弄假成真8
时间：2025-03-03 03:21:06
（单词翻译:单击）
Eight
old father. I daresay she’s spoke2 sharp to the girl once or twice and now she’s feeling bad about it.
Not that girls mind what their mothers say to them. Drops off ’em like water off a duck’s back.”
The inspector was slightly startled by the sight of Mrs. Oliver. He had not expected anything so
voluminous, so purple and in such a state of emotional disturbance5.
“I feel awful,” said Mrs. Oliver, sinking down in the chair in front of him like a purple
blancmange. “AWFUL,” she added in what were clearly capital letters.
The inspector made a few ambiguous noises, and Mrs. Oliver swept on.
“Because, you see, it’s my murder. I did it!”
For a startled moment Inspector Bland thought that Mrs. Oliver was accusing herself of the
crime.
“Why I should ever have wanted the Yugoslavian wife of an Atom Scientist to be the victim, I
well have been the second gardener who wasn’t what he seemed — and that wouldn’t have
mattered half as much because, after all, most men can look after themselves. If they can’t look
after themselves they ought to be able to look after themselves, and in that case I shouldn’t have
minded so much. Men get killed and nobody minds—I mean, nobody except their wives and
sweethearts and children and things like that.”
At this point the inspector entertained unworthy suspicions about Mrs. Oliver. This was aided
Hercule Poirot had firmly administered to his friend this sovereign remedy for shocks.
“I’m not mad and I’m not drunk,” said Mrs. Oliver, intuitively divining his thoughts, “though I
daresay with that man about who thinks I drink like a fish and says everybody says so, you
probably think so too.”
“What man?” demanded the inspector, his mind switching from the unexpected introduction of
the second gardener into the drama, to the further introduction of an unspecified man.
“Freckles and a Yorkshire accent,” said Mrs. Oliver. “But, as I say, I’m not drunk and I’m not
mad. I’m just upset. Thoroughly11 UPSET,” she repeated, once more resorting to capital letters.
“I’m sure, madam, it must have been most distressing,” said the inspector.
suppose she was—is—which should I mean?”
“There’s no question of a sex maniac,” said the inspector.
“Isn’t there?” said Mrs. Oliver. “Well, thank God for that. Or, at least, I don’t know. Perhaps
she would rather have had it that way. But if he wasn’t a sex maniac, why did anybody murder
her, Inspector?”
“I was hoping,” said the inspector, “that you could help me there.”
Undoubtedly13, he thought, Mrs. Oliver had put her finger on the crucial point. Why should
anyone murder Marlene?
“I can’t help you,” said Mrs. Oliver. “I can’t imagine who could have done it. At least, of
course, I can imagine—I can imagine anything! That’s the trouble with me. I can imagine things
now—this minute. I could even make them sound all right, but of course none of them would be
true. I mean, she could have been murdered by someone who just likes murdering girls but that’s
too easy—and, anyway, too much of a coincidence that somebody should be at this fête who
wanted to murder a girl. And how would he know that Marlene was in the boathouse? Or she
might have known some secret about somebody’s love affairs, or she may have seen someone bury
a body at night, or she may have recognized somebody who was concealing14 his identity—or she
may have known a secret about where some treasure was buried during the war. Or the man in the
launch may have thrown somebody into the river and she saw it from the window of the boathouse
—or she may even have got hold of some very important message in secret code and not known
what it was herself.”
“Please!” The inspector held up his hand. His head was whirling.
time, although it seemed to the inspector that she had already envisaged16 every possibility, likely or
otherwise. Out of the richness of the material presented to him, he seized upon one phrase.
“What did you mean, Mrs. Oliver, by the ‘man in the launch?’ Are you just imagining a man in
a launch?”
“Somebody told me he’d come in a launch,” said Mrs. Oliver. “I can’t remember who. The one
we were talking about at breakfast, I mean,” she added.
“Please.” The inspector’s tone was now pleading. He had had no idea before what the writers of
detective stories were like. He knew that Mrs. Oliver had written forty-odd books. It seemed to
him astonishing at the moment that she had not written a hundred and forty. He rapped out a
“He didn’t come in the launch at breakfast time,” said Mrs. Oliver, “it was a yacht. At least, I
don’t mean that exactly. It was a letter.”
“Well, what was it?” demanded Bland. “A yacht or a letter?”
“It was a letter,” said Mrs. Oliver, “to Lady Stubbs. From a cousin in a yacht. And she was
frightened,” she ended.
“Frightened? What of?”
“Of him, I suppose,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Anybody could see it. She was terrified of him and she
didn’t want him to come, and I think that’s why she’s hiding now.”
“Hiding?” said the inspector.
“Well, she isn’t about anywhere,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Everyone’s been looking for her. And I
think she’s hiding because she’s afraid of him and doesn’t want to meet him.”
“Who is this man?” demanded the inspector.
“You’d better ask M. Poirot,” said Mrs. Oliver. “Because he spoke to him and I haven’t. His
name’s Esteban—no, it isn’t, that was in my plot. De Sousa, that’s what his name is, Etienne de
Sousa.”
