by Nyla Nox
The House of Velvet is yet another diversification in our wide spread portfolio and another one of the many profitable enterprises that have left us with our current embarrassment of riches.
Mrs Mackenzie has served me in various capacities over many years and knows exactly what I demand of her. Which includes that she, like all my lieutenants, resolve as many problems herself as she can.
So when she curtsies at the door, shaking the abundant locks of her expensive black wig (in spite of her age she insists on maintaining the luscious appearance that made her such an asset at the House of Velvet during her time of active service here), and extends the silver plate to me, I set the fine French wine back on the table and take that which is proffered.
It is a hastily sealed note without the name of a recipient on it – unless you count the large M sprawled all over the outside, executed in what is unmistakably an accountant’s hand, and one educated in this country.
I must hasten to add that it is exceedingly difficult to connect the House of Velvet, like all my other operations, back to me, a fact that even the ridiculous amateur detective has had to acknowledge numerous times. So it is not without a certain amount of reluctant admiration that I acknowledge the power and knowledge that is intimated by that large letter M as I carefully open the note.
Not that there is any danger to my person. This note would have been examined several times by those whose job it is to protect me.
Strange as it may seem, the contents of the letter make me smile. As the telephone rings again, I nod to Mrs Mackenzie to ignore the machine. This is something I will investigate myself.
***
The man who wrote the note with the big M on it was, I am certain, intimately and unobtrusively observed even before he entered our premises but his visit would have been entirely confidential. Mrs Mackenzie’s sumptuously decorated heart holds many secrets.
(Indeed I heard later that he chose our establishment not least because he felt he could be ensured of his personal safety from what he considered, at that time, his biggest threat: a group of militant pacifists who reportedly attempt to follow him wherever he goes.)
But now I give the word, and in a few moments we are rushing down the service stairs and then along the famous House of Velvet corridors, equipped with the thickest of carpets and drapes so that no sound can disturb those engaged in their velvety practices inside the rooms.
Finally, a tiny door is opened and we slip inside.
The House of Velvet, although as inconspicuous from the outside as money can make it, is, on the inside, luxuriously appointed to stimulate all the senses. Every room is designed to appeal to a different taste, but all are equal in lusciousness.
The room we have entered is in stark contrast to all this. It is unfurnished and so narrow that only the very slim can fit their frames into it with any degree of comfort. But comfort is not the main purpose here.
Unbeknownst to our clients, all the private rooms are separated by such slim and small passages and each of them is only equipped with one significant tool: the time honoured device of a small hole in the wall (two to a passage) and a subsequent tiny opening in the heavily damasked draperies inside the other room. The House of Velvet takes its reputation very seriously – and it has never been betrayed.
Mrs MacKenzie unlocks the chamber and we silently slink inside. I personally address myself to the view port in question.
I am obliged to stoop to bring my eye to the level of the hole – it was fitted to the size of our employees. But what I see makes it all very much worthwhile.
On the other side of the eyehole, in a suite with scarlet walls and elaborate dark violet decorations growing out of the upholstery like the flowers of evil, I behold the current client.
Well, I behold what I can see of him right now – which is his mighty backside.
A vast expanse of pale and soft skin, which makes the coarse black hairs sprouting around a certain unspeakable area stand out all the more.
The great man’s bottom is moving vigorously back and forth, more vigorously perhaps than those who only know him in his official capacity would have give him credit for. Accompanying this impressive physical feat is a deep, startling sound – perhaps the sound that a viewer would imagine when watching motion pictures of a rhinoceros charging across the great African savannah.
Mrs Mackenzie expresses concern about the continued wellbeing of the highly skilled employee buried somewhere underneath the famous banker (for it is of course him!) while I am more alarmed at the potential damage to the well built and expensive four poster bed that is now starting to contribute to the concert with a high pitched jingle.
I need not have worried. Both bed and girl are properties of quality and survive the encounter unharmed, but not before the illustrious chairman has tested their strength and endurance to the utmost, which takes a surprisingly long time, at least according to Mrs MacKenzie and her girls. I can not but be impressed with the sheer physical stamina of a physique that is so unappealing to behold.
By then I have long retreated to my own rooms at the top of the establishment and called upon my other lieutenants to expedite the next stage of our plan. As always, I retreat there alone. I take great care never to come into intimate contact with our employees. It is not good for my health and neither is it for theirs.
An unobtrusive little package is delivered which, upon inspection, demonstrates young Spencer’s artistry at its finest yet.
Well, a courteous note such as the one the Other Mr M sent me, deserves a courtesy in return.
I, likewise, fold a large sheet of paper and decorate the outside with a well formed letter. The same letter, of course. Inside I place the item that was delivered to me
At the appropriate moment, the small package is delivered to our indefatigable employee inside the room with those black rimmed flowers. She gracefully hands it to him.
Mrs MacKenzie, who is now manning the eyehole alone, reports much outrage and snorting of the rhinoceros kind.
