Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 10: Last Ditch, Black As He’s Painted, Grave Mistake. Ngaio Marsh

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ jackets clustered at the rear of the assembly. Clearly they were all grouped in conformance with the domestic hierarchy. The President’s aides-de-camp waited at the back of the dais. And ranked on each side of it, armed and immovable, was his guard in full ceremonial kit: scarlet tunics, white kilts, immaculate leggings, glistening accoutrements.

      And on the floor in front of the dais, was a massive table bearing under a lion’s hide the unmistakable shape of the shrouded dead.

      Alleyn and Mr Whipplestone entered in the wake of The Boomer. The guard came to attention, the crowd became very still. The Boomer walked slowly and superbly to his dais. He gave an order and two chairs were placed on the floor not far from the bier. He motioned Alleyn and Mr Whipplestone to take them. Alleyn would have greatly preferred an inconspicuous stand at the rear but there was no help for it and they took their places.

      ‘I daren’t write, dare I?’ Mr Whipplestone muttered. ‘And nor dare I talk.’

      ‘You’ll have to remember.’

      ‘All jolly fine.’

      The Boomer, seated in his great chair, his hands on the arms, his body upright, his chin raised, his knees and feet planted together, looked like an effigy of himself. His eyes, as always a little bloodshot, rolled and flashed, his teeth gleamed and he spoke in a language which seemed to be composed entirely of vowels, gutturals and clicks. His voice was so huge that Mr Whipplestone, trying to speak like a ventriloquist, ventured two words.

      ‘Describing incident,’ he said.

      The speech seemed to grow in urgency. He brought both palms down sharply on the arms of his chair. Alleyn wondered if he only imagined that a heightened tension invested the audience. A pause and then, unmistakably, an order.

      ‘Spear chap,’ ventriloquized Mr Whipplestone. ‘Fetch.’

      Two of the guards came smartly to attention, marched to meet each other, faced front, saluted, about-turned and marched out. Absolute stillness followed this proceeding. Sounds from outside could be heard. Gibson’s men in the garden, no doubt, and once, almost certainly, Gibson’s voice.

      When the silence had become very trying indeed, the soldiers returned with the spear-carrier between them.

      He was still dressed in his ceremonial garments. His anklets and armbands shone in the lamplight and so did his burnished body and limbs. But he’s not really black, Alleyn thought, ‘If Troy painted him he would be anything but black – blue, mole, purple, even red where his body reflects the carpet and walls.’ He was glossy. His close-cropped head sat above its tier of throat-rings like a huge ebony marble. He wore his lion’s skin like a lion. Alleyn noticed that his right arm was hooked under it as if in a sling.

      He walked between his guards to the bier. They left him there, isolated before his late Ambassador and his President and close enough to Alleyn and Mr Whipplestone for them to smell the sweet oil with which he had polished himself.

      The examination began. It was impossible most of the time for Alleyn to guess what was being said. Both men kept very still. Their teeth and eyes flashed from time to time but their big voices were level and they used no gesture until suddenly the spearman slapped the base of his own neck.

      ‘Chop,’ breathed Mr Whipplestone. ‘Karate. Sort of.’

      Soon after this there was a break and neither man spoke for perhaps eight seconds and then, to Alleyn’s surprise and discomfiture, The Boomer began to talk, still in the Ng’ombwanan tongue, to him. It was a shortish observation. At the end of it, The Boomer nodded to Mr Whipplestone who cleared his throat.

      ‘The President,’ he said, ‘directs me to ask you if you will give an account of what you yourself witnessed in the pavilion. He also directs me to translate what you say as he wishes the proceedings to be conducted throughout in the Ng’ombwanan language.’

      They stood up. Alleyn gave his account, to which The Boomer reacted as if he hadn’t understood a word of it. Mr Whipplestone translated.

      Maintaining this laborious procedure, Alleyn was asked if, after the death had been discovered, he had formed any opinions as to whether the spearman was, in fact, injured.

      Looking at the superb being standing there like a rock, it was difficult to imagine that a blow on the carotid nerve or anywhere else for that matter could cause him the smallest discomfiture. Alleyn said: ‘He was kneeling with his right hand in the position he has just shown. His head was bent, his left hand clenched and his shoulders hunched. He appeared to be in pain.’

      ‘And then,’ translated Mr Whipplestone, ‘what happened?’

      Alleyn repressed an insane desire to remind The Boomer that he was there at the time and invite him to come off it and talk English.

      He said: ‘There was a certain amount of confusion. This was checked by –’ he looked straight at The Boomer – ‘the President, who spoke in Ng’ombwanan to the spearsman who appeared to offer some kind of statement or denial. Subsequently five men on duty from the Special Branch of the CID arrived with two of the President’s guard who had been stationed outside the pavilion. The spearsman was removed to the house.’

      Away went Mr Whipplestone again.

      The Boomer next wished to know if the police had obtained any evidence from the spear itself. Alleyn replied that no report had been released under that heading.

      This, apparently, ended his examination, if such it could be called. He sat down.

      After a further silence, and it occurred to Alleyn that the Ng’ombwanans were adepts in non-communication, The Boomer rose.

      It would have been impossible to say why the atmosphere, already far from relaxed, now became taut to twanging point. What happened was that the President pointed, with enormous authority, at the improvised bier and unmistakably pronounced a command.

      The spearsman, giving no sign of agitation, at once extended his left hand – the right was still concealed in his bosom – and drew down the covering. And here was the Ambassador, open-mouthed, goggle-eyed, making some sort of indecipherable declaration.

      The spearsman, laying his hand upon the body, spoke boldly and briefly. The President replied even more briefly. The lionskin mantle was replaced, and the ceremony – assembly – trial – whatever it might be, was at an end. At no time during the final proceedings had The Boomer so much as glanced at Alleyn.

      He now briefly harangued his hearers. Mr Whipplestone muttered that he ordered any of them who had any information, however trivial, bearing however slightly on the case, to speak immediately. This met with an absolute silence. His peroration was to the effect that he himself was in command of affairs at the Embassy. He then left. His ADCs followed and the one with whom Alleyn was acquainted paused by him to say the President requested his presence in the library.

      ‘I will come,’ Alleyn said, ‘in ten minutes. My compliments to the President, if you please.’

      The ADC rolled his eyes, said, ‘But –’, changed his mind and followed his Master.

      ‘That,’ said Mr Whipplestone, ‘was remarkably crisp.’

      ‘If he doesn’t like it he can lump it. I want a word with Gibson. Come on.’

      Gibson, looking sulky, and СКАЧАТЬ