The Old Man had said:
“Let them talk to you.”
As I shaved the following morning, I considered just how far that hadtaken me.
Edith de Haviland had talked to me—she had sought me out for that es-pecial purpose. Clemency1 had talked to me (or had I talked to her?).
Magda had talked to me in a sense—that is, I had formed part of the audi-ence to one of her broadcasts. Sophia naturally had talked to me. EvenNannie had talked to me. Was I any the wiser for what I had learned fromthem all? Was there any significant word or phrase? More, was there anyevidence of that abnormal vanity on which my father had laid stress? Icouldn’t see that there was.
The only person who had shown absolutely no desire to talk to me inany way, or on any subject, was Philip. Was not that, in a way, rather ab-normal? He must know by now that I wanted to marry his daughter. Yethe continued to act as though I was not in the house at all. Presumably heresented my presence there. Edith de Haviland had apologized for him.
She had said it was just “manner.” She had shown herself concernedabout Philip. Why?
I considered Sophia’s father. He was in every sense a repressed indi-vidual. He had been an unhappy jealous child. He had been forced backinto himself. He had taken refuge in the world of books—in the historicalpast. That studied coldness and reserve of his might conceal2 a good deal ofpassionate feeling. The inadequate4 motive5 of financial gain by his father’sdeath was unconvincing—I did not think for a moment that Philip Le-onides would kill his father because he himself had not quite as muchmoney as he would like to have. But there might be some deep psycholo-gical reason for his desiring his father’s death. Philip had come back to hisfather’s house to live, and later, as a result of the Blitz, Roger had come—and Philip had been obliged to see day by day that Roger was his father’sfavourite … Might things have come to such a pass in his tortured mindthat the only relief possible was his father’s death? And supposing thatdeath should incriminate his elder brother? Roger was short of money—on the verge6 of a crash. Knowing nothing of that last interview betweenRoger and his father and the latter’s offer of assistance, might not Philiphave believed that the motive would seem so powerful that Roger wouldbe at once suspected? Was Philip’s mental balance sufficiently7 disturbedto lead him to do murder?
I cut my chin with the razor and swore.
What the hell was I trying to do? Fasten murder on Sophia’s father?
That was a nice thing to try and do! That wasn’t what Sophia had wantedme to come down here for.
Or—was it? There was something, had been something all along, behindSophia’s appeal. If there was any lingering suspicion in her mind that herfather was the killer8, then she would never consent to marry me—in casethat suspicion might be true. And since she was Sophia, clear-eyed andbrave, she wanted the truth, since uncertainty9 would be an eternal andperpetual barrier between us. Hadn’t she been in effect saying to me,“Prove that this dreadful thing I am imagining is not true—but if it is true,then prove its truth to me—so that I can know the worst and face it!”
Did Edith de Haviland know, or suspect, that Philip was guilty. Whathad she meant by “this side idolatry?”
And what had Clemency meant by that peculiar10 look she had thrown atme when I had asked her who she suspected and she had answered:
“Laurence and Brenda are the obvious suspects, aren’t they?”
The whole family wanted it to be Brenda and Laurence, hoped it mightbe Brenda and Laurence, but didn’t really believe it was Brenda andLaurence….
And of course, the whole family might be wrong, and it might really beLaurence and Brenda after all.
Or, it might be Laurence, and not Brenda….
That would be a much better solution.
I finished dabbing11 my cut chin and went down to breakfast filled withthe determination to have an interview with Laurence Brown as soon aspossible.
It was only as I drank my second cup of coffee that it occurred to methat the Crooked12 House was having its effect on me also. I, too, wanted tofind, not the true solution, but the solution that suited me best.
After breakfast I went through the hall and up the stairs. Sophia hadtold me that I should find Laurence giving instruction to Eustace andJosephine in the schoolroom.
I hesitated on the landing outside Brenda’s front door. Did I ring andknock, or did I walk right in? I decided13 to treat the house as an integral Le-onides home and not as Brenda’s private residence.
I opened the door and passed inside. Everything was quiet, thereseemed no one about. On my left the door into the big drawing room wasclosed. On my right two open doors showed a bedroom and adjoiningbathroom. This I knew was the bathroom adjoining Aristide Leonides’
bedroom where the eserine and the insulin had been kept.
The police had finished with it now. I pushed the door open and slippedinside. I realized then how easy it would have been for anyone in thehouse (or from outside the house for the matter of that!) to come up hereand into the bathroom unseen.
