The Satan Sampler

by Victor Canning

  “Would I be in order to approach them individually before a vote is taken?”

  “I don’t think it would be necessary—or do you any good. But, of course, they would all concede you have a perfect right to appear before them to put your case when the matter comes up for decision.”

  “Well, that’s something. May I ask further how you think they will react?”

  “I don’t think it would be proper for me to guess. But I will tell you this in confidence—were it to come to the point of a decision being made on my casting vote then I would be on your side—much as I should regret the loss of the Hall as our home. In a way, the Foundation really stems from the feeling you have for your place . . . the preservation of our heritage, traditions and culture. Yet ironically, in your case, it is doing just the opposite. But in these days that is a paradox which cannot be avoided. However, leave it with me—and I’ll be in touch with you as soon as I can.”

  Seyton rose. The man was clearly on his side. For the moment he could hope for no more. And he was Felbeck—the grandson of the man who had created the Foundation; the best ally he could have—though that would bring no concessions, he guessed, when the matter of compensation for buying out the lease arose.

  He said, “Thank you very much, Mr Felbeck.”

  “Not at all.” He pressed a bell push at the side of the mantelpiece. “You came by taxi?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Well . . .” Felbeck smiled. “I’ll save you a little pocket money. My car’s waiting down below for you. No, no . . . I insist.”

  When Seyton had gone, Felbeck carried his glass of soda water, now half empty, to the sideboard and filled it to the top with whisky. He sat down by the telephone and lit himself a cigarette. He sat, smoking and drinking, lost in thought, for a long while and then he picked up the telephone and dialled a number.

  “Grandison?”

  “Yes, my dear Felbeck?” The voice was cultured, weighty and slow.

  “Seyton has just left. It was as you expected.”

  “It had to be.” The other’s voice was faintly tinged with amusement.

  “I told him I would put it to the Foundation Governors.”

  “Very proper.”

  “He’s not the type to be put off.”

  “If he were we’d have no problem.”

  “I don’t see that we have one anyway. The Foundation members will vote against selling back the lease—and that will be that.”

  “Either you’re an innocent or an optimist. Six centuries ago Owen Glendower, the last independent Prince of Wales, fathered a bastard girl on a farmer’s daughter at Pilleth in Radnorshire. She grew up to marry a Seyton—only they were named Satan then——”

  “Grandison, spare me.”

  “All right. Is he a sticker or a non-sticker?”

  “He’s a sticker. The kind I like in fact.”

  “Let’s avoid sympathies. There’s no way of leaving the Hall. We all agree about that. But you can have a meeting and a vote and make it look close. Thereafter there’s nothing he can do.”

  “There’s clause seven.”

  “Yes, yes, dear old clause seven. But, I don’t think you need worry about that. In the very unlikely event of its ever arising . . . well, I think you will agree that that’s my province. To save you worry I promise you that I will start doing something about it right away. And when I say doing I’m not talking about extreme measures. Just a few discreet moves against a possibility which is very, very remote. Am I soothing you?”

  “No, damn you. You’re just having fun at my expense.”

  “No, Felbeck. I’m quite serious.”

  “Well . . .”

  “Well, what?”

  “Oh, nothing . . . no, that’s not true. Talking to him he struck me as just the type we could take in. Just the type.”

  “So he may be. But it’s too late for that, isn’t it, in the circumstances?”

  “Yes, I suppose so.”

  “Then forget him. He’s my worry from now on. Goodnight.” Felbeck put the receiver back, drank some more whisky and then lay back and stared at the pen drawing of Felbeck Grange. Just the type. Just the type that this damned muddle and mess of an age needed. Yes, that was Seyton.

  * * * *

  Quint was on the point of leaving for home when Warboys came into his room. That he entered without knocking was no surprise. Warboys only knocked at the doors of those few who exceeded him in rank. He was an elegant man, tall, spare of flesh, the long, pale face deeply cleft below the cheek bones, the hazel eyes large-lidded, the pink of his scalp showing warmly through his thinning white hair. Without a word he walked to the window and stared out at the distant lights of the Mall.

  Knowing the game . . . perhaps ritual would be the better word he sometimes felt, Quint got up and moved towards his small wall cupboard and said, “It will be a glass of Tio Pépé, I presume?”

  “Half a glass—just to observe rare custom.”

  Quint brought a tray with glasses and a decanter to the old green leather-topped table in the centre of the room. As Quint poured sherry into the two glasses, he said, “The last time I had this pleasure was four months ago.”

  Warboys turned. “Do you wish it happened oftener?”

  “Frankly, no.”

  “True. I come as no harbinger of spring. Something moves in the air around us and it is not the first mild touch of the reviving year. Something . . . but what?”

  “Give me a clue and I’ll break a firm rule and make a guess. Your sherry.”

  Warboys took the glass and sipped, and then said, “Put together the Felbeck Foundation for the Preservation of the Christian Heritage and Grandison, and then stir in Richard Seyton and one Georgina Collet. What kind of mixture is that? Unpalatable?”

  Surprised, Quint said bluntly, “What on earth has Georgina Collet got to do with it?”

