Dead Men's s Boots читать онлайн

He was so frail he looked as though he might just break into pieces. He wore silk pyjamas that were a little too big for him; there was a broad, dark stain spreading outwards and downwards from the crotch, which explained the gents’-urinal smell.

I took a step backward, and then another, bending my head as I passed under the lintel. The old man shuffled out after me, not needing to bend his own head because of his diminutive size and stooped shoulders.

As I was closing the cupboard door I heard footsteps from behind me and turned my head with difficulty – because the old man was still holding tight onto my arm – to see who was coming.

One of the search parties had come in out of the cold: at its head was a familiar face topped by a familiar shock of snow-white hair.

‘Door was open, Mister Covington,’ I said. ‘So I let myself in. Hope you don’t mind.’

He stared at me, then at the old man leaning against my arm, then back at me. ‘The door was open,’ he agreed, ‘but as I recall the gate was locked. It still is.

Do I know you? Your face is vaguely familiar.’

‘Felix Castor. We met at Mount Grace,’ I said. ‘On Wednesday, when John Gittings was cremated.’ By this time, two of the searchers – a man in an immaculate white shirt and grey suit trousers and a woman who was self-evidently a nurse – had gently and painstakingly prised the old man’s fingers loose from my forearm and were leading him away, the woman murmuring reassuringly into his ear about getting cleaned up and having a nice cup of tea. I watched him ou» wa myt of sight, then turned back to Covington.

Covington nodded slowly, his expression still wary. ‘All right. Yes. I remember you. But what are you doing here now?’

‘I was hoping to talk to Mister Palance,’ I said, and saw the punchline looming a full second before it came.

‘Well,’ Covington said, nodding towards the door that the old man had disappeared through, ‘it looks as though you’ve already introduced yourself.’

‘Mister Palance – Lionel – had a stroke about ten years ago,’ Covington said, walking ahead of me along a corridor you could drive a truck down: it would have ruined the Persian carpet, though, and probably knocked one or two of the enormous Tiffany lamps off their wrought-iron brackets.

‘A bad one?’ I asked.

‘No.’ Covington shook his head. His expression – what I could see of it – was closed, impossible to read. ‘Not a bad one. Not really. He was able to walk afterwards, and his speech was back to normal after three months.