Lesson 4. & chapter seven; an escape from death

& Chapter Seven; AN ESCAPE FROM DEATH

Driving her large green Bentley, Frankie drew up to the curb outside a large old-fashioned house over the doorway of which was inscribed St. Asaph's.* Frankie jumped out and, turning, extracted a large bunch of lilies. Then she rang the bell. A woman in nurse's dress answered the door.

" Can I see Mr. Jones? " inquired Frankie.

The nurse's eyes took in the Bentley, the lilies, and Frankie with intense interest.

" What name shall I say? "

" Lady Frances Derwent."

The nurse was thrilled, and her patient went up in her estimation. She guided Frankie upstairs into a room on the " first floor.

" You've a visitor to see you, Mr. Jones. Now who do you think it is? Such a nice surprise for you."

All this in the 'bright' manner usual to nursing homes.

" Gosh! " said Bobby, very much surprised. " If it isn't Frankie! "

" Hullo, Bobby. I've brought the visual flowers. Rather a graveyard suggestion about them, but the choice was limited."

" Ooh, Lady Frances, " said the nurse, 'they're lovely. I'll put them into water." She left the room.

Frankie sat down in an obvious 'visitor's' chair. " Well, Bobby, " she said. " What's all this? "

" You may well ask, " said Bobby. " I'm the complete sensation of this place. Eight grains of morphia, no less. They're going to write about me in the Lancet* and the B.M.J"

" What's the B.M.J.? ” interrupted Frankie.

" The British Medical Journal."

" All right. Go ahead. Rattle off some more initials."

" Do you know, my girl, that half a grain is a fatal dose? I ought to be dead about sixteen times over. It's true that recovery has been known after sixteen grains —still, eight is pretty good, don't you think? I'm the hero of this place. They've never had a case like me before."

" How nice for them! "

" Isn't it? Gives them something to talk about to all the other patients."

The nurse re-entered, bearing lilies in vases.

" It's true, isn't it, nurse? " demanded Bobby. " You've never had a case like mine? "

" Oh, you oughtn't to be here at all, " said the nurse. " In the churchyard, you ought to be. But it's only the good die young, they say." She giggled at her own wit and went out.

" There you are, " said Bobby. " You'll see, I shall be famous all over England."

He continued to talk. Any signs of inferiority complex that he had displayed at his last meeting with Frankie had now quite disappeared. He took a firm and egoistical pleasure in recounting every detail of his case.

" That's enough, " said Frankie, quelling him. " I don't really care terribly for stomach pumps. To listen to you one would think nobody had ever been poisoned before."

" Jolly few have been poisoned with eight grains of morphia and got over it, " Bobby pointed out. " Dash it all, you're not sufficiently impressed."

" Pretty sickening for the people who poisoned you, " said Frankie.

" I know. Waste of perfectly good morphia."

" It was in the beer, wasn't it? "

" Yes. You see, someone found me sleeping like the dead, tried to wake me and couldn't. Then they got alarmed, carried t me to a farmhouse, and sent for a doctor —-"

" I know all the next part, " said Frankie hastily.

" At first they had the idea that I'd taken the stuff deliberately. Then when they heard my story, they went off and looked for the beer bottle and found it where I'd thrown it and had it analyzed — the dregs of it were quite enough for that apparently."

" No clue as to how the morphia got in the bottle? "

" None whatever. They've interviewed the pub where I bought it, and opened other bottles, and everything's been quite all right."

" Someone must have put the stuff in the beer while you were asleep? "

" That's it. I remember that the paper across the top* wasn't still sticking properly."

Frankie nodded thoughtfully. " Well, " she said, " it shows that what I said in the train that day was quite right."

" What did you say? "

" That that man — Pritchard — had been pushed over the cliff."

" That wasn't in the train. You said that at the station, " said Bobby feebly.

" Same thing."

" But why—"

" Darling — it's obvious. Why should anyone want to put you out of the way? You're not the heir to a fortune or anything."

" I may be. Some greataunt I've never heard of in New Zealand or somewhere may have left me all her money."

