Behold Here's Poison Read Free

our Marthas? And yet one does somehow yearn for just a little time to be quiet, to face our loss, before we plunge into the sordid side of what ought not to be sordid at all, but very, very beautiful.'
    Stella gave a gasp, and went off into a fit of strangled laughter. In the middle of this her brother walked into the room, looking tousled and a little dazed still with sleep. 'I s—say!' he stammered. 'Uncle's dead! Did you know? Beecher's locked the room, and gone to ring up Fielding. He says there's absolutely no doubt.'
    'Hush, dear!' said Mrs Matthews. 'Stella, try to control yourself! A doctor should of course be sent for, but one shrinks, somehow, from the thought of Dr Fielding, whom your uncle disliked, coming at such a moment. Perhaps I am over-sensitive, and I suppose there is no help for it, but—'
    'I can't see that it matters in the least,' said Guy. He grasped the rail at the foot of his mother's bed, and stood looking down at her with bright, uncomprehending eyes. 'I can't grasp it!' he announced. 'I mean, uncle's dying like that. Of course, everybody expected it in a way, I suppose. I mean, his blood-pressure. What do you think he died of? Do you suppose it was apoplexy? I always thought he'd have apoplexy sooner or later, didn't you, Stella? Will there have to be an inquest? I don't see why there should be, do you? I mean, everyone knows he had a weak heart. It's obvious he died of it.'
    'Yes, dear, but we won't talk of it now,' Mrs Matthews said repressively. 'You are upset, and you let your tongue run away with you. You must try and realise what it all means to me. I sometimes think poor Gregory was fonder of me than of his own sisters. I do try always to see only the good in everybody, and Gregory responded to me in a way that makes me very happy to look back upon.'
    'Oh Gawd!' said Guy rudely.
    Mrs Matthews compressed her lips for a moment, but replied almost at once in an extremely gentle voice: 'Go and dress, Guy dear. A dark suit, of course, and not that orange pull-over. You too, Stella.'
    'Actually, I hadn't thought of the orange pull-over,' said Guy loftily. 'But I utterly agree with Nigel about mourning. It's a survival of barbarism, and, as he says—'
    'Darling, I know you don't mean to hurt me,' said Mrs Matthews sadly, 'but when you treat sacred things in that spirit of—'
    'You've simply got to realise that I'm a Pure Agnostic,' replied Guy. 'When you talk about things like death being sacred it means absolutely nothing to me.'
    'Oh, shut up!' interrupted Stella, giving him a push towards the door. 'Nobody wants to listen to your views on religion.'
    'They're not particularly my views,' said Guy, 'but the views of practically all thinking people today.'
    'Oh yeah?' said Stella inelegantly, and walked off to her own room.
    Mary's surmise that Dr Fielding had been called out before breakfast was proved to be correct. He had not returned to his house when Beecher rang up, and it was not until both Stella and Guy had bathed and dressed that he arrived at the Poplars. By that time Miss Matthews, recovering from her fit of crying, had also dressed, and had not only telephoned to her elder sister, Gertrude Lupton, but had found time to give a great many orders to Mrs Beecher for the subsequent using-up of the fish and the eggs already cooked for a breakfast she felt sure no one could think of eating. These orders were immediately cancelled by Stella and Guy, who were feeling hungry, and an altercation was in full force when Dr Fielding walked into the house.
    He was a tall man in the middle-thirties, with very wide-set grey eyes, and a humorous mouth. As he stepped into the hall he exchanged a glance with Stella, who at once went forward to greet him. 'Oh Deryk, thank God you've come!' she said, taking his hand.
    'Stella, not with your uncle lying dead upstairs!' begged Miss Matthews distractedly. 'Not that I disapprove, because I'm sure dear Dr Fielding—But after all Gregory said—though I