Ladies From Hell Read Online Free PDF

taller than me by an inch or more with her heels on. Good forehead and line of jaw, firm chin; I suppose you’d have called her features regular rather than beautiful, but stap me, she was handsome. Her hair was dark blonde, drawn into a soft chignon that accentuated the slenderness of her neck. She wore a quietly elegant suit of business grey; her eyes were grey too, with flecks of another colour in them that I never really managed to define. “
Une pure Celte dolichocéphale
,” thinks I, “whatever next?” If this was the sort of thing the Department was sending out, things were definitely looking up.
    She had a nice cool handshake and her voice was just right too; light, with a hint of huskiness, and not too
loud
. She introduced herself as Netta Sandringham (A-tone in the surname for a change) and said she very much hoped she wouldn’t be in the way. I couldn’t see that possibility arising for some time to come, and said so; it produced a couple of quick dimples, but she was still unsure of herself. “It’s all very new to me,” she said, looking round the Barn in a troubled sort of way. “It’s my first Attachment you see, I’ve never met an artist before. Well, not a proper one. I shall just have to learn the ropes as quickly as I can.”
    “My girl,” thinks I, “you’ve come to the right place for that.” I was busy assessing her age. I put it at thirty-one or two, which was also fine. Women don’t really wake up till they’re into their third decade. Models get their Venus Rings then, sopranos get their voices; all sorts of interesting things start to happen.
    I handed Tiddly Poo to James, who looked faintly miffed.The Assistant didn’t coo over the beast to ingratiate herself, which was ten more points to her. I swept her into the lounge, got her sat down and scurried off to make coffee. George, the naughty lad, had nipped into Town for a noggin and a breath of turps-free air; he wasn’t going to be best pleased either when he got back. I bustled about, making the best of my head start; by the time he walked in his Assistant was sitting happily on the lounge carpet, smoking a Balkan Sobranie and surrounded by canvas and folios, while I extolled the virtues of Paul Nash. We’d got through the Great War stuff and the Dymchurch period and were well launched on the Avebury series. “I was always fascinated by art at school,” she had said. “I even thought about taking it up, but you know how it is; if you want to get on …” To which I had merely smiled, and made appropriate noises. I’m always amazed by the sheer hypocritical depth of my sexism; if a bloke had said a thing like that to me I’d almost certainly have belted him up the trunk.
    ‘Not best pleased’ turned out to be a mild description. A thundercloud with eyes on, that was George. The gold tooth winked fitfully through the murk as he strove to bring his charm to bear. It seemed he hadn’t known who he was getting either, so I was poaching his preserve in more ways than one. Still, I always know when to retire gracefully; Netta was borne away at speed to have her credentials examined, and I went through to the Barn and pottered about. I was surprised to notice Coventina had developed a faint but definite leer. I put it down to a trick of the light; after all it was a fairly overcast day.
    The couple of weeks that followed definitely didn’t show the Overseer at his best. Under normal circumstances it was obvious he’d have sailed into the comely Miss S. carrying all before him. Or tried to. But the circumstances weren’t normal. Despite her Grade there was an even chance she was reporting independently; the Service does tend to work like that. So he had to start doing everything by the book again; which meant that everywhere he went, I had to go as well. Just like the nursery rhyme. In the end it got to be difficult to tell just who was hung round whose neck.
    Not that I couldn’t see his point of view. I mean, if you