The Tumbled House

by Winston Graham

  He ground his teeth and took hold of the starting handle and gave it a vicious jerk. The heavy engine turned over but would not fire. He tried again and again. Then he lost his temper and went at it like a madman until the sweat was running down his face and his hands were too wet to take a grip. Finally he stopped, panting and gasping, and aimed a vicious kick at the wheel. He turned his back on the car and began to walk back the way he had come.

  “The advantage of an old taxi,” said Peter Waldo, “is that it goes, darling boy. Not rewarding aesthetically, but the engine turns over for ever like a sewing machine.”

  “Thanks for coming out,” Michael said bleakly.

  “What will you do with that motor coach you’ve left behind?”

  “Let it stay there till it rots on its wheels and someone carts it away for scrap.”

  Peter glanced at his friend. “Harsh words, my boy. By tomorrow you’ll be cooing over it again like a nursing mother.”

  After a minute Michael said explosively: “ You don’t understand. You’ve no soul for machines. It’s a beautifully made car, far better than much of this modern rubbish. If I could only keep it in repair. A hundred pounds would make all the difference. But as it is.…”

  “With a hundred pounds you’d do better to buy yourself a Vespa.”

  Michael was silent. Since the affair of the radiogram he had come to take Peter and his ideas more seriously. Against his better judgement he had been impressed by that adventure.

  “Maybe you’d like to get me a new car the way you got me a new radio.”

  “It’s a thought.”

  “And a dangerous one. Forget it.”

  “Not dangerous to me at all.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because no one but a cretin would steal an article which he had to use in public.”

  “Quite a lot appear to get stolen in a year.”

  “Yes. By Teddy Boys, ticket-of-leave soldiers, petty gangsters—and of course by the regular car gangs who drive them away to depots for re-spraying and new number plates. No, darling boy, I don’t propose to steal a car for you or to encourage you to steal one for yourself. It’s not recommended in Waldo’s Try-Anything-Once Course. You must walk, my lad. Learn to live the hard way.”

  “I want money,” said Michael, savagely. “I’m prepared to work for it—if I can work on the right job. But I’m not willing to sweat at something useless for ever. The world is pie-eyed. It’s far more important for a man to have money in his twenties than at any time in his life. Instead he’s expected to work eight hours a day for fourpence a week at a dead-end job so that he can be comfortably off when he’s fifty-nine. And when he’s fifty-nine he sits on his coronaries and thinks: “God if I were only young!”

  “Another and another cup to drown the memory of this impertinence,” Peter murmured.

  “What? Well, don’t you agree?”

  “Of course. And more so than ever today, since none of us are ever likely to live to be fifty-nine. But we’re up against a system, dear boy, a system sanctified by long usage, a code of law drafted by old men for the protection of old men. All over the country at any given moment, at every moment, there are young people feeling exactly as you and I do. But we can’t unite, we can’t kick, except as individuals, and those that do kick usually end up in approved schools or in prison or as burnt-out firebrands worse off than when they started. You’ve got to be terribly intelligent to get away with anything and you’ve got to take risks.”

  “You’ve taken risks already.”

  “In an amateur way, yes. For a bet. That doesn’t get us anywhere.”

  They went on in silence. Peter said as he swerved round a man: “One of the pleasures of driving an old taxi is being hailed by blind types who don’t see the meter has been taken off. Of course if the girl is pretty enough one can always stop.”

  “Some people stop for girls when they haven’t got taxis,” muttered Michael. “ I’d like to bet he’s dated her up for next week-end.”

  “That’s another delusion of youth,” said Peter, “ that love is free. No girl is ever free. Bought women are much cheaper in the long run. Besides, they’re a limited liability.”

  “It isn’t always as simple as that.”

  “I know. One gets caught in the coils of the serpent. Tell me, d’you want to go to your flat or shall we move on somewhere?”

  “Oh, let’s stop for a drink. I owe you that.”

