The Moving Toyshop Page 6

  ‘Gosh!’ said dark-haired Miriam in a small voice.

  The self-elected reorganizer of the nation’s finances blenched horribly.

  Mr Hoskins blinked.

  The young man with glasses retired deeper into Nightmare Abbey.

  The hook-nosed person, on being nudged by the barman, stopped talking about horses.

  Only Fen was unmoved. ‘Are you a member of this University?’ he shouted cheerfully to the proctor. ‘Hey, Whiskers! Are you a member of this University?’

  The proctor started. He was (as dons go) a youngish man who had grown a pair of large cavalry moustaches during the Great War, and had never had the heart to cut them off. He gazed glassily about the room, carefully avoiding Fen’s eye, and then went out.

  ‘Oooh!’ said Miriam, expelling a long sigh of relief.

  ‘He didn’t recognize you, did he?’ said Mr Hoskins. ‘Here, have another chocolate.’

  ‘You see?’ said the red-haired youth indignantly. ‘Even the capitalist universities are run on a terror basis.’ With a trembling hand, he lifted his half-pint of ale.

  ‘Well, let’s get on with the game,’ said Fen. ‘Ready, steady, go.’

  ‘Those awful gabblers, Beatrice and Benedick.’

  ‘Yes. Lady Chatterley and that gamekeeper fellow.’

  ‘Yes. Britomart in The Faerie Queene.’

  ‘Yes. Almost everyone in Dostoevsky.’

  ‘Yes. Er – er – ’

  ‘Got you!’ said Fen triumphantly. ‘You miss your turn. Those vulgar little man-hunting minxes in Pride and Prejudice.’

  At this exultant shout the muffled, rabbity man at the nearby table frowned, got unsteadily to his feet, and came over to them.

  ‘Sir,’ he said, interrupting Cadogan’s offering of Richard Feverel, ‘surely I did not hear you speaking disrespectfully of the immortal Jane?’

  ‘The Leech-Gatherer,’ said Fen, making a feeble attempt to carry on. Then he abandoned it and addressed the newcomer. ‘Look here, my dear fellow, you’re a bit under the weather, aren’t you?’

  ‘I am perfectly sober, thank you. Thank you very much.’ The rabbity man fetched his drink, drew up his chair, and settled down beside them. He raised one hand and closed his eyes as though in pain. ‘Do not, I beg of you, speak disrespectfully of Miss Austen. I have read all of her novels many, many times. Their gentleness, their breath of a superior and beautiful culture, their acute psychological insight – ’ He paused, speechless, and emptied his glass at a gulp.

  He had a weak, thin face, with rodent teeth, red-rimmed eyes, pale, straggling eyebrows, and a low forehead. Despite the warmth of the morning, he was dressed in the most extraordinary fashion, with fur gloves, two scarves, and (apparently) several overcoats.

  Sensing Cadogan’s startled inventory: ‘I am very sensitive to cold, sir,’ said the rabbity man with an attempt at dignity, ‘And the autumn chill – ’ He paused, groped for a handkerchief and blew his nose with a trumpeting noise. ‘I hope – I hope that you do not object, gentlemen, to my joining you?’

  ‘Yes, we do,’ said Fen, irritated.

  ‘Don’t be unkind, I beg of you,’ said the rabbity man beseechingly. ‘This morning I am so very, very happy. Allow me to give you a drink. I have plenty of money … Waiter?’ The waiter appeared at their table. ‘Two large whiskies and a pint of bitter.’

  ‘Look here, Gervase, I really ought to be going,’ Cadogan put in uneasily.

  ‘Don’t go, sir. Stay and rejoice with me.’ There was no doubt that the rabbity man was very drunk indeed. He leaned forward conspiratorially and lowered his voice. ‘This morning I got rid of my boys.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Fen without amusement. ‘And what did you do with the little bodies?’

  The rabbity man giggled. ‘Ah! You’re trying to catch me out. My schooldays, I mean. I am – I was a schoolmaster. A poor birchman. The specific gravity of mercury is 13.6,’ he chanted. ‘Caesar Galliam in tres partes divisit. The past participle of mourir is mort.’

  Fen gazed at him with distaste. The waiter brought their drinks and the rabbity man paid for them out of a rather grubby wallet, adding a huge tip.

  ‘Your health, gentlemen,’ he said, raising his glass. Then he paused. ‘But I haven’t introduced myself. George Sharman, at your service.’ He bowed low from the waist, and nearly sent his drink flying; Cadogan saved it just in time.

