Free Trusted Like The Fox by James Hadley Chase

the ground and heaved back. The stretcher slid over the ground for a foot or so, then stopped. She moved back, heaved again. Once more the stretcher moved, came to an abrupt stop.
    “Pull, can’t you?” Ellis muttered. “Get your weight into it.”
    Her face was set, her breath whistled in her dry throat. She strained on the rope, dragging the stretcher slowly over the uneven ground on to the fairway. Once there it began to move more easily and she turned, holding the rope over her shoulder, bowed down, and dragged the stretcher steadily towards the wood.
    But it was still a desperate task. She staggered on, determined to reach the wood, her strength draining out of her. She began to sway to right and left as she went and Ellis cursed her as he was zigzagged about, but she was unaware of him. Nothing existed for her but the stretcher and her failing strength.
    Ellis looked back. They had made progress. The trench was no longer in sight. The roof of the clubhouse was disappearing behind the gentle slope of the fairway, and as he looked, the roof disappeared altogether.
    Grace suddenly dropped to the ground. She lay panting, her face shiny and white. For a moment she was done. Even Ellis could see that, and shrugging impatiently, he waited for her to recover.
    After a few minutes, she sat up, ran her ringers through her tangled hair.
    “I’ll have to rest,” she said, trying to control her laboured breathing. “It’s early still. I can’t go on until I’ve had a rest.” In spite of her exhaustion, she smiled at him. She looked quite pretty when she smiled, and seeing the change in her, Ellis was irritated. He liked to think of her as a poor thing, to sneer at her plainness. “You’re heavy,” she said as if it was a joke.
    “You’re soft,” Ellis snapped back. “You haven’t any guts,” but again she missed his spitefulness as she was opening the suitcase and was not looking at him.
    She pulled out a package wrapped in a napkin, sat beside him.
    “You must be hungry,” she said, opening the napkin and handing him a sandwich. “The bread’s a bit stale, but we can eat it.”
    Without looking to see if she had anything for herself, Ellis snatched the sandwich from her and began tearing at it with his sharp little teeth.
    But the bread lay in his dry mouth, choking him, and his stomach cringed. He dropped the sandwich on the grass, tried to swallow what he had in his mouth, turned his head aside and got rid of it. He lay back, disappointed and alarmed. He knew for certain now that he was ill, and he looked anxiously at Grace to see if she realised just how ill he was.
    She was watching him, a concerned look on her face.
    “It’s all right,” he said angrily. “I’m feverish. I shouldn’t eat,” and he stared past her at the wood, wondering if she were scheming to desert him.
    “You’ll be all right,” she said doubtfully. “You’re bound to have a little fever, but it won’t be anything.”
    That’s all she knew about it, Ellis thought bitterly. He felt hot, and he could feel the blood hammering inside his head.
    “That was ham in the bread, wasn’t it?” he asked for something to say. He was anxious not to let her know he was so light-headed. “I haven’t tasted ham for years.”
    “There was a tin of it in the refrigerator,” she explained. “They do themselves well here. They’ll miss it.”
    He nodded, his eyes, feverish and bright, hardening. As soon as they found the place had been broken into, they’d send for the police. The police would search for them — might easily find them. He looked towards the wood again. It seemed to him then to be the only safe place in the world for him.
    “They’ll come after us,” he said uneasily.
    She was eating a sandwich, and was looking across the fairway at the distant hills. There was an unexpected expression of peace on her face that angered Ellis.
    He tapped her arm sharply.
    “They’ll come after us,” he repeated when she looked