‘Let’s see, what’s your name?’
As though in answer, there was a movement behind the screen. Something fell with a crash, and the ambulance man put out a scared face, saying urgently, ‘Doctor!’ At the same moment came Drury’s voice, ‘Walter – tell Walter –!’ trailing into silence. Walter and the doctor dived for the screen together, Scales catching Walter as he pushed past him. The second ambulance man put down what he was doing and ran to assist. There was a moment of bustle and expostulation, and the doctor said, ‘Come, now, give him a chance.’ Walter came back to his place at the table. His mouth looked as though he were going to cry.
‘They won’t let me see him. He asked for me.’
‘He mustn’t exert himself, you know,’ said Scales, mechanically.
The patient was muttering to himself and the doctor seemed to be trying to quiet him. Scales and Walter Hopkins stood waiting helplessly, with the plate between them. Four little drops of blood – absurd, thought Scales, that they should be of so much importance, when you remembered that horrible welter in the street, on the couch. On the table stood a small wooden rack, containing ampoules. He read the labels, ‘Stock serum No. II’, ‘Stock serum No. III’; the words conveyed nothing to him; he noticed, stupidly, that one of the little pink roses on the border of the plate had been smudged in the firing – that Walter’s hands were trembling as he supported himself upon the table.
Then the doctor reappeared, whispering to the ambulance men, ‘Do try to keep him quiet.’ Walter looked anxiously at him. ‘All right, so far,’ said the doctor. ‘Now then, where were we? What did you say your name was?’ He labelled the specimens on Walter’s side of the plate with the initials ‘W.H.’
‘Mine’s John Scales,’ said Scales. The doctor wrote down the initials of London’s popular playwright as indifferently as though they had been those of a rate-collector and took from the rack the ampoule of Serum II. Breaking it, he added a little of the contents, first to a drop of the ‘J.S.’ blood and, next, to a drop of ‘W.H.’ blood, scribbling the figure II beside each specimen. To each of the remaining drops he added, in the same way, a little of Serum III. Blood and serum met and mingled; to Scales, all four of the little red blotches looked exactly alike. He was disappointed, he had vaguely expected something more dramatic.
‘It’ll take a minute or two,’ said the doctor, gently rocking the plate. ‘If the blood of either of you mixes with both sera without clumping the red corpuscles, then that donor is a universal donor, and will do. Or, if it clumps with Serum II and remains clear with Serum III, then the donor belongs to the patient’s own blood-group and will do excellently for him. But if it clumps with both sera or with Serum III only, then it will do for the patient in quite another sense.’ He set the plate down and began to fish in his pocket.
One of the ambulance men looked round the screen again. ‘I can’t find his pulse,’ he announced helplessly, ‘and he’s looking very queer.’ The doctor clicked his tongue in a worried way against his teeth and vanished. There were movements, and a clinking of glass.
Scales gazed down at the plate. Was there any difference to be seen? Was one of the little blotches on Walter’s side beginning to curdle and separate into grains as though someone had sprinkled it with cayenne pepper? He was not sure. On his own side of the plate, the drops looked exactly alike. Again he read the labels; again he noted the pink rose that had been smudged in the firing – the pink rose – funny about the pink rose – but what was funny about it? Certainly, one of Walter’s drops was beginning to look different. A hard ring was forming about its edge, and the tiny, peppery grains were growing darker and more distinct.
‘He’ll do now,’ said the doctor, returning, ‘but we don’t want to lose any time. Let’s hope –’
He bent over the plate again. It was the drop labelled III that had the queer grainy look – was that the right way or the wrong way round? Scales could not remember. The doctor was examining the specimens closely, with the help of a pencil microscope … Then he straightened his back with a small sigh of relief.
‘Group 4,’ he announced; ‘we’re all right now.’
‘Which of us?’ thought Scales (though he was pretty sure of the answer). He was still obscurely puzzled by the pink rose.
‘Yes,’ went on the doctor, ‘no sign of agglutination. I think we can risk that without a direct match-up against the patient’s blood. It would take twenty minutes and we can’t spare the time.’ He turned to Scales. ‘You’re the man we want.’
Walter gave an anguished cry.
‘Not me?’
