When Mrs. Oliver returned to the house the following morning, she found Miss Livingstonewaiting for her.
“There have been two telephone calls, Mrs. Oliver.”
“Yes?” said Mrs. Oliver.
“The first one was from Crichton and Smith. They wanted to know whether you had chosen thelime green brocade or the pale blue one.”
“I haven’t made up my mind yet,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Just remind me tomorrow morning, willyou? I’d like to see it by night light.”
“And the other was from a foreigner, a Mr. Hercule Poirot, I believe.”
“Oh, yes,” said Mrs. Oliver. “What did he want?”
“He asked if you would be able to call and see him this afternoon.”
“That will be quite impossible,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Ring him up, will you? I’ve got to go outagain at once, as a matter of fact. Did he leave a telephone number?”
“Yes, he did.”
“That’s all right, then. We won’t have to look it up again. All right. Just ring him. Tell him I’msorry that I can’t but that I’m out on the track of an elephant.”
“I beg your pardon?” said Miss Livingstone.
“Say that I’m on the track of an elephant.”
“Oh yes,” said Miss Livingstone, looking shrewdly at her employer to see if she was right in thefeelings that she sometimes had that Mrs. Ariadne Oliver, though a successful novelist, was at thesame time not quite right in the head.
“I’ve never hunted elephants before,” said Mrs. Oliver. “It’s quite an interesting thing to do,though.”
She went into the sitting room, opened the top volume of the assorted1 books on the sofa, mostof them looking rather the worse for wear, since she had toiled2 through them the evening beforeand written out a paper with various addresses.
“Well, one has got to make a start somewhere,” she said. “On the whole I think that if Juliahasn’t gone completely off her rocker by now, I might start with her. She always had ideas andafter all, she knew that part of the country because she lived near there. Yes, I think we’ll startwith Julia.”
“There are four letters here for you to sign,” said Miss Livingstone.
“I can’t be bothered now,” said Mrs. Oliver. “I really can’t spare a moment. I’ve got to go downto Hampton Court, and it’s quite a long ride.”
The Honourable3 Julia Carstairs, struggling with some slight difficulty out of her armchair, thedifficulty that those over the age of seventy have when rising to their feet after prolonged rest,even a possible nap, stepped forward, peering a little to see who it was who had just beenannounced by the faithful retainer who shared the apartment which she occupied in her status of amember of “Homes for the Privileged.” Being slightly deaf, the name had not come clearly to her.
Mrs. Gulliver. Was that it? But she didn’t remember a Mrs. Gulliver. She advanced on slightlyshaky knees, still peering forward.
“I don’t expect you’ll remember me, it’s so many years since we met.”
Like many elderly people, Mrs. Carstairs could remember voices better than she did faces.
“Why,” she exclaimed, “it’s—dear me, it’s Ariadne! My dear, how very nice to see you.”
Greetings passed.
“I just happened to be in this part of the world,” explained Mrs. Oliver. “I had to come down tosee someone not far from here. And then I remembered that looking in my address book last nightI had seen that this was quite near where you had your apartment. Delightful4, isn’t it?” she added,looking round.
“Not too bad,” said Mrs. Carstairs. “Not quite all it’s written up to be, you know. But it hasmany advantages. One brings one’s own furniture and things like that, and there is a centralrestaurant where you can have a meal, or you can have your own things, of course. Oh yes, it’svery good, really. The grounds are charming and well kept up. But sit down, Ariadne, do sit down.
You look very well. I saw you were at a literary lunch the other day, in the paper. How odd it isthat one just sees something in the paper and almost the next day one meets the person. Quiteextraordinary.”
“I know,” said Mrs. Oliver, taking the chair that was offered her. “Things do go like that, don’tthey.”
“You are still living in London?”
Mrs. Oliver said yes, she was still living in London. She then entered into what she thought ofin her own mind, with vague memories of going to dancing class as a child, as the first figure ofthe Lancers. Advance, retreat, hands out, turn round twice, whirl round, and so on.
She enquired5 after Mrs. Carstairs’s daughter and about the two grandchildren, and she askedabout the other daughter, what she was doing. She appeared to be doing it in New Zealand. Mrs.
