"Masterton, Graham - The Djinn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Masterton Graham)

"They were portraits" said Marjorie. "We couldn't have portraits."

"You couldn't have portraits? What do you mean?"

Unaccountably, Marjorie Greaves began to tremble. It wasn't the deep spasm of sorrow or the nervous twitch of exhaustion. It was hysterical, paralytic fear. She was like a horse that senses a snake in the straw and shakes in terror.

"You'd better come outside," I told her, guiding her as quickly and calmly as I could through the gathered guests. From the other side of the room. Anna raised a querying eyebrow, but I stuck my hand up in the air with five fingers spread, indicating I'd be gone for only five minutes. She shrugged and nodded. At least my appetizing lunch date was secure, unless the miserable man with his cup oЈ water got in there while I was away, but there wasn't much chance of that.

Outside, in brilliant sunlight, we walked across the overgrown lawns in silence and rested at last on a rusty wrought-iron garden bench. There was a view of the glittering, ink-colored sea, with the starched sails of yachts leaning on it; the crumbling old house with its Gothic turret; and the neglected gardens that ran down through the land; there was nothing but the sound of the surf and the weathervane squeaking with every swing. Marjorie patted her graying hair straight, took out her handkerchief, and discreetly blew her nose.

"I've never seen you like this," I told her. "You seem frightened of something."

She folded her hands in her lap and stared out toward the seashore, saying nothing at all.

"I don't understand about the house," I said. "Didn't Max want you to keep it? Didn't he leave you some kind of trust fund for it?"

Marjorie didn't answer. She sat as if she were posing for a formal portrait, with her black funeral shoes side by side in the grass like a pair of obedient Labrador puppies.

"Well, I don't know," I said resignedly. I took a pack of cigarettes out of my black vest pocket and found they were crushed into S-shapes. I straightened one out, lit it with my trusty Zippo, and blew the smoke across the lawn.

The scimitar-shaped weathervane went squeeeekkk, squeeeekkk, squeeeekkk.

After a few minutes, Marjorie said, "Max was not himself toward the end."

I nodded. "Is that why he didn't settle anything about the house?"

"Oh, no," she said. "He was quite sure about the house."

"You mean Max wanted it demolished, too?"

"Oh, yes, he was quite sure about that."

"But why? What's the point of tearing down a historic house like this? Max loved it!"

Marjorie sighed nervously. She seemed very jittery, and it was obviously an effort for her to sit still.

"He never explained everything. He said that he would only tell me what I needed to know for my own safety."

I laughed. There was nothing notably funny in what Marjorie had told me, but I thought I ought to bolster her confidence by showing her how carefree and debonair I was.

"It sounds to me like one of Max's little jokes," I told her. "You really shouldn't worry about it. I think you need a little holiday more than anything else. It's a big strain, looking after a sick man."

She stared at me coldly, and my smile leaked out of my lips like air dribbling out of a balloon.

"It wasn't a joke," she said, "and he wasn't sick."

"But you just said he wasn't himself." "I didn't mean that he was sick." "Then what did you mean? You're speaking in riddles."

Marjorie picked at the edge of her thumbnail where her nail polish was chipped. When she spoke, her voice sounded very dry and deliberate, and I had an unsettling feeling that she was doing her utmost to tell me the truth.