  ‘At this moment,’ said Mr Sharman meditatively, ‘I should be teaching the Lower Fourth the elements of Latin Prose Composition. And shall I tell you why I’m not?’ Again he leaned forward. ‘Last night, gentlemen, I came into a large sum of money.’

  Cadogan jumped and Fen’s eyes hardened. Legacies seemed to be in the air that morning.

  ‘A ver’ large sum of money,’ Mr Sharman pursued indistinctly. ‘So what do I do? I go to the headmaster and I say, “Spavin,” I say, “you’re a domineering old sot, and I’m not going to work for you any more. I’m a gentleman of independent means now,” I said, “and I’m going to get some of the chalk out of my veins.”’ He beamed complacently about him.

  ‘Congratulations,’ said Fen with dangerous amiability. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘An’ thass not all.’ Mr Sharman’s utterance was becoming progressively more clouded. ‘I’m not the on’y lucky one. Oh, no. There’re others.’ He gestured broadly. ‘Lots ’n lots of others, all as rich as Croesus. An’ one of them’s a beautiful girl, with the bluest azure eyes. My luve is like a blue, blue rose,’ he sang in a cracked voice. ‘I sh’ll ask her to marry me, though she is only a shop-girl. Only a shop-girl’s daughter.’ He turned earnestly to Cadogan. ‘You mus’ meet her.’

  ‘I should like to very much.’

  ‘That’s the way,’ said Mr Sharman with approval. He trumpeted again into his handkerchief.

  ‘Have another drink with me, old man,’ said Fen, adopting an attitude of bibulous comradeship and slapping Mr Sharman on the back. Mr Sharman hiccupped. ‘’S on me,’ he said. ‘Waiter …!’

  They all had another drink.

  ‘Ah,’ said Fen, sighing deeply. ‘You’re a lucky man, Mr Sharman. I wish a relative would die and leave me a lot of money.’

  But Mr Sharman waggled his finger. ‘Don’ try to pump me. I’m not telling anything, see? I’m keeping my mouth shut.’ He shut his mouth, illustratively, and then opened it again to admit more whisky. ‘I’m surprised,’ he added in a tearful voice. ‘After all I’ve done for you. Tryin’ to pump me.’

  ‘No, no … ’

  A change came over Mr Sharman’s face. His voice grew weaker, and he clutched at his stomach. ‘’Scuse me, gen’lmen,’ he said. ‘Back in a moment.’ He got to his feet, stood swaying like a grass in the wind, and then tottered unsteadily in the direction of the lavatories.

  ‘We shan’t get much out of him,’ said Fen gloomily. ‘When a man doesn’t want to tell something, drunkenness only makes him more obstinate and suspicious. But it’s a queer coincidence.’

  ‘“The owl,”’ Cadogan quoted, looking after Mr Sharman’s weedy, muffled form, ‘“for all his feathers was a cold.”’

  ‘Yes,’ Fen said. ‘Like the old person of – Oh my fur and whiskers.’

  ‘What in God’s name is the matter?’ Cadogan asked in alarm.

  Fen got hastily to his feet. ‘Keep that man here,’ he said with emphasis, ‘until I get back. Ply him with whisky. Talk to him about Jane Austen. But don’t let him go.’

  ‘But look here, I was going to the police … ’

  ‘Don’t be so spiritless, Richard. This is a clue. I haven’t the least idea where it will lead, but so help me, it’s a clue. Don’t go away. I shan’t be long.’ And Fen strode out of the bar.

  Mr Sharman returned to his seat both more sober and more wary than he had been.

  ‘Your friend gone?’ he asked.

  ‘Only for a short while.’

  ‘Ah.’ Mr Sharman stretched himself luxuriously. ‘Glorious freedom. You’ve no idea what i
t is to be a schoolmaster. I’ve watched strong men go to pieces under it. It’s a perpetual war. You can keep the boys off for maybe thirty years, but they get you in the end.’

  ‘It sounds terrible.’

  ‘It is terrible. You get older, but they’re always the same age. Like the emperor and the crowd in the Forum.’

