Oisín McGann - Ancient Appetites

'Good God!' Gerald exclaimed. 'What on earth was that racket?'

'It has an unusual repertoire,' Nathaniel explained to his sister. 'You have to learn how to use it. It took me a while… And you should have heard the abuse I got aboard ship until I got the hang of it.'

Tatiana was wearing that mixed expression of horror and fascination peculiar to girls of a certain age. She didn't speak for a full minute, staring fixedly at the bird.

'If you'll excuse me,' she said at last, 'I think I'll take it to my room.'

'By all means.' Gerald waved her away. 'Take the little menace as far away as you like.'

Nathaniel waited until his sister had left before speaking again. Gerald was touching the side of his head tenderly.

'I've got a buzzing sound in my ears,' he complained. 'That thing could have deafened us all.'

'I've got a favour to ask,' Nate said to him.

'Well, ask it then.'

'You're in… what – the third year of medical school?'

'I may jump up to fourth,' Gerald said modestly. 'The others are very slow.'

Gerald was a genius; everyone who knew him knew that. He was less than two years older than Nate, but several years ahead in education and, as he delighted in pointing out, in evolutionary development.

'Have you done any autopsies yet?' Nate prompted him. 'Anything like that? I want you to come and see Marcus's body before they finish fixing it up.'

Gerald looked at him and sighed.

'Nate. Warburton's already examined it. He said there was no foul play'

'I want to see for myself… And I need you to help me,' Nate pressed him. 'You'll see things I won't. Please, Gerald. You know Warburton's half blind, and nobody's taking this seriously enough.'

Gerald stroked the surface of the shield, avoiding his cousin's gaze.

'Maybe you should be thankful for that, Nate. If they did find something, you know who'd be first to be blamed. Berto's been sidelined – as we all knew he would be. You'll control the money when the old man's dead. The fingers will point at you. I mean, nobody would do anything about it, of course. That's the Wildenstern way. But everybody's feelings are a bit raw at the moment. Maybe it's better left alone.'

Nathaniel stared hard at him. He knew his face had turned red.

'You don't think I had anything to do with this, do you?' he asked quietly.

'Of course not, old chap,' Gerald assured him, smiling slightly. 'But maybe you shouldn't stir things up. After all, if you didn't do it, who did? Not Berto, that's for certain.'

'No, not Berto,' Nate said, shaking his head. 'But what about his wife?'

Gerald looked sceptical for a moment, and then he frowned. None of them knew Daisy very well, but they were aware that she was ambitious and intelligent. And while she appeared to be fiercely loyal to Berto, she was nothing if not wilful. If Berto ascended to the position of Patriarch, she would become one of the most powerful women in Europe – and Berto already consulted with her before making any major decisions. Gerald shook his head.

'I don't think she'd have the nerve, Nate,' he said at last. 'Don't get me wrong: she's a gold-digger, there's no doubt about that – take the shirt off your back if you gave her half a chance. But I just can't see her doing away with anybody. She's… Well, she's a woman, for God's sake.'

'Will you come with me or not?'

'I don't think you should-'

'Somebody murdered him!' Nate shouted. 'They killed my brother and I want to know who! He shouldn't have died like that – not in some stupid bloody fall off a bloody mountain.' Nathaniel was taken aback to find tears streaming down his face. His voice was cracking into sobs and his breath started to catch in his chest. 'It's not right! It… it… You've got to help me find the vermin that did this, Gerald. Somebody's got to pay for this!'

His legs felt suddenly weak and he staggered over to a stool and sat down. He wanted to shout some more, but instead he found his pride stripped bare as he broke down in front of his cousin. Gerald left the room for a few minutes to spare his friend some embarrassment, and came back with a steaming cup of coffee once Nate's sobs had calmed down. Gerald often served himself when he was in the midst of delicate experiments. He found servants a terrible distraction at times. Nathaniel took the cup gratefully and sipped the hot, bitter contents.

'I've already seen the body' Gerald told him gently.

'You went without me?' Nate frowned, wiping his face with his handkerchief.

'Last night, after you'd gone to bed, I helped Warburton with the… the reconstruction,' Gerald said. 'I didn't find anything suspicious – but that doesn't mean you're wrong. I mean, maybe it was foul play. All I'm saying is… Look, he was in a bad way, all right? He fell from a height and his body was… it was horribly damaged, Nate. I thought it would be better if you waited until he'd been patched up a bit. It's not how you'd want to remember him.'

Nate sniffed and blew his nose. He took another sip of the coffee and then put down the cup.

'I'll remember him how I like,' he grated.

Slipping off the stool, he strode towards the door.

'You shouldn't have done it without me,' he called over his shoulder before he left the room.

D aisy had long ago discovered that it was difficult to move discreetly in a voluminous crinoline dress; particularly one with heavy, embroidered binding on its tiered layers and flared over-sleeves that rustled as one moved. There were more practical dresses she could have worn in order to stalk her husband, but there were issues of style to consider.

And she loved the exotic, Chinese-orange colour.

Women in this day and age were not expected to be very mobile, but she was light enough on her feet as she kept a safe distance behind Roberto, letting him reach the next corner each time before she followed with quick, quiet steps.

Daisy glanced behind her, conscious that she was beginning to perspire. That would be a disaster. She tried to slow her pace, but Berto was tall and took long strides and would quickly outpace her if she gave him the chance. She nearly tripped on the hem of her dress and uttered an unladylike curse under her breath. Looking up, she was relieved to see Roberto had still not noticed her.

It was important that nobody else saw her either. Apart from being an undignified way for a lady to behave, the sight of her sneakily scurrying along after her husband would raise questions about their marriage. And she would not have that.

The servants were a different matter. Daisy passed a door and noticed a chambermaid pressed into the doorway, her face turned away They were everywhere, like mice; busy but unnoticed. Whenever a member of the family approached, the junior house servants were trained to hide or turn their faces to the wall until the way was clear again. They had to be as unobtrusive as possible, but Daisy was not fooled. She remembered sneaking around her own house as a little girl, trying not to be seen and listening in on the adults. The servants heard and saw everything. But there was nothing she could do about that except count on their abject fear of being sacked.

Roberto had been lying to her for some time; he was a woeful liar, so it hadn't required any great powers of deduction on her part to realize that he was hiding something from her. A secret that disturbed him so much that it had him tossing and turning in his sleep, and caused him to exhibit any number of other signs that any good wife would spot in her man. But she didn't think that anyone else had noticed, and if she had her way, they never would.