Evil Under the Sun

‘Do you remember the day that we took Toby down to get water rats?’

They spent some minutes in recalling old adventures.

Then there came a pause.

Rosamund’s fingers played with the clasp of her bag. She said at last:

‘Kenneth?’

‘Um.’ His reply was indistinct. He was still lying on his face on the turf.

‘If I say something to you that is probably outrageously impertinent will you never speak to me again?’

He rolled over and sat up.

‘I don’t think,’ he said seriously, ‘that I would ever regard anything you said as impertinent. You see, you belong.’

She nodded in acceptance of all that last phrase meant. She concealed only the pleasure it gave her.

‘Kenneth, why don’t you get a divorce from your wife?’

His face altered. It hardened—the happy expression died out of it. He took a pipe from his pocket and began filling it.

Rosamund said:

‘I’m sorry if I’ve offended you.’

He said quietly:

‘You haven’t offended me.’

‘Well then, why don’t you?’

‘You don’t understand, my dear girl.’

‘Are you—so frightfully fond of her?’

‘It’s not just a question of that. You see, I married her.’

‘I know. But she’s—pretty notorious.’

He considered that for a moment, ramming in the tobacco carefully.

‘Is she? I suppose she is.’

‘You could divorce her, Ken.’

‘My dear girl, you’ve got no business to say a thing like that. Just because men lose their heads about her a bit isn’t to say that she loses hers.’

Rosamund bit off a rejoinder. Then she said:

‘You could fix it so that she divorced you—if you prefer it that way.’

‘I dare say I could.’

‘You ought to, Ken. Really, I mean it. There’s the child.’

‘Linda?’

‘Yes, Linda.’

‘What’s Linda to do with it?’

‘Arlena’s not good for Linda. She isn’t really. Linda, I think, feels things a good deal.’

Kenneth Marshall applied a match to his pipe. Between puffs he said:

‘Yes—there’s something in that. I suppose Arlena and Linda aren’t very good for each other. Not the right thing for a girl perhaps. It’s a bit worrying.’

Rosamund said:

‘I like Linda—very much. There’s something—fine about her.’

Kenneth said:

‘She’s like her mother. She takes things hard like Ruth did.’

Rosamund said:

‘Then don’t you think—really—that you ought to get rid of Arlena?’

‘Fix up a divorce?’

‘Yes. People are doing that all the time.’

Kenneth Marshall said with sudden vehemence:

‘Yes, and that’s just what I hate.’

‘Hate?’ She was startled.

‘Yes. Sort of attitude to life there is nowadays. If you take on a thing and don’t like it, then you get yourself out of it as quick as possible! Dash it all, there’s got to be such a thing as good faith. If you marry a woman and engage yourself to look after her, well it’s up to you to do it. It’s your show. You’ve taken it on. I’m sick of quick marriage and easy divorce. Arlena’s my wife, that’s all there is to it.’

Rosamund leaned forward. She said in a low voice:

‘So it’s like that with you? “Till death do us part”?’

Kenneth Marshall nodded his head.