Читать книгу The Master - T. H. White - Страница 8
ОглавлениеThe Master
They woke in a kind of hospital ward with no windows. The walls and floor and even the ceiling were tiled with the same white, glazed tiles as the corridor had been. The beds were black iron. There were four empty ones as well as their own, with the grey blankets folded neatly on them. There was a trolley with thermometers and bandages and shining scissors. There were screens. In fact, it really was a hospital, and it had central heating.
The twins felt dopey.
“Nicky?”
“Yes?”
“Are you awake?”
“No.”
“Please wake up.”
He rolled about in a protesting way, snorting like a grampus, then said in a perfectly sensible voice, “How are you?”
“I’m hungry.”
“My chin is sore underneath,” said Nicky.
He considered this.
“I must have gone into the water feet first, so it hit my underneath sides, under my arms and under my chin and under my nose and under my eyelids and ...”
He stopped to wriggle his toes, to find out about the soles of his feet, which had been protected by shoes.
“But why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did they push us off?”
“I suppose they didn’t want us.”
“Then why have they got us?”
“I don’t know.”
“They have got us, haven’t they, Nicky?”
“Yes.”
“Who are they?”
“I don’t know.”
After a bit, he asked, “Have you got anything on?”
She looked to see.
“Yes, a kind of nightshirt.”
She added with pleased surprise, “It has tapes to tie round the middle.”
“Mine has got pockets.”
“So has mine.”
“Well, that’s something.”
Later on, Nicky said, “Judy?”
“Yes?”
“I suppose these people live here.”
“Yes.”
“They must be hiding here.”
“Yes.”
“They didn’t want us to find out.”
“No.”
“They pushed us off because they heard you say to fetch Daddy.”
“Oh, Nicky!”
“You were quite right. We ought to have fetched him. It was my fault, Ju.”
“Nick!”
He praised her about twice a year, so this was a glorious moment, even in their adversity.
“The Chinaman heard us from behind the door. They must have been listening.”
“Then why did the black man save us?”
“Perhaps ...”
“And what were they throwing?”
“The Chinaman was shooting at us.”
“At us!”
“Oh, Judy, you are an ass.”
He jumped out of bed and went to hug her, which twins sometimes feel like doing.
“And you did look so ridiculous getting ducked all the time.”
“I am not ridiculous.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
It was enchanting to be talked about, whatever he said, but there were sterner things to do than snuggle. They had to find out what was happening.
Nicky said, “Did you hear the Voice?”
“Yes.”
“I believe that was the leader of them.”
“Why?”
“Because when he said what he said, the Chinaman stopped doing what he was going to do.”
“What was he going to do?”
“He was going to blow your head off.”
She said in a small, pale voice, “As a matter of fact, I knew he was.”
They were silent at this, two very unhappy children.
“Anyway, he didn’t.”
“No.”
“Why did he say, ‘Waste not, want not?’ ”
“Your head.”
In a real flash of inspiration, he explained, “The Voice meant that we could be used for something.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. It meant that people are more useful alive than dead.”
“Useful for what?”
“Useful for anything, I suppose.”
Silence.
“I say, Nicky?”
“What?”
“I wish these nightshirts weren’t so big.”
Silence.
“Nick?”
“Well?”
“The Chinaman is the second in command, and when their secret was going to be discovered he pushed us off the cliff, hoping it would kill us, but it didn’t, so he shot at us in the water, and when Daddy found we were gone he would have thought we had tumbled off, and when the black man rescued us it must have been without orders or something, so the Chinaman came to finish us off and then the Voice stopped him and here we are.”
“That’s it.”
“But oh,” she wailed, “what did Daddy think? Where is Daddy? When will he come?”
Nicky felt even worse, but he put his arm round his sister and said, “He will come.”
She shot up in bed.
“And where’s Jokey?”
Not in that room.
Judy turned on her face, absolutely shattered, and sobbed into the pillow.
“The door is locked, Judy.”
A sob.
“We are locked in.”
Another.
“They will have Jokey downstairs somewhere. Perhaps they have a kennel.”
“Jokey’s dead.”
Nicky suddenly went quite white, like your knuckles when you clench your fist, and said, “If Jokey is killed, I will kill them.”
He went to the door and kicked it.
He said ragingly all he knew how to say, “Bloody, bloody, bloody!”
“You ought not to swear.”
“Well, I did. And anyway, she’s not.”
“Not what?”
“Jokey is alive,” he said, glaring at her as if she had defied him.
“Perhaps she is.”
“Oh, Jokey!”
Later on, they grew more testy than miserable.
“Who are these people anyway?”
“Could they be pirates?”
“They don’t have pirates nowadays, you ninny. At least, I don’t think they do. Do they?”
“They have gangsters and smugglers.”
“I don’t see what you can smuggle in the middle of the Atlantic.”
“Well, there must be something wrong”, said Judy reasonably. “After all, they go about with pistols and push people off cliffs, which you would hardly do for a mother’s meeting, would you?”
“Could they be spacemen or flying sorcerers or anything?”
“That’s all rubbish.”
“How do you know?”
“I know.”
“Judy knows everything.”
“Its kid’s stuff—science fiction.”
“Judy knows everything. Judy ...”
They were on their way to a spat about this when the door opened silently, revealing a smiling man with a breakfast trolley.