I stood in the bathroom looking round. It was sumptuously14 appointedwith gleaming tiles and a sunken bath. At one side were various electricappliances; a hot plate and grill15 under, an electric kettle—a small electricsaucepan, a toaster—everything that a valet attendant to an old gentlemanmight need. On the wall was a white enamelled cupboard. I opened it. In-side were medical appliances, two medicine glasses, eyebath, eye dropper,and a few labelled bottles. Aspirin16, boracic powder, iodine17. Elastoplastbandages, etc. On a separate shelf were the stacked supply of insulin, twohypodermic needles, and a bottle of surgical18 spirit. On a third shelf was abottle marked “The Tablets—one or two to be taken at night as ordered.” Onthis shelf, no doubt, had stood the bottle of eyedrops. It was all clear, wellarranged, easy for anyone to get at if needed, and equally easy to get at formurder.
I could do what I liked with the bottles and then go softly out and down-stairs again and nobody would ever know I had been there. All this was, ofcourse, nothing new, but it brought home to me how difficult the task ofthe police was.
Only from the guilty party or parties could one find out what oneneeded.
“Rattle ’em,” Taverner had said to me. “Get ’em on the run. Make ’emthink we’re on to something. Keep ourselves well in the limelight. Sooneror later, if we do, our criminal will stop leaving well alone and try to besmarter still—and then—we’ve got him.”
Well, the criminal hadn’t reacted to this treatment so far.
I came out of the bathroom. Still no one about. I went on along the cor-ridor. I passed the dining room on the left, and Brenda’s bedroom andbathroom on the right. In the latter, one of the maids was moving about.
The dining room door was closed. From a room beyond that, I heard Edithde Haviland’s voice telephoning to the inevitable19 fishmonger. A spiralflight of stairs led to the floor above. I went up them. Edith’s bedroom andsitting room were here, I knew, and two more bathrooms and LaurenceBrown’s room. Beyond that again the short flight of steps down to the bigroom built out over the servants’ quarters at the back which was used as aschoolroom.
Outside the door I paused. Laurence Brown’s voice could be heard,slightly raised, from inside.
I think Josephine’s habit of snooping must have been catching20. Quite un-ashamedly I leaned against the door jamb and listened.
It was a history lesson that was in progress, and the period in questionwas the French Directoire.
As I listened astonishment21 opened my eyes. It was a considerable sur-prise to me to discover that Laurence Brown was a magnificent teacher.
I don’t know why it should have surprised me so much. After all, Ar-istide Leonides had always been a good picker of men. For all his mouse-like exterior22, Laurence had that supreme23 gift of being able to rouse enthu-siasm and imagination in his pupils. The drama of Thermidor, the decreeof outlawry24 against the Robespierrists, the magnificence of Barras, thecunning of Fouché—Napoleon the half-starved young gunner lieutenant—all these were real and living.
Suddenly Laurence stopped, he asked Eustace and Josephine a question,he made them put themselves in the place of first one and then anotherfigure in the drama. Though he didn’t get much result from Josephine,whose voice sounded as though she had a cold in the head, Eustace soun-ded quite different from his usual moody25 self. He showed brains and intel-ligence and the keen historical sense which he had doubtless inheritedfrom his father.
Then I heard the chairs being pushed back and scraped across the floor.
I retreated up the steps and was apparently26 just coming down them whenthe door opened.
Eustace and Josephine came out.
“Hallo,” I said.
Eustace looked surprised to see me.
“Do you want anything?” he asked politely.
Josephine, taking no interest in my presence, slipped past me.
“I just wanted to see the schoolroom,” I said rather feebly.
“You saw it the other day, didn’t you? It’s just a kid’s place really. Usedto be the nursery. It’s still got a lot of toys in it.”
He held open the door for me and I went in.
Laurence Brown stood by the table. He looked up, flushed, murmuredsomething in answer to my good morning and went hurriedly out.
“You’ve scared him,” said Eustace. “He’s very easily scared.”
“Do you like him, Eustace?”
“Oh! he’s all right. An awful ass3, of course.”
“But not a bad teacher?”
“No, as a matter of fact he’s quite interesting. He knows an awful lot. Hemakes you see things from a different angle. I never knew that Henry theEighth wrote poetry—to Ann Boleyn, of course—jolly decent poetry.”
We talked for a few moments on such subjects as The Ancient Mariner,Chaucer, the political implications behind the Crusades, the medieval ap-proach to life, and the, to Eustace, surprising fact that Oliver Cromwellhad prohibited the celebration of Christmas Day. Behind Eustace’s scorn-ful and rather ill-tempered manner there was, I perceived, an inquiringand able mind.
