The Mortdecai Trilogy

by Bonfiglioli, Kyril

  I began to feel positively chipper. Apart from the prospect of a few score years in prison the horizon was pretty clear. Peals of laughter wafted through from the kitchen, where Jock, I suppose, was showing my photograph to his dominoes-friend and the cook. I beamed indulgently.

  Dinner was announced.

  I need hardly say that I am not one of those whose minds dwell continually on foodstuffs: but when I do, once in a while, turn my mind in that direction it is with a certain single-mindedness; particularly when, as in this case, the grocery under advisement proves to be a guinea-fowl, that triumph of the poulterer’s art. This particular feathered friend was an uncommonly well-poultered example: it must have led a beautiful and sheltered life. Hand-in-hand tripped a bottle of Barolo, singing wistful lays of the gravel slopes of the Piedmont. Seldom have I spent a happier and more innocent hour but, as the Master himself tells us, it is at times like these that Fate creeps out of a dark alley, fingering a stuffed eel-skin destined for the back of one’s neck.

  I threw the end of my Romeo y Julieta into the embers of the fire and cast a sort of husbandly look at Johanna. She raised an eyebrow shaped like a seagull’s wing. I winked. The telephone rang.

  It was the Centenier, He thought I might like to know that there had been another rape. The wife of the tomato grower. Satanic trapping as before but with an addition: having knocked her unconscious with the same gentle punch, he had scribbled the word ‘secretary’ in greasepaint in a semi-circle on her bare belly, well below the navel.

  ‘Have you read the paper tonight?’ I asked.

  ‘I seen the photo of you, sir, but I ’aven’t what you might call perused the entire article, ’aving been called out on this case, eh?’

  ‘Take another look at the lady’s tummy,’ I said, ‘I think you’ll find the word is Sécaire.’

  I rose wearily, feeling as old as sin.

  ‘Ah well,’ I sighed, ‘back to the grind.’

  ‘Oh good,’ said Johanna. ‘Race you to bed?’

  ‘I did not mean that.’

  ‘You were meaning it just now.’

  ‘Just now I was in early middle age. At this moment I feel ready for the Tom and Geriatric ward.’

  ‘All right, we’ll play patients and nurses: you shall chase me upstairs, but very slowly; to husband your strength.’

  ‘Oh, very well,’ I said.

  My heart was not really in it but I appreciated the fact that she wanted to help. For some reason, you see, we can’t talk to each other properly.

  14

  Not utterly struck spiritless

  For shame’s sake and unworthiness

  Of these poor forceless hands that come

  Empty, these lips that should be dumb,

  This love whose seal can but impress

  These weak word-offerings wearisome

  Whose blessings have not strength to bless

  Nor lightnings fire to burn up aught

  Nor smite with thunders of their thought.

  Epilogue

  A hideous wailing penetrated my grimly dreams: I awoke shuddering. It was only Jock mounting the stairs with my tea-tray, singing ‘On the Good Ship Lollipop’ in his best falsetto. He does it rather well but there is a time and place for Shirley Temple.

  ‘This aubade or mattinata must not occur again, Jock. It hurts me in the liver. “Cursed is he who greets his brother with a loud voice in the morning” as Deuteronomy was so fond of pointing out.’

  Vengefully, he allowed some tea to slop into my saucer as he handed it to me, then deliberately mopped it up with a well-ripened pocket-handkerchief. Game, set and match to him. The tea, when I could bring myself to sample it, tasted like waters of Babylon which had been too freely wept in.

  ‘How is the canary this morning?’

  ‘Got a bad leg.’

  ‘Then summon the best vet money can buy, spare no expense. A Mr Blampied is well spoken of.’

  ‘He’s bin. Said the leg’ll ’ave to come orf.’

  ‘Nonsense. I am not a rich man, I cannot afford to keep wooden-legged canaries in idle luxury.’

