She shook her head slowly. “I’d just feel guilty about it later.” she said. “That would give me a excuse to come back and apologize again, of course, so that I could have another go...but you’re right. This isn’t the sort of thing I should be doing on a Sunday morning, stone cold sober. I’m sorry I asked about Lissa Lo. We’d be better off discussing Stevie’s transfer prospects. How much is he worth now, do you think? Five million? Ten?”
“He would be, if his contract with Milan had longer to run,” Canny said. “He seems to be close to his peak, so he’s probably got five or six more years at the top if he can stay injury-free, and a few years after that while he’ll still be an asset in the premiership. Given that he’ll be a free agent next season, though, I figure that he’s affordable—his agent’s probably trying to involve half a dozen clubs in the auction.”
“Shit,” she said. “I didn’t really mean that we should talk about football—and cricket’s out too. What about Cockayne? Any new broom-type plans for the village? The Mill? Strictly between us, honest.”
“Afraid not,” he said. “It doesn’t seem to be broke so I ain’t planning to fix it. Maurice Rawtenstall and the unit managers are doing a first rate job, so far as I can tell, and the village elders are doing their best.” They had reached the top of the ridge by now and were heading northwards. The Roman Ridge was visible in the west, on the far side of the Crede, while the terrain to the east undulated gently in the direction of Cock Beck.
“Does that mean you can go right back to being a playboy as soon as the traditional decent interval has elapsed?” Alice asked.
“I’m afraid not. Just because everything’s running smoothly doesn’t mean that I can duck out of it. I have a part to play, even if I don’t intend to rewrite it. I’m a cog in the big wheel now—no more early morning roulette for me.”
“And no more girls laid end-to-end all the way from Nice to Monte Carlo?”
“No,” Canny said, shortly.
“Laying them all the way from Tadcaster to Garforth doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, I suppose. Less comfortable too, given all the bumps and hollows—and the ground’s not very even either.”
“Mummy wants me to settle down,” Canny said. “It was Daddy’s dying wish, too. I guess it goes with all the other estate duties. You do know that it’s all nonsense, don’t you? I’m a gambler, not a womanizer. If they really say that about me in the village, it’s just fevered imagination.”
“You don’t have to make excuses to me. Has your mother got a likely gel lined up for you? She seemed to have a fair crop of cousins and nieces at the funeral—quite a contrast with the Kilcannon side of the family.”
“She made an effort, but I don’t think her heart’s in it. She’s probably delegated the job to Bentley, who’ll probably put his plans into action as soon as Bob Stanley’s completed background checks on all the likely candidates.”
“Who’s Bob Stanley?”
“An inquiry agent in Leeds. Daddy used him all the time.”
The Kilcannons have their own private detective?”
“Of course. No one in business can do without one nowadays. I blame the Internet myself. He’s not just ours, though—he’s Robert Stanley and Associates nowadays. I could put in a word if you need a job. It’s perfect for a historian—all trawling through archives, except for the occasional stake-out.”
“Is he looking into your mugging?”
“No, that’s over and done with. Storm in a teacup. Case closed.”
“Come on, Canny—you’re not trying. If things are really that boring, make something up. How much did the mugger get?”
“About thirty grand. It wasn’t really my money, though—I’d just won it at the casino. I hadn’t got used to thinking of it as mine, so it didn’t seem like a terrible loss. Anyway, I think the inside man at the casino who tipped the gunman off is dead now. The local heavy mob are very careful of their house percentage—they don’t like foreigners operating scams on their turf.”
“Foreigners?”
“Eastern Europeans, or so it’s rumored.”
“So you hired a French hit man instead of getting your friendly neighborhood inquiry agent to investigate?”
“I didn’t hire anybody. I really wasn’t that bothered—but I thought I ought to tell the casino manager that he had a rotten apple in his barrel. He didn’t hire anybody either. He didn’t have to. Nobody likes the Russian mafia—and if it was the Uzbekistani mafia, that would be adding insult to injury.”
