The Lacquer Screen
- Автор: ван Гулик Роберт Ханс
- Серия: Judge Dee #8
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «The Lacquer Screen». Краткое содержание книги:
Early in his career, Judge Dee visits a senior magistrate who shows him a beautiful lacquer screen on which a scene of lovers has been mysteriously altered to show the man stabbing his lover. The magistrate fears he is losing his mind and will murder his own wife. Meanwhile, a banker has inexplicably killed himself, and a lovely lady has allowed Dee's lieutenant, Chiao Tai, to believe she is a courtesan. Dee and Chiao Tai go incognito among a gang of robbers to solve this mystery, and find the leader of the robbers is more honorable than the magistrate.
One of the most satisfyingly devious of the Judge Dee novels, with unusual historical richness in its portrayal of the China of the T'ang dynasty.-—New York Times Book Review
Even Judge Dee is baffled by Robert van Gulik's new mysteries in The Lacquer Screen. Disguised as a petty crook, he spends a couple of precarious days in the headquarters of the underworld, hobnobbing with the robber king. Dee's lively thieving friends furnish some vital clues to this strange and fascinating jigsaw.-—The Spectator
So scrupulously in the classic Chinese manner yet so nicely equipped with everything to satisfy the modern reader.-—New York Times
Robert Van Gulik (1910-67) was a Dutch diplomat and an authority on Chinese history and culture. He drew his plots from the whole body of Chinese literature, especially from the popular detective novels that first appeared in the seventeenth century.
'Yet there are some very curious features,' Judge Dee interrupted him, 'features that hint at an outside element.'
The magistrate stamped his foot on the floor.
'Don't try to fool me with idle hope, Dee, that's cruel! Do you mean to make the preposterous suggestion that, just while I had my attack, an intruder murdered my wife? How could there ever be such an improbable coincidence?'
Judge Dee shrugged his shoulders.
'I don't like coincidences either, Teng. Yet such things have happened. And it is not more improbable than your having an attack and tampering with that screen, without remembering anything about it. Also, when you saw your wife upon entering the dressing-room she was lying with her back turned towards you. She may have been dead already. Have you any enemy here, Teng?'
'Of course not!' the magistrate replied angrily. 'Besides, only my wife and I knew the special significance of the screen. And it hasn't been out of the house since we arrived here. No one could have tampered with it!' Then he took hold of himself and asked in a calmer voice: 'What do you propose to do, Dee?'
'I propose,' the judge replied, 'that you give me tomorrow — one day — for gathering additional evidence. If I fail, I shall accompany you the day after tomorrow to Pien-foo, and explain everything to the Prefect.'
'Delaying the report of a murder is a grave offence, Dee!' Magistrate Teng cried out. 'Just now you said yourself you wouldn't impede . . .'
'I assume full responsibility for that!' Judge Dee interrupted him.
Teng thought for a while, nervously walking round. Then he halted and said resigned:
'All right, Dee. I'll leave everything in your hands. Tell me what I should do.'
'Very little. First, take an envelope and inscribe it with your wife's name and address.'
Teng unlocked the upper drawer of his desk and took out an envelope. After he had jotted down a few lines, he gave it to the judge, who put it in his sleeve. Judge Dee resumed:
'Now get me a set of your wife's clothes from her bedroom, and make a bundle of them. Don't forget a pair of shoes!'
The magistrate gave him a curious look, then left the room without another word.
Judge Dee quickly got up and took from the still open drawer a few sheets of official notepaper and envelopes bearing the large red seal of the tribunal. He put them carefully in his sleeve.
When Teng came in with a bundle wrapped up in blue cloth, he gave the judge a searching look, then exclaimed contritely:
'Excuse me please, Dee! I was so preoccupied by my own problems that I didn't even think of offering you a change! Your robe is dirty all over, and your boots are covered with mud. Allow me to lend you . . .'
'Don't bother!' Judge Dee interrupted quickly. 'I have a few other calls to make, in places where a new dress would attract undesirable attention. First I'll go back to the marsh now, clothe the body and drag it across the path so that it'll be found early tomorrow morning. The envelope I'll put in the sleeve, so that the body will be identified immediately. Then you'll have the autopsy conducted — you have a good coroner, I suppose?'
