Death in Disguise Read Online Free PDF Page B

Sonata. The bow swept back and forth with fierce élan. Two deep furrows tugged at her thick brows and her eyes were tightly closed. She tossed her head in such an excess of passionate dedication that transparent pearls of sweat flew sparkling through the warm air and one of her plaits, coiled like an auburn saucer over her ear, became loose, swinging vigorously back and forth in three-four time.
    She was wearing a loose gown, tie-dyed gamboge and maroon showing the pyramids and a burial cortege sideways on. Not one of the print room’s more successful efforts. A mistake had been made with the blocks so that at one point the funeral party—corpse, camels, mourners et al— had done a volte-face, colliding with the forward-looking lot head-on.
    Above the bateau neckline of this voluminous shift rose May’s splendid profile. Cleanly etched, serene, noble, unambiguous in its dedication to the spreading of happiness and health, it was also most attention-catching for May adorned her face as she did her room, her person and every single artefact she owned, which is to say prodigiously. And her palette was as comprehensive as her brush was generous. Cheeks bloomed wanton coral, full lips shiny pomegranate red. Eyelids bright green shading into a blend of sky blue and plum, occasionally patterned with silver dust. Her tea-rose complexion sometimes had quite a solid bloom for, occasionally distracted by other-worldly musings, she would forget she had already put on her foundation and would impasto on a further layer before finishing off with a generous dusting of Coty American Tan.
    Now, after a final buoyant flourish of the bow, she laid her hand upon the strings to still their vibration. Was there any other instrument, she wondered, any other creature that could grunt with elegance? She rested her cheek briefly against the glowing wood, leaving a dusty peach-brown imprint, then leaned the cello against her chair and in all her calicoed splendour billowed across to the window.
    She stood gazing out at the cedar tree, struggling to maintain the sensation of joyful calm that had possessed her whilst playing. But she had no sooner noted such feelings than joy became mere happiness, and pleasure transmuted quickly into a dullish lack of ease. May sighed and, for comfort, wrenched her thoughts to her recent colour workshop ‘There’s A Rainbow Round Your Shoulder’, which had been oversubscribed and very well received. But even this stratagem was only partially successful. Visions of uplifted participants all thinking aquamarine faded despite all her best efforts to the contrary, and the shadow of anxiety returned. She realised she was not even looking forward to her coming regression and these were often most exciting occasions.
    May was extremely cross that this should be so. She didn’t have a lot of patience with folk who ‘mooned about’ as she put it. Fretting over this and that, refusing to get to grips with the problem, never mind putting it right. Rather self-indulgent she thought that sort of thing. Now she was doing it herself. And really without excuse, for there was certainly no shortage of people to go and talk to. Unfortunately one of them (she didn’t know which) was the cause of her concern. She would have liked to turn to the Master even though it was not usual to bother him with temporal matters. The fact that in this instance she could not caused her genuine distress. It was as if a constantly reliable source of warmth and light had been unkindly doused. She felt not only bereft but also rejected—which she knew to be unreasonable. The difficulty was that her beloved guru—innocently and unwittingly she was sure—was partially to blame for this sense of unease.
    It had happened like this. Two days after Jim died May had been passing the Master’s chamber on her way to the laundry room. Although the door was ajar his beautiful passe-partout zodiac screen was