Appleby File Read online

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  The Appleby File

  First published in 1975

  © Michael Innes Literary Management Ltd.; House of Stratus 1975-2010

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The right of Michael Innes to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

  This edition published in 2010 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

  Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

  Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

  Typeset by House of Stratus.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

  ISBN: 0755120787 EAN: 9780755120789

  This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author's imagination.

  Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

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  About the Author

  Michael Innes is the pseudonym of John Innes Mackintosh Stewart, who was born in Edinburgh in 1906. His father was Director of Education and as was fitting the young Stewart attended Edinburgh Academy before going up to Oriel, Oxford where he obtained a first class degree in English.

  After a short interlude travelling with AJP Taylor in Austria, he embarked on an edition of Florio’s translation of Montaigne’s Essays and also took up a post teaching English at Leeds University.

  By 1935 he was married, Professor of English at the University of Adelaide in Australia, and had completed his first detective novel, Death at the President’s Lodging. This was an immediate success and part of a long running series centred on his character Inspector Appleby. A second novel, Hamlet Revenge, soon followed and overall he managed over fifty under the Innes banner during his career.

  After returning to the UK in 1946 he took up a post with Queen’s University, Belfast before finally settling as Tutor in English at Christ Church, Oxford. His writing continued and he published a series of novels under his own name, along with short stories and some major academic contributions, including a major section on modern writers for the Oxford History of English Literature.

  Whilst not wanting to leave his beloved Oxford permanently, he managed to fit in to his busy schedule a visiting Professorship at the University of Washington and was also honoured by other Universities in the UK.

  His wife Margaret, whom he had met and married whilst at Leeds in 1932, had practised medicine in Australia and later in Oxford, died in 1979. They had five children, one of whom (Angus) is also a writer. Stewart himself died in November 1994 in a nursing home in Surrey.

  Appleby’s File

  The Ascham

  I

  ‘I won’t swear,’ Appleby said, ‘that we haven’t been mildly rash. But we’ll get through.’ He changed gear cautiously. ‘With luck, we’ll get through… Damn!’

  The exclamation was fair enough. The car had been doing splendidly. At times, indeed, it seemed to float on the snow rather than cut through it, and when this happened it showed itself disconcertingly susceptible to the polar attractions – polar in every sense – of the bank rising steeply on its left and the almost obliterated ditch on its right. And now Appleby, steering an uncertain course round a bend, had been obliged to pull up – and to pull up more abruptly than was altogether safe. There was a stationary car straight in front, blocking the narrow road.

  ‘Bother!’ Lady Appleby said. ‘It’s stuck. We’ll have to help to dig it out.’

  Appleby peered through the windscreen. Snow was still lightly falling through the gathering dusk.

  ‘It won’t be a question of helping,’ he said. ‘If you ask me, it’s abandoned. I’ll investigate.’ He climbed out of the car, and found himself at once up to the knees in snow. ‘We’ve been pretty crazy,’ he said, and plunged towards the other car.

  Judith Appleby waited for a minute. Then, growing impatient, she climbed out too. She found her husband gazing in some perplexity at the stranded vehicle. It was an ancient but powerful-looking saloon.

  ‘Abandoned, all right,’ Appleby said, and tried one of the doors. ‘Locked, too. Not helpful, that.’

  ‘What do you mean, not helpful?’

  ‘If we could get in, we could let the brake off, and perhaps be able to shove it aside. It’s not all that snowed up, is it?’

  ‘Definitely not.’ Judith peered at the wheels. ‘Engine failure, perhaps. But it stymies us.’

  ‘Exactly. The driver got away while the going was good. Rather a faint-hearted bolt. And some time ago. There are footprints going on down the road. They’ve a good deal of fresh snow in them.’

  ‘I suppose that must be called a professional observation. Let’s get back into the car. I’m cold. But why didn’t the silly ass stay put? It’s the safest thing to do. And one can be perfectly snug in a stranded car.’ She had kicked some of the snow from her feet and climbed back into her seat. She closed the door beside her. ‘It’s beautifully warm. Stupid of him to stagger off into the night.’

  ‘Yes, wasn’t it?’ Appleby climbed in beside his wife. Their car was rather far from being a conveyance of the most modest order; the abandoned car was markedly humbler and less commodious. Appleby refrained from pointing this out. ‘I do find it a shade puzzling,’ he said. ‘But our own course is fairly simple. We’ll reverse as far as those last crossroads. It can’t be more than a mile… Good Lord, what’s that?’

  ‘I rather think–’ Turning in her seat, Judith looked through the rear window. ‘Yes. It’s something sublimely simple, John dear. An avalanche.’

  Appleby looked too. ‘Avalanche’ was perhaps rather a grand word for what had happened. But there could be no doubt about the fact. The bank behind them was extremely steep; nevertheless a surprising depth of snow had contrived to gather on it; and this had now precipitated itself upon the road. Appleby had to waste little time estimating the dimensions of the resulting problem. Their car was trapped.

