A Disturbing Influence Read Online Free PDF Page A

her. Since her illness had begun we had used separate bedrooms and she had to tell me whichdrawers everything was in. From time to time she asked me to show her some garment she didn’t want to take with her, but which she wanted to see. ‘I am going to die,’ she repeated again and again, always with that slight smile. ‘That girl has killed me.’
    ‘Listen, Isobel. You simply have a high temperature. You are not going to die.’
    ‘Oh yes, I am. We all are. Everyone dies in the end.’
    I became seriously worried that her mind might indeed be affected. I felt very relieved when the ambulance came. I went with her to the hospital and saw her into bed. Nye put her under sedation immediately.
    ‘She’s not going to die, whatever she may think,’ said Nye. ‘Not yet, anyway, unless I’m very much mistaken. I’ve always thought that she probably has milk fever or one of those things. But I must tell you, Raymond, that I don’t think that’s all she’s got.’
    ‘Well?’
    ‘The tests may still be negative, but it looks to me like a clear case of cancer. I haven’t told you before, because it’s not certain.’
    ‘I have suspected it myself.’
    ‘Her present condition isn’t caused by cancer, of course. But if she has it it won’t make things any better.’
    ‘Yes.’ I had a momentary vision of my beloved wife as a body falling apart with various diseases. I shuddered.
    ‘Has Isobel ever had malaria? Anything like that?’
    ‘No, never. Her sister and nephew have both had it.’
    ‘It can’t be that, then. I don’t know.’
    Next day was Sunday, and for the first time in my life I did not write a new sermon but repeated an old one. Miss Spurgeon looked suspicious but said nothing. At the hospital the nurses told me that Isobel kept talking about someone called Lindy. Nye suggested that I dismiss the girl, if that was what I was going to do, and tell Isobel I’d done so in one of her moments of calm.
    I wasn’t at all sure that I was doing the right thing when I summoned Lindy to my study next morning. But events hadmade me their puppet, I felt, and I had no choice but to dismiss her.
    ‘It has come to my notice, Lindy, that you have been behaving—badly—with Mr Johnson. I’m afraid I cannot possibly continue to employ you.’
    She looked at me quite blankly.
    ‘You know very well what I mean, Lindy. Fornication is a very serious sin.’
    She smiled feebly and blushed. ‘But I haven’t, sir.’
    ‘That is a lie, Lindy. Don’t make things still worse by telling me lies. I happen to know that you and Johnson are guilty of fornication. In his case adultery, too. It is a very serious matter.’
    She blinked at me, but did not look in the least put out. If anything she looked smug.
    ‘Do you realize what I am saying, Lindy? Your conduct is absolutely disgraceful. Here are a month’s wages. And I may as well warn you now that I am going to tell your mother.’
    Lindy began to sniffle. But she took the envelope and fingered it. ‘I’m sorry, sir.’
    ‘It’s not enough to be sorry, Lindy. You don’t seem to be in the least repentant. Don’t you know that you have committed a grave sin?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’ The sniffles continued, but they were not, I thought, very convincing.
    ‘And, besides that, I cannot tell you how disappointed both Mrs Henderson and I feel. We have done a great deal for you, Lindy, and you have let us down very badly.’
    ‘I’m sorry, sir, really I am.’
    ‘I don’t believe you’re in the least sorry. Will you promise me that this will never happen again?’
    She stopped sniffling and looked up at me. ‘I don’t know, sir. He’s so kind.’
    ‘Really, Lindy, this is too much. Have you no sense of decency? Mr Johnson is a married man. Have you thought of the misery you are causing his wife?’
    ‘No, sir.’
    I gave up. She simply wasn’t listening to me. Or, rather, she was listening to my words, but paying no attention at all to my meaning. I had a