Authors: Dorothy L. Sayers
This wont do, said Wimsey, this isnt the League of Nations. A plague on both your houses! Have a bit of sense.
He called me a , muttered Waters, wiping the whiskey from his face. Im damned if Ill stand it. Hed better keep out of my way, thats all. He glared furiously at Campbell.
Youll find me if you want me, retorted Campbell, I shant run away.
Now, now, gentlemen, said Murdoch.
He comes here, said Campbell, with his damned sneering ways
Nay, Mr. Campbell, said the landlord, but ye shuldna ha said thae things to him.
Ill say what I damn well like to him, insisted Campbell.
Not in my bar, replied Murdoch, firmly.
Ill say them in any damn bar I choose, said Campbell, and Ill say it again hes a .
Hut! said McAdam, yell be thinkin better of it in the morning. Come away now Ill give ye a lift back to Gatehouse.
You be damned, said Campbell. Ive got my own car and I can drive it. And I dont want to see any of the whole blasted lot of ye again.
He plunged out and there was a pause.
Dear, dear, said Wimsey.
I think Id best be off out of it too, said Waters, sullenly. Wimsey and McAdam exchanged glances.
Bide a bit, said the latter. Theres no need to be in sic a hurry. Campbells a hasty man, and when theres a wee bit drink in him he says mair nor he means.
Ay, said Murdoch, but he had no call to be layin them names to Mr. Waters, none at all. Its a verra great pity a verra great pity indeed.
Im sorry if I was rude to the Scotch, said Waters, I didnt mean to be, but I cant stand that fellow at any price.
Och, thats aricht, said McAdam. Ye meant no harm, Mr. Waters. Whatll ye have?
Oh, a double Scotch, replied Waters, with rather a shamefaced grin.
Thats right, said Wimsey, drown remembrance of the insult in the wine of the country.
A man named McGeoch, who had held aloof from the disturbance, rose up and came to the bar.
Another Worthington, he said briefly. Campbell will be getting into trouble one of these days, I shouldnt wonder. The manners of him are past all bearing. You heard what he said to Strachan up at the golf-course the other day. Making himself out the boss of the whole place. Strachan told him if he saw him on the course again, hed wring his neck.
The others nodded silently. The row between Campbell and the golf-club secretary at Gatehouse had indeed become local history.
And I would not blame Strachan, neither, went on McGeoch. Heres Campbell only lived two seasons in Gatehouse, and hes setting the whole place by the ears. Hes a devil when hes drunk and a lout when hes sober. Its a great shame. Our little artistic community has always gotten on well together, without giving offence to anybody. And now there are nothing but rows and bickerings all through this fellow Campbell.
Och, said Murdoch, hell settle down in time. The mans no a native o these parts and he doesna verra weel understand his place. Forbye, for all his havers, hes no a Scotsman at a, for everybody knows hes fra Glasgow, and his mother was an Ulsterwoman, by the name of Flanagan.
Thats the sort that talks loodest, put in Murray, the banker, who was a native of Kirkwall, and had a deep and not always silent contempt for anybody born south of Wick. But its best to pay no attention to him. If he gets what is coming to him, Im thinking itll no be from anybody here.
He nodded meaningly.
Yell be thinking of Hugh Farren? suggested McAdam.
Ill be naming no names, said Murray, but its well known that he has made trouble for himself with a certain lady.
Its no fault of the ladys, said McGeoch, emphatically.
Im not saying it is. But theres some gets into trouble without others to help them to it.
I shouldnt have fancied Campbell in the rôle of a home-breaker, said Wimsey, pleasantly.
I shouldnt fancy him at all, growled Waters, but he fancies himself quite enough, and one of these days
There, there, said Murdoch, hastily. Its true hes no a verra popular man, is Campbell, but its best to be patient and tak no notice of him.
Thats all very well, said Waters.
And wasnt there some sort of row about fishing? interrupted Wimsey. If the talk had to be about Campbell, it was best to steer it away from Waters at all costs.
Och, ay, said McAdam. Him and Mr. Jock Graham is juist at daggers drawn aboot it. Mr. Graham will be fishing the pool below Campbells hoose. Not but theres plenty pools in the Fleet wiout disturbin Campbell, if the man wad juist be peaceable aboot it. But its no his pool when as said and dune the rivers free and its no to be expectit that Mr. Graham will pay ony heed to his claims, him that pays nae heed to onybody.
