登陆注册
5291000000042

第42章 VI. THE HOLE IN THE WALL(7)

"What are you doing with that?" he asked. "Seems to be a woodman's chopper.""A natural association of ideas," observed Horne Fisher. "If you meet a cat in a wood you think it's a wildcat, though it may have just strolled from the drawing-room sofa. As a matter of fact, I happen to know that is not the woodman's chopper. It's the kitchen chopper, or meat ax, or something like that, that somebody has thrown away in the wood. I saw it in the kitchen myself when I was getting the potato sacks with which I reconstructed a mediaeval hermit.""All the same, it is not without interest," remarked the prince, holding out the instrument to Fisher, who took it and examined it carefully. "A butcher's cleaver that has done butcher's work.""It was certainly the instrument of the crime,"assented Fisher, in a low voice.

Brain was staring at the dull blue gleam of the ax head with fierce and fascinated eyes. "I don't understand you," he said. "There is no--there are no marks on it.""It has shed no blood," answered Fisher, "but for all that it has committed a crime. This is as near as the criminal came to the crime when he committed it.""What do you mean?"

"He was not there when he did it," explained Fisher. "It's a poor sort of murderer who can't murder people when he isn't there.""You seem to be talking merely for the sake of mystification," said Brain. "If you have any practical advice to give you might as well make it intelligible.""The only practical advice I can suggest," said Fisher, thoughtfully, "is a little research into local topography and nomenclature. They say there used to be a Mr. Prior, who had a farm in this neighborhood. I think some details about the domestic life of the late Mr. Prior would throw a light on this terrible business.""And you have nothing more immediate than your topography to offer," said Brain, with a sneer, "to help me avenge my friend?""Well," said Fisher, "I should find out the truth about the Hole in the Wall."That night, at the close of a stormy twilight and under a strong west wind that followed the breaking of the frost, Leonard Crane was wending his way in a wild rotatory walk round and round the high, continuous wall that inclosed the little wood. He was driven by a desperate idea of solving for himself the riddle that had clouded his reputation and already even threatened his liberty. The police authorities, now in charge of the inquiry, had not arrested him, but he knew well enough that if he tried to move far afield he would be instantly arrested. Horne Fisher's fragmentary hints, though he had refused to expand them as yet, had stirred the artistic temperament of the architect to a sort of wild analysis, and he was resolved to read the hieroglyph upside down and every way until it made sense. If it was something connected with a hole in the wall he would find the hole in the wall; but, as a matter of fact, he was unable to find the faintest crack in the wall. His professional knowledge told him that the masonry was all of one workmanship and one date, and, except for the regular entrance, which threw no light on the mystery, he found nothing suggesting any sort of hiding place or means of escape.

Walking a narrow path between the winding wall and the wild eastward bend and sweep of the gray and feathery trees, seeing shifting gleams of a lost sunset winking almost like lightning as the clouds of tempest scudded across the sky and mingling with the first faint blue light from a slowly strengthened moon behind him, he began to feel his head going round as his heels were going round and round the blind recurrent barrier. He had thoughts on the border of thought; fancies about a fourth dimension which was itself a hole to hide anything, of seeing everything from a new angle out of a new window in the senses; or of some mystical light and transparency, like the new rays of chemistry, in which he could see Bulmer's body, horrible and glaring, floating in a lurid halo over the woods and the wall. He was haunted also with the hint, which somehow seemed to be equally horrifying, that it all had something to do with Mr. Prior. There seemed even to be something creepy in the fact that he was always respectfully referred to as Mr. Prior, and that it was in the domestic life of the dead farmer that he had been bidden to seek the seed of these dreadful things. As a matter of fact, he had found that no local inquiries had revealed anything at all about the Prior family.

The moonlight had broadened and brightened, the wind had driven off the clouds and itself died fitfully away, when he came round again to the artificial lake in front of the house. For some reason it looked a very artificial lake; indeed, the whole scene was like a classical landscape with a touch of Watteau; the Palladian facade of the house pale in the moon, and the same silver touching the very pagan and naked marble nymph in the middle of the pond. Rather to his surprise, he found another figure there beside the statue, sitting almost equally motionless; and the same silver pencil traced the wrinkled brow and patient face of Horne Fisher, still dressed as a hermit and apparently practicing something of the solitude of a hermit. Nevertheless, he looked up at Leonard Crane and smiled, almost as if he had expected him.

