‘Professor Snodgrass?’Appleby began. ‘I owe you…’
‘But your eyes haven’t changed.’ Professor Snodgrass (who got along on a stick with a thick rubber tip) had taken a few steps forward, and was glancing at the photograph of the boy-soldier. ‘No, not since you were a child. Nor your nature either, I suppose.’ The Professor produced a chuckle which appeared to betoken indulgence rather than censure. ‘At least you keep your word – eh?’
‘My dear sir, you are quite mistaken. My name…’
‘Later than you might have done. But let that be, my dear boy. I have kept my word too. It’s one of our few family virtues, as your dear father used to say. The candle in the window, and the table spread. Have you had your supper yet?’
‘Professor Snodgrass, I am very sorry – but I have occasioned a total misapprehension. You are supposing me to be a relation, whereas I am an entire stranger. My name is Appleby, and I have no business at Ledward at all.’
‘No more you have. What a deuced odd thing!’ The Professor took out a watch and consulted it. ‘But the night remains young, and Adrian may turn up still. Did you say you were a friend of his? He has made an appointment with you?’
‘Nothing of the sort.’ The awkwardness of the occasion, Appleby reflected, was being enhanced by the fact that this aged academic person was no longer very fully in command of his wits. ‘It is simply that my car broke down a couple of miles away…’
‘That’s very bad – very bad, indeed.’ The Professor was suddenly emphatic. ‘Reliable transport, I have always insisted, is the vital condition of success in the field. Fire-power itself comes second to it. And my own vote is for camels, every time. I am delighted that you are interested in the subject. You and I must have a talk about the Sudan. I have been doing a good deal of work lately on the Juba River expedition of 1875. By the way, have you ever asked yourself why it took Sir Samuel Baker all that time to reach Gondokoro in 1870? We must take a careful look at the maps. Only tonight I am a little preoccupied by the arrival of my nephew Adrian Snodgrass, whom you no doubt know. Have the servants shown you to your room?’
‘No. You see…’
‘Ah, that is because there are no servants. Not here at the Park. My own people just come over, you see, from time to time.’ Professor Snodgrass paused, rather as if some perplexing problem had suddenly presented itself to him. And then his brow cleared. ‘And so do I,’ he said. ‘That accounts for my being here now.’ He fleetingly looked with great acuteness at Appleby. ‘But it doesn’t account for your being here. I’m far from certain there isn’t something damned fishy about you. I think perhaps I’d better call the police.’
‘By all means do. It’s an excellent idea. They will quite quickly be able to reassure you about me, as a matter of fact. Which won’t mean that I shan’t still owe you a great many apologies.’
‘My dear fellow, nothing of the kind is needed – nothing at all.’ The inconsequence of Professor Snodgrass seemed capable of continuing indefinitely and, as it were, accelerando. ‘May I suggest our taking a glass of wine while waiting for my nephew? Working over here from time to time as I do, I have them keep a decanter of port in that little cupboard by the desk. Quinta do Noval ’55, at the moment. Modest but wholesome stuff. To put my lips to when I am so disposed. Are you a Dickensian? The great novelist honoured my family, it may be said, quite early in his career.’ Not waiting for a reply, Appleby’s host (as he might now be called) made his way almost briskly to the cupboard he had indicated, and did in fact produce from it a decanter and two glasses. He set them on a table, and courteously motioned Appleby to a chair. ‘Delightful of you to have dropped in,’ he said. ‘I am conscious of seeing too little of my neighbours nowadays.’
Although no more a neighbour than a nephew, Appleby drank his port with a clear conscience. He had done his best to clarify the anomalous position in which he found himself. He was inclined to wonder – although he couldn’t quite have told why – whether Beddoes Snodgrass was altogether as crazed as he seemed. The old man’s words, like Hamlet’s, were wild and whirling. But his glance, at least intermittently, was that of one who knew a hawk from a handsaw. And no doubt a steady assumption of his rationality was the best means of getting a modicum of sense out of him. Although curious, Appleby acknowledged to himself that the why and wherefore of Adrian Snodgrass’ being expected to turn up at Ledward in the watches of the night was no business of his. But what he had heard on the terrace was another matter. It had rendered the effect, indeed, of amateur effort. But it certainly hadn’t been effort in any lawful direction. It would be irresponsible not to try to bring this old creature to some sense of the hazard to which his eccentric proceedings were putting his property – or his missing nephew’s property. Appleby decided to tackle this head-on.
