Surveying it at large, Fen concluded that Captain Watkyn’s organization was on the whole very commendable, considering the unnaturally short notice he had had. Its principal defect lay in the continued unworkability of the loudspeaker van, which according to the reports of those who were labouring at it, and whom they visited about tea-time, was lacking in numerous essential parts.
‘It’s a ruddy scandal, that’s what it is,’ said Captain Watkyn indignantly. ‘I’m not sure we couldn’t bring an action for false pretences. What’s the matter with this funny-looking terminal here? Damn the thing, it’s given me an electric shock.’
They left the electrician’s, and Captain Watkyn, who clearly regarded a quasi-maternal solicitude as part of the duties for which he was being paid, advised Fen to return to ‘The Fish Inn’ and rest there for the remainder of the day. ‘Mustn’t overdo it,’ he said. ‘We want you fresh and lively for the final round.’ Fen accepted the advice readily enough; the buttonholing of recalcitrant voters, he had found, made heavy demands on one’s reserves of nervous energy. He drove staidly back into Sanford Angelorum.
CHAPTER 10
THE inn, however, had not yet recovered from its initial postmeridian inertia, and promised little in the way of entertainment. For a short time Fen prowled unquietly about it, avid of diversion or company to expunge from his mind the cloying after-taste of the day’s routine affability. But he found nothing and no one, and presently a vestige of physical energy prompted him out of doors again. The sun was already westering, its fires refracted now and kinder to the eye; along the horizon the distant woods lay like a narrow roll of brown smoke; across a sky of Antwerp blue streamed shrilling hordes of unidentifiable birds. Fen paused in the back garden of the inn and contemplated the operations of Nature a shade grimly. Then he set off on a walk.
It was an hour before he returned. Breasting the far side of the rise behind the inn, his eye was caught by the lean apparition of Bussy – striding, from another angle of the compass, towards the same objective as himself. A moment more and Bussy had seen him, had swerved, and was moving with purposeful rapidity in his direction. They met by the three slim birch trees.
‘I hadn’t hoped to find you so easily.’ Breathing heavily, Bussy nodded his approval of the workings of chance. ‘Fen, I need help. You must help me. There’s a small element of risk, I’m afraid, but you won’t mind that.’
Fen studied him, diagnosed a wholly conscienceless zeal, and sighed resignedly. Self-respect obliged him to concur in Bussy’s facile assumption of his indifference to risk, but he did so without enthusiasm. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No, I shan’t mind that.’
‘Good.’ Bussy dismissed the issue from his mind without exhibiting a sign of gratitude. ‘It’s to do with this Lambert affair, of course. Something I can’t manage single-handed. I can’t give you the details now, I’m afraid, because I’ve got to catch a train.’
Fen was surprised. ‘You’re leaving?’
‘To all appearance, yes. I want it to be thought that I’ve returned to London. But after dark I shall sneak back again, and you must meet me. I can explain the position then.’
‘And where,’ Fen asked, ‘do you propose spending the night?’
‘In the open.’
‘That will be cold and disagreeable,’ said Fen practically. ‘You ought to find a shelter of some kind – if you’re proposing to sleep, that is.’
‘All right.’ Bussy gestured impatiently. ‘No doubt a haystack or a barn – –’
‘Or you might try one of the huts on the golf-course.’
‘Whatever you say.’ Clearly the topic held no interest for Bussy. ‘That would certainly have the advantage of providing a locus in quo for our meeting.’
‘And the time?’
‘Let’s say midnight. I shall almost certainly be back by then, but if I’m not, wait for me.’
‘Yes. I suggest the hut at the fourth green.’ Fen’s walk had familiarized him with the topography of the course. ‘It’s reasonably commodious.’
‘That will do,’ said Bussy. Then a new thought occurred to him. ‘Of course, Fen, you realize,’ he added considerately, ‘that you’re in no way obliged to undertake this.’
Fen opened his mouth to make some reassuring reply, but Bussy, who patently regarded his declaration as the merest formality, gave him no opportunity to do so. ‘That’s settled, then,’ he said. ‘I shall look forward to having your co-operation.’ He could no more conceive of a refusal, Fen reflected, than a fanatical gardener can conceive of an affirmative answer to the question ‘Are you bored?’ when conducting a guest on a tour of the flower-beds. It was inevitable, no doubt, that men with missions should display a certain brusquerie. . . .
