Death in Disguise Read online

  She had been picking absently at the rotting bark—it was soft like flakes of chocolate—struggling to regain some sort of equilibrium. Silly to get into a state. They’d probably just gone off somewhere for a drink. And he was only around for an hour or two. After dinner he’d be gone and that would be that. Surely?

  Her scratching had disturbed some woodlice. Dozens fell to the ground and started scurrying about. One fell on its back and scurried with its legs in the air. Janet turned it over with her thumbnail then looked at her watch. Trixie had been gone for nearly an hour. She could be back at any minute. Might be already.

  Springing up, Janet walked quickly to the edge of the wood and climbed the stile. She let herself into the grounds through the old door that opened into the orchard. As she did so, she was struck by a fierce urgent compulsion that something was wrong. That Trixie needed her. Was crying out for help or comfort. Janet began to run, stumbling across the lawn, tripping on tussocks of grass, using her arms like pistons—elbows tucked in—as if she were in a race.

  As she burst through the gap in the yew hedge, a taxi drew up at the front door and Trixie got out. Calling her name, Janet ran across the gravel to lean, panting, on the bonnet of the car. Trixie appeared quite calm but was pale and clutching at her blouse in a rather odd way.

  ‘Sort out the cab for me would you, Jan?’ She hurried into the house calling over her shoulder: ‘Pay you back.’

  Janet asked the man to wait while she found some money then, after he had driven away, she went upstairs and tapped several times very gently on Trixie’s door. But there was no reply. Eventually Janet gave up and went downstairs to help prepare the birthday dinner.

  Chapter Six

  Utterly transformed, Felicity sat quite still staring into her dressing-room mirror. She and Danton were enclosed inside a black faux marbre horseshoe supported by a cluster of grave-faced caryatids. The surface of this creation was invisible beneath a crust of glittering glass—jars, flasks, bottles—and metal—lipstick cases, aerosols, tins. The images in this small space, so grossly given over to a worship of the vanities, were multiplied a hundred times by the judicious arrangement of mirrored screens set at angles in the walls.

  As his client rose, Danton moved away, hands lifted in a curious Kabukiesque manner. This gesture encompassed both pride and disbelief as if he could barely comprehend the perfection of his art. Felicity’s complexion was drained of all colour but for a pearly pink glow on her cheekbones. Huge eyes were shrouded in violet and silver shadows, her shoulders gleamed and shimmered beneath a wrap of iridescent mussel-shell silk. Lips the colour of rich dark wine were parted in dismay.

  ‘I look like the angel of death.’

  ‘Mrs G…Mrs G…’ What a compliment though, thought Danton. From the first the dress had said to him “think ceremental,” and what an inspiration it had proved to be. ‘You need some more champers.’

  ‘No.’ Felicity shook her head but the heavy mane of ashen curls barely moved. ‘Too much already.’

  ‘A line then.’ Danton always carried an emergency repair kit for his clients.

  Felicity hesitated, ‘I’ve been off it for a bit.’ She watched Danton unscrew a thin tortoiseshell case. ‘Anyway—even if I do by the time I get there—’

  ‘Take it with you.’ Deftly he slipped the box and the glass fistula into her bag. ‘Chances are if you know it’s there, you’ll be OK.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Already Felicity knew she was not going to be anything remotely like ‘OK’. She stared at herself in apprehensive disbelief. How on earth had matters come to such a pass? All she’d done was make a phone call. But from the simple action, plus her decision to take up the invitation, had arisen this capricious and bizarre metamorphosis. She felt she had been ambushed and yet surely there must have been a point at which she could have called a halt? A rejection of the dress perhaps—how wildly unsuitable she now saw it to be. Or the moment when Danton, after studying her newly washed hair from every angle, had finally cried, ‘Cold cinders.’

  But that point had long been passed. In fifteen minutes the car would arrive. A terrible inertia now entrapped her. A pall of fatalism. She seemed to have no will of her own. Having been launched on a journey, she must continue. She saw herself at the dinner table. A spectre at the feast, like Banquo’s ghost. Guy would laugh at her as he did in his sleep. Sylvie would be distressed and ashamed. After it was over Felicity would haste away, cloaked and hooded, cast quite out.