But another name had caught the inspector’s attention.
“Who did you say?” he asked. “Mr. Poirot?”
“Yes. Hercule Poirot. He was with me when we found the body.”
“Hercule Poirot…I wonder now. Can it be the same man? A Belgian, a small man with a very
big moustache?”
“An enormous moustache,” agreed Mrs. Oliver. “Yes. Do you know him?”
“You met him on a murder case?”
“Yes, I did. What’s he doing down here?”
“He was to give away the prizes,” said Mrs. Oliver.
inspector.
“And he was with you when you discovered the body,” said Bland. “H’m, I’d like to talk to
him.”
“Shall I get him for you?” Mrs. Oliver gathered up her purple draperies hopefully.
“There’s nothing more that you can add, madam? Nothing more that you think could help us in
any way?”
“I don’t think so,” said Mrs. Oliver. “I don’t know anything. As I say, I could imagine reasons
—”
The inspector cut her short. He had no wish to hear any more of Mrs. Oliver’s imagined
solutions. They were far too confusing.
“Thank you very much, madam,” he said briskly. “If you’ll ask M. Poirot to come and speak to
me here I shall be very much obliged to you.”
Mrs. Oliver left the room. P.C. Hoskins inquired with interest:
“Who’s this Monsieur Poirot, sir?”
of a Frenchman, but actually he’s a Belgian. But in spite of his absurdities23, he’s got brains. He
must be a fair age now.”
Inspector Bland did not hear the question. He was struck by a fact which, though he had been
told it several times, was only now beginning to register.
First it had been Sir George, irritated and alarmed. “My wife seems to have disappeared. I can’t
think where she has got to.” Then Miss Brewis, contemptuous: “Lady Stubbs was not to be found.
She’d got bored with the show.” And now Mrs. Oliver with her theory that Lady Stubbs was
hiding.
“Eh? What?” he asked absently.
Constable Hoskins cleared his throat.
“I was asking you, sir, if you thought there was anything in this business of de Sousa—whoever
he is.”
Constable Hoskins was clearly delighted at having a specific foreigner rather than foreigners in
the mass introduced into the case. But Inspector Bland’s mind was running on a different course.
fell back a little to allow Hercule Poirot to enter. He looked back over his shoulder with some
interest before closing the door behind him.
“I don’t suppose,” said Bland, rising and holding out his hand, “that you remember me, M.
Poirot.”
“But assuredly,” said Poirot. “It is—now give me a moment, just a little moment. It is the young
sergeant—yes, Sergeant Bland whom I met fourteen—no, fifteen years ago.”
“Quite right. What a memory!”
“Not at all. Since you remember me, why should I not remember you?”
complimentary28 reasons.
“So here you are, M. Poirot,” he said. “Assisting at a murder once again.”
“You are right,” said Poirot. “I was called down here to assist.”
“Called down to assist?” Bland looked puzzled. Poirot said quickly:
“I mean, I was asked down here to give away the prizes of this murder hunt.”
“So Mrs. Oliver told me.”
“She told you nothing else?” Poirot said it with apparent carelessness. He was anxious to
her to insist on Poirot’s journey to Devon.
“Told me nothing else? She never stopped telling me things. Every possible and impossible
“She earns her living by her imagination, mon ami,” said Poirot dryly.
“She mentioned a man called de Sousa—did she imagine that?”
“No, that is sober fact.”
“There was something about a letter at breakfast and a yacht and coming up the river in a
launch. I couldn’t make head or tail of it.”
Lady Stubbs’ headache.
“Mrs. Oliver said that Lady Stubbs was frightened. Did you think she was afraid, too?”
“That was the impression she gave me.”
“Afraid of this cousin of hers? Why?”
“I have no idea. All she told me was that he was bad—a bad man. She is, you understand, a
little simple. Subnormal.”
“Yes, that seems to be pretty generally known round here. She didn’t say why she was afraid of
this de Sousa?”
“No.”
“But you think her fear was real?”
“If it was not, then she is a very clever actress,” said Poirot dryly.
“I’m beginning to have some odd ideas about this case,” said Bland. He got up and walked
restlessly to and fro. “It’s that cursed woman’s fault, I believe.”
“Mrs. Oliver’s?”
“Yes. She’s put a lot of melodramatic ideas into my head.”
“And you think they may be true?”
“Not all of them—naturally—but one or two of them mightn’t be as wild as they sounded. It all
depends…” He broke off as the door opened to re-admit P.C. Hoskins.
“Don’t seem able to find the lady, sir,” he said. “She’s not about anywhere.”
“Sergeant Farrell and P.C. Lorimer are searching the grounds, sir,” said Hoskins. “She’s not in
the house,” he added.
“Find out from the man who’s taking admission tickets at the gate if she’s left the place. Either
on foot or in a car.”
“Yes, sir.”
Hoskins departed.
“And find out when she was last seen and where,” Bland shouted after him.
“So that is the way your mind is working,” said Poirot.
“It isn’t working anywhere yet,” said Bland, “but I’ve just woken up to the fact that a lady who
you know about what’s-his-name de Sousa.”