  “Nothing yet—but she’s going to be required to. Faire des agaceries, perhaps?”

  “On whom?”

  “Richard Seyton. Is she capable of that?”

  “She’s capable. If the inducement is right—and I can only think of one.”

  “Quite. Her fool of a father gets a far earlier parole than he could ever have expected. But that’s not the point. You know her. Is she capable of handling someone like Seyton right up to the limit?”

  “She might be. Yes, I think she could—and would if it were for her father. She dotes on him—though God knows why. He was a useless type.”

  “No, not useless. He served us well—up to the time where he decided to listen to the call of conscience. Does she still use the name Collet?”

  “Yes. People’s memories are short. Anyway, she doesn’t run away from that sort of thing. But what is all this interest in the Christian Heritage people?” Quint waved a mollifying hand. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked that.”

  “Forget it. And between ourselves I wish I knew.” Warboys smiled. “Perhaps they’re shipping too much rice in famine relief to countries of doubtful political colour. Perhaps, on the other hand, someone in the higher regions has decided that they are an organization we could use if only we could compromise them discreetly and then turn the screws. I don’t know, dear Quint. And when I really, really don’t know, it upsets me to the point of coming to drink sherry with you. And to unburden myself further—an act I would normally deprecate—I don’t like it when our organization thinks less and less of using ways and means which smack more of the Inquisition than Intelligence. Oh, dear, oh dear—I am really quite upset . . .” He smiled suddenly and held out his glass. “On reflection, a little more, I think.”

  As he poured from the decanter Quint made a wry face.

  “In the good old days this used to be a profession for gentlemen—gentlemen adventurers and officers who chivalrously served the Empire.”

  Warboys shook his head. “No, Quint. It never was like that. And you know it. But at least there was some kind of ethos. Some limits. Oh, dear
—this is the kind of discussion I deprecate. It can lead to a stirring of conscience and that’s fatal.”

  Quint laughed, but beneath his true humour there was disquiet. Warboys had spoken, although lightly, more freely to him now than ever in his whole service before. If something were deeply troubling the man then it had to be abnormally serious to unsettle him to this point. Briefly the unworthy thought occurred to him that Warboys was getting beyond it—letting imagination distort reality, a common enough development among lesser men in the Department at times. He brought the conversation down to a practical level by saying, “Tell me what you want done about Georgina Collett.”

  “Not what I want done.”

  Quint was not deceived, nor, he guessed, meant to be. The answer was not meant to be evasive. It was an invitation—and of a very rare kind from Warboys. “Who then?” he asked gently.

  “I don’t know. The interest comes either through or immediately from Grandison. Sir Manfred Grandison.”

  To himself Quint reflected—Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. The éminence grise of this establishment in Birdcage Walk. But to the outside world the only note of any public service was in a listing of the members of the Agricultural Research Council under the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food—which was only part of the truth, the tip of the iceberg.

  Looking at Warboys who had turned his back and was staring out of the window, Quint said, “Grandison—above whom there stand very few. Originator? Or passer-on?” He spoke knowing the bluntness might be rebuked.

  Warboys was silent for a while, and then turned and with a mild smile, said, “The latter would be an unusual role. But far from an exception.”

  “But,” said Quint, uncertain of his own boldness, “you have doubts?”

  Warboys laughed. “Who serves here who doesn’t live all day with doubts? They are the essence of our being. What is truth or reality? Fire-thrown shadows on a cave wall. And honour—what is that? Here, admittedly, we have to and have made our own kind. Tarnished though it would be if exposed to the public eye, it is all we have. We both would have it stay that way. You are, I know, possessed with thoughts to which, at the moment, I have no wish to become privy. Out of an uneasiness of instinct perhaps too much has already been said. So let us be practical. Georgina Collet.”

  Quint shrugged his shoulders and knowing now that the almost dialectical play of dialogue was to cease, though he had drawn pleasure from the rare display of oblique confidence, said, “She has done one small thing for us before, as you know. To get her idiot father out of top security into the comparative luxury of an open prison. For an early parole . . . well, there should be no trouble. I’m still in touch. But I would, of course, need to know her role. And, of course, she can’t step out of her true character and profession:”

  “It’s because of just that that she has been chosen. She is to be herself. No more. And she is, to use a vulgar phrase, to go to the limit with Richard Seyton. A pastoral love affair.”

  “Marriage?”

  “My dear Quint—what an old-fashioned thought.”

  Quint grinned. “She is in some ways quite old-fashioned. I mean to the point of going to that limit if it could bring her father’s release.”

  “Then make it clear that—unless exceptional circumstances arise—no such development is at all necessary. There’s no need for any holy blessing on their pillow talk. Grandison, or whoever, just wants to share any confidences which Seyton may trust her with. You’ll see her?”

  “Of course. But I can make the firm promise that whether she does or does not turn up anything her father will get his parole?”

  “To his credit, Grandison made that point clear. When you’ve seen her let me know what you’ve arranged.”

  “Of course. I’ll see her tomorrow. I presume she’ll need a stand-off?”

  “Of course, again. Choose one of your bright boys.”

