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Authors: Michael Innes
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the Parole Board. They’ve been suborned.’
This was presumably Mark Chitfield’s percurrent bad joke. His sister ignored it, and took Appleby rather engagingly by the arm.
‘I suppose they’ll be beginning with the Ancient Britons,’ she said. ‘All skin-tights and woad. When it gets to Sherwood, Sir John, you’ll be able to join in. Daddy is very hot on audience participation. Perhaps we’ll have quite a lot of it.’
Cherry Chitfield was far from being the woebegone maiden of the day before. She was in good spirits. In fact she was distinctly excited. Appleby took another glance at her attire, and found himself wondering about Tibby Fancroft, that other elusive character on the fringes of the scene. He had formed a hypothetical picture of Tibby as not among the most dominant of males, and he suspected that whatever Tibby was doing at that moment it was something Cherry had put him up to. But this was guesswork such as competent policemen never indulge in. Appleby told himself that he wasn’t at Drool Court as a competent policeman. Tommy Pride was that. He himself had come along simply as an elderly gentleman with time on his hands. But this didn’t mean that he wasn’t to ask questions when they came into his head.
‘A fête on this scale,’ he said to Mark, ‘and one with such a variety of goings-on, must take a good deal of trouble to mount. And, of course, a good deal of time as well. I suppose it’s all planned well in advance?’
‘Very definitely. My father has been devoting much of his hard-won leisure to it over the past six months. Or when he isn’t catching fish. Not that we’re sure he does catch fish. He probably employs somebody to do just that. It’s called delegating responsibility.’
‘He believes in getting everything cut and dried?’ Appleby was not to be diverted by this rather tired joke on Mark’s part.
‘Oh, yes. It all goes down on paper at the start, and everybody has to stick to it.’
‘The fancy-dress element in this present affair, for instance: it wouldn’t have been a recent afterthought?’
‘Distinctly not. I think we began to hear about it before Christmas. Wouldn’t that be right, Cherry?’
‘Yes – and then off and on ever since. It’s all rather boring, really – organizing like mad for a stupid party. Let’s put Sir John in the front row, Mark, and then see if we can find Daddy. He’ll be hearing somebody their lines at the eleventh hour, or gumming on their whiskers.’
It was with reluctance that Appleby thus found himself dumped in a position of some prominence and then left to his own devices. The auditorium, which lay in bright sunshine, was filling up. In front of it, and before the stage, a curtain hung incongruously against the sky, supported on cables slung between two beech trees. There was a buzz of talk and a smell of trodden grass. Within further curtained-off areas it was clear that numerous preparatory activities were going on, although it was improbable that they could conceal whole hordes of Ancient Britons and centuries of Romans.
‘Excuse me,’ a woman’s voice said behind Appleby’s ear, ‘but can you tell me what a romantic rescue is?’
‘A romantic rescue? I’m afraid I don’t understand you, madam.’ Appleby had turned round, and saw a middle-aged woman poring over her programme.
‘That’s what it says. “A Romantic Rescue”. Do you think it might mean Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett? I’d have thought that a little too literary – wouldn’t you? For this sort of audience, I mean.’
‘Possibly so.’
‘And not really a very central incident in English History.’
‘Certainly not that.’ This gratuitously talkative person, Appleby thought, was of a somewhat captious disposition. ‘But it’s clear that they’ve strung a very miscellaneous collection of turns together, isn’t it? People must have come along offering to put on this and that, and they’ve just imposed some vague
This was presumably Mark Chitfield’s percurrent bad joke. His sister ignored it, and took Appleby rather engagingly by the arm.
‘I suppose they’ll be beginning with the Ancient Britons,’ she said. ‘All skin-tights and woad. When it gets to Sherwood, Sir John, you’ll be able to join in. Daddy is very hot on audience participation. Perhaps we’ll have quite a lot of it.’
Cherry Chitfield was far from being the woebegone maiden of the day before. She was in good spirits. In fact she was distinctly excited. Appleby took another glance at her attire, and found himself wondering about Tibby Fancroft, that other elusive character on the fringes of the scene. He had formed a hypothetical picture of Tibby as not among the most dominant of males, and he suspected that whatever Tibby was doing at that moment it was something Cherry had put him up to. But this was guesswork such as competent policemen never indulge in. Appleby told himself that he wasn’t at Drool Court as a competent policeman. Tommy Pride was that. He himself had come along simply as an elderly gentleman with time on his hands. But this didn’t mean that he wasn’t to ask questions when they came into his head.
‘A fête on this scale,’ he said to Mark, ‘and one with such a variety of goings-on, must take a good deal of trouble to mount. And, of course, a good deal of time as well. I suppose it’s all planned well in advance?’
‘Very definitely. My father has been devoting much of his hard-won leisure to it over the past six months. Or when he isn’t catching fish. Not that we’re sure he does catch fish. He probably employs somebody to do just that. It’s called delegating responsibility.’
‘He believes in getting everything cut and dried?’ Appleby was not to be diverted by this rather tired joke on Mark’s part.
‘Oh, yes. It all goes down on paper at the start, and everybody has to stick to it.’
‘The fancy-dress element in this present affair, for instance: it wouldn’t have been a recent afterthought?’
‘Distinctly not. I think we began to hear about it before Christmas. Wouldn’t that be right, Cherry?’
‘Yes – and then off and on ever since. It’s all rather boring, really – organizing like mad for a stupid party. Let’s put Sir John in the front row, Mark, and then see if we can find Daddy. He’ll be hearing somebody their lines at the eleventh hour, or gumming on their whiskers.’
It was with reluctance that Appleby thus found himself dumped in a position of some prominence and then left to his own devices. The auditorium, which lay in bright sunshine, was filling up. In front of it, and before the stage, a curtain hung incongruously against the sky, supported on cables slung between two beech trees. There was a buzz of talk and a smell of trodden grass. Within further curtained-off areas it was clear that numerous preparatory activities were going on, although it was improbable that they could conceal whole hordes of Ancient Britons and centuries of Romans.
‘Excuse me,’ a woman’s voice said behind Appleby’s ear, ‘but can you tell me what a romantic rescue is?’
‘A romantic rescue? I’m afraid I don’t understand you, madam.’ Appleby had turned round, and saw a middle-aged woman poring over her programme.
‘That’s what it says. “A Romantic Rescue”. Do you think it might mean Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett? I’d have thought that a little too literary – wouldn’t you? For this sort of audience, I mean.’
‘Possibly so.’
‘And not really a very central incident in English History.’
‘Certainly not that.’ This gratuitously talkative person, Appleby thought, was of a somewhat captious disposition. ‘But it’s clear that they’ve strung a very miscellaneous collection of turns together, isn’t it? People must have come along offering to put on this and that, and they’ve just imposed some vague
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