“Yes,” I said with some effort. “Yes, perfectly well, thank you.”
I felt as if I were suffering from a fever of some kind. I could scarcely remember where I was or what I was doing there. I reminded myself with what seemed enormous difficulty that I was travelling on a train, somewhere between Reading and London, and that in quite a short space of time I would arrive at Paddington Station. I knew that I was there because I particularly wanted to talk to Geoffrey Bolton, but I could no longer remember why. Eventually I recalled that it was because he was the principal suspect in a case of poisoning.
The bottle stood empty on the table between us. Bolton’s glass was still half full.
Timothy, I am the first to admit, has all the qualities which one would most hope to find in a former pupil: in particular an unhesitating readiness, upon unexpectedly finding his former tutor ill and exhausted on the doorstep, to offer a bed and a modest supper.
He has also developed, perhaps even to excess, that questioning and independent attitude of mind which as his tutor I had always striven to encourage. When I explained to him that I had been poisoned, he chose to attribute my symptoms to a combination of excessive alcohol and auto-suggestion.
“My dear Timothy,” I said, “if you wish to take that view, I fear that I am in no state of health to argue with you about it. If you see nothing strange or sinister in the fact of Bolton, having purchased a whole bottle of wine, electing to drink less than half a glass of it …”
“If he’d put anything really lethal in it, surely he wouldn’t have drunk even that much? And as I understand it, he didn’t actually force you to drink the rest of the bottle. But of course, if you’re really feeling ill, I’ll drive you over to the Emergency Department at St. Thomas’s.”
I explained the unwisdom, weakened as I already was, of my undertaking such a journey. Moreover, I feared that the poison used would be identifiable only after numerous tests, possibly in themselves dangerous, and too late for any effective antidote to be administered. We were dealing with a man of intelligence and sophistication: he would not have poisoned me with anything commonplace or obvious.
If he had indeed poisoned me. By the following morning I was sufficiently recovered not only to accept Timothy’s offer of scrambled eggs but to consider the possibility that he might be right in his opinion of the causes of my malaise. My consumption of alcohol had been, I need hardly say, in no sense immoderate. I remembered, however, that I had set out for London having eaten nothing since lunch; in the expectation of dining, I had drunk freely of the sherry provided at the reception, which owing to one of the Bursar’s more ludicrous economies was of indifferent quality; and the wine on the train was perhaps also somewhat inferior to what I am accustomed to: all these factors might have affected me more than I had realised.
“Yes, exactly,” said Timothy.
On the other hand, I had unquestionably been extremely ill and was even now feeling very far from robust.
“What a pity,” said Timothy. “I was hoping you’d be well enough to join us for lunch.”
“Lunch?” I said. His tone had seemed to suggest an occasion of festivity.
“Julia’s aunt is coming up to London this morning to see some solicitors in the Gray’s Inn Road. They want her to swear a statutory declaration identifying Terry Carver as the person she knows as Derek Arkwright. Terry’ll have to be there as well, of course, and Selena thought it would be a nice idea to invite them both out to lunch — she thinks it will be an ideal chance to talk to Terry about bookcases. We’d all be delighted if you were able to join us.”
I assured him that if my strength permitted I would be happy to accept his invitation.
18
THE TABLE IN THE Italian restaurant was laid for eight: covered by a cloth of cream-coloured damask and set with sparkling glass and silverware, it had an encouragingly festive look. Timothy and Julia were already present and drinking champagne, in celebration of Julia winning a large sum of money on a horse called Vagrant Folly.
Since the race in which this animal was to triumph was not to be run for another three hours the celebration seemed to me to be slightly premature; but Julia said that the running of the race was a mere formality She had backed the horse on the advice of a destitute Irishman whom she had met that morning in High Holborn and to whose living expenses she had made a modest contribution.
“And in this morning’s Scuttle Madame Louisa said that I should not ignore advice, even from a total stranger, because it might prove unexpectedly helpful. So I regard success as assured.”
I perceived, however, that Julia had not that expression of unclouded contentment which might have been expected in such circumstances.
“I’m feeling slightly worried about Reg. When she first arranged to come to London she was planning to stay for a night or two and go to exhibitions and so on, but she rang me yesterday to say she was going to go straight back to Sussex after she’d seen the solicitors — she said she was feeling under the weather. I managed to persuade her that she ought at least to stay for lunch, but it’s made me rather anxious. It isn’t at all like her to give way to feeling ill.”
But if Regina was feeling at less than her best, there was, when she entered the restaurant, no immediate sign of it. She was laughing as she came in, looking back over her shoulder at Terry Carver, who had evidently said something to amuse her. Dressed in turquoise and black, a silk scarf draped round her shoulders and fastened with an antique brooch of silver and amber, her smooth dark auburn hair framing her slightly mediaeval features, she gave an impression of easy and comfortable elegance. The Italian waiters, with welcoming murmurs of “Buon giorno, signora,” gathered round her to take her coat, pull back her chair and fill her glass with champagne.
