The Willow Pattern
- Автор: ван Гулик Роберт Ханс
- Серия: Judge Dee #11
- Год: 101
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «The Willow Pattern». Краткое содержание книги:
As Judge Dee copes with the administration of the plague-ridden Imperial Capital, he must also bring his skills to bear on the mystery of two seemingly unconnected murders that could mean the extinction of the city's oldest, most aristocratic families.
'Here we are,' Doctor Lew spoke. He had halted in front of a dilapidated gate. The weather-beaten bricks showed through the burst plaster, but the door studded with nails seemed quite new. Lew pointed at the wooden crossbar. Two scavengers lifted it from its hinges and pushed the door open. The doctor went inside, followed by Ma Joong and Chiao Tai. The scavengers stayed outside, the narrow street was crammed by black hoods.
Ma Joong stepped up to the two still figures lying on a heap of refuse, at the entrance of the high, semi-dark vestibule. He heaved a deep sigh of relief. The dead women were completely unknown to him.
'The air is polluted here,' Chiao Tai told the doctor gruffly. 'The squatters must evacuate this compound.'
'You go and tell them, colonel! I'll say good-bye here. I also have my duties.'
'Not nice to have met you,' Ma Joong said sourly.
'You'd better be careful, Colonel,' Dr Lew told him venomously. 'You might need me, one of these days.'
'When we get sick,' Chiao Tai put in cheerfully, 'we'll call our coroner. He'll be overjoyed at having a squint at a live body, for a change!'
Doctor Lew turned round and went outside without another word.
The two friends walked down the long, narrow corridor. A little farther along the roof had caved in, leaving a large gap high above them through which they could see the sultry sky. The corridor had no windows, and the walls, though covered with mould, looked very solid. At the end was another door. Chiao Tai tried to push it open, but it would not budge. He put his ear to the wood. On the other side was the murmur of many voices. Suddenly there came a coarse voice from above:
'You are caught, dirty dogs!'
A hooded head was peering down at them through the gap in the roof. There was a swishing sound. An arrow missed Ma Joong's head by the fraction of an inch.
'Back to the gate!' Chiao Tai hissed.
They ran down the corridor as fast as they could. Ma Joong stepped over the two dead women and pulled at the door. It didn't move.
'They got us!' Chiao Tai whispered. 'The bastards have bows, and they can pick us off through the gap as if we were sitting ducks. Let's break the other door down, and fight our way through the crowd at the back.'
'Heaven knows what weapons they carry under those damned cloaks,' Ma Joong said hurriedly. 'And it's forty to two. That calls for strategy rather than force, brother. Help me to take off my coat of mail, quick!' He whispered a few instructions into Chiao Tai's ear, then shouted through the door: 'What do you think you are doing, bastards? Our soldiers will make mincemeat out of you!'
The scavengers outside jeered.
'We'll deliver the two of you neatly rolled up in canvas,' someone shouted. 'Nobody'll know, and nobody'll care!'
'Let's talk this over!' Ma Joong called back. He was helping Chiao Tai to put his own jacket of mail on one of the dead women. After Chiao Tai had put Ma Joong's helmet on her head, Ma Joong lifted her up, his hands under her arms. Chiao Tai stuck the point of his sword into the nape of her neck, just under the backflap of the helmet. 'Sorry, old girl,' he muttered. Then he walked up to the gap, holding the limp body up in front of him on his sword, both hands on the hilt. Ma Joong, clad only in his leather trousers and an under-shirt, quickly inspected the bolt on the door. It was still in working order. When he looked around he saw two arrows hit the dead woman. Chiao Tai let her sink to the floor, then stepped forward and bent over her, keeping his face well down. An arrow struck his back, a second glanced off his helmet. He screamed, and let himself fall on top of the prostrate woman, then lay quite still.
MA JOONG AND CHIAO TAI VIEW TWO BODIES
'Got them both!' a voice shouted high above, on the roof.
Ma Joong who had pressed his back against the wall beside the door, now heard the sound of the crossbar being removed. The door opened, and a hooded man stepped inside. Ma Joong clasped his left arm round his head from behind and stuck his sword deep into his right flank. In practically the same moment he kicked the door shut. Letting the writhing body drop on to the floor, he shot the bolt.
'What's wrong?' a voice sounded from outside.
Ma Joong had draped the black cloak of his victim around his shoulders and stuck the dagger the man had been carrying in his own belt. Putting the hood over his head he ran over to Chiao Tai who was lying motionless over the dead woman.
'Give me a hand!' he shouted up.
Two hooded heads appeared in the gap above him. A light bamboo ladder was lowered and Ma Joong quickly climbed up. The hooded men, both carrying a bow and arrows, were precariously perched on the narrow ridge of the roof. Ma Joong saw to his satisfaction that the ridge ran straight to the roof's rear.
'What's——' the tallest black man began.
Ma Joong gave him a vigorous push that sent him tumbling head over heels through the gap. He opened his cloak and buried the dagger he had taken from the man down in the corridor into the stomach of the other scavenger with all the force he could summon. He let go of the hilt, and threw him down into the corridor too. Gathering the cloak closely round him, he walked gingerly along the ridge to the small flat roof that marked the back entrance of the corridor. Looking down at the two dozen hooded men that were crowding the small garden below, he shouted:
'Run for it! The soldiers are at the main gate!'
The men hesitated only a moment. When they heard the loud pounding on the iron-bound front gate, they scurried to the garden door.
Ma Joong walked back along the ridge as quickly as he dared. Surefooted as he was, he sighed with relief when he had safely reached the roof of the gatehouse.
'The soldiers are at the back gate!' he called out. 'Can't see anyone in the next street yet. If we hurry we can make it!'
A confused murmur of exclamations and curses came up to him. He quickly surveyed the black crowd. Doctor Lew was not among them.
He went to the gap and let himself slide down the bamboo ladder. Chiao Tai had already taken Ma Joong's jacket of mail off the dead woman, and wrapped it up in his neckcloth, together with the helmet. Now he was donning the black cloak of the tall scavenger Ma Joong had thrown down into the corridor first. The man's head was lying at an unnatural angle.
'Put the hood over your head and come along!' Ma Joong told his friend.
They climbed up the ladder, and surveyed the neighbourhood. All the black men had melted away.
Following the ridge to the rear end of the corridor, they jumped into the garden. The gate proved to give access to a narrow alley.
'On to the military post!' Ma Joong gasped.
In the next street they suddenly met four scavengers.
'What side are the soldiers, brothers?' Chiao Tai asked.
'Everywhere! Run!' The four scavengers pushed them aside and scurried into a side street.
It took them quite some time before they had located the military post. They met only one ordinary citizen on the way. He quickly stood aside when he saw the two tall hooded figures approach.
They discarded their cloaks and hoods only when they were in the yard of the small inn where the guardsmen had established their headquarters. Chiao Tai and Ma Joong stripped naked and squatted on the stone floor. While two soldiers were sluicing them with cold water, two others fumigated their clothes and armour over the brazier with aromatic herbs they kept burning in the yard's corner.
Chiao Tai learned to his satisfaction from the lieutenant in charge that a horse was standing ready. That was part of the alarm system he and Ma Joong had devised: during daytime every post should have always a horse ready for carrying a message, and at night a few signal rockets that exploded into many coloured lights. He ordered the lieutenant to dispatch a soldier on horseback to all the other posts in the vicinity, collect a hundred men and round up the scavengers in the quarter. 'Those who carry arms you arrest,' he added, 'and everyone who tries to put up resistance you cut down on the spot. Escort the lot to Military Police Headquarters.'