  ‘Never mind, darling.’ Judith, when cross, usually adopted a philosophical tone. ‘There’s some chocolate in the glovebox. And we can keep the engine running and the heater on. It’s a good thing you filled up.’

  ‘A good thing I filled up? You said–’ Appleby broke off, having glanced at the petrol gauge. It was not one of those occasions upon which expostulation serves any useful purpose. ‘There’s under a gallon,’ he said. ‘And we haven’t got a spare tin. Civilization is always lulling one into a false sense of security.’

/>   ‘But, surely, that’s all right? Just ticking over, the petrol will last, won’t it, for hours and hours?’

  ‘Undoubtedly. Into the small hours, in fact.’

  ‘The small hours?’

  ‘Two in the morning. Perhaps three.’

  ‘I see.’ Judith, who had been contentedly breaking up a slab of chocolate, seemed a little to lose heart. ‘John, when the heater stops, how long will the car take to…to get rather cold?’

  ‘Oh, a quite surprisingly long time. Fifteen minutes. Perhaps even twenty.’ Appleby picked up a piece of chocolate. ‘I think,’ he said rather grimly, ‘you’d better get out the map. And I’ll turn on this inside light. It’s getting dark.’

  ‘We are a surprisingly long way from the high road,’ Judith said presently. ‘I’d no idea.’

  ‘Um,’ Appleby said.

  ‘There’s that last signpost. At least I think it is.’

  ‘It’s a reasonable conjecture.’

  ‘I’d forgotten it was so deserted a countryside. There doesn’t seem to be a hamlet, or a house, for miles. But wait a minute.’ Judith’s finger moved across the map. ‘Here’s something. “Gore Castle”. Only it’s in a funny sort of print.’

  ‘That means it’s a ruin. They use a Gothic type for places of archaeological or antiquarian interest.’

  ‘But I don’t think Gore Castle is a ruin – or not all of it. I’m sure I’ve heard about it.’ Judith seemed for the moment to have forgotten their depressed situation. ‘Get out the Historic Houses.’ Appleby did as he was told. The work was very much Judith’s vade-mecum, and she flicked through its pages expertly. ‘Here we are,’ she said. ‘Yes, I was quite right. Listen. “Three miles south of Gore. Residence of J L Darien-Gore Esqre. Dates partly from 13th century. Pictures, tapestry, furniture, stained glass, long gallery–”’

  ‘I never heard of a medieval castle with a long gallery.’

  ‘It must be the kind of castle that turns into a Jacobean Mansion at the back. But let me go on. “–long gallery, formal gardens, famous well.”’

  ‘Famous what?’

  ‘Well. A wishing-well, perhaps, or something like that. “April 1 to October 15 – Thursdays only, 2–6. Admission 15p. Tea and biscuits at Castle. Catering facilities at Gore Arms, Gore.” I knew I was right.’

  ‘About the biscuits?’

  ‘About its being inhabited. This Darien-Gore person – and I’m sure I’ve heard the name–’

  ‘It does seem to recall something.’

  ‘Well, he certainly lives there. We’ve only got to find the place and introduce ourselves.’

  ‘I’d say we only have to find the place. No need to put on a social turn. The chap can’t very well thrust us back into the night. Not that the question is other than academic. We can’t possibly set out to find Gore Castle. It’s almost dark already, and we’d be off the road in no time. That mightn’t be a joke. The drifts must be pretty formidable.’

  ‘But, John, I can see the castle. It’s positively beckoning to us.’

  ‘See it? You’re imagining things. Visibility’s presently going to be nil.’

  ‘Over there to the right. Let your eye travel past the back of the stranded car. You see?’

  ‘Yes – I see. But–’

  ‘J L Darien-Gore Esqre has turned on a light – perhaps high in the keep, or something. It’s rather romantic.’

  ‘If it’s high in the keep, it may be anything up to five miles away.’

  ‘We can follow it for five miles.’

  ‘My dear Judith, have some sense. Darien-Gore – if it is he – may turn the thing off again at any moment. We’re able to see it at all only because it has stopped snowing–’

  ‘Which is encouraging in itself.’

  Appleby had produced a small pair of binoculars, and was focusing them on the light.

  ‘I think it possibly is the castle,’ he said, and slipped the binoculars back into his coat pocket. ‘But we mightn’t have gone a hundred yards before we lost it for good, owing to some configuration in the terrain.’

  ‘Bother the terrain. And I’d say we can each carry a suitcase.’

  ‘Dash it all!’ Very incautiously, Appleby allowed himself to be diverted by this manoeuvre. ‘We can’t turn up on the fellow’s doorstep as if he ran a blessed hotel.’

  ‘I think it would be only considerate. Otherwise Mr Darien-Gore would have to send grooms and people to rescue our possessions.’