“He is probably still here at the fête,” he said. “Shall I tell Sir George that you want to see
him?”
“Not for a moment or two,” said Bland. “I’d like to find out a little more first. When did you
yourself last see Lady Stubbs?”
Poirot cast his mind back. He found it difficult to remember exactly. He recalled vague glimpses
people, hovering37 here and there; occasionally he would hear that strange laugh of hers, distinctive38
amongst the many other confused sounds.
“I think,” he said doubtfully, “it must have been not long before four o’clock.”
“And where was she then, and who was she with?”
“She was in the middle of a group of people near the house.”
“Was she there when de Sousa arrived?”
“I don’t remember. I don’t think so, at least I did not see her. Sir George told de Sousa that his
wife was somewhere about. He seemed surprised, I remember, that she was not judging the
Children’s Fancy Dress, as she was supposed to do.”
“What time was it when de Sousa arrived?”
“It must have been about half past four, I should think. I did not look at my watch so I cannot
tell you exactly.”
“And Lady Stubbs had disappeared before he arrived?”
“It seems so.”
“Possibly she ran away so as not to meet him,” suggested the inspector.
“Possibly,” Poirot agreed.
“Well, she can’t have gone far,” said Bland. “We ought to be able to find her quite easily, and
when we do…” He broke off.
“And supposing you don’t?” Poirot put the question with a curious intonation39 in his voice.
“That’s nonsense,” said the inspector vigorously. “Why? What d’you think’s happened to her?”
Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
“What indeed! One does not know. All one does know is that she has—disappeared!”
“Perhaps it is sinister.”
“But evidently. So—why this interest in de Sousa? Do you think he killed Marlene Tucker?”
Inspector Bland replied irrelevantly42:
“It’s that woman!”
Poirot smiled faintly.
“Mrs. Oliver, you mean?”
“Yes. You see, M. Poirot, the murder of Marlene Tucker doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t make
possible motive.”
“And Mrs. Oliver supplied you with a motive?”
“With a dozen at least! Amongst them she suggested that Marlene might have a knowledge of
somebody’s secret love affair, or that Marlene might have witnessed somebody being murdered, or
that she knew where a buried treasure was hidden, or that she might have seen from the window of
the boathouse some action performed by de Sousa in his launch as he was going up the river.”
“Ah. And which of those theories appeals to you, mon cher?”
“I don’t know. But I can’t help thinking about them. Listen, M. Poirot. Think back carefully.
Would you say from your impression of what Lady Stubbs said to you this morning that she was
afraid of her cousin’s coming because he might, perhaps, know something about her which she did
not want to come to the ears of her husband, or would you say that it was a direct personal fear of
the man himself?”
Poirot had no hesitation in his reply.
“I should say it was a direct personal fear of the man himself.”
“H’m,” said Inspector Bland. “Well, I’d better have a little talk with this young man if he’s still
about the place.”
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1
bullies
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| n.欺凌弱小者, 开球 vt.恐吓, 威胁, 欺负 | |
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2
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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3
inspector
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| n.检查员，监察员，视察员 | |
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4
bland
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| adj.淡而无味的，温和的，无刺激性的 | |
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5
disturbance
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| n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调 | |
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6
sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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7
frenzied
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| a.激怒的；疯狂的 | |
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8
asinine
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| adj.愚蠢的 | |
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9
fragrance
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| n.芬芳，香味，香气 | |
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10
wafted
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| v.吹送，飘送，（使）浮动( waft的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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11
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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12
maniac
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| n.精神癫狂的人；疯子 | |
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13
undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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14
concealing
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，遮住( conceal的现在分词 ) | |
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15
vein
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| n.血管，静脉；叶脉，纹理；情绪；vt.使成脉络 | |
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16
envisaged
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| 想像，设想( envisage的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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17
peremptory
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| adj.紧急的，专横的，断然的 | |
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18
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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19
sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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20
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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21
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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22
parody
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| n.打油诗文，诙谐的改编诗文，拙劣的模仿；v.拙劣模仿，作模仿诗文 | |
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23
absurdities
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| n.极端无理性( absurdity的名词复数 )；荒谬；谬论；荒谬的行为 | |
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24
constable
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| n.(英国)警察，警官 | |
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25
curtly
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| adv.简短地 | |
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26
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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27
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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28
complimentary
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| adj.赠送的，免费的，赞美的，恭维的 | |
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29
motives
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| n.动机，目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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30
motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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31
embarked
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| 乘船( embark的过去式和过去分词 )； 装载； 从事 | |
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32
shrugged
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| vt.耸肩（shrug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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33
irritably
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| ad.易生气地 | |
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34
premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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35
quay
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| n.码头，靠岸处 | |
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36
drooping
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| adj. 下垂的，无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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37
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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38
distinctive
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| adj.特别的，有特色的，与众不同的 | |
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39
intonation
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| n.语调，声调；发声 | |
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40
sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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41
severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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42
irrelevantly
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| adv.不恰当地，不合适地；不相关地 | |
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43
moronic
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| a.低能的 | |
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