Chapter 5 chapter Five

After passing Marylebone, the tram drove into the morning sun.Grant looked out the window, in a much more cheerful mood than when he reported to the Gower Street police station.The murderer is no longer just a fictional character, they roughly grasp his appearance, which may be the only clue before they catch the murderer.The identity of the deceased may be determined tonight.He stretched out his legs in the empty compartment of the tram, and the sunlight slowly slid down like the rolling axles of a moving train.At ten o'clock on a fine morning, passing through the delightful English countryside.There is no provocative and vulgar atmosphere in the small village in the backcountry, shining selflessness and solemnity in the clear light and shadow.The narrow and bare door is not at all inferior to the poor quality of paintwork and decoration. Emerald, carnelian, lapis lazuli and agate are inlaid into a unique paradise.In their garden, filled with vigorous vitality.The tulips growing freely and the weak grass seedlings just planted make people feel like they are in the hanging garden of Babylon.The children's colorful clothes were blown and fluttered by the wind in a string of silver bells of laughter.Going forward, when the village finally disappeared from sight, the vast pastures were as clear and pleasant as a hunting engraving in the sun.

Grant knew that England was full of such charming mornings.However, there is a Venetian in the Nottingham Canal who will suffer today, and the dirty and imprisoned walls of the canal will be as red as the walls of Petra "The Fuchsia City.") The trolley whistles low and Grant arrives at the station.If you ask him what impresses him most about the Midlands of England, he will definitely say trams without hesitation.For him, trams are as out of place in London as outsiders, like a country bumpkin seduced by the metropolis, who is world-weary or despises his own existence because he can't make a lot of money.

If he hadn't heard the distinctive honking of the tram in the distance, Grant would not have realized that he was back in the same place.The tranquil Midlands of England is his birthplace.The Midlanders never dodge back street trams, they chase them proudly along the main arterials, partly for bragging rights and partly because they are out of step with reality. They used a long yellow rope to run from one end of the pavement to the vendors in Nottingham Market, and happily played hide and seek in a large square area enclosed by a square. The locals who have already integrated into the magical landscape of nature seem to be more enthusiastic about triple jumping. They think this kind of game is not dangerous enough to be addicted to.In short, no one was killed during Grant's days on the street.

At the Reliance Brothers branch, he pulled out the dead man's tie, wondering if anyone remembered selling it.The clerk at the counter was unimpressed with the deal, so another clerk came out.The man was flipping through the information in the card box on the wall with his white and extremely soft fingers, trying his best to find products that met the customer's requirements.Intuition told Grant that the young man had an impression of this tie, and he was right.After glancing at the tie, the clerk said he had taken it out of the window a month earlier at the request of a gentleman — or another tie of the same style.The gentleman saw this tie in the window and thought it would match his clothes, so he went into the store to buy it.No, he didn't think he was from Nottingham.Why? He didn't have a Nottingham accent, and he dressed very differently from the people here.

Can you describe what this man looks like? He can.After a while of recollection and confirmation, he said: "If you want to know, I can also tell you what day it is." The young man said casually: "The reason I remember it is because—" He hesitated for a moment, then changed The previous childishness, said again in a sophisticated tone, "is because something happened on February 2nd." Grant noted the date and asked him what impression he had of the stranger.Did he look like he was on a business trip? The young man didn't think so. He didn't talk about business, and didn't seem to have the slightest interest in the ups and downs of Nottingham.

Grant asked if there was any activity in the town that day that would bring the stranger to Nottingham, and the young man said yes.There was a great music festival that day--a festival for all the Midlands, and there were a lot of people in London to join in the fun.He knew it because he was a member of the church choir during the celebration and knew the whole celebration all too well.Outsiders were more interested in celebrations than in business investigations, and he guessed that this might be the reason why the man came to Nottingham. Grant found that to be a reasonable argument.He thought of the delicate, sensitive hands of the dead man.He frequented Woffington, and was a musician, if not an intellectual.This was inconsistent with the original assumption that the deceased belonged to a certain gang, but he couldn't ignore this clue because of this.Gang assumptions have no basis in fact.

That's just an idea—pure speculation.After he had thanked the young man, he asked him who in Nottingham knew best about the music festival and the visitors who attended it.The young man said it was Yudal, a solicitor.Yudal is not a secretary, he is the organizer, and he is very enthusiastic about this event.For the whole three-day celebration, he sat in town from morning to night, and he must know everyone who is interested in running from London to participate in the event. Grant noted Udal's address and noticed the young man staring at him curiously.If, years later, he was asked who asked for Yudal's address, he would be able to say exactly.Staying in the clothing store really buried him.

