Appleby's Answer by Michael Innes Page A

and untenanted except for a dog dismally clanking its chain beside a kennel. They all sat down. Miss Pringle found herself pinning a good deal of hope on the gin – even on the inane Ralph’s small one. She was conscious of being still undesirably short of facts. And particularly of one large psychological fact. How harmless was Captain Bulkington? If complete harmlessness was his true token, she told herself, he was really going to be no use to her at all. Of course if he was dangerous she would have to look out for herself. He might be precisely that to her. But she was a courageous woman. And in the interest of the mighty thought that had come to her she was prepared for a certain amount of risk. Some sense of the character of her hopeful collaborator was the first thing to get hold of. And these two odd young men were living with him in what must be a quite uncomfortable degree of intimacy. It was true they were not clever (although she was not quite sure about the anthropoid yet protean Adrian Waterbird). Nevertheless they must have their view.
    â€˜Does Captain Bulkington work you very hard?’ she asked conversationally.
    â€˜He certainly does,’ Adrian said decidedly. ‘He has the edge on us, you see. Ralph?’
    â€˜That’s it!’ There were signs of Ralph’s being suddenly prompted to voluble speech. ‘You see, he found out–’
    â€˜Shut up, Ralph, and drink your kindergarten drench.’ Adrian’s more polite manner had momentarily vanished. ‘It’s just that the Bulgar has got our people – my father and Ralph’s guardian – taped. Our last chance, and so on. I get through this rotten exam, or I’m booked for New South Wales. You see, my family has some property there. But I don’t know anything about it. Full of blacks, I expect.’ Adrian shook his head gloomily. ‘As for Ralph, he’s going to be put in a bicycle factory.’
    â€˜Push-bikes,’ Ralph said. ‘Kids’ tricycles, too, they say.’ He, perhaps in imitation of his dominant friend, also shook a gloomy head. ‘It’s bloody murder.’
    â€˜Murder?’ For a moment Miss Pringle was startled. Then she recovered herself. ‘You have some alternative career in mind, Mr Jenkins?’ It sometimes pleased Miss Pringle to be a mistress of delicate irony.
    â€˜I wouldn’t mind doing the Monte Carlo Rally. Or the Monaco Grand Prix. But here we are instead.’ Ralph’s vacant stare for a moment hinted helpless perplexity. ‘The fact is, we haven’t had a hope since the Bulgar found out–’
    â€˜Ralph maunders,’ Adrian said. ‘The worst part of it is, you see, that we don’t really think Bulkington is a proper coach at all. Or I don’t. Thinking isn’t much Ralph’s line.’
    â€˜Do you mean,’ Miss Pringle asked as if with mild interest, ‘that the establishment at “Kandahar” is simply a cover for some other activity?’
    â€˜I suppose it might be put that way.’ Adrian had now absorbed most of his double gin, but its only effect was to superimpose what might have been a look of cunning on the alarming ferocity which his habitual expression suggested. ‘Certainly his mind is on other things. Perhaps he was quite a good crammer long ago. But I’ve decided he knows next to nothing about the job as it is now. That stuff about decisive battles, for instance. It’s completely old-hat. He might as well have told us to go out and clean the windows, like the schoolmaster in Scott’s novel.’
    â€˜Dickens,’ Miss Pringle said.
    â€˜All right, Dickens’. And this business of saying he’s preparing us for something or other at Oxford. It seems that as things are there nowadays that’s just false pretences.’ Adrian Waterbird removed the slice of lemon from his glass, and for a moment sucked it sombrely. ‘Ralph