Free Dangerous Inheritance by Dennis Wheatley Page A

attractive.’
    â€˜It is,’ Douglas assured her. ‘Of course, it is utterly different from Corfu, but just as beautiful in its own way. In fact it’s one of the most beautiful places in the world. You’d meet with a lot of opposition from the Roman Catholics, but you’d find that wherever you go.’
    â€˜Are many of the Christians out there Catholics?’
    â€˜Yes, the great majority. While the age of discovery lasted the Fathers were most zealous missionaries and they had a free run during the hundred years that the Portuguese were established in the island. Later, under the Dutch and the British, the Reformed Religion and the English Church never secured anything near the same number of converts.’
    â€˜The Buddhists are not anti-Family Planning, are they—or the Hindus?’
    â€˜No. In Hinayana Buddhism, which is dominant in Burma, Thailand and Cambodia as well as Ceylon, there is no authoritarian body, so each
bhikkhu
interprets the sacred texts according to his lights. None of the texts has any bearing on the subject of contraception, and there are no injunctions in them such as “Be fruitful and multiply”. The question therefore boilsdown to, whether the prevention of conception amounts to the taking of life. If it does then the use of disinfectants to clean out dirty places must also be wrong, for that destroys the conditions which enable noxious insects to breed. That is the type of argument used by our more enlightened
bhikkhus
, who favour Planned Parenthood as the only means of keeping the population in reasonable proportion to the resources of the country, now that modern hygiene has so greatly reduced infant mortality. And the better educated Brahmins hold the same view. So it is only the Roman Catholics you would be up against; although even they have recently thrown a sop to modern opinion by advocating a system based on what’s called the “safe” period of the month. But from what I’ve heard it’s not very reliable; not to mention being a frightful bore.’
    Fleur laughed. ‘How right you are. Our clinics teach young women how to fit Dutch caps. That and the old French letter are the only things that are really any good.’
    Truss had overheard enough. Enormously relieved that his fears had been unjustified, he reproached himself now for ever having thought that Fleur would allow her interest in a man like Rajapakse to affect her physically. Suddenly conscious that he ought not to be eavesdropping anyway, he was about to step back when he saw Douglas lean over, take Fleur’s hand and say:
    â€˜I do hope that you will come out to Ceylon. We could have a marvellous time; especially if you come to stay with my mother with a view to what we talked about this afternoon.’ Then he kissed her lightly on the cheek.
    â€˜I’ll certainly think about that,’ Fleur replied. As she spoke, she stood up.
    Holding his breath, Truss backed away from the balustrade, turned and quickly moved into the deep shadow behind one of the big canopied hammocks. Two minutes later he saw the couple on whom he was spying come up the terrace steps and enter the house. After an interval he followed them, but not with any apprehension that they intended to go to bed together. The way Douglas had kissed Fleur had been too chaste foranything of that kind to be in the mind of either of them. But she had obviously not resented his kissing her. She had even leaned a little towards him and virtually presented her cheek. When Truss was back in bed, that gave him furiously to think.
    Douglas had said that including the journey both ways he could afford to be away from his office for three weeks. That meant he could spend another eight days in Corfu. It appeared that Fleur had not yet fallen for him, but her acceptance of his kiss indicated that she was on the edge of the slippery slope. Given a few more long days alone with Douglas it seemed