  “From time to time I do meet people who escape from the treadmill,” Peter said.

  “Such as?”

  “But they take risks and they’re clever. It’s a question of weighing up the odds. “ I’ve often been tempted to follow them.”

  “Into what?”

  Peter peered at his passenger with his disorientated gaze. “ Look, Michael, are you serious about this?”

  “Why shouldn’t I be?”

  “Only because at the moment you’re flamingly angry because you’ve been humiliated on the Great West Road. What I have in mind doesn’t need anger; it needs guts, courage, intelligence. If——”

  “Which you suppose I haven’t got?”

  “Which I know you’ve got. But you’ve two sides to your nature, darling boy. One’s gentle, cheerful, easy-going; the other side’s a good lot darker, and quite tough. But for the sort of thing you’re proposing we should talk about you’ve got to be on the ball all the time.”

  “Go on. Say what’s in your mind.”

  They drove on. “ I’m thinking along these lines,” said Peter. “ There’s money to be had if you go the right way about it. Cheap and easy money, I think. But it’s crime. If you get caught the old men will put you away for a couple of years. Him that takes what isn’t his’n.…”

  “I know. I know.”

  “You wouldn’t be able to go out courting your Bennie then.”

  “I can’t now. But that’s the risk. What’s the reward?”

  “As I see it,” said Peter, “people who do this sort of thing are usually too ambitious. They reason—if I could just do that one job I’d be rich for life. No more risks, no more litters; just this one. So they set about a bank and try to grab a hundred thousand. Banks have safety devices, burglar alarms. They’re well guarded. The job’s tried; the odds are twenty to one against and the one doesn’t come up; two or three intelligent but greedy men go behind bars. Or you see a jewellery shop with diamonds worth eighty thousand; you try an armed stick-up, a messenger is bumped on the head, the get-away goes wrong; robbery with violence; you wouldn’t come out till your glorious twenties were spent, Michael.”

  “What’s the answer?”

  “Small profits and quick returns. With the small job the police are almost helpless. They’re not really a very bright body of men, and unless they’re helped by a lack of intelligence on the other side, they don’t begin to get round to it. There are eight million people in London, darling boy. They can’t all be protected. There’s money everywhere for the picking, but you’ve got to use your loaf: never the same sort of job twice, never the same neighbourhood, never the same technique. It’s all a question of keeping a step ahead of the law instead of a step behind. Once you get behind you’ve had it.”

  Michael lit a cigarette. As he held the lighter he was surprised to see his hand wasn’t quite steady. “Sounds interesting.”

  “It is interesting. But it’s no joke. Now supposing you and I went into partnership. We’re both tough, young, intelligent, and if necessary athletic. Supposing we did six jobs a year. That’s six nights a year—six risks, but small risks. Each time we aim to get three thousand pounds’ worth of stuff. On an average, I mean. That’s very modest but I aim to be modest. Stuff up to three thousand pounds isn’t guarded much. It isn’t big stuff. Three good fur coats or a dozen rings or so much Georgian silver or a few antiques. We get rid of them for half the value. That’s——”

  “How?”

  “Boy Kenny. He knows every fence in London.”

 
“I don’t like Kenny.”

  “He’s all right. He knows his way around. I found that out over the radiogram. For a time we’d need an ‘L’ on our backs, and he could help with practical know-how. Afterwards maybe we could discard him.”

  “What does this all add up to?”

  “It could add up to about nine thousand pounds a year divisible between—for a start—the three of us. Free of tax, of course. It’s not a king’s ransom but single men could live off it.”

  So could a married man. “You wouldn’t want Boy’s friends in on this. He seems to have a few hangers-on.”

  “He fancies himself as their leader. But he’d drop them at a word from us. He pretends not to be impressed being in with me, but he is.”

  “Where are we?” Michael asked. “I’ve lost my bearings.”

  “Just coming off the Old Brompton Road.”

