Death on the Last Train (20 page)

Littlejohn had always regarded the trombone as a comic instrument, suitable for helping knockabout comedians at a music hall, or adding a vague and weighty background to a lead of cornets or strings. He changed his mind when Lambert Hiss got going.

During solos, as a rule, even by world-famed celebrities, the brass, at least, of the orchestra silently stole away and poured into the
Bishop Blaize
next door, where the landlord kept the window open on the side nearest the hall to enable them to follow the proceedings and get rid of their pints in time to appear in the orchestra again when they were due. But to-night, they all stayed in their places, much as their thirsts racked them. The landlord of the
Bishop Blaize
, himself a musician through associating with so many instrumentalists off-stage, was surprised.

“None of 'em comin' out to-night?” he said, scratching his bullet head, and looking angrily at the tankards of ale he had drawn in readiness. Through the window percolated the succulent notes of
Un Peu d' Amour.

The barmaid, elbows on the counter, eyes liquid with
sentiment answered: “Mr. 'iss is playin' his last tonight. That's 'im.”

“Why didn't you say so?”

“You 'ad a programme … ought to've known …”

The Horebers were weeping openly. Mellow as old wine, the notes of the trombone floated over their heads, out of the open doors and into the street, where passers-by stopped in the rain to listen. Lambert was playing his farewell for Bessie, and nobody knew it. Bessie thought the first piece lovely, but it moved her to no outward show of feeling. The second did the trick, however.

“Once in the dear dead days beyond recall …”

It shook the whole of the audience. A sort of pentecostal flame burned them up. Hiss was at the top of his form and his rendering brought to some memories long past, to others an intensification of existing emotions, and to those without any sentimentality at all, an asthmatic constriction of the throat and chest. The orchestra was visibly moved. One of the Horebers fainted from emotion and was hustled out by two angry companions whom she awoke from their trances of ecstacy.

Bessie Emmott broke down completely, buried her face in her handkerchief and sobbed.

“Just a song at twilight, when the lights are low, And the flickering shadows softly come and go.”

She was remembering Tim Bellis and his nights at the off-licence.

Lambert Hiss, seeing her so torn, had to turn away his head. The rising lump in his throat wouldn't do at all. It would impair his technique just as much as if you sucked a lemon before him.

The critic crossed out the pungent comment he'd made a note of, and Littlejohn sank his head on his chest in despair at the thought of what he'd got to do after the show.

“Bally Music from Fawst,” read the landlord of the
Bishop Blaize
from the programme. “None of 'em'll get out for that, dammit. Them beers'll be flat at the interval if we don't look out.”

The barmaid didn't reply. Two large tears fell on the zinc of the counter and she wiped them away with a beery thumb.

“Back's Brandyburg Concerto … Concerto?” said the landlord. “That means a couple more rounds for the brass and wood-wind,” he continued with expert knowledge. “Hope they don't all scutter back becoss Sir Gilbert's conductin'. He could shift it with the rest of 'em when he was plain Gilbert. Now, I suppose, plain beer ain't good enough …”

“
Pleese
, Mr. Prouse. I'm tryin' to listen to ‘
Just a Song at Twilight
' …”

Littlejohn left his seat at the interval merely to stretch his tortured legs. Hiss had caught his eye once or twice, and looked puzzled, but the Inspector was not greatly disturbed thereby. Hiss would not run away, of that he was sure.

Sir Gilbert Drawbell looked pleased at the thunders of clapping which welcomed him to his native town. He smiled at the audience and bowed his white head and then turned his tall, lean form to the orchestra. He nodded familiarly to them, many of them friends of his youth, and then he fixed them with a steely eye. You could feel the discipline suddenly grow tight. The individual players were welded into a body by the magic of Sir Gilbert's personality and he held them with a grip which did not slacken. He had had two rehearsals on the previous night and when he had finished with them, many of them thought they would never be able to slake their thirsts again.

“And, by the way,” he had said. “See that you're all at your desks from the start of
The Damnation
… No sitting in
The Bishop
through the Dance of the Sylphs and then shuffling back in penny numbers for the March.”