Carstairs did not seem to be quite sure what it was. Some kind of social research. Mrs. Carstairspressed an electric bell that rested on the arm of her chair, and ordered Emma to bring tea. Mrs.
Oliver begged her not to bother. Julia Carstairs said:
“Of course Ariadne has got to have tea.”
The two ladies leant back. The second and third figures of the Lancers. Old friends. Otherpeople’s children. The death of friends.
“It must be years since I saw you last,” said Mrs. Carstairs.
“I think it was at the Llewellyns’ wedding,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Yes, that must have been aboutit. How terrible Moira looked as a bridesmaid. That dreadfully unbecoming shade of apricot theywore.”
“I know. It didn’t suit them.”
“I don’t think weddings are nearly as pretty as they used to be in our day. Some of them seem towear such very peculiar6 clothes. The other day one of my friends went to a wedding and she saidthe bridegroom was dressed in some sort of quilted white satin and ruffles7 at his neck. Made ofValenciennes lace, I believe. Most peculiar. And the girl was wearing a very peculiar trouser suit.
Also white but it was stamped with green shamrocks all over.”
“Well, my dear Ariadne, can you imagine it. Really, extraordinary. In church too. If I’d been aclergyman I’d have refused to marry them.”
Tea came. Talk continued.
“I saw my goddaughter, Celia Ravenscroft, the other day,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Do you rememberthe Ravenscrofts? Of course, it’s a great many years ago.”
“The Ravenscrofts? Now wait a minute. That was that very sad tragedy, wasn’t it? A doublesuicide, didn’t they think it was? Near their house at Overcliffe.”
“You’ve got such a wonderful memory, Julia,” said Mrs. Oliver.
“Always had. Though I have difficulties with names sometimes. Yes, it was very tragic8, wasn’tit.”
“Very tragic indeed.”
“One of my cousins knew them very well in Malaya, Roddy Foster, you know. GeneralRavenscroft had had a most distinguished9 career. Of course he was a bit deaf by the time heretired. He didn’t always hear what one said very well.”
“Do you remember them quite well?”
“Oh yes. One doesn’t really forget people, does one? I mean, they lived at Overcliffe for quitefive or six years.”
“I’ve forgotten her Christian10 name now,” said Mrs. Oliver.
“Margaret, I think. But everyone called her Molly. Yes, Margaret. So many people were calledMargaret, weren’t they, at about that time? She used to wear a wig11, do you remember?”
“Oh yes,” said Mrs. Oliver. “At least I can’t quite remember, but I think I do.”
“I’m not sure she didn’t try to persuade me to get one. She said it was so useful when you wentabroad and travelled. She had four different wigs12. One for evening and one for travelling and one—very strange, you know. You could put a hat on over it and not really disarrange it.”
“I didn’t know them as well as you did,” said Mrs. Oliver. “And of course at the time of theshooting I was in America on a lecture tour. So I never really heard any details.”
“Well, of course, it was a great mystery,” said Julia Carstairs. “I mean to say, one didn’t know.
There were so many different stories going about.”
“What did they say at the inquest—I suppose they had an inquest?”
“Oh yes, of course. The police had to investigate it. It was one of those indecisive things, youknow, in that the death was due to revolver shots. They couldn’t say definitely what had occurred.
It seemed possible that General Ravenscroft had shot his wife and then himself, but apparently13 itwas just as probable that Lady Ravenscroft had shot her husband and then herself. It seemed morelikely, I think, that it was a suicide pact14, but it couldn’t be said definitely how it came about.”
“There seemed to be no question of its being a crime?”
“No, no. It was said quite clearly there was no suggestion of foul15 play. I mean there were nofootprints or any signs of anyone coming near them. They left the house to go for a walk after tea,as they so often did. They didn’t come back again for dinner and the manservant or somebody orthe gardener—whoever it was—went out to look for them, and found them both dead. Therevolver was lying by the bodies.”
“The revolver belonged to him, didn’t it?”