  Michael on his uncomfortable box seat stared out through the windscreen. It was just beginning to rain. He felt as if he were at some junction in his life, that he had lost his bearings there too. In one direction Bennie was receding rapidly. But the other offered a way of cutting her off. Whatever she said, he didn’t believe she was unaffected by money. Nobody could be. It was the lubricating oil without which life couldn’t continue to run. She meant, of course, that she was not a gold-digger; but that was quite a different thing.

  He said: “Peter, how much would it take for a course in civil engineering?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe a thousand pounds.”

  “And how much would it cost to live for three years married?”.… He answered his own question. “Maybe another three thousand … living quietly.”

  “It has been done.”

  “Four thousand pounds,” Michael said, toying with the thought. “So little—and yet so much.”

  In the old days men went overseas to make their fortune, to carve out some sort of a fate for themselves by pitting their skill against nature or against the skill of others. That was no longer possible. What Peter suggested was possible, but there was no point in deceiving oneself as to what it really amounted to.

  Peter sighed. “Ah, well, I thought for a moment you were serious.”

  His tone nettled Michael. “Come back to my place. I want to talk it over with you now.”

  Peter looked at him by the light from a passing neon sign that suddenly coloured their faces a startling red. “You remember I said once I thought it necessary for one’s self respect to cock a snook at authority from time to time.”

  “Yes.”

  “This way we might even succeed in giving it a kick in the crutch.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Mr Vincent Doutelle said: “Well, Mr Marlowe, we propose to plead four defences. (1) That these verses are in fact not libellous. (2) That the letter you wrote to the secretary of the Hanover Club was an occasion of qualified privilege: i.e. that you wrote in legitimate defence of your own interests. (3) Justification, namely that the facts and imputations in these verses and in the letter are true. (4) Fair Comment, namely that in so far as the words complained of are a statement of fact they are true, and in so far as they consist of an expression of your opinions they are a fair comment upon a matter of public interest.”

  “I don’t understand a word of it,” said Don. “I sweated my brains out to compose verses and a letter that would specially hit the plaintiff where it hurt most. Why say now I didn’t mean them?”

  “Well, we all understand that that was your intention, Mr Marlowe, but I trust it’s also your intention to win this case, and I have to advise you that we must have a defence on paper to meet all eventualities. Indeed, until we can find evidence for your convictions, we’re in better shape to fight on the alternative pleas than on the main one.”

  Don said: “ This quarrel has blown up at the most difficult time for me. I haven’t yet had the chance to do all I intended to do. In a week or two I hope to be freer.”

  “Well, Mr Borgward here will be drafting the Pleadings. In the meantime, Mr Whitehouse, if we can get further information by means of interrogatories of the grounds Shorn had for writing the articles on Sir John Marlowe.…”

  “Yes, we can try. It’s a complicated issue .… We have offered Mr Donald Marlowe the services of a private inquiry agency, but he feels that to begin with at least he is the most suitable person to make these inquiries into Shorn’s accusations.”

  “I quite agree. For example, you are the only one, Mr Marlowe, who can approach Miss Chislehurst personally. A lot can be done sometimes in this way.” Counsel folded his handkerchief corner to corner and put it back m his pocket. “It’s vitally important to know just where we stand at the earliest possible moment.” He peered at Don, who returned his stare.

  “What do you consider the prospects?”

  Doutelle smoothed his smooth cheek. “If there were a chance of a not-too-expensive settlement out of court I should strongly advise you to take it. But you wouldn’t, would you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, a great deal depends on what turns up in the interrogatories. I think from the preliminary exchanges the other side are going to be rather naughty. But at the moment everything really is in your hands, my dear sir. I’m afraid, for instance, that any jury will be impressed by the apparent similarities in the two books. Bring us proof that your father got his source material for those chapters from somewhere other than Chislehurst—notes made before he met Chislehurst—some admission from the sister—anything of that sort—and we shall be in a much better position to fight it out.”

