‘So, IdrisPukke, isn’t the unfortunate Conn Materazzi a relative of yours, then?’ From that day on Cadbury always mockingly referred to him as ‘the unfortunate Conn Materazzi.’
‘Of some kind – half a grand-nephew, I suppose. Couldn’t abide him myself. Though, to be fair, he was coming along pretty well.’
‘So explain why Vipond isn’t sweating for revenge,’ said Cadbury. ‘I thought the Materazzi were mad for their relations.’
‘My brother merely understands the impossible position Cale found himself in. Obviously he likes Conn and worked hard to support him – not with much gratitude, it has to be said, though there were other reasons for that. But he is neither a fool nor a hypocrite nor lacking in affection. He’s obliged for obvious reasons not to be seen to have anything to do with Cale, but he knows perfectly well that Conn has been a dead man since the line broke at Bex. What puzzles him is that Thomas,’ and here he looked pointedly at Cale, ‘should go to so much trouble to give evidence that neither condemned him nor helped to save him, so that he annoyed all sides for no obvious benefit.’
Everyone looked at Cale.
‘It was a mistake. All right? I knew I couldn’t do Conn any good by telling the truth and that if I went along with the trial they’d give me what I need … what everyone needs. It was just that, when it came to it, I just lost it … for a bit. I had a worthless attack of the truth – I admit it.’
‘Why was it worthless?’ asked Artemisia.
‘Because telling the truth just isn’t going to do any good. There’s one thing standing between all of us and a lot of blood and screaming – the New Model Army. There’s nothing complicated about it.’
‘So why didn’t you give evidence against him?’
‘Because as it turned out it was easier said than done, all right?’
‘Let justice rule – even though the heavens fall.’ IdrisPukke was lightly mocking Artemisia’s idealism but Cale was now in a touchy mood and took it as some sort of criticism.
‘Stick it back in your cracker, granddad.’
The dinner crumbled like one of IdrisPukke’s aphorisms and everyone went home in a bad mood. Outside the evening air was heavy and not so much lukewarm as tepid, vaguely unpleasant as if it was atomized with the dead souls of the sons and husbands of Spanish Leeds gathered to attend the execution of Conn Materazzi in two days. Cale and Vague Henri and Kleist, whose growing misery made the other two feel worse, got back to their elegant townhouse. They were still slightly intimidated by living there, as if expecting someone important to come and chase them out for living above their station. They were used to other people’s servants by now but not their own. It wasn’t that they minded someone cooking and cleaning for them, it was more that the power of servants to creep up on them at unexpected moments reminded them of the unprivacy of the Sanctuary, with its horror of doors and its punishments for being caught on your own. Servants seemed to think they could just appear like Redeemers. They took it badly when Cale insisted they knocked before entering, something they regarded as evidence that he was common. He also made a point of thanking them when they did something for him, a habit that also revealed him as common. The proper thing for any employer to do was to treat them as if they did not exist.
Before they had rung the bell the door, unusually, was opened by Bechete, the over-valet.
‘You have company, sir,’ he said, as he gestured towards the chambre des visiteurs.
‘Who?’
‘They declined to give their names, sir and I would have refused them entry under normal circumstances. But I recognized them and I thought …’ He allowed his sentence to trail off meaningfully.
‘So who is it?’
‘The Duchess of Memphis, sir, and I believe the wife of the Hanse Ambassador.’
‘I’m going to bed,’ said Kleist as if he’d heard nothing.
‘Guess why she brought Riba?’ said Vague Henri. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’
‘Yes. Arbell thinks I’ll come on my own. You go first and be cold with them. I’ll come in a bit. Leave the door open.’
Vague Henri almost knocked – but stopped himself and opened the door a little too energetically to compensate. Both Arbell and Riba stood up, a little startled, and he noticed the disappointment on Arbell’s face. One up to Cale.
‘This is late to be calling, ladies. What do you want?’
‘Good manners, perhaps,’ said Riba. But Vague Henri was no pushover.
‘So it’s a social visit? I’m surprised because there’s been plenty of time to call on us before now. Obviously I was wrong to think you wanted something. I apologize.’
‘Don’t be like this, Henri. It’s not worthy of you.’
‘Yes, it is.’
‘No. You’re the kindest of people.’ This time it was Arbell who spoke, but gently, not at all the proud Materazzienne.
‘Not so much any more. I had time to think while I was waiting to be beaten to death – about kindness, I mean. You’re a kind person, Riba, but you’d have let me die in Kitty the Hare’s basement. Cale, now, he’s not a kind person but he wouldn’t do that, let me die, I mean. So I’ve gone off kindness. What do you want?’
Vague Henri sensed there was something strange about his own indignation, something that he couldn’t put his finger on until much later. He was enjoying it.
Cale, carefully waiting the right time for a dramatic entrance, thought this was good enough.
‘Why don’t you tell him? I’d be interested to hear, too.’
Seeing her shook him. She was beautiful, certainly, with that touching bloom that had made such an impression on him when they’d met in the corridor. But there are fish-in-the-sea numbers of beautiful women in the world, many of them with that same flush of youth and power – but something about her touched him, always had and always would, like a malign twin of the lost chord, whose discovery the late Montagnards believed would generate a great and infinite calm. He wanted to be loved by her and to wring her neck in equal measure.
‘We were all friends once,’ said Riba, then turned to Vague Henri. ‘Can we talk somewhere?’ she said to him, so sadly and sweetly that, soft and sentimental as he was, he felt ashamed by his outburst. Cale nodded at him and he showed her out, but not before Riba had taken Cale’s hand. ‘Please be kind,’ she said, and was gone.
The two of them stared at each other for some time.
‘I suppose you …’
‘Help him,’ interrupted Arbell. ‘Please.’
Agitated and trying to hide it, he went over to the elegant and uncomfortable chair and sat down.
‘How?’ he said. ‘And why?’
‘They think – the Swiss – that you’re their saviour.’
‘They wouldn’t be the first to get that wrong.’
‘They’ll listen to you.’
‘Not about this, they won’t. It was a disaster and someone has to pay.’
‘Would you have done any better?’
‘I wouldn’t have been there in the first place.’
‘He doesn’t deserve to die.’
‘I can’t tell you how little that’s got to do with it.’
‘Are you so full of hatred for me you’ll let a good man die to get your own back?’
‘I saved his life once already, probably the stupidest thing I’ve ever done, and if I wanted to pay you back, you treacherous bitch, you’d be dead already.’
‘He doesn’t deserve to die.’
‘No.’
‘So help him.’
‘No.’
‘Please.’
‘No.’
It was a rare and intense pleasure to watch her suffer. He felt as if he could never have enough of it. And yet he also felt the dread of the loss of her, a horror that increased the greater his delight at watching her in pain. It was like scratching an itch that only made the pain worse even as it ecstatically soothed the very same.