Mark Easterbrook’s Narrative1
Three days later Ginger2 rang me up.
“I’ve got something for you,” she said. “A name and address. Write itdown.”
I took out my notebook.
“Go ahead.”
“Bradley is the name and the address is Seventy-eight Municipal SquareBuildings, Birmingham.”
“Well, I’m damned, what is all this?”
“Goodness knows! I don’t. I doubt if Poppy does really!”
“Poppy? Is this—”
“Yes. I’ve been working on Poppy in a big way. I told you I could getsomething out of her if I tried. Once I got her softened3 up, it was easy.”
“How did you set about it?” I asked curiously4.
Ginger laughed.
“Girls-together stuff. You wouldn’t understand. The point is that if a girltells things to another girl it doesn’t really count. She doesn’t think it mat-ters.”
“All in the trade union so to speak?”
“You could put it like that. Anyway, we lunched together, and I yapped abit about my love life—and various obstacles—married man with impos-sible wife—Catholic—wouldn’t divorce him—made his life hell. And howshe was an invalid5, always in pain, but not likely to die for years. Reallymuch better for her if she could die. Said I’d a good mind to try the PaleHorse, but I didn’t really know how to set about it—and would it be ter-ribly expensive? And Poppy said yes, she thought it would. She’d heardthey charged the earth. And I said ‘Well, I have expectations.’ Which Ihave, you know—a great-uncle—a poppet and I’d hate him to die, but thefact came in useful. Perhaps, I said, they’d take something on account? Buthow did one set about it? And then Poppy came across with that name andaddress. You had to go to him first, she said, to settle the business side.”
“It’s fantastic!” I said.
“It is, rather.”
We were both silent for a moment.
I said incredulously: “She told you quite openly? She didn’t seem —scared?”
Ginger said impatiently: “You don’t understand. Telling me didn’t count.
And after all, Mark, if what we think is true the business has to be more orless advertised, hasn’t it? I mean they must want new ‘clients’ all thetime.”
“We’re mad to believe anything of the kind.”
“All right. We’re mad. Are you going to Birmingham to see Mr. Brad-ley?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’m going to see Mr. Bradley. If he exists.”
I hardly believed that he did. But I was wrong. Mr. Bradley did exist.
Municipal Square Buildings was an enormous honeycomb of offices.
Seventy-eight was on the third floor. On the ground glass door was neatlyprinted in black: C. R. Bradley, COMMISSION AGENT. And below, in smal-ler letters: Please enter.
I entered.
There was a small outer office, empty, and a door marked PRIVATE, halfajar. A voice from behind it said:
“Come in, please.”
The inner office was larger. It had a desk, one or two comfortable chairs,a telephone, a stack of box files, and Mr. Bradley sitting behind the desk.
He was a small dark man, with shrewd dark eyes. He wore a dark busi-ness suit and looked the acme6 of respectability.
“Just shut the door, will you?” he said pleasantly. “And sit down. Thatchair’s quite comfortable. Cigarette? No? Well now, what can I do foryou?”
I looked at him. I didn’t know how to begin. I hadn’t the least idea whatto say. It was, I think, sheer desperation that led me to attack with thephrase I did. Or it may have been the small beady eyes.
“How much?” I said.
It startled him a little, I was glad to note, but not in the way that heought to have been startled. He did not assume, as I would have assumedin his place, that someone not quite right in the head had come into his of-fice.
His eyebrows7 rose.
“Well, well, well,” he said. “You don’t waste much time, do you?”
I held to my line.
“What’s the answer?”
He shook his head gently in a slightly reproving manner.
“That’s not the way to go about things. We must proceed in the propermanner.”
I shrugged8 my shoulders.
“As you like. What’s the proper manner?”
“We haven’t introduced ourselves yet, have we? I don’t know yourname.”
“At the moment,” I said, “I don’t really think I feel inclined to tell it toyou.”
“Cautious.”
“Cautious.”
“An admirable quality—though not always practicable. Now who sentyou to me? Who’s our mutual9 friend?”
“Again I can’t tell you. A friend of mine has a friend who knows a friendof yours.”
Mr. Bradley nodded his head.
“That’s the way a lot of my clients come,” he said. “Some of the problemsare rather—delicate. You know my profession, I presume?”
He had no intention of waiting for my reply. He hastened to give me theanswer.
“Turf Commission Agent,” he said. “You’re interested, perhaps, in —horses?”
There was just the faintest pause before the last word.
“I’m not a racing10 man,” I said noncommittally.
“There are many aspects of the horse. Racing, hunting, hacking11. It’s thesporting aspect that interests me. Betting.” He paused for a moment andthen asked casually12—almost too casually:
“Any particular horse you had in mind?”
