your patient, and I don’t intend to be. What I do and what I write is my own affair. And the people I consult in the course of my research have a right to privacy. I do not expect you to harass them, or me. Is that quite clear?’
‘OK. I surrender. I’ve said, I apologise.’ He raised his hands. ‘What more can I do?’
‘Don’t ever go behind my back again.’
‘You must trust me, Jo. I’ve said I’m sorry. But I am interested. And I do have a right to worry about you. I have more right than you’ll ever know.’ He paused for a moment. ‘So, you decided to defy me and see him again. You’d better tell me what happened. Did you learn anything more about your alter ego?’
‘A bit.’ Jo relented. ‘About her marriage to William …’ She was watching his face in the candlelight. The restaurant was dark, crowded now at the peak evening hour, and very hot. Sam was sweating slightly as he looked at her, his eyes fixed on her face. The pupils were very small. Without knowing why, she felt herself shiver slightly. ‘Nothing dramatic happened. It was all rather low key after the first session.’ Her voice tailed away suddenly. Low key? The violence! The rape! The agony of that man thrusting his way into her child’s resisting body, silencing her desperate screams with a coarse, unclean hand across her mouth, laughing at her terror. She realised that Sam was still watching her and looked away hastily.
‘Jo?’ He reached across and lightly ran his thumb across her wrist. ‘Are you all right?’
She nodded. ‘Of course. It’s just a bit hot in here.’ She withdrew her hand a little too quickly. ‘Let’s eat. I’m starving.’
They waited in silence as the waiter brought their antipasto. As they were starting to eat, Sam said thoughtfully, ‘William was very close to King John, did you know that?’
Jo stared up at him. ‘You’ve been looking it up?’
‘A bit. I have a feeling William was much maligned. Historians seem to doubt if the massacre was his idea at all. He was a useful pawn, the man at the sharp end, the one to carry it out and take the blame. But not quite as bad as you seemed to think.’
‘He enjoyed it.’ Jo’s voice was full of icy condemnation. ‘He enjoyed every moment of that slaughter!’ She shuddered violently and then she leaned forward. ‘Sam. I want you to do something for me. I want you to do whatever you have to do to lift that post-hypnotic suggestion that I forget that first session in Edinburgh. I have to remember what happened!’
‘No.’ Sam shook his head slowly. ‘No. I’m sorry. I can’t do that.’
‘You can’t, or you won’t?’ Jo put down her fork with a clatter.
‘I won’t. But I probably couldn’t anyway. It would involve rehypnosis, and I’m not prepared to try and meddle with something Michael Cohen did.’
‘If you won’t, I’ll get Carl Bennet to do it.’ Jo’s eyes were fixed on his. She saw his jaw muscles tighten.
‘That wouldn’t work, Jo.’
‘It would. I’ve been reading up about hypnosis. Believe me, I haven’t been sitting around the last few days wondering what is happening to me. There are hundreds of books on the subject and –’
‘I said no, Jo.’ Sam sat back slowly, moving sideways slightly to ease his long legs under the small table. ‘Remember what I told you. You are too suggestible a subject. And don’t pretend that you are not reacting deeply again because you have proved you are. Not only under hypnosis either. It is possible that you are susceptible to delayed reaction. For instance, Nick has told me what happened at your grandmother’s house.’
Jo looked up, stunned. ‘Nick doesn’t know what happened,’ she said tightly. ‘At least –’ She stopped abruptly.
‘Supposing you tell me what you think happened.’ Sam did not look at her. He was staring at the candle flame as it flared sideways in the draught as someone stood at the next table and reached for their coat.
Jo hesitated. ‘Nothing,’ she said at last. ‘I fainted, that’s all. It had nothing to do with anything. So, are you going to help me?’
For a moment he did not answer, lost in contemplation of the candle, the shadows playing across his face. Then once more he shook his head. ‘Leave it alone, Jo,’ he said softly. ‘Otherwise you may start something you can’t finish.’
‘May I have the Maclean file, please?’ Nick’s assistant’s voice was becoming bored. ‘For Jim, if it isn’t too much trouble!’ Behind her the office door swung to and fro in the draught from the open window.
Nick focused on her suddenly. ‘Sorry, Jane. What did you say?’
‘The Maclean file, Nick. I’ll try to get Jo again, shall I?’ Jane sighed exaggeratedly. She was a tall, willowy girl whose high cheek-bones and Roedean accent were at variance with the three parallel streaks of iridescent orange, pink and green in her short cropped hair. ‘Though why we go on trying when she is obviously out, I don’t know.’
‘Don’t bother!’ Nick slammed his pen down on the desk. He bent to rummage for the file and threw it across to her. ‘Jim has remembered that I’m supposed to be going to Paris next Wednesday?’
‘He’d remembered.’ Jane put on her calming voice. It infuriated Nick.
‘Good. Then from this moment I can leave the office in your hands, can I?’
‘Why, where are you going until Wednesday?’ Jane held the file clasped to her chest like a shield.
‘Tomorrow the printers, then lunch with a friend, then I said I’d look in at Carters on my way to Hampshire.’ He smiled. ‘Then the blessed weekend. Then Monday and Tuesday I’m in Scotland.’ He closed his case with a snap and picked it up. ‘And now I’m playing hookey for the rest of the afternoon. So if anyone should want me you can tell them to try again in ten days.’
Three minutes after he had left the building the phone rang. It was Jo.
Each time Nick had phoned her, Jo had put the phone down. The last time she slammed the receiver down she switched off her typewriter and walked slowly into the bathroom. Turning on the light she gathered her long hair up from her neck and held it on top of her head, then she studied her throat. There still wasn’t a mark on it.
‘So. That proves he did not touch me!’ she said out loud. ‘If anyone really had tried to strangle me the bruises would have been there for days. It was a dream. I was delirious. I was mad! It wasn’t Nick, so why am I afraid of him?’
She walked thoughtfully through into the kitchen and poured a glass of iced tomato juice, then she went back to the typewriter. All