by Hugh Canham
How had he paid her, he wondered? He left all that sort of thing to Jolly. Presumably she hadn’t been on the payroll like Jolly and the cleaning lady and had just been given a cheque each week. He really must take a closer interest in the running of the practice, he thought. So easy to leave it all to Jolly. Jolly might be ill one day or drop dead or something. Since he’d taken over the practice he’d never, he realised, been down to Jolly’s living quarters in the basement, not even at Christmas. He really should have. . .
After five more minutes he came to a decision. He walked down the stairs and along the hall and then turned right at the end into what was Jolly’s office. It was very large and at one time there had been three clerks working in it. Now there was only Jolly, who was seated at a very substantial old desk in the middle of the room writing in a large leather-bound ledger.
‘Ah, Jolly,’ began Hector somewhat overheartily. ‘I have to contact Miss Lucasta. I’ve discovered she’s left her spectacles behind. I found them in my sitting room. We don’t, I suppose, have her address?’
‘I’m afraid not, sir,’ said Jolly, not looking up.
‘But don’t we keep a note of people’s addresses who work for us?’
‘In this case I’m sure we didn’t. I paid her once a week by cheque according to the hours she’d worked, as instructed by you, sir.’
‘Damn! Yes, I see. Everything else all right, Jolly? Got everything you want? Haven’t been in here for ages!’
‘Yes, I’m very happy here, sir, as you see, and I trust that you find my work satisfactory?’
‘Of course, Jolly. Absolutely first class.’
Hector went and sat in his office and looked through the post which Jolly had left open on his desk. It all looked tediously routine – and included five telephone messages that Jolly had noted from Gloria asking for Hector to ‘call her’.
Sod Gloria. He’d let her stew. He had been sure from the moment the Raphael had been stolen that Gloria had arranged the theft to get the insurance money. He assumed that starring roles were becoming more and more difficult to come by and she’d be glad of some ready cash to pay for her two residences and her entourage. He’d been meaning to tell Lucasta his thoughts, but he might never get a chance to now, he reflected sadly. But there must be some way of contacting her if she didn’t ever come back to collect her glasses. . .
He buzzed for Jolly on the intercom and dictated several letters to him. He fancied he hadn’t seen Jolly looking so happy for some time as he sat there taking the dictation.
7
April 1970 continued
Considering he felt very depressed, Hector ate a reasonably hearty dinner at his club and was savouring his second glass of port with his cigar in the so-called Reading Room. In there were newspapers, periodicals, magazines and a selection of reference books. As he sat, his eyes drifted idly along the reference books – Who’s Who, List of Solicitors and Barristers, Crockford’s Directory. That was an idea! Lucasta’s father was a clergyman, and she’d once said he was a canon. Now, there might be lots of Reverend Smiths, but surely not too many Canon Smiths. And he lived somewhere near Oxford. So that narrowed the field . . . He’d start at the end of the Smiths and work up the list. Feeling very pleased with this idea, he rose slowly to his feet, but just as he did so a bent figure passed in front of him, bore down on the bookshelves and, grasping Crockford’s in both hands, carried it away with him to his armchair nearby.
‘Bugger!’ said Hector, he hoped not too audibly. He resumed his seat and glared at the old member whom he’d often seen before. He was dressed in a very crumpled black suit with an MCC tie and was furiously puffing a pipe, which appeared to have gone out. While he thumbed the pages of Crockford’s he chuckled to himself from time to time. After approximately fifteen minutes of this, he nodded off to sleep with the book still open on his knees and the pipe slowly fell from his mouth and onto his chair, scattering ash in all directions. Hector saw his opportunity and rushed forward, banging the ashes on the floor with a copy of the Daily Telegraph. At this, the old member woke up.
‘It’s quite all right. No need to be alarmed. The pipe went out ages ago. No danger of fire!’ And he recommenced his meanderings through Crockford’s.
By eleven o’clock, Hector gave up. He might have to wait for the book all night. He would come back in the morning . . .
