“There was never any sense in sending him there, except that it got rid of him. You’d better get back to bed you’ll catch cold if you stand about much longer.”
He opened his own door as he spoke, but she detained him for a moment, saying: “Well, I’m not worrying my head about Clay, but I wish you’d tell me if Father’s in the habit of drawing out vast sums of money by way of petty cash.”
“Why? What’s it got to do with you?” he asked.
She disregarded this question. “Why the hell don’t you put a stop to it?” she asked.
“I have no power to stop Father doing anything he wants to do,” he replied roughly. “Good night!”
He went into his room and shut the door. When he got into bed again he still could not sleep, and lay for a long time flogging his brain over and over the events of what had surely been the longest day of his life.
It seemed to him that he had been to sleep for only a few minutes when he was awakened by a hand shaking his shoulder, and Reuben’s voice insistently speaking his name in his ear; but when he opened his eyes he found that the sunlight was flooding the room, and that the hands of the clock beside his bed pointed to eight o’clock. He raised himself on his elbow, yawning, and passing a hand across his sleep-drenched eyes. He realised that Reuben’s voice sounded unusually urgent, and said:
“What’s the matter?” Then he saw that tears were running down Reuben’s lined cheeks, and this extraordinary sight fully awoke him, and he sat up with a jerk. “What the devil’s up with you?” he demanded.
“Master!” Reuben said, his lower lip trembling grotesquely. “He’s gone, Mr Ray!”
“Gone?” Raymond repeated. “What do you mean, gone? Gone where?”