Snow (St. John Strafford, #2)

by John Banville

She stood in a low doorway leading off to another part of the house, with one hand folded tensely over the other at the level of her waist. She was tall—she had to stoop a little in the doorway—and markedly slender, and her skin was pinkly pale, the color of skimmed milk into which had been mixed a single drop of blood. Her face was like that of a Madonna by one of the lesser Old Masters, with dark eyes and a long sharp nose with a little bump at the tip. She wore a beige cardigan and a calf-length gray skirt that hung a little crookedly on her hips, which were no broader than a boy’s.

Strafford studied the young man with interest. He wasn’t as cool as he was pretending to be, and his voice was strained behind its languid tone.

Strafford nodded. He didn’t care for this fellow, with his gruff jollity and his man-of-the-world patter. But then, there weren’t a great many people whom Strafford did care for.

The robin flew away. Random flakes of snow drifted past the window, swaying as they fell. Snow falls absentmindedly, Strafford thought, absentmindedly.

“Where would he have gone to? Is it now snowing down there, like it is here?” “Yes, Chief. Snow is general all over Ireland.” “Is it?” “It’s a quotation—never mind.”