The Hunter and the Trapped

Bello is a digital only imprint of Pan Macmillan, established to breathe life into previously published classic books.

At Bello we believe in the timeless power of the imagination, of good story, narrative and entertainment and we want to use digital technology to ensure that many more readers can enjoy these books into the future.

We publish in ebook and Print on Demand formats to bring these wonderful books to new audiences.

About Bello:
www.panmacmillan.com/imprints/bello

About the author:
www.panmacmillan.com/author/josephinebell

• Josephine Bell
  
• PART ONE
  
• Chapter One
  
• Chapter Two
  
• Chapter Three
  
• Chapter Four
  
• Chapter Five
  
• Chapter Six
  
• Chapter Seven
  
• Chapter Eight
  
• PART TWO
  
• Chapter One
  
• Chapter Two
  
• Chapter Three
  
• Chapter Four
  
• Chapter Five
  
• Chapter Six
  
• Chapter Seven
  
• Chapter Eight
  
• Chapter Nine
  
• Chapter Ten
  
• Chapter Eleven
  

Josephine Bell was born Doris Bell Collier in Manchester, England. Between 1910 and 1916 she studied at Godolphin School, then trained at Newnham College, Cambridge until 1919. At the University College Hospital in London she was granted M.R.C.S. and L.R.C.P. in 1922, and a M.B. B.S. in 1924.

Bell was a prolific author, writing forty-three novels and numerous uncollected short stories during a forty-five year period.

Many of her short stories appeared in the
London Evening Standard
. Using her pen name she wrote numerous detective novels beginning in 1936, and she was well-known for her medical mysteries. Her early books featured the fictional character Dr. David Wintringham who worked at Research Hospital in London as a junior assistant physician. She helped found the Crime Writers' Association in 1953 and served as chair during 1959–60.

The forecourt of the college was filled with students, some moving purposefully towards a door at the side of the quadrangle, others loitering to enjoy the spring sunshine, finding in it a nourishment far superior to that of the tepid meats offered in their dining room. Some again, ignoring altogether the main purpose of the midday break, sat basking on the wide sweep of steps that led up to the pompous, Victorian, pillared entrance.

Simon Fawcett came quietly from the darkness of the college entrance hall into the sunshine at the top of the steps. He paused there, looking down at the multitude and though he had made no sound in arriving and since then had not moved or spoken, a hundred eyes turned to look at him and many remained fixed, watching for a sign of recognition, hoping for acknowledgment or simply enjoying the grace and beauty of the figure set above them between the pillars.

For Simon had a singular beauty of face, a dark perfection that went well with his spare body, not over tall but well knit and reasonably strong. In repose, as now, he had an air of sadness, that might have conveyed an unbearable poignancy if it had not been so impersonal.

The crowd below him still watched expectantly. The physics lecturer, crossing the quadrangle with a senior mathematics tutor, gave a little exasperated laugh.

“Fawcett at public worship again,” he remarked, acidly.

The mathematician was more open-minded.

“I don't think he does it deliberately. It isn't his fault he happens to have a face like that.”

“Of course he does it deliberately. He adores the effect he makes.”

“Sheer vanity? I don't agree.”

“You never will.”

They reached the door leading to the dining rooms and disappeared. Penelope Dane, lingering there, hoping against hope that Simon Fawcett would pass close by, on his own way to lunch, heard the tail of their remarks, reddened in anger and dragged her eyes back to the open book in her hand to continue her pretence until all hope was gone.

Simon, the ritual of worship complete, the homage graciously accepted, caught sight of two of his senior history students lounging against the ornamental urns at the foot of the steps and giggling at their own wit. His face changed quite suddenly, breaking up into an eager, laughing, wholly boyish series of expressions as he ran lightly down the steps to join them. He thrust an arm through a crooked elbow of each and marched them off, bursting into their conversation as if he knew what had gone before and capping their sallies with a bite and bawdiness far beyond their range.

The professor of English literature and the President of the college, whose subject was philosophy, walked sedately down the steps. The sun had brought them out for the first time that spring. They had watched Simon's performance with a mixture of pleasure and faint disgust.

“Fawcett has been here for six years,” the President said, “and I still can't make up my mind about him. A good brain, an adult mind and yet I find myself, as I did just then, when he ran down the steps, saying to myself, ‘Who is this little mountebank?' Unfair?”

“Definitely. He's a first-class teacher of his subject. He even makes those two lads he's with now, work. They've both got excellent brains and they're as idle as hell. But Fawcett knows exactly how to handle them. Plays the fool with them, like this, but clamps down hard at the right time. They eat out of his hand and he'll drive them through a first-class honours degree, both of them.”

