"By rights we should have a Genever apéritif," he said, "but I'm convinced Dutch gin is distilled2 from frogs. On the other hand, Dutch beer compares to Hof, Rothausbr?u, or Kronenbourg."
"You've traveled a lot, haven't you?" she said. "I envy you that. Never got farther than the Sierras myself."
A little embarrassed—he had not been trying to play the cosmopolite—he fell silent while she glanced at her menu. "Will you order for me?" she asked finally. "You know your way around these dishes."
He made his selections, pleased by the compliment. When the beer came, in conical half-liter glasses, he raised his: "Prosit."
"It's all right if you go easy. Take the word of a hardened bowser." He searched out an inward weariness on the strong broad face. "You could use a little anesthesia."
"Well—" She set her glass down. "Bear with me. I promise not to blubber, but I may get sentimental4. Or maybe even hilarious5, I don't know. I've never lost anyone close to me before now."
"I understand," said Kintyre.
"And please help me steer6 clear of myself," she added. "I would like to talk about Bruce, and otherwise about wholly neutral things." She managed a smile. "I've been meaning to ask you something. You're the Machiavelli specialist. Our theater did Mandragola last year. Tell me, how could the same man write that and Il Principe?"
"Actually," said Kintyre, "I would be surprised if the author of The Prince—or, rather, the Discourses7 on Livy, since The Prince is really just a pamphlet—I'd be surprised if he had not done sheer amusement equally well. One of the more damnable heresies8 of this era is its notion that a man can only be good at one thing. That versatility9 is not the inborn10 human norm."
"I've often thought the same," she said. "I suppose you know Bruce changed his major to history because of you. He took one of your classes as a freshman11. Now I see why."
She shifted the conversation with a tact13 he appreciated: "But how did you happen to get interested in it, in the Italian Renaissance14 yet, with a name like yours?"
"I served time in one of those private schools back East," he said. "The Romance languages master got me enthusiastic."
He paused, then continued slowly: "I entered Harvard, but Pearl Harbor happened in my sophomore15 year. I was in the Navy the whole war, the Pacific; fell in love with the Bay Area on my shore leaves, which is why I came here to live afterward16. But during the war I had a lot of time to read and try to think where this world was going. To the wolves, I decided—like Machiavelli's world—I suppose that's why I feel so close to him. He was also studying the problem of how the decent man can survive. He spoke17 the truth as he saw it, because he didn't think that civilization should be encumbered18 with nice-nellyisms that the barbarians19 had already discarded. Wherefore he became the original Old Nick, and the very people—us, the free people, whom he could warn—won't listen, because we think he speaks for the enemy!"
He braked. "Sorry. I didn't mean to orate at you."
"I wish more men had convictions," she said. "Even when I don't agree. Everybody respects everybody else's sensibilities so much these days, there's nothing left to talk about but football scores."
"You're very kind," he said. "Ah, here come the appetizers20. Pay special attention to the characteristically Dutch delicacy21, Russian eggs, but don't ask me how they came by that name."
Later, after much talk, some of it with enough laughter to tell him she was a merry soul in better days:
A ruby22 spark lay in their glasses of Cherry Heering. "This isn't Dutch either," said Kintyre. "However."
"Do you know," she said, "I begin to understand the old idea of a wake. Getting the clan23 together and having one fine brawling24 celebration. It's more an act of love, really, than drawing the parlor25 curtains and talking in hushed voices."
"That's the Latin who speaks," he said. "We Protestant races are cursed with the tradition that misery26 is a virtue27."
"But you, you Bostonian Scot or whatever you are—I hear a trace of accent—you approve."
"What was the reason for that?"
"My father was a marine29 architect. He was laid off in, uh, 1930. Being an imaginative man, he spent his savings30 on a schooner31, hired a Mexican crew, and we all lit out for the South Seas. For seven years we lived on that schooner."
"Bruce told me you were a sailor." Her eyes were very bright upon him. "But how did you make it pay?"