Particularly, said McGeoch, after Campbell had tried to duck him in the Fleet.
Did he though, by Jove? said Wimsey, interested.
Ay, but he got weel duckit himsel, said Murdoch, savouring the reminiscence. And Grahams been fushin there every nicht since then, wi yin or twa of the lads. Hell be there the nicht, I wadna wonder.
Then if Campbells spoiling for a row, hell know where to go for it, said Wimsey. Come on, Waters, wed better make tracks.
Waters, still sulky, rose and followed him. Wimsey steered him home to his lodgings, prattling cheerfully, and tucked him into bed.
And I shouldnt let Campbell get on your nerves, he said, interrupting a long grumble, hes not worth it. Go to sleep and forget it, or youll do no work tomorrow. Thats pretty decent, by the way, he added, pausing before a landscape which was propped on the chest of drawers. Youre a good hand with the knife, arent you, old man?
Who, me? said Waters. You dont know what youre talking about. Campbells the only man who can handle a knife in this place according to him. Hes even had the blasted cheek to say Gowan is an out-of-date blunderer.
Thats high treason, isnt it?
I should think so. Gowans a real painter my God, it makes me hot when I think of it. He actually said it at the Arts Club in Edinburgh, before a whole lot of people, friends of Gowans.
And what did Gowan say?
Oh, various things. Theyre not on speaking terms now. Damn the fellow. Hes not fit to live. You heard what he said to me?
Yes, but I dont want to hear it again. Let the fellow dree his own weird. Hes not worth bothering with.
No, thats a fact. And his works not so wonderful as to excuse his beastly personality.
Cant he paint?
Oh, he can paint after a fashion. Hes what Gowan calls him a commercial traveller. His stuffs damned impressive at first sight, but its all tricks. Anybody could do it, given the formula. I could do a perfectly good Campbell in half an hour. Wait a moment, Ill show you.
He thrust a leg out from the bed. Wimsey pushed him firmly back again.
Show me some other time. When Ive seen his stuff. I cant tell if the imitations good till Ive seen the original, can I?
No. Well, you go and look at his things and then Ill show you. Oh, Lord, my heads fuzzy like nothing on earth.
Go to sleep, said Wimsey. Shall I tell Mrs. McLeod to let you sleep in, as they say? And call you with a couple of aspirins on toast?
No; Ive got to be up early, worse luck. But I shall be all right in the morning.
Well, cheerio, then, and sweet dreams, said Wimsey.
He shut the door after him carefully and wandered thoughtfully back to his own habitation.
Campbell, chugging fitfully homewards across the hill which separates Kirkcudbright from Gatehouse-of-Fleet, recapitulated his grievances to himself in a sour monotone, as he mishandled his gears. That damned, sneering, smirking swine Waters! Hed managed to jolt him out of his pose of superiority, anyhow. Only he wished it hadnt happened before McGeoch. McGeoch would tell Strachan and Strachan would redouble his own good opinion of himself. You see, he would say, I turned the man off the golf-course and look how right I was to do it. Hes just a fellow that gets drunk and quarrels in public-houses. Curse Strachan, with his perpetual sergeant-majors air of having you on the mat. Strachan, with his domesticity and his precision and his local influence, was at the base of all the trouble, if one came to think of it. He pretended to say nothing, and all the time he was spreading rumours and scandal and setting the whole place against one. Strachan was a friend of that fellow Farren too. Farren would hear about it, and would jump at the excuse to make himself still more obnoxious. There would have been no silly row that night at all if it hadnt been for Farren. That disgusting scene before dinner! That was what had driven him, Campbell, to the McClellan Arms. His hand hesitated on the wheel. Why not go back straight away and have the thing out with Farren?
