Ten Lords A-Leaping (12 page)

‘Do you have to see everything in terms of sex. She’s not my tottie. Just an agreeable new acquaintance. And I can’t get her to drive me to Cambridge.’

‘Why not?’

‘Why should she?’

‘She’ll enjoy it. Just persuade her. And when you get here, you’d better stay until Thursday. You’ve got a lot of speeches to write.’

‘I can’t stay.’

‘Why not?’

‘I’ve only got the weekend’s clothes.’

‘You really are turning into a complete old woman, Robert. If you run out of knickers I’ll lend you a pair of mine. This is St Martha’s, remember, not some fucking Buckingham Palace garden party. Come on, get cracking. I’ll get someone to sling another fatted calf on the fire. Bye.’

‘She’s rather like a tank,’ he explained to Jennifer. ‘Every time you produce a little pile of reasons why what she wants done is impossible she just flattens them.’

‘Well, I’m delighted she did.’ Jennifer put her foot down hard on the accelerator. ‘I’ve always wanted to see what Daddy’s old flame looked like.’

‘What!’

‘Didn’t she tell you?’

‘Jack doesn’t tell. She mostly imparts whatever is necessary to get you to do her bidding. She subscribes to that educational view that you learn best by finding out for yourself.’

‘Well, according to Daddy, he fell madly for her when she was about seventeen. Said she had a wonderful seat.’

‘Bit broad in the beam these days.’

‘He proposed to her but she turned him down and went to Cambridge instead.’

‘Surely they’re not contemporaries?’

‘No. He was in his mid-twenties at the time. She must have been something unusual.’

‘She’s still something unusual.’

‘Well, he did say to me that although he still respected her a great deal, he and Mummy were much better suited. Seemed to think Baroness Troutbeck would have found country life a bit dull.’

‘I expect she’d have livened it up. She certainly livened up the civil service and from all I gather St Martha’s has been undergoing a pretty thorough transformation over recent months.’

The dramatic nature of change was evident even at the gates of St Martha’s where rusty black had given way to scarlet. The garden – which for years had resembled an untended Victorian cemetery minus the gravestones – had been cheered up by judicious pruning and the addition of flowerbeds and pots full of winter pansies and flowering shrubs. And when the scarlet front door opened there was no longer that subtle aura of mildew and overdone cabbage.

‘Mr Amiss. How nice to see you again. We have missed you.’

‘Lady Jennifer Bovington-Petty, Miss Stamp.’

Miss Stamp tinkled girlishly. ‘Gosh, we are going up in the world, aren’t we, what with the Mistress becoming a baroness and lots of titled visitors like you, Lady Jennifer. Now, you won’t want to hang around here chatting. Let me take you to the Mistress. She’s got a lovely surprise for you, Mr Amiss.’

He didn’t like the sound of that at all. ‘Where is she?’

‘In her study. I’ll lead the way.’ And she trotted across the hall and tripped happily up the stairs ahead of them.

‘It’s very nice,’ said Jennifer. ‘We certainly didn’t have vast open fires at St Hilda’s.’ She sniffed. ‘Mmm. Smells like apple logs. And look at those rugs. For a women’s college this is a veritable Sybaris.’ They stopped abruptly halfway down a corridor. In answer to Miss Stamp’s knock, the door was opened swiftly.

‘Come on, you two. Quick.’ The baroness bundled them into the room and slammed the door behind her. ‘Don’t want to let the old girl out yet.’ And there, pacing moodily up and down the mantelpiece, was a large orange cat.

‘This is Plutarch,’ the baroness explained to Jennifer, ‘who lives with Robert. He should be proud of her, but – inexplicably – he’s not. I take her in from time to time to restore her self-confidence.’

Amiss approached Plutarch gingerly, muttered a greeting and stroked her left ear.

‘Go on, go on, pick her up. You haven’t seen her for weeks and weeks. You’re not worthy of that cat.’

She picked up Plutarch and thrust her into Amiss’s unwilling arms. Taking the line of least resistance, he sat down beside the fire and submitted himself to being trampled all over for several minutes until Plutarch decided she had found the most comfortable spot. Within a minute she was asleep.

‘You see. She’s glad to see you.’ The baroness pointed to Jennifer, who was now settled in the other armchair. ‘Drink?’

‘Yes, please.’

