Читать книгу Number Nineteen: Ben’s Last Case - J. Farjeon Jefferson - Страница 6

When Ben opened his eyes he decided that he was still asleep. You often wake from one dream into another, and it was of course quite impossible that he should be lying like this on a bed. Wasn’t he on a park seat, and even if he had rolled off the seat because of something that had happened—and he felt sure something had happened, though his mind was too muzzy to recall just what it was—he would have rolled off on to the grass, well, wouldn’t he? He wouldn’t have bounced into a bedroom, because even though Ben was good at bouncing he couldn’t bounce quite as far as that.

And there was another thing that proved this must be a dream. He could just see the tip of one of his boots, and it wasn’t his boot. His boots were old and shabby; in fact one of them, owing to sundry gaps, could hardly be called a boot at all. You just put your foot in and it came out at the other end. But this boot he could see the tip of—yes, it was the left boot, the one with the gap—had no gap at all. Nor did it look old and worn. It was miraculously complete, and there was even a bit of polish on it. So, well, there you were. It was just another dream.

He hoped it would prove a nice one. He had an idea that the preceding dream had not been so good. If he lay very still, so as not to disturb it, a door might open somewhere and the Prime Minister might come in. And he might say, ‘Don’t move, Ben. I know you’re feeling bad—’ he was ‘—but you did a noble act dashing in front of that car and saving that little girl from being run over. You might of got killed. Well, England doesn’t forget brave acts like that, so we’re going to reward you with Ten Thousand Pounds—’ Yes, that would be a very nice dream.

He closed his eyes, and waited for it. But the Prime Minister did not oblige. A door did open somewhere, however, and suddenly feeling convinced that it did not herald the arrival of anyone so beneficent as a grateful Premier, Ben opened his eyes again quickly, jest to be ready like. Again he saw that impossible, polished toe. He still believed he was dreaming, but he was sure by now that the dream was not going to be a nice one.

The person who had come in had entered by a door behind the bed. He seemed in no hurry—assuming it was a ‘he’—for after closing the door there was no further sound for a full minute. Then the approaching footsteps were resumed, reached the bed, and continued round the foot of it. Then they ceased again, and Ben found himself regarding no longer the surprisingly polished boot but the face above it, and as he gazed, remembrance came flooding back. It was the face of the man with the dark brown hair and the small moustache. The face that had enveloped him before his black-out.

‘This,’ decided Ben, ‘is goin’ ter be narsty!’

For a few moments the two men regarded each other silently. It was Ben who broke the silence.

‘Go on! Let’s ’ave it!’ he muttered.

‘Ah, you have recovered your voice,’ replied the other. ‘Have what?’

‘Wot it’s orl abart!’

‘But you, of all people, should know what it is all about?’

Ben gulped, then tried to steady himself. Things was wobblin’ somethink ’orrerble!

‘I knows a bit,’ he said, guardedly.

‘And what bit do you refer to?’ came the enquiry.

‘Do yer need me ter tell yer?’

‘I am asking you to tell me.’

Ben gulped again.

‘Orl right, guv’ner, ’ere goes. I knows that summon’s bin murdered!’

‘Murdered?’

‘Does it surprise yer?’

‘It’s a nasty word, but—no, I cannot say, truthfully, that it surprises me.’

‘It wouldn’t. See, yer was there, wasn’t yer?’

‘And so, I gather, were you?’

‘I was.’

‘Then of course you will know who did it?’

‘I knows.’

‘Then perhaps you would tell me?’

‘Yer want me ter say?’

‘I should be interested. It was a shocking thing, was it not? Who did do it?’

Ben swallowed, to clear his throat for the next. Of course the man knew Ben knew who had done it, but it is never pleasant to inform a murderer of his crime, especially when there is nobody else about.

‘You did it,’ said Ben.

‘Come, come!’ smiled the man.

‘That ain’t no good,’ retorted Ben. ‘I seen yer!’

‘I’m afraid that is no good, either,’ answered the man, ‘for is it not just what anybody in your position would say?’

‘Eh? In my persishun?’ repeated Ben, blinking. ‘I don’t git yer?’

The man continued to smile. It was one of the least pleasant smiles Ben had ever seen.

‘Please do not disappoint me, my good man. I credited you with some intelligence. Are you speaking the truth? Don’t you really and truly get me?’

And then, all at once, Ben did, and sweat appeared upon his brow.

‘Yer—yer ain’t meanin’—?’ he began, but he was interrupted before he got any farther.

‘Let us go slowly,’ said the man. ‘Sometimes it is not quite wise to say exactly what one means. We have plenty of time, and as this is going to be a long conversation, I think I will take a chair.’

He turned away and walked towards a chair in the corner of the room. How about a dash while his back was turned? Ben had not heard a key turn, so evidently the door was not locked. Yes, that was it! A couple of leaps and then ’ell for leather! He wouldn’t get another chance.

But unfortunately Ben was not in a condition for leaping. He could only leap in spirit; his body refused to oblige. Lummy, he didn’t half feel weak!

