Tuppence, on the following morning, went in search of that well-knownpublic character in the village known usually as Old Isaac, or, on formaloccasions if one could remember, Mr Bodlicott. Isaac Bodlicott was one ofthe local ‘characters’. He was a character because of his age–he claimed tobe ninety (not generally believed)–and he was able to do repairs of manycurious kinds. If your efforts to ring up the plumber1 met with no response,you went to old Isaac Bodlicott. Mr Bodlicott, whether or not he was in anyway qualified2 for the repairs he did, had been well acquainted for many ofthe years of his long life with every type of sanitation3 problem, bath-waterproblems, difficulties with geysers, and sundry4 electrical problems on theside. His charges compared favourably5 with a real live qualified plumber,and his repairs were often surprisingly successful. He could do carpenter-ing, he could attend to locks, he could hang pictures– rather crookedlysometimes– he understood about the springs of derelict armchairs. Themain disadvantage of Mr Bodlicott’s attentions was his garrulous6 habit ofincessant conversation slightly hampered7 by a difficulty in adjusting hisfalse teeth in such a way as to make what he said intelligible8 in his pro-nunciation. His memories of past inhabitants of the neighbourhoodseemed to be unlimited9. It was difficult, on the whole, to know how reli-able they might be. Mr Bodlicott was not one to shirk giving himself thepleasure of retailing10 some really good story of past days. These flights offancy, claimed usually as flights of memory, were usually ushered11 in withthe same type of statement.
‘You’d be surprised, you would, if I could tell you what I knew aboutthat one. Yes indeed. Well, you know, everybody thought they knew allabout it, but they were wrong. Absolutely wrong. It was the elder sister,you know. Yes, it was. Such a nice girl, she seemed. It was the butcher’sdog that gave them all the clue. Followed her home, he did. Yes. Only itwasn’t her own home, as you might say. Ah well, I could tell you a lotmore about that. Then there was old Mrs Atkins. Nobody knew as she kepta revolver in the house, but I knew. I knew when I was sent for to mendher tallboy–that’s what they call those high chests, isn’t it? Yes. Tallboys.
Well, that’s right. Well, there she was, seventy-five, and in that drawer, thedrawer of the tallboy as I went, you know, to mend–the hinges had gone,the lock too–that’s where the revolver was. Wrapped up, it was, with apair of women’s shoes. No. 3 size. Or, I’m not sure as it wasn’t No. 2. Whitesatin. Tiny little foot. Her great-grandmother’s wedding shoes, she said.
Maybe. But somebody said she bought them at a curiosity shop once but Idon’t know about that. And there was the revolver wrapped up too. Yes.
Well, they said as her son had brought it back. Brought it back from EastAfrica, he did. He’d been out there shooting elephants or something of thatkind. And when he come home he brought this revolver. And do you knowwhat that old lady used to do? Her son had taught her to shoot. She’d sit byher drawing- room window looking out and when people came up thedrive she’d have her revolver with her and she’d shoot either side of them.
Yes. Got them frightened to death and they ran away. She said shewouldn’t have anyone coming in and disturbing the birds. Very keen onthe birds, she was. Mind you, she never shot a bird. No, she didn’t want todo that. Then there was all the stories about Mrs Letherby. Nearly had up,she was. Yes, shoplifting. Very clever at it, so they say. And yet as rich asthey make them.’
Having persuaded Mr Bodlicott to replace the skylight in the bathroom,Tuppence wondered if she could direct his conversation to any memory ofthe past which would be useful to Tommy and herself in solving the mys-tery of the concealment12 in their house of some treasure or interestingsecret of whose nature they had no knowledge whatever.
Old Isaac Bodlicott made no difficulties about coming to do repairs forthe new tenants13 of the place. It was one of his pleasures in life to meet asmany newcomers as possible. It was in his life one of the main events tobe able to come across people who had not so far heard of his splendidmemories and reminiscences. Those who were well acquainted with themdid not often encourage him to repeat these tales. But a new audience!
That was always a pleasant happening. That and displaying the wonderfulamount of trades that he managed to combine among his various servicesto the community in which he lived. It was his pleasure to indulge in arunning commentary.
‘Luck it was, as old Joe didn’t get cut. Might have ripped his face open.’
‘Yes, it might indeed.’
‘There’s a bit more glass wants sweeping14 up on the floor still, missus.’
‘I know,’ said Tuppence, ‘we haven’t had time yet.’
