Chapter 1 Mary Jordan
‘But that alters everything,’ said Tuppence.
‘Yes,’ said Tommy. ‘Yes. It was–it was quite a shock.’
‘Why did he tell you?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Tommy. ‘I thought– well, two or three differentthings.’
‘Did he–what’s he like, Tommy? You haven’t really told me.’
‘Well, he’s yellow,’ said Tommy. ‘Yellow and big and fat and very, veryordinary, but at the same time, if you know what I mean, he isn’t ordinaryat all. He’s–well, he’s what my friend said he was. He’s one of the tops.’
‘You sound like someone talking about pop singers.’
‘Well, one gets used to using these terms.’
‘Yes, but why? Surely that was revealing something that he wouldn’thave wanted to reveal, you’d think.’
‘It was a long time ago,’ said Tommy. ‘It’s all over, you see. I supposenone of it matters nowadays. I mean, look at all the things they’re releas-ing now. Off the record. You know, not hushing up things any more. Let-ting it all come out, what really happened. What one person wrote andwhat another person said and what one row was about and how some-thing else was all hushed up because of something you never heardabout.’
‘You make me feel horribly confused,’ said Tuppence, ‘when you saythings like that. It makes everything wrong, too, doesn’t it?’
‘How do you mean, makes everything wrong?’
‘Well, I mean, the way we’ve been looking at it. I mean– what do Imean?’
‘Go on,’ said Tommy. ‘You must know what you mean.’
‘Well, what I said. It’s all wrong. I mean, we found this thing in TheBlack Arrow, and it was all clear enough. Somebody had written it inthere, probably this boy Alexander, and it meant that somebody–one ofthem, he said, at least, one of us–I mean he put it that way but that’s whathe meant–one of the family or somebody in the house or something, hadarranged to bring about the death of Mary Jordan, and we didn’t knowwho Mary Jordan was, which was very baffling.’
‘Goodness knows it’s been baffling,’ said Tommy.
‘Well, it hasn’t baffled you as much as me. It’s baffled me a great deal. Ihaven’t really found out anything about her. At least–’
‘What you found out about her was that she had been apparently1 a Ger-man spy, isn’t that what you mean? You found out that?’
‘Yes, that is what was believed about her, and I supposed it was true.
Only now–’
‘Yes,’ said Tommy, ‘only now we know that it wasn’t true. She was theopposite to a German spy.’
‘She was a sort of English spy.’
‘Well, she must have been in the English espionage2 or security whateverit was called. And she came here in some capacity to find out something.
To find out something about–about–what’s his name now? I wish I couldremember names better. I mean the naval3 officer or the Army officer orwhatever he was. The one who sold the secret of the submarine or some-thing like that. Yes, I suppose there was a little cluster of German agentshere, rather like in N or M all over again, all busy preparing things.’
‘It would seem so, yes.’
‘And she was sent here in that case, presumably, to find out all about it.’
‘I see.’
‘So “one of us” didn’t mean what we thought it meant. “One of us”
meant–well, it had to be someone who was in this neighbourhood. Andsomebody who had something to do with this house, or was in this housefor a special occasion. And so, when she died, her death wasn’t a naturalone, because somebody got wise to what she was doing. And Alexanderfound out about it.’
‘She was pretending to spy, perhaps,’ said Tuppence, ‘for Germany. Mak-ing friends with Commander–whoever it was.’
‘Call him Commander X,’ said Tommy, ‘if you can’t remember.’
‘All right, all right. Commander X. She was getting friendly with him.’
‘There was also,’ said Tommy, ‘an enemy agent living down here. Thehead of a big organization. He lived in a cottage somewhere, down nearthe quay4 I think it was, and he wrote a lot of propaganda, and used to saythat really our best plan would be to join in with Germany and get to-gether with them–and things like that.’
‘It is all so confusing,’ said Tuppence. ‘All these things–plans, and secretpapers and plots and espionage–have been so confusing. Well, anyway,we’ve probably been looking in all the wrong places.’
‘Not really,’ said Tommy, ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Why don’t you think so?’
‘Well, because if she, Mary Jordan, was here to find out something, andif she did find out something, then perhaps when they–I mean CommanderX or other people–there must have been other people too in it–when theyfound out that she’d found out something–’
‘Now don’t get me muddled5 again,’ said Tuppence. ‘If you say things likethat, it’s very muddling6. Yes. Go on.’
‘All right. Well, when they found out that she’d found out a lot of things,well, then they had to–’
‘To silence her,’ said Tuppence.
‘You make it sound like Phillips Oppenheim now,’ said Tommy. ‘And hewas before 1914, surely.’
‘Well, anyway, they had to silence Mary before she could report whatshe’d found out.’