  ‘He’s a singer, Mr Charlie, not a bleedin’ dancer. Oh, yeah, and Mr Davenant and Mr Breakspear are waiting for you downstairs.’

  ‘Oh dear, oh Christ, are they really? Er, they seem in a jolly sort of mood, I dare say?’

  ‘Bloody diabolical.’

  ‘Oh. They’ll have heard about the new incident, then?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Jock’s gift for language had not failed him: ‘diabolical’ was the only word to express the moods of George and Sam. They stared at me, as I good-morninged them, as though they were a brace of Lady Macbeths confronted with one of the less acceptable kinds of damned spot. I crinkled my mouth into a wry smile. Their mouths stayed grim. I toyed with the idea of telling them a funny story, then discarded it.

  ‘Drinks?’ I asked. ‘Scotch? Gin and tonic? Bottled beer?’

  ‘Mortdecai,’ said George, ‘you are a four-letter man.’

  ‘D’you know, I’ve never quite known what that meant.’

  Sam told me; in four letters. I allow no one to speak to me like that.

  ‘Sam,’ I began heavily.

  He repeated the word.

  ‘Well,’ I conceded, ‘there may be something in what you suggest. But consider: the rapist – if this incident is his work – may not have had time to read yesterday’s Jersey Evening Post; it had not been long on the streets.’

  ‘Then how do you account for the word Sécaire?’

  ‘Oh. You heard about that bit.’

  ‘Yes, we heard. And it seems to us that your perverse and crack-brained scheme has not only disgraced us and put us in jeopardy of gaol but, worst of all, it has not worked. The man is clearly laughing at us.’

  ‘Early days to be certain of that, surely? I mean, it’s just possible that it might really work, you know. In his subconscious or something …’ I tailed off lamely.

  ‘Rubbish. We must simply resume the ambushes – every night from now on. The new incident confirms our view that the targets are always likely to be Englishwomen in their thirties and living in this neighbourhood. It’s just a matter of time now, and vigilance.’

  ‘And staff-work,’ grunted George.

  ‘And loyalty.’

  ‘I see. Very well. We start tonight, I take it? Or do we leave it a night to let the chap re-charge his, ah, batteries?’

  ‘Tonight,’ they said with one voice.

  ‘I suppose you’re right; chap like that probably doesn’t run off batteries – glands like nuclear reactors, I should think.’

  ‘Unfunny. And I suppose you know that we’re all due at the Police Station in forty minutes: I dare say you might care to offer us a drink before we leave.’

  I opened my mouth and shut it again. It was clear that I could do no right that morning.

  The Chief Superintendent met us with a stony look. Like all good policemen who have received hints to lay off from people in high places, he was in an ugly mood. He studied us carefully, one by one – the time-honoured technique of policemen who wish you to understand that they will be Keeping an Eye on you in the future and that you’d better not be caught parking on a yellow line.

  ‘For some reason not confided in me,’ he began heavily, ‘it has been decided that this is to be treated as a silly prank which ended tragically. Most of the gravamen of the many charges will be laid to the account of the deceased Tichborne. I hope that will please you. You are only to be charged with Unlawfully Entering Private Premises, Unlawfully Causing Scandal and Distress, Failing to prevent a Breach of the Law Against Ill-treatment of Animals and you, Mr Breakspear, with Driving an Uninsured Vehicle and Failing to Sign a Driving Licence.’

  I broke out in a sweat of relief. George grated his teeth audibly. Sam’s eyes seemed to be fixed on some distant and loathsome object.

  ‘I have been in touch informally,’ the policeman went on, ‘with the Société Jersaise. They are, q
uite rightly, shocked and furious, but you may find that a written apology and an offer to pay for a new padlock-chain and for the removal of the smoke-stains on the walls of the chapel will satisfy them. Say, three hundred pounds.’

  Three cheque-books flashed in the dusty sunshine; three fountain pens scratched and squirted in unison.

