Corpse in a Gilded Cage (5 page)

Anyone seeing her at that moment might well have concluded that Lady Portsea was beginning to scent enticing future possibilities.

•   •   •

‘Turkey's sizzling,' said the Earl, rubbing his hands. ‘If you nip through the hall and half a mile down the corridor to your left you might get a whiff. Blimey—think of my lot never getting the smell of turkey in the oven.'

They had all gathered in the Dining-Room. The Earl had stationed himself by the fireplace, under the portrait of Sir Rupert Spender. His face was enclosed by the riot of fruit and flowers within which Grinling Gibbons had enclosed the portrait, so that he looked like nothing so much as an amiable greengrocer peering out from among his wares. At his right hand, on the marble fireplace, he had placed an enormous can of beer.

‘Anyone else feel like a snifter? I got a bumper keg of Watbread's Special from the local—I know Chokey won't say no to sharing it with me. But there's other stuff around too: part of the loot, you might say. What'll you all have?'

‘I'll have a dry sherry, Dad, please,' said Joan.

‘For me too,' said Digby.

‘Have you got brandy and blackcurrant?' asked Michele.

‘A gin and tonic, please, Dad,' said Dixie, patting at a flounce. Something in her tone led Joan to dart her a sharp glance.

But the Earl had held up his hand.

‘Here—I can't remember all that! It's every man for himself. It's all in the cabinet through there in the lounge. Chokey, boy: here's a glass of your favourite.'

While the rest stampeded in the direction of the doors to the Green Drawing-Room, Chokey came forward and accepted the proffered glass of beer—a shade reluctantly, perhaps, as if he'd have preferred something a bit harder, but his watery, shifty eyes were fixed on the Earl's shoes, and he voiced profuse thanks.

‘Sam?' said the Earl, holding out the bumper can.

‘No, thanks, man,' said Sam, and strolled elegantly into the Green Drawing-Room and poured himself a neat cognac. Sipping it, Sam stood in the large open doorway that separated the two rooms, gazing silently
around at the splendours of both. He and Chokey kept themselves somewhat apart—perhaps feeling themselves strangers at a family party, perhaps feeling (who knows?) that the Spenders' ennoblement had somehow marked them off. Chokey lurked in a dark far corner, saying little to anyone, but, like Sam, looking around him a lot, and keeping his ears open.

‘Well,' said the Earl, when they had gathered again. ‘This is nice, I must say.'

‘That's it, you see,' said the Countess to no one in particular, heaving her bulk into a gilded chair by the fireplace. ‘This is how he would have it. But don't think you're going to eat here for the rest of the weekend. Not on your life. There's a great big table in the kitchen where the servants used to eat. We'll use that. Food'll be a sight hotter, that's for sure.'

‘I thought we ought to do it once,' said the Earl, standing by his lady's side and surveying with some pride the table which it had taken them half an hour to lay. ‘It's a sight, isn't it, eh? Like those old costume films with Margaret Lockwood your mum used to love. It's all part of the ancestral loot. Fancy some of the cut glassware, Joanie?'

Joan's eyes glinted, but the children claimed their grandfather's attention. They were ranged down the side of the table, clutching glasses with something orange in them, but gazing wide-eyed at the table, which was groaning under the weight of silver, glassware, candelabra and tureens that any museum in the country would have itched to get its fingers on. Karen lifted the littlest one up to see.

‘I think it's lovely, Grandad,' she said.

‘Who asked you?' snapped Dixie, in a semi-automatic response. She immediately tried to retrieve it, turning to the Earl and saying in a very different tone of voice: ‘She's like that, though, Karen is. Loves to have things nice. Appreciates it.'

Once again Joan shot her a sharp glance, and Sam too, from his doorway, cast an amused look in her direction. For both of them had suddenly realized what had been bothering them about Dixie. She was attempting a refined accent. Apparently she was auditioning for the part of Lady of the Manor. The Earl, however, was oblivious.

‘I know she does. She's a lovely girl, is my Karen. And take a good look, my little lady, because you won't be seeing this little lot every day of your life.'

Thus launched on to the subject closest to his heart, the Earl seemed
inclined to open up to the family his whole thinking on the matter. He took a great gulp of his beer and set the glass down on the chimneypiece.