" Nonsense. Not without knowing you. And if she didn't know you, why leave money to a fourth son? Why, in these hard times even a clergyman mightn't have a fourth son! No, it's all quite clear. No one benefits by your death, so that's ruled out. Then there's revenge. You haven't seduced a chemist's daughter by any chance? "

" Not that I can remember, " said Bobby with dignity.

" I know. One seduces so much that one can't keep count. But I should say offhand that you've never seduced anyone at all."

" You're making me blush, Frankie. And why must it be a chemist's daughter, anyway? "

" Free access to morphia. It's not so easy to get hold of morphia."

" Well, I haven't seduced a chemist's daughter."

" And you haven't got any enemies that you know of? "

Bobby shook his head.

" Well, there you are, " said Frankie triumphantly. " It must be the man who was pushed over the cliff. What do the police think? "

" They think it must have been a lunatic."

" Nonsense. Lunatics don't wander about with unlimited supplies of morphia looking for odd bottles of beer to put it into. No, somebody pushed Pritchard over the cliff. A minute or two later you come along, and he thinks you saw him do it and so determines to put you out of the way."

" I don't think that will hold water, Frankie."

" Why not? "

" Well, to begin with, I didn't see anything."

" Yes, but he didn't know that."

" And if I had seen anything I should have said so at the inquest."

" I suppose that's so, " said Frankie unwillingly. She thought for a minute or two. " Perhaps he thought you'd seen something that you didn't think was anything but which really was something. That sounds pure gibberish, but you get the idea? "

Bobby nodded. " Yes, I see what you mean, but it doesn't seem very probable somehow."

" I'm sure that cliff business had something to do with this. You were on the spot — the first person to be there —"

" Thomas was there, too, " Bobby reminded her. " And nobody's tried to poison him."

" Perhaps they're going to, " said Frankie cheerfully. " Or perhaps they've tried and failed."

" It all seems very farfetched."

" I think it's logical. If you get two out-of-the-way things happening in a stagnant pond like Marchbolt – wait - there's a third thing."

" What? "

" That job you were offered. That, of course, is quite a small thing, but it was odd, you must admit. I've never heard of a foreign firm that specialized in seeking out undistinguished ex-Naval officers."

" Did you say undistinguished? "

" You hadn't got into the B.M.J. then. But you see my point.

You've seen something you weren't meant to see — or so they — whoever they are — think. Very well. They first try to get rid of you by offering you a job abroad. Then, when that fails, they try to put you out of the way altogether."

" Isn't that rather drastic? And anyway a great risk to take? "

" Oh, but murderers are always frightfully rash. The more murders they do, the more murders they want to do."

" Like The Third Bloodstain, " * said Bobby, remembering one of his favourite works of fiction.

" Yes, and in real life, too — Smith and his wives, * and Armstrong, * and other people."

" Well, but, Frankie, what on earth is it I'm supposed to have seen? "

" That, of course, is the difficulty, " admitted Frankie. " I agree, that it can't have been the actual pushing, because you would have told about that. It must be something about the man himself. Perhaps he had a birthmark or double-jointed fingers or some stranger physical peculiarity."

" Your mind is running on Doctor Thorndyke, * I see. It couldn't be anything like that because whatever I saw the police would see as well."

" So they would. That was an idiotic suggestion. It's very difficult, isn't it? "

" It's a pleasing theory, " said Bobby. " And it makes me feel important. But all the same, I don't believe it's much more than a theory."

" I'm sure I'm right." Frankie rose. " I must be off now. Shall I come and see you again tomorrow? "

" Oh, do. The arch chatter of the nurses gets very monotonous. By the way, you're back from London very soon."

" My dear, as soon as I heard about you» I tore back. It's most exciting to have a romantically poisoned friend."

" I don't know whether morphia is so very romantic, " said Bobby reminiscently.

" Well, I'll come tomorrow. Do I kiss you or don't I? "

" It's not catching, " said Bobby encouragingly. " Then I'll do my duty to the sick thoroughly." She kissed him lightly. " See you tomorrow."

The nurse came in with Bobby's tea as she went out. " I've seen her pictures in the paper often. She's not so very like them, though. And, of course, I've seen her driving about in her car. But I've never seen her before close to, so to speak. Not a bit haughty, is she? "

" Oh, no, " said Bobby. " I should never call Frankie haughty."