  * * * *

  Seyton gave Nancy a lift as far as Oxford on his way to see his son, Roger. They had spent the previous night together, and this Oxford visit, he guessed, she had arranged in order to have more time in his company. To begin with she was unusually silent, but after they were clear of the London suburbs she suddenly said out of the blue, “What did you think of Felbeck?”

  “I liked him. Have you met him?”

  “Once or twice. He’s hunted at times when he has been staying at the Hall. Do you think you’ll get what you want from him?”

  “I don’t see why not. But it all rests with his fellow Governors. He only has a casting vote.”

  “He struck me as the kind of man who’d screw the neck of any committee which didn’t want to go his way.”

  “I hope that’s true.” Then, knowing her, sensing that she was not just making conversation, he asked, “What’s on your mind?”

  “Just a feeling.”

  “You can do better than that.”

  She smiled. “I’ll try. Punch liked him, you know.”

  “Punch liked most people. Gould have been a failing.”

  “I know. That’s why I thought it was odd. Fair or foul weather—if Punch liked someone he stuck to them. But he suddenly went off Felbeck.”

  “How do you know?”

  “If you mentioned someone to Punch his face told you a lot at once. About three months before his death he came to town for a few days. We had dinner, and I happened to mention Felbeck—in fact I had a feeling that he’d come up to see him.”

  “So?”

  “Well—you know Punch’s give-away face. All he felt always on the surface. He usually said what he thought and his face, on the few occasions when he didn’t want to say, showed his feelings plainly. He just put on that face.”

  “So you just shut up.”

  “I would have done normally. But we’d had a few drinks and I was over-bold and jollied him. Asked him what had changed his opinion—because that’s what it was clearly. And then he said that he wished he’d never seen the man and that it was not a subject he wanted to talk about. So that was that.”

  “Was it?”

  “So far as Punch was concerned, yes. But since we were old friends, I pushed a bit. You know—you can tell old Nancy about it. That sort of thing. So he laughed then and was suddenly all nice, the old Punch. And he said—I remember his words clearly—There’s only one person I want to talk about Felbeck to and that’s Richard—and God knows where he’s globe-trotting at this moment. And that was the end of that conversation.”

  “Well, that’s that. But Punch could get steamed up over small things. I remember there was hell to pay when he met one of the Foundation staff coming back from the bit of water we leased them carrying two salmon kelts. Christ—you should have heard his language about bloody idiots who couldn’t tell a kelt from a fresh-run salmon and so on. Though, to tell the truth, it is sometimes difficult with a well-mended kelt if you haven’t been at it for some years. He had the poor sod in tears almost. Then Punch calmed down and was charming in the way he could be and showed the chap the differences.”

  “Well, maybe I’m exaggerating.”

  After he had dropped Nancy in Oxford the conversation went from his mind as he drove on to Cheltenham. He had got permission to take Roger out to lunch—the house master was an old friend of his. Roger—almost fourteen—had his leanness of body and the same dark hair, but his face held much of his wife, Ruth; clear, olive skin, the same dark eyes, the same feeling about him of self-possession and then—when touched with a sudden absurdity or moved by a joke or deep emotion—showing all. He took him to Cavendish House for lunch and they talked easily for there had never been any shyness between them. Both he and Ruth had brought the boy up to a frankness of communication, so that he knew if he were in trouble or perplexed over anything he could come to them and get advice or explanation. He had loved Ruth and he loved his boy. And now, out of the blue, it had become a reality that one day the Hall would belong to Roger; should and would. />
  After lunch, to please him, they went to a couple of places to look at motor cycles and scooters with Roger enthusiastically discussing their merits and drawbacks and—Richard Seyton had to smile to himself—already assuming that there could be no objection to his having one before age so long as he used it on the estate private roads (a promise which Seyton knew at a pinch would not be honoured, but later the breach confessed without prompting).

  “Punch said it would be all right—so long as I cleared it with you, dad. And he told me about that old bull-nosed Morris you had before age.”

  They were driving back to the school at the moment and Seyton said, “Well—we’ll see what your end of term report is like.”

  “Oh, that’s fine. Thanks, dad.”

  And it was fine, for he was a good worker, had a keen memory and intelligence so that schoolwork came, perhaps, a little too easily to him. But what matter? thought Seyton fondly. You don’t have to be ashamed about the gifts the gods honour you with at birth.

  As they sat in the car for a few moments in the school driveway before Roger left him, the boy said, “Will the school let me get away for Punch’s memorial service? I’d like to come.”

  “I think it can be arranged.”

  “Oh, good. You know——” Roger paused, looking away at a quarrel of sparrows squabbling in the branches of a newly-budded thorn tree on the driveside. Then with an unnatural briskness said, “Oh, well, I suppose I must be going.”

  Seyton was going to let him escape, and then decided against it. He recognized the boy’s sudden change of mood and decided to hold him.

  He said, “You were going to say something.”

  For a moment Roger was silent and then, with a little half nod to himself, said, “Well, I was and I will. Though . . . well, dad—do you think Punch could have had a feeling that something was going to happen to him?”