"Miscellaneously. Sometimes we carried cargo32 and passengers between islands. The passengers were usually Kanakas, and those who didn't have money would pay us in food and hospitality when we got where we were going. Father wasn't after riches anyway. His main enterprise was to gather and prepare marine specimens33, for museums and colleges and so on. Toward the end, he was making a name for himself. Well, we never saw much cash money, but we never needed a lot either."
Kintyre held his glass to the light, tossed it off and followed it with a scalding sip34 of coffee. Why was he speaking of this? He had barely mentioned his youth to anyone else, except Trig, who was the friend of a dozen years. Trig had led him into the dojo, hoping that its discipline of mind as well as body would strangle the horror. But Corinna had the story out of him in a matter of hours, not even knowing what she did.
He had taken her for Morna last night.
"What happened?" she asked. Her tone said that he needn't answer unless he wanted to.
He took out a cigarette. She folded her hands and waited, in case he should want to say more.
"That was in the Gilbert Islands," he continued after the smoke was curling down his tongue. "The British authorities shipped me home. The guardianship36 was wished onto a cousin of my mother's. So I went to the boarding school I spoke of, and summers I worked at a seaside resort. Don't feel sorry for me, it was quite a good life."
"But a lonely one," she said.
He grinned with a single corner of his mouth. "'He travels the fastest who travels alone.'"
"I understand a great deal now." She held her cup so lightly that he grew aware he was in danger of breaking his. Tendon by tendon, he eased his fingers. "Yes," she said after a moment. "Bruce was always puzzled by you. As I imagine most people are. You don't seem to belong anywhere, to anything or anyone. And yet you do. You belong to a world that foundered37 in the ocean."
It jarred him. Not given to self-analysis, he had imagined he lived a logical, well adapted round of days.
"Sometime you'll build it again," she said. "Oh, not the physical ship, you've more important things on hand, but a personal world."
And again it was a blow, to be shown himself as alien as a castaway from Mars.
"Please," he said, more roughly than he had intended. "I don't find my personality the most interesting object on earth."
She nodded, as if to herself. The long hair swept her flat high-boned cheeks. "Of course. You wouldn't."
"Perhaps I'd better take you home now," he said, without noticeable enthusiasm. "Are you working tomorrow?"
"Only if I feel like it, my boss told me. I'd planned to, but—Are you in any hurry?"
"Contrariwise." I don't think I would sleep much.
"Then could we go somewhere and talk? I'd like to ask you some things."
"I'd love to be asked. I know a place."
It was small, dark, and masculine, undegraded by jukebox or television. Kintyre led Corinna into a booth at the rear.
"They serve steam beer," he said. "The only really good beer made in this country."
"Oof! I couldn't. Another Irish, if I may. I promise to go slow." Her tone was not as light as the words.
Nonetheless, he needed a little while to sense the trouble in her.
After much time she met his eyes, obviously forcing his own. "Dr. Kintyre," she began.
He was about to ask her to use his given name; and then he thought how little intimacy38 could be achieved in this American cult39 of first-name familiarity with all the universe. "Yes?" he said.
"I would—I would have thanked you for a wonderful time, which helped me more than you know. And then I would have gone home. But—"
He waited.
"I don't know how to say it," she stumbled. "I knew you were Bruce's—Bruce's brother, the one he should have had. But only tonight could I feel it." She searched for a phrase. Finally: "I don't believe I could hurt myself by being serious with you."
"I hope not," he said, as grave as she. "I can't promise it."
"Why did you go to the Michaelises last night?"
"I'm not quite sure."
"You want to discover who killed Bruce? Isn't that it?"
"I am not a self-appointed detective. The police can do that job infinitely40 better than I. But I have been thinking."
"What do you think?" she persisted.
"I certainly wouldn't go accusing someone who—"
"Can you realize what Brace41 meant to me?" She asked it quietly, as a meaningful request for truth. "We were more than siblings42. We were friends, all our lives, in a way they haven't made words for."
"I do know," he said, and he would have told it to few other creatures that lived. "I had a younger sister myself."
