LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

it isn’t, is it?’ said Fen cheerfully. ‘Nor dead bodies either. Good morning to you.’ He went out.

      ‘It’s no good,’ he told Cadogan, who was sitting in Lily Christine III, trying to adjust his bandage and staring in front of him. ‘I’m convinced that man knows nothing about it. Though he did behave rather queerly when I asked about the owner of the shop. A Miss Alice Winkworth, apparently.’

      Cadogan grunted ambiguously at this information. ‘Well, let’s go round to the back, if you think it will do any good.’ His tone indicated little confidence in this prospect.

      ‘And by the way,’ Fen added as they walked down the narrow, sloping alleyway which led to the back of the shops, ‘was there anyone about when you came with the police this morning?’

      ‘In the shop, you mean? No, no one. The police let themselves in with skeleton keys, or something. The door was locked by then.’

      They counted the creosoted wooden fences which marked off the little garden.

      ‘This is it,’ said Cadogan.

      ‘And someone’s been sick here,’ said Fen with distaste.

      ‘Yes, that was me.’ Cadogan peered in at the gate. The neglected overgrown enclosure, which had seemed so sinister in the half-light, looked quite ordinary now.

      ‘You see that small window?’ he said. ‘To the right of the front door? That’s the sort of closet place I got out of.’

      ‘Is it, now?’ Fen answered thoughtfully. ‘Let’s go and have a look at it.’

      The small window was still open, but it was higher from the ground than Cadogan had remembered, and even Fen, tall as he was, could not see inside. Somewhat disappointed they went on to the back door.

      ‘This is open, anyway,’ said Fen. Cadogan banged against a dustbin which stood beside it. ‘For goodness’ sake try to avoid making that terrible noise.’

      He moved inside with some caution, and Cadogan followed him. He was not very clear what they were supposed to be doing. There was a short corridor, with a kind of kitchen, untenanted, on the left, and the door of the closet, half open, on the right. From the shop in front came the murmur of voices and the bell of the cash register.

      But the closet contained cleaning things no longer. There were, instead, piles of groceries and provisions. And Cadogan was seized by a sudden doubt. Was the whole thing, after all, a delusion? Surely it was all too fantastic to be real? After all, it wasn’t impossible that he should have fallen on his way into Oxford, struck his head, and dreamed the entire business – its quality was nightmarish enough. He blinked about him. He listened. And then, in some alarm, he tugged Fen by the sleeve.

      There was no doubt about it. Footsteps were approaching the closet.

      Fen did not hesitate a moment. ‘Every man for himself,’ he said, leaped on to a pile of boxes and projected himself feet first out of the window. Unfortunately in so doing he knocked over the boxes with a great clatter, and thus cut off Cadogan’s line of retreat. There was no time to pile them up again, and the back door was out of the question – the handle of the closet was already turning. Cadogan seized a tin of baked beans in his right hand, and one of kidney pudding in his left, and waited, adopting a forbidding aspect.

      Fatly expectant, the grocer entered his closet. His eyes bulged and his mouth gaped in stupefaction when he saw the intruder, but to Cadogan’s surprise he made no aggressive movements. Instead, he raised both hands above his head, like an Imam invoking Allah, called out ‘Thieves! Thieves! Thieves!’ in a loud theatrical voice, and fled away as fast as his bulk would allow. Evidently he was much more afraid of Cadogan than Cadogan was of him.

      But Cadogan did not stop to think of these things. The back door, the neglected garden, the gate, and the alleyway marked the stages of his frantic retreat. Fen was sitting in Lily Christine III, reading The Times with elaborate concentration, and a small, vaguely interested crowd had gathered round the front of the shop to listen to the grocer’s continued cries. Cadogan scuttled across the pavement and into the back of the car, where he lay down on the floor. With a jerk they started.

      Once over Magdalen Bridge, he sat up and said ‘Well?’ with some bitterness.

      ‘Sauve qui peut,’ said Fen airily – or as airily as was possible above the outrageous din of the engine. ‘And remember, I have a reputation to keep up. Was it the grocer?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Did you cosh him one?’

      ‘No, he ran away in a fright…Well, I’m damned,’ said Cadogan, staring. ‘I’ve brought a couple of tins away with me.’

      ‘Well, we’ll have them for lunch. That is, if you’re not arrested for petty larceny before then. Did he get a look at you?’

      ‘Yes…I say, Gervase.’

      ‘Well?’

      ‘I want to get to the bottom of this business. My blood’s up. Let’s go and see this Wheatley woman.’

      So they drove to New Inn Hall Street.

       3

       The Episode of the Candid Solicitor

      Two hundred and twenty-nine, New Inn Hall Street proved to be a modest and attractive lodging-house almost next door to a girls’ school; and its proprietress, Mrs Wheatley, a small, timid, bustling, elderly woman who twisted her apron nervously in her hands while she talked.

      ‘I’ll deal with this,’ Cadogan had said to Fen when they arrived. ‘I have a plan.’ In point of fact, he had no plan of any kind. Fen had agreed to this, rather grudgingly. He had then settled down to do the Times crossword puzzle, filling in the literary clues without difficulty. But the rest eluded him, so he sat looking crossly at the passers-by.

      When Mrs Wheatley opened the door to him, Cadogan was still trying to think what to say.

      ‘I expect,’ she said anxiously, ‘that you’re the gentleman about the Rooms.’

      ‘Exactly.’ He was greatly relieved. ‘The Rooms.’

      She showed him inside.

      ‘Very nice weather we’re having,’ she said, as though personally responsible for this phenomenon. ‘This would be the sitting-room.’

      ‘Mrs Wheatley, I’m afraid I’ve deceived you.’ Now he was inside the house, Cadogan decided to abandon his stratagem. ‘I’m not about the Rooms at all. The fact is’ – he cleared his throat – ‘have you a friend or relation, an elderly lady, unmarried, with grey hair and – er – given to wearing tweeds and blouses…?’

      Mrs Wheatley’s pinched, anxious face lit up. ‘You don’t mean Miss Tardy, sir?’

      ‘Er – what was the name again?’

      ‘Miss Tardy, sir. Emilia Tardy. “Better Late than Never” we used to call her. On account of the name, you see. Why, Emilia’s my oldest friend.’ Her face clouded. ‘Nothing’s wrong, is it, sir? Nothing’s happened to her?’

      ‘No, no,’ Cadogan said hastily. ‘Only I met your – ah –friend some time ago, and she said that if ever I was in Oxford I was to be sure to look you up. Unfortunately, I never quite caught her name, though I remembered yours.’

      ‘Why, that’s right sir.’ Mrs Wheatley beamed. ‘And I’m very glad you’ve come – very glad indeed. Any friend of Emilia’s is welcome here. If you’d like to just come down to my sitting-room and take a cup of tea, I could show you a photograph of her to refresh your memory.’

Скачать книгу