“No,” Alice retorted, abruptly losing the mood she was trying so hard to sustain. “Two teenagers from Chapeltown with a fucking crowbar is adding insult to injury. Compared with that, the humblest tea-boy in the Uzbekistani mafia is Professor fucking Moriarty, the Napoleon of crime.”
“Sorry,” Canny said. “I talked my way round in a circle.”
“No you didn’t—I did. If you’re lying. by the way, and you’ve got the hit man’s number, let me know...and don’t tell me I can’t afford him. Martin was insured, and we never got around to producing the dependants it was supposed to be protecting. Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Canny said. “But a hit man isn’t the answer. I don’t know what is, but it’s not that. I don’t think there is an answer, except to keep going through until you come out the other side. And cursing, of course.”
“You don’t seem to be doing any cursing. I’ve never heard you say anything worse than shit.”
“Well, as you pointed out yesterday, I only lost an aged father, as expected. What happened to you is intrinsically more curseworthy. Will you still move back to Cockayne, do you think?”
“There’s no point in staying in Leeds, is there? I hadn’t even got round to finding a job, or even thinking about one. Staying home to write a history of Cockayne took it for granted that Martin would be bringing in a salary. On the other hand, I’m hardly going to qualify for a place of my own, am I? The thought of moving back in with Mum and Dad on a permanent basis...I thought I was past that. I thought I’d moved on, spread my wings, become the owner of my own destiny. Silly me.”
“The elders are breaking some of the bigger houses into flats when they fall vacant,” Canny told her. “Cockayne may be stuck in the nineteenth century, but it has twenty-first century demographics. A place of your own wouldn’t be out of the question, by any means—and a job shouldn’t be too had to find either. The Mill always needs new blood.”
“Not the blood of historians. I guess I could answer to haddock and chips twice, but Ellen wouldn’t want her smart-mouthed little sister in the shop, showing her up. My Mum’s idea of seeing me settled, of course, would be the same as your Mum’s. If Lissa Lo hadn’t broken your heart we could probably kill two birds with one ring, but I can’t live with competition like that. Not without plastic surgery and a personality transplant.”
“Don’t go fishing for compliments, Alice,” Canny said. “They’re far nicer when they’re spontaneous. Besides which, given my extreme ugliness and lack of athleticism, you’re probably much more comfortable with my studied indifference.”
“That’s true,” she countered, calmly. “We ought to be turning round, I suppose, or we’ll be bumping into the A64—the ridge runs out in a couple of hundred yards. Do you know, I haven’t been up here for years. Were there more sheep around when I was a kid, or have I just sugar-coated the memory?”
They both stopped as she spoke, and turned back in their tracks. “No,” Canny said. “There really were more sheep. We ran down the flocks in the nineties—not commercially viable in the modern meat trade. We were lucky in the foot-and-mouth epidemic, though. It passed us by, and the stud-value of our rams rocketed afterwards. The farm-manager reckons that we ought to re-think the whole operation. Import some rare breeds, start a proper conservation program. Mind you, it’s only five years ago that he wanted us to get into transgenics and cloning.”
“It all seems quite serene now we’re looking at it backwards,” sh
e said—meaning the Great Skull. “When we get back to the brow, it’ll be just a few black rocks jutting through the turf, with no shape at all. Pity about the house, though—doesn’t matter what angle you look at it from, it’s gargoyles all around.”
“It may be mock-Gothic,” Canny said, “but it’s mock-Yorkshire Gothic. In a thousand years time it’ll be one of the seven wonders of the county, along with the Grand Hotel in Scarborough and our half of the Humber Bridge.”
“Not to mention the wind farm on Wuthering Heights,” Alice said. “You know, Canny, even for a lord of the manor and recently-reformed playboy, you’re a seriously weird person.”
“That’s it,” he said. “Pile on the insults. I’m the universe, remember. You have one hell of a grudge to pay back.”