“Oh, they're his slaves all right. So are a good many more. I suppose there's no harm in it – with him.”

They exchanged knowing glances and the professor laughed.

“You don't imagine Fawcett is emotionally involved with any of this crowd, or ever has been, do you? He treats them all alike; he's kind, he likes them, he talks to them on their own level and keeps it all on the surface. Admirable.”

The President nodded but he remained unconvinced. After a few turns in the sun he went indoors again, to enjoy a solitary lunch in his own room. The professor had a date with a friend at the Athenaeum. Walking down to the main road he took a bus. His salary did not run to taxis, except very occasionally.

Near the door of the students' canteen Penelope Dane lingered, her eyes on the open page of her book, her ears alert for the sound of the beloved voice. When Simon, still linked to the two students, came within earshot she looked up, trying to pretend surprise, but so clumsily that she blushed at her own ineptitude. The young men were too preoccupied to notice her. Simon glanced in her direction, gave her a mechanically polite nod and swept past. Penelope, shutting her book with a violent gesture of anger, but suffering in her heart a sickening despair, moved away to sit on the steps and stare blindly at nothing.

Nothing was the key to her life at present, which for her meant Simon and only Simon. Every time, as now, she suffered some marked rebuff from him she thought of their first meeting and was once more most painfully confused. Before this year the boys and men she had met at her home, or at the Allinghams, or as fellow students, had without exception behaved in one of two ways. Either they were friendly, easy to get on with, eager to develop the acquaintance, or else they were awkward, totally uninterested. Simon fitted neither of these categories. At the Allinghams, where she and her father were dining, Simon had made a fifth. He had sat next to her: he had monopolised her, flattered her, amused her, touched her, wholly captivated her. She did not discover until the next day that he was on the staff at the college, because the term had only just begun and it was her first term there. She did not understand how deep and total was her infatuation until, after taking her once to the theatre and once to the ballet, his interest seemed to have faded as suddenly as it had appeared.

So this was the older man, she thought bitterly, sitting on the steps, drowning in her grief, but not willingly, rather thrashing about for some foothold in the depths. She might have guessed that a bachelor in his mid-thirties would be difficult. At the very least, different. She tried to be honest. What exactly did the whole thing amount to? She was in love, completely besotted, as Caroline, her friend, continually reminded her. And Simon? When she was with him he was kind, even tender: he was amusing, exciting, a well-informed man of the world. He caressed her with his eyes but he had never kissed her. He had never come into her home, nor had she ever visited his. A theatre, a ballet, a few dinners at cheap restaurants. And now, when she had managed to get tickets for …

“Have you had your lunch or are you giving it a miss?”

He stood over her, looking down into the face she instantly lifted to his. She had neither seen nor heard his approach. She felt her cheeks grow hot again and even the pricking of tears in her eyes. She was furious.

“I'm on my way now,” she said, only too well aware of the absurdity of this statement. She got to her feet. It was unbearable to be so near him and held at such a distance. She added, trying to smile, “I got those tickets.”

“Tickets?”

“For the Festival Hall. Next Tuesday. You said …”

“Yes, I did, didn't I?”

He was not looking pleased. It was quite obvious that he did not want to prolong this meeting. His eyes flicked away from her and back as if he were calculating how much curiosity was growing in the minds of those about them.

Penelope wanted to move, but her limbs, being held by her heart, would not obey her mind. In extreme exasperation she said, “Of course if you don't
want
to go …”

“Why should you think that?”

It was said gently but it struck deep.

“Because … just now. Oh, what does it matter? What does anything matter?”

Simon drew in his breath and let it out slowly. She heard it as a sigh, a sign of boredom.

“I'll get Carol to go instead,” she said, briskly.

“No.” Simon held out a hand. “Give me the tickets. Meet me outside the Hall. Quarter of an hour before it starts. We'll feed afterwards.”

Without a word she got the tickets from her handbag and gave them to him. His fingers touched hers as he took them, touched her wrist as he lifted his hand away. Penelope stood for a full minute after he left her and then walked slowly towards the canteen. She floated along in a golden mist of pleasure, her doubts destroyed, her reason snuffed out, her heart filled with a vague pity for her friends, who did not feel a lover's touch lingering on their hands.

She arrived five minutes early at the Festival Hall, Simon five minutes late. He was absorbed into the music for which he had a great love and real understanding, while Penelope sat entranced by his nearness, finding the whole performance magical, transformed and illuminated by her love. At dinner, afterwards, she suffered unexpected, total disillusion.