I shrugged my shoulders and burnt my boats.
“A pale horse….”
“Ah, very good, excellent. You yourself, if I may say so, seem to be rathera dark horse. Ha ha! You mustn’t be nervous. There really is no need to benervous.”
“That’s what you say,” I said rather rudely.
Mr. Bradley’s manner became more bland13 and soothing14.
“I can quite understand your feelings. But I can assure you that youneedn’t have any anxiety. I’m a lawyer myself—disbarred, of course,” headded parenthetically, in what was really almost an engaging way. “Other-wise I shouldn’t be here. But I can assure you that I know my law.
Everything I recommend is perfectly15 legal and aboveboard. It’s just aquestion of a bet. A man can bet on anything he pleases, whether it willrain tomorrow, whether the Russians can send a man to the moon, orwhether your wife’s going to have twins. You can bet whether Mrs. B. willdie before Christmas, or whether Mrs. C. will live to be a hundred. Youback your judgement or your intuition or whatever you like to call it. It’sas simple as that.”
I felt exactly as though I were being reassured16 by a surgeon before anoperation. Mr. Bradley’s consulting room manner was perfect.
I said slowly:
“I don’t really understand this business of the Pale Horse.”
“And that worries you? Yes, it worries a lot of people. More things inheaven and earth, Horatio, and so on and so on. Frankly17, I don’t under-stand it myself. But it gets results. It gets results in the most marvellousway.”
“If you could tell me more about it—”
I had settled on my role now—cautious, eager—but scared. It was obvi-ously an attitude with which Mr. Bradley had frequently had to cope.
“Do you know the place at all?”
I made a quick decision. It would be unwise to lie.
“I—well—yes—I was with some friends. They took me there—”
“Charming old pub. Full of historical interest. And they’ve done won-ders in restoring it. You met her, then. My friend, Miss Grey, I mean?”
“Yes—yes, of course. An extraordinary woman.”
“Isn’t she? Yes, isn’t she? You’ve hit it exactly. An extraordinary woman.
And with extraordinary powers.”
“The things she claims! Surely—quite—well—impossible?”
“Exactly. That’s the whole point. The things she claims to be able toknow and do are impossible! Everybody would say so. In a court of law,for instance—”
The black beady eyes were boring into mine. Mr. Bradley repeated thewords with designed emphasis.
“In a court of law, for instance—the whole thing would be ridiculed18! Ifthat woman stood up and confessed to murder, murder by remote controlor ‘will power’ or whatever nonsensical name she likes to use, that confes-sion couldn’t be acted upon! Even if her statement was true (which ofcourse sensible men like you and I don’t believe for one moment!) itcouldn’t be admitted legally. Murder by remote control isn’t murder in theeyes of the law. It’s just nonsense. That’s the whole beauty of the thing—asyou’ll appreciate if you think for a moment.”
I understood that I was being reassured. Murder committed by occultpowers was not murder in an English court of law. If I were to hire a gang-ster to commit murder with a cosh or a knife, I was committed with him—an accomplice19 before the fact—I had conspired20 with him. But if I commis-sioned Thyrza Grey to use her black arts—those black arts were not ad-missible. That was what, according to Mr. Bradley, was the beauty of thething.
All my natural scepticism rose up in protest. I burst out heatedly:
“But damn it all, it’s fantastic,” I shouted. “I don’t believe it. It’s impos-sible.”
“I agree with you. I really do. Thyrza Grey is an extraordinary woman,and she certainly has some extraordinary powers, but one can’t believe allthe things she claims for herself. As you say, it’s too fantastic. In this age,one really can’t credit that someone can send out thought waves orwhatever it is, either oneself or through a medium, sitting in a cottage inEngland and cause someone to sicken and die of a convenient disease outin Capri or somewhere like that.”
“But that is what she claims?”
“Oh yes. Oh course she has powers—she is Scottish and what is calledsecond sight is a peculiarity21 of that race. It really does exist. What I do be-lieve, and believe without a doubt, is this,” he leaned forward, wagging aforefinger impressively, “Thyrza Grey does know — beforehand — whensomeone is going to die. It’s a gift. And she has it.”
He leaned back, studying me. I waited.
“Let’s assume a hypothetical case. Someone, yourself or another, wouldlike very much to know when—let’s say Great-Aunt Eliza—is going to die.
It’s useful, you must admit, to know something like that. Nothing unkindin it, nothing wrong—just a matter of business convenience. What plans tomake? Will there be, shall we say, a useful sum of money coming in bynext November? If you knew that, definitely, you might take up somevaluable option. Death is such a chancy matter. Dear old Eliza might live,pepped up by doctors, for another ten years. You’d be delighted, of course,you’re fond of the dear old girl, but how useful it would be to know.”
