Sea of Glass (Valancourt 20th Century Classics) (16 page)

‘I forgot, though,’ said Cedric. ‘You’re going into that walk yourself. I trust you’ll take the hint.’

He started out meaning to be nasty. But in mid-process a different idea visibly occurred to him. It was an awful demonstration of the involuntary transparency with which a just Providence had afflicted him. A smile formed on his lips and into his light-grey eyes came an expression of supernatural sincerity. He took off his tortoiseshell glasses and pointed them at me with the friendly, compelling gesture which one sees in advertisements. ‘But after all,’ he said, ‘isn’t it better that a young man should face the disadvantages of his chosen profession?’

‘I don’t want to go into the Law with any illusions,’ I replied cautiously.

‘Well then . . . frankly I should say a person of your independence and spirit, David, would find it a little trying to be always acting as . . . a, well, frankly, a professional lackey.’

I wondered whether the same applied, frankly, to doctors, actuaries, and chartered accountants.

‘Because,’ Cedric went on, with a glance of whimsical apology, ‘I’m afraid that’s how we people in a substantial way of business tend to regard our legal advisers.’

I was fascinated. I wondered very much where all this was going. That it had some preconceived goal I did not doubt. It was part of Cedric’s peculiar misfortune that when he warily led up to a subject you could hear him clocking-in at each intermediate stage on the march.

‘Of course,’ he said, ‘that attitude wouldn’t apply to anybody with a legal training who happened also to be an executive of the firm. Oh, no. In my own business, for instance, I have a couple of chaps who took Law degrees, and I can’t think of any of my staff for whom I have more liking and respect. I could use another of their type—to follow on behind, so to speak, because they’ll both shortly be moving up to seats on the Board—where, if we’re going to be vulgar, I rather suspect that their monthly cheques will look like a year’s reward to a partner in some pettifogging solicitor’s office.’

He intensified his stare, as if to rub in the already blatant implication. I was at a loss. I never entertained the idea that he seriously meant to give me a job in his organization; and if he had, I should not have accepted it. What I failed to understand was why he saddled himself with an offer which he would subsequently have the trouble of evading.

For reasons which will presently become clear, I still do not know the answer. I think, however, that his strangely insensitive character made him more prone than most people to employ routine gambits; it may have been his policy, when one of his enterprises was at a critical point, to conciliate any possible opposition, however unlikely it was to upset his plans. It is not inconceivable that, by some kindly reference, his mother had given him the idea that I had a little influence with her; and until he had clinched his machinations, he was not taking the smallest chance.

Foreseeing embarrassment if this conversation continued, I told him that he had given me a great deal to think about and then made an excuse to leave. I was going upstairs to my bedroom to fetch a book when I passed Varvara on the stairs. One glance showed me that her wrongs were again rampant in her mind. She was scowling all over her beautiful fierce face, and her lips were moving in a subdued mutter. Her eyes flicked over me without any lightening of expression. Unfortunately I was seized with an absurd sense of guilt. I felt that perhaps I had been disloyal in temporizing, however insincerely, with Cedric’s offer. But for this I should probably have warned her that her uncle was in the morning-room. Yet I thought nothing of it when I heard her turn in at the door.

From time to time in my profession I am called on to advise or defend persons who are actually innocent of the offences with which they are charged. In these cases the main difficulty is usually to disinfect random acts of some guilty purpose. ‘Why,’ say the police, ‘did you walk home that way, Mr. Smith? It’s not your normal route and it’s three hundred yards longer.’ ‘I don’t know,’ replies Mr. Smith sheepishly. ‘I did it on impulse.’ Despite the sceptical smiles with which this is received, it is quite possible that he is telling the truth. It ought to be widely recognized how many times a day the ordinary man exercises choices which have no basis in reason.

On fine afternoons when she did not go out Varvara generally sat on the lawn. That day the weather was excellent. Yet she chose the morning-room—and I do not think that she could ever explain why.

On reaching my room, I thought I would write a letter. I had been at this task for about twenty minutes when I heard a strange wheezing noise come up the stairs. Then my door rattled violently as someone tried to open it in the wrong direction. I got up and turned the handle from the inside.

