It was a crowd of people almost too surprised for words that crowdedround Emily Trefusis.
Inspector1 Narracott had led his prisoner from the room.
Charles Enderby found his voice first.
“For heaven’s sake, cough it up, Emily,” he said. “I want to get to the tele-graph office. Every moment’s vital.”
“It was Major Burnaby who killed Captain Trevelyan.”
“Well, I saw Narracott arrest him. And I suppose Narracott’s sane2 —hasn’t gone off his nut suddenly. But how can Burnaby have killed Trev-elyan? I mean how is it humanly possible? If Trevelyan was killed at fiveand twenty past five—”
“He wasn’t. He was killed at about a quarter to six.”
“Well, but even then—”
“I know. You’d never guess unless you just happened to think of it. Skis—that’s the explanation—skis.”
“Skis?” repeated everyone.
Emily nodded.
“Yes. He deliberately3 engineered that table-turning. It wasn’t an acci-dent and done unconsciously as we thought, Charles. It was the second al-ternative that we rejected—done on purpose. He saw it was going to snowbefore very long. That would make it perfectly4 safe and wipe out alltracks. He created the impression that Captain Trevelyan was dead—goteveryone all worked up. Then he pretended to be very upset and insistedon starting off for Exhampton.
“He went home, buckled5 on his skis (they were kept in a shed in thegarden with a lot of other tackle) and started. He was an expert on skis.
It’s all down hill to Exhampton — a wonderful run. It would only takeabout ten minutes.
“He arrived at the window and rapped. Captain Trevelyan let him in, allunsuspecting. Then, when Captain Trevelyan’s back was turned he seizedhis opportunity, picked up that sandbag thing and—and killed him. Ugh! Itmakes me sick to think of it.”
She shuddered6.
“It was all quite easy. He had plenty of time. He must have wiped andcleaned the skis and then put them into the cupboard in the dining room,pushed in among all the other things. Then, I suppose he forced the win-dow and pulled out all the drawers and things—to make it look as thoughsomeone had broken in.
“Then just before eight o’clock, all he had to do was to go out, make a de-tour on to the road higher up and come puffing8 and panting into Exhamp-ton as though he’d walked all the way from Sittaford. So long as no onesuspected about the skis, he’d be perfectly safe. The doctor couldn’t fail tosay that Captain Trevelyan had been dead at least two hours. And, as I say,so long as no one thought of skis, Major Burnaby would have a perfectalibi.”
“But they were friends—Burnaby and Trevelyan,” said Mr. Rycroft. “Oldfriends—they’ve always been friends. It’s incredible.”
“I know,” said Emily. “That’s what I thought. I couldn’t see why. Ipuzzled and I puzzled and at last I had to come to Inspector Narracott andMr. Duke.”
She paused and looked at the impassive Mr. Duke.
“May I tell them?” she said.
Mr. Duke smiled.
“If you like, Miss Trefusis.”
“Anyway—no, perhaps you’d rather I didn’t. I went to them, and we gotthe thing clear. Do you remember telling me, Charles, that Evans men-tioned that Captain Trevelyan used to send in solutions of competitions inhis name? He thought Sittaford House was too grand an address. Well—that’s what he did in the Football Competition that you gave Major Burn-aby five thousand pounds for. It was Captain Trevelyan’s solution really,and he sent it in in Burnaby’s name. No. 1, The Cottages, Sittaford, soun-ded much better, he thought. Well, you see what happened? On Fridaymorning Major Burnaby got the letter saying he’d won five thousandpounds (and by the way, that ought to have made us suspicious. He toldyou he never got the letter—that nothing had come through on Friday ow-ing to the weather. That was a lie. Friday morning was the last day thingsdid come through). Where was I? Oh!—Major Burnaby getting the letter.
He wanted that five thousand—wanted it badly. He’d been investing insome rotten shares or other and had lost a terrible lot of money.
“The idea must have come into his head quite suddenly, I should think.
Perhaps when he realized it was going to snow that evening. If Trevelyanwere dead—he could keep that money and no one would ever know.”
“Amazing,” murmured Mr. Rycroft. “Quite amazing. I never dreamed—But my dear young lady, how did you learn all this? What put you on theright track?”
For answer, Emily explained Mrs. Belling’s letter, and told how she haddiscovered the boots in the chimney.
“It was looking at them that put it into my mind. They were ski boots,you see, and they made me think of skis. And suddenly I wondered if per-haps—I rushed downstairs to the cupboard, and sure enough there weretwo pairs of skis there. One pair was longer than the other. And the bootsfitted the long pair—but they didn’t fit the other. The toe clip things wereadjusted for a much smaller pair of boots. The shorter pair of skis be-longed to a different person.”
“He ought to have hidden the skis somewhere else,” said Mr. Rycroftwith artistic9 disapproval10.
“No—no,” said Emily. “Where else could he hide them? It was a verygood place really. In a day or two the whole collection would have beenstored, and in the meantime it wasn’t likely that the police would botherwhether Captain Trevelyan had had one or two pairs of skis.”