‘Ah, but you can’t take risks with glass. You know what glass is. A littlesplinter can do you all the harm in the world. Die of it, you can, if it getsinto a blood vessel15. I remember Miss Lavinia Shotacomb. You wouldn’t be-lieve…’
Tuppence was not tempted16 by Miss Lavinia Shotacomb. She had heardher mentioned by other local characters. She had apparently17 beenbetween seventy and eighty, quite deaf and almost blind.
‘I suppose,’ said Tuppence, breaking in before Isaac’s reminiscences ofLavinia Shotacomb could begin, ‘that you must know a lot about all thevarious people and the extraordinary things that have happened in thisplace in the past.’
‘Aw, well, I’m not as young as I was, you know. Over eighty-five, I am.
Going on ninety. I’ve always had a good memory. There are things, youknow, you don’t forget. No. However long it is, something reminds you ofit, you know, and brings it all back to you. The things I could tell you, youwouldn’t believe.’
‘Well, it’s really wonderful, isn’t it,’ said Tuppence, ‘to think how muchyou must know about what a lot of extraordinary people.’
‘Ah no, there’s no accounting18 for people, is there? Ones that aren’t whatyou think they are, sometimes things as you wouldn’t have believed inabout them.’
‘Spies, I suppose, sometimes,’ said Tuppence, ‘or criminals.’
She looked at him hopefully…Old Isaac bent19 and picked up a splinter ofglass.
‘Here you are,’ he said. ‘How’d you feel if that got in the sole of yourfoot?’
Tuppence began to feel that the replenishing of a glass skylight was notgoing to yield much in the way of Isaac’s more exciting memories of thepast. She noticed that the small so-called greenhouse attached to the wallof the house near the dining-room window was also in need of repair andreplacement by an outlay20 of money upon glass. Would it be worth repair-ing or would it be better to have it pulled down? Isaac was quite pleased totransfer himself to this fresh problem. They went downstairs, and outsidethe house walked round its walls until they came to the erection in ques-tion.
‘Ah, you mean that there, do you?’
Tuppence said yes, she did mean that there.
‘Kay-kay,’ said Isaac.
Tuppence looked at him. Two letters of the alphabet such as KK reallymeant nothing to her.
‘What did you say?’
‘I said KK. That’s what it used to be called in old Mrs Lottie Jones’s time.’
‘Oh. Why did she call it KK?’
‘I dunno. It was a sort of–sort of name I suppose they used to have forplaces like this. You know, it wasn’t grand. Bigger houses have a real con-servatory. You know, where they’d have maidenhair ferns in pots.’
‘Yes,’ said Tuppence, her own memories going back easily to suchthings.
‘And a greenhouse you can call it, too. But this here, KK old Mrs LottieJones used to call it. I dunno why.’
‘Did they have maidenhair ferns in it?’
‘No, it wasn’t used for that. No. The children had it for toys mostly. Well,when you say toys I expect they’re here still if nobody has turned themout. You see, it’s half falling down, isn’t it? They just stuck up a bit thenthey put a bit of roofing over and I don’t suppose that anyone will use itagain. They used to bring the broken toys, or chairs out here and thingslike that. But then, you see, they already had the rocking-horse there andTruelove in the far corner.’
‘Can we get inside it?’ asked Tuppence, trying to apply her eye to aslightly clearer portion of a pane21 of window. ‘There must be a lot of queerthings inside.’
‘Ah well, there’s the key,’ said Isaac. ‘I expect it’s hanging up in the sameplace.’
‘Where’s the same place?’
‘Ah, there’s a shed round here.’
They went round an adjacent path. The shed was hardly worthy22 of be-ing called a shed. Isaac kicked its door open, removed various bits ofbranches of trees, kicked away some rotting apples and, removing an olddoormat hanging on the wall, showed three or four rusty23 keys hanging upon a nail.
‘Lindop’s keys, those,’ he said. ‘Last but one was as living here asgardener. Retired24 basket-maker, he was. Didn’t do no good at anything. Ifyou’d like to see inside KK–?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Tuppence hopefully. ‘I’d like to see inside KK. How do youspell it?’
‘How do you spell what?’
‘I mean KK. Is it just two letters?’
‘No. I think it was something different. I think it was two foreign words.
I seem to remember now K-A-I and then another K-A-I. Kay-Kay, or Kye-Kye almost, they used to say it. I think it was a Japanese word.’
‘Oh,’ said Tuppence. ‘Did any Japanese people ever live here?’