Before me stood Turpin, or rather a disintegrated parody of him. He was too old and too fond of the bottle to run up three long flights with impunity. His breath went huck-a-huck-a-huck like a motor on a cold morning. The genial rosy varnish of his face, which was produced by a nice blending of white flesh and purple veins, had broken up starkly into its separate components. The dark worms across his cheeks looked like hæmorrhages below the skin.

‘Good God!’ I said. ‘What’s the matter?’

He could not answer at first. I dragged him into the room and put an easy chair beneath him. After a few seconds he recovered sufficiently to speak.

‘It’s Mr. Cedric . . . I was sitting in my pantry when suddenly there’s a noise like a big bird squawking . . . and then another, like someone ’ad squashed a sack of fruit. I felt the place give a shake and, same time, it got dark. ’Ullo, I said to my budgies, thunder comin’ on. . . .’ As with many shrewd men, who have not had much education, Turpin’s sense of relevance and logical order went to pieces under any violent shock. He tended to dwell on incidentals whilst neglecting the crux. On this occasion it took me several seconds of questioning to extract it.

Cedric Ellison had fallen off the roof-garden two storeys up, and had impaled himself on the area railings just above the pantry window. Turpin had forced himself to approach the victim closely enough to be certain that he was dead.

‘I’d better ring the police,’ I said. ‘You see that all the maids are kept away from any window that overlooks the scene.’

As I spoke it struck me that Mrs. Ellison must be up and about for her appointment with the lawyer. Presumably she was in her boudoir, which looked on to the roadway, but if Mr. Pyne was much later she might come out to make inquiries. However she was ultimately to learn the truth, it must not be at first hand.

I had no faith in Nurse Fillis’s ability to weather the news and remain competent. She was too much involved emotionally. On the other hand I saw nothing for it but to risk telling her.

As I pushed into her room I had one of the few flashes of inspiration which have ever visited me. Like most such enlightenments it was very simple. Gabbling out the essentials of the story, I deliberately slurred the title before the name so that it sounded like Miss, rather than Mr., Ellison.

To my relief wishful thinking did the rest. She did not question that it was Varvara who had been overtaken by disaster. White, but speaking quite firmly, she said:

‘Certainly Mrs. Ellison must not be allowed to know anything about this at present. I’ll go to her immediately.’

(Lest I now seem to be imputing callousness to a woman of whom in other respects I have found little good to say, I would point out that I had minimized the more horrible features of the case.)

Downstairs in the hall I was rapidly put through by the exchange to the nearest police station. The sergeant there was helpful, and promised that he and one of his men would be with us in a few minutes. He also said that he would arrange for a doctor and an ambulance.

‘One thing, sir,’ he added. ‘Don’t move the patient.’

‘Patient?’ I echoed. ‘Oh, you mean the body.’

‘We prefer people shouldn’t draw conclusions until a doctor’s been,’ he said repressively.

As I finished telephoning I was facing towards the door of the drawing-room. It opened slowly and Varvara came out. I remember wondering what she had been doing in there, for she had often told me how much she hated its atmosphere of tawdry splendour.

Her face was strained and set; so that for a moment I imagined her as sharing my knowledge. Then with a sigh I realized that I must recapitulate the story once again: hoping for my nerves’ sake that it would not be received in the spirit of Deborah celebrating Sisera’s death.

In fact, Varvara listened with complete impassivity. She did not seem surprised or even particularly interested. But as I made for the door which gave on to the garden at ground-floor level I heard two pairs of footfalls behind me. She was following, as well as Turpin.

‘Go back,’ I said. ‘This will be a ghastly sight.’

Varvara did not reply; nor did she slacken her step. I was not equal to arguing; if she wanted to saddle herself with a recurrent nightmare, well, let her.

As on other occasions when I tried to assert my masculinity over her, the comparison of strength went humiliatingly against me. I had underrated the revolting quality of the spectacle in the garden. I shall not describe it. I will merely say that Cedric was a large-bodied man and he had fallen from a considerable height straight across a row of iron stakes with broad paddle heads like those of Kaffir spears.

