The Durham Deception (5 page)

There was a pause. Tom was still recovering from Mrs Scott's attempt at making a joke when Helen said, ‘Mother, why don't you tell us what's on your mind? It has been plain ever since you mentioned Aunt Julia that there's something bothering you.'

‘Why yes, there is.'

‘What is it?'

‘I do not know whether it is because your aunt is unmarried but she never seems to have acquired – how shall I put this? – she has never acquired an inoculation against men.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘I mean that poor Julia never learned to close her ears to half – no, to three quarters – of what men are saying. Their stuff and nonsense if you'll forgive me, Thomas. The poor thing has always had an open heart. An open heart and an open purse.'

Ah, thought Tom, here it comes. Money has been mentioned.

‘There was a missionary preacher a few years ago who was raising subscriptions for the unfortunate natives in some part of Africa, and your Aunt Julia was more than generous in giving him money,' said Mrs Scott. ‘The fellow was no more a preacher than I am. He had one wife in Bradford and a second one in Newcastle, and probably other wives elsewhere. Certainly he had no intention of sending the money to Africa. He went to prison eventually, I am glad to say. It was reported in the papers. But Julia never saw her money again.'

‘And now another preacher has appeared?'

‘Not exactly. This time it is one of those spiritualists who claim to be in touch with the departed. A gentleman called Eustace Flask. Apparently he is making a name for himself in Yorkshire and Durham. And your aunt has fallen under his spell.'

‘You make him sound like a magician,' said Tom.

‘I wish he were,' said Mrs Scott. ‘At least magicians are honest. They make a virtue of their trickery.'

‘Where is the harm in Aunt Julia consulting a medium?' said Helen. ‘Plenty of people visit mediums.'

‘No doubt; but they aren't usually told to hand over their fortunes.'

Yes, here comes the money, thought Tom, helping himself to another piece of anchovy toast. Helen said, ‘I knew Aunt Julia was well-off but I didn't know she had a fortune.'

‘I may exaggerate but not much. Julia has always been lucky with money even though she knows nothing about it. Indeed, I sometimes think she is lucky precisely
because
she is ignorant. Our father left each of us girls a small but adequate sum when he died but only Julia managed to make it grow by investing it in – oh I don't know what – in the railways and mining stock and the like. And I believe she did no more than put a pin in a list in the newspaper! She puts her good fortune down to Providence. The result is that she is thoroughly comfortable and never has to lift a finger and I am glad for her because there is nothing worse than a crabbed old spinster living in poverty. But I almost wish she were poor because then she would not be preyed on by these tricksters!'

Mrs Scott took up the ham sandwich again and tore into it with as much vigour as if she were savaging the leg of a trickster. Helen glanced at Tom. Her glance said, this is serious. When her mother had swallowed the sandwich and regained a bit of control, she went on, ‘Now this Eustace Flask person has persuaded your Aunt Julia that he is in touch with the spirit of our late father, and that
he
is instructing Julia to treat Flask like a son. The son she might have had if she were married! The spirit says that Flask is to be provided with a very generous allowance. She has already given him a handful of small cheques. It is an outrage!'

‘Have some more tea, mother,' said Helen and she fussed over the pot and strainer and milk jug so as to give Mrs Scott time to calm down.

Eventually, Mrs Scott said, ‘I am sorry, my dears, but I am very indignant over this. It is not so much that Julia is throwing away her money on a charlatan. It is that this wretched Flask person is invoking father in order to trick her. Helen, you can scarcely remember your Howlett grandfather, I suppose?'

‘Not much, I'm afraid. An upright gentleman with tickly whiskers.'

‘Yes, that will do. An upright gentleman. He would have had no time for these mediums and spiritualists if they had existed in his day. He would have called them humbugs. I can hear him saying the word now. So it is especially insulting that this wretch should invoke my father and pretend to be receiving instructions from him over on the other side. Thomas, would you mind bringing me that box?'

