by Ngaio Marsh
‘We think there may have been an accident.’
‘To whom?’
‘Questing. We don’t know yet. He may have just wandered off somewhere. Or sprained his ankle.’
‘You don’t believe that.’ Barbara’s arm in its red flannel sleeve shot out as she pointed to the hill. ‘You think something’s happened, out there. Don’t you? Don’t you?’
Dikon took her by the shoulders. ‘I’m not going to conjure up horrors,’ he said, ‘before there are any to conjure. If you take my tip you’ll follow suit. Think what a frightful waste of the jim-jams if we find him cursing over a fat ankle, or if he merely went home to supper with the Mayor. I’m sure he adores mayors.’
‘And so, who screamed?’
‘Seagulls,’ said Dikon, shaking her gently. ‘Banshees, Maori maidens. Go home and do your stuff. Make cups of tea. Go to bed. Men must search and women must sleep and if you don’t like me kissing you don’t look at me like that.’
He turned her about and shoved her away from him. ‘Flaunting about in your nightgown,’ he said. ‘Get along with you.’
He watched her go and then, with a sigh, set out for the hill.
He thought he would climb high enough to get a comprehensive view of the native thermal reserve and the land surrounding it. If anything stirred down there he should stand a good chance of seeing it in the bright moonlight. He found the track that Rua used on his evening walks and felt better for the stiff climb. Someone had suggested half-heartedly that they should at intervals call out to Questing but Dikon could not bring himself to do this. A vivid imagination stimulated by the conviction that Questing was most horribly dead made the idea of shouting his name quite appallingly stupid. However, he had promised to search so he climbed steadily until he reached a place where the reserve was spread out before him in theatrical relief. It had the curious and startling unreality of an infra-red photograph. ‘If it wasn’t so infernally alive,’ he thought, ‘it would be like a lunar landscape.’ He could see that the reserve was more extensive than he had imagined it to be. It was pocked all over with mud pots and steaming pools. Far out toward its eastern border he caught a glimpse of a delicate jet that spurted from its geyser and was gone. ‘It’s a lost world,’ Dikon thought. He reflected that a man lying in one of the inky shadows would be quite invisible and decided that he had had his climb for nothing. He looked at the slopes of the hill immediately beneath him. The short tufts of grass and brush were motionless. He wandered about a little and was going to turn back when he sensed, rather than saw, that beneath him and out to his left something had moved.
His heart and his nerves were jolted before his eyes had time to tell him that it was only Mr Septimus Falls, moving quietly along the white-flagged path across the reserve. As far as he could make out, Mr Falls was bent forward. Dikon remembered Simon’s theory and wondered if, after all, it was so preposterous. But Mr Falls was still well within the bounds that he himself had set, though he walked fairly rapidly towards the forbidden territory. Dikon realized with a sudden pang of interest that he was moving in a very singular manner, running when he was in the moonlight and dawdling in the shadows. The mound above Taupo-tapu was easily distinguishable; Mr Falls had almost reached the limit of his allotted patrol. ‘Now,’ Dikon said, ‘he must turn.’
At that moment a cloud passed before the face of the moon and Dikon was alone in the dark. The reserve, the path and Mr Falls had all been blotted out.
Clouds must have come up from the south while Dikon climbed the hill, for the sky was now filled with them, sweeping majestically to the northeast. A vague sighing told him that a night wind had arisen and presently his hair lifted from his forehead. He had brought his torch but he was unwilling to disclose himself. He had told nobody of his intention to climb high up the hill. He saw that in a minute or two the moon would reappear and he waited, peering into darkness, for the moment when Mr Falls would be revealed.
It was not long, perhaps no more than a minute, before the return of the moonlight. After its brief eclipse the strange landscape seemed to be more sharply defined; mounds, craters, pools and mud pots all showed clearly. He could even see the white flags along the path. But Mr Falls had completely disappeared.
IV
‘Really,’ Dikon thought, ‘if I go all jitter-bug after the problematical death of a man who was almost certainly an enemy agent, I’m not likely to be a howling success in the blitz. No doubt Mr Falls is pottering about in the shadows. In a moment he will reappear.’