The harpist, who was the biggest soak among them, was very pleased about it. He always played The Sylphs resentfully, thinking of the brass getting in another pint.

So they were all on as the oboe gave out that beloved
tuning note and the instruments responded each after its fashion in a little inharmonious medley of sounds.

Sir Gilbert rapped on his desk like an angry woodpecker.

They went through
Damnation of Faust
like men possessed. Hearing them tripping with the Sylphs or beating out the Hungarian March you'd have thought they were an orchestra from heaven, faultless, fresh from accompanying the Eternal Choir. Who would have guessed the keen relish with which the brass were getting ready for the beer whilst the strings dealt with the Brandenburg? Listening to Lambert Hiss's tromboning as the Hungarian March crashed its way to a finish, it was as much as the Horebers could do not to rise in a body and tramp round the room in sympathy. The critic was writing. “In this death trap to the brass of an orchestra, the players, especially the tombones, used commendable restraint, bringing the whole to a masterly conculsion …”

(The misprints made by an apprentice compositor, are as they appeared in the
Clarion
later.)

General good feeling was restored by a Strauss Waltz and then Lambert Hiss finished up on a top note in the
Tannhäuser
overture. This had been specially selected for his benefit and crowned the evening.

Piling climax on climax,
Tannhäuser
had the audience spellbound before it came time for Hiss to show his mettle. Here and there he played a passage, but the finale covered him with a shower of glory.

Driving his men, lashing them to a frenzy, Sir Gilbert paved the way. Then, up went his fist, straight at Hiss, and out came the magnificent honking trombone notes, with the violins chattering like unheeded gossips in the background. Sir Gilbert ignored the rest of the orchestra and left the strings to the leader. Left hand and baton were both for Lambert Hiss, like a man conducting a solo, and through the torrent of sound the two old friends, agitated by their efforts, managed to smile. …

Sir Gilbert was deeply affected as he bowed to the applause and a great wave of pride in its two best musicians
surged over the audience, tempered with regret that this was the last of Hiss.

The conductor shook hands with Lambert, brought him to the front to bow, patted him on the back and uttered his own congratulations.

Hiss bobbed his head again, raised his eyes to the middle of the gallery and smiled. But Bessie had departed! She was one of those who like to scuffle out of an assembly before the National Anthem suspends the scramble for the doors. Then, he reeled back a pace and had Sir Gilbert not been there to give him a helping hand, would have fallen. They managed to get him to the ante-room and find a doctor in the audience.

When Littlejohn reached the side of Mr. Lambert Hiss, after battling with the cross currents of the homebound audience, they were helping him to a taxi. The doctor was taking him home to bed, for he had had a heart attack.

Littlejohn went with them.

Dr. Flanagan, of Mereton, and Littlejohn put Lambert Hiss to bed. Downstairs the women of Horeb clamoured and struggled together in a turmoil of would-be helpfulness.

“Get away the lot of ye!” yelled Flanagan at them. “The Insthpector and I'll put Mr. Hiss to bed. Now be decidin' among ye which two are going to stay and do some proper work, and the rest of ye clear out!”

Whether they drew lots or fought it out was not plain, but in due course the pack of predatory women withdrew leaving a pair of a more gentle type to render such assistance as might be needed in the way of nursing. Thus did the meek inherit Hiss!

The trombone player was in bad shape. Completely exhausted by his efforts and the excitement at the concert, he could hardly help himself and his two companions undressed him, put him in his pyjamas and slipped him into bed. Littlejohn and the doctor even carried Lambert upstairs.

“I've been tellin' him for weeks,” said Flanagan, a roguish Irishman with an unruly mop of grey hair, Irish blue eyes, and a small dissipated-looking nose. “I've been tellin' him for weeks, bring your bed downstairs. You're in no condition to be climbin' stairs with a heart like that o' yours. But no. Those damned women had him scared to death. He thought if they knew he was ailin' at all, they'd have him in his bed and the lot of 'em be twitterin' round him for the rest of his days.”

“He was so bad, then?”

“I don't know how he got upstairs. Wonder he didn't kill himself. I promised to patch him up if he'd do as I told him. He didn't and behold …!”