I was forthwith sick and, through the scalding tears which were forced into my eyes, I could hear old Turpin retching dryly. Varvara however was not overcome—at any rate in the physical sense. Kneeling on the grass border opposite the impaled body, she began to pray aloud in Russian. This behaviour neither repelled me as theatrical nor touched me as an example of spiritual valour; it seemed to me to be purely an hieratic gesture, belonging to a world with which I had no contact.

The scene was ceasing to be the private property of No.
8
. The houses for some way along the Terrace overlooked each other’s gardens. Now we could see white caps and aprons bobbing at the upper windows and on the balconies, and hear a shrill twittering, interspersed with cries of horror.

The police drove up at almost the same moment as the doctor who came in an ambulance with two attendants. I signalized their arrival by another lapse. As I greeted the newcomers I was shaking with hysterical laughter. However, they seemed to understand.

My memories of the next hour are confused. Mr. Pyne made a belated appearance and, though badly shaken, took charge of the domestic situation. He shepherded Varvara and myself into the house—very properly, for the manner of Cedric’s death had set the authorities a hideous mechanical task. They had to send for more men and tackle from the hospital in order to detach his body.

Pyne went upstairs to break the news to Mrs. Ellison, who must by now have realized that something was amiss.

Varvara and I were left sitting in the dining-room. For half an hour we scarcely spoke: then she leapt up quivering and slamming her palms on the table.

‘Why are you staring at me like that?’ she said, her voice rising abruptly. ‘Why?’

‘I wasn’t staring
at
anything.’

I went over meaning to comfort her, but she shied away from me. It seemed that old England had shown her something against which even Doljuk could not proof the nerves.

At last we heard the ambulance drive away. A few minutes later the sergeant came in with his notebook. He was extremely considerate and before he questioned us he repeatedly asked for assurances that we felt equal to the ordeal.

During his short interrogation, Varvara uttered one extraordinarily ill-judged remark. A few days before, in some chance context, I had observed that sensible people did not make important statements to the police in the absence of their lawyers.

‘If that solicitor is on our side,’ she said, ‘perhaps we should fetch him back.’

The sergeant blenched visibly, as if he had been asked for his warrant whilst collecting for a police charity. Nevertheless his questions maintained the same level of perfunctory blandness.

My story was the one which I have already recounted in all its featureless innocence. Varvara deposed that she had entered the morning-room after passing me on the stairs. There she had exchanged a few casual words with her uncle. Then, knowing that he had a business appointment, she had excused herself and continued downstairs. As she left she had seen him walking out onto the roof-garden.

The sergeant said: ‘Now, Miss Ellison, did you know of any reason why your uncle should lose his balance?’

Varvara’s eyes, never inexpressive, dilated like those of the heroine in a primitive film.

‘Why should I?’ she countered. The man was taken aback for a second time.

‘Families usually know of any little weakness in each other,’ he suggested mildly.

‘I knew of my uncle’s wickedness, but not his weakness,’ said Varvara. ‘But now that he is dead I forgive him with all my heart.’

He let her go after that, rather thankfully. It was obvious that he did not know what to make of her and an expression of bewilderment verging on suspicion lingered in his eyes. As I saw him to the door I tried to apply a corrective.

‘This has completely bowled everyone over,’ I said. ‘In a way it’s harder on Miss Ellison than the rest of us because she’s only been in this country a few weeks. I dare say you noticed . . .’

‘Ah!’ said the sergeant, interrupting. ‘A foreigner, eh?’

It seemed that I had done more harm than good. Any allowance which he might make for foreigners was obviously outweighed by his conviction that, like Voltaire’s Habbakuk, they were
capable de tout.

I was retracing my steps across the hall when Turpin came up the back stairs with an immense funereal dignity which showed he had taken several bracers for his morale. He held up his hand to detain me.

‘ “Nothing in ’is life became ’im like the leaving of it”,’ he said in a sepulchral tone. ‘I don’t bloody think!’