Blood Sinister (22 page)

‘Would you like some?’ Piers offered, gesturing vaguely towards it. ‘Lentil soup – home-made. There’s plenty.’

‘No, thanks all the same,’ Slider refused for them both. ‘But please don’t let us stop you.’

‘All right, I won’t,’ said Piers, resuming his seat. ‘Make yourselves at home.’

Slider and Atherton pulled out chairs and sat at the table. The dogs had stopped bouncing in favour of a lengthy and committed smelling of their shoes and trousers. They were terriers of some sort; their square faces and grizzled curls reminded Slider disconcertingly of Commander Wetherspoon, especially as they stared at him with the same dispassion. It made him feel he was on trial.

‘So, what do you want to know? It’s a terrible business about poor Phoebe. There was a big spread about her in the
Guardian
on Monday – was it? – or Tuesday. I hear,’ he twinkled gravely at them over his spoon, ‘you’ve been grilling my brother about it. He’s thinking of suing you for wrongful arrest.’

‘He wasn’t arrested. He was—’

‘—helping you with your enquiries, yes,’ Piers finished for him. ‘You can’t sue for that: that’s what I told him. Poor dear, he was mortified. He was on the phone last night, keening like an Irish peasant for his lost career – his political career, I mean – because the Government can’t bear anything that looks the least bit like sleaze, so poor Josh will be out on his ear before you can say floccinaucinihilipilification.’ He paused a beat to see if they appreciated his style, and meeting intelligent interest, he seemed to relax a little and expand. ‘I said, love, you don’t want to work for that bunch of crypto-fascist asses anyway.’ He pronounced it
arses
. ‘But of course the tragedy is
that he
does
. The architectural stage was never big enough for Josh. The
stage
stage wasn’t. Well,’ he took and swallowed a spoonful of soup demurely, ‘I suppose there’s always Europe.’

His voice reminded Slider of dried flowers: a faint, odourless ghost of some great past vigour. He moved his hands as he spoke, as though trying to help the failing voice along, but his gestures had the slow, underwater impotence of the running-dream. Still, talking was obviously very much his thing, for which Slider gave inner thanks. All he had to do was to filter out the useful grit from the river of words. He settled himself, exuding ease and not-being-in-a-hurry. Atherton, noting the posture, resigned himself to a long session.

‘Your brother was never on the stage, was he?’ Slider asked, on the back of Prentiss’s last comment.

‘Not an act
or
,’ Piers said, striking an attitude, ‘and yet, surely an actor
manqué?
Always wanted to be centre stage - always
was
centre stage, let’s face it – but without the nuisance of learning lines.’

‘He joined the Drama Society at university, didn’t he?’

‘However did you know that? Yes, he did – though of course in any university, joining Dramsoc has everything to do with social popularity and nothing to do with the theatre. But Josh could have been a thespian if only he’d had the self-discipline. He has real talent, you know. He dissipates it.’

He smiled, and his rather lugubrious face was translated: the charm and pulling-power of his brother were there, but diluted, like September rather than July sunshine.

‘On the other hand,’ he went on, ‘if it comes to the parable of the talents, Josh would say I’ve buried mine under a bush. We were both born with every advantage, and look at our relative positions now.’

‘You come from a wealthy family?’ Slider slipped the question in as undisturbingly as an otter slipping into water.

‘Oh, yes. Family pile in leafy Buckinghamshire – not too many acres, though. Grandpa and Father were both ambassadors, so they preferred their wealth portable.’

‘So you must have spent a lot of time abroad?’

‘Oh, no, we stayed at home in good old England.’

‘Who looked after you?’

‘We had nannies and so forth until we went to school. But
we had super holidays with the parents – up until Mummy died. That was when I was eleven. After that we didn’t go and stay with Father because there wouldn’t have been anyone to supervise us. But there were always relatives around. And Granny lived in the South of France – we stayed with her quite often.’

‘You went to Eton, like your brother?’ Atherton asked.

He nodded. ‘Eton, Oxford and the Guards was the family tradition – until Josh broke it. After Mummy died, he was always getting into rows with Father. First he refused to go to university at all, and then instead of PPE at Balliol he chose architecture and UCL. Father dropped down dead with shock – well, almost.’ He made a deprecating gesture. ‘It was heart, but in fact he died in May 1972, just when I was about to do my finals. Still, I like to think it was Josh’s rebellion that brought it on. Makes the story so much more symmetrical, doesn’t it?’