Very soon, I began to realize the source of his ill humour. His illness hadnot only been a frightening ordeal27, it had also been a frustration28 and a set-back, just at a moment when he had been enjoying life.
“I was to have been in the eleven next term—and I’d got my house col-ours. It’s pretty thick to have to stop at home and do lessons with a rottenkid like Josephine. Why, she’s only twelve.”
“Yes, but you don’t have the same studies, do you?”
“No, of course she doesn’t do advanced maths—or Latin. But you don’twant to have to share a tutor with a girl.”
I tried to soothe29 his injured male pride by remarking that Josephine wasquite an intelligent girl for her age.
“D’you think so? I think she’s awfully30 wet. She’s mad keen on this detect-ing stuff—goes round poking31 her nose in everywhere and writing thingsdown in a little black book and pretending that she’s finding out a lot. Justa silly kid, that’s all she is,” said Eustace loftily.
“Anyway,” he added, “girls can’t be detectives. I told her so. I thinkmother’s quite right and the sooner Jo’s packed off to Switzerland the bet-ter.”
“Wouldn’t you miss her?”
“Miss a kid of that age?” said Eustace haughtily32. “Of course not. Mygoodness, this house is the absolute limit! Mother always haring up anddown to London and bullying33 tame dramatists to rewrite plays for her,and making frightful34 fusses about nothing at all. And father shut up withhis books and sometimes not hearing you if you speak to him. I don’t seewhy I should have to be burdened with such peculiar parents. Thenthere’s Uncle Roger—always so hearty35 that it makes you shudder36. AuntClemency’s all right, she doesn’t bother you, but I sometimes think she’s abit batty. Aunt Edith’s not too bad, but she’s old. Things have been a bitmore cheerful since Sophia came back—though she can be pretty sharpsometimes. But it is a queer household, don’t you think so? Having a step-grandmother young enough to be your aunt or your older sister. I mean, itmakes you feel an awful ass!”
I had some comprehension of his feelings. I remembered (very dimly)my own supersensitiveness at Eustace’s age. My horror of appearing inany way unusual or of my near relatives departing from the normal.
“What about your grandfather?” I said. “Were you fond of him?”
A curious expression flitted across Eustace’s face.
“Grandfather,” he said, “was definitely antisocial!”
“In what way?”
“He thought of nothing but the profit motive. Laurence says that’s com-pletely wrong. And he was a great individualist. All that sort of thing hasgot to go, don’t you think so?”
“Well,” I said, rather brutally37, “he has gone.”
“A good thing, really,” said Eustace. “I don’t want to be callous38, but youcan’t really enjoy life at that age!”
“Didn’t he?”
“He couldn’t have. Anyway, it was time he went. He—”
Eustace broke off as Laurence Brown came back into the schoolroom.
Laurence began fussing about with some books, but I thought that hewas watching me out of the corner of his eye.
He looked at his wristwatch and said:
“Please be back here sharp at eleven, Eustace. We’ve wasted too muchtime the last few days.”
“OK, sir.”
Eustace lounged towards the door and went out whistling.
Laurence Brown darted39 another sharp glance at me. He moistened hislips once or twice. I was convinced that he had come back into the school-room solely40 in order to talk to me.
Presently, after a little aimless stacking and unstacking of books and apretence of looking for a book that was missing, he spoke41:
“Er—How are they getting on?” he said.
“They?”
“The police.”
His nose twitched42. A mouse in a trap, I thought, a mouse in a trap.
“They don’t take me into their confidence,” I said.
“Oh. I thought your father was the Assistant Commissioner43.”
“He is,” I said. “But naturally he would not betray official secrets.”
I made my voice purposely pompous44.
“Then you don’t know how—what—if—” His voice trailed off. “They’renot going to make an arrest, are they?”
“Not so far as I know. But then, as I say, I mightn’t know.”
Get ’em on the run, Inspector45 Taverner had said. Get ’em rattled46. Well,Laurence Brown was rattled all right.
He began talking quickly and nervously47.
“You don’t know what it’s like … The strain … Not knowing what—Imean, they just come and go—Asking questions … Questions that don’tseem to have anything to do with the case….”
He broke off. I waited. He wanted to talk—well, then, let him talk.
“You were there when the Chief Inspector made that monstrous48 sugges-tion the other day? About Mrs. Leonides and myself … It was monstrous. Itmakes one feel so helpless. One is powerless to prevent people thinkingthings! And it is all so wickedly untrue. Just because she is—was—so manyyears younger than her husband. People have dreadful minds—dreadfulminds. I feel—I can’t help feeling, that it is all a plot.”