‘Professor Snodgrass,’ he said, ‘I have something to urge upon you. And it is relevant to begin by saying that I am a retired policeman.’
‘India, eh?’ The Professor appeared much interested. ‘Very decent service, to my mind. Never been adequately recognized. I expect you knew my friend Strickland. Ran your show on the hush-hush side. Keeping an eye on the Czar, and all that.’
‘Not India. London.’
‘Oh.’ Professor Snodgrass’ interest sensibly diminished. But then he suddenly set down his glass. ‘Didn’t you say Appleby? It’s not Sir John Appleby?’
‘Yes, it is.’
‘Dear me!’ The Professor appeared to recognize that he had occasioned surprise by being thus swiftly on the ball. ‘Odd thing – but I remember Tommy Titherton used to talk about you. When he was Home Secretary, that was. I’m delighted to have you call. Curious that I should have taken you for Adrian. He’ll be amused to hear about it. I expect him at any moment.’
‘I shall be interested to meet him.’ Appleby found this further example of matter and impertinency mixed no less baffling than before. ‘But my point is that, just as a point of professional feeling, I don’t like coming across open invitations to crime. And that’s what your open house is. A very open invitation to crime indeed. I’ve seen that the Park is full of valuable things – and I’ve done so while roaming in it without anybody to stop me.’
‘Ah, but you forget the candle in the window.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘One of my promises to Adrian. I interpret it a shade liberally, my dear Sir John, by flicking a switch that turns on every light in Ledward.’
‘I’m very aware of the resulting effect.’
‘No doubt – or no doubt in one sense. But have you considered how it must take burglars, and fellows of that sort? Scare them out of their wits, my dear chap.’
‘Once in a way – perhaps.’ Appleby paused. ‘I don’t want to be intrusive, but may I know how often you – well, mount this ritual reception for your nephew? It’s not every night of the week?’
‘Heavens above, no!’ Professor Snodgrass’ astonishment sounded entirely sane. ‘Only on Adrian’s birthday, of course. That was our compact, you know.’
‘Very well. But surely it must be known for miles around that this extraordinary affair happens yearly: Ledward all prepared for the return of its owner (as I suppose your nephew to be) and then vacated?’
‘Known for miles around?’ Professor Snodgrass had the air of one confronting a novel idea. ‘But what if it is? Over that sort of area they’re all our own people, more or less. They’d be as delighted to see Adrian back as I’d be.’
‘No doubt.’ Appleby judged it pointless to question this squirarchal assumption. ‘But, you know, quite apart from this annual tryst you keep, the house strikes me as uncommonly vulnerable to burglary. If, that is, it is regularly untenanted by night – which is what I seem to gather from you. May I ask if the Dower House is far away?’
‘The Old Dower House. The New Dower House is a ruin. I’m just across the park. Matter of less than half a mile. Fellow from the insurance company did once come and take up your point. Had a lot to say about rascals who steal pictures, and so forth. Of course I reassured him. Showed him my double action Colt. Reliable weapon. Used by an uncle of mine, as a matter of fact, at Balaclava.’
Appleby again had his moment of suspicion about Professor Snodgrass. Had it been wholly fanciful to imagine a slight pause before the word ‘Balaclava’, as if his host had been considering saying ‘Waterloo’ instead?
‘Mark you, we have had one alarm.’ Snodgrass was at his most reasonable again. ‘It was only last year, as a matter of fact.’
‘You mean on this particular night last year?’
‘Of course – on Adrian’s birthday. I came over to the Park to see if he had turned up. As a matter of fact, he hadn’t, and I decided to wait for a while. Not here, come to think of it, but in the drawing-room. I was on the qui vive, you know. Odd expression that. It means Long live who? Same sort of challenge as Under which king, Bezonian? speak, or die! Are you a Shakespeare man? I’ve always been a strong Shakespeare man myself. Used to have long chats about the plays with Mr Kipling. Another strong Shakespeare man. Bible too. Amazing.’
‘And what was the result of your being on the qui vive?’
‘I heard these noises outside. Thought it was opossums.’
‘Opossums?’
‘Yes – but the Australian kind. Got to know them when I did an ADC spell there as a young man. Climb on the roof or under it, or fool around on your verandah. Cough and wheeze and jibber so that you’d swear it was half a regiment of senile tramps.’
‘You thought you heard half a regiment of senile tramps outside your drawing-room?’
