The Players And The Game Read Free Page B

Alice had spoken at the interview.
    ‘And he has turned down the other offer.’ He pressed a buzzer. A flabby-looking woman with mouse-coloured hair came in. ‘Miss Brown, the letter to Mr Makepeace’s solicitors, please. And the carbon of my acknowledgement.’
    Miss Brown brought them in. The solicitors’ letter confirmed that they were going ahead and would be ready to exchange contracts within a couple of days.
    ‘You’ll no doubt be hearing from your own solicitors. Our postal services are not what they used to be.’ He smiled shyly at this, then grew serious. ‘You’ll have a beautiful home, Mrs Vane. In the best part of Rawley.’
    ‘The best part of Rawley,’ Alice repeated as they got out of the car and she looked at the red-brick Edwardian houses around them, each with its separate garage and well-kept front and back gardens. They went round the empty house again, looking for cracks in ceilings, sniffing in the damp cellar. ‘Are you having second thoughts? It’s not too late.’
    ‘No second thoughts. I told you, it’s going to be terrific.’
    ‘I hope I can take life in the best part of Rawley, that’s all.’
     
    ‘You know the finest cure for crime? Health.’ Sir Felton Dicksee looked challengingly around the table. He was Chief Constable of the county, and nobody cared to contradict him. The men were still in the dining-room after dinner, on their second glass of port.
    ‘You mean the criminal type is mentally abnormal?’ Dick Service, keen and doggish, was the Timbals Plastics psychiatrist.
    ‘Not mental. Let you trick cyclist chaps get going and you tell us we’re all abnormal, more or less.’ Sir Felton laughed heartily. ‘May be right for all I know, but it’s not what I’m talking about. Talking about health, keeping fit. No need to spend too much time on it. Ten minutes a day with the Dicksee Diaphragm exercises will keep you in trim.’ He slapped his solar plexus which reverberated like a drum, then got out of his chair, touched his toes and kicked up each leg high as a ballet dancer.
    ‘Splendid,’ Dick Service said. ‘But do you mean that if all crooks did this they’d become honest citizens?’
    Sir Felton snorted. He was a small red peppery man with a thick moustache. ‘Course not. I’m not a crank. What causes crime? Bad housing, wrong food, environment generally, right?’
    ‘It certainly has a lot to do with it,’ Dick Service agreed diplomatically.
    ‘Right. Bring up people in healthy conditions, give ’em light, air, make ’em take exercise whether they want to or not, and you’d cut the crime rate by a quarter in ten years.’
    ‘What about heredity?’ Paul Vane asked. Sir Felton made a derisive noise. ‘And then what about the exceptional criminal?’
    ‘Never met one. Have you?’ The Chief Constable drained his glass, glared across the table. ‘They don’t exist. Believe me, I know.’
    ‘Just people who don’t do the Dicksee Diaphragm exercises.’ The words came out with an ironic effect that was not intended. There was silence. Then Bob Lowson smoothly led the conversation to golf handicaps, and went on to suggest that Paul should think about joining Rawley Golf Club. When he admitted that he did not play there was again a moment of silence.
     
    In the drawing-room the ladies talked about the latest films, and in particular about Little Woman, Big Man, which had been showing at the Odeon. Too much sex, Lady Dicksee said decisively, why couldn’t they realise that people went to the cinema for entertainment?
    In her breathless apologetic voice Penelope Service disagreed. ‘I mean it was all rather, didn’t you think, sweet? Especially this girl, you know, the one who was almost, well, raped on board the boat.’
    ‘Karen ValIance,’ Valerie contributed helpfully.
    ‘I thought Karen Vallance was the one in the dress shop.’
    ‘That was Marianne Musgrave.’
    ‘No, Marianne Musgrave was the one thumbing a lift, the one who said,