Free Death at the Chase by Michael Innes Page B

drive, after all. I think it’s just the thing. A gentleman can always drop in on another gentleman with a dozen bottles of wine. It’s always happening to my father.’ Finn looked gratefully at Judith. ‘A first-rate notion. We’ll get hold of the stuff in the morning.’
    ‘I think–’ Appleby began – and then checked himself and said something else. Why should he say disillusioning things about Château Lafite to these cheerful young idiots? ‘I think,’ he said gravely, ‘that you will find a reputable licensed grocer next door to the post-office in Linger.’
    ‘Then that’s fine!’ A blessed moment had come, for Finn was on his feet – and plainly with the intention of shoving Giles Ashmore out of the house. ‘We’ll collect the stuff in the morning, and push the whole thing through. Giles, that’s right?’
    Perhaps because he was advancing politely upon Lady Appleby, Giles Ashmore for a moment made no reply. But when he spoke, it was with surprising decision.
    ‘The whole thing,’ he said. ‘We’ll push it through.’

 
     
8
     
    Appleby’s interest in the numerous Ashmores of King’s Yatter, Abbot’s Yatter, and other rural localities on the farther side of the downs was surprisingly gratified on the following day. Armed with a chain-saw, he had spent a good part of the morning coping with the impending timber crisis. On the ground was an aged and twisted oak, brought down by the October gales. Standing by – also aged and twisted, but as yet resistant to the seasons – was Hoobin, equipped with an axe and a wheelbarrow. Appleby’s task was to saw the trunk and larger branches into sections, shear away the smaller branches, and pause every now and then to take up a second axe and help his assistant to catch up with the cleaving. Every now and then, also, Hoobin would load the barrow with the logs and amble off to the wood-shed. It was on his return from one of these missions that he paused, eyed with critical appraisal his employer’s manipulation of the chain-saw, and then drew from a pocket an enormous silver watch.
    ‘Gone eleven,’ Hoobin said above the uproar of the saw.
    ‘What of it?’ It had to be admitted that Hoobin’s age asked ease, and in this interest he had in fact spent a placid quarter of an hour with a pipe some time after ten o’clock.
    ‘Doctor Verity do go out on his rounds come eleven.’ Hoobin spoke with gloomy satisfaction. ‘And there be times when only haste will serve.’
    ‘No doubt.’ With what he was conscious of as foolish bravado, Appleby performed an intricate manoeuvre with the chain-saw. It was an implement the lethal potentialities of which it would be rash to question. But that Hoobin should be rapt in a gratifying inward vision of an amputated and writhing employer was faintly disagreeable even to one well-acquainted with the harmless vagaries of the rustic mind. So Appleby attempted distraction. ‘Hoobin,’ he asked, ‘have you any acquaintance over at the Yatters?’
    Hoobin put down his axe. Although not to be described as of a conversible habit, he was not averse to talk when he judged it not compatible with labour.
    ‘My brother Alfred,’ Hoobin said, ‘has worked for Farmer Blowbody – at Low Yatter, that be – these forty year. And these forty year have I heard never a report on him.’
    ‘You’ve heard nothing of a brother in a neighbouring parish, as it almost is, for forty years?’
    Some slight note of surprise in Appleby’s voice perhaps offended Hoobin, for he remained broodingly silent (without however taking up his axe) for a full minute. And then he spoke.
    ‘Words passed,’ Hoobin said.
    ‘I’m very sorry to hear it. Is Alfred married, and with a family? It seems a pity you shouldn’t make it up.’
    Hoobin was again silent for a space – plainly to mark his scorn of this flaccid suggestion. He then condescended to take up the question that had preceded it.
    ‘A wife there be, and childer too. But none