Murder in the Night. Arthur Gask
Чтение книги онлайн.
Читать онлайн книгу Murder in the Night - Arthur Gask страница 9
Название: Murder in the Night
Автор: Arthur Gask
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Языкознание
isbn: 4064066392147
isbn:
Boulter's house was a corner house and honored with a back door which opened into a narrow passage that led into the garden.
I gambled on the back door being unlocked, and instead of climbing over the fence, approached it from the road.
The noise of my approaching footsteps cut short the howling of the dog and I could hear her shuffling down the passage to meet me.
She growled menacingly as I came near, and to reassure her I called her softly by name.
"Nell, old girl—good dog, lie down."
She knew my voice at once for I had often patted her in passing and not infrequently she had come to our house for scraps.
She stopped growling at once, and very gently I pushed open the door intending to bash her with the iron directly I saw her head appear. But she was too quick for me, for when I had opened the door, ever so slightly, she slipped by me in a flash, and was out and down the road before I could even aim at her with my heavy bit of iron.
I swore at her retreating figure with a damn that came easily, though strangely, to my lips, and seeing there was no chance at all of overtaking her, turned back into her master's back garden.
It was still dark, but a faint glowing in the sky warned me that morning was not far off.
There was a nasty strong smell in the garden and my disappointed rage found vent in more cursing. It was Boulter's rabbits, of course.
What right had Boulter, I asked myself angrily, to keep his stinking rabbits so near to other houses? With his dog and his other dirty belongings he was a positive menace to the health of the place. He should be taught a lesson anyhow.
I cautiously approached the row of hutches and, after looking round to make sure no one was watching me, opened the door of the one nearest, and feeling about for a moment inside, brought out the inmate by its ears.
It was a fine big beast, and in the softly glowing light I could see the glinting of two big, frightened eyes. But I had no pity at all, and in a sudden paroxysm of rage nipped its body firmly between my knees and broke its neck.
Making sure I had killed it, I put back the quivering body into the hutch and, curling it in what I considered a natural position for sleep, carefully reshut and fastened the door.
The animals in the next hutches I served in exactly the same way, and in three or four minutes at most, seven of Boulter's best rabbits were in the process of stiffening in their houses.
I felt the lust of taking life intoxicating me like wine and I should undoubtedly have finished off every rabbit in the place but for the sudden noise of a distant train.
It startled me unpleasantly and thinking that at all events I had done enough to go on with, I hurried stealthily back by the same way I had come.
I closed the hall door very carefully and with hardly a sound tiptoed to my bedroom and threw myself back into bed. Again I fell asleep at once, but this time I had no disturbing dreams.
CHAPTER IV.—THE FIRST CRIME.
I woke up feeling very irritable and with a bitter taste in my mouth. It was seven o'clock, and about the usual time I awoke. I could hear Mrs. Bratt brushing vigorously in the hall and my first thought was one of annoyance at the noise she was making. Then all the events of the previous twenty-four hours flashed through my mind and I felt out of temper with everyone.
I would make them smart at the office for all their insolence to me. Captain Barker deserved to die for being such an old liar about his wretched red paste. Mrs. Bratt was a drunken old charwoman, and I would clear out of her dirty show with a week's notice. Boulter had only got his deserts and it was a pity all his beastly old rabbits weren't dead, instead of a beggarly lot of seven.
I dressed myself quickly and going out into the hall, proceeded at once to give Mrs. Bratt a piece of my mind. I told her, and in not over quiet tones either, that she was an alcoholic old beast, and shouted to her, as she retreated hysterically towards the kitchen, that I should be leaving that day week. When she feebly remonstrated with me for speaking so loudly and pointed reproachfully to Captain Barker's door, saying, "Hush, hush," I got angrier still, and stamped noisily about the hall, flourishing the dead man's walking stick that I had taken from the stand.
I felt that I wanted to kill her, and had quite a difficulty to restrain myself from doing her some injury.
She was quite thunderstruck at my rage, as well she might be, for I had been always meek as a young calf before her.
I swallowed some sort of breakfast, and banging the door behind me set off to catch my usual train up to the city.
The sun was shining gloriously, but it only roused my anger with its promise of more heat and I felt ready to quarrel with everything and everybody.
A big ugly looking dog was sunning himself on the footpath, and I surprised both myself and him by sending him off howling with a well directed kick in the ribs.
The usual last minute crowd was hurrying into the station as I arrived, and I pushed and elbowed amongst them in a manner that quickly reaped for me a rich harvest of black looks, but my savage face and the complete indifference with which I received their uncomplimentary remarks preserved me from molestation and, the train steaming into the station, I threw myself sourly into a corner seat and gave myself up to my own thoughts.
I was beginning to think that after all there might be some virtue in the red paste. I felt quite different from the way I did yesterday. I didn't feel afraid of anyone any more, and I was just longing to injure someone at the office. But I told myself I mustn't be too hurried and too eager in paying off my grudges. I must be cunning and take advantage of my supposed timidity to be revenged on everyone in their proper turn. I musn't overdo it at first.
I reached the office in good time and could not refrain from commencing the new era by straightaway giving the office boy a slap on the face for being immersed in the pages of a book instead of dusting the desks and filling the inkpots as was his proper duty. He gasped at first, in mingled pain and astonishment, but immediately recovering called me a damned fool and prepared to show fight. But he was a small boy with all his damns, and I was soon able to convince him that physically, at least, I was easily his superior. Indeed, the generosity of my violence took all the fight out of him at once.
I took the accustomed place in my corner and the other clerks began to arrive chatting and passing laughing remarks to one another as they hung up their hats and took their seats at the desks.
Waller came in as usual, last of all—twenty-one minutes after his proper time I noticed. I said nothing, however, to anyone, and was apparently absorbed as usual in my work.
Waller exhibited no particular hurry to settle at his desk; instead he perambulated about the room, flourishing a high-colored sporting paper and informing the office generally that he had a certain winner for the afternoon at ten to one.
"Fireball's bound to win," he exclaimed emphatically, СКАЧАТЬ