Mark Gatiss - The Vesuvius Club

«Great Scott,» breathed Unmann.

The poor sap swallowed such stoic babble whole. I hoped it would keep the tick out of my way. He was, of course, the kind of dependable idiot upon whom the Diplomatic is founded but, really , was this the best they could do these days? If the king had any inkling of the state of things he’d probably pop another button off his waistcoat.

«Also, I need to know if someone called the Duce Tiepolo has recently re-entered the country.»

Unmann paused in his scribbling. «Illicitly?»

«I should think so. The new regime chucked him out. He has some curious connection to the business in hand.»

I snapped my fingers and ordered Unmann a cup of coffee. When it came he drank it in one swift gulp.

«Finally,» I continued, «I want whatever information you can dig up about the firm of Thomas Bowler, undertaker of London and Naples.»

Unmann nodded, scratching hurriedly in his pocket-book.

«Will you stay for lunch?» I offered, stomach rumbling.

«Can’t, I’m afraid,» he jabbered. «Office in a frightful mess. Got all old Jocelyn’s papers to sort through. Quite big shoes to fill. Now I’ll get on to these names just as soon as I can, Mr Box. I’ll cable the Santa Lucia if there’s any news. Got to dash» He glanced down at Poop’s book. «Holiday reading, eh? Might I ask—?»

«You may not. Most secret.» I flashed him my wide smile. «Good day to you.»

With a nod, Unmann was gone. At length, I ordered scrambled eggs and spiced sausage and turned my attention to the book. It was some kind of novel from what I could glean. And it must be precious indeed if it were to whet the appetite of the famous Sir Emmanuel Quibble.

The venerable scholar had always been, according to my researches, an exceptionally gifted man. He had shown extraordinary facility for music and the arts before turning his mind towards scientific matters at the ripe old age of seven after conducting a remarkable experiment with a song thrush and a vacuum tube. Tragically, only a few years later, he had been thrown from a gelding, sustaining a spinal injury that kept him confined, forever after, to a wheeled-chair. Ill-health had turned into a kind of mania and now he was said to positively thrive on his allergic reaction to the nineteenth (no, I keep forgetting, the twentieth ) century. In recent years the old fellow had withdrawn entirely from the world, moving to Italy and taking solace in his unrivalled library of arcane literature. Now I was being granted the rare privilege of entry to this inner sanctum. What would I find there?

I sat for a while with eyes closed, listening to the muffled aria that thrilled through the sunshine. How I loved Italy! The heat assuaged by salty air, bright with dragon-flies humming over starched white tablecloths. I caught sight of a woman a few tables from me. She had her back to me and I took the opportunity to drink in the details of her exquisite carriage.

She wore a splendid canary-yellow creation with a high, transparent collar, tight against her throat and her hair was hidden beneath the brim of a huge oval hat. Of course, there are few things in life more deceptive than a person’s back view. How many times have you yourself spotted someone at the theatre or on the underground whose magnificent bearing and gorgeous, swan-like neck have lured you into a state of unconditional lust? Only to discover, as they bend to read, to adjust a shoe or step off the staircase, that they have a face like a Transylvanian fish-wife.

I ordered tea with lemon and sat with my chin on my hand, surveying the lovely, graceful woman before me who would, any moment now, turn and reveal herself to be a gorgon.

The woman seemed to be listening to the aria as well. Her head was cocked attentively. I imagined she was smiling. At last she shifted in her seat and the sunshine illumined her face.

My teacup clattered on to its saucer.

The woman was Bella Pok.

I rose and, raising my hat, stepped into her line of sight. Shading her eyes, she smiled sweetly at me as though we had simply run into one another at the Café Royal.

«Lucifer!» she cried. «I’m so delighted. I had anticipated traipsing all over Naples to find you and yet here you are, large as life.»

She gestured to a chair and I sank into it. «I don’t suppose this is a coincidence?»

«Not a bit,» she said with a grin. «You really can’t expect a girl to return to her drab little existence after becoming involved in Mr Miracle’s adventure! Whatever’s going on, I yearn to be part of it. Please say you’ll have me!»

Which is the sort of invitation one longs to hear from such as Mademoiselle Pok.

I shook my head, however. «There is nothing going on. As I told you, I have business here in Naples which I hope to combine with a little sketching. You know it is vital for we daubers to refresh ourselves now and then.»

She looked hard at me.

«Don’t be so disappointing,» she said.

I sighed. «I’m afraid I must escort you back to your hotel, Miss Pok,» I said, «and then put you on the first boat back to England.»

«You certainly shan’t put me anywhere.»

«Bella»

«I want to be at your side, Lucifer!»

«On no account!» I snapped.

«But if there’s nothing to fear, then why ever not? Am I such an embarrassment?»

«Of course not.»

«Well then.»

She sighed and sat back in her chair, the brim of her hat eclipsing the dazzling disc of the sun. «Whatever can I do to persuade you?»

Well, she didn’t have to do much in the end. Fact is, I was fearfully besotted with her and her boldness in following me to Naples had only endeared her more to me. Over a kir or three, she cajoled and argued until all I could think of was the glow of her lovely face and the wide, inviting mouth I so longed to kiss.

«Very well,» I said at last. «If you mean to stay then you are welcome. But this is no holiday for me. You must excuse me if I have to… dash off at the most inopportune moments.»

«Of course.»

«May I see you to your hotel?»

She was staying, appropriately enough, at the Vesuvio. We made an appointment to meet there the next day and I walked back to the Santa Lucia, whistling if you don’t mind.

Well, she would certainly help take my mind off the business in hand. The danger was that she would do so too effectively. I had work to do in Naples. This was not a honeymoon.

After dressing for dinner I hailed a cab and barked out Quibble’s address in my ever-so-good Italian. I am, naturally, a master of languages. I have, in addition to robust Eye-tie, a little French, a little German and some particularly filthy Latin. I am also quite good at American.

Stooping to conquer with a « Pronto!» , I was ferried away up the steep slopes of the old city towards Capodimonte.

The weather had deteriorated into a stinker of an evening. Sweaty mist hung in great miasmic wreaths around the jumble of crumbling stucco, my carriage cutting a coffin-shaped swathe through it as we climbed ever higher. The humidity was so thick that the traffic seemed scarcely to move at all. I could hear the soft clop of horseshoes on the cobbles, muffled by the atmosphere as though for a funeral.

As we ascended the mountain, the mist cleared slightly to reveal verdant countryside thick with dark olive groves until, at last, the carriage drew to a halt. Six or seven lonely cottages clustered around the edifice of a mansion like mournful piglets around a long-dead sow.

It must have been a grim place at the best of times, but on an oppressive evening like this one, I felt positively mournful as I bid the driver wait and made my way up the weed-throttled gravel to the gates. Thick creepers were enmeshed in every part of the ironwork, as though a mob trying to get in had been turned, by some spell, into a jungle of rain-rotted vegetation.