‘Fact is, your mum and I hope to be out of all this in ten days or so—two weeks at the outside. Everything seems to be sorting itself out—quick as you can expect, anyway, with lawyers in the picture. So as soon as we can make it, we're going to pack our bags and make for home, and leave old Lillywaite to sell the place up.'

Nobody looked directly at anyone else, but Digby and Joan, who had had an earnest little conversation in the privacy of their bedroom, breathed tiny sighs of relief.

‘So you're going to put the place on the market, are you, Dad?' Digby said. ‘I think you're wise. It seems a terrible shame, but in the end it would only have been a millstone round your necks.'

‘Nobody expected you to stop,' said Joan, who nevertheless did rather wish she could have had a longer and more complete initiation into gracious living while they were there. ‘I wish you'd kept the staff on, though, Dad. You'd have been a lot more comfortable while you were here.'

‘No fear,' said the Earl, looking more like Low's Little Man every minute. ‘Not on your life. Of course the estate workers stayed on. Even I know the cows have to be milked. But having butlers and what-have-you watching our every move—that's not our style at all.'

‘You'd have soon got used to it.'

‘As the judge said when he sentenced the man to thirty years in the salt mines. No, ta very much: that's not something Elsie and I want to get used to. As I said to Lillywaite: we're not having spies around the house. Listening to every word we say. Watching. What the Butler Saw and all that. Not that there's much of
that
for him to see these days, eh, Elsie?'

The Earl let out a bellow of laughter, but his daughter flinched and pursed her lips, as she often did at the uninhibited animality of the children in her class. The Earl resumed his discourse.

‘Anyway, even if we'd wanted to—
which
we don't, and never will—there's all them death duties to be paid off. My noble family couldn't go in for any of the regular dodges this time. The only sensible thing is: get what they'll fetch, pay over what's got to be paid, and make hay with the rest.'

His words fell on silence, as various little brains set to the calculation of their interests, the assessing of their positions.

‘The death duties will be phenomenal, of course,' said Digby, whose brain was quicker by experience at this sort of calculation. ‘But this stuff will fetch, make no mistake.' He waved his hand towards the picture over
the fireplace above the Earl's head. ‘That's a Van Dyke. That alone would fetch three-quarters of a million.'

‘Oh, been pricing it, have you?' said the Countess nastily.

‘Mum!' protested Joan. ‘It's Digby's job. He is a valuer. Digby just knows these things.'

‘Well, bully for Digby,' said the Countess. ‘Any Van Dykes come up for sale in Wandsworth and Digby's the boy to call in.'

‘Mother!' said the Earl. He turned round and gazed at the picture enclosed within the Gibbons carvings. It was of Sir Rupert Spender, grandfather of the first Earl, who had fought for King and Commonwealth (successively) in the Civil War, and whom a later portrait by Lely showed as one of those hard-faced men who do well out of wars. Here, however, he was in the prime of youth, his hand on the head of a pointer, his slim body clad in a blue velvet suit with lacy collar and cuffs.

‘Three-quarters of a million, just for nancy boy here,' said the Earl. ‘It makes you think.'

‘Don't be nasty,' said Michele. ‘I think he has a look of Trevor.'

They all looked at Trevor, then at the portrait of Sir Rupert, then back at Trevor. Certainly there was a resemblance: the same fair-brown hair, the same good-looking but slightly pinched face. The resemblance was accentuated by the velveteen jacket and floppy bow-tie that Trevor was wearing, filched from the wardrobe of
Evie in the Naughty Nineties.

‘Thank you, Michele,' said Trevor, enjoying the notice. ‘There's my reputation gone. Only nancy roles for me from now on.'

Michele's remark had brought her to general notice. Joan, who had earlier cast glances of prim disapproval at the thin white shift which was apparently her sole garment, seemed suddenly seized by a desire to play the hostess. Perhaps she was spurred on by the fact that the Countess made no gestures at all in that direction, or perhaps she was just working towards an alliance of the family's younger members. She leaned forward to the slim girl, and with a condescending smile said:

‘How clever of you to notice . . . er, Michele, is it?'

‘Michele with one I,' said the girl, turning her hard eyes in Joan's direction.

‘You must have a genius for faces,' said Digby, leaning forward in his turn. ‘How did you first meet Trevor?'

