I
The lights went up in the cinema. Advertisements flashed on to the screen.
The cinema usherettes walked round with cartons of lemonade and of icecream. Arthur Calgary scrutinized1 them. A plump girl with brown hair, atall dark one and a small, fair-haired one. That was the one he had cometo see. Jacko’s wife. Jacko’s widow, now the wife of a man called Joe Clegg.
It was a pretty, rather vapid2 little face, plastered with makeup3, eyebrowsplucked, hair hideous4 and stiff in a cheap perm. Arthur Calgary bought anice-cream carton from her. He had her home address and he meant to callthere, but he had wanted to see her first while she was unaware5 of him.
Well, that was that. Not the sort of daughter-in-law, he thought, that Mrs.
Argyle, from all accounts, would have cared about very much. That, nodoubt, was why Jacko had kept her dark.
He sighed, concealed6 the ice-cream carton carefully under his chair, andleaned back as the lights went out and a new picture began to flash on thescreen. Presently he got up and left the cinema.
At eleven o’clock the next morning he called at the address he had beengiven. A sixteen-year-old boy opened the door, and in answer to Calgary’senquiry, said:
“Cleggs? Top floor.”
Calgary climbed the stairs. He knocked at a door and Maureen Cleggopened it. Without her smart uniform and her makeup, she looked a dif-ferent girl. It was a silly little face, good-natured but with nothing particu-larly interesting about it. She looked at him doubtfully, frowned suspi-cously.
“My name is Calgary. I believe you have had a letter from Mr. Marshallabout me.”
Her face cleared.
“Oh, so you’re the one! Come in, do.” She moved back to let him enter.
“Sorry the place is in such a mess. I haven’t had time to get around tothings yet.” She swept some untidy clothes off a chair and pushed asidethe remains7 of a breakfast consumed some time ago. “Do sit down. I’msure it’s ever so good of you to come.”
“I felt it was the least I could do,” said Calgary.
She gave a little embarrassed laugh, as though not really taking in whathe meant.
“Mr. Marshall wrote me about it,” she said. “About that story that Jackiemade up—how it was all true after all. That someone did give him a liftback that night to Drymouth. So it was you, was it?”
“Yes,” said Calgary. “It was I.”
“I really can’t get over it,” said Maureen. “Talked about it half the night,Joe and I did. Really, I said, it might be something on the pictures. Twoyears ago, isn’t it, or nearly?”
“About that, yes.”
“Just the sort of thing you do see on the pictures, and of course you sayto yourself that sort of thing’s all nonsense, it wouldn’t happen in real life.
And now there it is! It does happen! It’s really quite exciting in a way, isn’tit?”
“I suppose,” said Calgary, “that it might be thought of like that.” He waswatching her with a vague kind of pain.
She chattered8 on quite happily.
“There’s poor old Jackie dead and not able to know about it. He gotpneumonia, you know, in prison. I expect it was the damp or something,don’t you?”
She had, Calgary realized, a definite romantic image of prison in hermind’s eye. Damp underground cells with rats gnawing9 one’s toes.
“At the time, I must say,” she went on, “him dying seemed all for thebest.”
“Yes, I suppose so … Yes, I suppose it must have done.”
“Well, I mean, there he was, shut up for years and years and years. Joesaid I’d better get a divorce and I was just setting about it.”
“You wanted to divorce him?”
“Well, it’s no good being tied to a man who’s going to be in prison foryears, is it? Besides, you know, although I was fond of Jackie and all that,he wasn’t what you call the steady type. I never did think really that ourmarriage would last.”
“Had you actually started proceedings10 for divorce when he died?”
“Well, I had in a kind of way. I mean, I’d been to a lawyer. Joe got me togo. Of course, Joe never could stand Jackie.”
“Joe is your husband?”
“Yes. He works in the electricity. Got a very good job and they think a lotof him. He always told me Jackie was no good, but of course I was just akid and silly then. Jackie had a great way with him, you know.”
“So it seems from all I’ve heard about him.”
“He was wonderful at getting round women—I don’t know why, really.
He wasn’t good-looking or anything like that. Monkey-face, I used to callhim. But all the same, he’d got a way with him. You’d find you were doinganything he wanted you to do. Mind you, it came in useful once or twice.
Just after we were married he got into trouble at the garage where he wasworking over some work done on a customer’s car. I never understood therights of it. Anyway, the boss was ever so angry. But Jackie got round theboss’s wife. Quite old, she was. Must have been near on fifty, but Jackieflattered her up, played her off this way and that until she didn’t knowwhether she was on her head or her heels. She’d have done anything forhim in the end. Got round her husband, she did, and got him to say as hewouldn’t prosecute11 if Jackie paid the money back. But he never knewwhere the money came from! It was his own wife what provided it. Thatreally gave us a laugh, Jackie and me!”
Calgary looked at her with faint repulsion. “Was it—so very funny?”
“Oh, I think so, don’t you? Really, it was a scream. An old woman likethat crazy about Jackie and raking out her savings12 for him.”
