6.
A form of consciousness returned with a slap to my face, the muffled screams of the woman beside me, a bowler-hatted head thrusting into view and growling, “The shower for you, you damned idiot.” As a second assailant whisked her away, the woman, whom I thought to be Marguerite, wailed. I struggled against the man gripping my shoulders, and he squeezed the nape of my neck.
When next I opened my eyes, I was naked and quivering beneath an onslaught of cold water within the marble confines of my shower cabinet. Charlie-Charlie Rackett leaned against the open door of the cabinet and regarded me with ill-disguised impatience. “I’m freezing, Charlie-Charlie,” I said. “Turn off the water.”
Charlie-Charlie thrust an arm into the cabinet and became Mr. Clubb. “I’ll warm it up, but I want you sober,” he said. I drew myself up into a ball.
Then I was on my feet and moaning while I massaged my forehead. “Bath time all done now,” called Mr. Clubb. “Turn off the wa-wa.” I did as instructed. The door opened, and a bath towel unfurled over my left shoulder.
Side by side on the bedroom sofa dimly illuminated by the lamp, Mr. Clubb and Mr. Cuff observed my progress toward the bed. A black leather satchel stood on the floor between them. “Gentlemen,” I said, “although I cannot presently find words to account for the condition in which you found me, I trust that your good nature will enable you to overlook… or ignore… whatever it was that I must have done… I cannot quite recall the circumstances.”
“The young woman has been sent away,” said Mr. Clubb, “and you need never fear any trouble from that direction, sir.”
“The young woman?” I asked, and remembered a hyperactive figure playing with the controls in the back of the limousine. This opened up a fragmentary memory of the scene in Gilligan’s office, and I moaned aloud.
“None too clean, but pretty enough in a ragamuffin way,” said Mr. Clubb. “The type denied a proper education in social graces. Rough about the edges. Intemperate in language. A stranger to discipline.”
I groaned-to have introduced such a creature to my house!
“A stranger to honesty, too, sir, if you’ll permit me,” said Mr. Cuff. “It’s addiction turns them into thieves. Give them half a chance, they’ll steal the brass handles off their mothers’ coffins.”
“Addiction?” I said. “Addiction to what?”
“Everything, from the look of the bint,” said Mr. Cuff. “Before Mr. Clubb and I sent her on her way, we retrieved these items doubtless belonging to you, sir.” While walking toward me he removed from his pockets the following articles: my wristwatch, gold cuff links, wallet, the lighter of antique design given me by
Mr. Montfort d’M____________________, likewise the cigar cutter, and the last of the cigars I had purchased that day. “I thank you most gratefully,” I said, slipping the watch on my wrist and all else save the cigar into the pockets of my robe. It was, I noted, just past four o’clock in the morning. The cigar I handed back to him with the words “Please accept this as a token of my gratitude.”
“Gratefully accepted,” he said. Mr. Cuff bit off the end, spat it onto the carpet, and set the cigar alight, producing a nauseating quantity of fumes.
“Perhaps,” I said, “we might postpone our discussion until I have had time to recover from my ill-advised behaviour. Let us reconvene at…” A short period was spent pressing my hands to my eyes while rocking back and forth. “Four this afternoon?”
“Everything in its own time is a principle we hold dear,” said Mr. Clubb. “And this is the time for you to down aspirin and Alka-Seltzer, and for your loyal assistants to relish the hearty breakfasts the thought of which sets our stomachs to growling. A man of stature and accomplishment like yourself ought to be able to overcome the effects of too much booze and attend to business, on top of the simple matter of getting his flunkies out of bed so they can whip up the bacon and eggs.”
“Because a man such as that, sir, keeps ever in mind that business faces the task at hand, no matter how lousy it may be,” said Mr. Cuff.
“The old world is in flames,” said Mr. Clubb, “and the new one is just being born. Pick up the phone.”
“All right,” I said, “but Mr. Moncrieff is going to hate this. He worked for the duke of Denbigh, and he’s a terrible snob.”
“All butlers are snobs,” said Mr. Clubb. “Three fried eggs apiece, likewise six rashers of bacon, home fries, toast, hot coffee, and for the sake of digestion a bottle of your best cognac.”
Mr. Moncrieff picked up his telephone, listened to my orders, and informed me in a small, cold voice that he would speak to the cook. “Would this repast be for the young lady and yourself, sir?” he asked.
With a wave of guilty shame which intensified my nausea, I realised that Mr. Moncrieff had observed my unsuitable young companion accompanying me upstairs to the bedroom. “No, it would not,” I said. “The young lady, a client of mine, was kind enough to assist me when I was taken ill. The meal is for two male guests.” Unwelcome memory returned the spectacle of a scrawny girl pulling my ears and screeching that a useless old fart like me didn’t deserve her band’s business.
“The phone,” said Mr. Clubb. Dazedly I extended the receiver.
“Moncrieff, old man,” he said, “amazing good luck, running into you again. Do you remember that trouble the duke had with Colonel Fletcher and the diary?… Yes, this is Mr. Clubb, and it’s delightful to hear your voice again… He’s here, too, couldn’t do anything without him… I’ll tell him… Much the way things went with the duke, yes, and we’ll need the usual supplies… Glad to hear it… The dining room in half an hour.” He handed the telephone back to me and said to Mr. Cuff, “He’s looking forward to the pinochle, and there’s a first-rate Pétrus in the cellar he knows you’re going to enjoy.”
I had purchased six cases of 1928 Château Pétrus at an auction some years before and was holding it while its already immense value doubled, then tripled, until perhaps a decade hence, when I would sell it for ten times its original cost.
“A good drop of wine sets a man right up,” said Mr. Cuff. “Stuff was meant to be drunk, wasn’t it?”
“You know Mr. Moncrieff?” I asked. “You worked for the duke?”
“We ply our humble trade irrespective of nationality and borders,” said Mr. Clubb. “Go where we are needed, is our motto. We have fond memories of the good old duke, who showed himself to be quite a fun-loving, spirited fellow, sir, once you got past the crust, as it were. Generous too.”
“He gave until it hurt,” said Mr. Cuff. “The old gentleman cried like a baby when we left.”
“Cried a good deal before that too,” said Mr. Clubb. “In our experience, high-spirited fellows spend a deal more tears than your gloomy customers.”
“I do not suppose you shall see any tears from me,” I said. The brief look which passed between them reminded me of the complicitous glance I had once seen fly like a live spark between two of their New Covenant forebears, one gripping the hind legs of a pig, the other its front legs and a knife, in the moment before the knife opened the pig’s throat and an arc of blood threw itself high into the air. “I shall heed your advice,” I said, “and locate my analgesics.” I got on my feet and moved slowly to the bathroom. “As a matter of curiosity,” I said, “might I ask if you have classified me into the high-spirited category, or into the other?”
“You are a man of middling spirit,” said Mr. Clubb. I opened my mouth to protest, and he went on. “But something may be made of you yet.”
I disappeared into the bathroom. I have endured these moonfaced yokels long enough, I told myself, hear their story, feed the bastards, then kick them out.