Sensing Teschmaker’s shift in mood, Gerard looked up from the trussed-up form of Viola and rolled his eyes. ‘Time was when people were happy to spend the evening watching the television.’
‘Tempora mutantur, times change,’ Teschmaker said and yawned. ‘Take a break for tea.’
On Saturday morning Viola woke Teschmaker with the news that Oliver Sinclair was downstairs, impatient to see him.
‘Make him some coffee while I get dressed,’ Teschmaker mumbled and headed for the shower. Stupid bloody time of the day to be calling. He glanced at his watch. It was quarter to nine. He had intended to get up early and spend some time going over the plans for the night ahead with Norman and Gerard.
By the time he had shaved and showered he was feeling slightly more human. The smell of fresh muffins greeted him halfway down the stairs.
‘There is no need to cook every morning, Viola.’
The poor man looked instantly crestfallen; damn him, he had no right to make Teschmaker feel guilty in his own house. But he backpedalled. ‘I mean, toast would have been okay.’
‘Don’t knock it.’ Sinclair spoke with his mouth full and he had crumbs on the corners of his moustache. ‘Best muffins I’ve had in a while.’
Emboldened by the praise, Viola placed a buttered muffin in front of Teschmaker. ‘Wholemeal. It keeps you regular. Coffee’s coming up. I had to make a fresh lot.’ He rolled his eyes as if to say, I made your coffee but these peasants drank it all.
‘Fine. Whenever you’re ready.’
Teschmaker pulled up a seat and turned to Sinclair. ‘Well, what — other than Viola’s baking — brings you here so early, Oliver?’
‘You and your paranoia. What the hell was that about Irene and my phone being bugged?’ Sinclair washed the muffin down with a gulp of coffee.
‘Did you have your phones checked?’
‘No, of course I didn’t. Costs an arm and a leg. I’d need a bloody good reason —’
‘I had a phone call from someone claiming to be your personal assistant, Irene. She said she was setting up a meeting between us —’
‘It sure as hell wasn’t on my instructions.’
‘Does she have a slightly foreign accent?’
‘No. Believe me, it wasn’t Irene.’
‘As I found out when I turned up.’ Teschmaker picked at his muffin; it did taste good.
‘Who?’ Oliver snapped impatiently.
‘A Russian spook.’
Oliver put down his coffee cup slowly. ‘Now, I know that something pretty weird is going on with Jane, but would you care to explain to me what the hell a Russian spook has got to do with anything?’
‘Might have been an idea to keep us informed.’ Gerard sounded miffed.
‘Shut up, Edwards. Teschmaker knows what he’s doing.’
‘I just meant —’ Gerard tried to claw back some ground but was dismissed with a gesture from Oliver.
‘I’m trying to understand it myself.’ Teschmaker paused and accepted a mug of coffee from Viola. ‘Thanks. I think the more important thing is that this Russian not only knew that you and I were in contact but had Irene’s name.’
‘Irene’s not a state secret.’
‘No, but he could have simply made up a name. I wouldn’t have known. I think it was his way of showing me that he had the bases covered. I don’t think the man’s a fool.’
Teschmaker shrugged and took a sip of his coffee then turned to Gerard. He didn’t want the man offside, especially as getting into the Chambers was going to require his expertise. ‘I didn’t have anything concrete to share with you and I didn’t want to speculate about anything at that stage; it would only have muddied the waters.’
He turned back to Oliver. ‘The Russian isn’t interested in Jane.’
‘Then what’s he after?’
‘Jane’s father.’
‘But isn’t he dead? I always assumed he must be by now.’
‘Seems not. I’m doing some digging around and I’ll brief you as soon as I have something. Now . . .’ Teschmaker put down his coffee and got to his feet.
‘Okay. I have things to do.’ Oliver obviously wasn’t happy but appeared resigned to the fact he wasn’t going to learn any more at the moment.
‘Like getting your phones checked and sending someone over here to sweep this place.’
‘Are you really serious?’ Oliver looked dubious.
Teschmaker nodded.
‘Twenty seconds in the microwave and they’ll be just like new.’ Viola smiled and handed Oliver a paper bag. ‘I’ve wrapped them in greaseproof paper.’