He paused and then leaned a little farther forward.
“Now that’s where I come in. I’m a betting man. I’ll bet on anything—naturally on my own terms. You come to see me. Naturally you wouldn’twant to bet on the old girl’s passing out. That would be repulsive22 to yourfiner feelings. So we put it this way. You bet me a certain sum that AuntEliza will be hale and hearty23 still next Christmas, I bet you that she won’t.”
The beady eyes were on me, watching….
“Nothing against that, is there? Simple. We have an argument on thesubject. I say Aunt E. is lined up for death, you say she isn’t. We draw up acontract and sign it. I give you a date. I say that a fortnight either wayfrom that date Auntie E.’s funeral service will be read. You say it won’t. Ifyou’re right—I pay you. If you’re wrong, you—pay me!”
I looked at him. I tried to summon up the feelings of a man who wants arich old lady out of the way. I shifted it to a blackmailer24. Easier to throwoneself into that part. Some man had been bleeding me for years. Icouldn’t bear it any longer. I wanted him dead. I hadn’t the nerve to killhim myself, but I’d give anything—yes, anything—”
I spoke—my voice was hoarse25. I was acting26 the part with some confid-ence.
“What terms?”
Mr. Bradley’s manner underwent a rapid change. It was gay, almost fa-cetious.
“That’s where we came in, isn’t it? Or rather where you came in, ha ha.
‘How much?’ you said. Really quite startled me. Never heard anyone cometo the point so soon.”
“What terms?”
“That depends. It depends on several different factors. Roughly it de-pends on the amount there is at stake. In some cases it depends on thefunds available to the client. An inconvenient27 husband—or a blackmaileror something of that kind—would depend on how much my client couldafford to pay. I don’t—let me make that clear—bet with poor clients—ex-cept in the kind of case I have just been outlining. In that case it would de-pend on the amount of Aunt Eliza’s estate. Terms are by mutual agree-ment. We both want something out of it, don’t we? The odds28, however,work out usually at five hundred to one.”
“Five hundred to one? That’s pretty steep.”
“My wager29 is pretty steep. If Aunt Eliza were pretty well booked for thetomb, you’d know it already, and you wouldn’t come to me. To prophesysomebody’s death to within two weeks means pretty long odds. Five thou-sand pounds to one hundred isn’t at all out of the way.”
“Supposing you lose?”
Mr. Bradley shrugged his shoulders.
“That’s just too bad. I pay up.”
“And if I lose, I pay up. Supposing I don’t?”
Mr. Bradley leaned back in his chair. He half closed his eyes.
“I shouldn’t advise that,” he said softly. “I really shouldn’t.”
Despite the soft tone, I felt a faint shiver pass over me. He had utteredno direct menace. But the menace was there.
I got up. I said:
“I— I must think it over.”
Mr. Bradley was once more his pleasant and urbane30 self.
“Certainly think it over. Never rush into anything. If you decide to dobusiness, come back, and we will go into the matter fully31. Take your time.
No hurry in the world. Take your time.”
I went out with those words echoing in my ears.
“Take your time….”
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收听单词发音
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1
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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ginger
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| n.姜，精力，淡赤黄色；adj.淡赤黄色的；vt.使活泼，使有生气 | |
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softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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invalid
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| n.病人，伤残人；adj.有病的，伤残的；无效的 | |
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acme
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| n.顶点，极点 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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shrugged
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| vt.耸肩（shrug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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11
hacking
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| n.非法访问计算机系统和数据库的活动 | |
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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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bland
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| adj.淡而无味的，温和的，无刺激性的 | |
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soothing
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| adj.慰藉的；使人宽心的；镇静的 | |
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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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16
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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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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ridiculed
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| v.嘲笑，嘲弄，奚落( ridicule的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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accomplice
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| n.从犯，帮凶，同谋 | |
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conspired
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| 密谋( conspire的过去式和过去分词 )； 搞阴谋； （事件等）巧合； 共同导致 | |
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peculiarity
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| n.独特性，特色；特殊的东西；怪癖 | |
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repulsive
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| adj.排斥的，使人反感的 | |
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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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blackmailer
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| 敲诈者，勒索者 | |
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hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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27
inconvenient
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| adj.不方便的，令人感到麻烦的 | |
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28
odds
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| n.让步，机率，可能性，比率；胜败优劣之别 | |
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29
wager
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| n.赌注；vt.押注，打赌 | |
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30
urbane
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| adj.温文尔雅的，懂礼的 | |
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fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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