After a less leisurely breakfast than usual, Hector arrived at his club at eight-thirty and hurried up to the Reading Room. Crockford’s was not in its place on the shelves, nor was it by the member’s chair who had had it the previous night, nor was it anywhere to be seen! Hector asked the Club servant who was tidying the room where it had gone.
‘I suppose the Bishop must have taken it to his room with him. He’s very fond of reading it,’ said the servant, shaking his head and showing some slight disapproval.
Silently cursing all clergy, Hector left the club and considered what to do. He considered a public library, but they probably didn’t open until ten o’clock at the earliest. A bookshop – that was it! If one was open. He remembered there were two in Piccadilly.
After an impatient wait outside the shop, which didn’t open until nine-thirty, Hector raced to the top floor, where the lady at the information desk had told him the Crockford’s would be. He duly found the volume and surreptitiously started to copy the details of Canons Smith into his diary. Unfortunately there seemed quite a few and an assistant kept walking past him and eyeing him suspiciously. After writing down the details of five Canons Smith, with goodness knows how many others to go, Hector succumbed to the glare of the assistant and bought the book. It was very expensive.
Once back home, he took it to his sitting room out of Jolly’s way, and where he had a private telephone. Starting from the bottom, as he had decided to do, he telephoned the number of the first Canon Smith. A lady’s voice answered.
‘Ah, hello. Is that Mrs Smith?’ enquired Hector tentatively.
‘No, it’s Veronica Smith speaking; Mother’s out.’
‘Did Lucasta have a sister?’ Hector asked himself rapidly. Try and see!
‘Do you have a sister called Lucasta?’
‘Yes. But she’s not here at the moment. She lives in London.’
‘Ah, good,’ thought Hector. ‘Bingo, first time!’ Aloud, he continued, ‘I wanted to contact her, that’s all. Do you have her telephone number or, better still, her address?’
‘Yes, I do, but who are you?’
‘Hector Elroy.’
‘Ah, yes, I see. She told me about you at Christmastime. She works for you, doesn’t she? I’d have thought you’d have had her address!’
‘Er, yes. . . But I seem to have lost it!’
‘Ah well. It’s 410C Philimore Gardens and the phone number is KEN0024. Lucasta’s okay is she? I haven’t heard from her for some time.’
‘Yes, fine. Well, she was yesterday when I saw her.’
‘Good.’
‘Excellent – I’m just going round to see her now. Thank you for your help. Goodbye.’
Hector, who had balked at phoning Lucasta before he set out, had only a vague idea of what he was going to say to her when he saw her, he realised, as he drove down Kensington High Street. He didn’t even know for sure whether she’d be in.
In his left hand he clutched her glasses, which he had wrapped in one of her clean dusters, as he rang the bell to her flat with his right. She lived on what appeared to be the top floor of a house in a rather nice tree-lined road just off the High Street. It all seemed vaguely familiar. After a pause, a sash window at the top of a house was thrown open and Lucasta’s head appeared.
‘Who is it?’ she shouted down.
‘It’s me. I’ve come to return your spectacles. You left them behind.’
‘Ah, yes. Kind of you. Just pop them through the letterbox would you? It’s a long way down. I’ll come and pick them up in due course.’
‘But they might break . . .’ said Hector. But Lucasta had
shut the window. ‘Bugger this,’ uttered Hector. He rang the bell again.
‘What is it now?’
‘They haven’t got a case and they might break if I put them through the letterbox. You’d better come down and get them.’
Lucasta uttered one of her now familiar sighs, followed by, ‘Oh, very well, I suppose so.’
There was a very long wait. Eventually, Lucasta opened the door a crack and held out her hand.
‘Please Lucasta!’ said Hector pushing the door open firmly.
Lucasta stepped back. She was in her dressing gown and it appeared that either she had had no sleep or she had been crying all night. Or both.
‘There,’ she said. ‘You can see for yourself what a mess I’m in now!’
‘I want to talk to you.’
‘Well, go on then, since you’ve pushed your way in. Talk to me.’
‘Well, not here, Lucasta. Can’t we go up to your flat?’
‘I suppose so!’ Another sigh. ‘Shut the front door after you.’