As soon as Oliver Sinclair was gone Teschmaker outlined the plans for the day. Norman and Gerard were dispatched to procure Adrian Wright’s tool kit and to make certain that Mr Wright would not be attending the evening function at the Chambers.
‘You don’t trust Mr Sinclair, do you?’ Viola didn’t look up from his cleaning of the kitchen benches.
‘What makes you say that?’ Teschmaker looked at Viola with mild astonishment. The idea of not trusting Oliver was not even that firmly established in his own mind. But Viola was correct: he had been guarded with the man. Maybe it was rebellion. He had never trusted the rich; not because of any ideological belief on his behalf, but because of the vague notion that anyone who had amassed that kind of wealth must have bent the rules. His father had once told him that compliance was the treason of the upwardly mobile. Teschmaker had never really understood what sort of compliance his father had meant. Compliance with the status quo and the death of idealism? His father had been living — and dying — proof of the antithetical position. He had rebelled at every moment of his downward spiral; a railing rallentando against capitalism and hotel closing hours.
‘You didn’t tell him what you are going to do tonight.’ Viola sprayed disinfectant around the sink and began to scrub far harder than necessary.
Teschmaker laughed out loud. ‘Viola, for fuck’s sake! He knows I’m going, that’s enough. I don’t even know what I’m going to do tonight.’
‘Ah, but I can help you.’ As if to prove his determination to assist, Viola wrung the neck of the dish cloth. ‘As soon as Norman and Mr Edwards get back with Doctor Orpheus’s tool kit we can begin.’
‘You seem a little too keen to help, Viola.’
For the first time in the conversation Viola raised his eyes and looked directly at Teschmaker. ‘I’ve always fancied the smell of vanilla, Master Martin.’
‘Then you’ll have to wait until I get back from doing the shopping. What do we need?’
Viola produced a neatly folded square of paper. ‘I’ve made a list. We’ve got the meat, so it’s only really vegetables and some green apples for the sauce.’
Teschmaker took his time. He did the shopping and then, although he disliked the local shopping centre, opted to linger over a coffee, putting off returning home. A few years back, the village — as the locals called it — had been a conglomeration of small shops and boasted the best coffee this side of the CBD. But then the developers had moved in and the Gower supermarket had spread out like a cancer, transforming itself into Gower shopping town. The small traders had been squeezed out, replaced by small boutique shops with low ceilings and high rents. The independent traders, gobbled up by franchise holders, employed teenage staff done out in ridiculous uniforms whose idea of service was a scripted response: ‘Hello, I’m Marlene and I hope you’re having a truly wonderful day.’ The smile was as uniform as the teeth would be once the orthodontic work kicked in. Teschmaker mumbled that he just wanted a coffee, but still had to sit through a recitation of the virtues of the morning’s special pancakes. He repeated his desire for coffee a little more tersely and was rewarded with a mantra of Italian. He waited until Marlene had got to macchiato and interrupted her. ‘I’ll have a flat white, thanks.’ Flat was how he was feeling. The idea that in a few short hours he was going to be venturing into the ludicrously named Chambers of Pain was not one that he relished. Should
he abandon the idea? Why not? After all, who was he doing this for?
His coffee arrived. ‘I’ve given you two special almond kisses.’ Marlene beamed through the metalwork on her teeth. Teschmaker waited until she had retreated and glanced around. She was obviously liberal with her kisses as every other patron had benefited from her special largesse. He let his previous train of thought meld with the current and imagined Marlene strapped to a metal frame, being whipped. It was a mildly pleasant thought. He nibbled at one of Marlene’s kisses and turned his mind back to the evening ahead.
On the plus side was the notion of seeing Jane, albeit in a bizarre setting. He wondered what she was doing now. Was she looking forward to an evening of libertine indulgence, or fearing it? There was also the possibility that she wouldn’t be there at all. There had been nothing in the photographs Oliver had given him to indicate that it was a public affair. Maybe the entire thing had been a setup — a few people brought in to give the photograph a sense of veracity. On the other side of the ledger was the impression he had gained from Viola that, despite Francis Grice’s penchant for cruelty, he would not have played with Jane if she wasn’t a willing participant. Played — that was the word he had used. Viola was insistent that he had never been present while Jane was around. ‘Master Francis knows how jealous I get’ had been his response to Teschmaker’s probing.
