Death at the Chase (11 page)

‘Not exactly buggered up,’ Bobby interposed – and wondered what de Voisin would make of this simple English colloquialism. ‘A crumpled wing each. But I think we’re both still mobile, and that’s the main thing.’

‘I am most relieved.’ De Voisin responded instantly to this more civilized speech. ‘And I reiterate my regrets. As to our good Giles’ question about my business here, I have simply been visiting my kinsman, Martyn Ashmore – whom you will know to be Giles’ uncle. A visit
pour prendre congé
, as you English used to delight to say. I am shortly to go home for a while, and it appeared a necessary, as well as an agreeable, attention to pay. On my own behalf and Virginia’s, my dear Giles. In fact I ventured to make my kinsman a small present – alike from Virginia and from myself.’

Finn, who had been prowling round both cars without taking any part in these exchanges, produced at this point a wild shout of laughter. That this smoothly spoken Frog had been up to precisely the same game as Giles was something which appeared to amuse him very much. He turned to Giles now.

‘There’s a tip for you,’ he said. ‘
Finesse
, man! Tell your uncle that the grocer’s claret is from you and the flat champagne from his Robina. From
your
Robina, I mean. Nothing’s more likely to crown the success of your little venture. And now let’s do another spot of the
congé
business with this chap, and get moving.’

Bobby – who was beginning to find something perplexing in Finn’s attitude to their affair – agreed that they had better get on. They were already running late on any schedule that he had himself contemplated, and he didn’t much want to arrive back at Long Dream with a noisy Finn in the small hours. So after satisfying himself with a decent solicitude that this night-wandering Frenchman’s wretched car was in fact in running order, he exchanged addresses with him, and then shoved his two companions back into the Mercedes. The solitary Martyn Ashmore quite possibly kept very early hours. It would be extremely tedious if they had to get him out of bed. As he moved off, he glanced into his driving-mirror. De Voisin had shifted his car to its proper side of the road. But now he had got out again and was standing immobile beside it. There was no possibility of distinguishing his features, or even of being quite sure of the direction in which he was facing. But Bobby somehow imagined, without at all knowing why, that the young Frenchman was staring thoughtfully and even distrustfully after the three young Englishmen.

‘Perhaps we ought to give it up.’

Bobby glanced sideways in surprise. It had been Giles who spoke, and something odd had sounded in the quality of his voice. Bobby wondered whether it was only a trick of the moonlight that made him look even paler than he had done at the end of dinner. Certainly there were beads of sweat on his brow. The filthy idiot is going to be sick, he told himself. He has no bloody head for liquor at all. And if he gets into his uncle’s presence it will only be to make a complete botch of a plan that’s feeble enough already.

‘OK by me,’ Bobby said. ‘I’ll call it a day, if you want to.’

‘To hell with calling it a day – or a bleeding night either!’ From the back of the Mercedes Finn produced this as an indignant shout. ‘Giles has cold feet. But we’re damned well going to see this through.’

‘I haven’t got cold feet, at all.’ Giles managed a faint access of spirit. ‘Only–’ He hesitated, as if groping for something to say. ‘It seems silly, somehow, now. After Virginia’s young man doing the same thing.’

‘He hasn’t done the same thing. He’s the only one to have done anything, so far, you stupid clot. So it’s up to you to do something different. Give the gambit a different twist, old boy. Don’t take a present in with you at all.’ Finn appeared to view this as a sudden inspiration. ‘Bobby and I will stay in the car, drinking up the claret. And we’ll take your dreadful champagne back to Dream and feed it to Sir John’s pigs.’

‘I don’t find that in the least funny. I don’t–’ At this point Giles Ashmore, who aspired to the refined employment of curating things in museums,
was
sick. Fortunately he did his vomiting more or less over the side of the car. And a few moments later – with a wan apologetic grin – he had sat back. ‘Finn’s right,’ he said. ‘Drive on.’

‘I
am
driving on.’ Bobby hadn’t, in fact, thought it necessary to slow down. ‘You mean Finn’s right about your blessed present? It’s a forced note?’

‘I don’t know. I’ll think. Just let’s get to the Chase first.’

‘It looks enormous,’ Bobby said a few minutes later. Ashmore Chase was before them. The moonlight had turned its lichened roof to tarnished silver. The house might have been some scaly or plated creature slumbering on the bed of the ocean, its slender chimney-shafts the erected antennae which guarded its repose.

