Colour Scheme by Ngaio Marsh

Questing attempted to stop him, and the scene mounted in a rapid crescendo. Dikon, Mrs. Claire, and Barbara remained in the room, Dr. Ackrington on the verandah appeared to hold a watching brief, while Questing and Smith yelled industriously in each other’s faces. The climax came when Questing again attempted to shove Smith away from the verandah. Smith drove his fist in Questing’s face and lost his balance. They fell simultaneously.
    The noise stopped as suddenly as it had begun. An inexplicable and ridiculous affair changed abruptly into a piece of convincing melodrama. Dikon had seen many such a set-up at the cinema studios. Smith, shaky and bloated, crouched where he had fallen and mouthed at Questing. Questing got to his feet and dabbed ai the corner of his mouth with his handkerchief. His cigar lay smoking on the ground between them. It was a shot in technicolour, for Rangi’s Peak was now tinctured with such a violence of purple as is seldom seen outside the theatre, and in the middle distance rose the steam of the hot pools.
    Dikon waited for a bit of tough dialogue to develop and was not disappointed.
    “By God,” Questing said, exploring his jaw, “you’ll get yours for this. You’re sacked.”
    “You’re not my bloody boss.”
    “I’ll bloody well get you the sack, don’t you worry. When I’m in charge here…”
    “That will do,” said Dr. Ackrington crisply.
    “What
is
all this?” a peevish voice demanded. Colonel Claire, followed by Simon, appeared round the wing of the house. Smith got to his feet.
    “You’ll have to get rid of this man, Colonel,” said Questing.
    “What’s he done?” Simon demanded.
    “I socked him.” Smith took Simon by the lapels of his coat. “You look out for yourselves,” he said. “It’s not only me he’s after. Your dad won’t sack me, will he, Sim?”
    “We’ll see about that,” Questing said.
    “But
why
…” Colonel Claire began, and was cut short by his brother-in-law.
    “If I may interrupt for a moment,” said Dr. Ackrington acidly, “I suggest that I take Mr. Bell to my room. Unless, of course, he prefers a ring-side seat. Will you come and have a drink, Bell?”
    Dikon thankfully accepted, leaving the room in a gale of apologies from Mrs. Claire and Barbara. Questing, who seemed to have recovered his temper, followed them up with a speech in which anxiety, propitiation, and a kind of fawning urgency were most disagreeably mingled. He was cut short by Dr. Ackrington.
    “Possibly,” Dr. Ackrington said, “Mr. Bell may prefer to form his own opinion of this episode. No doubt he has seen a chronic alcoholic before now, and will not attach much significance to anything this particular specimen may choose to say.”
    “Yes, yes. Of course,” Dikon murmured unhappily.
    “As for the behaviour of Other Persons,” Dr. Ackrington continued, “there again, he may, as I do, form his own opinion. Come along, Bell.”
    Dikon followed him along the verandah to his own room, a grimly neat apartment with a hideous desk.
    “Sit down,” said Dr. Ackrington. He wrenched open the door of a home-made cupboard, and took out a bottle and two tumblers. “I can only offer you whisky,” he said. “With Smith’s horrible example before you, you may not like the idea. Afraid I don’t go in for modern rot-gut.”
    “Thank you,” said Dikon, “I should like whisky. May I ask who he is?”
    “Smith? He’s a misfit, a hopeless fellow. No good in him at all. Drifted out here as a boy. Agnes, my sister, who is something of a snob, talks loosely about him being a public-school man. Her geese are invariably swans, but I suppose this suggestion is within the bounds of possibility. Smith may have originated in some ill-conducted establishment of dubious gentility. Sometimes their early habits of speech go down the wind with their self-respect. Sometimes they keep it up even in the gutter. They used to be called remittance men, and in this extraordinary