Sarah Caudwell - The Sirens Sang of Murder

TO THE SENIOR CLERK 62 NEW SQUARE ABSOLUTELY PRIVATE AND TREMENDOUSLY CONFIDENTIAL

Dear Henry,

As per your esteemed instructions I have started negotiating with your deserted wife re her claim for increased maintenance. She says with five children fifty pence a week is not enough. Have pointed out that as you never divorced your first wife in Singapore or the one in Buenos Aires she has no legal rights and is lucky to get anything, but she seems to know about the money in your Swiss bank account and how you got it, so you may want me to offer a bit more to keep her quiet. The children do look rather hungry. Awaiting your instructions

Your sincere friend and well-wisher,

Titus A. Newt

The pseudonym deceived no one. The question whether it would be proper, as it would plainly be politic, to remove and destroy the message before it was seen by Henry was still under discussion when his arrival rendered it academic. Thinking the moment un-propitious to my errand, I joined Selena and Ragwort in seeking shelter from his rage in Basil Ptarmigan’s room — a room of such serene and elegant distinction, its walls lined with centuries of legal learning, that Henry would not venture, it was felt, to give rein there to his indignation.

We found Basil in consultation with Julia, who had persuaded her instructing solicitors that for the purpose of the appeal from Mr. Justice Welladay’s recent decision it was essential to engage the services of leading Counsel: she and Basil were now deliberating the grounds of the appeal. The eminent Silk accepted our apologies for the interruption, courteously implying that company so agreeable and distinguished could never be considered intrusive. Selena explained why we were obliged to seek refuge.

“As you know,” said Basil, “I have always had grave doubts of the wisdom of installing a telex machine. Technology is responsible for much that is wrong with the modern world — now we are going to have Henry in one of his difficult moods, and we all know how tiresome that is for everyone.”

“I’m not sure,” said Julia, “that it’s the existence of telex machines that’s wrong with the modern world — I’m inclined to think it’s the existence of Cantrip. He’s sent me a telex as well, and its contents are rather disturbing. Perhaps the rest of you would care to read it while Basil and I finish drafting our notice of appeal.”

TELEX M. CANTRIP TO J. LARWOOD TRANSMITTED GRAND HOTEL ST. HELIER 9:00 A.M. FRIDAY 27TH APRIL

Yoo-hoo there, Larwood, me here. All right so far advicewise, but thought you ought to know about chap here called Edward Malvoisin casting vile aspidistras on fair name of J. Larwood. Don’t worry, I got him sorted out all right — jolly lucky I did, bet you’ll never guess who was listening.

This Malvoisin chap is the Jersey lawyer for these characters I’m meant to be advising. Seemed like a pretty good egg to start off with — met me at the airport yesterday P.M., whizzed me off to the Grand Hotel, and began pouring booze down me like there was no tomorrow, so I took a pretty genial view of him.

I suppose you know the Grand Hotel — all potted plants and wickerwork, with the waiters still getting over the excitement of Queen Victoria’s Jubilee. It’s the sort of place where you’d expect to find my Uncle Hereward, sitting on the veranda chatting with his ex-army cronies about the great days of Empire. That reminds me, I meant to tell you — the old boy’s been threatening to come up to London for a few days. If he turns up before I get back, don’t let him get into any trouble. He’s fairly harmless really if you know how to handle him.

Where was I? Oh yes — me and the Malvoisin chap in the bar of the Grand Hotel. It was fairly early still, and we had it pretty much to ourselves. No one else around except a chap reading The Times in one corner and an old biddy all wrapped up in black shawls doing her knitting in another — probably got lost on the way to the guillotine.

The way your name cropped up was because I was telling Malvoisin I was in 62 New Square and he said he knew a bird in 63, and I said I knew a bird in 63 as well and they both turned out to be you. So of course we wittered on about you for a bit and to start off with he seemed to have pretty sound views on the subject, viz that you were hot stuff on double tax treaties and fanciable with it.

Only then he gave me a funny sort of look and said something like what a pity it was about you being the way you are. At first I thought what he was talking about was just your general sort of goopiness, and I pointed out that one didn’t mind it once one got used to it and anyway it wasn’t your fault. Then he gave me another funny look and said something about people in London being very broad-minded, and it turned out that what he thought was that you were like those ancient Greek birds who fancied other birds instead of chaps.

I don’t know how he got the idea, I expect it’s because you’re always talking bits of Latin. Anyway, I told him he was talking codswallop and you were one of the keenest chap fanciers I knew. He wouldn’t believe it at first but I told him I was talking from firsthand experience, nothing hearsay about it. He still looked as if he didn’t a hundred percent believe me, so I told him all about what happened after you won that case about goldfish in front of the Special Commissioners. It’s not the sort of thing I’d usually go into a lot of detail about to a chap I’d only just met, but the way I see it is that if you find someone casting aspidistras at an old mate, you’ve jolly well got to spring to the defence — I mean, you’d do the same for me, wouldn’t you, if you came across some bird saying “Nice chap, old Cantrip, pity about his cootlike tendencies”?

You might think it doesn’t matter a lot what someone says about you in the bar of the Grand Hotel because of there being no one to listen, but that just shows how wrong you can be. I’d just finished putting Malvoisin straight when the chap who was reading The Times got up to go and I saw who it was. Bet you’ll never guess, not in a million years.

All right, I’ll tell you, it was old Wellieboots, large as life, teeth and eyebrows included. Gave me a nasty shock seeing him there, all unexpected. Don’t know what he was doing there or how much he heard, but the point is that if he heard what Malvoisin said about you, he heard what I said as well. So it’s jolly lucky I was there, because you wouldn’t want old Wellieboots getting funny ideas about you, would you?

Have just sent frightfully witty telex to Henry. Don’t let on it was me — bet he’s as miffed as maggots.

Must dash off now and advise these trustee bods.

Over and out — Cantrip

There was some curiosity about what had happened after the case about goldfish, but Julia, though willing to explain in some detail the interesting questions of law raised by the case itself, declined to give particulars of its sequel. The first significant victory of her forensic career, the goldfish case had occurred at the time when she and Cantrip were on those terms conventionally described as closer than mere friendship. She had celebrated her triumph in his company, and with an exuberance more unrestrained than it might have been, she said, had she known that in future years it would be made the subject of a public proclamation to the senior judiciary.

“Oh dear,” said Selena. “I hope that isn’t going to cause you any embarrassment.”

“I suppose,” said Julia, “that when I next appear before Mr. Justice Welladay, the thought of his having quite such a detailed knowledge of what I had previously regarded as my private life may indeed be a trifle disconcerting. That, however, isn’t actually what I’m worried about. The thing that’s worrying me—”