Appleby's Answer by Michael Innes Page B

ran into his old housemaster last holidays, and told him about this Balliol Scholarship thing. The chap just roared with laughter.’
    â€˜How very rude and unkind.’
    â€˜It was candid, anyway. Ralph?’
    â€˜That’s right – candid. He said the Bulgar must be a madman.’ Ralph fished out his own piece of lemon. ‘I said no – just a maniac.’
    â€˜A maniac!’ Miss Pringle exclaimed.
    â€˜Well, yes.’ Adrian chucked his scrap of lemon expertly at the chained dog, catching it in the eye. ‘We think you ought to know. And we think you ought to keep away. It’s all right for men. We can take it. Even Ralph can take it. But it wouldn’t be at all nice for a lady, if you ask me.’
    â€˜We think you oughtn’t to take it,’ Ralph Jenkins said.
    â€˜To take it?’
    â€˜Well, the job. Doesn’t the Bulgar want to hire you for something? That’s been our guess.’
    Miss Pringle was obliged to reflect that it wasn’t a bad guess. Circumspection, however, was required.
    â€˜There is no question of anything that could be called employment,’ she said with dignity. ‘But Captain Bulkington and I have had a little business to discuss. May I ask just what sort of maniac you suppose him to be?’
    â€˜A homicidal maniac, of course.’ Adrian seemed surprised. ‘Ralph and I are pretty sure he did in the last chap.’
    â€˜The last chap?’ Any undue excitement, Miss Pringle hoped, was absent from her voice. But, of course, she was excited. Here, at least, were two independent witnesses who believed Captain Bulkington to be not a mere visionary but the real thing. ‘Who was the last chap?’
    â€˜The crammer the Bulgar took over from, of course.’
    â€˜But Captain Bulkington’s predecessor in “Kandahar” – who I do happen to know met some sinister end – was a clergyman. In fact he was the rector of Long Canings, and the house was the rectory.’
    â€˜Yes, I know.’ Adrian Waterbird glanced into his almost empty glass. ‘Can I get you another half pint of that beer?’ he asked.
    â€˜No, thank you.’
    â€˜Then I’ll just freshen this up a bit. Half as much again, you know. That’s a very good rule when drinking.’ Having offered this serious adult communication, Adrian rose and made for the bar. There was something ape-like in his gait, Miss Pringle reflected. She was almost surprised to be surveying a pair of well-tailored pin-stripe trousers and not a purple and orange behind.
    â€˜Adrian will be a drunk a damn sight sooner than he’ll be a BA.’ This was the first independent observation Ralph Jenkins had offered. ‘But an old bastard like the Bulgar would drive anybody to the bottle. The way he got us just where he wants us – not even daring to write home about the bloody farce of his silly battles and all that – it was a trap, if you ask me.’
    â€˜A trap?’
    â€˜He planted her on us. Probably paid her thirty bob for the job. And then in he came.’
    â€˜I’m afraid I don’t understand you, Mr Jenkins.’
    â€˜That’s just as well.’ Mr Jenkins was eyeing with alarm the unexpectedly quick return of Mr Waterbird from the bar. ‘It’s not a thing for ladies, at all. And please don’t tell Adrian I got going on it. It’s not in what he calls our terms of reference.’
    â€˜Your terms of reference? Whatever do you mean by that?’
    â€˜I really don’t know.’ And Ralph favoured Miss Pringle with his most inane and helpless stare. ‘It’s all a bit deep, you see. I can’t say I’m really with it.’
    â€˜It sounds as if that may be just as well.’ Miss Pringle was aware that she had been shown the tip of something highly discreditable – and not of an order which would be of any use to her in her fastidious fiction. She