"Are you looking for the guy who bought the tie?" asked the young man.He said the word "looking for" with a particularly emphatic tone, the tone of a policeman questioning. "Not exactly," Grant said, "but I'll keep following him up if I can." Then he left to visit Udal. Udal's (or Lister and Udal's) dark and cramped office is located in an alley close to the castle - the kind where no trams ever pass by, and the echo of footsteps makes one involuntarily want to look back alley.The house has a history of three hundred years at least. The oak paneling in the reception room, which has lost even the last gleam of luster, seems to want to compete with the bright green glass windows as in the past.The dimmed light on the window sill seems to be the last survivor under the siege of the enemy, and it is an honor to die.Mr. Yudal, the one named Yudal in "Lister and Yudal", seems to be a person with a different idea, otherwise he wouldn't have decided to make everything here so weird.Weird! refers to this cupboard-like house, decorated only with windows so that you can't see the walls at all.

Slabs of plate glass are semi-recessed in incredible grunge style on decorative columns in the walls.What a modern building! However, despite using this method to make up for the darkness in the room, Mr. Udal himself greeted the guest with a smile on his face. He was a trustworthy person without any suspicion before making friends. like a lawyer.As the only surviving heir of the third generation of the Yudal family, he devoted his young years to this room the size of a cupboard.He had been there long since he was fascinated by oak paneling, its luster and green glass, and symphonies and sonatas.He was now Udal of Lister & Udal—the only capable clerk in the company who took care of all the little things.

In fact, Mr. Udal did not sincerely welcome the arrival of the inspector.Grant thought Mr. Udal just thought he should see the man first.When the detective searched all the way to his office with the address, he always had a very curious attitude towards strange faces.His slightest liking for Grant came when Grant realized that it was time for lunch at the end of work.It was already past one o'clock, and it had been a long time since breakfast, and if the Inspector wasn't going to eat, he would be hungry too.Grant dined with his unexpected but enthusiastic host: he hadn't got a clue yet, but it seemed like a good chance.The police never pass up an opportunity to make friends.If Scotland Yard should have a motto, it should be: "You won't know until you try."