同类推荐
  • 明伦汇编人事典形貌部

    明伦汇编人事典形貌部

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 续词余丛话

    续词余丛话

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 佛说国王不黎先尼十梦经

    佛说国王不黎先尼十梦经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 神异典二氏部汇考

    神异典二氏部汇考

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 太上混元老子史略

    太上混元老子史略

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 舍得的人生收获多

    舍得的人生收获多

    本书道出了智慧之人的舍得之道,也写出了愚鲁之人的失败教训,用简单的哲理道出了“舍得”的内涵,并揭示出舍得之道对于人生发展的重要影响。
  • 仙道我为首

    仙道我为首

    融合地球凡人与仙道大能的灵魂,徐枫重生归来,发誓一扫前身因果,再追仙道长生!(一言不合就扮猪吃虎,装逼打脸的修仙爽文)书友群:666763307
  • 死影师之瘟疫

    死影师之瘟疫

    “我欲为遗表,惟庸在,无益也。惟庸败后,上必思我,有所问,以是密奏之。”——刘基明洪武八年,四月,御史中丞刘基刘伯温因病逝于青田。后因世人对其死因纷纷深表怀疑,帝遂令右丞相胡惟庸彻查此事。同年十二月,参与为刘基诊病的三名太医涉嫌毒害御史中丞刘伯温,获罪问斩,但因事先走漏风声,其中一名夤夜离京,遂不知所终。
  • 第100次拒婚:不嫁腹黑老公

    第100次拒婚:不嫁腹黑老公

    什么温文儒雅,什么风度翩翩,全都是骗人的,这分明就是一头无比腹黑的大尾巴狼!!!可偏偏就有她这样的傻瓜,傻乎乎地把自己送到狼的餐桌上……六年后再次相遇,喂,男人,你要不要这么公报私仇?不要以为你是上司就可以为所欲为……某男摸着下巴:为所欲为?我觉得我已经很收敛了……某女气急败坏,“喂,你这是骗婚!”某腹黑男,笑的一脸愉悦,“不骗可以婚么?”一场精细谋划的游戏,到底是谁入了谁的局?
  • 洞玄灵宝课中法

    洞玄灵宝课中法

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 元经

    元经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 口袋传说

    口袋传说

    林飞是一名看似普通的高二学生,在一次事件过后,对同学林庆濠说出了自己的真实身份……不久,林飞的女友艾伦找到了林飞…………从那以后,林飞卷入了一次又一次的事件中。甚至还牵扯到银河团的惊天阴谋!最终,林飞做出了一个令人惊讶的决定……本作书友群:801242887
  • 我在火影当忍者

    我在火影当忍者

    带着游戏职业系统重生火影世界,成为超级忍者,拥有无尽的查克拉,了解忍者世界的真实,登上忍者世界的顶端改变忍者世界成为忍者之神。
  • 破局

    破局

    1970年代早春的盐阜大地与中国许多地方一样正从沉睡中慢慢苏醒过来,经历了一个个漫长的冬季,许多人已经习惯了一种生活方式,那就是工作听从个人安排,生活画地为牢,不敢越雷池一步,阶级论,成分论,向贫下中农学习论等等,现在看来无法想象的奇思怪论都已经结为同盟,成为一种司空见惯的约束机制。本书为长篇报告文学,小说以主人公殷广平为线索,讲述了主人公从一个知青到最后在教育事业上有所成就的故事,体现了当时的时代背景和国家的教育事业发展。
  • 胜在制度赢在执行

    胜在制度赢在执行

    制度是管理的法宝,是企业成功的基石,而用制度进行管理则是企业成长壮大的推动力。正如阿里巴巴董事长马云所说,三流的点子加上一流的执行,强于一流的点子加上三流的执行。执行力是决定团队成败和企业兴衰的关键。星巴克、麦当劳全世界开花,其经营手段和管理制度曝光于大庭广众之下,却没有哪一家企业能与之争锋。分析发现这些企业成功的关键原因在于它们的员工拥有超强的执行力。《胜在制度赢在执行》用创新的理论、经典的案例以及全新的视角,诠释制度与执行的关系,点击执行的现实意义,探寻执行不力的根源,并传递出这样的工作理念:执行是推动企业发展的力量源泉。是促进企业腾飞的助力器。