"Even after he left home—can you imagine the way he continued to watch over me? How often he stepped in and used a word or two to straighten out a lonesome, confused, unhappy girl whom nobody else liked; how he steered43 me toward the kind of people I can feel at home with; how he healed the breach44 with my parents, when I had to get away and they didn't understand; how he got me out of a wretched business office and into the museum, where I can like what I'm doing and believe it has some value. You knew Bruce, did you know that side of him?"
"No," said Kintyre. "He wouldn't have talked about it. Still, yes, I can imagine."
"And he was lured45 somewhere, and tortured, and murdered," she said. The lacquered fingernails stood white where she caught the table edge.
Kintyre didn't touch her himself, but he held out his hand. She gripped it for a while. Her face was lowered. When she let go and looked up again, he saw tears.
Kintyre let her have it out. It didn't take long, nor was it noisy.
She said at last, in a wire-thin voice: "Why was it done? Who would do it, to him of all people in the world?"
"I don't know," said Kintyre. "I just don't know."
"But you can guess, can't you? You know everyone concerned. That writer he was having the fight with. That businessman who owns the thesis manuscript. Gene1 Michaelis. You could be wrong! Even his girl, God help me for saying it. Who?"
"Why must you know?" he asked.
"Why?" It took her aback. "To know! To understand—"
"Do you want to be reassured48 the murderer won't strike at you next? I hardly think you need fear that."
"That's too metaphysical to be true," he said.
Briefly50, she shivered with tension. Then, leaning back, she picked up her whisky glass and sipped51 of it and asked coldly:
"Where did you go last night after you left the Michaelis place?"
"Home," he said.
"Guido was badly shaken today. He hadn't slept at all, I could see that in the morning. He stayed around the apartment like a hurt animal. I know him, he's terrified." Corinna spat52 as if at an enemy: "What did you do to him?"
"Nothing!" said Kintyre.
Her lip caught her teeth.
"I didn't think of it till just now," she breathed. "But it all fits. You do know something. In God's name, tell me!"
He said, with an overpowering compassion53: "I see. You're afraid Guido is involved."
"Yes," she said dully.
"Why should he be?"
"Oh—I don't know—jealousy? Who can tell? Guido always seemed like the wild, reckless one and Bruce a mama's boy. Yet it was Bruce who left home and Guido never has."
"Let's have no half-digested psychological theory," he said, purposely astringent54. "Stick to facts. What leads you to suspect your brother is involved?"
"I might as well tell you," she sighed. "Last week he was dropping all kinds of dark hints about a big job which would take him out of town over the weekend. He's like that, has to sound important, mostly there's no harm in it. But he came back Monday evening with a good deal of money. I knew he was broke before. He had even been forced to sell his car. He came in loaded with expensive presents for all of us, and had a fat roll in his wallet. Of course, when we told him about Bruce, that more or less made us forget it. But then today, how frightened he was—
"What happened last night?"
Kintyre took out a cigarette. "Excuse me while I think," he said. He made a ceremony of lighting55 it.
"Guido is in trouble," he admitted. "I don't know how closely related to the murder it is."
"Don't misunderstand me." Her face could have been modeled in chalk. "I never thought Guido would—would dream of—no! But he could have been drawn56 into something. And what would the police think?"
"Uh-huh. The same notion occurred to me."
"What happened, then?"
He told her.
"Oh, no." Her eyes closed.
"You see my dilemma," he said wearily. "I'll protect Guido if my conscience will let me, even though it's already led me into lawbreaking. But I don't know, I can't tell—"
She opened her eyes again. They blazed.
"Thank You," she said, not to Kintyre.
His scalp crawled. "What are you thinking of?"
"I know Guido," she answered. "I can get the truth out of him."
"You can try."
She stood up. "I'll take a cab," she said.
"What?" He rose himself. "You're not going there now?"
"When else? I'm sorry, it's a shabby way to treat you, but do you think something like this can wait?"
"A murderer is hanging around that place," he said. "You can see Guido tomorrow at your parents', but tonight I won't have it."