He had a round, brown, bald face, twinkling with the fascination of his smile (false teeth). He announced in a fluting voice, “Good morning, kiddies. How’s about some brekker?”
They looked at him aghast, for Kiddies and Brekker were almost worse than Chinamen according to their standards. With whiskers made of cotton wool he could have been a first rate Santa Claus. He sounded like a cuckoo, but seemed bent on being kind.
Judy said, in a society tone, “Do come in.”
The false voice had made her feel false as well.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning, my loves,” he said. “Good morning, my pickaninnies. The top of the morning to ye, says Bould Ben Backstay.”
“Who?”
“Sure, ’tis only me, what they calls the ould Smiler.”
Nicky ignored the introduction and demanded, “Where is Jokey?”
“And who would Jokey be, might it plaze yer honour, when Jokey be’s at home?”
“Where is our dog?”
“Ah, now, that’s asking.”
He said whitely, “Please tell me where she is at once.”
“Aha!” said Bould Ben Backstay or Smiler or whoever he was. “Will ye listen now to me turkey cock! Now here we haves some postie-toasties suited to the juvenile appetites, and on the dish to de starboard is iggs and bacon wit some of thim chipperlarters as comes in tins. Indade, ye might say ’tis a faist for an imperor ye have before ye, and all sairved up by gintle Bonio, or Jacko de Peeper, as his messmates call him.”
“Where is Jokey?”
“And dis does be de marmylaid.”
“Our dog ...”
“Now that’s a crook question,” said the gentle Bonio, relapsing into Austrylian, and he bowed himself out backwards, softly rubbing his smooth hands, with nods and becks and wreathèd smiles.
He locked the door.
“The beast!”
“Perhaps he was forbidden to tell us.”
“Perhaps he didn’t want to.”
“If people kill your dogs, they say they have sold them or given them away or sent them to a good home or some foul lie like that.”
“Don’t talk about it, Judy. We don’t know she’s dead. Perhaps the men in dungarees have got her. Sailors and those sort of people are fond of pets. And I know that on a liner you are not allowed to keep dogs in your cabin, because they are looked after by the butcher or somebody, down below.”
“She’ll be miserable.”
“If we could get out of here,” exclaimed Nicky. “I bet the yacht is still there, looking for us. They wouldn’t go away without trying. There must be some way of sending a message. If only there was a window!”
“Do you think we could bribe this Bonio or whatever he’s called?”
“What with?”
“We could promise to make Daddy pay him.”
“It would have to be Uncle Pierrepoint, because Daddy hasn’t any money.”
“Uncle Pierrepoint could pay him in dollars. They are valuable in England.”
“We could try.”
“We could tell him you are a Marquess, if that’s any good.”
After a bit, he said, “Ju, will you do the bribing? I don’t think I know how to.”
“Yes.”
She was ruthless and would use any weapon, but he was shy about being a lord.
“We must offer to be ransomed.
“Kidnapped!” he added with satisfaction. “It’s just like in Chicago. And sometimes they bump you off!”
But the bribery was a failure. When he brought their next meal, the kindly man only smiled like a pussy-cat. He refused to speak. Whatever they said, he smiled and smiled and was a villain.
The long afternoon was tedious, like being punished at school. They explored the boring, dead-white room, which would have been less inhuman if it had been cream—or any colour at all, for that matter, since white is not a colour. Judy noticed how the angles and corners were curved, to make sweeping easier, and her brother noticed the geometric exactness with which the tiles were cemented.
“I wonder how many rooms there are in this rock?”
“There were lots of rooms off those corridors.”
“And a big lift.”
“It must have taken ages to make.”
“I could understand,” added Nicky, “if they had blasted caves with dynamite or something, sort of rough like in a coal mine, but everything is done like a public lavatory. Pooh! That’s just what it is like. But it must have taken millions of people to do it. There must be much more people than we saw.”
“Do you think they could be making something here, like a factory? Perhaps they are forging something or boiling opium?”
“More likely atomic bombs.”
“Could they?”
“I suppose not. You have to be as rich as a nation is to make them. As rich as Russia.”
“Perhaps they are Russians.”
“We haven’t seen any so far.”
“What is Bonio?”
“I don’t think he’s Irish really, do you?”
“He doesn’t look unkind.”
“He’s beastly.”
“You don’t know he is. After all, he brought us our dinner.”
“Oh, well, he’s a steward or something. He has greasy hands.”
“He can’t help being a steward. Perhaps he’s been washing up.”
“Anyway, I don’t like him. If he was decent he would tell us about Jokey.”
“He may not know.”
“Oh, all right.”
After a gloomy pause, Judy said, “He may be a prisoner here, like us. Do you think they will keep us prisoners for ever?”
But the evening meal, when it came at last, did bring something new to think about. It was a regular restaurant dinner, with tinned grouse which the children detested and an imitation pêche melba made from tinned peaches, and, of all things, a priceless claret to drink, which tasted like ink. It was served by Bonio, silent in a white jacket. His hands were trembling.
“What are you called?” asked Judy curiously.
He cleared his throat and answered in a hoarse voice. “Sure, it’s what I tould ye. Little Nell.”
“But you said you were Ben Backstay and then you said you were called the Smiler and ...”
He went Scottish all of a sudden and whispered urgently, “Dinna tell him I convairsed wi’ ye. Dinna let fall I spake one worrd.”
“Tell who?”
He dropped a plate and said, “The Maister.”