“But why did he hide the boots?”
“I suppose,” said Emily, “that he was afraid the police might do exactlywhat I did—The sight of ski boots might have suggested skis to them. So hestuffed them up the chimney. And that’s really, of course, where he madehis mistake, because Evans noticed that they’d gone and I got to know ofit.”
“Did he deliberately mean to fasten the crime on Jim?” demanded BrianPearson angrily.
“Oh! no. That was just Jim’s usual idiotic11 luck. He was an idiot, poorlamb.”
“He’s all right now,” said Charles. “You needn’t worry about him. Haveyou told me everything, Emily, because if so, I want to rush to the tele-graph office. You’ll excuse me, everybody.”
He dashed out of the room.
“The live wire,” said Emily.
Mr. Duke spoke12 in his deep voice.
“You’ve been rather a live wire yourself, Miss Trefusis.”
“You have,” said Ronnie admiringly.
“Oh! dear,” said Emily suddenly and dropped limply on a chair.
“What you need is a pick-me-up,” said Ronnie. “A cocktail13, eh?”
Emily shook her head.
“A little brandy,” suggested Mr. Rycroft solicitously14.
“A cup of tea,” suggested Violet.
“I’d like a spot of face powder,” said Emily wistfully. “I’ve left mypowder puff7 in the car. And I know I’m simply shining with excitement.”
Violet led her upstairs in search of this sedative15 to the nerves.
“That’s better,” said Emily dabbing16 her nose firmly. “What a nice kind. Ifeel much better now. Have you got any lipstick17? I feel almost human.”
“You’ve been wonderful,” said Violet. “So brave.”
“Not really,” said Emily. “Underneath this camouflage18 I’ve been aswobbly as a jelly, with a sort of sick feeling in my middle.”
“I know,” said Violet. “I’ve felt much the same myself. I have been so ter-rified this last few days—about Brian, you know. They couldn’t hang himfor murdering Captain Trevelyan, of course, but if once he had said wherehe was during that time, they would soon have ferreted out that it was hewho engineered Father’s escape.”
“What’s that?” said Emily pausing in her facial repairs.
“Father was the convict who escaped. That’s why we came here. Motherand I. Poor Father, he’s always—been queer at times. Then he does thesedreadful things. We met Brian on the way over from Australia, and he andI—well—he and I—”
“I see,” said Emily helpfully. “Of course you did.”
“I told him everything and between us we concocted19 a plan. Brian waswonderful. We had got plenty of money fortunately, and Brian made allthe plans. It’s awfully20 hard to get away from Princetown, you know, butBrian engineered it. Really it was a kind of miracle. The arrangement wasthat after Father got away he was to go straight across country here andhide in the Pixie’s Cave and then later he and Brian were to be our twomenservants. You see with our arriving so long beforehand we imaginedwe would be quite free from suspicion. It was Brian who told us about thisplace, and suggested us offering a big rent to Captain Trevelyan.”
“I’m awfully sorry,” said Emily—“I mean that it all went wrong.”
“It’s broken Mother up completely,” said Violet. “I think Brian’s wonder-ful. It isn’t everybody who would want to marry a convict’s daughter. But Idon’t think it’s really Father’s fault, he had an awful kick on the head froma horse about fifteen years ago, and since then he has been a bit queer.
Brian says if he had a good counsel he would have got off. But don’t let’stalk about me any more.”
“Can’t anything be done?”
Violet shook her head.
“He’s very ill—the exposure, you know. That awful cold. It’s pneumonia21.
I can’t help feeling that if he dies—well—it may be best for him really. Itsounds dreadful to say so, but you know what I mean.”
“Poor Violet,” said Emily. “It is a rotten shame.”
The girl shook her head.
“I’ve got Brian,” she said. “And you’ve got—”
She stopped embarrassed.
“Ye-es,” said Emily thoughtfully, “That’s just it.”
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收听单词发音
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1
inspector
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| n.检查员，监察员，视察员 | |
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2
sane
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| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
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3
deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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4
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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5
buckled
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| a. 有带扣的 | |
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6
shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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7
puff
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| n.一口(气)；一阵(风)；v.喷气，喘气 | |
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8
puffing
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| v.使喷出( puff的现在分词 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
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9
artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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10
disapproval
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| n.反对，不赞成 | |
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11
idiotic
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| adj.白痴的 | |
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12
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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13
cocktail
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| n.鸡尾酒；餐前开胃小吃；混合物 | |
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14
solicitously
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| adv.热心地，热切地 | |
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15
sedative
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| adj.使安静的，使镇静的；n. 镇静剂，能使安静的东西 | |
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16
dabbing
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| 石面凿毛，灰泥抛毛 | |
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17
lipstick
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| n.口红，唇膏 | |
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18
camouflage
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| n./v.掩饰，伪装 | |
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19
concocted
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| v.将（尤指通常不相配合的）成分混合成某物( concoct的过去式和过去分词 )；调制；编造；捏造 | |
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20
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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21
pneumonia
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| n.肺炎 | |
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