Читать книгу Scales of Justice - Ngaio Marsh, Stella Duffy - Страница 8

Mr Phinn was a widower but Commander Syce was a bachelor. He lived next to Mr Phinn, in a Georgian house called Uplands, small and yet too big for Commander Syce, who had inherited it from an uncle. He was looked after by an ex-naval rating and his wife. The greater part of the grounds had been allowed to run to seed, but the kitchen garden was kept up by the married couple and the archery lawn by Commander Syce himself. It overlooked the valley of the Chyne and was, apparently, his only interest. At one end in fine weather stood a target on an easel and at the other on summer evenings from as far away as Nunspardon, Commander Syce could be observed, in the classic pose, shooting a round from his sixty-pound bow. He was reputed to be a fine marksman and it was noticed that however much his gait might waver, his stance, once he had opened his chest and stretched his bow, was that of a rock. He lived a solitary and aimless life. People would have inclined to be sorry for him if he had made any sign that he would welcome their sympathy. He did not do so and indeed at the smallest attempt at friendliness would sheer off, go about and make away as fast as possible. Although never seen in the bar, Commander Syce was a heroic supporter of the pub. Indeed, as Nurse Kettle pedalled up his overgrown drive, she encountered the lad from the Boy and Donkey pedalling down it with his bottle-carrier empty before him.

‘There’s the Boy,’ thought Nurse Kettle, rather pleased with herself for putting it that way, ‘and I’m very much afraid he’s just paid a visit to the Donkey.’

She, herself, had a bottle for Commander Syce, but it came from the chemist at Chyning. As she approached the house she heard the sound of steps on the gravel and saw him limping away round the far end, his bow in his hand and his quiver girt about his waist. Nurse Kettle pedalled after him.

‘Hi!’ she called out brightly. ‘Good evening, Commander!’

Her bicycle wobbled and she dismounted.

Syce turned, hesitated for a moment and then came towards her.

He was a fairish, sunburned man who had run to seed. He still reeked of the Navy and, as Nurse Kettle noticed when he drew nearer, of whisky. His eyes, blue and bewildered, stared into hers.

‘Sorry,’ he said rapidly. ‘Good evening. I beg your pardon.’

‘Dr Mark,’ she said, ‘asked me to drop in while I was passing and leave your prescription for you. There we are. The mixture as before.’

He took it from her with a darting movement of his hand. ‘Most awfully kind,’ he said. ‘Frightfully sorry. Nothing urgent.’

‘No bother at all,’ Nurse Kettle rejoined, noticing the tremor of his hand. ‘I see you’re going to have a shoot.’

‘Oh, yes. Yes,’ he said loudly, and backed away from her. ‘Well, thank you, thank you, thank you.’

‘I’m calling in at Hammer. Perhaps you won’t mind my trespassing. There’s a footpath down to the right-of-way, isn’t there?’

‘Of course. Please do. Allow me.’

He thrust his medicine into a pocket of his coat, took hold of her bicycle and laid his bow along the saddle and handlebars.

‘Now I’m being a nuisance,’ said Nurse Kettle cheerfully. ‘Shall I carry your bow?’

He shied away from her and began to wheel the bicycle round the end of the house. She followed him, carrying the bow and talking in the comfortable voice she used for nervous patients. They came out on the archery lawn and upon a surprising and lovely view over the little valley of the Chyne. The trout stream shone like pewter in the evening light, meadows lay as rich as velvet on either side, the trees looked like pincushions, and a sort of heraldic glow turned the whole landscape into the semblance of an illuminated illustration to some forgotten romance. There was Major Cartarette winding in his line below Bottom Bridge and there up the hill on the Nunspardon golf course were old Lady Lacklander and her elderly son George, taking a post-prandial stroll.

‘What a clear evening,’ Nurse Kettle exclaimed with pleasure. ‘And how close everything looks. Do tell me, Commander,’ she went on, noticing that he seemed to flinch at this form of address, ‘with this bow of yours could you shoot an arrow into Lady Lacklander?’

Syce darted a look at the almost square figure across the little valley. He muttered something about a clout at two hundred and forty yards and limped on. Nurse Kettle, chagrined by his manner, thought: ‘What you need, my dear, is a bit of gingering up.’

He pushed her bicycle down an untidy path through an overgrown shrubbery and she stumped after him.

‘I have been told,’ she said, ‘that once upon a time you hit a mark you didn’t bargain for, down there.’

Syce stopped dead. She saw that beads of sweat had formed on the back of his neck. ‘Alcoholic,’ she thought. ‘Flabby. Shame. He must have been a fine man when he looked after himself.’

‘Great grief!’ Syce cried out, thumping his fist on the seat of her bicycle, ‘you mean the bloody cat!’

‘Well!’

‘Great grief, it was an accident. I’ve told the old perisher! An accident! I like cats.’

He swung round and faced her. His eyes were misted and his lips trembled. ‘I like cats,’ he repeated.

‘We all make mistakes,’ said Nurse Kettle, comfortably.

He held his hand out for the bow and pointed to a little gate at the end of the path.

‘There’s the gate into Hammer,’ he said, and added with exquisite awkwardness, ‘I beg your pardon, I’m very poor company as you see. Thank you for bringing the stuff. Thank you, thank you.’

She gave him the bow and took charge of her bicycle. ‘Dr Mark Lacklander may be very young,’ she said bluffly, ‘but he’s as capable a GP as I’ve come across in thirty years’ nursing. If I were you, Commander, I’d have a good down-to-earth chinwag with him. Much obliged for the assistance. Good evening to you.’

She pushed her bicycle through the gate into the well-tended coppice belonging to Hammer Farm and along a path that ran between herbaceous borders. As she made her way towards the house she heard behind her at Uplands, the twang of a bow string and the ‘tock’ of an arrow in a target.

‘Poor chap,’ Nurse Kettle muttered, partly in a huff and partly compassionate. ‘Poor chap! Nothing to keep him out of mischief.’ And with a sense of vague uneasiness, she wheeled her bicycle in the direction of the Cartarettes’ rose garden where she could hear the snip of garden secateurs and a woman’s voice quietly singing.

‘That’ll be either Mrs,’ thought Nurse Kettle, ‘or the stepdaughter. Pretty tune.’

A man’s voice joined in, making a second part.

‘Come away, come away Death

And in sad cypress let me be laid.’

The words, thought Nurse Kettle, were a trifle morbid but the general effect was nice. The rose garden was enclosed behind quickset hedges and hidden from her, but the path she had taken led into it, and she must continue if she was to reach the house. Her rubber-shod feet made little sound on the flagstones and the bicycle discreetly clicked along beside her. She had an odd feeling that she was about to break in on a scene of exquisite intimacy. She approached a green archway and as she did so the woman’s voice broke off from its song, and said: ‘That’s my favourite of all.’

‘Strange,’ said a man’s voice that fetched Nurse Kettle up with a jolt, ‘strange, isn’t it, in a comedy, to make the love songs so sad! Don’t you think so, Rose? Rose … Darling …’

Nurse Kettle tinkled her bicycle bell, passed through the green archway and looked to her right. She discovered Miss Rose Cartarette and Dr Mark Lacklander gazing into each other’s eyes with unmistakable significance.