‘It isn’t, really,’ Giles Ashmore said. ‘It just sprawls around. Pull up for a minute, Bobby, and let’s think.’

‘Courage!’ Finn said from the back.

‘All right, all right – but I mustn’t make a mistake, must I?’ Giles stared dubiously at the darkened mansion. ‘Anyway, I’m glad I’ve driven right up to the place, and not footed it along this drive, as one of you silly asses suggested.’

‘You couldn’t have footed it with your
petit cadeau
. I wonder, by the way, what that Frenchman’s
petit cadeau
was? Nice night for a walk, apart from that.’

‘There’s Ibell to think of.’

‘And who’s Ibell, for the love of mike?’

‘He’s the keeper. About the only person Uncle Martyn has within a mile of him nowadays. He’s said to prowl around the place at night with a shot-gun. Uncle Martyn gets nervy at times. It’s something to do with not having had too good a war.’

‘But this Ibell isn’t going to shoot
you
.’ Finn was impatient. ‘If he’s around, he’ll simply sidle up respectfully, pulling his forelock to the squire’s favourite nephew. That’s right, isn’t it, Bobby? You know the rural set-up in these things.’

‘Absolutely right.’ Bobby said this in a tone confessing boredom. He had come to doubt whether there was much amusement in making fun of the rather feeble Giles Ashmore.

‘But I’m
not
a favourite nephew. That’s the whole point, isn’t it? I have the job still to do. And as for Ibell, you just don’t know him. Next to my other uncle – Ambrose Ashmore of Abbot’s Yatter – Ibell is said to be the most ferocious character in the district.’

‘Oh, rot!’ Finn said ‘Even if he’s a bleeding maniac, he can hardly shoot you down while you toy with your uncle’s front-door bell. And now, listen. We’ll drive right up. Bobby and I will help you to hump the Father Christmas stuff right into the porch or whatever. Then we’ll turn round, and stop just out of sight round the first bend of the drive. Tell the old gentleman you were dropped by friends, and that they’ve ventured to take a moonlight stroll, and that you have a rendezvous with them in half an hour near the main road. That will give you a getaway.’

‘I don’t want you to go as far off as that.’

‘We shan’t, and you’re not listening. We’ll be no more than out of sight. But it will mean the old chap won’t feel he has to ask Bobby and me in. Bobby, drive on.’

As these seemed to be rational arrangements, Bobby drove on. They appeared to have approached the Chase more or less by the back. But they rounded a corner, ran up some sort of ramp, and found themselves on a broad terrace.

‘There’s the main door,’ Giles said. ‘But – I say! – isn’t the whole place in total darkness?’

‘Not a bit of it,’ Finn said cheerfully. ‘We passed a ruddy great blazing window only five seconds ago. You must be as blind as a bat. Out you get.’ Finn jumped from the car. ‘And heave out the good cheer. Bobby and I will watch you ring the bell, old chap, and then we’ll cut and run.’ Finn gave one of his sudden and disconcerting laughs. It sounded very loud in the dark. ‘I’ve just remembered a funny thing.’ He turned to Bobby. ‘It was when we were talking about just this: Giles’ ringing the front-door bell at the Chase. Your father said that Giles should first take out a life assurance policy. Seems to make the place a kind of Castle Dangerous, wouldn’t you say? Childe Roland to the dark tower came.’

‘It
is
dark,’ Giles said. He seemed to be in a panic again. ‘I think we’ve made a mistake.’

‘Too late, old chap.’ With another burst of unholy laughter, Finn stepped forward and tugged the bell. ‘Run, Bobby you bastard!’ he shouted, and made a dash for the car.

Bobby followed briskly. He had a notion Finn cherished designs on the wheel of the Mercedes, which was something which, during the remainder of this nocturnal escapade, he wasn’t going to have. After Finn had drunk a certain amount, he appeared to have the faculty of going on getting drunker for some hours, absolutely
gratis
. It must be economically advantageous. But it didn’t go with making free with a friend’s car.

‘This is boring,’ Finn said, twenty minutes later. He was sitting beside Bobby, and had smoked several cigarettes. ‘But at least there’s more joy to come.’

‘What do you mean – more joy to come?’ Bobby heard a note of suspicion in his own voice. He was beginning to think it time to be getting off to bed.

‘You’ll see. This is going to turn out even funnier than it was meant to be. Only I’m surprised the aged relative is detaining our Giles so long.’