He waited and watched. He could hear his watch tick. Away to the east a night bird cried out twice. He saw a light moving about in the village and wondered if it was Colonel Claire’s. Two or three more sprang up. They were searching about the village. Once, far below on the other side of the hill, he heard Simon and Smith call to each other. An interval in the vast procession of clouds left the face of the moon quite clear. But still Mr Falls remained invisible.
‘I can’t stand this any longer,’ Dikon thought. He had taken three strides downhill when a brilliant point of light flashed on the mound above Taupo-tapu and was gone, but not before the image of a stooping man had darted up in Dikon’s brain. The flash was not repeated but in a little while the faintest possible glow of reflected light appeared behind the mound. ‘Why, damn and blast the fellow,’ thought Dikon, ‘he’s messing about on forbidden territory!’
His only emotion was that of fury; his impulse, to plunge downhill, cross the path and catch Falls red-handed. He had actually set out to do this when a shattering fall taught him that he could not run downhill and at the same time keep his eye on a distant spot on the landscape. When he had picked himself up and recovered his torch, which had rolled downhill, he heard a thin sweet whistle threading its way through an air that transported Dikon with astounding vividness into the wings of a London theatre.
‘Come away, come away, Death, I am slain by a fair cruel maid.’
Mr Septimus Falls was walking briskly back along the path, whistling his way home.
He had reached the foot of the hill and turned its flank before Dikon, cursing freely, was halfway down. The thin whistle changed into a throaty baritone and the last Dikon heard of the singer was a doleful rendering of the song which begins: ‘Fear no more the heat of the sun.’
The jolts and stumbles of his journey downhill took the fine edge off his temper and by the time he had reached the bottom he was telling himself that he must go warily with Falls. He paused, lit a cigarette and made some attempt to sort out the jumble of events, suspicions and conjectures that had collected about the person and activities of Maurice Questing.
Questing had visited Rangi’s Peak and the Maori people believed he had gone there to collect forbidden curios. When Smith attempted to spy on Questing he had narrowly escaped death under a train and at the time had believed Questing had done his best to bring about the accident. Had Smith, then, been on the verge of stumbling across evidence which would incriminate Questing? Subsequently Questing had offered to keep Smith on at the Springs and pay him a generous wage. This sounded like bribery on Questing’s part. Simon and Dr Ackrington were convinced that Questing’s main object in visiting the Peak was to flash signals out to sea. This theory was strongly borne out by Simon’s investigations on the night before the ship went down. Questing had manoeuvred to get possession of Wai-ata-tapu and, when he was about to take over, Septimus Falls had arrived, making certain that he would not be refused a room. Mr Falls had made himself pleasant. He had talked comparative anatomy with Dr Ackrington, and Shakespeare with Gaunt. He had also tapped out something that Simon declared was a repetition of the signal flashed from the Peak. Had this been an intimation to Questing that Falls himself was another agent? Why had Falls been at such pains to ensure that nobody inspected the path above Taupotapu? Was it because he was afraid that Questing might have left some incriminating piece of evidence behind him? If so, what? Papers? Some object that might be recovered from the cauldron? For the fir
st time Dikon forced himself to consider the possibility of anything being recovered from the cauldron, and was sickened by a procession of unspeakable conjectures.
He decided that as soon as he returned he would tell Dr Ackrington what he had seen. ‘I shan’t tell Simon,’ he decided. ‘His present theory will lead him to behave like the recording angel’s offsider whenever he sets eyes on Falls.’
And Gaunt? His first impulse was not to tell Gaunt. It was an impulse based on some instinctive warning which he did not care to recognize. He told himself that knowledge of this new development would only add to Gaunt’s nervous distress and that no good purpose would be served by speaking to him.
As he walked briskly along the path towards the Springs, he was conscious of a feeling of extreme dissatisfaction and uneasiness. There was at the back of his mind some apprehension which he had not yet acknowledged. He felt that a further revelation was to come and that within himself, unadmitted to his thoughts, was the knowledge of what it would be. The air of the little Maori song came back to him and with it, like a chain jerked out of dark waters, sprang the sequence of ideas he was so loath to examine.
It was with a sense of extreme depression that he finally reached the house.
