"Г.К.Честертон. The Scandal of Father Brown " - читать интересную книгу автора

Parlour and was now mysteriously known as a Saloon Lounge, and was newly
'decorated', in the manner of an Asiatic Divan. For Oriental ornament
pervaded the new scheme; and where there had once been a gun hung on hooks,
and sporting prints and a stuffed fish in a glass case, there were now
festoons of Eastern drapery and trophies of scimitars, tulwards and
yataghans, as if in unconscious preparation for the coming of the gentleman
with the turban. The practical point was, however, that the few guests who
did arrive had to be shepherded into this lounge, now swept and garnished,
because all the more regular and refined parts of the hotel were still in a
state of transition. Perhaps that was also the reason why even those few
guests were somewhat neglected, the manager and others being occupied with
explanations or exhortations elsewhere. Anyhow, the first two travellers who
arrived had to kick their heels for some time unattended. The bar was at the
moment entirely empty, and the Inspector rang and rapped impatiently on the
counter; but the little clergyman had already dropped into a lounge seat and
seemed in no hurry for anything. Indeed his friend the policeman, turning
his head, saw that the round face of the little cleric had gone quite blank,
as it had a way of doing sometimes; he seemed to be staring through his
moonlike spectacles at the newly decorated wall.
'I may as well offer you a penny for your thoughts,' said Inspector
Greenwood, turning from the counter with a sigh, 'as nobody seems to want my
pennies for anything else. This seems to be the only room in the house that
isn't full of ladders and whitewash; and this is so empty that there isn't
even a potboy to give me a pot of beer.'
'Oh . . . my thoughts are not worth a penny, let alone a pot of beer,'
answered the cleric, wiping his spectacles, 'I don't know why . . . but I
was thinking how easy it would be to commit a murder here.'
'It's all very well for you. Father Brown,' said the Inspector good -
humouredly. 'You've had a lot more murders than your fair share; and we poor
policemen sit starving all our lives, even for a little one. But why should
you say . . . Oh I see, you're looking at all those Turkish daggers on the
wall. There are plenty of things to commit a murder with, if that's what you
mean. But not more than there are in any ordinary kitchen: carving knives or
pokers or what not. That isn't where the snag of a murder comes in.'
Father Brown seemed to recall his rambling thoughts in some
bewilderment; and said that he supposed so.
'Murder is always easy,' said Inspector Greenwood. 'There can't
possibly be anything more easy than murder. I could murder you at this
minute - more easily than I can get a drink in this damned bar. The only
difficulty is committing a murder without committing oneself as a murderer.
It's this shyness about owning up to a murder; it's this silly modesty of
murderers about their own masterpieces, that makes the trouble. They will
stick to this extraordinary fixed idea of killing people without being found
out; and that's what restrains them, even in a room full of daggers.
Otherwise every cutler's shop would be piled with corpses. And that, by the
way, explains the one kind of murder that really can't be prevented. Which
is why, of course, we poor bobbies are always blamed for not preventing it.
When a madman murders a King or a President, it can't be prevented. You
can't make a King live in a coal - cellar, or carry about a President in a
steel box. Anybody can murder him who does not mind being a murderer. That