‘When he was shoved on top of me, on a bed, with arc lamps behind him,' said Michele. ‘That way you never forget a face.' And then, turning
to the assembled family, began: ‘About Trevor: we've been talking about his career, and—'

But the Countess was having nothing of this, and heaved her bulk out of her chair like an ageing coalman.

‘Well, no peace for the wicked. I'm going to serve up down there, and you can come and get it in ten minutes. You—whatsyername?—Sam: you look as if you could bring up three or four. And Chokey and Perce, you can bring up the rest.'

‘The kids can fetch their own,' said Dixie. And in what passed with her for
sotto voce
added: ‘And if any of you spill one drop of gravy on them Persian carpets . . .'

As the Countess waddled out, the Earl resumed his discourse, determined that his intentions should be entirely understood.

‘No—as I say, it's sell out and get out. Sale of the century, everything must go. Old Lillywaite tried to bring Phil into it, but I said to him: “I wouldn't expect him to consult me if he was selling his house, and I won't be consulting him when I sell mine.” '

‘Still,' said Dixie, who had been very thoughtful in the last few minutes, since the Earl had started explaining his intentions, ‘you could go and talk it over with Phil, Dad. It's not far, and he'd love to see you. And he is the heir.'

‘Heir, my Aunt Fanny,' said Lord Ellesmere. ‘That's one old Lillywaite tried to pull. I said to him—'

But he was interrupted by the telephone. He looked wildly round in several directions, trying to remember where the nearest extension was. Then he darted through the doors into the Green Drawing-Room and grabbed up the receiver.

‘Hello, Mr Lillywaite. Talk of the . . . your name was on our lips.'

The phone was on a Chippendale side table on the wall near the door. Sam had moved away when the call came through, and the Earl now stood in the doorway, smirking at his children.

‘Yes, thank you, Mr Lillywaite: Lady Joan has arrived . . . And the Honourable Trevor.'

‘Whoops! There goes my reputation again,' said Trevor, giving his father a tremendous smirk in return. But Joan merely responded with a dignified smile. It was, after all, the first time she had heard the title used. She had had a vague feeling that it might have been abolished by the last Labour government.

‘You've arranged to see Phil, have you? . . . Tomorrow afternoon?
. . . Quite all right with me, mate . . . and with Dixie, I'm sure . . . She was just saying Phil enjoyed having visitors . . . Say “keep your chin up” from us, will you? And say we'll see him in three weeks' time, when he's out . . . Oh, and Lillywaite: it won't make a ha'porth of difference, you know.'

He put down the phone in high good humour, and came back into the Dining-Room, rubbing his hands.

‘Never did like lawyers. He's batting on a sticky wicket if he thinks he can make trouble between Phil and me. Phil's a good lad.'

‘Too bloody good, sometimes,' muttered Dixie to herself. But she turned to the Earl casually, and said: ‘What did you say his name was, Dad?'

Joan looked down at her hands, and tightened her mouth.

‘Lillywaite. Pompous old twerp he is too. Well, come on, Sam, come on, Chokey. Turkey up. You going to come and get yours, my little darlings?'

And the Earl and his helpers bustled off to the kitchen. In the Dining-Room a sudden hush fell, and then they all started making their way, awkwardly, to the table.

‘Isn't it lovely?' said Dixie, in a voice that was most un-Dixie.

‘Oh, look at that,' said Joan, vexed. ‘They've got all the knives and spoons the wrong way round.'

‘Put us all right, then, Joanie,' shrilled Dixie, instantly her normal self. ‘We didn't know you'd been in domestic service.'

Joan and Digby, both giving tense little smiles, went round the table from place to place, rearranging the cutlery. Then they stood back, hands clasped in front of them, and nodded in satisfaction.

‘Isn't it marvellous?' muttered Dixie.

Then the turkey came in, Sam bearing four plates expertly in his big hands, the rest juggling them as they might. The children gazed at their plates, and then wide-eyed once more around the rose-papered room, with the immensely white table cloth and the sparkling glasses. Then the Earl dashed back to the kitchen and returned with three bottles of wine, followed by the Countess, who sank exhaustedly into her place without a word, conveying a distinct aura of reproach to them for the effort their coming had put her to. The Earl handed a bottle to Trevor, and one to Digby, and together they filled up the glasses, Digby covering the neck dexterously to prevent drips. Then the Earl stood at the foot of the table, stepped back to admire his handiwork and see that everyone was served, and then took up his glass.