  Then they talked about Jane Austen, a subject made difficult for Cadogan by his imperfect knowledge of that author. Mr Sharman, however, made up for this deficiency in both knowledge and enthusiasm. Cadogan felt his dislike for the man increasing – dislike for his bleary little eyes, his projecting front teeth, his pedagogue’s assumption of culture; unquestionably Mr Sharman was an unpleasant illustration of the effects of a powerful greed suddenly satisfied. He did not refer again to his inheritance, or to the ‘others’ who shared it with him, but perorated resolutely on Mansfield Park. Cadogan made monosyllabic replies, and considered with a certain impatience the curious behaviour of Gervase Fen. As it grew nearer lunchtime the bar filled up with hotel visitors, actors, undergraduates. The noise of chatter rose in volume, and the sunlight pouring through the Gothic windows cut the haze of cigarette smoke into pale-blue triangles. ‘The only solution, I think,’ said someone suddenly and with conviction, ‘is liquid soap.’ Solution to what? Cadogan vaguely wondered.

  ‘And then look at the character of Mr Collins,’ Mr Sharman was remarking. With reluctance Cadogan focused his attention on this personage.

  At five minutes to midday there was a loud roar outside, accompanied by a clattering like saucepans at war. A moment later Fen pushed through the swing doors of the hotel to the sound of a sharp detonation. He was greatly exuberant, and carried a brightly jacketed book which he regarded with affection. Ignoring the bar on his left, he went on into the hotel proper, down a blue-carpeted corridor towards the porter’s box. Ridley, the porter, resplendent in blue and braid, greeted him with a certain apprehension, but he only entered one of the nearby telephone boxes. There he put through a call to Somerset House.

  ‘Hello, Evans,’ he said. ‘Fen here … Yes, very well, thanks, my dear fellow, and how are you …? I wonder if you’d look something up for me?’

  An indistinct crackle.

  ‘I can’t hear a word you’re saying … What I want is the details of the will of a Miss Snaith, Boar’s Hill, Oxford, who died about six months ago. It can’t have been proved until quite recently … What? Oh, well ring me back, will you? Yes … At the “Mace and Sceptre”. Yes. All right … Good-bye.’

  ‘My soul cleaveth to the dust,’ he sang without much humility as he jogged the receiver-rest, inserted two more pennies, and dialled a local number. Once again the telephone shrilled in the study of the Chief Constable of Oxford on Boar’s Hill.

  ‘Well?’ said that dignitary. ‘Oh, my God, is it you again? Not more about this Cadogan man?’

  ‘No,’ said Fen, hurt. ‘As a matter of fact, no. Though I must say I think you’re being most unhelpful.’

  ‘It’s no use. The grocer’s kicking up a stink about it. You’d better keep out of the way. You know what happens when you start interfering in things.’

  ‘Never mind that now. Have you any recollection of a Miss Snaith who lived near you?’

  ‘Snaith? Snaith? Oh, yes, I know. Eccentric old lady.’

  ‘Eccentric? How?’

  ‘Oh, terrified of being murdered for her money. Lived in a sort of fortified grange, with damned great fierce mastiff dogs all over the shop. Died a short while ago. Why?’

  ‘Did you ever meet her?’

  ‘Oh, once or twice. Never really knew her. But what – ’

  ‘What sort of things was she interested in?’

  ‘Interested in? Well – education, I believe. Oh, and she was always writing a lot of trashy books about spiritualism. Don’t know if she ever published them. Hope not. But she was terrified of dying – particularly of getting herself murdered – and I suppose it consoled her to think there was an after-life. Though I must say, if I’m going to come back after I’m dead and spell out idiotic messages on ouija boards, I’d rather not know about it beforehand.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Well, she was really quite a nice old thing, and very sensitive to kindness. But as I say, she was terrified people wanted to kill her. The only person she really trusted was some solicitor fellow – ’

  ‘Rosseter?’

  ‘Come to think of it, that was the name. But look here, why – ’

  ‘I suppose there’s no doubt her death was an accident?’

  ‘Lord, no. Run over by a bus. She just walked into it – there was no one else anywhere near her. You can imagine that, in view of the circumstances, we investigated pretty carefully.’

  ‘Did she travel about much?’

  ‘No, never – that was another odd thing. Stuck in Oxford all her life. Strange bird. By the way, Gervase about Measure for Measure – ’

  Fen rang off. He was not prepared to discuss Measure for Measure at the moment. While he was considering what he had learned the bell rang in the call-box, and he lifted the receiver.

  ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Yes, this is Fen. Oh, it’s you, Evans. You’ve been quick.’