“A plot? That’s interesting.”
It was interesting, though not quite in the way he took it.
“The family, you know; Mr. Leonides’ family, have never been sympath-etic to me. They were always aloof49. I always felt that they despised me.”
His hands had begun to shake.
“Just because they have always been rich and—powerful. They lookeddown on me. What was I to them? Only the tutor. Only a wretched con-scientious objector. And my objections were conscientious50. They were in-deed!”
I said nothing.
“All right then,” he burst out. “What if I was—afraid? Afraid I’d make amess of it. Afraid that when I had to pull a trigger—I mightn’t be able tobring myself to do it. How can you be sure it’s a Nazi51 you’re going to kill?
It might be some decent lad—some village boy—with no political leanings,just called up for his country’s service. I believe war is wrong, do you un-derstand? I believe it is wrong.”
I was still silent. I believed that my silence was achieving more than anyarguments or agreements could do. Laurence Brown was arguing withhimself, and in so doing was revealing a good deal of himself.
“Everyone’s always laughed at me.” His voice shook. “I seem to have aknack of making myself ridiculous. It isn’t that I really lack courage—but Ialways do the thing wrong. I went into a burning house to rescue a wo-man they said was trapped there. But I lost the way at once, and thesmoke made me unconscious, and it gave a lot of trouble to the firemenfinding me. I heard them say, ‘Why couldn’t the silly chump leave it to us?’
It’s no good my trying, everyone’s against me. Whoever killed Mr. Le-onides arranged it so that I would be suspected. Someone killed him so asto ruin me.”
“What about Mrs. Leonides?” I asked.
He flushed. He became less of a mouse and more like a man.
“Mrs. Leonides is an angel,” he said, “an angel. Her sweetness, her kind-ness to her elderly husband were wonderful. To think of her in connectionwith poison is laughable — laughable! And that thick- headed Inspectorcan’t see it!”
“He’s prejudiced,” I said, “by the number of cases on his files where eld-erly husbands have been poisoned by sweet young wives.”
“The insufferable dolt,” said Laurence Brown angrily.
He went over to a bookcase in the corner and began rummaging52 thebooks in it. I didn’t think I should get anything more out of him. I wentslowly out of the room.
As I was going along the passage, a door on my left opened andJosephine almost fell on top of me. Her appearance had the suddenness ofa demon53 in an old-fashioned pantomime.
Her face and hands were filthy54 and a large cobweb floated from one ear.
“Where have you been, Josephine?”
I peered through the half-open door. A couple of steps led up into an at-tic-like rectangular space in the gloom of which several large tanks couldbe seen.
“In the cistern55 room.”
“Why in the cistern room?”
Josephine replied in a brief businesslike way:
“Detecting.”
“What on earth is there to detect among the cisterns56?”
To this, Josephine merely replied:
“I must wash.”
“I should say most decidedly.”
Josephine disappeared through the nearest bathroom door. She lookedback to say:
“I should say it’s about time for the next murder, wouldn’t you?”
“What do you mean—the next murder?”
“Well, in books there’s always a second murder about now. Someonewho knows something is bumped off before they can tell what theyknow.”
“You read too many detective stories, Josephine. Real life isn’t like that.
And if anybody in this house knows something the last thing they seem towant to do is to talk about it.”
Josephine’s reply came to me rather obscurely by the gushing57 of waterfrom a tap.
“Sometimes it’s something that they don’t know that they do know.”
I blinked as I tried to think this out. Then, leaving Josephine to her ablu-tions, I went down to the floor below.
Just as I was going out through the front door to the staircase, Brendacame with a soft rush through the drawing room door.
She came close to me and laid her hand on my arm, looking up in myface.
“Well?” she asked.
It was the same demand for information that Laurence had made, onlyit was phrased differently. And her one word was far more effective.
I shook my head.
“Nothing,” I said.
She gave a long sigh.
“I’m so frightened,” she said. “Charles, I’m so frightened …”
Her fear was very real. It communicated itself to me there in that nar-row space. I wanted to reassure58 her, to help her. I had once more thatpoignant sense of her as terribly alone in hostile surroundings.
She might well have cried out: “Who is on my side?”
And what would the answer have been? Laurence Brown? And what,after all, was Laurence Brown? No tower of strength in a time of trouble.
One of the weaker vessels59. I remembered the two of them drifting in fromthe garden the night before.