‘There is a mirror on this wall,’ remarked the man, as he reached the chair, ‘and I have something in my pocket which would get to the door before you possibly could. As a matter of fact, it would pass through you on its way. Let me repeat my advice. Take things slowly. You may find—if you are sensible—that your position has its saving graces.’

‘Savin’ ’oo?’ muttered Ben.

As the man returned with the chair his teeth became prominent below his little moustache. He smiled with his teeth.

‘Do you know, I rather like you,’ he said. ‘What is your name?’

‘Winston Churchill,’ replied Ben. You might as well die game. ‘Wot’s your’n?’

‘I won’t respond with Clement Attlee. If you want something to call me—’

‘I could call yer plenty withaht no ’elp!’

‘I have no doubt you could, but I suggest Mr Smith. What am I to call you? I confess I find Winston Churchill rather a mouthful.’

‘Orl right. Yer can call me Jones.’

‘That being your real name?’

‘As much as I reckon Smith is your’n!’

‘Very well. Then that is settled—for the moment. I am Smith and you are Jones, and we are discussing the demise—or death, if you prefer simple terms—of a third party who so far has to be nameless.’ He sat down by the bed. ‘Oh, but perhaps you can tell me his name?’

‘Corse I carn’t!’ retorted Ben. ‘’Ow’d I know it?’

‘Well, it occurred to me that you might, since you were so obviously interested in him?’

‘’Ow was I interested in ’im?’

‘That is what I hope to learn, for only lunatics—and I haven’t yet decided that you are a lunatic, though it is a theory—only lunatics attack perfect strangers—’

‘Nah, then, I don’t want no more o’ that!’ interrupted Ben, with anxious indignation. ‘I never seed the bloke afore in me life, and you ain’t goin’ ter put that on me!’

Mr Smith shook his head reprovingly.

‘I fear you are getting me all wrong,’ he said. ‘I am not putting anything on you—or, more correctly speaking, what I put on you need not matter. Your headache, Mr Jones, is what the police may put on you, and that actually is what you and I have got to discuss.’

‘The pleece carn’t put nothink on me!’

‘I wish I could agree.’

‘Well, as I didn’t do it—’

‘Somebody did it!’

‘Yus, but we ain’t torkin’ abart anyone else jest nah, we’re torkin’ abart me, and as I didn’t do it I ain’t got ter worry abart the pleece!’

Mr Smith gave a little sigh, turned his head for a moment towards the door, and then turned it back again.

‘You really are being very difficult, Mr Jones,’ he complained. ‘Here I am, trying to help you—’

‘Oh, ’elp me, is it?’

‘Can’t you see?’

‘I couldn’t see that withaht a telerscope!’

‘You say the most delightful things. My desire to help you increases every moment, and the best way to prove it is to explain to you precisely what your position is, and what the police could put on you if you had the misfortune to meet them. I am afraid we can no longer mince matters, Mr Jones, and we shall have to say exactly what we mean, after all. And, come to think of it, you didn’t mince matters when you attempted to put the murder on me! Not many would forgive you for that, yet here am I, still sticking to you! Now, then, let us begin. You deny, I understand, that you stabbed the man on the other end of your seat?’

‘’Ow many more times?’ growled Ben.

‘One of your troubles, of course, is that you cannot prove an alibi. You know what an alibi is?’

‘Yus. It’s when yer can prove yer wasn’t where they say yer was.’

‘Correct. If ever you write a dictionary I shall buy a copy. And you cannot prove that you were not on that seat.’

‘Come ter that, ’oo could prove I was?’

‘Well—I could!’

‘That’s not sayin’ they’d believe yer.’

‘No, but then I could prove you were, if my word wasn’t good enough.’

‘’Ow could yer?’

‘You have a very short memory. Don’t you remember that, a few moments before the tragedy, I took a photograph?’

‘Lummy, so yer did!’

‘The police might give a lot for a copy of that photograph. Don’t you agree?’

Ben offered no opinion.

‘And then,’ went on Mr Smith, ‘there is something else you ought to know. That horrible knife sticking in the poor man’s back—I had to leave it there, for I had not the nerve to take it out—horrible, horrible!—the police will naturally examine the handle, and they will find your fingerprints upon it.’

‘Wot’s that?’ gasped Ben.

‘You really ought to have wiped them off,’ said Mr Smith, sadly. ‘You can be quite sure that, if I had done the deed, I would have wiped mine off! You might like to make a note of that. Oh, no! Oh, no! I would never have left mine on!’

‘But mine carn’t be on!’ cried Ben, desperately.

‘Not so loud, not so loud!’ admonished Mr Smith. ‘I assure you, Mr Jones, your fingerprints are on that knife. You may deny it till you are blue in the face. It will make no difference. The fingerprints are there.’

‘Owjer know?’

‘A needless question, surely? I was present at the tragedy. I saw the deed, and I know you did not wipe the knife-handle after using it.’