  ‘The Police Court magistrate has sent up your case directly to the Royal Court. You are to appear before a special session at precisely two-thirty this afternoon, which gives you plenty of time to enjoy a large and expensive lunch. No, please do not ask me to join you. I am feeling a little sick. Good day to you.’

  That man was wasted as a policeman: he should have been the headmaster of a High Anglican public school. We slunk out.

  The desk sergeant offered no cups of tea this time; he viewed us coldly. He probably knew little of the matter but the scent of opprobrium must have clung to us: we were no longer gents as such but faces to memorize.

  He asked me to identify, and sign for, my tape-recorder complete with one cassette. I did so.

  ‘There’s nothing on the cassette,’ he explained.

  ‘D’you want to bet?’ I asked.

  My car was triumphantly displaying a parking-ticket, which the others gazed at with moody satisfaction.

  ‘Well, where are we lunching?’ asked George.

  ‘At the nearest rookery for me,’ I said, ‘it is my day for eating crow.’

  In the event we were lucky enough to secure a table at the Borsalino, but we could do scant justice to the excellent fare.

  ‘Don’t you like the Poulet Borsalino?’ asked a puzzled proprietor.

  Sam looked at him with dreary eyes.

  ‘The Poulet Borsalino is excellent. It is us we don’t like.’

  There was nothing in that for the proprietor; he stole away. (When I tell you that Poulet Borsalino is breast of chicken rolled around gobs of Camembert cheese and deep-fried, you will realize what depths of chagrin caused us to spurn it.)

  The Royal Court was intimidating beyond belief. George and Sam’s Advocates and my jolly Solicitor joined us in the lobby. The Advocates pursed their lips; Solly gave me a wink. Taking his point, I wrenched the knot of my necktie tight and slid it to one side, rumpling the collar; a simple ruse which reduces one’s apparent income by several hundred pounds. Verb. sap., not to mention experto crede. We mounted flight after flight of linoleumclad stairs, designed, no doubt, in ancient times to ensure that prisoners arrived in Court flushed and sweating with guilt. Solly goosed me on the stairs, no doubt to cheer me up. Outside the court room itself we were surrendered to the Greffier: a terrifying personage in a black robe who looked as though he believed in capital punishment for motoring offences. Soon we were joined by the Vécomte – pronounced Viscount – another black-robed officer bearing a great mace, and we processed through oaken doors into the Court. It is a tall, airy, well-lit chamber of great beauty, hung with excellent pictures. Before us, in some majesty and under a splendid canopy, sat the arbiters of our fate. In the centre (Solly explained to me in a whisper) the Deputy Bailiff; to his right a lower throne – empty – where Her Majesty’s Lieutenant-Governor would have been sitting had he chosen to exercise his right to attend; on the other side a brace of Jurats, chosen from the flower of Jersey’s ancient aristocracy. They looked wise and useful, which I believe is their function.

  The Vécomte stood the mace in its socket before the Bench, the Greffier took his stall and the Court of the Inferior Number (so called when only two Jurats are sitting) was in session.

  The public benches were almost empty: the notice had been too short for the mass of sensation-seekers and only the usual handful of ghoulish old ladies sucking peppermints was there – the ones who don’t like all that violence on television and prefer to hear it at first hand, hot from the sty. The sole occupant of the Press bench was my friend Miss H. Glossop, radiating intelligence and goodwill. I had the impression that she would have liked to give me a friendly wave.

  There was a deathly hush in the Court, then people recited things in ancient Norman-French; lesser officers repeated them in English; policemen, both Paid and Honorary, related how they had proceeded from one place to another in the execution of their duty and acting on information received and what was more they had notebooks to prove it. Sam’s advocate rose and moaned piteously; George’s man boomed capably; Solly – a Solly I had never seen before – craved the Court’s indulgence to explain briefly that I was – although not in just those words – merely a fucking idiot and more to be pitied than censured.