‘There must be a little more to it than that,’ said Tommy. ‘Perhaps she’dgot hold of something important. Some kind of papers or written docu-ment. Letters that might have been sent or passed to someone.’
‘Yes. I see what you mean. We’ve got to look among a different lot ofpeople. But if she was one of the ones to die because of a mistake that hadbeen made about the vegetables, then I don’t see quite how it could bewhat Alexander called “one of us”. It presumably wasn’t one of his family.’
‘It could have been like this,’ said Tommy. ‘It needn’t have been actuallysomeone in the house. It’s very easy to pick wrong leaves looking alike,bunch ’em all up together and take them into the kitchen; you wouldn’t, Ithink, make them really–I mean, not really–too lethal7. Just the people atone8 particular meal would get rather ill after it and they’d send for a doc-tor and the doctor would get the food analysed and he’d realize some-body’d made a mistake over vegetables. He wouldn’t think anyone haddone it on purpose.’
‘But then everybody at that meal would have died,’ said Tuppence. ‘Oreverybody would have been ill but not died.’
‘Not necessarily,’ said Tommy. ‘Suppose they wanted a certain person–Mary J.–to die, and they were going to give a dose of poison to her, oh, in acocktail before the lunch or dinner or whatever it was or in coffee or some-thing after the meal–actual digitalin, or aconite or whatever it is in fox-gloves–’
‘Aconite’s in monkshood, I think,’ said Tuppence.
‘Don’t be so knowledgeable,’ said Tommy. ‘The point is everyone gets amild dose by what is clearly a mistake, so everyone gets mildly ill–but oneperson dies. Don’t you see, if most people were taken ill after whatever itwas–dinner or lunch one day and it was looked into, and they found outabout the mistake, well, things do happen like that. You know, people eatfungus instead of mushrooms, and deadly nightshade berries children eatby mistake because the berries look like fruit. Just a mistake and peopleare ill, but they don’t usually all die. Just one of them does, and the onethat did die would be assumed to have been particularly allergic9 towhatever it was and so she had died but the others hadn’t. You see, itwould pass off as really due to the mistake and they wouldn’t have lookedto see or even suspected there was some other way in which it happened–’
‘She might have got a little ill like the others and then the real dosemight have been put in her early tea the next morning,’ said Tuppence.
‘I’m sure, Tuppence, that you’ve lots of ideas.’
‘About that part of it, yes,’ said Tuppence. ‘But what about the otherthings? I mean who and what and why? Who was the “one of us”–“one ofthem” as we’d better say now–who had the opportunity? Someone stayingdown here, friends of other people perhaps? People who brought a letter,forged perhaps, from a friend saying “Do be kind to my friend, Mr or MrsMurray Wilson, or some name, who is down here. She is so anxious to seeyour pretty garden,” or something. All that would be easy enough.’
‘Yes, I think it would.’
‘In that case,’ said Tuppence, ‘there’s perhaps something still here in thehouse that would explain what happened to me today and yesterday, too.’
‘What happened to you yesterday, Tuppence?’
‘The wheels came off that beastly little cart and horse I was going downthe hill in the other day, and so I came a terrible cropper right down be-hind the monkey puzzle and into it. And I very nearly–well, I might havehad a serious accident. That silly old man Isaac ought to have seen that thething was safe. He said he did look at it. He told me it was quite all rightbefore I started.’
‘And it wasn’t?’
‘No. He said afterwards that he thought someone had been playingabout with it, tampering10 with the wheels or something, so that they cameoff.’
‘Tuppence,’ said Tommy, ‘do you think that’s the second or third thingthat’s happened here to us? You know that other thing that nearly camedown on the top of me in the book-room?’
‘You mean somebody wants to get rid of us? But that would mean–’
‘That would mean,’ said Tommy, ‘that there must be something. Some-thing that’s here–in the house.’
Tommy looked at Tuppence and Tuppence looked at Tommy. It was themoment for consideration. Tuppence opened her mouth three times butchecked herself each time, frowning, as she considered. It was Tommywho spoke12 at last.
‘What did he think? What did he say about Truelove? Old Isaac, I mean.’
‘That it was only to be expected, that the thing was pretty rotten any-way.’
‘But he said somebody had been monkeying about with it?’
‘Yes,’ said Tuppence, ‘very definitely. “Ah,” he said, “these youngstershave been in tryin’ it out, you know. Enjoy pulling wheels off things, theydo, young monkeys.” Not that I’ve seen anyone about. But then I supposethey’d be sure that I didn’t catch them at it. They’d wait till I’m away fromhome, I expect.
‘I asked him if he thought it was just–just something mischievous,’ saidTuppence.
‘What did he say to that?’ said Tommy.
‘He didn’t really know what to say.’
‘It could have been mischief13, I suppose,’ said Tommy. ‘People do dothose things.’
