A Small Town in Germany Read Online Free PDF

It was a plain chair of varnished pine, different from the others and slightly pink in colour, hinting remotely at the boudoir; and it had a small, embroidered cushion on the seat.
    'Where is he?' Bradfield asked shortly. He alone had not followed Crabbe's gaze. 'Where's Harting?'
    No one answered. No one looked at Bradfield. Jenny Pargiter, scarlet in the face, stared at her mannish, practical hands which rested on her broad lap.
    'Stuck on that dreary ferry, I should think,' said de Lisle, coming too quickly to the rescue. 'God knows what the farmers are doing that side of the river.'
    'Someone find out, will they?' Bradfield asked, in the most disinterested tone. 'Ring his house or something, will you?'
    It is a matter of record that no one who was present took this instruction as his own; and that they left the room in curious disarray, looking neither at Bradfield nor at one another, nor at Jenny Pargiter, whose confusion seemed beyond all bearing.

    The last sack race was over. The strong wind, whipping over the waste land, dashed pebbles of rain against the flapping canvas. The wet rigging creaked painfully. Inside the marquee, the surviving children, mostly coloured, had rallied to the mast. The small flags of the Commonwealth, creased by storage and diminished by secession, swung unhappy in disarray. Beneath them, Mickie Crabbe, assisted by Cork the cypher clerk, was mustering the winners for the prize-giving.
    'M'butu, Alistair " Cork whispered. 'Where the hell's he got to?'
    Crabbe put the megaphone to his mouth:
    'Will Master Alistair M'butu please come forward. Alistair M'butu...Jesus,' he muttered, 'I can't even tell them apart.'
    'And Kitty Delassus. She's white.'
    'And Miss Kitty Delassus, please,' Crabbe added, nervously slurring the final 's'; for names, he had found by bitter experience, were a source of unholy offence.
    The Ambassadress, in ragged mink, waited benignly at her trestle table behind a motley of gift-wrapped parcels from the Naafi. The wind struck again, venomously; the Ghanaian Chargé, despondent at Crabbe's side, shuddered and pulled up the fur collar of his overcoat.
    'Disqualify them,' Cork urged. 'Give the prizes to the runners up.'
    'I'll wring his neck,' Crabbe declared, blinking violently. 'I'll wring his bloody neck. Skulking the other side of the river. Whoopsadaisy.'
    Janet Cork, heavily pregnant, had located the missing children and added them to the winners' enclosure.
    'Wait till Monday,' Crabbe whispered, raising the megaphone to his lips, 'I'll tell him a thing or two.'
    He wouldn't though, come to think of it. He wouldn't tell Leo anything. He'd keep bloody clear of Leo as a matter of fact; keep his head down and wait till it blew over.
    'Ladies and Gentlemen, the Ambassadress will now present the prizes!'

    They clapped, but not for Crabbe. The end was in sight. With a perfect insouciance that was as well suited to the launching of a ship as to the acceptance of a hand in marriage, the Ambassadress stepped forward to read her speech. Crabbe listened mindlessly: a family event... equal nations of the Commonwealth... if only the greater rivalries of the world could be resolved in so friendly a fashion... a heartfelt word of thanks to the Sports Committee, Messrs Jackson, Crabbe, Harting, Meadowes...
    Lamentably unmoved, a plain clothes policeman, posted against the canvas wall, took a pair of gloves from the pocket of his leather coat and stared blankly at a colleague. Hazel Bradfield, wife of the Head of Chancery, caught Crabbe's eye and smiled beautifully. Such a bore, she managed to imply, but it will soon be over, and then we might even have a drink. He looked quickly away. The only thing, he told himself fervently, is to know nothing and see nothing. Doggo, that's the word. Doggo. He glanced at his watch. Just one hour till the sun was over the yardarm. In Greenwich if not in Bonn. He'd have a beer first, just to keep his eye in; and afterwards he would have a little of