“Oh yes. He had two revolvers in the house. These ex-military people so often do, don’t they? Imean, they feel safer what with everything that goes on nowadays. A second revolver was still inthe drawer in the house, so that he—well, he must have gone out deliberately16 with the revolver,presumably. I don’t think it likely that she’d have gone out for a walk carrying a revolver.”
“No. No, it wouldn’t have been so easy, would it?”
“But there was nothing apparently in the evidence to show that there was any unhappiness orthat there’d been any quarrel between them or that there was any reason why they should commitsuicide. Of course one never knows what sad things there are in people’s lives.”
“No, no,” said Mrs. Oliver. “One never knows. How very true that is, Julia. Did you have anyidea yourself?”
“Well, one always wonders, my dear.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Oliver, “one always wonders.”
“It might be of course, you see, that he had some disease. I think he might have been told hewas going to die of cancer, but that wasn’t so, according to the medical evidence. He was quitehealthy. I mean, he had—I think he had had a—what do they call those things?—coronary, is thatwhat I mean? It sounds like a crown, doesn’t it, but it’s really a heart attack, isn’t it? He’d had thatbut he’d recovered from it, and she was, well, she was very nervy. She was neurotic17 always.”
“Yes, I seem to remember that,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Of course I didn’t know them well, but—”
she asked suddenly—“was she wearing a wig?”
“Oh. Well, you know, I can’t really remember that. She always wore her wig. One of them, Imean.”
“I just wondered,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Somehow I feel if you were going to shoot yourself oreven shoot your husband, I don’t think you’d wear your wig, do you?”
The ladies discussed this point with some interest.
“What do you really think, Julia?”
“Well, as I said, dear, one wonders, you know. There were things said, but then there alwaysare.”
“About him or her?”
“Well, they said that there was a young woman, you know. Yes, I think she did some secretarialwork for him. He was writing his memoirs18 of his career abroad—I believe commissioned by apublisher at that—and she used to take dictation from him. But some people said—well, you knowwhat they do say sometimes, that perhaps he had got—er—tied up with this girl in some way. Shewasn’t very young. She was over thirty, and not very good-looking and I don’t think—there wereno scandals about her or anything, but still, one doesn’t know. People thought he might have shothis wife because he wanted to—well, he might have wanted to marry her, yes. But I don’t reallythink people said that sort of thing and I never believed it.”
“What did you think?”
“Well, of course I wondered a little about her.”
“You mean that a man was mentioned?”
“I believe there was something out in Malaya. Some kind of story I heard about her. That shegot embroiled19 with some young man much younger than herself. And her husband hadn’t liked itmuch and it had caused a bit of scandal. I forget where. But anyway, that was a long time ago andI don’t think anything ever came of it.”
“You don’t think there was any talk nearer home? No special relationship with anyone in theneighbourhood? There wasn’t any evidence of quarrels between them, or anything of that kind?”
“No, I don’t think so. Of course I read everything about it at the time. One did discuss it, ofcourse, because one couldn’t help feeling there might be some—well, some really very tragic lovestory connected with it.”
“But there wasn’t, you think? They had children, didn’t they. There was my goddaughter, ofcourse.”
“Oh yes, and there was a son. I think he was quite young. At school somewhere. The girl wasonly twelve, no—older than that. She was with a family in Switzerland.”
“There was no—no mental trouble, I suppose, in the family?”
“Oh, you mean the boy—yes, might be of course. You do hear very strange things. There wasthat boy who shot his father—that was somewhere near Newcastle, I think. Some years beforethat. You know. He’d been very depressed20 and at first I think they said he tried to hang himselfwhen he was at the university, and then he came and shot his father. But nobody quite knew why.
Anyway, there wasn’t anything of that sort with the Ravenscrofts. No, I don’t think so, in fact I’mpretty sure of it. I can’t help thinking, in some ways—”
“Yes, Julia?”
“I can’t help thinking that there might have been a man, you know.”
“You mean that she—”
“Yes, well—well, one thinks it rather likely, you know. The wigs, for one thing.”
“I don’t quite see how the wigs come into it.”
“Well, wanting to improve her appearance.”
“She was thirty-five, I think.”