The church clock struck six, and Bussy’s determination gave place with some abruptness to anxiety. ‘My God, I must be off,’ he said. ‘I haven’t had a chance to pack yet. I’ll see you, then, at midnight.’
‘One moment. Are you telling anyone else about this – this manoeuvre? The local police, for instance?’
‘No. Certainly not. And I rely on your keeping it strictly to yourself.’
‘Yes, I’ll do that all right.’
Bussy nodded, and with this much farewell turned and made off down the slope towards the inn, absorbed, it was to be presumed, in the details of his scheming. For perhaps half a minute Fen stood watching him; then – but more slowly – followed. Single-mindedness, he reflected, is always obscurely ludicrous – and he smiled. But the smile faded on his recollecting that he was now committed to an indistinct and probably tiresome nocturnal labour; one, moreover, which had been characterized as involving ‘an element of risk’. Risk is no doubt tolerable at the time of undergoing it, when the blood is impregnated with adrenalin; in prospect, however, and with its nature wholly undefined, it is conspicuously lacking in charm. Fen reached the inn in a rather dreary state of mind.
Bussy had long since disappeared from sight; by now he was probably in the act of packing or of paying his bill. Skirting the back of the inn, Fen was vaguely aware of a car being driven away in the direction of Sanford Morvel, of quick, light footsteps receding along the village street, of the rumbling approach of some heavy vehicle and the blaring vehemence of its horn. But the impact of these things was on the remote periphery of his mind, and the shout of warning, the short, choked scream, the sudden skidding swerve, were held tranced for long seconds at that periphery before, with a sinking heart, he returned to full consciousness of his surroundings and knew them for what they were. Then he ran – ran across the inn-yard and out into the road.
A hundred yards along it curved sharply. On the right, as you stood with your back to Sanford Morvel, was a high, blank wall of umber brick, screening the inn from approaching traffic. And there was no pavement – only a fringe of grass and nettles less than a foot’s breadth wide. . . . Given these conditions, an accident was likely enough, and this accident had apparently been a bad one. The lorry, stationary now but with its engine still pulsing, stood diagonally across the road; the sprawled, motionless figure of Jane Persimmons lay almost beneath its wheels; and around her, as Fen ran up, there hovered the driver of the lorry, a middle-aged village woman, and an old man, their faces a painter’s allegory of mingled indecision and shock.
Fen knelt beside the girl, felt for her heart; it was beating still, though faintly and irregularly. He glanced swiftly, appraisingly, at the dark blood ebbing out through her tangled hair, at the gashed lower lip, at the dirt-smeared pallor of her face, at the bag which lay near her outstretched hand, its contents – a lace-edged handkerchief, a latchkey, a powder compact and lipstick, a cheap cigarette case, a box of matches – half spilled into the dust. Then he straightened up, made a split-second assessment of the relative intelligence of the three people confronting him, and said to the lorry driver:
‘Go in at the door on this side of the pub. In a little office, just inside on the left, there’s a telephone. Get an ambulance. Say it’s either concussion or a ba
sal fracture of the skull. And if they’re going to be of any use, they’ll have to be quick about it.’
The man – he was young, Fen saw, and trembling and on the verge of nausea – hesitated fractionally, then nodded and ran heavily towards the inn. And again Fen knelt beside Jane Persimmons, his fingers testing the bone from ankle to cervix. On the body, he found, there was no palpable injury except bruises – though internal haemorrhage remained a possibility. . . . He frowned, perplexed. The girl’s condition was consonant enough with the nature of the accident; what problem there was lay in its circumstances. The approach of the lorry had been by no means noiseless, and it had hooted, prolongedly. . . .
Above his head, the woman spoke – timidly and in low tones. ‘I dunno if ’ee’d like to bring the poor maid in my ’ouse, sir. I’d ’elp ’ee carry ’er there.’