" I said to Sister, I said, she's as natural as anything. Not a bit stuck-up. I said to Sister, she's just like you or me, I said."

Dissenting violently though silently from this view, Bobby returned no reply. The nurse, disappointed by his lack of response, left the room, and Bobby was left to his own thoughts. He finished his tea. Then he went over in his mind the possibilities of Frankie's amazing theory, and ended by deciding reluctantly against it. He then cast about for other distractions.

His eye was caught by the vases of lilies. Frightfully sweet of Frankie to bring him all these flowers, and of course, they were lovely, but he wished it had occurred to her to bring him a few detective stories instead. He cast his eye over the table beside him. There was a novel of Ouida's* and a copy of John Halifax, Gentleman* and last week's Marchbolt Weekly Times.* He picked up John Halifax, Gentleman.

After five minutes he put it down. To a mind nourished on The Third Bloodstain, The Case of the Murdered Archduke, and The Strange Adventure of the Florentine Dagger, Mrs. MulockCraik's* story somehow lacked pep. With a sigh he picked up last week's Weekly Times.

A moment or two later he was pressing the bell beneath his pillow with a vigor which brought a nurse into the room at a run.

" Whatever's the matter, Mr. Jones? Are you taken bad? "

" Ring up the Castle, " cried Bobby. " Tell Lady Frances she must come back here at once."

" Oh, Mr. Jones — you can't send a message like that."

" Can't I? " said Bobby. " If I were allowed to get up from this blasted bed, you'd soon see whether I could or couldn't. As it is, you've got to do it for me."

" But she'll hardly be back."

" You don't know that Bentley."

" She won't have had her tea."

" Now look here, my dear girl, " said Bobby, " don't stand there arguing with me. Ring up as I tell you. Tell her she's got to come here at once because I've got something very important to say to her."

Overborne, though unwilling, the nurse went. She took some liberties with Bobby's message. If it was no inconvenience to Lady Frances, Mr. Jones wondered if she would mind coming, as he had something he would like to say to her. But, of course, Lady Frances was not to put herself out in any way. Lady Frances replied curtly that she would come at once.

" Depend upon it, " said the nurse to her colleagues, " she's sweet on him! That's what it is."

Frankie arrived all agog. " What's this desperate summons? " she demanded.

Bobby was sitting up in bed, a bright red spot in each cheek. In his hand he waved the copy of the Marchbolt Weekly Times.

" Look at this, Frankie."

Frankie looked. " Well? " she demanded.

" This is the picture you meant when you said it was touched up but quite like the Cayman woman? " Bobby's finger pointed to a somewhat blurred reproduction of a photograph. Underneath it were the words: Portrait found on the dead man by which he was identified: Mrs. Amelia Cayman, the dead man's sister.

" That's what I said — and it's true, too. I can't see anything to rave over in it."

" No more can I."

" But you said — "

" I know I 'said.' But you see, Frankie —" Bobby's voice became very impressive — " this isn't the photograph that I put back in the dead man's pocket."

They looked at each other.

" Then, in that case —" began Frankie slowly.

" Either there must have been two photographs

" — which isn't likely —"

" — or else — "

They paused.

" That man — what's his name? " said Frankie.

" Bassington-ffrench! " said Bobby.

@ Questions and Tasks

1. Translate and learn the following words and expressions.

to escape from patient

estimation fatal

inferiority complex to get alarmed

to be a heir to a fortune revenge

to have free access to smth an enemy

to seem very farfetched to get rid of

fiction lack of smth

2. Fill in the gaps in the sentences with the necessary words from the list above.

1) The doctor said that the … had a very serious disease and it even might be ….

2) “You must … your phonetic mistakes as soon as possible” said the teacher to the student.

3) The boy fell off the roof of the house but he had a miraculous … death.

4) The poor always suffer from … money and experience the so called … when they deal with the rich.

5) The person who is … and is supposed to have a lot of money soon may have many ….

6) If you use internet you can …any information.

7) … is one of the most popular kinds of literature.

