Trusted Like The Fox by James Hadley Chase Page A

platform, getting into the train and settling in a corner seat. He could picture her white, anxious face as she peered through the window to make sure that no one had seen her. The train began to move again. He imagined her being carried away from him, and he clawed at the wet soil, trying to pull himself up, fearful of being left on his own.
    He heard a distant signal thump down as the train moved off. Somehow the sound reminded him of the noise the trap would make when they hanged him. He shivered, his hand going to his throat.
    Then, just as he was about to give up hope, he heard her coming, and saw a light flickering over the edge of the trench.
    “Put it out, you fool!” he raved. Was the girl crazy to wave a light like that for anyone to see? But, of course, she couldn’t hear him, and when she climbed down into the trench, he knocked the torch violently out of her hand.
    “It’s all right,” she said quietly, picking up the torch and kneeling in the wet beside him. “No one can see us. I had to have a light. It’s dark and wet out there.”
    The torch lit up the trench, and he saw the sand, dark with rain, his twisted leg, his wet trousers, the girl also wet through, her hair like rats’ tails, the awful little hat wilting.
    “I’ll try and fix your leg,” she said.
    She had with her a big suitcase and two brightly-coloured golfing umbrellas. Although she was breathing hard, she was calm, and he felt more confident now she was with him.
    “It would rain, wouldn’t it?” she said as she opened one of the umbrellas. Unconsciously she had adopted the cheerful tone a nurse has in a sickroom.
    He nodded, watched her. She wasn’t such a fool, he decided. He doubted if even he would have thought to look for an umbrella.
    She fixed the big umbrella across the sides of the trench so that it formed a roof over his head. It was a relief not to feel the rain, and he nodded approvingly when she opened the second umbrella and set it up beside the first. The two umbrellas formed a gay and complete roof to the trench, shutting out the rain and making the trench almost cosy. It was now just the kind of place a child would have loved to have been shut up in; and lying there, the rain and the sullen sky blotted out, the light from the torch on the brilliant colours of the umbrellas, Ellis went back into his childhood, and for a moment or so was actually moved.
    Grace was unpacking the suitcase. She produced two large mackintosh sheets which she spread out on the wet soil.
    “You’ll have to move on to that,” she said, “or you’ll get rheumatism.”
    He pointed to his leg. “Fix my leg,” he said impatiently. “Never mind about rheumatism. Do you think I want to stay here all night?”
    But she was busy unpacking the suitcase and she wasn’t looking at him so she did not know he was speaking. This threw him into another rage. (To be at the mercy of this deaf bitch, he raved.) He tried to touch her, but she was just beyond his reach and he was forced to lie still, hating her, waiting for her to turn.
    “Can you help yourself?” she asked, coming to him and kneeling over him. He smelt the wet flannel of her skirt and drops of water fell from the stupid little flower in her hat on to his face.
    He grabbed her arm, shook it. “My leg,” he shouted. “Get on with it! Never mind about the wet. Fix my leg!”
    But she couldn’t have been watching his lips, for she said calmly: “Raise yourself. I’ll steady your leg while you get on to the mackintosh.”
    He was going to argue, telling her he didn’t give a damn about the damp, but he suddenly hadn’t the strength. He hated to let her dominate him, but in his present condition it was so much easier to do what he was told.
    He finally worked his way on to the mackintosh. She was remarkably efficient the way she handled his leg. Tenderly she held it just off the ground and she seemed to anticipate his movements so he managed to inch on to the mackintosh without