  ‘Fragrance.’ It wasn’t a question. Danton’s fingers hovered in a familiar way about the jewelled stoppers. ‘L‘Egypte.’

  Very apt, thought Felicity. Heady and oppressive. Sealed tombs, dried-up corpses, dank lifeless air. He sprayed lavishly then re-swathed her hair in the misty scarf: ‘I’ll take your case down.’

  She had gone along with the suggestion of an overnight bag and change of clothes, for protesting seemed onerous. But she knew she would not stay and planned to keep the hired car at the door to facilitate her flight.

  Danton returned and stood behind his client. A final touch to the earrings, a rearrangement of a curl. Felicity bowed her head as if for a coup de grâce.

  ‘Don’t look like that Mrs G,’ said Danton. ‘You’ll have a wicked time. Wish I was coming.’ In the street a horn blared. ‘That’ll be us.’ He tucked away his cheque and flourished her velvet cloak like a matador. ‘Ring me the second you get back and tell me all about your marvellous evening. I’ll be in knots till you do.’

  At 6.55 precisely the Corniche drew up once more at the Manor House and Guy pulled once more on the iron rod. He was making no mistakes this time. Sylvie—no Suhami, he must remember this changeling name—had rung Chartwell Grange to say that the Master would see her father at seven o’clock for a brief talk before dinner.

  Guy had been elated at the sound of her voice. He was already longing to see her again, greedy for an opportunity to repair the damage done this afternoon. But softly, softly… He must feel his way along. Be careful not to offend. Keep his opinions to himself. It would be bloody difficult but he would do it because he had found her and she must never be lost again.

  At that moment a pillar of fire came round the corner. Scarlet and orange draperies floated, flared, flickered and flamed. They were encircled by a belt studded with stones like embers. It shimmered to a halt and spoke.

  ‘You’re not wearing indigo.’

  ‘I never wear indigo,’ said Guy. ‘What’s indigo?’

  ‘You should. You’re over-aggressive. Too much red.’

  ‘I never wear red either.’ Guy thought, look who’s talking, and felt some perturbation as if the conversation was already out of control.

  ‘In your aura, man. Positively seething. Plus a hole in it big as a cantaloupe.’

  ‘Is…is there?’

  ‘Etheric leakage is no joke.’ May looked stern as she opened the door. ‘There’s also a lot of murky spots. You’re not a miser by any chance?’

  ‘Certainly not,’ replied Guy peevishly, following her into the hall. How could anyone who had treated himself to a Rolls-Royce Corniche possibly be called miserly?

  ‘Well, I see a grave imbalance, Mr Gamelin. Too much of one activity I suspect. I have no wish to pry. But if you crave worldly success—’

  ‘I have worldly success. I crave nothing.’ Except a daughter. Ah Sylvie—my grave imbalance. My life.

  ‘I’m here to see—’

  ‘I know all about that. I’ll take you. This way please.’ She surged off, with Guy in hot pursuit. They were passing the door behind which he had discovered the mad boy when she spoke again.

  ‘Are you staying over?’

  Guy mumbled something about a hotel.

  ‘Excellent. Tomorrow you must come and choose some bottles and I’ll get you on to a corrective regime.’

  Guy wasn’t at all sure about that. The words ‘colonic irrigation’ sprang to mind. He asked what the consultation might involve.

 
‘I start with the chakras. Give them a good rinse, clear the nadis. Then I try and get in touch with one of the grand Masters. Mine is inestimable. She’s a first chohan of the seventh ray you see.’

  ‘But you have a master here already,’ said Guy, struggling to keep a straight face. ‘Couldn’t we just ask him?’

  He was intrigued by May’s response. She appeared flustered and the rhythm of that splendid stride was momentarily broken.

  ‘Oh—I couldn’t do that. He’s…tired at the moment. Hasn’t been too well.’

  ‘My daughter didn’t mention it.’