The eminent banker apparently calls my message an offence to humanity. Well, we shall see.
And it is but a short time after he leaves the House of Velvet until the telephone rings again. It appears that the Other Mr M, although scandalised, has nevertheless understood my message very well and as a consequence I have become visible to him. Yes, the great man will now be pleased to make my acquaintance, and he will comply with my conditions.
It is also clear now why negotiations stalled before – the time he spent in the House of Velvet accounts for that. Ironically, he chose this exact time (and perhaps the fact that he was unobserved even by his closest advisers at the bank?) to send me his note.
Which just confirms that, in any business, it is always best to go directly to the top even if , in this case, the top may turn out to be a very hairy bottom.
And now, finally, I will no longer ride on the tailcoats of history.
I really do hope Emmeline gets her chocolate.
***
I awake the next morning with great gusto.
Before I make my way to the location, I just need to look after one small point of business and then…
The item inside my note, the item that moved the large mountain of the Other Mr M’s presence towards me was a small square of canvas, representing a cut from the picture that he had so fortuitously acquired and then so unaccountably lost yesterday.
I was correct in assuming that Mr M would respond it in the way others might react to the severed finger of an abducted relative. (Not that all relatives are solicitous that way, in the course of earlier business ventures I did encounter a few who never responded at all…)
I was also correct in predicting that he would, after consulting the very best experts, sworn to secrecy, realise that this little square of canvas was not vandalised from the original but part of the highly artistic homage superbly executed by our Fine Arts Department, and young Spencer in part
icular.
I must confess I am quite looking forward to the encounter.
It is a mystery to me why secret meetings are always supposed to happen in the dark. Surely the whole purpose of personal meetings is to illuminate the participants, to each other.
Another idea persistent in the .public mind seems to be that meetings involving the kind of unconventional business I am associated with tend to happen in derelict buildings, dirty, rainy streets or – who knows why – graveyards.
Graveyards are of no interest to me. They house those who are no longer able to provide me with profit. In addition they also tend to be unsavoury places, perilous to health and wellbeing. And if there is anything an unconventional businessman does not need it is additional perils to my health and wellbeing.
I have no means of knowing whether the Other Mr M would have consented to a meeting in a graveyard or derelict warehouse. Perhaps it would have a held a certain frisson to him after his sumptuous study, all clad in red Chinese silk, Pre-Raphaelites hanging on the walls, but I doubt that he would sacrifice business interests to a passing frisson.
The best place is of course the least expected, and least obvious. And where is the last place you would expect to encounter a Napoleon (of crime or otherwise)? Not on the battlefield nor in a palace, not on horseback (I detest horses and was among the first in Britain to purchase and maintain a fleet of automobiles – besides I have no need to try to appear taller) and not on a boat, ruling the waves.
Interestingly, the place I chose will afford both Mr M and myself the opportunity to blend in.
***
I find that a little exertion in the bedroom always clears my mind.
And the lady who exerts herself with me this noon time in an elegant bedroom, on a modern, well balanced bed, is well versed in the skills I have come to expect.
No doubt some women are beautiful, which I suppose means that they resemble the shapes represented in paintings. I have no interest in beauty. What I seek in the bedroom is not an art gallery. To me, it is all about the act itself, or acts, to be precise. A bedroom encounter with but a single act committed would hardly be worth the effort. All I ask is a certain equity of engagement. Which is why I now insist on ladies of at least a certain minimum age.
The lady I am possessing right now in the most intimate way also has another important asset. She is the owner (at least on paper) of a rather charming, and very secure, garden house set inside the grounds of an extensive and very comfortable residence that looks deceptively modest from the street.
For isn’t the location you would least expect to encounter a Napoleon a suburban garden, particularly at tea time? The tea, it goes without saying, being provided by a certain affiliated company that happens to be very much in my debt…
Today we are a little pressed for time, I admit, and so, with an eye on the clock, I must ask the lady to withdraw to her quarters and leave me to my toilette.
Fresh underwear has already been laid out and I can hear the maid in the adjoining dressing room, clanging water basins. When I was younger, I would have pounced on the maid, too, and it would not have mattered a jot what her age or appearance was. But now I am more focused on the meeting ahead.
As I get dressed, I bless the invention of modern underwear, the fashionable roomy, cool silk pants that barely go down to the knee, thoughtfully provided by the lady of the house who is an expert in matters of fashion. Like exertion of the intimate kind, physical comfort also increases the ability to think.
***
The flowers I can see through the bay window are large and colourful. They should be, considering the amount of money we spend on upkeep. I do know from my late mother that gardens are very deceptive, pretty on the surface, but in truth battlegrounds of ruthless selection and execution.
Like the House of Velvet, this house, too, is a house of business. But unlike the House of Velvet, the business of this house is the business of respectability. The lady of the house does sometimes receive male visitors, but never without female company, and she has a female companion living with her, a woman who excels at invisibility. Each to their skills…
The Other Mr M, I hear, was a little taken aback at the location I chose for our encounter and even more so by the request to include a respectable middle aged lady among his retinue, something that is apparently not customary in circles of High Finance. But he acceded. And now, an automobile with a driver has drawn up opposite our venue.