  There was another deathly hush, broken only by peppermint noises from the old ladies. The Deputy Bailiff and Jurats retired to debate the finer points and I had a quick consultation with my pocket-flask.

  Our judges returned after a very few minutes, wearing damned disinheriting countenances. When everyone was seated, we miscreants were bidden to stand up again. The Deputy Bailiff had a fine command of the language; as he summarized our follies we shrank in stature quite visibly.

  Five sonorous minutes made it clear to us, and to all beholders, that we were the sort of reprobates without which the fair Isle of Jersey could well do; that much of the hooliganism, drunkenness and general lowering of moral standards on the Island was directly attributable to such as we; that men of our age should be giving an example to the younger generation and that it had better not happen again, or else.

  He took a pause for breath.

  ‘Charlie Strafford Van Cleef Mortdecai,’ he said in a voice of doom. ‘You are deemed guilty on all three counts. What say you in answer?’

  I caught the compelling eye of the old lady opposite. She was leaning forward, her mouth ajar, the great striped peppermint inside clearly visible.

  ‘I’m awfully sorry,’ I told the peppermint; ‘foolish, ill-advised, unforgivable. Yes. Sorry. Very.’

  He told me that I was a man of good family; that I had acted in a disinterested way on my friends’ behalf, although foolishly; that the Court was satisfied with my expressions of regret, that the disgrace was probably punishment enough and that the Court was therefore disposed to be lenient. I hung my head to hide my smirk.

  ‘You are therefore committed to prison for a total of twenty-seven months.’ The old lady’s dentures snapped shut on the unlucky peppermint. ‘Or to pay an aggregate fine of four hundred and fifty pounds. Give the prisoner a chair, officer. You are also bound over to be of good behaviour for five years in your own recognizance of a further five hundred pounds.’

  He slid his spectacles six inches down his splendid nose. ‘Can you pay?’ he asked in a kinder voice.

  Sam drew fifty pounds less in fines but he didn’t get the bit about being of good family, which must have stung.

  George drew the same as Sam because, as the Deputy Bailiff pointed out, he had a fine military record. He was on the point of sitting down when the Deputy Bailiff, displaying a sense of timing that Mohammed Ali would have envied, hit him with another hundred and fifty quid for the motor-insurance offence.

  Outside, in Royal Square, Solly congratulated me.

  ‘You did very well. I was proud of you. And the Deputy Bailiff was very gentle.’

  ‘Gentle?’

  ‘Lord, yes. You should hear him telling off one of us lawyers if we put a foot wrong. Makes one feel like a Labour MP caught soliciting in a public lavatory. Which reminds me, what does one do with a toad?’

  ‘A toad?’ I squeaked.

  ‘Well, it could be a frog, I suppose. Sort of brown, warty thing.’

  ‘That’s a toad.’

  ‘Yes, well, it arrived this morning and my secretary can’t get it to eat. Offered it bread and jam, all sorts of things. Fussy little beast.’

  ‘When you say “arrived” … ?’

  ‘In a cigar-box. Also enclosed was a piece of lavatory paper, inscribed with the word “Mortdecai”. Er, it was used lavatory paper.’

  I became glad that I had eaten so sparingly at luncheon. Pul
ling myself together, I said:

  ‘A ribald pun, simply, I should think. On the word crapaud, you see.’

  ‘I see,’ he said; but he gave me an odd look.

  Sam and I dined early, at George’s house, then made our selection of women to be protected that night and started to place telephone calls. We were quite unprepared for the stiff hostility with which our suggestions were met; we were, it seemed, social lepers. The first two people we spoke to said, with no attempt at plausibility, that they were otherwise engaged; the third put the receiver down in a marked manner as soon as she heard our names; the fourth said that her husband could look after her perfectly adequately, thank you very much; the fifth said that if we telephoned again she would inform the police. Only the last, a gin-sodden, lust-crazed poetess welcomed our proposal – and her tones made it clear that she had it in mind to do a bit of raping on her own account.