Teschmaker realised that he would be unable to resolve the question of Jane’s role in things until he had spoken to her, or seen with his own eyes that she was a willing participant or otherwise. That being the case, he knew he couldn’t renege on the decision to go ahead with the masquerade. Having arrived at that conclusion he started to worry that something might have gone wrong for Gerard and Norman because, if he had any chance at all of pulling off the charade, he needed Adrian Wright’s tool kit. He abandoned the remains of his coffee and one of Marlene’s special kisses and headed home.
Coming into the kitchen with the groceries is usually the most mundane of experiences. Or at least it should be. Teschmaker took one look at the trussed body of Adrian Wright and knew that he had a choice: stay and admire the rope work, or turn around and walk away. A long way away. Preferably overseas and for a considerable length of time.
He took a deep breath and put the supermarket bags down on the sink. Mild, he told himself, adopt a mild tone.
‘What the fuck is he doing here?’
It came out a little too high-pitched and definitely far too panicky. It wasn’t within a bull’s roar of mild. His words appeared to have no effect on Viola and Norman.
‘Couldn’t leave him.’ Norman didn’t even look up from whatever he was involved in.
‘Is he alive?’ The man seemed, at the very least, to be on the dead side of comatose.
Viola giggled. ‘He’s having a little nap.’
Time to be firm, Teschmaker told himself. He saw what Norman and Viola were doing; saw it, but didn’t understand and couldn’t bring himself to ask. Then he had another thought. ‘Where’s Gerard?’ At least he would get some common sense out of Edwards.
‘Upstairs, he said he was going to have a shower,’ Norman volunteered. But he still didn’t look up and not for a second did he lessen his concentration on the job at hand. For a moment Teschmaker watched the two men and then plucked up the courage to broach the subject of their attentions, albeit from a lateral direction. ‘Is that the meat for dinner?’
‘Rolled shoulder of pork,’ Viola clarified. ‘I hope you remembered the apples.’
Apples? Of course he had remembered the apples. Daft thing to do, buying apples when you could get damn good apple sauce ready-made in a bottle. There is a man dead or unconscious on my kitchen floor, tied up like a Sunday roast and two deviants doing strange things to meat. Teschmaker took a deep breath and decided to try a lighter note. ‘Call me silly, call me wacky, even call me zany, but hey, I don’t get it.’ He was struggling to keep the sarcasm below critical mass.
‘What?’ Norman glanced over his shoulder.
‘Can you explain to me in words of one syllable what the fuck you two are doing sticking coloured needles into our dinner?’
Norman and Viola exchanged a glance as if to confirm that silly, wacky and zany weren’t even in the same ballpark.
‘The needles are not coloured. The needles are metal. The plastic knobs on the ends of the needles — they’re the coloured things. It’s where they connect to the end of a syringe.’ Viola stretched, rotating his neck and exercising his back as if he had been hunched over the shoulder of pork for far too long. ‘You can leave the shopping, we’ll put it away.’
Teschmaker knew that tone of voice. It was the same one his mother had used. There, there, run along and play, this is adult time.
‘He’s showing me some needlework,’ Norman explained. ‘See. He’s pushed all the needles just under the skin and left the coloured ends in a circle —’
‘This pattern is called the Rose of Pain.’ Viola’s eyes were gleaming. He held up the meat so that Teschmaker could admire their handiwork.
On the floor Doctor Orpheus gave a long low groan. Viola glanced at him apprehensively. ‘Maybe I should tell Gerard that he’s coming round?’ He looked questioningly at Teschmaker.
‘No, I will. And while I do, get those bloody needles out of our dinner and get it in the oven. Norman, give him a hand.’ He spun on his heel and executed what he hoped was a dignified exit.
