"Mortimer, John - Rumpole A La Carte" - читать интересную книгу автора (Mortimer John)

My little sister!

Who's always been the teacher's pet?

Who took our puppy to the vet?

T That was last night and she's not home yet! * My little sister!' 'What an extraordinary song!' Hilda said when my request Performance was over.

'Yes,' I told her. 'Takes you back, doesn't it? Takes me back, yway.' en the party in the Old Salts' bar was over, Hilda slipped B-, 5 her arm through mine and led me across r the deck to the ship's rail. I feared some romantic demonstratidon and looked around for help, but the only person about seemed to be Bill Britwell, wrapped in a heavy raincoat, who was standing some way from us. It was somewhat draughty and a finec rain was falling, but there was a moon and the sound of a" distant dance band.

Hilda, apparently, drew the greatest encouragement from these facts.

'The sound of music across the water.", Stars. You and I by the rail. Finding each other... Listen, Rumpole! What do you think the Med. is trying to say to us?' 'It probably wants to tell you it's the I Bay of Biscay,' I suggested.

'Is there nothing you feel romantic aboout?' 'Of course there is.' I couldn't let: that charge go unanswered.

'There you are, you see!' Hilda was clearly pleased. 'I always thought so. What exactly?' 'Steak and kidney pudding.' I gave htier the list. 'The jury system, the presumption of innocence.' 'Anything else?' 'Oh. Of course. I almost forgot,' I reasssured her.

'Yes?' 'Wordsworth.' There was a thoughtful silence then and Hilda, like Gloria, went off down Memory Lane. 'It doesi-n't seem so very long ago,' she said, 'that I was a young girl, ;and you asked Daddy for my hand in marriage.' 'And he gave it to me!' I remembered i it well.

'Daddy was always so generous. Tell me, Rumpole. Now we're alone', Hilda started off. I'm rot sure what sort of intimate subject she was about to broachl because I had to warn her, 'But we're not alone. Look!' She turned her head and we both saw' Bill Britwell standing by the rail, staring down at the sea and aapparently involved in (, his own thoughts. Then, oblivious to ou existence, he opened his coat, under which he had concealed two silver-framed photographs, much like those Hilda had1 seen on the dressing146 table on her first visit to his cabin. He looked at them for a moment and dropped them towards the blackness of the passing sea. He turned from the rail then and walked away, not noticing Hilda and me, or Howard Swainton, who had also come out of the Old Salts' bar a few minutes before and had been watching this mysterious episode with considerable fascination. "

Time, on a cruise ship, tends to drag; watching water pass by you slowly is not the most exciting occupation in the world.

Hilda spent her time having her hair done, or her face creamed, or taking steam-baths, or being pounded to some sort of pulp in the massage parlour. I slept a good deal or walked round the deck. I was engaged in this mild exercise when I came within earshot of that indefatigable pair. Graves and Swainton, the Judge and the detective writer, who were sitting on deckchairs, drinking soup. I loitered behind a boat for a little, catching the drift of their conversation.

'Photographs?' The Judge was puzzled. 'In silver frames? and he threw them into the sea?' 'That's what it looked like.' 'But why would a man do such a thing?' 'Ask yourselves that. Members of the Jury.' I emerged and posed the question, 'Is the Court in secret session or can anyone join?' 'Ah, Rumpole. There you are.' Graves, given a case to try, seemed to be in excellent humour. 'Now then, I believe you were also a witness. Why would a man throw photographs into the sea? That is indeed the question we have to ask. And perhaps, with your long experience of the criminal classes, you can suggest a solution?' 'I'm on holiday. What Britwell did with his photographs seems entirely his own affair.' But Swainton clearly didn't Aink so. 'I can offer a solution.' He gave us one of his plots for ""thing. 'Suppose the Reverend Bill isn't a Reverend at all. I believe a lot of con men go on these cruises.' That is an entirely unfounded suggestion by the Prosecution, my Lord.' I had the automatic reaction of the life-long defender, at which moment the steward trundled the soup trolley up to me and Graves, by now well in to presiding over the upper-deck Court, said, 'Please, Mr Rumpole! Let Mr Swainton complete his submission. Your turn will come later.' 'Oh, is that soup?' I turned my attention to the steward.

'Thank you very much.' 'Suppose Bill Britwell wanted to remove all trace of the person in the photographs?' Swainton suggested.

'Two persons,' I corrected him. 'Hilda told me there were two photographs. One was Bill Britwell and his wife. The other was of a young girl. Are you suggesting he wanted to remove all trace of two people? Is that the prosecution case?' 'Please, Mr Rumpole, it hasn't come to a prosecution yet,' Graves said unconvincingly.

'His wife? This is very interesting!' Swainton yelped terrierlike after the information. 'One picture was of his wife. Now, why should he throw that into the sea?' 'God knows. Perhaps it didn't do her justice,' I suggested, and Swainton looked thoughtful and said, in a deeply meaningful sort of way, 'Or was it a symbolic act?' 'A what?' I wasn't following his drift, if indeed he had one.

'He got rid of her photograph,' Swainton did his best to explain, because he means to get rid ofher.' 'That is a most serious suggestion.' Graves greeted it with obvious relish, whilst I, slurping my soup, said, 'Balderdash, my Lord!' 'What?' The little novelist looked hurt.

'The product of a mind addled with detective stories,' I suggested.

'All right!' Swainton yapped at me impatiently. 'If you know so much, tell us this. Where do you think Mrs Mavis Britwell is? Still in bed with her clothes on?' 'Why don't you go and have a peep through the keyhole?' I suggested.

'I wasn't thinking of that, exactly. But I was thinking...' " 'Oh, do try not to,' I warned him. 'It overexcites his Lordship.' 'The steward does up the cabins along our corridor at about 148 Btei?

this time,' Swainton remembered. 'If we happened to be passing we might just see something extremely interesting.' 'You mean we might take a view?' The Judge was clearly enthusiastic and I tried to calm him down by saying,', Of the scene of a crime that hasn't been committed?' 'It's clearly our duty to investigate any sort of irregularity.' Graves was at his most self-important.

'And no doubt your delight,' I suggested.

'What did you say, Rumpole?' The Judge frowned.

'I said you're perfectly right, my Lord. And no doubt you would wish the Defence to be represented at the scene of any possible crime.' 'Have you briefed yourself, Rumpole?' Swainton gave me an unfriendly smile. I took a final gulp of soup and told him, 'I certainly have, as there's no one else to do it for me.' When we got down to the corridor outside the cabins, the trolley with clean towels and sheets was outside the Graves's residence, where work was being carried out. We loitered around, trying to look casual, and then Bill Britwell greatly helped the Prosecution by emerging from his door, which he shut carefully behind him. He looked at Graves in a startled and troubled sort of way and said, 'Oh. It's you! Good morning, Judge.' 'My dear Britwell. And how's your wife this morning?' The Judge smiled with patent insincerity, as though meaning. We certainly don't hope she's well, as that would be far too boring.