Lucasta went up the six flights of stairs very slowly in front of Hector. When they eventually arrived at her front door, she said, ‘It’s a very small flat, as you see. I was going to buy something bigger but then I got engaged to Duncan and stayed here. You’d better sit down. Amazing you didn’t know where I lived.’
‘How did you know that?’
‘My sister phoned. Thought it was hilarious.’
Hector looked round the flat. It was indeed very small; really only a bedsit with a kitchen and bathroom.
‘Look, Lucasta, I’m sorry for anything I’ve said or done to offend you, but would you please reconsider – er, well, what I mentioned to you yesterday.’
‘It’s too soon after Duncan. . . You’re an impossible old bore, Hector, set in your ways. But I do like you. I suppose you could say you’re unique!’
‘You must realise I’ve always been keen on you right from the first. Why do you think I offered you half the reward from the Duchess? I need you to help me particularly with my art-theft work – and I desperately want you to be, well, “around”. It’s occurred to me that there’s a whole floor of my house which isn’t used at all. It’s much, much bigger than this place. It was the housekeeper’s flat when my father had one. I could do it up and you could live there absolutely rent free and I’d pay you to help me whenever I wanted – er, well – you to help me. I wouldn’t interfere with you at all, I promise.’
‘Um,’ said Lucasta. One day when Hector and Jolly had both been out she had in fact sneaked up to the second floor and taken a look around. There were two large rooms, a kitchen and a bathroom, she remembered. They were all very dusty, but in fact it was more spacious than the first floor where Hector lived because part of that floor was taken up with rooms for file storage.
‘I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it.’
‘Please do.’
‘I’m not promising anything, just thinking, you must understand.’
‘Of course. I say, you look pretty bad, Lucasta. Don’t you think you ought to lie down and take an aspirin or something?’
‘Do stop fussing. Please, please go away and leave me alone.’
Hector couldn’t sleep properly that night, in spite of the three glasses of port he downed. He tossed and turned and eventually saw by the alarm clock next to his bed that it was three o’clock. He put on his dressing gown and went up to the next floor and looked at the housekeeper’s rooms again. Yes, they could be made very nice indeed, although he hated the thought of workmen in the house as they were always so disruptive. How lucky that he’d managed to contact Lucasta, and how strange that they didn’t have a note of her address or telephone number in the office. But then he had a sudden thought. He went down the stairs into the large clerk’s room where Jolly worked. He knew on one of the shelves there was a large book that had ‘Addresses and Telephone Numbers’ embossed in gold letters across the spine. He took it down and opened it on Jolly’s desk. He then turned to ‘S’. There it was, all the time, in Jolly’s copperplate writing. ‘Lucasta Smith’, followed by her address and telephone number!
‘The old bugger!’ said Hector quietly to himself.
At that moment, the door opened and Jolly entered wearing ancient carpet slippers with a heavy camel-coloured dressing gown over what was obviously a nightshirt, as his scrawny legs could be seen under the dressing gown.
‘Ah, it’s you, sir. I heard noises and came to investigate.’
‘Very good, Jolly. Yes, I couldn’t sleep. You can put that poker you’re carrying down. Now look, Jolly, you said this afternoon that we hadn’t a note of Lucasta’s address. What is this?’ said Hector, pointing.
Jolly peered at the book.
‘Indeed, yes, sir. There is her address and phone number.’
‘And in your handwriting, Jolly!’
‘Yes, sir. I must have made the entry when she arrived and then it completely slipped my mind.’
‘Jolly, I have in fact seen and talked to Lucasta Smith and I hope she’s reconsidering her decision to leave. I very much hope she will come back. What would you say to that, Jolly?’
‘I shall be pleased about it if you’re pleased, sir.’
But Hector still couldn’t go off to sleep properly when he returned to his bedroom. Something – he couldn’t quite place it – was worrying him. As he lay in his bed tossing and turning, outside the wind got up and it started to rain heavily. The sash windows of his bedroom began to rattle, as they always did when there was a wind. His father had never bothered with curtains. Somewhere there were two small rubber wedges to stop the windows rattling. Reluctantly, he got out of bed and put on his dressing gown to hunt for them. He looked at the alarm clock – four-thirty. He had probably only had half an hour’s sleep all night!