Fen smiled rather wanly and shook his head. ‘She mustn’t be moved, I’m afraid.’ He stood up, brushing disjointedly at the knees of his trousers. ‘There’s nothing that can be done for her until the ambulance arrives.’
The woman looked down at the pretty, pathetic, blood-stained face with a compassion too full to admit of mere morbid inquisitiveness, and sighed noisily, shifting a half-empty washing-basket mechanically from one arm to the other. But she was not unnerved, Fen thought, as the driver had been. Unimaginative, probably; and for that reason a reliable witness. ‘You saw the accident?’ he asked.
She had. Disposing damp clothes on a line in the garden, she had seen Jane emerge from the inn-yard and had watched her steadily as, preoccupied and walking fast, she came up the road. Undeniably the lorry had hooted; and until she was almost at the corner, Jane had kept well in to the side of the road. But then she had turned her head to look back at the inn, and so doing had walked straight out into the middle of the road. ‘I shouted at ’er,’ the woman concluded. ‘But it didn’t do no good. And the lorry swerved, but that didn’t do no good, neither. So there it was.’
‘There was no one near her when it happened? She couldn’t have been jostled or pushed, that is?’
The woman stared. ‘Oh, no, sir, she were quite alone. No one else except me Dad ’ere in sight.’
‘And you’re certain the driver didn’t run into her deliberately?’
She was shocked, antagonized. ‘That’s a nice question!’ she ejaculated indignantly. ‘Course he didn’t, poor lad! Why’d ’e do a terrible thing like that?’ And she removed herself two or three paces from the moral leprosy which had made the inquiry, eyeing it militantly and with overt distrust.
At this point the victim of Fen’s imputation returned; an ambulance, he reported, was on the way. His account of what had happened amply confirmed the woman’s; so also – though more inchoately – did Dad’s. And there could be no possible doubt, Fen concluded, that the thing had been a genuine accident. Whence, then, his own scepticism? Well, the girl had been preoccupied; but brooding does not inevitably result in immolation – as witness the continuing survival of one of Fen’s Oxford colleagues, whose perilous habit it was to perambulate the streets engrossed in a book. To him the senses continued to make their reports, and by some esoteric mechanism to deliver them at the very centre of the intelligence whenever his preservation required it. So also, presumably, with this girl. Only in her case the delivery had for once not been made, the alarm had not sounded. She must have heard the lorry yet have remained totally oblivious of it.
The interval of waiting seemed interminable. The driver sat on the running-board of the lorry and smoked, fretful at inaction, his eyes fixed miserably on the body of the unconscious girl; the woman stared defensively at Fen, anticipating – it was possible to suppose – some further enormity; the old man retired behind his garden wall and weeded, pausing from time to time to peer vacantly in the direction from which the ambulance was expected. A few pedestrians stopped, gaped, proffered futile advice, and passed soberly on. Presently Diana’s taxi drove up to the inn, and Diana, emerging from it, hurried up to them.
‘Oh, Lord,’ she said to Fen. ‘This looks nasty. Is there anything I can do?’
‘I don’t think so, thanks. I’d ask you to drive her to the hospital only I daren’t take the risk of moving her.’
‘Concussion?’
‘That or a fracture.’
Diana grimaced. ‘Sounds bad.’ She picked up the handbag, restoring its contents to it, and laid it on the grass verge. ‘Do you know anything about her? Who she is, or – or what she’s doing here?’
The question, Fen thought, was a little sudden. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No, I’m afraid not.’
‘Well, there’s rather an odd thing about her.’
‘And that is?’
But Diana was looking at her watch. ‘I’ll tell you later,’ she said equably. ‘If there’s nothing I can do, I’d better go, because I’m supposed to be taking someone called Crawley to catch the 6.42, and it’ll be a miracle if we make it. . . . By the way, I hear your meetings are rather good.’
‘They are enthralling,’ said Fen complacently.
‘I shall go to one and heckle you.’ She smiled, turned, and ran athletically back to the car.
Burdened with luggage, Bussy came out of the inn as she reached it. He glanced at the forlorn group along the road and seemed to ask a question. The reply clearly reassured him, for he nodded briskly and plunged into the car. It backed, turned, and was gone. Not more than a minute afterwards the ambulance came.