‘Are you trying to say you think that it was meant in some way so that Ishould go on playing the fool with the cart and that the wheel would comeoff and the thing would fall to pieces–oh, but that is nonsense, Tommy.’
‘Well, it sounds like nonsense,’ said Tommy, ‘but things aren’t nonsensesometimes. It depends where and how they happen and why.’
‘I don’t see what “why” there could be.’
‘One might make a guess–about the most likely thing,’ said Tommy.
‘Now what do you mean by the most likely?’
‘I mean perhaps people want us to go away from here.’
‘Why should they? If somebody wants the house for themselves, theycould make us an offer for it.’
‘Yes, they could.’
‘Well, I wondered– Nobody else has wanted this house as far as weknow. I mean, there was nobody else looking at it when we were. Itseemed to be generally regarded as if it had come into the market rathercheap but not for any other reason, except that it was out of date andneeded a lot doing to it.’
‘I can’t believe they wanted to do away with us, maybe it’s becauseyou’ve been nosing about, asking too many questions, copying things outof books.’
‘You mean that I’m stirring up things that somebody doesn’t want to bestirred up?’
‘That sort of thing,’ said Tommy. ‘I mean, if we suddenly were meant tofeel that we didn’t like living here, and put the house up for sale and wentaway, that would be quite all right. They’d be satisfied with that. I don’tthink that they–’
‘Who do you mean by “they”?’
‘I’ve no idea,’ said Tommy. ‘We must get to “they” later. Just they. There’sWe and there’s They. We must keep them apart in our minds.’
‘What about Isaac?’
‘What do you mean, what about Isaac?’
‘I don’t know. I just wondered if he was mixed up in this.’
‘He’s a very old man, he’s been here a long time and he knows a fewthings. If somebody slipped him a five pound note or something, do youthink he’d tamper11 with Truelove’s wheels?’
‘No, I don’t,’ said Tuppence. ‘He hasn’t got the brains to.’
‘He wouldn’t need brains for it,’ said Tommy. ‘He’d only need the brainsto take the five pound note and to take out a few screws or break off a bitof wood here or there and just make it so that–well, it would come to griefnext time you went down the hill in it.’
‘I think what you are imagining is nonsense,’ said Tuppence.
‘Well, you’ve been imagining a few things that are nonsense already.’
‘Yes, but they fitted in,’ said Tuppence. ‘They fitted in with the thingswe’ve heard.’
‘Well,’ said Tommy, ‘as a result of my investigations14 or researches,whatever you like to call them, it seems that we haven’t learnt quite theright things.’
‘You mean what I said just now, that this turns things upside down. Imean now we know that Mary Jordan wasn’t an enemy agent, instead shewas a British agent. She was here for a purpose. Perhaps she had accom-plished her purpose.’
‘In that case,’ said Tommy, ‘now let’s get it all clear, with this new bit ofknowledge added. Her purpose here was to find out something.’
‘Presumably to find out something about Commander X,’ said Tuppence.
‘You must find out his name, it seems so extraordinarily15 barren only to beable to say Commander X all the time.’
‘All right, all right, but you know how difficult these things are.’
‘And she did find them out, and she reported what she had found out.
And perhaps someone opened the letter,’ said Tuppence.
‘What letter?’ said Tommy.
‘The letter she wrote to whoever was her “contact”.’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you think he was her father or her grandfather or something likethat.’
‘I shouldn’t think so,’ said Tommy. ‘I don’t think that’s the sort of waythings would be done. She might just have chosen to take the name ofJordan, or they thought it was quite a good name because it was not asso-ciated in any way, which it wouldn’t be if she was partly German, and hadperhaps come from some other work that she had been doing for us butnot for them.’
‘For us and not for them,’ agreed Tuppence, ‘abroad. And so she camehere as what?
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Tuppence, ‘we shall have to start all over againfinding out as what, I suppose…Anyway, she came here and she found outsomething and she either passed it on to someone or didn’t. I mean, shemight not have written a letter. She might have gone to London and repor-ted something. Met someone in Regent’s Park, say.’
‘That’s rather the other way about, usually, isn’t it?’ said Tommy. ‘Imean you meet somebody from whatever embassy it is you’re in collusionwith and you meet in Regent’s Park and–’
‘Hide things in a hollow tree sometimes. Do you think they really dothat? It sounds so unlikely. It’s so much more like people who are having alove-affair and putting love-letters in.’
‘I dare say whatever they put in there was written as though they werelove-letters and really had a code.’
‘That’s a splendid idea,’ said Tuppence, ‘only I suppose they–Oh dear, it’ssuch years ago. How difficult it is to get anywhere. The more you know, Imean, the less use it is to you. But we’re not going to stop, Tommy, arewe?’
‘I don’t suppose we are for a moment,’ said Tommy. He sighed.
‘You wish we were?’ said Tuppence.