She and Terry, it was clear, were delighted to be in each other’s company: any embarrassment there might have been about the Virgil frontispiece was forgotten or resolved. They had spent a satisfactory morning with Maurice’s solicitors, who had given them sherry and biscuits, thanked Regina very nicely for her help and assured Terry that they would complete the administration of the estate as soon as possible. There was now, they said, no obstacle to their doing so, other than the unpleasant insinuations which continued to be made by his cousin Daphne.
“But Terry,” said Julia, “if Maurice instructed them in person and executed the will in their office, they must know the whole idea of undue influence is absolute nonsense.”
“Oh yes,” said Terry “And they’ve told Daphne that, so now she’s suggesting something much more sinister. She’s written them a letter going on about how suddenly he died and me being the last person to see him. She’s practically saying that I made away with him to get my paws on his savings. It’s all rather upsetting.”
“It’s perfectly monstrous,” said Julia. “But never mind — no one takes any notice of anything Daphne says. Did you tell her, Reg, that you were coming to London to give evidence for Terry?”
“Certainly not,” said Regina. “She’d have made a scene about it and I really didn’t feel like coping with one of Daphne’s scenes. I just told her that I was going to London on business. And even so, she was quite difficult about it. She’s been having an attack of the Cassandras — she keeps saying she’s afraid something awful is going to happen to me and she can’t bear it and she doesn’t know what to do. Telling her I was coming to London seemed to be the last straw — she got into a terrible state and said I mustn’t. I’m afraid I had to be rather sharp with her.”
“Why? What does she think will happen to you in London?”
“My dear Julia, I’ve no idea — you know what Daphne’s like. She seems to think I’m too old and silly and feeble to be allowed out in the big city. She keeps telling me I’m ill and not as young as I used to be.”
“Reg,” said Julia anxiously, “are you sure you’re not really ill?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Julia,” said her aunt briskly. “I have a cold, that’s all
, like half the population at this time of year. The fact is, I think the poor girl is really rather nervous about my being away With no one at the Vicarage, I’m her nearest neighbour. Now, for heaven’s sake, do let’s stop talking about her and think about food and wine. Oh, Julia, before I forget — I have a present for you.”
She had with her a small valise, of which she had not permitted the waiters to dispossess her. From this she now took and handed to Julia a flat rectangular package, wrapped in green-and-gold paper and tied with tinsel ribbon. Julia regarded it with pleasure and perplexity.
“It isn’t from me, it’s…well, it’s from Maurice. I was clearing out his desk the night before last — I ought to have done it sooner, but I’d been putting it off — and I found his Christmas presents still in the bottom drawer, all wrapped up and ready to give to people on Christmas Day. So I spent yesterday morning running round Parsons Haver giving everyone their presents from Maurice. There were quite a lot of them — mostly just small things, you know, for people he wanted to give something a bit more than a Christmas card.”
“Oh dear,” said Julia, presumably thinking of the rococo mirror, “I do hope there was one for Daphne.”
“Yes, thank heavens — she’d have been terribly upset if there hadn’t been. Well, this is yours — are you going to open it now, or are you going to wait until after lunch and not risk spilling anything on it?”
Not the most decisive of women, Julia was still debating this question when Ragwort and Cantrip arrived. They advised us not to wait for Selena before ordering lunch.
“I was in the Clerks’ Room twenty minutes ago,” said Cantrip, “and Selena’s big-shot banker rolled up, all of a tizzwoz, with his solicitor in tow and wanting an urgent conference. So of course Henry said, ‘Yes sir, certainly sir, anything you like sir, and who gives two hoots about Miss Jardine’s lunch?’ Or words to the like effect.”
“We must try to console ourselves,” said Ragwort, “with the hope that Henry will charge a fee which reflects the starvation factor. Did you happen to gather any hint of why the matter was so urgent?”
“Well, I couldn’t say for certain, but what it sounded like to me was that they’d got another insider-dealing problem.”
Though we ordered and ate our meal at a leisurely pace, it was not until we were halfway through the second course that Selena at last arrived. She was obliged even now to eat in uncomfortable haste: her conference was not over but adjourned to the afternoon, and she had to be back in Chambers by quarter past two.
At ten past two she sighed and rose from her chair, gulping a last mouthful of black coffee. Finding myself in need of a little fresh air, I offered to keep her company on her way back to New Square.
“This is most kind of you, Hilary,” said Selena, as we stood waiting to cross Chancery Lane. “So few people would have worried about how lonely and miserable I might get walking back through Lincoln’s Inn all by myself — almost no one, in fact. Do you happen to have any particular topic of conversation in mind which might enliven our journey?”
“I was wondering,” I said, “if you might like to tell me about the insider-dealing problem at Renfrews’ Bank, relating to the most recent takeover.”
“My dear Hilary, whatever makes you think there is any such problem?”
“My dear Selena,” I said, “few questions are impenetrable to the mind of the trained Scholar.”
“You mean it’s your usual mixture of eavesdropping and guesswork. Well, I’m willing to admit it’s quite a good guess.”
“It seems likely, then, that the person who previously acted improperly for Isabella’s benefit has now decided to do so for his own. I suppose there is still no way of knowing which of them it was?”