The baroness walked over to the corner of the room, opened a wooden door to a concealed refrigerator and removed a bottle of champagne. ‘We’re celebrating your reunion with Plutarch, your return to this academic backwater and, of course, Jennifer’s first visit, for any daughter of Reggie Poulteney is a daughter of mine.’ She reflected for a moment. ‘That isn’t quite right, but you know what I mean.’

‘It’s not like you to make pretty speeches, Jack. I suppose it’s a by-product of mixing with the nobility.’

There was a resounding explosion as the cork parted company with the champagne. Plutarch took off like a gazelle and, after a brief touchdown in the middle of the mantelpiece, completed several circuits of the room at high speed and landed on the desk, where in short order she knocked over a pile of books, a filing tray of papers, a container of pens and pencils and three glasses.

‘Good thing they were empty,’ said the baroness cheerfully. ‘There, there, Plutarch, steady now. You really must learn to cope with the unexpected.’

She picked her up, dropped her on Amiss’s lap, put the scattered articles back in place and poured out the champagne.

‘How long has she been here?’

‘I picked her up yesterday. As you can see, she hasn’t quite got acclimatized yet.’

‘Any major disasters so far?’

‘Well, she had a slight contretemps with the contents of the mantelpiece, but there were few casualties.’ She handed over the glasses. ‘Now, enough feline chitchat. What’s all this about skulduggery at Shapely Bottom? I take a very dim view of any of those hairy thugs trying to kill Reggie. What do the rozzers have to say?’

‘Didn’t really have a clue,’ said Jennifer. ‘The saddle’s gone off for examination, but I’ve no doubt it’s been deliberately damaged.’

‘Access?’

Jennifer looked puzzled. Amiss, a hardened interpreter of the baroness, interjected, ‘Quite easy. A hunting magazine feature on Shapely Bottom Hall last month had a map of the grounds and an illustration of the tack room. Even pinpointed the spot where Reggie’s saddle always hung. Couldn’t have been more helpful to sabs, really.’

‘Any of you with any ambition to rub Reggie out?’ asked the baroness.

‘I expect my sister-in-law has occasionally, but she wouldn’t have the nerve.’

‘Hmm,’ said the baroness. She looked appraisingly at Jennifer. ‘Have some more champagne.’

‘Well, I’d better be careful. I’ve a long drive this afternoon.’

‘Rubbish. Now you’re here, you’d better stay overnight. Sunday lunch goes on a long time. Besides…’ She smiled winningly. ‘I’d like you to talk to me and some of my colleagues about anthropology. There might be a vacancy coming up here soon.’

Chapter 13

«
^
»

‘Aren’t you being rather…’ Soup spoon halfway to his mouth, Pooley paused to find the right word.

‘Weak?’

‘Well, if you want to put it like that.’

‘I don’t, dammit. But it’s what you think. The trouble with all you people who want me to do what they think I should do is that you want to operate a monopoly.’

‘I’m not sure I followed that.’

Amiss chewed crossly on a piece of asparagus and took an irritable gulp of Chablis. ‘You think I am letting Jack push me around.’

‘Aren’t you?’

‘May I remind you, Ellis, that in your time you have pushed me into being not only an unwilling English teacher in a den of corruption but also a waiter in a murderous mausoleum. At least Jack introduces me to a better class of person.’

Pooley looked crestfallen. ‘I’m sorry. You’re right. I was just worrying that it was bad for your career to be in yet another dead-end job.’

‘Yes, yes. I know all that. But it’s not for long and it isn’t half interesting. I mean, I know all these toffs are what you fled from, but they’re a new experience for me and you know I’m a sucker for new experiences. And the more I read about hunting the more I see their point. You can’t read Walter Scott and Trollope and all those marvellous Victorians without grasping something of the magic of the whole business. I simply hadn’t realized that hunting had a distinguished literature.’

‘So has bull fighting.’

‘Sure, and that’s why though nothing would get me to a bullring, I wouldn’t simply abolish bullfighting because it offended my sensibilities. You can’t just go blindly against the grain of tradition.’

He saw Pooley’s quizzical look. ‘All right, I admit it. Of course the real reason I’m committed to this is that it’s always exhilarating being in cahoots with Jack. You never know what the day might hold.’

Pooley gave a shiver. ‘I think I’d rather be on safer ground.’