He pointed to the mound in the bed. Hiss looked at them with large, regretful, questioning eyes.

“I'm sorry to be such a lot of trouble,” he whispered hoarsely.

There was a box of digitalis pills on the bedside table, and the doctor passed one to Hiss.

“Now you be restin' yourself and take the medicine as you're told, and I shouldn't be surprised if we didn't be havin' ye runnin' around again by the Spring.”

“Spring?” groaned Lambert Hiss.

“Yes. And I'm taking steps to see that that unholy pack o' women keeps away. Either they come here in moderation two at a time … I'd say one, only you'd be in danger for your life … two at a time, or else straight to the Infirmary you go. Be makin' up your mind.”

“I'll do anything you say, doctor.”

Spring, thought Littlejohn. He fingered the warrant in his pocket. Spring!

Littlejohn and the doctor descended the stairs, leaving
one of the women tidying up the bedroom and the other preparing a light supper for the patient.

They entered the small sitting-room behind the closed shop, where Dr. Flanagan had left his bag.

The place was very cosy. A gas fire, easy chairs, a couch and a small sideboard on which reposed Hiss's trombone in its case. The walls were covered in pictures of brass band groups, and one of Hiss, togged up in a uniform, standing beside a table on which reposed a huge silver rose-bowl. Over the fireplace, a framed photograph of a sickly-looking woman in a dress with mutton-chop sleeves. Presumably Mrs. Hiss long ago.

“He never ought to have done it to-night. I warned him. Wonder he didn't drop dead.”

“How is his heart, doctor?”

“Not bad now for what he's being doing to it. Mostly emotional shock it's had to-night. Physical exertion would probably have stopped it entirely. It's still a profound mystery to me how he's got up those stairs every night. Must have crept up by degrees on his hands and knees.”

“Is that really true?”

“What do you mean, really true? What do you think I'm talking about? I've just sounded his heart again. It's not changed in the last month, thanks to his stupidity and those blasted women about the house. It's no use takin' pills if you don't remove the cause of the trouble.”

“I know it sounds ridiculous, but could Hiss have gone down forty steps and climbed back again …”

“What
is
all this? Are you tryin' to get out of me just how bad Hiss is? Why man, up and down ten steps, except on his knees and by slow degrees, would have snuffed him out like a candle.”

And yet Littlejohn had been assuming that Hiss had gone up and down the platelayers' steps and killed Bellis into the bargain. How had it been done?

“I want to talk to Hiss about the murder of Bellis last week. Can I do so to-night?”

“No, you may not! He's to get to sleep now after
his supper. I won't have him disturbed, and I'll hold you responsible if you give him any trouble or shock before I say you can.”

The doctor fixed Littlejohn with a steely blue eye, and jerked his head at him bellicosely.

“May I just go and see him for a minute, then … Just to see he's all right?”

“Very well. But no excitement, or …”

“I promise I'll not agitate him.”

“Get goin', then. He wants some sleep. I'm off. Two imminent confinements and I hope they're on time. I've been out of my bed for the last three nights.”

Flanagan bustled off. He looked as though he made up for lack of sleep by taking poteen.

Upstairs, Hiss had finished his supper. They were settling him for the night. Freed from his loving man-hunters he looked less harassed. The mild woman with fluffy hair and large china-blue eyes hovered very solicitously around.

“I'm all right, Ada,” Hiss was saying.

“I just came up to wish you a good night, Mr. Hiss,” said Littlejohn.

“You've been very kind, Inspector.”

“Not at all. Is there anything I can do for you before I go?”

Hiss looked anxiously at Ada. She was fussing with articles on the dressing table. Picking up collar studs and putting them down again, rolling up a tie, examining a soiled collar with expert eyes, twisting a pair of braces and untwisting them again.

“May we have a word alone, Mr. Hiss and I, Mrs … Mrs. . .”

“Mrs. Scattermole …”

She didn't wear a wedding ring. The late Scattermole had taken to drink in his latter days, and thus cut himself off from the congregation of the righteous. She wanted to forget him.