Tom went to a sideboard and brought back a little box which Mrs Scott unfolded on her lap to reveal a portable writing-block. Inside there was a flat baize-covered surface and holders for pens and an inkpot. Mrs Scott opened a compartment beneath the green baize and took out an envelope. From it she extracted a photograph which she passed to Helen who, after examining the picture for a few moments, handed it to Tom.

It was a small version of a studio portrait. A man sat in an armchair which was turned at a slight angle from the camera. He had a narrow face. Tom had the impression of very pale skin although that might have been the result of the studio lighting. It was difficult to get much of a sense of what he looked like because something had gone wrong with the exposure of the picture and everything appeared bleached. Nevertheless the man was smiling in welcome, as if to say: ‘Here I am. What is it that you require of me?' His hands, resting limply on the arms of the chair, were long and the fingers adorned with rings.

‘That is Mr Eustace Flask,' said Mrs Scott. ‘You can see how besotted my sister is by the way she describes him in the letter which came with that photograph. She talks about his delicate complexion and his noble brow and piercing stare. She talks of the face of an angel in human guise. I can't see any of it myself.'

‘Why did she send you the picture?' said Tom.

‘She is like a young girl who has fallen in love for the first time and wishes all the world to see her sweetheart. Yet she is in her seventies!'

‘What can we do?' said Helen.

‘It is no good my writing to Julia to object to what she's doing. Whatever I said she would only take it as more proof that she is right. Tom, you're a lawyer. Is there any way this man could be stopped? Could he be prosecuted?'

Tom – who was always Tom and not Thomas to Mrs Scott when her guard was down – thought for a while. He said, ‘I don't think so. As long as your sister Julia is in her right mind and provided she is not under any kind of duress, well, she is free to dispose of her property and goods as she wants. Do you know how much she has given him already?'

‘Not so much, I believe. This Flask individual seems to be very clever in his approach. He turns down the money for a first time and then a second time before accepting it, with reluctance, only when Julia tells him it is a contribution for the cause. The cause of spiritualism. He pretends to deny himself. She feels sorry for him as if he really were her son. She tells him he must take care of himself and wrap up warmly and eat properly, he is so thin and careworn. He may be thin but he does not look careworn to me in that photograph. It is sickening, I tell you, to see how she is being duped. In her last letter she said that she was considering making Flask an allowance because her father had indicated that was an appropriate course of action. Her father,
our
father, speaking through Mr Flask!'

‘Perhaps Aunt Julia will see the light,' said Helen. ‘Perhaps she'll suddenly see this man Flask for what he is.'

‘Julia is too trusting. She still believes that the last one, the preacher with several wives, was essentially a good man tempted by Jezebels. I fear there is worse to come in this crisis. Her most recent letter, the one in which she enclosed the photograph so that I might admire her
angelic
medium, talked about her own failing health. She hinted she was not much longer for this vale of tears. If Julia is really in a weakened condition – although I must say that her handwriting was quite firm – then there's no saying what mischief Flask might wreak.'

‘You mean he might prevail on her to change the terms of her will.'

‘That is exactly what I mean, Thomas. It is bad enough her giving out a few hundred pounds here and there but to think of her whole estate falling into this trickster's hands . . . well, that is too terrible to contemplate. The shame for the family, not to mention Julia herself. No, there is only one hope . . .'

‘What is that, mother?'

‘I would like you and dear Thomas here to undertake a mission for me. Will you travel up to Durham and see your Aunt Julia for yourselves? You were always her favourite, Helen, as I said. She would listen to you where she would turn a deaf ear to me. And Thomas, with his knowledge of the law, might be able to do something. Perhaps he could confront this dreadful Flask. Threaten him.'

The very vagueness of what Mrs Scott was suggesting showed her desperation. Tom was not very enthusiastic, not so much because he didn't sympathize with his mother-in-law – though he didn't, greatly – but because he thought any intervention might well make things worse. Fortunately Helen said, ‘I do not know how easily Tom could free himself from work. I could go by myself, I suppose?'

