Gently Instrumental Read Online Free Page A

case now. He’d like to ask you a few questions, sir – just to get things clear in his mind.’
    Hozeley peered at Gently. ‘From Scotland Yard?’
    ‘Yes, sir. From the Yard.’
    ‘Hasn’t he read my statement?’
    ‘Well yes, sir, but—’
    ‘I don’t have anything more to add.’
    He stalked to a wing-armchair and sat, his craggy profile turned to a window: Walt, Walter Hozeley, whose large brain had heard the
Beach Suite
.
    Gently hunched. He strolled across to the piano. He began pressing notes with unskilled fingers. It was that theme again, Leyston noticed, at first picked out haltingly, then with more confidence. And at last Gently got it together, was making note follow note in tempo. He played it lingeringly, sensitively, searching for the feeling. Hozeley jumped up.
    ‘
Not
like that!’
    He stormed over to the piano stool. His large hands spread over the keyboard and for an instant were quite still. Then they struck. From another world the theme came tumbling in a poised rhapsody, an electrifying fabric which the hands seemed to conduct rather than play. They stilled again. ‘Thus.’
    ‘But I don’t play,’ Gently admitted.
    ‘You don’t listen,’ Hozeley retorted. ‘You haven’t heard it. Perhaps you never will.’
    ‘Could Virtue hear it?’ Gently said.
    Hozeley glared for a space at the keyboard. He raised and let fall his hands, but without striking a note. ‘Yes.’
    ‘Virtue really had talent?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘He just lacked the discipline to go with it.’
    ‘When he wished he had it.’
    ‘But is that good enough?’
    Hozeley said nothing and his hands stayed still.
    ‘I think Virtue was a failure,’ Gently said. ‘He didn’t have the character to be an artist. You tried to give it to him but you couldn’t. He belonged where you found him – in someone’s Palm Court.’
    ‘That is unfair!’
    Gently grunted. ‘We know a bit about him, too.’
    ‘If I could have kept him long enough—’
    ‘But that’s the point, isn’t it? He would never have stayed with you until then.’
    Hozeley pressed hard on the edge of the keyboard. ‘Terry had his failings and I wasn’t blind to them. First they had to be overcome, and that was a task that called for patience. But Terry was worth it. He had a wonderful ear and his fingering was quite exceptional. Those are two things that rarely come together. I couldn’t let him throw such potential away.’
    ‘But by Tuesday you knew it was useless.’
    ‘What happened on Tuesday was just one more hurdle.’
    Gently shook his head. ‘Tuesday was the end. You knew that Virtue was a dud, that you were going to lose him.’
    Hozeley slammed a chord. ‘I deny that.’
    Gently shrugged. He turned away into the room.

    It was a cool room: between it and the sun lay eighteen inches of fragrant thatch. Also it smelled of potpourri and another scent, less easy to identify. Gently prowled around it. The potpourri was contained in two Chinese jars on a teak stand. The keener odour he traced to a deeply carved camphor-wood chest. Then there was other Chinese bric-a-brac and a Chinese carpet, the colour of jade. The furniture however was conventional, with loose covers of flowered cretonne.
    Hozeley had begun to play again: Chopin that sounded like tears. Leyston stood by with a gloomy expression – no doubt he preferred the hard-shooting game. Gently came back to the piano.
    ‘Tell me about Tuesday.’
    Hozeley didn’t stop playing. ‘I gave the Inspector an exhaustive statement.’
    ‘Not the air. The orchestration.’
    Hozeley played the Chopin to a close. ‘Terry was . . . fretting.’
    ‘Go on.’
    ‘The young are restless – impatient. Terry was a London boy. Of course, he would find Shinglebourne dull.’
    ‘Had there been other rows?’
    Hozeley struck a note. ‘Terry would have liked me to have given him money. A substantial sum, I mean. Naturally, I saw he had pocket money.’
    ‘Did he ever threaten you?’
    ‘He could