The doctor and attendants had neither time nor words to waste; they stowed the girl away with rapid efficiency and drove off, leaving in their wake no more potent consolation than the fact that she still lived. With aggravating deliberation, a policeman who had accompanied them recorded names, addresses, statements. He rode back in the lorry to Sanford Morvel, and Fen retired to the inn.
He found Myra alone in the bar – which already, at the encroaching threat of renovation, seemed dilapidated and sullen; just so, Fen thought, must the House of Usher have looked prior to its wholesale submersion, or Shiel’s nightmare copper mansion on the island of Vaila. . . . Myra, it proved, was still in ignorance of what had happened, having been down in the cellar at the time of the accident.
‘Poor kid,’ she said compassionately. ‘She wasn’t much more than a kid, really. . . . You know, since she came here I’ve had the impression something was worrying her. She seemed to be fretting, like, and nervous.’
‘Yes, I thought so, too.’
‘I suppose the police’ll be getting touch with her people?’
‘I imagine so,’ said Fen.
Half an hour later there was a telephone call from the hospital at Sanford Morvel, requesting Jane Persimmons’ address; and about nine o’clock Superintendent Wolfe, of the Sanford Morvel Constabulary, appeared at the inn. He was a burly, clean-shaven man who exhibited less consciousness of the dignity of his office than is common in the police force. When he had looked at Jane’s room, he conversed affably, over a drink, with Fen.
‘Our trouble is,’ he said, ‘that the Nottingham address she gives in the register is the address of a boarding-house. I’ve rung them up, but she’s only been staying there a month, and they have no idea whether or not there are any relatives alive. No doubt there’s someone we ought to communicate with, but I’m damned if I can find out who.’
‘Then there were no letters in her pockets or her bag?’
‘None. A diary without any entries was all I could find. It has the usual page for personalia, and the usual heading: “In case of accident communicate immediately with”. But she’s filled it in: “the nearest hospital,” which shows a certain sense of humour but isn’t useful.’
‘And nothing in her room?’
‘Nothing. I’ve never come across anyone so completely devoid of papers. There’s this, of course.’ Wolfe indicated a small, rectangular box of black steel which he carried under his arm. ‘But it’s locked, and I can’t find a key that fits it – which is odd – and I doubt if I’m justified in b
reaking it open. Still, I may hear something from the Nottingham police; they’re going to go through her belongings there. . . . You don’t happen to know why she was visiting this neighbourhood, do you?’
Fen shook his head. ‘I’ve no idea.’
‘Nor has anyone.’ Wolfe finished his drink. ‘Well, I’d better be getting back. Glad to have met you.’
‘Before you go, tell me what the doctors think about her.’
‘Concussion. And they’re not sure yet which way the cat will jump. She’s still unconscious, of course, and probably will be for a day or two. Nasty business – and not less nasty because it was obviously her own fault. . . . Well, well.’ Wolfe nodded amiably and departed.
Fen sought out Myra. He would be late returning to the inn that night, he said – or possibly he might stay with friends and not return at all.
‘Well, I’ll give you a key, my dear,’ she said, ‘and then you can come in at the side door as late as you like. Jackie and me’ll be late too – we’re going to a dance.’
‘Enjoy yourself.’
‘And you, my dear,’ said Myra. ‘Give her my love,’ she added pleasantly.
‘Unluckily it isn’t that,’ Fen said. ‘Duty, not romance. How is Samuel?’
‘He was in again this evening. Offered me a couple of eggs, on a condition.’
Fen was shocked. ‘Two eggs? That’s a very poor tender. Herod offered Salome a hundred white peacocks. Two eggs I should be inclined to regard as insulting.’
‘Yes, I suppose it is, now you mention it.’ Evidently this aspect of the matter had not previously occurred to Myra. ‘Small eggs, too. More like a bantam’s eggs they were.’
‘Next time I should stand out for a hundred white peacocks. Or for beryls and chrysolites and sardonyx and chalcedony.’
‘Or John the Baptist’s head on a charger,’ Myra supplied efficiently. ‘I shall stand out, anyway. . . . You know what he says about his wife? “She’m cold”. he says, “she’m cold as a dead weasel”.’
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