3. Choose the correct answer.

1) The hospital was called …

a) St. James’s; b) St. Asaph’s, c) St. Adam’s

2) Bobby’s surname was …

a) James; b) John; c) Jones

3) Frankie brought Bobby some…

a) violets; b) tulips; c) lilies

4) B.M.J. means …

a) The British Medicine Journal; b) The British Medical Journal; 3) The Britain Medical Journal

5) There were …grains of morphia in the bottle.

a) eight; b) six; c) seven

6) Bobby began to read …

a) the Marchbolt Weekly Times; b) the Marchbolt Weekly Magazine; c) the Melbourn Weekly Times

7) The man’s name was …

a) Barrington-ffrench; b) Bassington-french; c) Bassington-ffrench

4. Make up a dialogue describing Frankie’s visit to Bobby.

5. What kind of accident happened to Bobby?

& Chapter Eight: RIDDLE OF A PHOTOGRAPH

They stared at each other as they tried to adjust themselves to the altered situation.

" It couldn't be anyone else, " said Bobby. " He was the only person who had the chance."

" Unless, as we said, there were two photographs? "

" We agreed that that wasn't likely. If there had been two photographs they'd have tried to identify him by means of both of them — not by only one."

" Anyway, that's easily found out, " said Frankie. " We can ask the police. We'll assume for the moment that there was just the one photograph — the one you saw, that you put back again in the man's pocket. It was there when you left him, and it wasn't there when the police came. Therefore the only person who could have taken it away and put the other one in its place is this man Bassington-ffrench. What was he like, Bobby? "

Bobby frowned in the effort to remember. " A sort of nondescript fellow. Pleasant voice. A gentleman and all that. I really didn't notice him particularly. He said he was a stranger down here — and something about looking for a house."

" We can verify that, anyway, " said Frankie. " Wheeler and Owen are the only house agents." Suddenly she gave a shiver. " Bobby, have you thought? If Pritchard was pushed over — Bassington-ffrench must be the man who did it."

" That's pretty grim, " said Bobby. " He seemed such a nice, pleasant sort of fellow. But you know, Frankie, we can't be sure Pritchard really was pushed over."

" I'm quite sure! "

" You have been, all along."

" No, I j ust wanted it to be that way because it made things more exciting. But now it's more or less proved. If it was murder everything fits in. Your unexpected appearance which upsets the murderer's plans. Your discovery of the photograph and, in consequence, the need to put you out of the way."

" There's a flaw there, " said Bobby.

" Why? You were the only person who saw that photograph. As soon as Bassington-ffrench was left alone with the body he changed the photograph, which only you had seen."

But Bobby continued to shake his head. " No, that won't do. Let's grant for the moment that that photograph was so important that I had to be 'got out of the way', as you put it. Sounds absurd, but I suppose it's just possible. Well then, whatever was going to be done would have to be done at once. The fact that I went to London and never saw the Weekly Times or the other papers with the photograph in them was just pure chance — a thing nobody could count on. The probability was that I should say at once, 'That isn't the photograph I saw'. Why wait till after the inquest when everything was nicely settled? "

" There's something in that, " admitted Frankie.

" And there's another point. I can't be absolutely sure, of course, but I could almost swear that when I put the photograph back in the dead man's pocket Bassington-ffrench wasn't there. He didn't arrive till about five or ten minutes later, "

" He might have been watching you all the time, " argued Frankie.

" I don't see very well how he could have, " said Bobby slowly. " There's really only one place where you can see down to exactly the spot we were. Farther round, the cliff bulges and then recedes underneath, so that you can't see over. There's just the one place, and when Bassington-ffrench did arrive there I heard him at once. Footsteps echo down below. He may have been near at hand, but he wasn't looking over till then —that I'll swear."

" Then you think that he didn't know about your seeing the photograph? "

" I don't see how he could have known."

" And he can't have been afraid you'd seen him doing it — the murder, I mean — because, as ycu say, that's absurd. You'd never have held your tongue about it. It looks as though it must have been something else altogether."

" Only I don't see what it could have been."

" Something they didn't know about till after the inquest. I don't know why I say they — " Why not? After all, the Caymans must have been in it, too. It's probably a gang. I like gangs."