‘We said half an hour. Do you mean something should have happened to send Giles out on his ear before that?’ It seemed to Bobby that a kind of malice was building up in Finn. He had almost forgotten that Finn had been Giles’ rival for the hand of the agreeable but impecunious Robina Bunker. For the first time that night, he wondered whether there were, so to speak, wheels within wheels in this business. ‘Finn, are you playing this straight?’ Bobby asked.

‘Just what do you mean by that?’

‘You and this Giles both having been after the girl. Are you really backing Giles now?’

‘You’re crazy! What else could I be doing – boiling over with a passion for revenge? I ask you Bobby, am I that sort of chap?’

Bobby – consulting his professional knowledge of human nature – decided that Finn was not that sort of chap. Finn was just a silly ass, and entirely bearable as such from time to time.

‘You’re a silly ass,’ Bobby said. ‘And, of course, I’m very fond of you.’

‘Exactly! So we’ve got that clear. Hullo! I think he’s coming now.’

A flicker of light from the invisible house had suggested the opening and closing of the front door. A moment later, they heard Giles Ashmore’s footsteps. Then he swung round the first bend of the drive, walking briskly. He raised an arm and gave a wave; the gesture brought his hand up out of shadow and into moonlight; it was like the sudden pale flame of a candle, Bobby told himself.

‘Absolutely OK!’ Giles almost shouted as he came up. He was a man transformed. ‘I knew I’d bring it off, whatever you said. And I have.’

‘Your uncle will stump up!’ Bobby asked.

‘I’m sure he will. He was touched. And he’ll
be
touched.’ Giles laughed appreciatively at his own joke. ‘It’s just a matter of the amount, I’d say. But at the moment, by the way, he wants–’

‘You told him what your application was in aid of?’ Finn interrupted. He sounded incredulous. ‘The bedding of Miss Bunker – all that?’

‘Yes, of course.’

Finn gave his yell of laughter. ‘I’d like to meet Uncle Martyn Ashmore. He’s a deep one, he is.’

‘Well, you’re not going to – not now. But Bobby is.’ Giles talked rapidly and in plain excitement. ‘Bobby, he wants you just to come back and be introduced. Something about having met your father, and worked it out that you must be a great-nephew of his old friend Somebody Raven.’

‘Everard Raven. You mean your uncle wants this handshake now?’ Bobby was surprised. ‘The idea was–’

‘You don’t mind, do you? And Finn won’t mind waiting. We’ll only be a jiffy.’

‘But I want to come too!’ Finn was extremely indignant. ‘You mean I’m to stay in the car as unpresentable? What a damned uncivil thing!’

‘Not unpresentable – only tight.’ Giles – he was really a transformed Giles – brought this out briskly. ‘Come on, Bobby. Five minutes will do the trick.’

Finn made a resigned gesture, and lit another cigarette. Bobby followed Giles back to the house. He was trying to remember all he could about his great-uncle Everard. He had a notion that he had edited an encyclopaedia, and was not to be confused with Ranulph Raven, the author of
Tales: Chiefly Imaginative or Grotesque
. Ranulph Raven, too, had presumably been acquainted with sundry Ashmores. Perhaps he had picked up a grotesque tip or two from them.

‘Giles,’ Bobby said, ‘you did honestly come clean to your uncle about Robina?’

‘Yes, of course. It’s the whole point, isn’t it? But, by the way, I don’t think you should mention her to him yourself. He’d probably like to think our engagement wasn’t public property until after he’d approved it.’

‘I don’t see that it’s your uncle’s business to approve of your engagement – except, I suppose, that he’s going to finance the marriage. But I’ll say nothing about it unless he does. This really must be just five minutes, wouldn’t you say?’

‘Oh, certainly. I’ll ring the bell again.’

But this proved unnecessary. The door opened as Giles stepped forward, and revealed to Bobby’s curiosity – although for the moment only in silhouette against some bleak and unshaded light in the background – the craggy figure of Martyn Ashmore. Bobby decided that the proprietor of the Chase was older than he had expected – and then found himself deciding that he was younger. What led to this instant conflict of impressions – if indeed it wasn’t entirely random – he couldn’t quite make out.

‘Ah, Giles, come in again.’ Martyn Ashmore stepped back; the two young men advanced; Giles politely closed his kinsman’s front door behind him. ‘And this must be Robert? How do you do. I have told Giles that your great uncle Everard was a close friend of mine. A remarkable man. A very hard-working man. His
Revised and Enlarged
Resurrection
was a masterpiece.’