Chapter 5 The White Elephant Sale（2）

II
Tuppence, having got home, put the car away in the garage and walkedround the house to the front door. The door was open, so she walked in.
Albert then came from the back premises¹ and bowed to greet her.
‘Like some tea, madam? You must be very tired.’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Tuppence. ‘I’ve had tea. They gave me tea down atthe Institute. Quite good cake, but very nasty buns.’
‘Buns is difficult. Buns is nearly as difficult as doughnuts. Ah,’ he sighed.
‘Lovely doughnuts Amy used to make.’
‘I know. Nobody’s were like them,’ said Tuppence.
Amy had been Albert’s wife, now some years deceased. In Tuppence’sopinion, Amy had made wonderful treacle² tart³ but had never been verygood with doughnuts.
‘I think doughnuts are dreadfully difficult,’ said Tuppence, ‘I’ve neverbeen able to do them myself.’
‘Well, it’s a knack⁴.’
‘Where’s Mr Beresford? Is he out?’
‘Oh no, he’s upstairs. In that room. You know. The book- room orwhatever you like to call it. I can’t get out of the way of calling it the atticstill, myself.’
‘What’s he doing up there?’ said Tuppence, slightly surprised.
‘Well, he’s still looking at the books, I think. I suppose he’s still arrangingthem, getting them finished as you might say.’
‘Still seems to me very surprising,’ said Tuppence. ‘He’s really been veryrude to us about those books.’
‘Ah well,’ said Albert, ‘gentlemen are like that, aren’t they? They likesbig books mostly, you know, don’t they? Something scientific that they canget their teeth into.’
‘I shall go up and rout⁵ him out,’ said Tuppence. ‘Where’s Hannibal?’
‘I think he’s up there with the master.’
But at that moment Hannibal made his appearance. Having barked withthe ferocious⁶ fury he considered necessary for a good guard dog, he hadcorrectly assumed that it was his beloved mistress who had returned andnot someone who had come to steal the teaspoons⁷ or to assault his masterand mistress. He came wriggling⁸ down the stairs, his pink tongue hangingout, his tail wagging.
‘Ah,’ said Tuppence, ‘pleased to see your mother?’
Hannibal said he was very pleased to see his mother. He leapt upon herwith such force that he nearly knocked her to the ground.
‘Gently,’ said Tuppence, ‘gently. You don’t want to kill me, do you?’
Hannibal made it clear that the only thing he wanted to do was to eather because he loved her so much.
‘Where’s Master? Where’s Father? Is he upstairs?’
Hannibal understood. He ran up a flight, turned his head over hisshoulder and waited for Tuppence to join him.
‘Well, I never,’ said Tuppence as, slightly out of breath, she entered thebook-room to see Tommy astride a pair of steps, taking books in and out.
‘Whatever are you doing? I thought you were going to take Hannibal for awalk.’
‘We have been for a walk,’ said Tommy. ‘We went to the churchyard.’
‘Why on earth did you take Hannibal into the churchyard? I’m sure theywouldn’t like dogs there.’
‘He was on the lead,’ said Tommy, ‘and anyway I didn’t take him. Hetook me. He seemed to like the churchyard.’
‘I hope he hasn’t got a thing about it,’ said Tuppence. ‘You know whatHannibal is like. He likes arranging a routine always. If he’s going to havea routine of going to the churchyard every day, it will really be very diffi-cult for us.’
‘He’s really been very intelligent about the whole thing,’ said Tommy.
‘When you say intelligent, you just mean he’s self- willed,’ said Tup-pence.
Hannibal turned his head and came and rubbed his nose against the calfof her leg.
‘He’s telling you,’ said Tommy, ‘that he is a very clever dog. Clevererthan you or I have been so far.’
‘And what do you mean by that?’ asked Tuppence.
‘Have you been enjoying yourself?’ asked Tommy, changing the subject.
‘Well, I wouldn’t go as far as that,’ said Tuppence. ‘People were verykind to me and nice to me and I think soon I shan’t get them mixed up somuch as I do at present. It’s awfully⁹ difficult at first, you know, becausepeople look rather alike and wear the same sort of clothes and you don’tknow at first which is which. I mean, unless somebody is very beautiful orvery ugly. And that doesn’t seem to happen so noticeably in the country,does it?’
‘I’m telling you,’ said Tommy, ‘that Hannibal and I have been extremelyclever.’
‘I thought you said it was Hannibal?’
Tommy reached out his hand and took a book from the shelf in front ofhim.
‘Kidnapped,’ he remarked. ‘Oh yes, another Robert Louis Stevenson.
Somebody must have been very fond of Robert Louis Stevenson. The BlackArrow, Kidnapped, Catriona and two others, I think. All given to AlexanderParkinson by a fond grandmother and one from a generous aunt.’
‘Well,’ said Tuppence, ‘what about it?’
‘And I’ve found his grave,’ said Tommy.
‘Found what?’
‘Well, Hannibal did. It’s right in the corner against one of the smalldoors into the church. I suppose it’s the other door to the vestry, some-thing like that. It’s very rubbed and not well kept up, but that’s it. He wasfourteen when he died. Alexander Richard Parkinson. Hannibal was nos-ing about there. I got him away from it and managed to make out the in-scription, in spite of its being so rubbed.’
‘Fourteen,’ said Tuppence. ‘Poor little boy.’
‘Yes,’ said Tommy, ‘it’s sad and–’
‘You’ve got something in your head,’ said Tuppence. ‘I don’t under-stand.’
‘Well, I wondered. I suppose, Tuppence, you’ve infected me. That’s theworst of you. When you get keen on something, you don’t go on with it byyourself, you get somebody else to take an interest in it too.’
‘I don’t quite know what you mean,’ said Tuppence.
‘I wondered if it was a case of cause and effect.’
‘What do you mean, Tommy?’
‘I was wondering about Alexander Parkinson who took a lot of trouble,though no doubt he enjoyed himself doing it, making a kind of code, asecret message in a book. “Mary Jordan did not die naturally.” Supposingthat was true? Supposing Mary Jordan, whoever she was, didn’t die natur-ally? Well then, don’t you see, perhaps the next thing that happened wasthat Alexander Parkinson died.’
‘You don’t mean–you don’t think–’
‘Well, one wonders,’ said Tommy. ‘It started me wondering– fourteenyears old. There was no mention of what he died of. I suppose therewouldn’t be on a gravestone. There was just a text: In thy presence is thefullness of joy. Something like that. But– it might have been because heknew something that was dangerous to somebody else. And so–and so hedied.’
‘You mean he was killed? You’re just imagining things,’ said Tuppence.
‘Well you started it. Imagining things, or wondering. It’s much the samething, isn’t it?’
‘We shall go on wondering, I suppose,’ said Tuppence, ‘and we shan’t beable to find out anything because it was all such years and years and yearsago.’
They looked at each other.
‘Round about the time we were trying to investigate the Jane Finn busi-ness,’ said Tommy.
The looked at each other again; their minds going back to the past.