He pounded up the stairs, furious with himself for allowing his home to be taken over by such maniacs. Sick! That’s what they were. As he reached the top of the stairs he came face to face with Gerard coming out of the bathroom. He was naked but for a towel wrapped around his waist. For some inexplicable reason this was the final straw for Teschmaker.
‘I hope you can explain what the hell is going on?’ he exploded. ‘Why is Adrian Wright here? I thought we had decided you would do what was necessary to incapacitate him. I don’t recall saying you should bring him here. What the hell do we do with him now that he’s seen this place?’
Unperturbed by the outburst Gerard removed the towel and gave his hair a quick rub.
‘Relax, Teschmaker. He was unconscious and blindfolded.’
Relax? Sure, I always relax in the presence of naked men. Edward’s tattoos were not confined to his arms but snaked across his chest and down his stomach like a roadmap leading to . . . Teschmaker looked down at the floor. ‘But why bring him here?’
‘We got in easy as pie but unfortunately he was . . . er . . . how can I put this delicately? He was with someone. A young boy. And it looked as though he was expecting other people as well . . .’
‘So?’ Then the penny dropped. ‘You mean with like I think you mean with?’
‘Yep.’ Gerard curled his mouth in distaste. ‘He was screwing the kid on a couch in his lounge room. Fucking pervert.’ To Teschmaker’s relief he tucked the towel back around his middle.
‘Jesus! So what about the kid? Did he see you?’
‘No. He was face down. Never knew what happened. I gave our Doctor Orpheus a little tap and Norman grabbed the kid.’ He turned and gestured to the study. ‘He’s in there.’
Shaking his head in disbelief, Teschmaker strode past him and swung the door open, hoping that somehow this was all a sick joke. He swung the door open and took a step back. The boy, no more than seventeen or eighteen years of age, was expertly tied to his office chair, the blanket from the bed wrapped around his shoulders, the pillowcase doubled over as a blindfold.
Teschmaker stepped back and quietly shut the door. Thinking time. He needed thinking time. This was getting way out of hand and there was a glaring absence of exit signs. For a moment he considered ringing Oliver Sinclair and telling him to get his men as far away from him as possible, but even as he thought it he knew it was never going to happen. He remembered seeing a documentary about buffalo or wildebeest who had strayed into a swamp. Of those who kept going straight ahead a few made it to safety, but those that hesitate
d or tried to backtrack were sucked under and drowned in the mud. He began to appreciate how they must have felt. In certain circumstances, oblivion must be a blessed relief. But he knew that it wasn’t a choice on offer. They had come a long way down this road now and there really was no feasible option other than pressing ahead. Okay. One problem at a time.
‘Have you any idea what those two are doing in the kitchen?’
‘Needlework. Viola said it was important. Not my scene, I’m afraid I get a bit squeamish.’ It must have suddenly dawned on Gerard that Teschmaker was seriously pissed off, for his tone changed. ‘Look, let me get some clothes on and then Norman and I will get our two guests out of harm’s way and into the spare room. We’ve got a few hours up our sleeve and we had better use it to check we have you all set for this evening. Okay?’
Yes, it was okay. Just. Mind you, Teschmaker thought, it felt good to let Gerard run things for a while. The tiredness he was feeling was, he knew, due to the accumulation of days of tension and the unfamiliar experience of sharing his home. He remembered how often it had happened during his childhood. When other kids had come to stay it was always fine for the first couple of days, but any longer and the tension would build to the point where he ended up detesting them.
Not for the first time he wondered why Sinclair had offered Norman and Gerard’s services. At the time it had seemed an act of generosity from a man who could afford such gifts. But now Teschmaker wondered if it didn’t have the potential to become something of a poisoned chalice. No, he dismissed the thought. Norman might be a tad strange and Edwards a bit of a thug, but if you were liberal with the definition they could be described as well meaning.
He turned to Edwards. ‘Sorry I shouted, Gerard. I’m feeling a little strung out.’ It came out lame as hell, but Gerard caught the drift.
‘The tool kit is on the table downstairs. Have a look through it. I’ll bring you a belt of scotch.’
Teschmaker was about to say that it was far too early, but stopped himself. It was the right time for a scotch; if anything it was a touch late.
Delicate Indecencies Page 23