  ‘Traced it easily,’ said the disembodied spokesman of Somerset House. ‘Elizabeth Ann Snaith, “Valhalla”, Boar’s Hill, Oxford. Will dated August 13th, 1937, and witnessed by R. A. Starkey and Jane Lee. Estate £937,642 – tidy packet. Personalty, £740,760. A few small bequests – to servants, I imagine – but the bulk of it goes to “my niece, Emilia Tardy”, with a lot of queer provisions about advertising for her only in English papers, not communicating direct, and Lord knows what gallimaufry of rubbish. Oh, and a time limit of six months after the Snaith’s death to claim the bequest. Looks as if she was doing everything she could to prevent the miserable Tardy woman getting her paws on the money.’

  ‘And what happens if she doesn’t claim it?’

  It the other end there was a pause. ‘Half a tick, it’s over the page. Ah, yes. In that case, it all goes to a Mr Aaron Rosseter, of 193A Cornmarket, Oxford. Lucky devil. That’s all, I think.’

  ‘Ah.’ Fen was thoughtful. ‘Thanks, Evans. Thanks very much.’

  ‘Any time,’ said that official ‘Give my love to Oxford.’ He rang off.

  Outside the call-box, Fen stood for a minute, and considered. The guests of the hotel drifted past him, stopping to ask the porter for timetables, taxis, newspapers. Ridley dealt with them with practised competence. In the diningroom the tables were being laid for lunch, and the head waiter was checking off reservations from a list pencilled on the back of a menu.

  Unquestionably, Mr Rosseter had a very good motive for murdering Miss Emilia Tardy. If he was only one of the executors of the will, he would have had no chance of cheating Miss Tardy out of her inheritance by failing to advertise for her. So when, in fact, she appeared … Fen shook his head. It didn’t really fit. For one thing, it was scarcely conceivable that Miss Snaith should have put such extraordinary powers into Mr Rosseter’s hands, however much she trusted him; for another, if Mr Rosseter had murdered Miss Tardy and knocked Cadogan on the head, why had he not recognized him, or, if he had, why had he been so extremely informative? Of course it was not necessarily the murderer who had knocked Cadogan on the head; possibly an accomplice … But, then, why the toyshop?

  Fen sighed deeply and patted the book he was carrying. His spirits were extremely volatile, and at the moment he felt a trifle depressed. He waved to Ridley and went back to the bar. Cadogan and Mr Sharman had reached a conversational impasse; Mr Sharman had by now voided the whole of his views on Jane Austen, and Cadogan could not think of any fresh topic. At present, however, Fen was intent on avoiding them; he addressed himself, instead, to the melancholy, raw-boned Mr Hoskins.

  Mr Hoskins was not in any way a troublesome undergraduate: he did his work with efficiency if not zeal, refrained from drunkenness and comported himself in a gentlemanly manner. His only remarkable c
haracteristic was the unfailing spell which he appeared to cast upon young women. At the moment he was sitting before his second small glass of pale sherry and urging black-haired Miriam to the further consumption of chocolates.

  Excusing himself to the girl, who gazed up at him with a kind of holy awe, Fen got Mr Hoskins outside.

  ‘Mr Hoskins,’ said Fen with mild severity. ‘I shall not inquire why you are devoting the golden hours of your youth to the illegal consumption of sherry in that imitation of Chartres Cathedral – ’

  ‘I’m much obliged to you, sir,’ said Mr Hoskins without any special perturbation of spirit.

  ‘I only wish to ask,’ Fen proceeded, ‘if you will do me a service.’

  Mr Hoskins blinked and silently bowed.

  ‘Are you interested in the novels of Jane Austen, Mr Hoskins?’

  ‘It has always appeared to me, sir,’ said Mr Hoskins, ‘that the women characters are poorly drawn.’

  ‘Well, you should know,’ said Fen, grinning. ‘Anyway, there’s a dreary, sordid fellow in there who has a passion for Jane Austen. Could you keep him here for an hour or so?’

  ‘Nothing easier,’ said Mr Hoskins with benign self-assurance. ‘Though I think perhaps I had better go and pack my young woman off first.’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ said Fen hastily.

  Mr Hoskins bowed again, returned to the bar, and shortly reappeared, shepherding Miriam with soothing explanations to the door. There he pressed her hand warmly, waved after her, and returned to Fen.

  ‘Tell me, Mr Hoskins,’ said Fen, seized by a sudden disinterested curiosity, ‘how do you explain your extraordinary attraction for women? Don’t answer if you think I’m being impertinent.’

  ‘Not at all.’ Mr Hoskins conveyed the impression that he found this query most gratifying. ‘It’s really very simple: I quieten their fears and give them sweet things to eat. It seems never to fail.’