Two well-muscled gentlemen, dressed very unconvincingly as banking clerks, descend from it. One of them extends his arm inside the car and, yes, a middle aged, respectable looking lady follows him. All is well. I would not like this house to become unusable by acquiring even the slightest hint of ill report.
The second over-muscled ‘clerk’ discreetly scouts the area around the garden entrance and assorted bushes, presumably against the presence of those dangerous pacifists. Needless to say, he comes up short. We have no pacifists in this street.
And then it’s him. The Other Mr M slowly descends from the vehicle and crosses the affluent suburban road, looking straight ahead into the future.
I withdraw into the garden room at the back, outfitted in dark leather by my good lady’s late husband who used it as some kind of manly refuge, to await the great man’s arrival.
***
I hear a swell of voices at the other end of the long corridor. Then footsteps, firm and heavy. Only one set. He comes alone.
Then the footsteps stop. Abruptly.
I open the door to a suited back and a brief snort.
‘Mr M, I presume’, I say in a quiet voice which nevertheless has my visitor swivel around on his well shod heels.
He looks from me towards the painting that hangs on the wall opposite the door and has been hanging there since early this morning. It is a painting that shows, in extravagant colour and with a wild amount of artistic licence, a garden that is worth a huge amount of money. Or would be if there wasn’t, at the bottom, a small square cut out of the lavish flower paradise, thus ruining everything.
I clearly have been able to surprise him. Good. I don’t know how many advantages I will need in the upcoming negotiations.
The Other Mr M reaches into the pocket of his pants and produces the matching missile I sent him last night.
He tears it up in front of my eyes.
‘Let’s get real, Mr Moriarty’, he says. ‘I am not here for my pleasure.’
‘But the pleasure is very much mine’, I retort, and invite him inside with a polite bow.
It is always an interesting experience to meet, face to face, a man of whom one has only previously see the unclothed posterior.
I must admit that for a moment I was concerned that this unclothed posterior would perhaps turn out to be the better looking of the two, having been well apprised of the way his late father, the Robber Baron, used to conceal his huge, disfigured nose in all known pictures. But no. The Other Mr M, Junior, though not so Junior in age, looks only as commonly unattractive as befits his line of work and status in society.
He is portly though very well dressed indeed, and has a skull shape more usually associated with the farm labourer than with his squire, but his eyes are very sharp, darting all around the room.
‘Mr M’, I say, advancing towards him with outstretched hand, ‘welcome to my garden hut.’
He extends his hand, too, and shakes mine vigorously. The tiny hesitation I notice in his eyes just before the consummation of physical contact is that of a man who reminds himself that in the interest of business he is prepared to shake hands with anyone, even the devil himself. Of course his line of business avails him a wide circle of potential hand shakers, including the president of his own country.
‘Mr Moriarty’, he says, ‘since you went to such lengths to get me here, let us skip the preliminaries. I know that you have what I want. What is it that you want from me? A ransom?’
&n
bsp; His voice comes as a bit of a shock. I am not used to the accent.
But then, again, that could work to my advantage. Mr M is out of place in this very English garden.
I invite him to sit with me in one of the deep armchairs that have been placed at an angle to the table, overlooking the garden.
The two tea cups are already filled, the liquid just at the right temperature. The tea pot promises more. It is also invisibly heated from underneath by a new contraption that will be sold, very much to the exclusion of its inventor, on the market, in a few months’ time.
Mr M pours his substantial weight into the seat and leans forward to look me straight in the eye.
He hasn’t spared a single look for the view.
‘Milk?’ I say.
‘And three sugars’, he answers.
I delicately pick up the tongs and slide them gently into his cup, taking care not to disturb the placid surface.
He lifts the cup, correctly, by its handle, keeping all four fingers rounded. His nose, inherited, like his vast fortune, from his father the robber baron (but in a much more palatable version), flares only slightly as he takes in the scent of the tea.
His skull may be that of a lumber jack and his posture that of the proverbial American adventurer but his upbringing owes much a well-bred mother.
He takes a polite sip, and looks at me over the rim. His bushy eyebrows make a strange contrast to the exquisite porcelain.
‘Mr M’, I say, ‘I, too, would have preferred a meeting preceded without so much unnecessary drama. I asked you here because I believe I am the answer to your current business predicament.’
‘Is that so’, he says, leaning back.
‘Yes’, I say. ‘Mr M, I believe we both have what the other wants.’
He folds his arms in the approved manner and stares at me.
I don’t stare back. On the contrary, I politely let my gaze travel around the room until it settles on my cup.
‘I believe that you are looking to make certain investments, Mr M’, I say, in a light conversational tone, ‘in the field of, shall we say, the technologies of conflict. And I have at my disposal a source of finance that is as vast as it is hitherto untapped.’