The dining-room was in darkness but a light shone faintly round the edge of the study window. The Colonel’s blackout arrangements were not entirely successful. Dikon could hear the drone of voices—the Colonel’s, he thought, and Dr Ackrington’s—and he tapped at the door and the Colonel called out in a high voice: ‘Yes, yes, yes? Come in.’
They sat together, portentously, after the manner of elderly gentlemen in conclave. They seemed to be distressed. With a trace, or so Dikon thought, of his old regimental manner, the Colonel said: ‘Come to report, Bell? That’s right. That’s right.’
Feeling rather like a blushing subaltern, Dikon stood by the desk and gave his account. The Colonel, as usual, stared at him with his eyes wide open and his mouth not quite closed. Dr Ackrington looked increasingly perturbed and uncomfortable. When Dikon had finished there was a long silence and this surprised him, for he had anticipated that from Dr Ackrington, at least, there would be a display of wrath in the grand manner. Dikon waited for a minute and then said: ‘So I thought I’d better come straight back and report.’
‘Exactly so,’ said the Colonel. ‘Perfectly correct. Thank you, Bell.’ And he actually gave a little nod of dismissal.
‘This,’ thought Dikon, ‘is not good enough,’ and he said: ‘The whole affair seemed so very suspicious.’
‘No doubt, no doubt,’ said Dr Ackrington very quickly. ‘I’m afraid, Bell, you’ve merely been afforded a momentary glimpse into a mare’s nest.’
‘Yes, but look here, sir…’
Dr Ackrington raised his hand. ‘Mr Falls,’ he said, ‘has already informed us of this incident. We’re satisfied that he acted advisedly.’
‘Quite. Quite!’ said the Colonel, and touched his moustache. Again with that air of dismissal, he added: ‘Thank you, Bell.’
‘This is not the army,’ Dikon thought furiously, and stood his ground.
Dr Ackrington said: ‘I think, Edward, that perhaps Bell is entitled to an explanation. Won’t you sit down, Bell?’
With a sense of bewilderment Dikon sat down and waited. These two amazing old gentlemen appeared to have effected a swap of their respective personalities. As far as his native mildness would permit, the Colonel had now assumed an air of austerity; Dr Ackrington’s manner, on the contrary, was almost propitiatory. He glanced sharply at Dikon, looked away again, cleared his throat, and began.
‘Falls,’ he said loudly, ‘had no intention of infringing the bounds that he himself had set upon the extent of his investigation. You will remember that the area between the two points where the red-flagged path deviated from the white-flagged one was to be regarded as out of bounds. He had arrived at the first red flag on this side of Taupo-tapu and was about to turn back when he was arrested by a suspicious noise.’
Dr Ackrington paused for so long that Dikon felt obliged to prompt him.
‘What sort of noise, sir?’ he asked.
‘Somebody moving about,’ said Dr Ackrington, ‘on the other side of the mound. Under the circumstances Falls decided—rightly, in my opinion—that he’d go forward and establish the identity of this person. As quietly as possible and very slowly, he crept up the mound and looked over it.’
With a sudden dart that made Dikon jump, Colonel Claire thrust a box of cigarettes at him, muttering the preposterous phrase: ‘No need for formality.’ Dikon refused a cigarette and asked what Mr Falls had discovered.
‘Nothing!’ said the Colonel opening his eyes very wide. ‘Nothing at all. Damned annoyin’. What!’
‘The fellow had either heard Falls coming,’ said Dr Ackrington, ‘or else he’d finished whatever game he was up to and bolted while Falls was climbing the mound; in my opinion the more likely explanation. He’d a good start and although Falls went some way down the other side and flashed his torch, there wasn’t a sign of anybody. Fellow had got clean away.’
Dikon felt foolish and therefore rather annoyed.
‘I see, sir,’ he said. ‘Obviously, I’ve been barking up the wrong tree. But Simon and I had some further cause for believing Mr Falls to be a rather mysterious person.’
He paused, wishing he had held his tongue.
‘Well,’ said Dr Ackrington sharply, ‘what was it, what was it?’
‘I thought perhaps Simon had told you.’