‘Oh no, nothing like that. No. Not that kind of foreigner.’
The application of a little oil, which Isaac seemed to produce and applyquite quickly, had a wonderful effect on the rustiest25 of the keys which, in-serted in the door and turned with a grinding noise, could be pushedopen. Tuppence and her guide went in.
‘There you are,’ said Isaac, not displaying any particular pride in the ob-jects within. ‘Nothing but old rubbish, is it?’
‘That’s a rather wonderful-looking horse,’ said Tuppence.
‘That’s Mackild, that is,’ said Isaac.
‘Mack-ild?’ said Tuppence, rather doubtfully.
‘Yes. It’s a woman’s name of some kind. Queen somebody, it was. Some-body said as it was William the Conqueror’s wife but I think they were justboasting about that. Come from America, it did. American godfatherbrought it to one of the children.’
‘To one of the–?’
‘One of the Bassington children, that was. Before the other lot. I dunno. Isuppose it’s all rusted26 up now.’
Mathilde was a rather splendid-looking horse even in decay. Its lengthwas quite the length of any horse or mare27 to be found nowadays. Only afew hairs were left of what must once have been a prolific28 mane. One earwas broken off. It had once been painted grey. Its front legs splayed out infront and its back legs at the back; it had a wispy29 tail.
‘It doesn’t work like any rocking-horse I’ve ever seen before,’ said Tup-pence, interested.
‘No, it don’t, do it?’ said Isaac. ‘You know, they go up and down, up anddown, front to back. But this one here, you see–it sort of springs forwards.
Once first, the front legs do it–whoop–and then the back legs do it. It’s avery good action. Now if I was to get on it and show you–’
‘Do be careful,’ said Tuppence. ‘It might–there might be nails or some-thing which would stick into you, or you might fall off.’
‘Ah. I’ve ridden on Mathilde, fifty or sixty years ago it must have been,but I remember. And it’s still pretty solid, you know. It’s not really fallingto bits yet.’
With a sudden, unexpected, acrobatic action he sprang upon Mathilde.
The horse raced forwards, then raced backwards30.
‘Got action, hasn’t it?’
‘Yes, it’s got action,’ said Tuppence.
‘Ah, they loved that, you know. Miss Jenny, she used to ride it day afterday.’
‘Who was Miss Jenny?’
‘Why, she was the eldest31 one, you know. She was the one that had thegodfather as sent her this. Sent her Truelove, too,’ he added.
Tuppence looked at him enquiringly. The remark did not seem to applyto any of the other contents of Kay-Kay.
‘That’s what they call it, you know. That little horse and cart what’sthere in the corner. Used to ride it down the hill, Miss Pamela did. Veryserious, she was, Miss Pamela. She’d get in at the top of the hill and she’dput her feet on there–you see, it’s meant to have pedals but they don’twork, so she’d take it to the top of the hill and then she’d let it begin to godown the hill, and she’d put the brakes on, as it were, with her feet. Oftenshe’d end up landing in the monkey puzzle, as a matter of fact.’
‘That sounds very uncomfortable,’ said Tuppence. ‘I mean, to land in themonkey puzzle.’
‘Ah well, she could stop herself a bit before that. Very serious, she was.
She used to do that by the hour–three or four hours I’ve watched her. Iwas doing the Christmas rose bed very often, you know, and the pampasgrass, and I’d see her going down. I didn’t speak to her because she didn’tlike being spoken to. She wanted to go on with what she was doing orwhat she thought she was doing.’
‘What did she think she was doing?’ said Tuppence, beginning suddenlyto get more interested in Miss Pamela than she had been in Miss Jenny.
‘Well, I don’t know. She used to say sometimes she was a princess, youknow, escaping, or Mary, Queen of What-is-it–do I mean Ireland or Scot-land?’
‘Mary Queen of Scots,’ suggested Tuppence.
‘Yes, that’s right. She went away or something, or escaped. Went into acastle. Lock something it was called. Not a real lock, you know, a piece ofwater, it was.’
‘Ah yes, I see. And Pamela thought she was Mary Queen of Scots escap-ing from her enemies?’
‘That’s right. Going to throw herself into England on Queen Elizabeth’smercy, she said, but I don’t think as Queen Elizabeth was very merciful.’
‘Well,’ said Tuppence, masking any disappointment she felt, ‘it’s all veryinteresting, I’m sure. Who were these people, did you say?’