‘Almost. Yes. Far as I can see–’
‘Well,’ cut in Tuppence, ‘I can’t see you taking yourself off the trail. No,and it would be very difficult to get me off the trail. I mean, I’d go on think-ing about it and it would worry me. I dare say I should go off my food andeverything.’
‘The point is,’ said Tommy, ‘do you think–we know in a way perhapswhat this starts from. Espionage. Espionage by the enemy with certain ob-jects in view, some of which were accomplished16. Perhaps some whichweren’t quite accomplished. But we don’t know–well–we don’t know whowas mixed up in it. From the enemy point of view. I mean, there werepeople here, I should think, people perhaps among security forces. Peoplewho were traitors17 but whose job it was to appear to be loyal servants ofthe State.’
‘Yes,’ said Tuppence. ‘I’ll go for that one. That seems to be very likely.’
‘And Mary Jordan’s job was to get in touch with them.’
‘To get in touch with Commander X?’
‘I should think so, yes. Or with friends of Commander X and to find outabout things. But apparently it was necessary for her to come here to getit.’
‘Do you mean that the Parkinsons–I suppose we’re back at the Parkin-sons again before we know where we are–were in it? That the Parkinsonswere part of the enemy?’
‘It seems very unlikely,’ said Tommy.
‘Well, then, I can’t see what it all means.’
‘I think the house might have something to do with it,’ said Tommy.
‘The house? Well, other people came and lived here afterwards, didn’tthey?’
‘Yes, they did. But I don’t suppose they were people quite like–well, quitelike you, Tuppence.’
‘What do you mean by quite like me?’
‘Well, wanting old books and looking through them and finding outthings. Being a regular mongoose, in fact. They just came and lived hereand I expect the upstairs rooms and the books were probably servants’
rooms and nobody went into them. There may be something that was hid-den in this house. Hidden perhaps by Mary Jordan. Hidden in a placeready to deliver to someone who would come for them, or deliver them bygoing herself to London or somewhere on some excuse. Visit to a dentist.
Seeing an old friend. Quite easy to do. She had something she had ac-quired, or got to know, hidden in this house. You’re not saying it’s still hid-den in this house?’
‘No,’ said Tommy, ‘I shouldn’t have thought so. But one doesn’t know.
Somebody is afraid we may find it or have found it and they want to get usout of the house, or they want to get hold of whatever it is they thinkwe’ve found but that they’ve never found, though perhaps they’ve lookedfor it in past years and then thought it had been hidden somewhere elseoutside.’
‘Oh, Tommy,’ said Tuppence, ‘that makes it all much more exciting,really, doesn’t it?’
‘It’s only what we think,’ said Tommy.
‘Now don’t be such a wet blanket,’ said Tuppence. ‘I’m going to look out-side as well as inside–’
‘What are you going to do, dig up the kitchen garden?’
‘No,’ said Tuppence. ‘Cupboards, the cellar, things like that. Who knows?
Oh, Tommy!’
‘Oh, Tuppence!’ said Tommy. ‘Just when we were looking forward to adelightful, peaceful old age.’
‘No peace for the pensioners18,’ said Tuppence gaily19. ‘That’s an idea too.’
‘What?’
‘I must go and talk to some old age pensioners at their club. I hadn’tthought of them up to now.’
‘For goodness’ sake, look after yourself,’ said Tommy. ‘I think I’d betterstay at home and keep an eye on you. But I’ve got to do some more re-search in London tomorrow.’
‘I’m going to do some research here,’ said Tuppence.
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1
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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2
espionage
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| n.间谍行为，谍报活动 | |
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3
naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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4
quay
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| n.码头，靠岸处 | |
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5
muddled
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| adj.混乱的；糊涂的；头脑昏昏然的v.弄乱，弄糟( muddle的过去式)；使糊涂；对付，混日子 | |
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6
muddling
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| v.弄乱，弄糟( muddle的现在分词 )；使糊涂；对付，混日子 | |
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7
lethal
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| adj.致死的；毁灭性的 | |
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8
atone
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| v.赎罪，补偿 | |
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9
allergic
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| adj.过敏的，变态的 | |
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10
tampering
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| v.窜改( tamper的现在分词 )；篡改；（用不正当手段）影响；瞎摆弄 | |
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11
tamper
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| v.干预，玩弄，贿赂，窜改，削弱，损害 | |
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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
mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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14
investigations
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| （正式的）调查( investigation的名词复数 )； 侦查； 科学研究； 学术研究 | |
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15
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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16
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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traitors
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| 卖国贼( traitor的名词复数 )； 叛徒； 背叛者； 背信弃义的人 | |
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pensioners
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| n.领取退休、养老金或抚恤金的人( pensioner的名词复数 ) | |
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gaily
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| adv.欢乐地，高兴地 | |
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