“It was a compliment,” she told him. “A spontaneous one—the nicest kind.”
“I knew that,” he admitted. “But I was hoping that you wouldn’t point it out, so that when I got around go telling you how impressed I am with the way you’re handling all this, I could pretend to be exercising extraordinary generosity.”
“I’m not doing it to impress you,” she said, sharply. “I’m just doing the best I can.”
“I know,” he said. “I really do understand. Isn’t that a police car heading for the village? Your family liaison officer, do you think?”
“Could be,” she agreed. “Shit—if Mum rings your house and the creepy butler tells her we’re out walking on the ridge, our Ellen will...no, actually, she won’t. She’ll make allowances. And she thinks you’re a saint, even if she’s the only person in the village who does.”
“She’s right,” Canny said.
“I know. Better hurry anyway, though. There might be news—I’ll just have to take the risk of being in time for church. I hope you find the book interesting, Canny—you’re probably the only reader it’s ever going to have. If you’re as much of an expert as you pretend, you could finish it for him. Monument to his genius, etc. If you’re not too busy being a big cog in a little wheel.”
“I’ll think about it,” Canny promised, insincerely.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Canny had to go to London the following day, but he drove into Leeds first to collect Bob Stanley’s report on Lissa Lo and her ancestry.
“It was easier than I expected,” Stanley reported, as he passed over a remarkably bulky file. “Her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother all married relatively high-profile guys, and several journalists in search of background took the trouble to follow the paper trail back to the nineteenth century—including a number of highly efficient Japanese and Singaporean researchers. Let me know if you need more.”
“I will,” Canny said. “Thanks, Bob. Send me the bill and I’ll settle up.”
“Not the kind of work your father used to ask for,” the detective observed.
“Not exactly,” Canny agreed, “but it demands the same kind of discretion. Must rush—got to drive to London and the M1 will be hell, at least until junction 32.”
This prophecy proved, alas, to be all-too-accurate—and the traffic built up again as he approached the M25, with the result that he was running late all day. He had no opportunity to study the file until the day’s business was belatedly concluded, at which point he was finally able to retire to the flat. The last phase of his day’s journey was the slowest of all, even though rush hour was long past. The flat was located in one of the residential terraces off Marylebone High Street, but the subterranean garage in which the Bentley’s parking-spot was reserved was five minutes walk away—which always caused problems when he had paperwork to transport. It was ten-thirty before he got in, eleven before he started turning the pages of Stanley’s report. There was no time left to plough through it all that night, and he was too tired to give it his full attention.
Canny tried to absorb as much of the story as he could by scanning each document in a matter of seconds. The method left him hazy on matters of details but allowed him to build up a composite sketch in which a clear pattern seemed to be discernible. He had already anticipated its broad outlines, but he was grateful for the solid support that hard data lent to his conjectures.
It wasn’t just the procession of the centuries that altered the rewards of luck, he deduced. Cultural contexts varied just as much—and even more so when sex-differences were factored into the calculation. The direction in which the male Kilcannons had been steered by their lucky streak was entirely expectable in the context of the north of England; the direction in which Lissa Lo’s female ancestors had been steered by theirs was just as expectable in their own context. The greatest luck conveniently available to Lissa’s mother, maternal grandmother and half a dozen others before them had been luck in contracting marriages. The model was the natural product of a multigenerational Cinderella story, whose meteoric stars—in striking contrast to the wives of the Earls of Credesdale—were all makeshift Prince Charmings.
Lissa’s back-story lacked the steadiness and coherency of Canny’s, because her family’s house percentage had never worked as smoothly. Canny couldn’t be certain whether that was due more to the innate conservatism of his own forebears or to the fact that Lissa’s ancestors had lived in such interesting times, but he figured that the combination probably leaned in favor of the latter. The luck carried forward by Lissa’s female ancestors did seem to be transferable to their spouses, but only in the short term; the consorts drafted by Dame Fortune enjoyed remarkable prosperity immediately before and immediately after their marriages, but once their daughters were born their disability became obvious—more than one had died with extraordinary abruptness.