She grinned. There was even a little humor in the expression. "What do you plan to do?"
"Call the police!" he rapped.
She said like a sword: "By the time you've explained all the ins and outs to them, I'll have taken him elsewhere. And you needn't bother speaking to either of us again."
"Wait a second." Again he knew the night feeling, that he must go, and that that would happen which another force than he had willed. But somehow, crazily, this time he was glad of it.
"Just wait for me," he finished.
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1
gene
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| n.遗传因子，基因 | |
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distilled
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| adj.由蒸馏得来的v.蒸馏( distil的过去式和过去分词 )；从…提取精华 | |
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salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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sentimental
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| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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hilarious
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| adj.充满笑声的，欢闹的；[反]depressed | |
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steer
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| vt.驾驶，为…操舵；引导；vi.驾驶 | |
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7
discourses
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| 论文( discourse的名词复数 )； 演说； 讲道； 话语 | |
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heresies
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| n.异端邪说，异教( heresy的名词复数 ) | |
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versatility
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| n.多才多艺，多样性，多功能 | |
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inborn
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| adj.天生的，生来的，先天的 | |
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freshman
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| n.大学一年级学生(可兼指男女) | |
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hoisted
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| 把…吊起，升起( hoist的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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tact
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| n.机敏，圆滑，得体 | |
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renaissance
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| n.复活，复兴，文艺复兴 | |
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sophomore
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| n.大学二年级生；adj.第二年的 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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18
encumbered
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| v.妨碍，阻碍，拖累( encumber的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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barbarians
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| n.野蛮人( barbarian的名词复数 )；外国人；粗野的人；无教养的人 | |
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appetizers
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| n.开胃品( appetizer的名词复数 )；促进食欲的活动；刺激欲望的东西；吊胃口的东西 | |
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21
delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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ruby
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| n.红宝石，红宝石色 | |
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clan
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| n.氏族，部落，宗族，家族，宗派 | |
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brawling
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| n.争吵，喧嚷 | |
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parlor
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| n.店铺，营业室；会客室，客厅 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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arthritic
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| adj.关节炎的 | |
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marine
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| adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵 | |
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savings
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| n.存款，储蓄 | |
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schooner
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| n.纵帆船 | |
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cargo
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| n.(一只船或一架飞机运载的)货物 | |
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specimens
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| n.样品( specimen的名词复数 )；范例；（化验的）抽样；某种类型的人 | |
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sip
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| v.小口地喝，抿，呷；n.一小口的量 | |
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survivor
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| n.生存者，残存者，幸存者 | |
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guardianship
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| n. 监护, 保护, 守护 | |
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foundered
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| v.创始人( founder的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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cult
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| n.异教，邪教；时尚，狂热的崇拜 | |
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infinitely
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| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
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brace
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| n. 支柱,曲柄,大括号; v. 绷紧,顶住,(为困难或坏事)做准备 | |
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siblings
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| n.兄弟，姐妹( sibling的名词复数 ) | |
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steered
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| v.驾驶( steer的过去式和过去分词 )；操纵；控制；引导 | |
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breach
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| n.违反，不履行；破裂；vt.冲破，攻破 | |
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lured
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| 吸引，引诱（lure的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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46
gulped
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| v.狼吞虎咽地吃，吞咽( gulp的过去式和过去分词 )；大口地吸（气）；哽住 | |
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bawl
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| v.大喊大叫，大声地喊，咆哮 | |
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48
reassured
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| adj.使消除疑虑的；使放心的v.再保证，恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词) | |
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49
Flared
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| adj. 端部张开的, 爆发的, 加宽的, 漏斗式的 动词flare的过去式和过去分词 | |
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50
briefly
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| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
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51
sipped
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| v.小口喝，呷，抿( sip的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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52
spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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53
compassion
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| n.同情，怜悯 | |
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54
astringent
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| adj.止血的，收缩的，涩的；n.收缩剂，止血剂 | |
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55
lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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56
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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