  ‘Really?’ May had stopped in front of a carved door. She knocked and waited. Then, apparently answering a response which to Guy was inaudible, she opened the door and said:

  ‘Mr Gamelin is here, Master,’ and ushered him in.

  The impression first received was of a quite large room but Guy quickly realised that this was because the place was nearly empty. It reminded him of a Japanese interior, pale and uncluttered. A negation of a room. There were two cushions on the floor, a screen near the window and a wooden frame over which stretched a piece of silk dyed in fabulous bird-of-paradise colours.

  A man arose from one of the cushions in an enviously supple way and came forward to greet him. Guy looked into eyes so compelling that it was a moment before he noticed any other details of the man’s appearance. When he did so, he was immediately comforted. Long white hair, blue robe, sandalled feet—a pathetically transparent straining for spiritual effect. A drawing by a hack artist. Astroth: Master of the Universe. Guy shook hands forcefully and grinned.

  Invited to sit, he lowered himself with some difficulty on to a cushion, remaining bolt upright, hands flat on the floor behind him, legs sticking straight out. He regretted the discomfort whilst appreciating the strategy. Craigie obviously had more orthodox seating (no one lived in a shell this bare), but had deliberately removed it to place his audience at a disadvantage. A fakir’s version of the ‘look who’s in the highest chair’ manoeuvre. It’ll take more than that, Craigie. Guy looked with a fierce and challenging encouragement, mano-amano, at his companion, who smiled faintly in return but did not speak.

  The silence lengthened. When it began, Guy was restless—his mind, as always, furiously thrusting and parrying, plotting the destruction of opposing hordes but then, as the seconds and then the minutes slid by, all his whirling aggravation became first muted and then displaced. He could still hear his bombastic inner voice but faintly, like the sounds of battle beyond distant hills.

  Guy was not usually at ease with silence. He liked what he called ‘a bit of life,’ by which he meant a bit of noise. But now the quiet was affecting him strangely. He seemed to be settling into it as into a huge, consoling embrace. He was tempted to let go. To rest safely. A burden seemed to have been lifted from his back and all motion stalled. He felt that he should comment on this extraordinary state of affairs, but the language needed to express such sentiments seemed to be unavailable, so he continued to sit. There seemed to be no hurry for anything and he no longer felt uncomfortable.

  The room was filled with light from the setting sun and the strip of silk caught fire. As Guy stared at it, the zinging colours developed in intensity—glowing to such an extent that they seemed almost to be alive and pulsing with energy. He found it impossible to take his eyes off this luminous transformation and began to wonder if he was being hypnotised. And then the other man spoke.

  ‘I’m so glad that you could come and visit us.’

  Guy collected himself, attempted to ball up the soft spread of his attention. It wasn’t easy. ‘The gratitude is mine. For your kindness to my daughter.’

  ‘She’s a delightful girl. We are all extremely fond of Suhami.’

  ‘I was very worried when she disappeared.’ Rule One. Never acknowledge a weakness. ‘Not that we were close.’ Rule Two. Or admit failure.

  What was wrong with him? This was the adversary. The father figure that Sylvie thought the world of. Guy struggled to reactivate his previous sensations of jealousy and revenge. Without them he felt naked. He stared into the brilliant blue eyes and calm expressionless face. The flesh had fallen in at the side of the nose. It was sharp and pointed, an old man’s nose. Hold fast to that. He’s decrepit. One foot in the grave. But what about that jaw? A soldier’s jaw. A soldier’s jaw in a monk’s face. What was being signalled here? Guy felt completely at a loss.

  ‘Even in the closest of families young people must break away. It is always painful.’

  There was something about Craigie’s presence, perhaps the deep concentration of his attention, that demanded a response. Guy said, ‘Pain is putting it mildly.’

  ‘These rifts can be healed.’

  ‘D’you think so? Do you really think that’s possible?’ Guy leaned forwards, hands clasped. And started to talk. Streams of resentful reminiscence poured from his lips. Torrents of remorse. Floods of self-justification. On and on it went, seemingly without end. Guy heard it all with feelings of incredulous disgust. Such loathsome black fecundity. And yet—the ease with which it flowed! As if it had been waiting all these years in a pounce posture on the back of his tongue.