Canny could see the logic of that. Mummy had been an invaluable asset to Daddy in terms of the contribution she made to his own welfare, let alone the upbringing of his son; the continued utility of a patriarch in the Far East was, from the viewpoint of a female’s luck, far less obvious. Lissa’s own father had died while she was still in infancy—a pattern that could be extrapolated back to the sixth generation with only minor temporal variations. Only in remoter ages, before the advent of the nineteenth century, had the material protection afforded by warlords been a sufficiently significant factor to sustain the male adjuncts long enough to see their daughters married. Or so it seemed.
The fact that Lissa’s foremothers tended to die a good deal younger than Canny’s forefathers gave him slight pause for thought, but it wasn’t difficult for him to come up with plausible explanations. Given the way the world worked, even in the supposedly-enlightened West, a man needed far less luck to establish him in long-sustainable comfort than a woman. If the females in Lissa’s ancestry had used their lucky streaks more recklessly, it was probably because they had always had to. It couldn’t have been as easy for her ancestors as it had been for his to maintain a balance between self-restraint and self-indulgence. No wonder her oral traditions were more sensitive to issues of yin and yang—and no wonder her defiant attitude to family tradition seemed reckless even to him.
The way that Lissa seemed to be using her ration of luck at present suggested to Canny that her mother might not have much left of her own portion—but if Lissa’s lucky streak was allegedly fated to run dry in the same way that Canny’s was, when her mother’s luck ran out entirely, the experiment she had proposed to him began to seem even riskier. Lissa appeared to be hoping that a child whose heredity was lucky on both sides might renew her own luck more prodigiously than any child produced in accordance with tradition.
In essence, Canny guessed, Lissa was hoping for a miracle child: a superheroic Cinderella, with more than a double dose of shareable luck, by virtue of some kind of chemical or alchemical synergy. Such hope—and such recklessness—might be more in keeping with her traditions than his...but it seemed to Canny to be perfectly conceivable, if not rather probable, that the vital genes—or their metaphysical equivalent, if it turned out that his materialist assumptions were false—would not work in association at all. Even if the
y did, it might not follow that both the miracle child’s parents would benefit equally. If chance should dictate that the child was a boy, and that Canny was the parent who benefited from his son’s remarkable inheritance...what would Lissa do then?
He tried to haul himself back from the wilderness of conjecture to the contents of the documents Bob Stanley had gathered for him, but it wasn’t easy. How, Canny wondered, did Lissa interpret the demographics of her own bloodline? Did she expect that he would follow the examples of her father and grandfather by dying almost as soon as his appointed task was complete? Did she really imagine herself as some kind of queen bee, relative to whom he was a mere disposable drone? Was she simply taking it for granted that her child would be a daughter rather than a son, or did she have some magic or technology in mind that would enhance her chances? If so, did she also have some magic or technology in mind that might assist in his removal from the scene? If not, what would the consequences be if she were to give birth to a boy who would be heir apparent to Can’s wealth, if not to his titles?
Canny decided, on due reflection, that he dared not hope, let alone assume, that Lissa was planning to share the fruits of her experiment with him. She hadn’t bothered to put up any sort of pretence that she was looking for a long-term relationship, so she presumably intended to take the child for herself, even if it turned out to be a boy. If she did intend to take sole custody of the child, there would be little that Canny could do, in spite of his title and all his connections, to prevent her doing so. But would that matter? Did legal custody of a luck-bearing child have anything to do with the distribution of its gift? There was nothing in the Kilcannon archives to help him with that; it was a possibility as yet untested.
How much would it matter, he wondered, if the child’s luck—however exceptional it might prove to be—were to be used entirely to Lissa Lo’s benefit? He could go on to have other children, with other women...but that might not suffice to renew the family streak.
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