Calgary sighed. Things were never, he thought, the way you imaginedthem to be. Every day he found himself less attracted to the man whosename he had taken such trouble to vindicate13. He was almost coming to un-derstand and share the point of view which had so astounded14 him atSunny Point.
“I only came here, Mrs. Clegg,” he said, “to see if there was anything Icould—well, do for you to make up for what had happened.”
Maureen Clegg looked faintly puzzled.
“Very nice of you, I’m sure,” she said. “But why should you? We’re allright. Joe is making good money and I’ve got my own job. I’m an usherette,you know, at the Picture-drome.”
“Yes, I know.”
“We’re going to get a telly next month,” the girl went on proudly.
“I’m very glad,” said Arthur Calgary, “more glad than I can say that this—this unfortunate business hasn’t left any—well, permanent shadow.”
He was finding it more and more difficult to choose the right wordswhen talking to this girl who had been married to Jacko. Everything hesaid sounded pompous15, artificial. Why couldn’t he talk naturally to her?
“I was afraid it might have been a terrible grief to you.”
She stared at him, her wide, blue eyes not understanding in the leastwhat he meant.
“It was horrid16 at the time,” she said. “All the neighbours talking and theworry of it all, though I must say the police were very kind, all things con-sidered. Talked to me very politely and spoke17 very nice about everything.”
He wondered if she had had any feeling for the dead man. He asked hera question abruptly18.
“Did you think he’d done it?” he said.
“Do you mean, do I think he’d done his mother in?”
“Yes. Just that.”
“Well, of course—well—well—yes, I suppose I did in a way. Of course,he said he hadn’t, but I mean you never could believe anything Jackie said,and it did seem as though he must have done. You see, he could get verynasty, Jackie could, if you stood up against him. I knew he was in a hole ofsome kind. He wouldn’t say much to me, just swore at me when I askedhim about it. But he went off that day and he said that it was going to beall right. His mother, he said, would stump19 up. She’d have to. So of courseI believed him.”
“He had never told his family about your marriage, I understand. Youhadn’t met them?”
“No. You see, they were classy people, had a big house and all that. Iwouldn’t have gone down very well. Jackie thought it best to keep medark. Besides, he said if he took me along his mother’d want to run my lifeas well as his. She couldn’t help running people, he said, and he’d hadenough of it—we did very well as we were, he said.”
She appeared to display no resentment20, but to think, indeed, that herhusband’s behaviour had been perfectly21 natural.
“I suppose it was a great shock to you when he was arrested?”
“Well, naturally. However could he do such a thing? I said to myself, butthen, you can’t get away from things. He always had a very nasty temperwhen anything upset him.”
Calgary leaned forward.
“Let’s put it like this. It really seemed to you not at all a surprising thingthat your husband should have hit his mother on the head with a pokerand stolen a large quantity of money from her?”
“Well, Mr.—er—Calgary, if you’ll excuse me, that’s putting it in rather anasty way. I don’t suppose he meant to hit her so hard. Don’t suppose hemeant to do her in. She just refused to give him some money, he caught upthe poker22 and he threatened her, and when she stuck it out he lost controlof himself and gave her a swipe. I don’t suppose he meant to kill her. Thatwas just his bad luck. You see, he needed the money very badly. He’d havegone to prison if he hadn’t got it.”
“So—you don’t blame him?”
“Well, of course I blamed him … I don’t like all that nasty violent beha-viour. And your own mother, too! No, I don’t think it was a nice thing to doat all. I began to think as Joe was right in telling me I oughtn’t to have hadanything to do with Jackie. But, you know how it is. It’s ever so difficult fora girl to make up her mind. Joe, you see, was always the steady kind. I’veknown him a long time. Jackie was different. He’d got education and allthat. He seemed very well off, too, always splashing his money about. Andof course he had a way with him, as I’ve been telling you. He could getround anybody. He got round me all right. ‘You’ll regret it, my girl,’ that’swhat Joe said. I thought that was just sour grapes and the green-eyed mon-ster, if you understand what I mean. But Joe turned out to be quite right inthe end.”
Calgary looked at her. He wondered if she still failed to understand thefull implications of his story.
“Right in exactly what way?” he asked.
“Well, landing me up in the proper mess he did. I mean, we’ve alwaysbeen respectable. Mother brought us up very careful. We’ve always hadthings nice and no talk. And there was the police arresting my husband!
And all the neighbours knowing. In all the papers it was. News of the Worldand all the rest of them. And ever so many reporters coming round andasking questions. It put me in a very nasty position altogether.”
“But, my dear child,” said Arthur Calgary, “you do realize now that hedidn’t do it?”
For a moment the fair, pretty face looked bewildered.
“Of course! I was forgetting. But all the same—well, I mean, he did gothere and kick up a fuss and threaten her and all that. If he hadn’t donethat he wouldn’t have been arrested at all, would he?”
“No,” said Calgary, “no. That is quite true.”
Possibly, he thought, this pretty, silly child was more of a realist than hewas.
