Complete Works of Nevil Shute

by Nevil Shute

  He glanced at me curiously. “Miss Stevenson came to me this morning,” he said. “She wished to make your position in this matter quite clear, Captain Stenning. Perhaps I may be forgiven for expressing the opinion that she came more in your interests than in the interests of justice.”

  I couldn’t think of anything to say to that, and didn’t have much time to wonder exactly what he meant. Sir David nodded slightly to the man that he had called Norman, who took up the tale and proceeded to cross-examine me pretty thoroughly on the details of my story. He made me go over the account of Mattani that Compton had given to me; I searched my memory for details that I had already half forgotten in the stress of subsequent events. He was very anxious to find out in what way the stuff reached England, but I could give him very little information there. I told him about the rag and pliers that I had found on the beach, which seemed to point to transhipment to a smaller motor-boat. It was a theory that didn’t bear close examination, but it was all we could think of at the moment.

  He finished his questions at last. I plucked up my courage then, and asked one on my own account.

  “I suppose you will want me to give evidence in court,” I remarked. “Shall I be needed at the inquest?”

  I saw Norman glance towards his chief, who sat motionless in his chair, staring straight ahead of him.

  “The inquest will be adjourned,” said Sir David.

  I felt that I was treading on thin ice, but I persisted. “I see,” I said. “I suppose you’ll want me to give evidence some time, though? I take it that you are putting forward a case against Mattani?”

  “That is a matter that will have to be considered rather carefully,” said Norman, with an air of polite finality.

  I was silent. The room became very still; there were none of those sounds in the building to which one is accustomed. The absence of voices, of the sound of passing feet, and of the rumble of traffic seemed to leave a noticeable blank. I glanced at the clock, and was surprised to see that it was half past eleven. I was beginning to wonder irrelevantly for how long the sitting was to continue, when I was roused by Sir David.

  “Captain Stenning,” he said. I turned towards him. “I imagine that you must be feeling very curious about this unfortunate matter. So much is natural. I trust that when you leave this building you will not allow your curiosity to run away with you. I must ask you to be discreet.”

  “I can hold my tongue, if that’s what you mean,” I said.

  He inclined his head gravely. “Exactly. We expect you to hold your tongue. On our part, however, I feel that we are under some obligation to you for the part you have played in this affair. We should show a poor sense of that obligation if we were to conceal facts that may be of some importance to you. I think I need hardly dwell upon the fact, Captain Stenning, that I think that you may be in some danger for the present. I am sure that your experience of the world will tell you so much.”

  I nodded. That was one of the conclusions that I had come to already; that Mattani, wherever he might be, would be feeling a little peeved with me. It was surprising that he had not made a greater effort to prevent me from giving evidence. I put that down to this: that when his men visited Marazan they had no orders regarding anyone but Compton. They must have expected to find him alone; it was probably beyond their calculations that he should have confided in anybody. They must have realized the position as soon as they found us together on the yacht; I have very little doubt that then they realized the importance of preventing my escape. The arrival of the police, however, had upset their plans; they had to stake everything on the chance of two good shots when the opportunity came. One had gone home, but mine had missed. It was certainly on the cards that they might try again.

  “I can see that,” I said reflectively. “I should think the best thing I can do is to make out a written statement, isn’t it? You’ll want that later, whether I’m in a condition to give evidence or not.”

  He smiled. “I should not put it quite like that, myself,” he said. “However, I am inclined to think that there may be trouble, Captain Stenning. Briefly, I should anticipate an attempt to induce you to go to Italy, either with your own consent or without. I doubt if you are in any serious personal danger. I doubt if Baron Mattani would attempt another murder at this time; indeed, I should say that the murder of Compton was not entirely premeditated. However, I have no doubt that Mattani will be anxious to find out how much you know, how much you have been able to tell us. For this reason, I think he will be anxious to get hold of you.”

  I did my best to look pleasant. “That sounds jolly,” I said weakly. “How long do you reckon this is going on for? I take it that you will be bringing him to trial before so very long.”

  He didn’t answer for a moment, but then he said:

  “That is a very difficult matter.”

  I didn’t follow him. “Is it?” I inquired. “Surely there’s enough evidence for him to stand his trial on?”

  He shook his head. “I think that very doubtful,” he replied. “You must remember, Captain Stenning, there is nothing to identify the launch that you saw with Baron Mattani — except your evidence. That makes a thin case, a case that needs further backing before it is brought into court. But even if the evidence were perfect, the difficulties would still be great.”

  Norman nodded in corroboration. “The Americans have been trying to get him for a year,” he remarked.

  That startled me. “What for?” I asked.

  “The charge that they have been proceeding upon,” said Sir David, “is one of wounding with intent to kill. There is very little doubt, I think, that other charges would be preferred against him if he were to arrive in America in custody. Unfortunately, that appears to be a most improbable event.”

  “Good God!” I said bluntly. “Do you mean he can’t be extradited?”

  “The difficulties are very great,” said Sir David quietly.