‘On no account, Helen,' said her mother. ‘For all I know, Eustace Flask has a gang of ruffians and minions under his command despite his
angelic
countenance. No, you need a man with you.'

Normally this would have been the kind of remark to get Helen packing her bags and catching the first train north but she seemed curiously prepared to accept her mother's ban. It seemed that something had to be done, however, so Tom and Helen eventually agreed to consider a Durham visit. They might, said Mrs Scott, make a bit of a holiday out of it. In any case, Aunt Julia would be delighted to see her niece after so many years. And her new husband, of course.

Mrs Scott's mood brightened. She started on the cakes and urged the others to tuck in. She explained that she'd been thinking it might be good for Tom and Helen to get the measure of the enemy – those were the words she used, ‘the enemy' – by attending a séance here in London before they travelled north. Tom noticed how what had been a possibility was now a fact: they were going to visit Durham. He listened as Helen's mother talked about a medium who lived in Tullis Street, whose sister she and Julia had known many years ago. She had discovered that the man, Ernest Smight, held regular sessions every Sunday evening. Perhaps Tom and dear Helen might just look in on Tullis Street next week?

This was how it came about that Tom received a message from his long-dead father and how an equally dead cat, run over in the Fulham Road, was resurrected as the spirit of Mrs Seldon's first husband. And soon after that other things occurred which made the Durham visit even more of a certainty.

Death by Water

It was a few days after the Sunday séance that Mr Ashley the senior clerk at Scott, Lye & Mackenzie told Tom that Mr David Mackenzie wished to see him. Ashley, the clerk, had been with the firm longer than anyone. As a mark of his status, he had a separate office which no one would have dreamed of entering without knocking first. Tom was told to go and see Ashley by another of the juniors, a pleasant chap called William Evers. This was how it worked at the firm. Someone told you to go and see Ashley, who in turn told you what you had to do next.

Tom duly knocked and walked in without waiting for permission. By now he was on quite good terms with Ashley. Marrying the daughter of one of the founding partners had, perhaps surprisingly, not counted against him. Tom sensed that Ashley didn't actively disapprove of him, which was probably as enthusiastic an endorsement as he was going to get.

The senior clerk looked up from a pile of papers and folders. Gifted with a prodigious memory, he had a high forehead which was permanently creased. Tom thought of the interior of his head as an orderly storehouse with details from different years, different decades even, filed away on each level.

‘Mr Mackenzie wishes to see you at your earliest convenience, Mr Ansell. Which we may translate as straightaway.'

‘Do you know why?'

There was a time when Tom wouldn't have asked such a question and Ashley wouldn't have deigned to answer it. Now he said, ‘I do know why. A strange affair. Come and have a word with me when you're finished if you like.'

Tom went along the passage to Mackenzie's chamber. He knocked and this time waited to be told to enter. As usual, it was hard to make out much of the interior because of the pipe smoke. Mackenzie waved away a cloud or two and, his teeth gripping the pipe stem, gestured at Tom to sit down on the other side of his desk. With his tonsure of white hair and wide, benevolent face, Mackenzie looked like a monk or a universal uncle. But he was quick and canny.

‘How are you, Thomas? Married life suiting you, ha?'

Odd how often that question came up. Tom used his wife's answer: ‘It suits us well.'

‘Good, good. Time will tell, you know. It usually does.'

Having dispersed a few more parcels of smoke, David Mackenzie got down to business. At least Tom assumed it was business despite the oddness of his next question.

‘Know any magicians?'

‘
Magicians
? No, I don't know any magicians, sir. I've seen Dr Pepper's Ghost and the Corsican Trapdoor in the theatre.'

‘The Trapdoor was Boucicault's idea,' said Mackenzie, showing an unexpected familiarity with stage magic. ‘So you have never seen Major Sebastian Marmont?'

‘Nor heard of him, I'm afraid.'

‘He has a touring show during which he displays some magic feats he learned in the orient.'

‘What they call “the mysterious east”,' said Tom.