  The following week Don pressed the bell of a tiny modern bungalow on the outskirts of Blakiston and when someone narrowly opened the door he said: “ Could I speak to Miss Chislehurst, please.”

  “I am Miss Chislehurst.” The nine-inch gap became six.

  “I’m John Marlowe’s son. I should be grateful if you could see me for a few minutes.”

  She stared at him with unwinking eyes, a stout old lady with a bulging face like a purse that has never been opened for charity. She wore a faded serge dress the colour of a nurse’s uniform with a heavy black knitted cardigan over it and a jet brooch pinned to her lapel like a long-service medal.

  “I’ve nothing to say to you, Mr Marlowe.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s rather important.”

  She swelled up. “I know. I’ve had nothing but reporters. Buzz, buzz, they’ve come, back door and front. I’ve said nothing to any of them—you’d think I’d committed a crime.…” She was shutting the door.

  “I’m not a reporter, Miss Chislehurst. I’m only anxious to talk to you.”

  “Well, I don’t care to talk to you——” Just in time he put his foot in the door. She stared at him indignantly. “If you don’t go away I’ll call the police! I’ve done it twice already.”

  “Miss Chislehurst, you gave an interview at the beginning of all this—you must have done. That’s why the other reporters came down here——”

  “That first man deceived me; he took me in; I wouldn’t have said anything to him if I’d known; it’s not my concern to——”

  “Well, if you saw him it’s only fair you should see me——”

  “I want to have no truck with the son of John Marlowe. Let me close this door!”

  “Miss Chislehurst, d’you realise you are going to be subpoenaed to appear in court in a libel action that will be coming on soon?”

  That stopped her. She examined him closely with her opinionated eyes. “Why? I’ve done nothing.”

  “You’re the only material witness left to what passed between John Marlowe and George Chislehurst. You’re certain to be called.”

  She hesitated. “If this is a trick.…”

  “It’s no trick.”

  She looked at her watch, holding it well away from her and screwing up her eyes. “I can’t see the time without my glasses.”

  “It’s a quarter to three.”

  “Well, I can talk to you for five minutes. But
I’m due at a Working Party. I can’t stop longer than that.”

  He followed her into the small living-room which was full of enormous clerical furniture that stood about in it as if waiting for a sale. There were religious pictures among the books and a calendar of saints. On the sideboard was a Victorian knife-box and a big silver-plated cruet with six cut-glass bottles. The table was covered with a dark-red plush cloth, with a heavy silk fringe. Miss Chislehurst faced him across this. “Well?”

  “I wonder if you’d tell me what you told Mr Shorn when he came down?”

  “Was that his name? He represented himself as a publisher interested in reissuing my brother’s book.”

  “As I’ve told you, I’m John Marlowe’s son; but this is the first I’ve ever heard of any complaints your brother had or any quarrel that occurred between——”

  “Quarrel indeed! The upset, the anguish ended my brother’s life! When Sir John came down to the funeral I said to him——”

  “Just a minute, Miss Chislehurst, could you start from the beginning? D’you remember for instance exactly when they first met?”

  She stared at him for a long time.

  “How should I know when they first met? They didn’t know each other before George was inducted into St Anne’s, that’s all I can tell you.”

  “When was that?”

  “In 1941. Right in the middle of the Plymouth blitz. I remember——”

  “But, Miss Chislehurst, you must have some idea of when my father first called at the house.”

  “I haven’t an idea in the world. You don’t suppose I lived with my brother, do you?.… Oh, I see you did think that. I loved my brother devotedly but I never lived with him; we had certain fundamental differences of opinion; I lived in Minehead until he was taken ill; then I gave up my house there to come to look after him. Alas, he lived only a few months. Your father’s action, that was what did it.”

  Don took a few breaths for mental adjustment. “ I see.… Then you don’t actually know about this quarrel at first hand?”

  “At first hand! My brother was still alive when I answered his call, wasn’t he? I learned enough from him about the way your father stole his ideas and perverted them to his own ends!”