  ‘Sometimes I think you are beginning to suffer from delusions of grandeur.’ But Appleby was fishing the suitcases from the back of the car. He’d taken another careful look at that light, and decided it couldn’t be very far away. The venture was worth risking. ‘At least we’ve got a torch,’ he said. ‘So come on.’

  They plunged into the snow. But Appleby paused again by the abandoned car. If the fellow had just contrived to steer into the side of the road, they themselves would probably have managed to get past the obstruction, and so be on their way by now. Appleby felt the radiator. He looked again at the surface of the road immediately in front. The snow was thick enough. But it wasn’t as thick as all that. He shook his head, and trudged on.

  II

  ‘Not at all,’ Mr Darien-Gore said. ‘The gain is all mine – and my guests. Most delighted to have you here.’

  Jasper Darien-Gore was in early middle-age. Spare and upright, he would have suggested chiefly an athlete who has carefully kept his form – if he hadn’t more obviously and immediately impressed himself as the product of centuries of breeding. His appearance was as thoroughly Anglo-Norman as was that of his castle. And he had the air of courteous informality and perfect diffidence – Appleby thought – that masks the arrogance of his kind.

  ‘And I do hope,’ Darien-Gore added, ‘that this will prove a reasonably comfortable room.’

  Appleby looked around him in decent appreciation. It was at least a rather more than reasonably splendid room. If it was comfortable as well – which seemed very likely – this hadn’t been secured at the expense of disturbing the general medieval effect. The walls were hung with tapestries in which sundry allegorical events dimly transacted themselves; logs crackled in a fireplace in which it would have been possible to park a small car; there was an enormous four-poster bed. It was no doubt one of the apartments one could view (on Thursdays only) for half-a-crown. Appleby wasn’t without an awkward feeling that he ought to produce a couple of half-crowns now.

  ‘Ah!’ Darien-Gore said. ‘Here is my brother Robert. He has heard of the accession to our company, and has come to add his welcome to mine.’

  It seemed to Appleby that these last words had been uttered less by way of politeness than of instruction. Robert Darien-Gore was not looking very adequately welcoming. He was much younger than Jasper, equally handsome, equally athletic in suggestion, and decidedly colder and more reserved. Heredity, perhaps, had dealt less kindly with him. His, in fact, was a curiously haunted face – and not the less so from its air of now quickly assuming an appropriate social mask.

  ‘Robert,’ Jasper said, ‘let me introduce you to–’ He broke off. ‘By the way, I think it is Lady Appleby? But of course. I was sure I recognized your husband. One never knows whether it is quite civil to tell people one has spotted them from photographs in the public prints. Robert – Sir John and Lady Appleby. Sir John is Commissioner of Metropolitan Police.’

  ‘How do you do. I’m so glad you found your way to Gore. It might have been awkward for you, otherwise.’ Robert was producing adequate interest. It couldn’t have been put higher than that.

  ‘We couldn’t possibly have been luckier,’ Judith said. ‘We had a guidebook, you know. And it said “Tea and biscuits at Castle”. I had a wonderful feeling that we were saved.’

  ‘And so you are, Lady Appleby.’ Jasper Dar
ien-Gore, who appeared to be more amused than his brother, nodded cordially. ‘The kettle, I assure you, is just on the boil.’

  Judith, Appleby thought, was made to take this sort of situation in her stride. One couldn’t even say that she was putting on a social turn. She was just being natural. Judith, in fact, ought to have married not a policeman but an ambassador.

  ‘I hope that being held up for a night isn’t desperately inconvenient,’ Robert said. ‘And I really came in to ask at once whether we could do anything about a message. The snow has brought our telephone line down, unfortunately – and it’s the same, it seems, at the home farm. But I think we might manage to get one of the men through to the village.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Appleby said. ‘But there’s no need for anything of the sort. Nobody’s going to miss us tonight, and I’m sure we can get ourselves dug out in the morning.’

  ‘Then, for the moment, I’ll leave you.’ Robert turned to his brother. ‘They’re amusing themselves in the gallery again. I’ll just go and see they do nothing lethal.’ With the ghost of a smile, he left the room.

  ‘Thank you!’ Judith was saying – not to her host, but to her host’s butler, whose name appeared to be Frape. The fact that Frape himself had brought up their suitcases was a simple index of the grip Judith was getting on the place. ‘There, please.’ Judith had pointed to an enormous expanse of oak – it might have been a refectory table of an antiquity not commonly come by – upon which the suitcases would modestly repose. She turned to Darien-Gore. ‘It’s so stout of you,’ she said. ‘Sheer pests hammer at your door, frost-bitten and famished’ – Judith quite shamelessly emphasized this word – ‘and you don’t bat an eyelid.’

  ‘I had no impulse to bat.’ Darien-Gore was amused. ‘And, of course, one mustn’t – not on one’s own doorstep. But, come to think of it, I almost did – bat, I mean – shortly before you came. You see, somebody else has turned up: a fellow who had to abandon a car–’