It wasn't until after lunch that he discovered that Mr. Udal knew nothing about the man he was looking for.He knew all about the personalities, looks, and interests of all the performers at the festival, but none of them matched Grant's description. "If you think that man is a musician, you might as well try the symphony orchestra in Lyon. The musicians in that orchestra are mostly Londoners." Grant didn't bother to explain that the assumption that the dead man was a musician arose from speculation that his dead man was connected to the celebration.Mr. Udal opened up the chatter with ease and gaiety.In the afternoon, bidding farewell to his hospitable hosts, Grant hurried to the town's symphony orchestras with the expected setback.After running back and forth, he dialed back to Scotland Yard to hear the progress of Williams' investigation of bank notes.Williams, who had just returned from a long morning shift, said that the banknotes had been sent to the bank and there was no result yet, but they had been promised that the bank would fully cooperate. Hanging up the phone, Grant thought, the tangled end of the case seemed to move slowly but steadily.None of the clues were clear, and there was clearly something behind the notes issued by the Bank of England.Failing this lead in the pursuit of the dead man in Nottingham, an investigation into the identity of this friend might help them find the dead man.From the dead to the Levantine will be but a step away.However, he was still missing something.He had an intuition early this morning that there would be unexpected news today that would allow him to get the right clues.He recalled with disgust that his wasted day was not a hangover from Mr. Udal's sumptuous lunch, nor was it the earnestness of that good gentleman, and he was sorry he had to console himself.At the station, finding that there was still an hour and a half to wait for the train, he dragged himself to the nearest hotel lobby, in the faint hope of gleaning some trifling information from the most gossipy public place. He watched the two waiters with scrutiny, one defiant like an overfed pug, the other like an absent-minded German spaniel.Grant instinctively thought that the two men would be of no help to him.However, Grant's weary body and mind were lifted when an attractive middle-aged waitress brought his coffee.In just a few minutes, he was immersed in this kind atmosphere and chatted casually with her.Their conversation continued when she temporarily left the other customers waiting for service and turned back to him, and when she was within a talking distance.It is useless to try to describe to the woman a person who is neither hunchback nor blind or has any abnormal conditions. She has seen at least half a dozen dead people who fit his description every day. Can be called satisfactory. "Your business here is a little deserted," he said. That's right, she agreed: this was the quietest time of their business.They are busy when they are free, doing business, always like this. Is it all about the number of hotel guests? No, not necessarily.Usually, though.That's the way the hotel business works: when you're free and when you're busy. Is the hotel ever full? Yes.When people from the consumer cooperative came, it was already full.They booked a total of 200 rooms.She remembered the only time when Nottingham was crowded. "When did it happen?" Grant asked. "Early February," she said, "they do it every two years, I think." Early February! Where do the Consumer Co-ops come from? All from all over the Midlands. Not from London? No, she didn't think so; but some of them ought to be. Grant rushes to catch a train, haunted by new possibilities and implausibility, which he does not know why.The deceased did not look like this type of person.If he was a store clerk, he would have to dress more appropriately for business. The journey back to the city was no longer slow, nor surrounded by bright and optimistic joy.The sun was setting, and the gray twilight had smudged the entire country skyline, making the haggard night look even more monotonous and gloomy. Poplar buildings stood everywhere, and the non-reflective white paint shone ominously in the puddles of water.Grant buried himself in his report, and when he felt weary he would gaze out of the gray window at the boundless night sky, and once again his thoughts wrestled with the question of the dead man's occupation.There were still three people sitting in the compartment of the train, and they spouted out their opinions on some subject, whatever it was they were talking about, which drove him mad and bored for no reason.The traffic signals hung like isolated rubies and emeralds across the fading light, and his mood returned slightly. The interweaving of these lights creates a scene that is breathtakingly stunning.What an inconceivable play of phantom visions faceless in the abundance of lampstands and bars whose subject is only a dynamo.He was glad that, after so much noise and chatter, his journey had come to an end, with the bright and vibrant lights of London hanging high above his head. He returned to Scotland Yard with a strange presentiment that what he had planned to find was waiting for him here, and his intuition had not fooled him that the crucial clue to the life of the deceased would be in his hands.He subconsciously quickened his pace, he couldn't wait, he had never felt that he was lifting his feet so slowly, and he had never felt that the journey was so far away. It turned out to be nothing, except—Williams, who had been here for a cup of tea, had left Grant with a report that was supposed to be handed to him—he had heard the gist of it on the phone. However, just as Inspector Grant returned to Scotland Yard, a strange thing happened to Danny Miller. He was sitting on a chair on the east side of the upper room of the apartment in the Pimlico District, hanging his clean feet in delicate slippers by the armrest, dangling lazily, and inserting them into the six-inch filter The cigarette protruded from his thin lips at a slightly upward angle.Standing in the middle of the room was his "Jane," busy trying on an evening gown, taking out the cardboard of her shirt like she was peeling a pea out of a pod with her thumb.She slowly turned her graceful body, allowing the light to fall on her fragile and innocent face, which made her figure appear more slender. "Isn't that a nice evening gown?" she said, glancing at Miller in the mirror.Even if she noticed that those eyes were focusing on her back, he still kept staring at her.She turns around. "What's wrong?" she asked. Danny didn't seem to hear her: the focus of his eyes was motionless.Suddenly he took the filter out of his mouth, threw the cigarette into the fireplace, jumped up like a madman, and started looking for something. "My hat!" he said. "Where's my hat? Where the hell is my hat?" "Behind that chair you're sitting on," she said in amazement, "what frightens you?" Danny grabbed his hat and rushed out of the room, as if all the demons were hiding in the floor beneath his feet.She heard him rush down the stairs and the front door slam shut.Then she heard the sound of him going back and forth again, and she couldn't help but stand at the door with her eyes wide open in surprise.He came back again, ran up the stairs three steps at a time, his steps were as light as a cat, and returned to her. "Give me twopence," said he, "I haven't even twopence." She took two pennies out of the expensive ornate bag he had given her. "I didn't know you were penniless," she said, trying to provoke him to an explanation of his behaviour. "What do you want twopence for?" "Get lost!" he yelled, disappearing again. He was still panting as he ran to the nearest phone booth, but he felt very happy.Instead of looking down the telephone directory for a long time as usual, he directly asked to be connected to Scotland Yard.While waiting, he shuffled excitedly and impatiently up and down the booth floor.Finally—Grant's voice finally appeared on the other end of the phone. "I said Inspector, I'm Miller. I just remembered where I saw that guy you mentioned. 'Gangster'? ... I was on the train with him to the races in Leicester, end of January , I think then... are you sure? I remember it like it was yesterday. We talked about horse racing and he seemed to be very knowledgeable. I hadn't seen him in the past until... well... no, I didn't Read those papers...don't bother with that. I'm glad I could help. I tell you, my memory hasn't worked for a long time!" Danny backed out of the phone booth and walked away, sane, ready to go back and comfort the irritated and dumped woman who had prepared his evening gown.And Grant put down the microphone and let out a long breath.Horse racing! This incident seems to fit the case very well, why is he so stupid! A completely ignorant and hateful idiot! How could he have never thought of it at all.Didn't realize that although two-thirds of the people in Nottingham are obsessed with lace, the other third are obsessed with horse racing.So horse racing is enough to explain the man - his attire, the purpose of his visit to Nottingham, his penchant for musical comedy, even...maybe...the gang. He went out and found a copy of the Samat.Yes, there was an obstacle course at Kerwick Park on February 2nd.The previous game at Leicester was at the end of January.Danny's description provides a key clue. Grant wrestled with the information that the bookies on Saturday night were watching the race from a distance from their offices, if not there.Next day--None of the bookies were at home on Sunday.It is conceivable that all day the next day, the mercury-like crowd drove their cars from all over the UK to the racecourse.Investments in banks and horse racing will be affected by the weekend. Grant put aside his galloping thoughts and went to Laurent to recover. There will be tougher jobs on Monday - the tie and the as yet unclaimed revolver. But maybe there will be clues in the bank notes, so that the efficiency of investigation can be accelerated and those tiring procedures can be avoided.Now he's off to his early dinner, to filter things through.