For some peculiar reason my penchant for a good cigar riles Felicity. Maybe because she associates it with my tete-a-tetes with Renee? Only the other day Felicity told me that I was the worst liar she had ever known, which, apart from being damned unfair, somehow manages to suggest she moves exclusively in the society of liars.
It is all rather tiresome, but, fortunately, I am of an equable temperament. I will not deny that sometimes Felicity taxes my patience, but I accept her acrimonious outbursts as an act of God and no more think of rebelling against them than I would against bad weather or a cold in the head …
Leaning back in his chair, he reached for his cigar case. Shouldn’t bother too much about Felicity, really. It would be wrong to get fixated on Felicity. The broader picture was not too bad at all. His shockingly unpopular elder brother was dead and he, Gerard Fenwick, was rich. Rich at last. Well, not yet, not technically speaking, but he would be soon enough.
As it happened, the opening and reading of the will was taking place later in the afternoon. He looked at his watch. He must try not to be late. He expected no surprises. How splendid it would be to be rich. He wouldn’t dream of actually articulating the sentiment, frightfully bad form, but a multi-million-pound fortune was, well, a multi-million-pound fortune. He would be so rich, he could buy the club and make it his writing pad, if he felt like it. He smiled at the idea.
Holding his cigar between his thumb and forefinger, he glanced round. He liked what he saw. The room had been recently repapered and hung with pleasing Piranesi prints — there was a good fire — a revolving mahogany bookcase, which he had filled with old favourites (Lord Berners’s A Distant Prospect, Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Saki’s Beasts and Super-Beasts, Donna Tartt’s The Secret History) — a photo of him winning a shooting competition — his humidor. The ambience couldn’t have been cosier or more bachelor-ish.
Where had his cigar cutter disappeared to? For some reason he felt the stirrings of unease. Oh well, never mind, he’d use the point of his paper knife — it should do the trick — voila. He clicked his lighter. Bliss. A woman is only a woman but a good cigar is a smoke. He wished it was he and not old Kipling who’d said that!
He regarded his lighter with some amusement. It was made of silver and shaped like a gun. It had been a present from his wife, dating back to their shooting — and happier — days.
Gerard could handle any kind of gun. Big or small. He was a first-class shot. He was better than his late brother had been. Roderick had always been awfully jealous of him on that count. Awfully jealous. Odd chap, Roderick. Dangerous. What was it he told him once when they were children? I’ll smash your big head like a pumpkin. More than once, actually. Fancied himself as a ladies’ man too. Mad, most probably. Like Papa and Uncle William before him. Like Aunt Margot and Cousin Lionel. Living in a hot climate couldn’t have made things any better.
Oh well, Roderick was dead now. Dead and gone. He might never have existed. All that was left of him was little more than a handful of dust. I no longer have a brother, Gerard thought.
He had spent the previous night at his club. Felicity had phoned to ask where he was. I am at my club, my dear, didn’t I say? No, you didn’t, Gerard. I am sure I did, my dear. No, you didn’t. All too tiresome for words. Felicity appeared to think his writing was a cover for something else. It was fascinating to speculate what she might be suspecting. Gerard puffed at his cigar.
Brothels? The criminal underworld? Strolling up and down Piccadilly in drag? While all he did was sit at his club overlooking St James’s, in his shabbiest tweeds, leaning over a desk, scribbling away! Well, he was a sphinx without a secret, like the woman in the Oscar Wilde story. She was suspected of harbouring some extraordinary secret, of doing things no respectable woman should, whereas all she did was sit in a rented room and drink tea.
He found the idea of men in drag a jolly curious one. What was it that caused phenomena like that? Some chemical anomaly in the brain? Perhaps he could write a short story about it? There used to be a chap back in the nineteenth century, a politician or a philosopher, who was said to have dressed much better as a woman than as a man and was an inspiration to a whole generation of Englishmen …
He could write a story about a man who disguises himself as his wife, makes himself look exactly like her, then starts following her about and makes sure she sees him. She is persuaded she has a twin sister of whose existence she hadn’t been aware — no — that she has a double — and she remembers the old wives’ tale that if you have seen your double, you are about to die. The husband’s intention is to drive her mad. Something on those lines.
Felicity had informed him that a videotape had arrived, which he needed to see. She said it was important. Apparently it showed Roderick’s death. She had been dashed mysterious about it.
He thought about Roderick’s phone call — the awful things Roderick had said — how it had made him feel — he’d seen red — his subsequent decision and the action he had taken-
He still couldn’t quite believe what he had done! It felt like a dream now. Quite unlike him.
Once more he glanced at his watch. Time to go. Old Saunders wouldn’t start without him, though it would be terribly bad form to make him wait. Noblesse oblige and all that kind of rot. The reading of Roderick’s will was going to take place in exactly three-quarters of an hour. Saunders’s office was in New Bond Street. He could walk. The weather seemed fine at the moment, though, to be on the safe side, he would take his faithful brolly with him.
People who didn’t know him well thought him mild-mannered, slightly eccentric, not terribly practical, completely unremarkable. Nothing like his exhibitionistic late brother — or the elusive Lucan — or Wodehouse’s master of misrule, the havoc-wreaking Ickenham — all of them unreliable earls! Not a controversialist like Spencer (that speech) or the late Longford (Myra Hindley!) either.
As he rose and stubbed out his cigar in the ashtray, Gerard thought about his cigar cutter once more. Such a pity if he’d lost it. He’d allowed himself to become attached to it. He believed he was emotionally starved. The cigar cutter was made of silver, fashioned like a guillotine, with his monogram engraved on one side and the Remnant coat of arms on the other, and it could fit into his waistcoat pocket.
When was the last time he’d used it?
15
They walked along an interminable avenue of tall houses with elegant if faded facades, none of which seemed to show any sign of life. If one could imagine a terrace of tombs, Payne murmured. Several moments later, having arrived at their destination, he observed that the steps to Hortense Tilling’s front door were as steep as the side of a pyramid; one would hesitate to knock on the door for fear of a mummy emerging, didn’t Antonia think?
‘No, I don’t. Sometimes, Hugh, I do wonder if you say these silly things with the sole purpose of finding out if I’m listening.’ Antonia grasped the door knocker resolutely.
‘Well, murder will out! Old deceits claim their dues! They always say that, don’t they? Thy sin will find thee. I have been dreading this moment. Absolutely dreading it.’ Hortense Tilling shut her eyes. ‘Someone turning up out of the blue. The moment of truth. Having to explain.’ She was holding her hand at her throat. ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t have let you in, but it’s too late for that now.’