'Yes, he is the owner of the large pharmacy at the market.'
'Good. You'll say that your wife was murdered on her way to the north gate, and that the investigation is in progress. Then you can have the body placed in a temporary coffin at least.' He picked up the bundle, laid his hand on Teng's shoulder and said with an affectionate smile: 'Try to get some sleep, Teng! You'll hear from me tomorrow. Don't bother to show me out, I know the way.'
Judge Dee found the Student in a pitiful state. He was sitting huddled up on the boulder, with violent shivers shaking his body, despite the heat. Looking up at the judge with a sickly smile he tried to speak, but his teeth started clattering as soon as he opened his mouth.
'Don't worry, master-criminal!' Judge Dee said. 'I am back! I'll just have another look at the corpse. Then we'll be off to home and to bed!'
The youngster was so upset that he didn't notice the bundle Judge Dee was carrying.
After he had drawn out the dagger he wrapped it up in a piece of oil-paper and put it in his bosom. Then he dressed the dead body. When he had put on the shoes also, he dragged it across the footpath. He called the Student. Silently they walked back through the now deserted city.
The Student seemed still deeply upset by his lonely wait. The judge reflected that the youngster's show of viciousness was perhaps for the greater part bravado. He was only about eighteen, perhaps his morbid craving for crime would leave him in a year or so. The boy could have done worse things than join the Corporal's gang. The Corporal was a rough-and-ready rascal, but somehow or other the judge didn't think he was a really depraved man. If the Student came through this experience, he might yet repent and return to a normal life.
When they had gone about half-way, the Student suddenly said:
'I know that you and the Corporal don't think much of me, but I tell you that in a couple of days you'll be surprised! I'll have made more money than the two of you'll ever have in your whole lives!'
Judge Dee made no response. The youngster was boring him with his boasting.
At the entrance of the alley where the Phoenix Inn was located the Student halted. He said crossly:
'I'll say goodbye here. I have other things to attend to.'
Judge Dee walked on to the inn.
VII
After Judge Dee and the Student left the Phoenix Inn for the marsh, Chiao Tai drank a few cups with the Corporal. They came to talk about the battles of the Imperial Army in recent years, which evidently was one of the Corporal's favourite subjects.
'If you liked army life,' Chiao Tai asked, 'why did you leave?'
'I made a stupid mistake, and I had to take to my heels in a hurry!' the Corporal replied gruffly.
Small groups of beggars in smelly rags came drifting in. The Corporal got up and started on the accounts together with the bald man. Chiao Tai found the air in the taproom becoming worse and worse. Moreover, he was afraid that the beggar who had sold him the jewels might show up. He went out for a walk.
In the street outside it was still hot and muggy. Thinking that it might be better downtown near the river, he entered at random a sloping street. After a few wrong turns he finally arrived at the broad, curved bridge over the river. He went to stand on its highest point, leaning his elbows on the carved marble balustrade. Underneath the black water rushed along in a continuous roar, white foam spurting up as it dashed against the rocks that showed their jagged heads here and there. Chiao Tai followed the angry current as it formed swift whirlpools, and inhaled the cool air with relief.
There weren't many people about. This was evidently a residential quarter; on the right bank he saw the large compounds of opulent mansions, and on the left the long crenellated wall and the impressive gatehouse of the garrison headquarters. The coloured flags hung down limply in the still air.
Two footpads walked up to him, noiseless on their felt shoes. But when they had come nearer they shook their heads at each other disconsolately. This rough-looking giant was not the man for them to tackle.
Chiao Tai was at a loss what to do. He tried to figure out what Judge Dee was up to, but soon gave up in disgust. All that was far beyond him. And he knew that the judge would tell him anyway — in his own good time. He spat into the water, the acrid taste of the wine he had drunk in the Phoenix Inn was still in his mouth. He wistfully thought of his comrades, Sergeant Hoong and Ma Joong, back in Peng-lai. Probably they were at this very moment swilling good wine in the Nine Flowers Orchard, their favourite inn, on the corner opposite the tribunal! If Ma Joong was not playing games with a nice girl! He could do with a woman himself, for that matter. But he was rather fastidious, he didn't feel like having a look at a brothel. With a sigh he decided to walk back to the inn. The beggars might have left by now.