‘Hush!’ said the doctor, authoritatively. ‘No, I’m afraid we can’t let it be you. Now, you’ – he turned to Scales again –‘are a universal donor; very useful person to have about. Heart quite healthy, I suppose? Feels all right. You look fit enough, and thank goodness, you’re not fat. Get your coat off, will you and turn up your sleeve. Ah, yes. Nice stout-looking vein. Splendid. Now, you won’t take any harm – you may feel a little faint perhaps, but you’ll be as right as rain in an hour or so.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Scales. He was still looking at the plate. The smudged rose was on his right. Surely it had always been on his right. Or had it started on his left? When? Before the blood-drops had been put on? or after? How could it have altered its position? When the doctor was handling the plate? Or could Walter have caught the plate with his sleeve and swivelled it round when he made his mad rush for the screen? If so, was that before the specimens had been labelled? After, surely. No, before – after they were taken and before they were labelled. And that would mean …
The doctor was opening the drum again; taking out bandages, forceps, a glass flask …
That would mean that his own blood and Walter’s had changed places before the serum was added, and if so …
… Scissors, towels, a kind of syringe …
If there was the slightest doubt, one ought to draw attention to it and have the specimens tested again. But perhaps either of their bloods would have done equally well; in that case, the doctor would naturally give the preference to John Scales, rather than to poor Walter, shivering there like a leaf. Clump with II, clear with III; clump with III clear with II – he couldn’t remember which way it went …
‘No, I’m sorry,’ repeated the doctor. He escorted, Walter firmly to the door and came back. ‘Poor chap – he can’t make out why his blood won’t do. Hopeless, of course. Just as well give the man prussic acid at once.’
… The pink rose …
‘Doctor –’ began Scales.
And then, suddenly, Drury’s voice came from behind the screen, speaking the line that had been written to be spoken with a harsh and ugly cynicism, but giving it as he had given it now on the stage for nearly a hundred performances:
‘All right, all right, don’t worry – I’ll rest on my laurels.’
The hated, heartbreaking voice – the professional actor’s voice – sweet as sugar plums – liquid and mellow like an intoxicated flute.
Damn him! thought Scales, feeling the rubber band tighten above his elbow, I hope he dies. Never to hear that damned-awful voice again. I’d give anything. I’d give …
He watched his arm swell and mottle red and blue under the pressure of the band. The doctor gave him an injection of something. Scales said nothing. He was thinking:
Give anything. I would give my life. I would give my blood. I have only to give my blood – and say nothing. The plate was turned round … No, I don’t know that. It’s the doctor’s business to make sure … I can’t speak now … He’ll wonder why I didn’t speak before … Author sacrifices blood to save benefactor … Roses to right of him, roses to left of him … roses, roses all the way … I will rest on my laurels.
The needle now – plump into the vein. His own blood flowing, rising in the glass flask … Somebody bringing a bowl of warm water with a faint steam rising off it …
His life for his friend … right as rain in an hour or two
… blood-brothers … the blood is the life … as well give him prussic acid at once … to poison a man with one’s own blood … new idea, for a murder … MURDER …
‘Don’t jerk about,’ said the doctor.
… and what a motive! … murder to save one’s artistic soul … Who’d believe that? … and losing money by it … your money or your life … his life for his friend … his friend for his life … life or death, and not to know which one was giving … not really know … not know at all, really … too late now … absurd to say anything now … nobody saw the plate turned round … and who would ever imagine …?
‘That’ll do,’ said the doctor. He loosened the rubber band, dabbed a pad of wool over the puncture and pulled out the needle, all, it seemed to Scales, in one movement. He plopped the flask into a little stand over the bowl of water and dressed the arm with iodine. ‘How do you feel? A trifle faint? Go and lie down in the other room for a minute or two.’
Scales opened his mouth to speak, and was suddenly assailed by a queer, sick qualm. He plunged for the door. As he went, he saw the doctor carry the flask behind the screen.
Damn that reporter! He was still hanging round. Meat and drink to the papers, this kind of thing. Heroic sacrifice by grateful author. Good story. Better story still if the heroic author were to catch him by the arm, pour into his ear the unbelievable truth – were to say, ‘I hated him, I hated him, I tell you – I’ve poisoned him – my blood’s poison – serpent’s blood, dragon’s blood –’
And what would the doctor say? If this really had gone wrong, would he suspect? What could he suspect? He hadn’t seen the plate move. Nobody had. He might suspect himself of negligence, but he wouldn’t be likely to shout that from the housetops. And he had been negligent – pompous, fat, chattering fool. Why didn’t he mark the specimens earlier? Why didn’t he match-up the blood with Drury’s? Why did he need to chatter so much and explain things? Tell people how easy it was to murder a benefactor?
Scales wished he knew what was happening. Walter was hovering outside in the passage. Walter was jealous – he had looked on enviously, grudgingly, as Scales came stumbling in from the operation. If only Walter knew what Scales had been doing, he might well look … It occurred to Scales that he had played a shabby trick on Walter – cheated him – Walter, who had wanted so much to sacrifice his right, his true, his life-giving blood …
Twenty minutes … nearly half an hour … How soon would they know whether it was all right or all wrong? ‘As well give him prussic acid,’ the doctor had said. That suggested something pretty drastic. Prussic acid was quick – you died as if struck.