‘Simon hasn’t honoured me with his theories which, I have no doubt, constitute a plethora of wildcat speculations.’
‘Not quite that, I think,’ Dikon rejoined and he related the story of Mr Falls and his pipe. To this recital they listened with ill-concealed impatience; indeed it had the effect of restoring Dr Ackrington to his customary form. ‘Damn and blast that cub of yours, Edward,’ he shouted. ‘What the devil does he mean by concocting these fables and broadcasting them in every quarter but the right one? He knew perfectly well that I regarded Questing’s visits to the Peak with the gravest suspicion, he goes haring off by himself, picks up what may prove to be vital information, and tells me nothing whatever about it. In the meantime a ship goes down and an agent from whom we should have got valuable information goes and gets lost in a mud pot. Of all the blasted, self-sufficient young popinjays…’ He broke off and glared at Dikon. ‘As a partner in this conspiracy of silence, perhaps you will be good enough to offer an explanation.’
Dikon was in a quandary. Though he had refused to be bound to secrecy by Simon he felt that he had betrayed a trust. To tell Dr Ackrington that he had urged a consultation and that Simon had refused it would be to present himself as an insufferable prig. He said he understood that Simon had every intention of going to the police with his story. Far from pacifying Dr Ackrington this statement had the effect of still further inflaming him, and Dikon’s assurances that so far as he knew Simon had not yet consulted an authority did little to calm him.
The Colonel bit his moustache and apologized to his brother-in-law for Simon’s behaviour. Dikon attempted to lead the conversation back to Mr Falls and was instantly snubbed for his pains.
‘Sheer twaddle and moonshine,’ Dr Ackrington fumed. ‘The young ass had his head full of this precious signal and no doubt heard it in everything. What was it?’ he demanded. Fortunately Dikon remembered the signal and repeated it.
‘Makes no sense in Morse,’ said the Colonel unhappily. ‘Four t’s, four 5’s, a t, a 1 and an s. Ridiculous, you know, that sort of thing.’
‘My good Edward, I don’t for an instant doubt the significance of this signal as flashed from the Peak. Do you imagine that Questing would communicate in intelligent Morse code to an enemy raider: “Ship sails tomorrow night kindly sink and oblige yours Questing”?’ He gave an unpleasant bark of laughter. ‘It’s this tarradiddle about Falls and his pipe that I totally discredit. The man’s full of nervous mannerisms. I’ve obse
rved him. He’s forever fiddling with his pipe. And will you be good enough to tell me, Mr Bell, how one distinguishes between a long and a short tap? Pah!’
Dikon thought this over. ‘By the intervals between the taps?’ he suggested timidly.
‘Indeed? Would Simon be able, without warning, so to distinguish?’
‘The t’s would sound very like a collection of o’s and m’s,’ said the Colonel.
‘I never heard such high-falutin’ piffle in my life,’ added Dr Ackrington.
‘I don’t profess to read Morse,’ said Dikon huffily.
‘And you never will if you take lessons from Falls and his pipe. He’s a reputable person and not altogether a fool on the subject of comparative anatomy. I may add that we have discovered friends in common. Men of some standing and authority.’
‘Really, sir?’ said Dikon demurely. ‘That, of course, completely exonerates him.’
Dr Ackrington darted a needle-sharp glance at Dikon and evidently decided that he had not intended an impertinence. ‘I consider,’ he said, ‘that Falls has behaved with admirable propriety. I shall speak to Simon tonight. It’s essential that he should not go shouting about this preposterous theory to anyone else.’
‘Quite,’ said the Colonel. ‘We’ll speak to him.’
‘As for the interloper at Taupo-tapu, it was doubtless one of your Maori acquaintances, Edward, disobeying orders as usual. By the way, you must have been there at the time. Did you notice any suspicious behaviour?’
The Colonel rubbed his hair and looked miserable. ‘Not to say suspicious, James. Odd. They see things differently, you know. I don’t pretend to understand them. Never have. I like them, you know. They keep their word and so on. But of course they’re a superstitious lot. Interestin’.’
‘If you found their behaviour this evening so absorbing,’ said Dr Ackrington acidly, ‘perhaps you will favour us with a somewhat closer description of it.’