‘She makes a jolly interesting psychological study, don’t you think?’ Gerard Fenwick glanced at Antonia, then at Payne.
‘Absolutely fascinating,’ said Antonia.
‘I am sure Freud has written something about this sort of behaviour… We’ve got a book somewhere. There it is!’ Gerard Fenwick pointed. ‘The Loss of Reality in Neurosis and Psychosis – next to Diagnosing Depression in Donkeys.’
‘The second act of the drama took place here, at Remnant Castle. It was also the final act,’ Payne said. ‘Hortense phoned Clarissa to ask how she was and Clarissa blurted out the truth about the dead man not being really dead. Clarissa made it clear it was Peter Quin who had died.’
‘She also revealed that her husband was at Remnant,’ said Antonia. ‘She told Hortense that her husband was blackmailing her.’
‘Most importantly, Clarissa told Hortense that the marriage hadn’t been consummated, but that Lord Remnant was eager to exercise his marital rights. This decided Hortense. She came to Remnant Castle determined not to allow your brother to go to bed with Clarissa. Incest was something she simply could not allow, she said.’
‘Did you say you found the wretched woman with a smoking gun in her hand? But how the deuce did you know which room was my brother’s? The place is a bloody labyrinth. Even I get confused sometimes.’
‘It was the gunshot that sent us in the right direction.’
‘What did she do when she saw you? She didn’t try to shoot you, did she?’
‘No. She handed over the gun, then sat down and chatted to us. She sat perched forward, knees together, head bowed, the palms of her hands flat together with the fingers pointing away from her, like a nun praying.’
‘She was only too willing to fill in the gaps for us. I made her a cup of tea,’ Antonia said. ‘It was all rather cosy. When she had told us the whole story, she asked Hugh to call the police.’
Major Payne was looking out of the open window. The lawns were freshly mown, the shrubs clipped and a bevy of footmen could be seen rubbing away at the ancient statuary. Spring seemed to have come at last, with a vengeance, and little ripples of heat mist danced above the stone-flagged terrace.
‘I see you have been busy, Fenwick,’ he said.
‘One must do one’s bit. Noblesse oblige and all that kind of rot. This place used to be a veritable House of Usher, too macabre for words, but it all looks awfully pretty now, doesn’t it, in an Arcadian kind of way?’
‘Indeed it does… What are the advantages of being an earl, if you don’t mind my asking?’
‘The advantages, Payne? Are there advantages? Well, it’s easier to get a table in a restaurant. Or a seat at the Coronation, I imagine. I’d enjoy that. Though heaven knows when that’s going to be.’
‘Are there any disadvantages?’
‘Of course there are. Some people seem to think that if one’s an earl, one is an absolute bloody fool. That’s perhaps why I haven’t been able to get any publisher interested in my stuff. They are all socialists, aren’t they? The irony is that I am something of a socialist m’self.’
‘No, not all of them,’ Antonia said. ‘Incidentally, those extracts you let me read earlier on show great promise. Only you should try to complete things, you know.’
‘I am afraid I’m not frightfully disciplined.’ Gerard Fenwick sighed. ‘Well, my next effort will be something in your line, Antonia, and I have every intention of completing it. A detective story, which will also be a multi-layered psychodrama… I found your deductions frightfully stimulating. I say, would you like one of my cigars, Payne?’
‘I would. Davidoff Grand Cru?’
‘Yes, they are awfully good.’
‘Thank you, Fenwick. I mean Remnant.’
The two men lit their cigars.
Gerard said dreamily, ‘My story will be about a man who dies twice.’
Coda
It was a couple of days later.
Gerard Fenwick, thirteenth Earl Remnant, sat at his desk at Remnant, a brand new laptop before him.
‘I see you mean business this time,’ Renée Glover said with a smile. ‘Beginnings are always difficult, aren’t they?’
‘No, not really,’ Gerard said. ‘Not this one.’
He was about to embark on a novel, which he had provisionally called The Murder of Gonzago.
Gerard knew exactly where to begin:
Three minutes passed before they realized he was dead and another two before it was established how he had died, though any suspicious observer might have argued that at least one of the five people in the room had been aware of both facts all along…
R. T. Raichev