Scales got up, pushed Walter and the pressman aside and crossed the passage. In Drury’s room the screen had been pushed back. Scales, peeping through the door, could see Drury’s face, white and glistening with sweat. The doctor bent over the patient, holding his wrist. He looked distressed –almost alarmed. Suddenly he turned, caught sight of Scales and came over to him. He seemed to take minutes to cross the room.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the doctor. ‘I’m very much afraid – you did your best – we all did our best.’
‘No good?’ Scales whispered back. His tongue and palate were like sawdust.
‘One can never be certain with these things,’ said the doctor. ‘I’m very much afraid he’s going.’ He paused and his eyes were faintly puzzled. ‘So much haemorrhage,’ he muttered as though explaining the trouble to himself. ‘Shock – cardiac strain – excitable’ – and, in a worried voice – ‘he complained almost at once of pain in the back.’ He added, with more assurance: ‘It’s always a bit of a gamble, you see, when the operation is left so late – and sometimes there is a particular idiosyncrasy. I should have preferred a direct test; but it’s not satisfactory if the patient dies while you wait to make sure.’
With a wry smile he turned back to the couch, and Scales followed him. If Drury could have acted death as he was acting it now! … Scales could not rid himself of the notion that he was acting – that the shine upon the skin was grease-paint, and the rough, painful breathing, the stereotyped stage gasp. If truth could be so stagey, then the stage must be disconcertingly like truth.
Something sobbed at his elbow. Walter had crept into the room, and this time the doctor made way for him.
‘Oh, Mr Drury!’ said Walter.
Drury’s blue lips moved. He opened his eyes: the dilated pupils made them look black and enormous.
‘Where’s Brand?’
The doctor turned interrogatively to the other two men. ‘His son?’
‘His understudy,’ whispered Scales. Walter said, ‘He’ll be here in a minute, Mr Drury.’
‘They’re waiting,’ said Drury. He drew a difficult breath and spoke in his old voice:
‘Brand! Fetch Brand! The curtain must go up!’
Garrick Drury’s death was very ‘good theatre’.
Nobody, thought Scales, could ever know. He could never really know himself. Drury might have died, anyhow, of shock. Even if the blood had been right, he might have died. One couldn’t be certain, now, that the blood hadn’t been right; it might have been all imagination about the smudged pink rose. Or – one might be sure, deep in one’s own mind. But nobody could prove it. Or – could the doctor? There would have to be an inquest, of course. Would they make a post-mortem? Could they prove that the blood was wrong? If so, the doctor had his ready explanation – ‘particular idiosyncrasy’ and lack of time to make further test. He must give that explanation, or accuse himself of negligence.
Because nobody could prove that the plate had been moved. Walter and the doctor had not seen it – if they had, they would have spoken. Nor could it be proved that he, Scales, had seen it – he was not even certain himself, except in the hidden chambers of the heart. And he, who lost so much by Drury’s death – to suppose that he could have seen and not spoken was fantastic. There are things beyond the power even of a coroner to imagine or of a coroner’s jury to believe.
Suspicion
AS THE ATMOSPHERE OF the railway carriage thickened with tobacco-smoke, Mr Mummery became increasingly aware that his breakfast had not agreed with him.
There could have been nothing wrong with the breakfast itself. Brown bread, rich in vitamin-content, as advised by the Morning Star’s health expert; bacon fried to a delicious crispness; eggs just nicely set; coffee made as only Mrs Sutton knew how to make it. Mrs Sutton had been a real find, and that was something to be thankful for. For Ethel, since her nervous-breakdown in the Summer, had really not been fit to wrestle with the untrained girls who had come and gone in tempestuous succession. It took very little to upset Ethel nowadays, poor child. Mr Mummery, trying hard to ignore his growing internal discomfort, hoped he was not in for an illness. Apart from the trouble it would cause at the office, it would worry Ethel terribly, and Mr Mummery would cheerfully have laid down his rather uninteresting little life to spare Ethel a moment’s uneasiness.
He slipped a digestive tablet into his mouth – he had taken lately to carrying a few tablets about with him – and opened his paper. There did not seem to be very much news. A question had been asked in the House about Government typewriters. The Prince of Wales had smilingly opened an all-British exhibition of foot-wear. A further split had occurred in the Liberal party. The police were still looking for the woman who was supposed to have poisoned a family in Lincoln. Two girls had been trapped in a burning factory. A film-star had obtained her fourth decree nisi.
At Paragon Station, Mr Mummery descended and took a tram. The internal discomfort was taking the form of a definite nausea. Happily he contrived to reach his office before the worst occurred. He was seated at his desk, pale but in control of himself, when his partner came breezing in.
‘’Morning, Mummery,’ said Mr Brookes in his loud tones, adding inevitably, ‘Cold enough for you?’
‘Quite,’ replied Mr Mummery. ‘Unpleasantly raw, in fact.’
The Nine Tailors Page 20