  When finally it was over he was exhausted. He looked across at Craigie who was looking down at his hands. Guy tried to read the other man’s expression which struck him as one of concerned detachment, but this could surely not be the case. You could be one or the other but not both. And certainly not both at once. Guy sat for several moments more until the longing to evoke some sort of response became too much for him. He struggled to gather his wits then added a vindicative coda.

  ‘I gave her everything.’

  Ian Craigie nodded sympathetically. ‘That’s understandable. But of course it doesn’t work.’

  ‘Can’t buy love you mean? That’s for sure. Otherwise there’d be no lonely millionaires.’

  ‘My point is that ultimately things cannot satisfy, Mr Gamelin. They have no life you see.’

  ‘Ah.’ Guy did not see. Surely things, acquisitions to display and use, were what it was all about. How else did people know what sort of man you were? And surely on the most basic level one needed a house, food, warmth and clothing. He said as much.

  ‘Of course this is true. But there is a fourth great need which we ignore at our peril. And that’s the need for intoxication.’ He smiled, correctly interpreting Guy’s translation of the word. ‘I refer to emotional and spiritual intoxication. We see it at the games sometimes. Hear it in music…’

  ‘I understand that.’ Guy recalled the crowding glass canyons of the city. The dramatic rites of passage. Smoke-filled boardrooms; daggers noiselessly drawn. That was bloody intoxicating if you like. ‘But I don’t see how, here…’ He gave an all-inclusive wave.

  ‘Here we are in love with prayer. And the pursuit of goodness.’

  A disturbing hint of irony. Guy disliked irony, seeing it as a weapon needed only by the smart-arsed weakling. ‘You sound as if you don’t take it seriously.’

  ‘I take the quest very seriously. But people, no. At least only rarely.’

  Guy felt suddenly cold as if a source of comfort had been capriciously withdrawn. Had the warmth, then, the understanding that he was pouring out his sorrow to an empathetic and receptive intelligence been no more than an illusion? Guy felt aggrieved. Cheated even. ‘The pursuit of goodness? I don’t quite understand.’

  ‘No. Abstract nouns are always difficult. And dangerous. I suppose the plainest way to put it is that once the idea that such a thing truly exists…that it is perhaps available and we can experience it—once that idea has pricked you, it never afterwards leaves you quite alone.’

  Guy thought of his all-consuming love and understood completely.

  ‘We spend most of our time here falling by the wayside of course, like everyone else.’

  ‘And is this…pursuit what Sylvie wants, do you think?’

  ‘She believes so at the moment. Her meditations have brought
her a measure of content. But she is very young. We try on many masks throughout our lives. Eventually we find one that fits so well we never take it off.’

  ‘I’ve never worn a mask.’

  ‘You think not?’ There was a rap on the door. He called out: ‘A few minutes May,’ and turned back to Guy. ‘We haven’t even touched on the problem of your daughter’s inheritance, which was one of the principal reasons that I asked you down.’

  ‘The McFadden bequest? Not with you, Craigie.’

  ‘She wants to give it all to the community.’

  Guy gave a strangled groan and the Master leaned forward anxiously. ‘Are you all right Mr Gamelin?’

  Guy lifted his face. It was stamped with an expression of stupefied dismay. His jaws gaped. The Master surveyed this pitiable spectacle then smiled, but without parting his lips. These were firmly clamped together. After a few moments he spoke again.

  ‘Please don’t distress yourself. The money will not be accepted. At least not at the moment. Your daughter is overly grateful for our affection, as children are who have not known love. Also the bequest reminds her of past unhappiness which is why she is determined to offload it, if not on us, elsewhere.’ Guy became pale, even his port-wine nose blanched.

  ‘This vulnerability is what I hoped to talk about with you. I wondered if some procedure could not be opened whereby I can appear to accept it but actually make some arrangements for it to be securely held, perhaps for at least another year. She may of course still wish to dispose of it but my experience,’ the irony was plainer now, ‘leads me to the belief that she will not.’ The rap came again. May put her lips to the door frame. ‘Master—we’re awaiting dinner.’