“As it happens, that is a rather less good guess. As you know, Sir Robert made his decision to go ahead with the takeover just before Christmas, when he was at the villa in Cannes. He asked his two codirectors to join him there to discuss the steps to be immediately taken. Until they arrived at the villa, they didn’t know what the meeting was about. It wasn’t the sort of meeting where they needed lawyers present, but apart from that conditions were much the same as when I was there in the summer — that’s to say, all calls and fax messages from the villa were automatically recorded.”
We walked through the gateway into Old Buildings.
“Well, up to a point it all seemed to have gone smoothly. They had a busy day on the Tuesday, buying up the maximum number of shares permitted without making a public announcement, and the share price hardly moved at all. Which meant, of course, that there was no reason to suspect that there’d been any insider dealing. But in the past week someone did a more or less routine analysis of the dealing pattern in the period before the takeover and the results were rather disquieting. It showed, of course, a large number of purchases on the twenty-first of December, most of which were purchases by Renfrews’ clients in pursuance of their advice. But one of them wasn’t.”
“Ah,” I said, since some such comment seemed to be called for.
“You may well say so — the chances of its being a coincidence are almost nonexistent. The records don’t show the identity of the purchaser, only his stockbroker. The stockbroker wouldn’t disclose the identity of his client without a court order. And even then, it would probably be a nominee company registered in the Channel Islands or Liechtenstein or somewhere like that. But what it does show is the time the bargain was struck. And it shows that this particular bargain was struck at twenty to ten on the morning of the twenty-first of December.”
“Which in France would have been twenty to eleven?”
“Quite so. Which would mean, according to my instructions, that the order was placed immediately before that — at the outside, not more than ten minutes. And at that time, one of Sir Robert’s fellow directors was under surveillance and could not have made a telephone call. And the other wasn’t.”
We had reached the steps of 62 New Square.
“Sir Robert thinks the case proved. But I’ve told him that the first thing to do is put the accusation to the person he suspects. He wants to have his lawyers present when he does that, so he’s told the director in question to be here this afternoon.”
“But which of them is it?”
“Really, Hilary,” said Selena, pushing open the heavy oak door leading to the Clerks’ Room, “I would have thought that the trained mind of the Scholar…oh, bother.”
The entire floor space of the waiting room being at present occupied by piles of books, the accommodation provided for visitors consisted of two rather uncomfortable chairs in the corridor outside the Clerks’ Room. One of these was occupied by Edgar Albany, who rose, however, on observing our presence, or rather on observing Selena’s — mine he seemed content to ignore.
“Ah, Miss Jardine. I want a word with you, young lady.”
“Good afternoon, Mr. Albany. I’m afraid I can’t discuss anything with you until Sir Robert arrives — he should be here very shortly.”
“Now look here, that just isn’t good enough, you know. I get a telephone call from the Chairman telling me to drop everything and be here straight after lunch because he has ‘a very grave matter’ to discuss with me and when I get here I’m kept hanging around in this bloody corridor like some bloody fourth-former outside the headmaster’s study being given time to think about what’s coming to him.”
“I’m sure,” said Selena, “that Sir Robert had no deliberate intention of keeping you waiting. As I understand it he asked you to be here at half past two. Naturally, I am extremely sorry that we can’t offer you a more comfortable place to sit, but our refurbishments—”
“I don’t give a damn about your bloody refurbishments. I just want to know what’s going on, and if the Chairman’s got a bone to pick with me about something why he has to do it in some damned lawyer’s office instead of back in his office at Renfrews’. And don’t tell me you don’t know, because I bloody well shan’t believe you.”
“Christ Almighty, you sound like a policeman saying anything I say may be taken down and used in evidence. Anyone would think I’d done something criminal. Well, let me tell you—”
He broke off suddenly, making a curious noise which was not precisely a gasp nor exactly a groan nor strictly speaking a rattle but somehow participating in the qualities of all these, and stood staring with an expression of alarm at the doorway behind us, as if some hideous spectre had appeared there.
Upon following the direction of his gaze, I saw nothing more alarming than the graceful figure of Ragwort.
Sir Robert and his solicitor were mounting the steps behind him. Becoming aware of this, Ragwort stood courteously aside to allow them to precede him through the doorway.
Selena greeted them with perceptible relief and proposed that they should all now proceed to her room.
“I’m not going anywhere,” said Albany, “until I know what’s going on. And what that man is doing here. And what lies he’s been telling about me.”
Sir Robert gazed at him with astonishment and a measure of disapproval.
“What man? My dear Edgar, you seem to be overwrought.”
“I’m not going another step till you tell me what this is all about.”
“Well, Edgar, if you insist on my telling you in this not very private place, then I have to tell you that it is my painful task to enquire into an incident which occurred on the morning of the twenty-first of December. When, as you may recall, you and Geoffrey Bolton were visiting me in Cannes.”
Albany’s response to this was to lunge forward and attempt to strike Ragwort on the nose. Ragwort moved adroitly aside. Albany overbalanced and fell to the ground. He appeared, having done so, unable or disinclined to rise.
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