  I began to realize then the significance of what Compton had told me in the Irene. He had said that Mattani was useful to Il Duce. He was a Ras, and I knew enough of Italy to know that one doesn’t trifle with a Ras. He was editor of one of the Fascisti papers. I knew something of Fascismo through flying through the country, and through reading the Corriere. I could see that the difficulties of extraditing Mattani were likely enough to be — well, very great.

  “I hadn’t thought of that,” I muttered.

  Sir David eyed me keenly. “A charge of murder against Baron Mattani is a new thing,” he said quietly. “The chain of evidence is not complete — at present. The charge of smuggling drugs into this country is also a new one.”

  He paused. “I can assure you, Captain Stenning, that if either of these charges can be upheld we shall see that he appears in England to stand his trial. In the meantime, I am sure you will be ... discreet.”

  They sent me back to my room and I went to bed, a little overawed. Next day Burgess sent his bright boy along directly after breakfast, and I was driven out to Finchley in a taxi to answer my summons on the aeroplane charges. Morris was there on behalf of the firm; I managed to get in a word or two with him before the case came on. He was pretty terse about it all. The proceedings were purely formal. Burgess’s bright boy stood up and explained that owing to my absence from land on a yachting tour I had not been served with the summons, and hinted gently at the illegality of issuing a warrant for my arrest in the circumstances. He had too much sense to dwell upon this point, but he so worried the court with his veiled allusions that they fined me two pounds and sent me away with a flea in my ear.

  Immediately the case was over the inspector who had brought me out asked me to return with him to the Yard. I had only time for a word or two with Morris, but promised to turn up and give an account of myself during the afternoon. At the Yard I was shown into Sir David’s office, who asked me to dictate a statement of the whole business. This took a considerable time, and it wasn’t till three o’clock that I walked out of the place a free m
an — and fair game for Mattani.

  The thought depressed me. A month before I wouldn’t have cared two hoots about the chance of being shot at from round a corner; I should probably have welcomed such a diversion from the monotony of my daily round. But now — it was different. Compton’s death had shaken me badly. One talks glibly of battle, murder, and sudden death; one takes the risk of all three with very little hesitation. But when one sees the results, it makes a difference.

  I say that his death had shaken me. For one thing, Compton was a man that I could have hit it off with most awfully well. One can’t describe these things, but — I liked him. At that time I’d never had much to do with educated people, people of my father’s sort; I can’t say that I had felt the loss. Till I met Compton, I don’t think I had ever dealt with a man of his sort quite on terms of equality, unless perhaps in the Service. It takes all sorts to make a world, and my way wasn’t theirs. But Compton had been different. I walked up Regent Street and Oxford Street on my way to Maida Vale, and I was pretty miserable.

  The sheer brutality of the murder came home to me then in a way that it hadn’t before; I suppose because I had had my own affairs to think about. It was a blazing afternoon. I went striding on down the hot pavements without looking where I was going; once or twice I cannoned into people, but mostly they looked at me and got out of my way. I’m too old to have ideals. I had all that knocked out of me before I was fourteen. I’m not the sort of man that goes and puts his shirt on Truth or Justice or Purity, or any of those things with capital letters. That was the difference between Compton and myself; he was a man who lived for his ideals, whereas I hadn’t any to live for.

  The whole show formed itself into a series of pictures as I strode on down Oxford Street on that blazing afternoon. I saw Compton driving his car up over the Downs from Winchester to Petersfield, and returning to his home near Guildford to sit down and write to his brother that he really couldn’t go doing that sort of thing in England. I saw him in the restaurant in Leeds, repeating the same vague threat. I saw him in the cockpit of the Irene, and then I saw him as I had seen him last, with that frightful wound in the chest that I could do so little for, that was hopeless from the start, smashed and broken. All these pictures shimmered and danced against a grey background of dope, grey, brutal, and depressing.

  Presently I found myself in my flat. I was suddenly very tired, most utterly weary. I slung my hat into a corner and collapsed into a chair in the tiny sitting-room. I was out of it all now. I tried to get the whole business out of my mind; I didn’t want to think about it any more. It had been a nightmare show; I didn’t think that sort of thing ever happened in real life. I must get along back to my flying, I thought, and forget about it. It would be as well to avoid any trips to Italy for a month or two. I could do that all right; very likely there would be no occasion for me to go.

  It had been a rotten business to get mixed up in.

  It’s curious how little a thing can turn the course of one’s life. The old woman in the basement who came in every morning to make my bed had given me a calendar at the New Year, the sort of thing that tradesmen send round to their customers. It had some advertisement on it. I had kept it to avoid hurting her feelings, and because above the calendar there was rather a pleasant reproduction of a water-colour sketch. The picture was a wide landscape with fields and woods running down to a blue sea, all very bright and sunny. I had always thought of it as a bit of the North Devon coast. I suppose I must have seen it every day since it arrived. I looked at it again now, and for the first time I saw that there was a couplet below the picture, not very conspicuous. It was a bit of Kipling and it ran:

  Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made

  By saying, “Oh, how beautiful!” and sitting in the shade.