‘Well, approximately that. Just some fellows up to no good. Proposing to break and enter, eh? But they cleared out when I shouted at them.’
‘I see. But I suppose they could have entered without breaking? Walked in, I mean, through your symbolically open door, just as I’ve done tonight.’
‘I’m very sorry there was nobody to receive you, my dear Appleby.’ The Professor’s port appeared to be prompting its proprietor to cordiality. ‘Must have appeared uncommonly uncivil. But it just so happens, you see, that you’ve turned up on rather an exceptional night.’
‘I’ve tumbled to that.’
‘Nothing of the kind. I’ve been most uncommunicative. Another uncivil thing. Very conscious that I owe you an explanation. So I’m going to tell you about Adrian.’
It is a principle of the human mind that information which it may be intriguant to ferret out for oneself becomes potentially boring as soon as it is volunteered by somebody else. And this principle obtains with particular force in the minds of retired professional detectives. Appleby in his retirement found himself at times positively prowling round for some small mystery to bite on; conversely, being addressed in an instructive way by other people frequently prompted him (as it did Dr Johnson) to remove his mind and think of Tom Thumb. So he was suddenly not at all sure that he wanted to hear the life-story of Adrian Snodgrass. The mild duty he had felt to protect property wantonly exposed to larceny had lured him into and around Ledward, and the sounds he had heard outside the library disposed him to believe that his solicitude had been by no means idle. But in the face of Professor Snodgrass’ regardlessness in the matter there seemed to be little more he could do. And as for Adrian (Appleby suspected), the more one heard about him, the less was one likely to be charmed or edified. He bore all the signs of belonging to that sizeable flock of black sheep which the English upper classes, collectively regarded, are concerned to maintain at pasture in regions of the globe as remote as possible. Adrian Snodgrass was perhaps peculiar in that he possessed, in the Ledward estate, a tolerably rich home pasture which he didn’t appear much to bother about – and in that he possessed, too, in the form of an aged military historian, a doting relative who yearly made bizarre and elaborate preparations for a return to the fold which, in all probability, was never going to happen. And if it did happen – if by any conceivable chance the long-lost heir turned up this very night – the occasion would not be one at which a total stranger could with any propriety assist.
Nevertheless Appleby was fairly caught. He could not now with civility rise to his feet and offer brief farewells. And the Professor, he noticed, had poured another glass of port for each of them. If he had kept this vigil in solitude for years – as was rather to be supposed – he was far from disconcerted at having a companion on this occasion. In fact, he was enjoying it. Simple humanity required Appleby to sit back and listen.
‘As a young man, or indeed as a boy,’ Professor Snodgrass began, ‘Adrian was remarkable for…’ He broke off. ‘My dear Appleby,’ he said, ‘have you heard anything?’
It must certainly have been true that Appleby looked as if he were hearing something. His sitting back had abruptly become a sitting forward as if at the bidding of an alerted sense. He had turned, moreover, to look at the French window which he had shut again after his recent survey of the terrace beyond it. The window was shut still.
‘Heard anything?’ Appleby repeated. ‘Well, no. But what about smell? Do you smell anything out of the way?’
‘I can’t say that I do.’ The Professor was reasonably surprised. ‘A whiff of stale tobacco, perhaps? I smoke a cigar in this room from time to time. Delighted to find you one now. Neglectful of me.’
‘Not tobacco. I’d be inclined to say Chanel.’
‘Camel?’ Appleby’s host seemed gratified rather than puzzled. ‘You must be right. Not a thing it’s easy to mistake, eh? Adrian arrived on one, no doubt. Capital means of transport, as I think I said.’
But Appleby had jumped to his feet, and was making for the door of the library. Either Professor Snodgrass had failed to close it on entering, or somebody else had opened it subsequently. For it was certainly ajar by rather more than a chink now. Appleby was perhaps acting out of turn once more – for here again was something which, strictly regarded, was no business of his at all – but he nevertheless made no bones about going across the room at the double, and throwing the door as wide open as it would go. There was no doubt about the scent; it was faint and delicate, but undeniably present. Equally – if only for a moment – there was clear evidence of how it had, as it were, come on the air. The figure of a woman had disappeared round the curve of the quadrant corridor. Appleby hesitated, and decided not to follow. He really could not go pounding after somebody who might well enjoy a better right to be here than he did. Then he found that Professor Snodgrass was standing beside him, sniffing vigorously.
‘Not a doubt of it,’ Snodgrass said with satisfaction. ‘Unmistakably camel.’