He brooded a moment, crumbling a piece of bread in his fingers. There was some hostility buried here, Slider thought. Simple sibling rivalry?

‘So,’ Piers said abruptly, coming back, ‘brother and I inherited the family fortune between us. As soon as probate was through, Josh used his to buy his own firm and the house in Campden Hill Square. Such foresight! Everything he now has and is stems from that first sensible investment. I, on the other hand,’ he went on with an airy gesture, scattering crumbs, ‘used my half to allow me to live comfortably without having to take the antiques business too seriously. It’s moot whether the shop keeps me or I keep the shop. Now
whose
, I ask you, was the wasted talent?’

‘I hope that’s a rhetorical question,’ Slider said. Worldly success versus elegant living: was that the issue between the brothers? Piers wanted his comment to sound ironic, wanted his audience to conclude from his denigration of his lifestyle that he thought it superior; but underneath, did he really feel that he was a failure, and that Josh had scored on all fronts?

‘Oh, goodness, I wouldn’t force you to take sides!’ Piers said. He seemed to have been distracted from his lunch. The soup was cooling and congealing around the neglected spoon, and all he had done with the bread was to make a mess on the table. Now he pushed his chair back with a final air. ‘What about some coffee?’ He stood up, and the dogs, who had gone
off trouser duty and were curled together on a beanbag in the corner next to the Aga, lifted their heads hopefully. ‘You’ll have some coffee?’

‘I’m afraid we’ve kept you from eating.’

‘Oh, no, don’t worry. I never eat much at lunchtime, anyway. Besides,’ he looked down at the bowl with sudden dislike, ‘I loathe lentil soup. One might as well eat cardboard boxes.’

‘I thought it was home-made,’ Atherton said, amused.

Piers looked at him. ‘Not by
me
. Good Lord, I’m
nothing
of a cook! No, I have an absolute treasure who comes in. My “lady who does”. She cleans, cooks, soothes the brow when fevered, and looks after the doggies when I’m away travelling – doesn’t she, woofies? Doesn’t dear old Aunty Marjie look after my wuffle-buffles, then?’ The dogs looked adoring and waggled their bottoms ecstatically. ‘The trouble is,’ he added in a normal voice, ‘that she’s
frightfully
keen on wholemeal nourishment and regular bowel movements. Just like an old-fashioned nanny! So, let me whisk away this
abrasive
nourishment—’ He swept the soup bowl up, ‘and put on some nice, evil, caffeine-loaded coffee. How do you take it? Why don’t you two chaps go and make yourselves comfortable in the drawing-room, and I’ll bring it in. Too sordid, sitting in the kitchen with the left-overs!’

The change of room was not a change for the better, for the drawing-room was chill and smelled of mushrooms, but at least it was a chance to have a look round.

‘This bloke’s a babbling brook,’ Atherton complained when they were alone. ‘We’ll be lucky to get out of here before Easter.’

Slider raised his eyebrows. ‘In a hurry? Got some major appointment you’ve been keeping from me?’

‘I thought we had a date,’ Atherton said. ‘You, me and a couple of pints of the amber foaming.’ The dogs pattered in and stood just inside the doorway watching them. ‘Watch out, guv,’ Atherton hissed. ‘Two people in dog suits at twelve o’ clock. Don’t touch the silver.’

Slider was making a round of the framed photographs which decorated almost every surface. Here was a 1950s black and white snapshot of the Prentiss boys aged about ten and six, with, presumably, their mother and father, standing together on a windy clifftop. The children’s faces seemed a nice blend
of the parents’ different features, with Josh perhaps favouring his spectacularly beautiful mother slightly more, and Piers his rather long-faced father. Even at that age Josh was the more physically attractive, and looked straight at the camera with the winning smile of one who had no doubts he would be liked. Piers seemed to be drawing back, pressing against his mother, his eyes sliding uncertainly sideways, his smile required and perfunctory. Always overshadowed by his brother, Slider thought. A slight rearrangement of the same genes, and you had less of everything – good looks, charm, confidence and success. A first-class and a second-class son. There were things to be said, after all, for being an only child.