‘Oh, they were the Listers, they were.’
‘Did you ever know a Mary Jordan?’
‘Ah, I know who you mean. No, she was before my time a bit, I think.
You mean the German spy girl, don’t you?’
‘Everyone seems to know about her here,’ said Tuppence.
‘Yes. They called her the Frow Line, or something. Sounds like a rail-way.’
‘It does rather,’ said Tuppence.
Isaac suddenly laughed. ‘Ha, ha, ha,’ he said. ‘If it was a railway, a line, arailway line, oh, it didn’t run straight, did it? No, indeed.’ He laughedagain.
‘What a splendid joke,’ said Tuppence kindly32.
Isaac laughed again.
‘It’s about time,’ he said, ‘you thought of putting some vegetables in, isn’tit? You know, if you want to get your broad beans on in good time youought to put ’em in and prepare for the peas. And what about some earlylettuce? Tom Thumbs now? Beautiful lettuce33, those, small but crisp as any-thing.’
‘I suppose you’ve done a lot of gardening work round here. I don’t meanjust this house, but a lot of places.’
‘Ah yes, I’ve done odd jobbing, you know. I used to come along to mostof the houses. Some of the gardeners they had weren’t any good at all andI’d usually come in and help at certain times or other. Had a bit of an acci-dent here once, you know. Mistake about vegetables. Before my time–but Iheard about it.’
‘Something about foxglove leaves, wasn’t it?’ said Tuppence.
‘Ah, fancy you having heard of that already. That was a long time ago,too. Yes, several was taken ill with it. One of them died. At least so I heard.
That was only hearsay34. Old pal35 of mine told me that.’
‘I think it was the Frow Line,’ said Tuppence.
‘What, the Frow Line as died? Well, I never heard that.’
‘Well, perhaps I’m wrong,’ said Tuppence. ‘Supposing you takeTruelove,’ she said, ‘or whatever this thing’s called, and put it on the hill inthe place where that child, Pamela, used to take it down the hill–if the hillis still there.’
‘Well, of course the hill is still there. What do you think? It’s all grassstill, but be careful now. I don’t know how much of Truelove is rustedaway. I’ll have a bit of a clean-up on it first, shall I?’
‘That’s right,’ said Tuppence, ‘and then you can think of a list of veget-ables that we ought to be getting on with.’
‘Ah well, I’ll be careful you don’t get foxglove and spinach36 planted to-gether. Shouldn’t like to hear that something happened to you whenyou’ve just got into a new house. Nice place here if you can just have alittle money to spend on it.’
‘Thank you very much,’ said Tuppence.
‘And I’ll just see to that there Truelove so it won’t break down underyou. It’s very old but you’d be surprised the way some old things work.
Why, I knew a cousin of mine the other day and he got out an old bicycle.
You wouldn’t think it would go– nobody had ridden it for about fortyyears. But it went all right with a bit of oil. Ah, it’s wonderful what a bit ofoil can do.’
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收听单词发音
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plumber
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| n.(装修水管的)管子工 | |
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qualified
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| adj.合格的，有资格的，胜任的，有限制的 | |
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sanitation
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| n.公共卫生，环境卫生，卫生设备 | |
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sundry
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| adj.各式各样的，种种的 | |
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favourably
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| adv. 善意地，赞成地 =favorably | |
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garrulous
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| adj.唠叨的，多话的 | |
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hampered
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| 妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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unlimited
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| adj.无限的，不受控制的，无条件的 | |
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retailing
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| n.零售业v.零售(retail的现在分词) | |
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ushered
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| v.引，领，陪同( usher的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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concealment
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| n.隐藏, 掩盖，隐瞒 | |
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tenants
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| n.房客( tenant的名词复数 )；佃户；占用者；占有者 | |
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sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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accounting
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| n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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outlay
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| n.费用，经费，支出；v.花费 | |
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pane
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| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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rustiest
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| 生锈的( rusty的最高级 )； 荒疏的 | |
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rusted
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| v.（使）生锈( rust的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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mare
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| n.母马，母驴 | |
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prolific
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| adj.丰富的，大量的；多产的，富有创造力的 | |
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wispy
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| adj.模糊的；纤细的 | |
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backwards
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| adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地 | |
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eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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lettuce
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| n.莴苣；生菜 | |
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hearsay
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| n.谣传，风闻 | |
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pal
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| n.朋友，伙伴，同志；vi.结为友 | |
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spinach
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| n.菠菜 | |
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