“More. More. Thirty-six, I think. And, well, I know she showed me the wigs one day, and oneor two of them really made her look quite attractive. And she used a good deal of makeup21. Andthat had all started just after they had come to live there, I think. She was rather a good-lookingwoman.”
“You mean, she might have met someone, some man?”
“Well, that’s what I’ve always thought,” said Mrs. Carstairs. “You see, if a man’s getting offwith a girl, people notice it usually because men aren’t so good at hiding their tracks. But awoman, it might be—well, I mean like someone she’d met and nobody knew much about it.”
“Oh, do you really think so, Julia?”
“No I don’t really think so,” said Julia, “because I mean, people always do know, don’t they? Imean, you know, servants know, or gardeners or bus drivers. Or somebody in the neighbourhood.
And they know. And they talk. But still, there could have been something like that, and either hefound out about it .?.?.”
“You mean it was a crime of jealousy22?”
“I think so, yes.”
“So you think it’s more likely that he shot her, then himself, than that she shot him and thenherself.”
“Well, I should think so, because I think if she were trying to get rid of him—well, I don’t thinkthey’d have gone for a walk together and she’d have to have taken the revolver with her in ahandbag and it would have been rather a bigger handbag if so. One has to think of the practicalside of things.”
“I know,” said Mrs. Oliver. “One does. It’s very interesting.”
“It must be interesting to you, dear, because you write these crime stories. So I expect really youwould have better ideas. You’d know more what’s likely to happen.”
“I don’t know what’s likely to happen,” said Mrs. Oliver, “because, you see, in all the crimesthat I write, I’ve invented the crimes. I mean, what I want to happen, happens in my stories. It’snot something that actually has happened or that could happen. So I’m really the worst person totalk about it. I’m interested to know what you think because you know people very well, Julia, andyou knew them well. And I think she might have said something to you one day—or he might.”
“Yes. Yes, now wait a minute when you say that, that seems to bring something back to me.”
Mrs. Carstairs leaned back in her chair, shook her head doubtfully, half closed her eyes andwent into a kind of coma23. Mrs. Oliver remained silent with a look on her face which women areapt to wear when they are waiting for the first signs of a kettle coming to the boil.
“She did say something once, I remember, and I wonder what she meant by it,” said Mrs.
Carstairs. “Something about starting a new life—in connection I think with St. Teresa. St. Teresaof Avila. .?.?.”
Mrs. Oliver looked slightly startled.
“But how did St. Teresa of Avila come into it?”
“Well, I don’t know really. I think she must have been reading a Life of her. Anyway, she saidthat it was wonderful how women get a sort of second wind. That’s not quite the term she used,but something like that. You know, when they are forty or fifty or that sort of age and theysuddenly want to begin a new life. Teresa of Avila did. She hadn’t done anything special up tillthen except being a nun24, then she went out and reformed all the convents, didn’t she, and flung herweight about and became a great Saint.”
“Yes, but that doesn’t seem quite the same thing.”
“No, it doesn’t,” said Mrs. Carstairs. “But women do talk in a very silly way, you know, whenthey are referring to love affairs when they get on in life. About how it’s never too late.”
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1
assorted
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| adj.各种各样的，各色俱备的 | |
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toiled
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| 长时间或辛苦地工作( toil的过去式和过去分词 )； 艰难缓慢地移动，跋涉 | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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enquired
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| 打听( enquire的过去式和过去分词 )； 询问； 问问题； 查问 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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ruffles
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| 褶裥花边( ruffle的名词复数 ) | |
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tragic
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| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
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distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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wig
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| n.假发 | |
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wigs
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| n.假发，法官帽( wig的名词复数 ) | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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pact
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| n.合同，条约，公约，协定 | |
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foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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neurotic
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| adj.神经病的，神经过敏的；n.神经过敏者，神经病患者 | |
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memoirs
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| n.回忆录；回忆录传( mem,自oir的名词复数) | |
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embroiled
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depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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makeup
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| n.组织；性格；化装品 | |
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jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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coma
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| n.昏迷，昏迷状态 | |
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nun
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| n.修女，尼姑 | |
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