P. James - The Skull Beneath The Skin

'Yes, as you see. I wanted a solicitor in a hurry. It's rather urgent.'

'Yeah, that's the thing about solicitors. If you have to have 'em it's usually urgent. You could try Beswick. He's got an office in Gentleman's Walk. About thirty yards down the street and turn left. He's about half-way up on the right.'

Cordelia thanked him and ran. Gentleman's Walk was easily found, a narrow cobbled street of elegant early eighteenth-century houses. A brass name-plate, polished to the point of being almost indecipherable, identified James Beswick, Solicitor. Cordelia was relieved to see that a light still shone behind the translucent glass and the door opened to her touch.

Seated at the desk was a fat, rather untidy woman with immense scarlet-rimmed spectacles, wearing a tightly belted suit in a brightly patterned cretonne of overblown roses and intertwined vine leaves which gave her the look of a newly upholstered sofa. She said:

'Sorry, we're shut. Call or ring tomorrow, ten o'clock onwards.'

'But the door was open.'

'Literally, but not figuratively. I should have locked it five minutes ago.'

'But since I'm here… it's very urgent. It won't take more than a few minutes, I promise.'

A voice from an upper room called out: 'Who is it, Miss Magnus?' 'A client. A girl. She says it's very urgent.' 'Is she comely?'

Miss Magnus jerked her spectacles to the end of her nose and looked at Cordelia over the rims. Then she shouted up the stairs:

'What's that got to do with it? She's clean, she's sober and she says it's urgent. And she's here.'

'Send her up.'

The footsteps receded. Cordelia, suddenly assailed by doubts, asked:

'He is a lawyer, isn't he? A good one?'

'Oh yes, he's that all right. Nobody's ever said that he isn't a good lawyer.'

The emphasis on the last word was ominous. Miss Magnus nodded at the staircase.

'You heard him. First floor to the left. He's feeding his tropical fish.'

The man who turned to her from the window was tall and gangling with a lean, creased, humorous face and half-spectacles worn low on his long nose. He was sprinkling seed from a packet into an immense fish tank, not shaking it from the packet but pinching small quantities between his fingers and dropping the seed in a careful pattern on the surface of the water. There was a tumble of red and bright blue as the fish swirled together and snapped at the food. He pointed as one of the fish streaked to the surface in a blaze of polished bronze.

'Look at him. Isn't he a beauty? That's the dawn tetra, an expensive little fellow from British Guiana. But perhaps you prefer the glowlight tetra. There he is, lurking under the shells.'

Cordelia said:

'He's very beautiful, but I don't much enjoy tropical fish in tanks.'

'Is it the fish or the tanks or the conjunction you object to? They're perfectly happy I assure you, at least one assumes so. Their small world has been artistically and scientifically devised for their comfort, and they get their food regularly. They sow not neither do they reap. Ah, there's a beauty! Look at that flash of gold and green.'

Cordelia said:

'I wanted some urgent information. It isn't about my affairs, it's just a general inquiry. You do give that kind of advice?'

'Well, it isn't usual. I'm not sure that it's wise. Solicitors are rather like doctors. You can't really generalize or deal in hypotheses; each case is unique. You have to know all the circumstances if you're really going to help. That's an interesting analogy, come to think of it; and I'll go further. If your doctor tells you to go abroad at once you can always settle for sunny Torquay instead. If your solicitor suggests you go abroad, you'd be wise to make for Heathrow immediately. I hope you're not in that precarious situation.'

'No, but it's about going abroad that I've come to consult you. I want to know about tax avoidance.'

'Do you mean tax avoidance, which is legal, or tax evasion, which isn't?'

'The first. Suppose I came into a very large sum of money, all of it in one tax year. Could I avoid paying tax if I went abroad for twelve months?'

'That depends what you mean by "came into a large sum of money". Are you talking about an inheritance, a gift, a football pool win, a sale of property or shares or what? You're not contemplating a bank raid, are you?'

'I mean earned income. Money I received by writing a successful play or a novel, or painting a picture or acting in a film.'

'Well if you were sensible you would arrange your contracts so that the money wasn't all received during the one financial year. That would be a matter for your accountant rather than for me.'

'But suppose I didn't expect it to be so successful?'

'Then you could avoid paying tax on it by becoming non-resident for the whole of the subsequent financial year. Money earned in that way is taxed retrospectively as you probably know.'

'Could I come home for a holiday or weekend?' 'No. Not even for a day.' 'Suppose I needed to? I might be homesick.' 'I should strongly advise you not to. Tax exiles can't afford the luxury of homesickness.' 'But if I did come back?' He sighed.

'If you really want an authoritative answer I would have to do some delving to see if there is any case law. And as I say, it's more a question for a tax accountant than for me. My present view, for what it's worth, is that you would become liable for tax on the income received during the whole of the preceding year.'

'And if I concealed the fact of my return from the Inland Revenue?'

'Then you could be prosecuted for attempted fraud. Probably they wouldn't bother with that if the amount wasn't large, but they would see that they got the tax due. I mean, they're in the business of getting their hands on tax properly due.'

'How much would that be?'

'Well the present top rate on earned income is sixty per cent.' 'And in 1977?'

'Ah, in those unregenerate days it was rather more. Eighty per cent or more on an income of over twenty-four thousand of taxable income. Something like that.'

'So they might ruin me?'

'Bankrupt you, you mean. Indeed they might if you were so ill advised as to spend all your previous year's income in advance in the confident expectation that it wouldn't be taxable. Death and taxation catch up with us all.'

'Thank you. You've been very kind. Can I pay now? If it's more than two pounds I'm afraid I'll have to give you a cheque. I have a cheque card.'

'Well, it hasn't taken very long, has it? And I think Miss Magnus has balanced the petty cash and locked away the box. Suppose you have this consultation on me?'

'I don't think that would be right. I ought to pay for your time.'

'Then put a pound in the doggy-box and we'll call it quits. When you've written your bestseller you can come back and I'll give you some proper advice and charge you highly for it.'

The doggy-box was on his desk, the brightly painted model of a lugubrious spaniel holding between his paws a collecting-tin bearing the name of a well-known animal charity. Cordelia folded in a couple of pound notes with the mental promise that she would charge only one to Sir George's account.

And then she remembered. There probably wouldn't be any account. Perhaps she would return to the office poorer than when she had left. Sir George had reassured her that she would be paid, but how could she charge him for so tragic a failure; it would be too like blood money. And how on earth would her bill be worded? It was strange how many small complications the huge complication of murder threw up. She thought: even in the midst of death we are in life, and the petty concerns of life don't go away.

She reached the harbour with two minutes to spare. She was surprised and a little disconcerted to find that the launch wasn't waiting, but told herself that Oldfield must have been kept by some job on the island; she was, after all, a little ahead of time. She sat on the bollard to wait, glad of the chance to rest although her mind, stimulated by the excitements of the day, soon drove her to action. She got up and began restlessly pacing the harbour wall. Below her a sluggish tide sucked at the verdigrised stones and a swag of seaweed spread its gnarled and drowned hands under the darkening surface. Daylight was fading and the warmth died with the light. One by one the houses climbing the hill lit their glowing oblongs behind drawn curtains and the winding streets became festive with sparkling necklaces of light. The late shoppers and holidaymakers had gone home and she heard only the occasional echo of a solitary footfall on the harbour wall. The little town, as if regretting its hours of unseasonable frivolity, was settling into a chill autumnal calm. The smells of summer were forgotten and a rank watery smell rose from the harbour.