" That's a low taste, " said Frankie absently. " A single-handed murder is much higher class. Bobby! "

" Yes? "

" What was it Pritchard said just before he died? You know, you told me about it that day on the links. That funny question? "

" 'Why didn't they ask Evans? ' "

" Yes. Suppose that was it? "

" But that's ridiculous."

" It sounds so, but it might be important really. Bobby, I'm sure it's that. Oh, no, I'm being an idiot — you never told the Caymans about it."

" I did, as a matter of fact, " said Bobby slowly.

" You did? "

" Yes. I wrote to them that evening saying that, of course, it was probably quite unimportant."

" And what happened? "

" Cayman wrote back politely agreeing that, of course, there was nothing in it, but thanking me for taking the trouble. I felt rather snubbed."

" And two days later you got this letter from a strange firm bribing you to go out to South America? "

" Yes."

" Well, " said Frankie, " I don't know what more you want. They try that first. You turn it down. And the next thing is that they follow you round and seize a good moment to empty a lot of morphia into your bottle of beer."

" Then the Caymans are in it? "

" Of course the Caymans are in it! '*

" Yes, " said Bobby thoughtfully. " If your reconstruction is correct, they must be in it. According to our present theory it goes like this. Dead man X is deliberately pushed over cliff — presumably by B.F. Pardon the initials. It is important that X should not be correctly identified, so the portrait of Mrs. С is put in his pocket and the portrait of Fair Unknown removed. Who was she, I wonder? "

" Keep to the point, " said Frankie sternly.

" Mrs. C. waits for the photograph to appear. Then turns up as grief stricken sister and identifies X as her brother from foreign parts."

" You don't believe he could really have been her brother? "

" Not for a moment! You know, it puzzled me all along. The Caymans were a different class altogether. The dead man was — well, it sounds a most awful thing to say and just like some deadly old retired Anglo-Indian — but the dead man was a pukka sahib."

" And the Caymans emphatically weren't? "

" Most emphatically."

" And then, just when everything has gone off well from the Caymans' point of view — body successfully identified, verdict of accidental death, everything in the garden lovely* — you come along and mess things up, " mused Frankie.

" 'Why didn't they ask Evans? ''" Bobby repeated the phrase thoughtfully. " You know I can't see what on earth there can be in that to put the wind up anybody." *

" Ah! That's because you don't know. It's like making crossword puzzles. You write down a clue and you think it's too idiotically simple and that everyone will guess it straight off, and you're frightfully surprised when they simply can't get it in the least. Why didn't they ask Evans? ' must have been a most frightfully significant phrase to them, and they couldn't realize that it meant nothing at all to you."

" More fools they."

" Oh, quite so. But it's just possible they thought that if Pritchard said that, he might have said something more which would also recur to you in due time- Anyway, they weren't going to take chances. You were safer out of the way."

" They took a lot of risk. Why didn't they engineer another 'accident'? "

" No, no. That would have been stupid. Two accidents within a week of each other? It might have suggested a connection between the two, and then people would have begun inquiring into the first one. No, I think there's a kind of bald simplicity about their method which is really rather clever."

" And yet you said just now that morphia wasn't easy to get hold of."

" No more it is. You have to sign poison books and things.* Oh — of course, that's a clue! Whoever did it had easy access to supplies of morphia."

" A doctor, a hospital nurse, or a chemist, " suggested Bobby.

" Well, I was thinking more of illicitly imported drugs."

" You can't mix up too many different sorts of crime, " said Bobby.

" You see, the strong point would be the absence of motive. Your death doesn't benefit anyone. So what will the police think? "

" A lunatic, " said Bobby. " And that's what they do think."

" You see? It's awfully simple really."

Bobby began to laugh suddenly.

" What's amusing you? "

" Just the thought of how sick-making it must be for them! All that morphia — enough to kill five or six people — and here I am alive and kicking."

" One of Life's little ironies that one can't foresee, " agreed Frankie.

" The question is, what do we do next? " said Bobby practically.

" Oh, lots of things, " said Frankie promptly.

" Such as? "

" Well — finding out about the photograph -— that there was only one, not two. And about Bassington-ffrench's house hunting."

" That will probably be quite all right and aboveboard."