‘Have you and Jim any interesting murders on your hands at the moment?’

‘No. I have to admit things are a bit dull. A few open-and-shut domestics are all I’m dealing with at present.’

‘Well, you never know. The way the activists are carrying on, you may yet be landed with a corpse. Their demos are getting nastier. Sometimes I’m quite nervous. I won’t be sorry when all this is over.’

‘So what’s going to happen now? The second reading debate’s on Tuesday, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

‘How will it go? Will you win?’

‘Apparently by convention government bills just don’t go to a vote on the second reading. Mind you, at first Jack thought we should bash ahead with a vote regardless. She pointed out that in war it’s important to try to win as early as possible so as to minimize your losses. But Stormerod put his foot down. Said we’d lose the waverers if we flew in the face of tradition. Besides, as he rightly said, since some of the provisions are acceptable, it would be hard to vote against. You don’t win friends by voting for torturing squirrels.’

‘So what’s your immediate objective?’

‘To win a moral victory and,
inter alia
, give the government notice that this one could be a nuisance. They’re full of legislative plans – including Lords reform – so they won’t be pleased at the possibility of being tied down on this one. But our side intend to fight it out in hand-to-hand combat in Committee. We won’t be able to defeat it, but we intend if we can to emasculate it. And then bung it back to the Commons.’

‘Sounds straightforward, but I suppose it isn’t.’

‘Too right. It’ll all involve a lot of work and aggro, especially with these mad clowns demonstrating outside day in and day out. Our worry is that it won’t be easy to whip in enough of our chaps to support us in the chamber and turn up regularly to the Committee. However, I’m reasonably optimistic. Jack’s managed to form a coherent group that’s more or less prepared to follow orders.’

‘From whom?’

‘Stormerod nominally, though Jack’s the driving force and I’m the ventriloquist, writing speeches and doing briefing. It’s just like being back in the civil service. Just more fun.’

‘And who are your puppets?’

‘Beesley and Poulteney mainly. Though I’m doing a fair bit of work with Jack, Sid Deptford and Stormerod to make sure they don’t trip over each other in their arguments. We’re focusing on the fox-hunting issue, since that’s the one everyone’s particularly exercised about.’

‘You should be all right, shouldn’t you? Isn’t Stormerod an old master at this sort of thing? Though of course Jack’s new to it. It must be a strain for her to have to make her maiden speech on such a high-profile occasion.’

‘You speaking of Jack Troutbeck?’

‘Sorry. Wasn’t thinking.’

‘In fact, she and Stormerod have decided to throw discretion to the winds and put her in the vulnerable position towards the end where she’ll have to respond to the opponents’ arguments. Old Bertie has great faith in her. So do I, really.’

Pooley raised his glass. ‘To success. And I promise not to nag you again until it’s all over.’

‘I’ve written speeches for some dodos in my time, but nothing to match this. I don’t think even the dimmest politician presents a challenge of the magnitude of Tommy and Reggie.’ The baroness laughed. ‘Are you seriously suggesting they’re stupider than your old minister, Norman Thring?’

‘He doesn’t even rate. At least when you gave him a speech – admittedly in words of one syllable – he was able to read it out with a bit of expression. But there are moments when I’ve been seriously wondering if Tommy Beesley can read. However, I’ve taken both of them through their speeches three times and they might just do.’

‘Well, I don’t want this to go to your head, Robert, but I have to say that bearing in mind the raw material they gave you and their deficiencies as orators, it sounds as if you’ve done a notable job of damage limitation.’

‘There’s always the chance Reggie will lose his speech or Tommy will return to his plan of simply asserting stoutly over and over again that he won’t stand for it.’

‘Just make sure that doesn’t happen. Now, had Reggie heard any more about the damaged saddle?’

‘Yes. Forensic tests show definitely it was tampered with, which is borne out by Hawkins, who had polished it within a few days of the hunt. But a lot of people could have had access to it during the day. And at night if they knew where to find the key.’

‘Which was kept?’

‘On a nail outside the back door. Not very difficult. Anyone could have had access to it. It required no special skill.’

‘So is the money on the looney end of the animal activists?’

‘Jennifer said the police had given the family a considerable going-over, but that they’re now doing routine checks on any violent animal activists they’ve got on file. But they’re not hopeful of finding the culprit.’

‘How’s Reggie taking it?’