1 premises   

n.建筑物，房屋

参考例句：

• According to the rules,no alcohol can be consumed on the premises.按照规定，场内不准饮酒。
• All repairs are done on the premises and not put out.全部修缮都在家里进行，不用送到外面去做。

2 treacle   

n.糖蜜

参考例句：

• Blend a little milk with two tablespoons of treacle.将少许牛奶和两大汤匙糖浆混合。
• The fly that sips treacle is lost in the sweet.啜饮蜜糖的苍蝇在甜蜜中丧生。

3 tart   

adj.酸的；尖酸的，刻薄的；n.果馅饼；淫妇

参考例句：

• She was learning how to make a fruit tart in class.她正在课上学习如何制作水果馅饼。
• She replied in her usual tart and offhand way.她开口回答了，用她平常那种尖酸刻薄的声调随口说道。

4 knack   

n.诀窍，做事情的灵巧的，便利的方法

参考例句：

• He has a knack of teaching arithmetic.他教算术有诀窍。
• Making omelettes isn't difficult,but there's a knack to it.做煎蛋饼并不难，但有窍门。

5 rout   

n.溃退，溃败；v.击溃，打垮

参考例句：

• The enemy was put to rout all along the line.敌人已全线崩溃。
• The people's army put all to rout wherever they went.人民军队所向披靡。

6 ferocious   

adj.凶猛的，残暴的，极度的，十分强烈的

参考例句：

• The ferocious winds seemed about to tear the ship to pieces.狂风仿佛要把船撕成碎片似的。
• The ferocious panther is chasing a rabbit.那只凶猛的豹子正追赶一只兔子。

7 teaspoons   

n.茶匙( teaspoon的名词复数 )；一茶匙的量

参考例句：

• Add two teaspoons of salt. 加两小匙盐。
• Add 3 heaped teaspoons of sugar. 加满满的三匙糖。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 wriggling   

v.扭动，蠕动，蜿蜒行进( wriggle的现在分词 )；（使身体某一部位）扭动；耍滑不做，逃避（应做的事等）；蠕蠕

参考例句：

• The baby was wriggling around on my lap. 婴儿在我大腿上扭来扭去。
• Something that looks like a gray snake is wriggling out. 有一种看来象是灰蛇的东西蠕动着出来了。 来自辞典例句

9 awfully   

adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地

参考例句：

• Agriculture was awfully neglected in the past.过去农业遭到严重忽视。
• I've been feeling awfully bad about it.对这我一直感到很难受。