Ben shut his eyes hard to think. It was easier in the dark, without Mr Smith’s face before him. First the photograph—and now the fingerprints. Clearly Mr Smith had not left his own prints on the knife; he had told Ben to make a note of this, and he was far too wily a customer to commit such a cardinal blunder. But he had not merely wiped his fingerprints off, he had apparently stamped Ben’s on! While he was unconscious! He’d worked the whole thing out from the word go …

‘Are you asleep?’ came Mr Smith’s voice.

If only he had been! Apprehensively and slowly, Ben opened his eyes.

‘So you see,’ went on Mr Smith smoothly, as though there had been no interruption, ‘you are in a bit of a hole, are you not?’

‘S’pose I am?’ answered Ben.

‘There is no suppose about it. You are. And you will be in a worse hole if, in addition to the fingerprints, I am unable to prevent that photograph from appearing in all the newspapers—a photograph of a murdered man on one end of a seat with another man wanted for enquiries at the other. You say you never saw the murdered man before today?’

‘Never in me life,’ replied Ben.

He knew this was a frame-up, but would it be wise to let Mr Smith know he knew? Perhaps he’d better lie doggo for a bit—stop makin’ a fuss like—and act as though he thought Mr Smith were really trying to help him, until he found out where it was all leading?

‘Then why did you kill him?’

Still wavering as to his best policy, and with his mind beginning to rocket again, Ben could not answer that one and remained silent. He was stunned by the cool audacity of Mr Smith, who now bent forward and continued, almost confidentially.

‘Do you know, I’ve got a theory about this murder of yours, and you need not tell me whether I am right or wrong. As a matter of fact, it was because of my idea that I brought you along here instead of handing you over to the police, as of course I ought to have done. Oh, don’t make any mistake, I am taking a big risk myself in acting like this—but let that go. I like to help people in trouble—if they’re worth it, of course—and the reason I’m helping you is because I feel sure yours wasn’t a premeditated murder.’

‘Pre ’oo?’ blinked Ben.

‘You didn’t set out to murder this poor fellow,’ explained Mr Smith, ‘as—for instance—I might have done if I had been the culprit. You were ill, perhaps. Or hungry. I don’t know—don’t ask me! But all at once everything got on top of you, eh? You had a brain-storm. As a matter of fact, Mr Jones, that’s just what it looked like to me! A brain-storm. And you jumped upon your poor victim with that knife, perhaps hardly knowing you did it—why, you even thought I did it, which proves the brain-storm, doesn’t it—and then—I suppose you know this?—you had a complete black-out! Well, as my car was handy, for I’d only left it a minute or two before to have a tiny stroll, I acted upon a sudden impulse and bundled you off while the going was good. Of course, there’ll be a big hue and cry for you later, if it hasn’t already started. You’d never have left those fingerprints on the knife if you’d been normal. They’ll damn you, I’m afraid. But you’re safe here, for the time being, so now what we’ve got to decide is what I’m going to do with you.’ He displayed his teeth in another of his unpleasant smiles. ‘Have you any idea?’

Guardedly Ben responded,

‘’Ave you?’

‘As a matter of fact I have, but first let me ask you a question or two. A lot will depend on your answers. Let us hope for your sake they will be satisfactory.’

‘S’pose they ain’t?’

‘That will be just too bad. Now, then. Is anybody likely to trail you here? Apart, of course, from the police?’

‘’Owjer mean?’

‘I speak the King’s English. Have you any people who will wonder why you haven’t gone home tonight?’

‘Oh, I see.’

‘Well, have you?’

‘No one never worries abart me, and if they did, ’ow’d they find me? I dunno where I am meself!’

‘Where do you live?’

‘Where I ’appen to be.’

‘Try again. What’s your address?’

‘Nothink doin’, guv’nor! I knows that one!’

‘What one?’

‘I seen it done. Yer gits a bloke away wot’s wanted, and then yer gits a messidge to ’is wife or ’is muvver that yer’ll give ’im up unless they sends yer a pony.’

‘You know, you’re smarter than you look,’ said Mr Smith, admiringly. ‘If I weren’t straight I’d begin to watch my step. Will it ease you if I promise not to communicate with your wife or mother?’

‘Yer couldn’t, ’cos I ain’t got ’em,’ answered Ben.

‘I am full of patience. Who have you got?’

‘I told yer. Nobody.’

‘Where did you sleep last night?’

‘In a bus.’

‘But when you got out of the bus?’

‘I’d ’ad it by then, it was mornin’.’

‘Tell me, Mr Jones. Does all this mean you haven’t got any address?’

‘That’s right. Two and two’s four. And if that ain’t a satisfact’ry answer, I’ve ’ad it.’

‘It is an exceedingly satisfactory answer,’ Mr Smith assured him. ‘If you have no home and no family you should be free to accept the position I’m thinking of offering you.’

‘Oh! A persishun?’

‘That is what I said.’

‘A standin’ up one? Not lyin’ in a bed?’

‘Or hanging from a rope.’

‘Oi! That’s enuff o’ that!’

‘It is an alternative we want to bear in mind.’

‘Well, wot’s the persishun?’

‘Quite a simple one, and just the thing, I should say for you. We’ve—er—lost our caretaker, and we need a new one.’