As he located the rubber wedges and started pushing them into the window it suddenly came to him.
‘My God, I must be totally losing my grip!’ he said aloud. ‘Of course I should have known where Lucasta lived!’ He’d picked her up from her flat the day they’d gone to Norfolk to try and find the Duchess’s statue. He rubbed his eyes and went to his chest of drawers where he kept his old pocket diaries and thumbed quickly through last year’s to October. God, yes! He’d written her address down and even her phone number. And there he’d been pursuing bishops in the club and standing outside bookshops before they opened to look at Crockford’s!
He sat down on the bed and groaned. He’d been warned that becoming emotionally involved could drive strong men to lose their reason and do the most peculiar things. And as he sat there with his head in his hands, and as the rain poured down outside and the windows rattled, he noticed that the wedges had dropped out onto the floor. Oh, just leave them! He knew he’d never go to sleep. He lay down on the bed in his dressing gown and reviewed his life since he’d been an adult. National service, university, law school, articles with his father, and then a short while as his father’s assistant solicitor. And then twenty years with the firm in Lincoln’s Inn. Goodness, how he was missing the social life he’d had there!
At about the same moment that Hector was getting out of bed and trying to wedge his windows shut, Lucasta was half asleep in her bed when she felt a splash on her face. She could hear it was raining hard, but why in her bedroom? She sat up and switched on the light. On the ceiling above her bed a small damp patch had appeared, and as she watched, a large drop of water passed her head and landed on her pillow.
‘Damn and blast!’ she said and got up and started to drag the bed across the room out of the line of drips. By the time she’d got it out of the way the water was coming in in a steady trickle and soaking the rug. So she started to roll up the rug, but didn’t get very far with this as it was wedged under various pieces of furniture.
‘Bucket,’ she said to herself. Having brought the bucket in from the kitchen, she sat on the sofa and watched it fill up. Every fifteen minutes or so she had to struggle with it into the kitchen, e
mpty it down the sink, and rush back with it. It was seven o’clock before it stopped raining.
‘Well, at least the ceiling hasn’t fallen down – yet,’ she thought. ‘I’ll have to telephone the managing agents as soon as they open, but I don’t suppose that will be until nine-thirty at the earliest!’
Her previous experiences with the agents during the time she’d lived there did not bode well for a speedy repair of the roof. Usually it took three or four days for someone to come and see what exactly was wrong. It was generally a very dismal bald-headed, middle-aged man in a shiny brown suit who sucked at his teeth and shook his head, and ended up by saying that he’d have to write to his client for instructions and Lucasta must understand that it might be a little while before he received these as his client lived in the West Indies. Then, when he’d got the instructions, he telephoned Lucasta to say that three sets of builders would be coming at various times to give estimates for the work and could she please be there to show them exactly what needed to be done. The upshot of this grinding bureaucracy was that last time when one of her window frames had disintegrated, it took two months to get it repaired!
Thinking these thoughts, she had a hot bath and a cup of tea, put on her clothes and a mac and went out into the still-glistening streets of Kensington. She had only two months left of her lease on the flat. It was not much of a place. She’d taken it at first as a stop-gap while she looked for a flat to buy. Then she’d met Duncan and renewed her tenancy because she and Duncan were going to buy a house together once they were married. And then Duncan had gone to China. And then . . . !
She made her way to Kensington High Street and browsed the estate agents’ windows. Since the time she’d been all set to buy something for herself, prices seemed to have risen amazingly! Even with her savings and the thousand pounds Hector had given her as her share of the reward for finding the Duchess’s statue, she’d need a large mortgage, and as she didn’t have a regular job, she probably wouldn’t be able to get one! She looked in the windows that had details of flats to let. Goodness! Rents had gone up too. Her rent was a bargain; it was sure to be increased if she wanted to renew her lease in two months’ time.