“Oo, it was awful,” went on Maureen. “I didn’t know what to do. Andthen Mum said better go over right away and see his people. They’d haveto do something for me, she said. After all, she said, you’ve got your rightsand you’d best show them as you know how to look after them. So off Iwent. It was that foreign lady help what opened the door to me and at firstI couldn’t make her understand. Seemed as if she couldn’t believe it. ‘It’simpossible,’ she kept saying. ‘It’s impossible,’ she kept saying. ‘It’s quiteimpossible that Jacko should be married to you.’ Hurt my feelings a bit thatdid. ‘Well, married we are,’ I said, ‘and not in a registry office neither. In achurch.’ It was the way my Mum wanted! And she said, ‘It’s not true. Idon’t believe it.’ And then Mr. Argyle came and he was ever so kind. Toldme not to worry more than I could help, and that everything possiblewould be done to defend Jackie. Asked me how I was off for money—andsent me a regular allowance every week. He keeps it up, too, even now.
Joe doesn’t like me taking it, but I say to him, ‘Don’t be silly. They canspare it, can’t they?’ Sent me a very nice cheque for a wedding present aswell, he did, when Joe and I got married. And he said he was very glad andthat he hoped this marriage would be happier than the last one. Yes, he’sever so nice, Mr. Argyle is.”
She turned her head as the door opened.
“Oh. Here’s Joe now.”
Joe was a thin-lipped, fair-haired young man. He received Maureen’s ex-planations and introduction with a slight frown.
“Hoped we’d done with all that,” he said disapprovingly23. “Excuse me forsaying so, sir. But it does no good to go raking up the past. That’s what Ifeel. Maureen was unlucky, that’s all there is to say about it—”
“Yes,” said Calgary. “I quite see your point of view.”
“Of course,” said Joe Clegg, “she ought never to have taken up with achap like that. I knew he was no good. There’d been stories about himalready. He’d been under a Probation24 Officer twice. Once they begin likethat, they go on. First it’s embezzling25, or swindling women out of their sav-ings and in the end it’s murder.”
“But this,” said Calgary, “wasn’t murder.”
“So you say, sir,” said Joe Clegg. He sounded himself completely uncon-vinced.
“Jack Argyle has a perfect alibi26 for the time the crime was committed.
He was in my car being given a lift to Drymouth. So you see, Mr. Clegg, hecould not possibly have committed this crime.”
“Possibly not, sir,” said Clegg. “But all the same it’s a pity raking it all up,if you’ll excuse me. After all, he’s dead now, and it can’t matter to him.
And it starts the neighbours talking again and making them think things.”
Calgary rose. “Well, perhaps from your point of view that is one way oflooking at it. But there is such a thing as justice, you know, Mr. Clegg.”
“I’ve always understood,” said Clegg, “that an English trial was as fair athing as can be.”
“The finest system in the world can make a mistake,” said Calgary.
“Justice is, after all, in the hands of men, and men are fallible.”
After he had left them and was walking down the street he felt more dis-turbed in his own mind than he could have thought possible. “Would itreally have been better,” he said to himself, “if my memory of that day hadnever come back to me? After all, as that smug, tight-lipped fellow has justsaid, the boy is dead. He’s gone before a judge who makes no mistake.
Whether he’s remembered as a murderer or merely as a petty thief, it canmake no difference to him now.”
Then a sudden wave of anger rose in him. “But it ought to make a differ-ence to someone!” he thought. “Someone ought to be glad. Why aren’tthey? This girl, well, I can understand it well enough. She may have hadan infatuation for Jacko, but she never loved him. Probably isn’t capableof loving anybody. But the others. His father. His sister, his nurse … Theyshould have been glad. They should have spared a thought for him beforethey began to fear for themselves … Yes—someone should have cared.”
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1
scrutinized
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| v.仔细检查，详审( scrutinize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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vapid
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| adj.无味的；无生气的 | |
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makeup
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| n.组织；性格；化装品 | |
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hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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unaware
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| a.不知道的，未意识到的 | |
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concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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chattered
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| （人）喋喋不休( chatter的过去式 )； 唠叨； （牙齿）打战； （机器）震颤 | |
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gnawing
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| a.痛苦的，折磨人的 | |
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proceedings
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| n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报 | |
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prosecute
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| vt.告发；进行；vi.告发，起诉，作检察官 | |
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savings
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| n.存款，储蓄 | |
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vindicate
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| v.为…辩护或辩解，辩明；证明…正确 | |
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astounded
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| v.使震惊(astound的过去式和过去分词)；愕然；愕；惊讶 | |
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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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horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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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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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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stump
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| n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走 | |
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resentment
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| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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poker
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| n.扑克；vt.烙制 | |
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disapprovingly
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| adv.不以为然地，不赞成地，非难地 | |
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probation
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| n.缓刑(期)，(以观后效的)察看；试用(期) | |
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embezzling
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| v.贪污，盗用（公款）( embezzle的现在分词 ) | |
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alibi
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| n.某人当时不在犯罪现场的申辩或证明；借口 | |
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