命案目睹记13
时间：2025-10-20 07:18:04
（单词翻译:单击）
II
“I’m sorry, very sorry—to have asked this of you,” said Inspector Bacon.
His hand under her arm, he led Emma Crackenthorpe out of the barn.
Emma’s face was very pale, she looked sick, but she walked firmly erect.
“I’m quite sure that I’ve never seen the woman before in my life.”
“We’re very grateful to you, Miss Crackenthorpe. That’s all I wanted to
know. Perhaps you’d like to lie down?”
“I must go to my father. I telephoned Dr. Quimper as soon as I heard
about this and the doctor is with him now.”
Dr. Quimper came out of the library as they crossed the hall. He was a
tall genial man, with a casual offhand cynical manner that his patients
found very stimulating.
He and the inspector nodded to each other.
“Miss Crackenthorpe has performed an unpleasant task very bravely,”
said Bacon.
“Well done, Emma,” said the doctor, patting her on the shoulder. “You
can take things. I’ve always known that. Your father’s all right. Just go in
and have a word with him, and then go into the dining room and get your-
self a glass of brandy. That’s a prescription.”
Emma smiled at him gratefully and went into the library.
“That woman’s the salt of the earth,” said the doctor, looking after her.
“A thousand pities she’s never married. The penalty of being the only fe-
male in a family of men. The other sister got clear, married at seventeen, I
believe. This one’s quite a handsome woman really. She’d have been a
success as a wife and mother.”
“Too devoted to her father, I suppose,” said Inspector Bacon.
“She’s not really as devoted as all that—but she’s got the instinct some
women have to make their menfolk happy. She sees that her father likes
being an invalid, so she lets him be an invalid. She’s the same with her
brothers. Cedric feels he’s a good painter, what’s his name — Harold —
knows how much she relies on his sound judgment—she lets Alfred shock
her with his stories of his clever deals. Oh, yes, she’s a clever woman—no
fool. Well, do you want me for anything? Want me to have a look at your
corpse now Johnstone has done with it” (Johnstone was the police sur-
geon) “and see if it happens to be one of my medical mistakes?”
“I’d like you to have a look, yes, Doctor. We want to get her identified. I
suppose it’s impossible for old Mr. Crackenthorpe? Too much of a strain?”
“Strain? Fiddlesticks. He’d never forgive you or me if you didn’t let him
have a peep. He’s all agog. Most exciting thing that’s happened to him for
fifteen years or so—and it won’t cost him anything!”
“There’s nothing really much wrong with him then?”
“He’s seventy-two,” said the doctor. “That’s all, really, that’s the matter
with him. He has odd rheumatic twinges—who doesn’t? So he calls it arth-
ritis. He has palpitations after meals—as well he may—he puts them down
to ‘heart.’ But he can always do anything he wants to do! I’ve plenty of pa-
tients like that. The ones who are really ill usually insist desperately that
they’re perfectly well. Come on, let’s go and see this body of yours. Un-
pleasant, I suppose?”
“Johnstone estimates she’s been dead between a fortnight and three
weeks.”
“Quite unpleasant, then.”
The doctor stood by the sarcophagus and looked down with frank curi-
osity, professionally unmoved by what he had named the “unpleasant-
ness.”
“Never seen her before. No patient of mine. I don’t remember ever see-
ing her about in Brackhampton. She must have been quite good-looking
once—hm—somebody had it in for her all right.”
They went out again into the air. Doctor Quimper glanced up at the
building.
“Found in the what—what do they call it?—the Long Barn—in a sarco-
phagus! Fantastic! Who found her?”
“Miss Lucy Eyelesbarrow.”
“Oh, the latest lady help? What was she doing, poking about in sarco-
phagi?”
“That,” said Inspector Bacon grimly, “is just what I am going to ask her.
Now, about Mr. Crackenthorpe. Will you—?”
“I’ll bring him along.”
Mr. Crackenthorpe, muffled in scarves, came walking at a brisk pace,
the doctor beside him.
“Disgraceful,” he said. “Absolutely disgraceful! I brought back that sar-
cophagus from Florence in—let me see—it must have been in 1908—or
was it 1909?”
“Steady now,” the doctor warned him. “This isn’t going to be nice, you
know.”
“No matter how ill I am, I’ve got to do my duty, haven’t I?”
A very brief visit inside the Long Barn was, however, quite long enough.
Mr. Crackenthorpe shuffled out into the air again with remarkable speed.
“Never saw her before in my life!” he said. “What’s it mean? Absolutely
disgraceful. It wasn’t Florence—I remember now—it was Naples. A very
fine specimen. And some fool of a woman has to come and get herself
killed in it!”
He clutched at the folds of his overcoat on the left side.
“Too much for me… My heart… Where’s Emma? Doctor….”
Doctor Quimper took his arm.
“You’ll be all right,” he said. “I prescribe a little stimulant. Brandy.”
They went back together towards the house.
“Sir. Please, sir.”
Inspector Bacon turned. Two boys had arrived, breathless, on bicycles.
Their faces were full of eager pleading.
“Please, sir, can we see the body?”
“No, you can’t,” said Inspector Bacon.
“Oh, sir, please, sir. You never know. We might know who she was. Oh,
please, sir, do be a sport. It’s not fair. Here’s a murder, right in our own
barn. It’s the sort of chance that might never happen again. Do be a sport,
sir.”
“Who are you two?”
“I’m Alexander Eastley, and this is my friend James Stoddart-West.”
“Have you ever seen a blonde woman wearing a light-coloured dyed
squirrel coat anywhere about the place?”
“Well, I can’t remember exactly,” said Alexander astutely. “If I were to
have a look—”
“Take ’em in, Sanders,” said Inspector Bacon to the constable who was
standing by the barn door. “One’s only young once!”
“Oh, sir, thank you, sir.” Both boys were vociferous. “It’s very kind of
you, sir.”
Bacon turned away towards the house.
“And now,” he said to himself grimly, “for Miss Lucy Eyelesbarrow!”
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