Josh featured in lots of the photographs. Here was another of the two boys together, this time kneeling with their arms round two Weimaraners; now a formal picture of them, mid teens, standing behind their seated father with a hint of pillars and chandeliers behind them – some embassy or foreign palace? Another, in their late teens and leaning on the rail of a ship. Here was a wedding photograph, Josh in morning suit and Noni thin as a rail and vividly dark in full white fig, Piers with top hat in hand, head turned, looking out to the side of the picture as though he didn’t belong to the group.

Those that didn’t feature Josh were of Piers – alone, with dogs, or with various men; the various men alone; and the progress of some children who Slider assumed were Josh’s son and daughter. He was interested to note that there was no photograph of Phoebe Agnew anywhere – and also none of Peter Medmenham.

He was just working his way round to the piano and the last crop when Piers Prentiss came in with a tray, preceded by the smell of coffee. ‘Here we are! Now let’s sit down and be comfortable.’ He saw Atherton glance at the clock and said, ‘I’m not going to worry about opening the shop again. I hardly ever get passing trade on a weekday anyway, and everyone else knows to try here if the shop’s shut. So we can take our time.’

‘I was just looking at your photographs,’ Slider said. ‘I hoped you might have one of Phoebe Agnew.’

‘There’s one on the bookcase,’ Piers said. He put down the tray on the coffee table and crossed the room, and then paused,
puzzled. ‘Well, that’s odd. There was one here. It’s gone. It was a rather nice one, of Phoebe, Josh and me in Josh’s garden. What on earth could have happened to it? I suppose Marjorie must have moved it.’ He made a rapid scan of the room, and shrugged. ‘I’ll have to ask her what she’s done with it. I’ve got lots of others, though, unframed. I’ll get the box out if you like. But first – coffee.’

He poured and handed it, and then from a cupboard in the chimney corner produced a bottle of Caol Ila. ‘You’ll indulge in a little
pousse-café?
Do you care for malt whisky?’

‘I’m rather a fan,’ Slider said. Atherton refused, on the grounds that he was driving, and Piers poured two large ones, and then took an armchair facing them, with the dogs at his feet. ‘I didn’t see any photos of Peter Medmenham, either,’ Slider said, when they were settled. He sipped his malt, and noticed with mild satisfaction that Piers drank more deeply of his. ‘He told me that you had been friends for many years.’

‘Oh, poor Peter!’ Piers said, but sounded quite detached about it. ‘Did he tell you that our ways have parted?’

‘He seems to hope they haven’t really,’ Slider said.

‘Yes, that’s what Thursday’s little visit was all about. I’d spent Wednesday night with Richard, and we’d planned to have the weekend together, and I couldn’t risk Peter barging in on us, so I decided it was time to tell him it was over. Then he insisted on coming over on Thursday night to persuade me that my new love was just a fling, a will-o’-the-wisp leading me from the true path.’

‘And it isn’t?’

‘No,’ he said, quite serious for once. ‘If you’d seen how sorry Richard was to leave me on Thursday morning, you’d know. I’m sorry about Peter, because we’ve been together a long time, and I hate to hurt anyone, but the thing with Richard is on a different plane altogether. That’s why I took down the photos of Peter. Richard didn’t like them being there. I explained it to Peter and tried to be nice about it – I even offered him the photos, frames and all, which was generous because they were solid silver and rather nice – but he just got hysterical and started throwing things—’

‘The orange juice?’

Piers raised his eyebrows. ‘Oh, he told you that, did he? It
made an awful mess – orange juice is so sticky! I was furious. And then he just walked out.’ He finished his whisky and reached for the bottle. ‘Top-up?’

‘I’m all right, thanks.’

‘But Peter always was too emotional. He says it’s the artistic temperament but you can put
that
another way and say it’s pure theatrics. He plays to the gallery the whole time. Richard’s so different. He’s serious. You’d never believe he was only twenty-eight. He’s made me see how superficial Peter always was. And if we’re talking talent,’ he added emphatically, opening his eyes wide, ‘Richard’s in a whole different class. To have got as far as he has at such an early age—’ He stopped. ‘This is all confidential, isn’t it?’