  I remember I felt just as if somebody had hit me in the wind. I sat for a long time staring at that thing. Looking back upon it now after all these years, I don’t think there’s any argument that could have stung me up just like that calendar did. It got me just where I lived. I can’t explain myself; I only know that I saw then that Compton had been right; we couldn’t possibly have that sort of thing going on in England. I only know that when I got up out of my chair and moved over to have a better look at the thing, Richard was himself again.

  The front door bell rang. I turned slowly away and went to open the door; as I went the words of the couplet were ringing through my head. Absently I opened the door. I was hardly surprised when I saw it was Joan Stevenson.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Stevenson,” I said quietly. “I want you to tell me what I ought to do about Mattani.”

  She stood on the mat looking at me in that disconcerting, direct way of hers, as if she had been a man. I wasn’t accustomed to it and it worried me; the girls I knew didn’t look at one like that. This time I managed to meet her gaze. I don’t think I shall forget that. I don’t know how long we stood there; I only remember the shadows in her deep grey eyes, and the couplet that was running in my head:

  Our England is a garden ...

  “Do?” she said. “Haven’t you done enough for us? It’s in the hands of the police now.”

  We moved into the sitting-room.

  “I came to make sure that you were all right,” she said, “and to hear what happened that night.”

  “They told me at the Yard that you’d been there,” I said. “Thanks for that.” I didn’t say that they had told me that she went there to try and get me out of the mess, but I knew she understood.

  “It seemed so rotten for you to have been dragged into all this,” she explained. “And it was quite easy, because I was at school with Doris Carter, and she took me along to her father yesterday morning. He was so nice about it, and he said you’d be all right. Captain Stenning, I haven’t really heard anything about this — this frightful thing. How did it all happen? Who killed him?”

  “Mattani killed him,” I said shortly. “Mattani, or his men.”

  “It’s horrible!” she muttered.

  She sat down, and I told her the whole story so far as I knew it. I found that she couldn’t tell me much that I didn’t know already; we compared notes, but I learned very little more. She told me that they had had an inquest in the Scillies and had adjourned for a month; the funeral was to be held at Guildford on the following day. I don’t know how much they had told his parents. Joan said that she thought his mother was getting so feeble that she would hardly realize the details. It was an extraordinarily painful business.

  Presently we had told each other everything we knew. I got up and opened a window, and stood looking out into the street. They had diverted a bus route down our road while the main road was being repaired, I remember; I stood and watched the scarlet buses as they passed below in the sunlight, their decks crowded.

  As I stood there, it seemed to me that the man I ought to get in touch with was Giovanni da Leglia. He had been in my flight of Sopwith Camels during the war. Heaven knows what had brought him into the British Flying Corps; he was one of those freaks that turn up from time to time even in the best regulated squadrons. We used to call him Lillian, being the closest approximation to his name that we could manage. He was in my flight for six months, a long partnership in the Flying Corps. He was shot off back to Italy, as an instructor, then; I remember that we swore blue we’d meet in Paris when the war was over. I hadn’t seen him since.

  I had an idea he came from Florence. I tried hard to remember something of his characteristics. He had been a harebrained young man in those days, cool, keen as mustard on flying, and utterly irresponsible. We had a Bessoneau hangar on one ‘drome that was open at each end, and served as a garage for cars. I remember the rowing I gave him for diving down at the end of a patrol and flying his Camel clean through this thing and out the other side, regardless as to whether there was anyone or anything inside. His speed was probably a hundred and fifty miles an hour or so, the clearance about two feet above and below the machine. It
turned out later that there were two men in the hangar, who hurled themselves into corners as he came through. I made him give them credit for a quid each in the wet canteen when I’d done with him. I think he thought me very pernickety.

  That was one side of him. The other point that I remembered was his fantastic pride of race. He was an aristocrat of the aristocrats. He used to try and tell us all about the da Leglias. We used to throw things at him. Once, indeed, one guest night, we were too far gone to hit him, and he rambled on till he came to the bit about his descent from one of the Kings of Aragon on the wrong side of the bed. We began to sit up and take notice then; before we went rolling to our huts we had revised and improved upon his pedigree. It needed bowdlerizing by the time we’d done with it, but it proved a great attraction at subsequent guest nights.

  That, however, is all by the way. The thing that really mattered, and the thing that had impressed me at the time, was his pride in his family. I began to wonder how that fitted in with Fascismo. For all I knew, he might be one of the most ardent of the lot. On the other hand, he might be sitting quietly at home in a dignified opposition. He had pots of money. But Fascist or not, I knew that I could depend on Leglia for advice. He was a stout lad; there would be no shaking hands with murder where he was concerned.

  Joan got up from the chair where I had left her and came across to me at the window.

  “Is there anything more for us to do?” she said. I think she must have guessed what I was thinking about.

  I looked down at her reflectively. There was nothing more that she could do, and if there was I didn’t want her to do it. Whatever turn this affair was to take; it was pretty sure to end in a vulgar brawl.

  I temporized. “The police are taking it up,” I said.

  She nodded. “They’ll arrest Roddy?”

  I laughed. “If they get a chance,” I said. “They’ll have their work cut out to do it. He can’t be extradited.”