I wanted to help her. I badly wanted to help her. But there was nothingmuch I could say or do. And I had at the bottom of my mind an embar-rassed guilty feeling, as though Sophia’s scornful eyes were watching me. Iremembered Sophia’s voice saying: “So she got you.”
And Sophia did not see, did not want to see, Brenda’s side of it. Alone,suspected of murder, with no one to stand by her.
“The inquest is tomorrow,” Brenda said. “What—what will happen?”
There I could reassure her.
“Nothing,” I said. “You needn’t worry about that. It will be adjourned60 forthe police to make inquiries61. It will probably set the Press loose, though.
So far, there’s been no indication in the papers that it wasn’t a naturaldeath. The Leonides have got a good deal of influence. But with an ad-journed inquest—well, the fun will start.”
(What extraordinary things one said! The fun! Why must I choose thatparticular word?)
“Will—will they be very dreadful?”
“I shouldn’t give any interviews if I were you. You know, Brenda, youought to have a lawyer—” She recoiled62 with a terrific gasp63 of dismay. “No—no—not the way you mean. But someone to look after your interests andadvise you as to procedure, and what to say and do, and what not to sayand do.
“You see,” I added, “you’re very much alone.”
Her hand pressed my arm more closely.
“Yes,” she said. “You do understand that. You’ve helped, Charles, youhave helped….”
I went down the stairs with a feeling of warmth, of satisfaction … Then Isaw Sophia standing64 by the front door. Her voice was cold and rather dry.
“What a long time you’ve been,” she said. “They rang up for you fromLondon. Your father wants you.”
“At the Yard?”
“Yes.”
“I wonder what they want me for. They didn’t say?”
Sophia shook her head. Her eyes were anxious. I drew her to me.
“Don’t worry, darling,” I said, “I’ll soon be back.”
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clemency
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| n.温和，仁慈，宽厚 | |
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conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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ass
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| n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人 | |
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inadequate
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| adj.(for,to)不充足的，不适当的 | |
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motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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killer
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| n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者 | |
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uncertainty
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| n.易变，靠不住，不确知，不确定的事物 | |
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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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dabbing
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| 石面凿毛，灰泥抛毛 | |
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crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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sumptuously
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| 奢侈地，豪华地 | |
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grill
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| n.烤架，铁格子，烤肉；v.烧，烤，严加盘问 | |
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aspirin
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| n.阿司匹林 | |
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iodine
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| n.碘，碘酒 | |
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surgical
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| adj.外科的，外科医生的，手术上的 | |
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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astonishment
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exterior
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supreme
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outlawry
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moody
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apparently
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ordeal
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frustration
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soothe
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awfully
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poking
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| n. 刺，戳，袋 vt. 拨开，刺，戳 vi. 戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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haughtily
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bullying
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| v.恐吓，威逼( bully的现在分词 )；豪；跋扈 | |
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frightful
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hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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shudder
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brutally
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callous
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| adj.无情的，冷淡的，硬结的，起老茧的 | |
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darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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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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twitched
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| vt.& vi.（使）抽动，（使）颤动（twitch的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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commissioner
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| n.（政府厅、局、处等部门）专员，长官，委员 | |
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pompous
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的；夸大的；豪华的 | |
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inspector
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| n.检查员，监察员，视察员 | |
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rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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nervously
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| adv.神情激动地，不安地 | |
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monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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aloof
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| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
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conscientious
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| adj.审慎正直的，认真的，本着良心的 | |
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51
Nazi
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| n.纳粹分子，adj.纳粹党的，纳粹的 | |
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rummaging
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| 翻找，搜寻( rummage的现在分词 )； 海关检查 | |
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demon
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| n.魔鬼，恶魔 | |
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filthy
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| adj.卑劣的；恶劣的，肮脏的 | |
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cistern
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| n.贮水池 | |
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cisterns
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| n.蓄水池，储水箱( cistern的名词复数 )；地下储水池 | |
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gushing
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| adj.迸出的；涌出的；喷出的；过分热情的v.喷，涌( gush的现在分词 )；滔滔不绝地说话 | |
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reassure
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| v.使放心，使消除疑虑 | |
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vessels
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| n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人 | |
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adjourned
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| （使）休会， （使）休庭( adjourn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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inquiries
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| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
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62
recoiled
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| v.畏缩( recoil的过去式和过去分词 )；退缩；报应；返回 | |
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63
gasp
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| n.喘息，气喘；v.喘息；气吁吁他说 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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