Read Scales of Justice for Free Online Page B

air, twitching the tip of her tail.
    The Colonel straightened up and found himself face-to-face with Mr. Phinn.
    “Good evening,” said the Colonel.
    “Sir,” said Mr. Phinn. He touched his dreadful hat with one finger, blew out his cheeks and advanced. “Thomasina,” he added, “hold your body more seemly.”
    For Thomasina, waywardly taken with the Colonel, had returned and rolled on her back at his feet.
    “Nice cat,” said the Colonel and added, “Good fishing to you. The Old ’Un lies below the bridge on my side, by the way.”
    “Indeed?”
    “As no doubt you guessed,” the Colonel added against his better judgment, “when you watched me through your field-glasses.”
    If Mr. Phinn had contemplated a conciliatory position, he at once abandoned it. He made a belligerent gesture with his net. “The landscape, so far as I am aware,” he said, “is not under some optical interdict. It may be viewed, I believe. To the best of my knowledge, there are no squatter’s rights over the distant prospect of the Chyne.”
    “None whatever. You can stare,” said the Colonel, “at the Chyne, or me, or anything else you fancy till you are black in the face, for all I care. But if you realized… If you…” He scratched his head, a gesture that with the Colonel denoted profound emotional disturbance. “My dear Phinn…” he began again, “if you only knew… God bless my soul, what
does
it matter! Good evening to you.”
    He encircled Mr. Phinn and hurried up the path. “And for that grotesque,” he thought resentfully, “for that impossible, that almost certifiable buffoon I have saddled myself with a responsibility that may well make me wretchedly uncomfortable for the rest of my life.”
    He mended his pace and followed the path into the Hammer coppice. Whether summoned by maternal obligations or because she had taken an inscrutable cat’s fancy to the Colonel, Thomasina Twitchett accompanied him, trilling occasionally and looking about for an evening bird. They came within view of the lawn, and there was Commander Syce, bow in hand, quiver at thigh and slightly unsteady on his feet, hunting about in the underbrush.
    “Hullo, Cartarette,” he said. “Lost a damned arrow. What a thing! Missed the damned target and away she went.”
    “Missed it by a dangerously wide margin, didn’t you?” the Colonel rejoined rather testily. After all, people did use the path, he reflected, and he began to help in the search. Thomasina Twitchett, amused by the rustle of leaves, pretended to join in the hunt.
    “I know,” Commander Syce agreed; “rotten bad show, but I saw old Phinn and it put me off. Did you hear what happened about me and his cat? Damnedest thing you ever knew! Purest accident, but the old whatnot wouldn’t have it. Great grief, I told him, I
like
cats.”
    He thrust his hand into a heap of dead leaves. Thomasina Twitchett leapt merrily upon it and fleshed her claws in his wrist. “Perishing little bastard,” said Commander Syce. He freed himself and aimed a spank at her which she easily avoided and being tired of their company, made for her home and kittens. The Colonel excused himself and turned up through the spinney into the open field below his own lawn.
    His wife was in her hammock dangling a tightly encased black-velvet leg, a flame-coloured sleeve and a pair of enormous ear-rings. The cocktail tray was already on her iron table.
    “How late you are,” she said, idly. “Dinner in half an hour. What have you been up to at Nunspardon?”
    “I had to see George.”
    “What about?”
    “Some business his father asked me to do.”
    “How illuminating.”
    “It was very private, my dear.”
    “How
is
George?”
    The Colonel remembered George’s empurpled face and said, “Still rather upset.”
    “We must ask him to dinner. I’m learning to play golf with him tomorrow, by the way. He’s giving me some clubs. Nice, isn’t it?”
    “When did you arrange that?”
    “Just now.