The Secret of the Tower. Anthony Hope

Чтение книги онлайн.

CHAPTER II. — THE GENERAL REMEMBERS

       Table of Contents

      Amongst other various, and no doubt useful, functions, Miss Delia Wall performed that of gossip and news agent-general to the village of Inkston. A hard-featured, swarthy spinster of forty, with a roving, inquisitive, yet not unkindly eye, she perambulated—or rather percycled—the district, taking stock of every incident. Not a cat could kitten or a dog have the mange without her privity; critics of her mental activity went near to insinuating connivance. Naturally, therefore, she was well acquainted with the new development at Tower Cottage, although the isolated position of that dwelling made thorough observation piquantly difficult. She laid her information before an attentive, if not very respectful, audience gathered round the tea-table at Old Place, the Naylors’ handsome house on the outskirts of Sprotsfield and on the far side of the heath from Inkston. She was enjoying herself, although she was, as usual, a trifle distrustful of the quality of Mr. Naylor’s smile; it smacked of the satiric. “He looks at you as if you were a specimen,” she had once been heard to complain; and, when she said “specimen,” it was obviously beetles that she had in mind.

      “Everybody knows old Mr. Saffron—by sight, I mean—and the woman who does for him,” she said. “There’s never been anything remarkable about them. He took his walk as regular as clockwork every afternoon, and she bought just the same things every week; her books must have tallied almost to a penny every month, Mrs. Naylor! I know it! And it was a very rare thing indeed for Mr. Saffron to go to London—though I have known him to be away once or twice. But very, very rarely!” She paused and added dramatically, “Until the armistice!”

      “Full of ramifications, that event, Miss Wall. It affects even my business.” Mr. Naylor, though now withdrawn from an active share in its conduct, was still interested in the large shipping firm from which he had drawn his comfortable fortune.

      She looked at him suspiciously, as he put the ends of the slender white fingers of his two hands together, and leant forward to listen with that smile of his and eyes faintly twinkling. But the problem was seething in her brain; she had to go on.

      “A week after the armistice Mr. Saffron went to London by the 9.50. He traveled first, Anna.”

      “Did he, dear?” Mrs. Naylor, a stout and placid dame, was not yet stirred to excitement.

      “He came down by the 4.11, and those two men with him. And they’ve been there ever since!”

      “Two men, Delia! I’ve only seen one.”

      “Oh yes, there’s another! Sergeant Hooper they call him; a short thickset man with a black mustache. He buys two bottles of rum every week at the Green Man. And—one minute, please, Mr. Naylor—”

      “I was only going to say that it looks to me as if this man Hooper were, or had been, a soldier. What do you think?”

      “Never mind, Papa! Go on, Miss Wall. I’m interested.” This encouragement came from Gertie Naylor, a pretty girl of seventeen who was consuming much tea, bread, and honey.

      “And since then the old gentleman and this Mr. Beaumaroy go to town regularly every week on Wednesdays! Now who are they, how did Mr. Saffron get hold of them, and what are they doing here? I’m at a loss, Anna.”

      Apparently an impasse! And Mr. Naylor did not seem to assist matters by asking whether Miss Wall had kept a constant eye on the Agony Column. Mrs. Naylor took up her knitting and switched off to another topic.

      “Dr. Arkroyd’s friend, Delia dear! What a charming girl she looks!”

      “Friend, Anna? I didn’t know that! A patient, I understand, anyhow. She’s taking Valentine’s beef juice. Of course they do give that in drink cases, but I should be sorry to think—”

      “Drugs, more likely,” Mr. Naylor suavely interposed. Then he rose from his chair and began to pace slowly up and down the long room, looking at his beautiful pictures, his beautiful china, his beautiful chairs, all the beautiful things that were his. His family took no notice of this roving up and down; it was a habit, and was tacitly accepted as meaning that he had, for the moment, had enough of the company, and even of his own sallies at its expense.

      “I’ve asked Dr. Arkroyd to bring her over, Miss Walford, I mean, the first day it’s fine СКАЧАТЬ