The Thief

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Book: Read The Thief for Free Online
Authors: Ruth Rendell
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    Why hadn’t he told the police? That puzzled her. He must guess it was Polly who had taken his case. She had been flying club class so he would know she had got off the aircraft before him. When his case couldn’t be found the first person he would think of would be her. And then when they found his case in the ladies’ . . . They would tell him that, and he would go straight to the airport police. So why hadn’t they phoned or come here? Perhaps they had. Another peacock blue car was behind her, two cars behind her, and for a moment she felt afraid. But once she was home it had gone.
    The look on Alex’s face when she went in scared her. He was hardly ever angry but he looked angry now. She thought, he has been to my desk and found the money. Or the police have been here. But she was wrong. It was only that his computer had crashed and he had to call for help. Smiling now, pleased to see her, he helped her in with the bags of shopping.
    ‘You didn’t tell me we’re going to see your parents tonight.’
    She had forgotten. ‘I forgot,’ she said. ‘Don’t you want to? I can put them off.’
    ‘No, I’d like to go. It’s just that we said we’d go and see that film. I suppose we could go first. Shall we?’
    She must keep watch on Lant’s house. She had meant to go back this afternoon, see if his car was gone or stay there until he came out and drove away. Then she could put the money through his letter box . . . It would have to wait, that was all. Wait all through Sunday? She wasn’t due at work until midday on Monday but must she wait until Monday morning?
    ‘Did you get a paper?’
    ‘I forgot,’ she said again. ‘I’ll go out again.’
    ‘No, I’ll go.’
    Never before had she been so glad to see him go out. To leave her on her own. Always, in the past, she had wanted him with her. She had felt lonely and lost without him. Now his going out was a relief. She ran to her desk and opened the drawer where the money was.
    She called it ‘her’ desk because she used it but in fact it was Alex’s. Almost everything in the house was Alex’s, the carpets, the curtains, the tables and chairs and beds and the kitchen things. It was just as it had been when she moved in with him. She had brought only a radio with her, a lamp or two, and some china and glass. The desk she had taken over because she was the one who sometimes worked from home. As far as she knew, he never went near it.
    And he had not been near it that morning. The money was just as she had left it. Why had Lant wanted it in pounds, dollars and euros? It didn’t matter. She found some envelopes, ten of them, and put the money into them, five hundred pounds in each one. Alex might never go near the desk but still the money wasn’t safe there. She took the ten envelopes upstairs and put them in her underwear drawer. Then she checked on Lant’s clothes. They were where she had left them, at the back of her wardrobe. If she did the washing now, his with hers, Alex might see Lant’s yellow shirt and the orange T-shirt when she took them out of the machine. Better wait till tomorrow . . .
    He was back with his paper just as she was coming downstairs. As they walked together into the living room the phone rang. Again she thought, it will be the police. Or Lant himself. Lant. He knows. He must have seen me this morning. She picked up the phone and said, ‘Hello?’
    Alex was standing behind her. She said into the phone, ‘Who is that?’ There was silence, no heavy breathing, just silence. ‘Who is it?’ Her voice sounded strained, panicky. There was no answer and she put the phone down.
    She turned to Alex. He had sat down, the paper on his knees.
    ‘Who was that?’ he said. ‘Was it someone you knew?’
    ‘I don’t know who it was,’ she said, her eyes meeting his. ‘He didn’t speak.’
    ‘He?’
    ‘He, she, I told you I don’t know. They didn’t say anything.’
    That had been a mistake, a bad mistake for a

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