" Why do you say that? "

" Look here, Frankie, think a minute. Bassington-ffrench must be above suspicion. He must be all clear and aboveboard. Not only must there be nothing to connect him in any way with the dead man, but he must have a proper reason for being down here. He may have invented house-hunting on the spur of the moment, but I bet he carried out something of the kind. There must be no suggestion of a 'mysterious stranger seen in the neighborhood of the accident'. I fancy that Bassington-ffrench is his real name, and that he's the sort of person who would be quite above suspicion."

" Yes, " said Frankie thoughtfully. " That's a very good deduction. There will be nothing whatever to connect Bassington-ffrench with Alex Pritchard. Now if we knew who the dead man really was —"

" Ah! Then it might be different."

" So it was very important that the body should not be recognized. Hence all the Cayman camouflage. And yet it was taking a big risk."

" You forget that Mrs. Cayman identified him as soon as was humanly possible. After that, even if there had been pictures of him in the papers — you know how blurry these things are — people would only say, 'Curious, this man Pritchard who fell over a cliff is really extraordinarily like Mr. X'.

" There must be more to it than that, " * said Frankie shrewdly. " X must have been a man who wouldn't easily be missed. I mean, he couldn't have been the sort of family man whose wife or relations would go to the police at once and report him missing."

" Good for you, Frankie. No, he must have been just going abroad, or perhaps just comeback. He was marvelously tanned, like a big-game hunter — he looked that sort of person, and he can't have had any very near relations who knew all about his movements."

" We're deducing beautifully, " said Frankie. " I hope we're not deducing all wrong."

" Very likely, " said Bobby. " But I think what we've said so far is fairly sound sense — granted, that is, the wild improbability of the whole thing."

Frankie waved away the wild improbability with an airy gesture. " The thing is — what to do next? " she said. " It seems to me we've got three angles of attack."

" Go on, Sherlock." *

" The first is you. They've made one attempt on your life. They'll probably try again. This time we might get what they call a 'line* on them. Using you as a decoy, I mean."

" No, thank you, Frankie, " said Bobby with feeling. " I've been very lucky this time, but I mightn't be so lucky again if they changed the attack to a blunt instrument. I was thinking of taking a great deal of care of myself in the future. The decoy idea can be washed out."

" I was afraid you'd say that, " said Frankie with a sigh. " Young men are sadly degenerate nowadays. Father says so. They don't enjoy being uncomfortable and doing dangerous and unpleasant things any longer. It's a pity."

" A great pity, " said Bobby, but he spoke with firmness. " What's the second plan of campaign? "

" Working from the 'Why didn't they ask Evans? ' clue, " said Frankie. " Presumably the dead man came down here to see Evans — whoever he was. Now, if we could find Evans —"

" How many Evanses, " Bobby interrupted, " do you think there are in Marchbolt? " *

" Several hundred, I should think, " admitted Frankie.

" At least! We might do something that way, but I'm rather doubtful."

" We could list all the Evanses and visit the likely ones."

" And ask them — what? "

" That's the difficulty, " said Frankie.

" We need to know a little more, " said Bobby. " Then that idea of yours might come in useful. What's Number Three? "

" This man Bassington-ffrench. There we have got something tangible to go upon. It's an uncommon name. I'll ask Father. He knows all these county family names and their various branches."

" Yes, " said Bobby, " we might do something that way."

" At any rate we are going to do something? "

" Of course we are. Do you think I'm going to be given eight grains of morphia and do nothing about it? "

" That's the spirit! " said Frankie.

" And besides that, " added Bobby, " there's the indignity of the stomach pump to be washed out."

" That's enough, " said Frankie. " You'll be getting morbid and indecent again if I don't stop you."

" You have no true womanly sympathy, " Bobby retorted.

@ Questions and Tasks

1. Make a list of about 10 new words and expressions from the chapter.

2. Act as a teacher: write down the words you have chosen on the blackboard, prepare two tasks based on these words for your fellow students to fulfill.

3. Why is the chapter called ‘Riddle of a Photograph’?

4. What suppositions did Frankie and Bobby make about the death of the unknown man and Bobbie’s accident?

5. Make up a summary of the chapter.