After all, what did it matter? He stopped the car and lit a cigarette, smoking fast and savagely. If the whole place was against him, he hated the place anyhow. There was only one decent person in it, and she was tied up to that brute Farren. The worst of it was, she was devoted to Farren. She didnt care twopence for anybody else, if Farren would only see it. And he, Campbell, knew it as well as anybody. He wanted nothing wrong. He only wanted, when he was tired and fretted, and sick of his own lonely, uncomfortable shack of a place, to go and sit among the cool greens and blues of Gilda Farrens sitting-room and be soothed by her slim beauty and comforting voice. And Farren, with no more sense or imagination than a bull, must come blundering in, breaking the spell, putting his own foul interpretation on the thing, trampling the lilies in Campbells garden of refuge. No wonder Farrens landscapes looked as if they were painted with an axe. The man had no delicacy. His reds and blues hurt your eyes, and he saw life in reds and blues. If Farren were to die, now, if one could take his bull-neck in ones hands and squeeze it till his great staring blue eyes popped out like he laughed like bulls eyes that was a damned funny joke. Hed like to tell Farren that and see how he took it.
Farren was a devil, a beast, a bully, with his artistic temperament, which was nothing but inartistic temper. There was no peace with Farren about. There was no peace anywhere. If he went back to Gatehouse, he knew what he would find there. He had only to look out of his bedroom window to see Jock Graham whipping the water just under the wall of the house doing it on purpose to annoy him. Why couldnt Graham leave him alone? There was better fishing up by the dams. The whole thing was sheer persecution. It wasnt any good, either, to go to bed and take no notice. They would wake him up in the small hours, banging at his window and bawling out the number of their catch they might even leave a contemptuous offering of trout on his window-sill, wretched little fish like minnows, which ought to have been thrown back again. He only hoped Graham would slip up on the stones one night and fill his waders and be drowned among his infernal fish. The thing that riled him most of all was that this nightly comedy was played out under the delighted eye of his neighbour, Ferguson. Since that fuss about the garden-wall, Ferguson had become absolutely intolerable.
It was perfectly true, of course, that he had backed his car into Fergusons wall and knocked down a stone or two, but if Ferguson had left his wall in decent repair it wouldnt have done any damage. That great tree of Fergusons had sent its roots right under the wall and broken up the foundations, and what was more, it threw up huge suckers in Campbells garden. He was perpetually rooting the beastly things up. A man had no right to grow trees under a wall so that it tumbled down at the slightest little push, and then demand extravagant payments for repairs. He would not repair Fergusons wall. He would see Ferguson damned first.
He gritted his teeth. He wanted to get out of this stifle of petty quarrels and have one good, big, blazing row with somebody. If only he could have smashed Waters face to pulp let himself go had the thing out, he would have felt better. Even now he could go back or forward it didnt matter which, and have the whole blasted thing right out with somebody.
He had been brooding so deeply that he never noticed the hum of a car in the distance and the lights flickering out and disappearing as the road dipped and wound. The first thing he heard was a violent squealing of brakes and an angry voice demanding:
What the bloody hell are you doing, you fool, sitting out like that in the damn middle of the road right on the bend? And then, as he turned, blinking in the glare of the headlights, to grapple with this new attack, he heard the voice say, with a kind of exasperated triumph:
Campbell. Of course. I might have known it couldnt be anybody else.
CAMPBELL DEAD
Did ye hear about Mr. Campbell? said Mr. Murdoch of the McClellan Arms, polishing a glass carefully as a preparation for filling it with beer.
Why, what further trouble has he managed to get into since last night? asked Wimsey. He leaned an elbow on the bar and prepared to relish anything that might be offered to him.
2
Hes deid, said Mr. Murdoch.
Deid? said Wimsey, startled into unconscious mimicry.
Mr. Murdoch nodded.
Och, ay; McAdams juist brocht the news in from Gatehouse. They found the body at 2 oclock up in the hills by Newton Stewart.
Good heavens! said Wimsey. But what did he die of?
Juist tummled intae the burn, replied Mr. Murdoch, an drooned himself, by what they say. The pollisll be up there now tae bring him doon.
An accident, I suppose.
Ay, imphm. The folk at the Borgan seed him pentin there shortly after 10 this morning on the wee bit high ground by the brig, and Major Dougal gaed by at 2 oclock wi his rod an spied the body liggin in the burn. Its slippery there and fou o broken rocks. Im thinkin hell ha climbed doon tae fetch some watter for his pentin, mebbe, and slippit on the stanes.
He wouldnt want water for oil-paints, said Wimsey, thoughfully, but he might have wanted to mix mustard for his sandwiches or fill a kettle or get a drop for his whiskey. I say, Murdoch, I think Ill just toddle over there in the car and have a look at him. Corpses are rather in my line, you know. Where is this place exactly?