Simon Green - The Dark Side of the Road

‘This,’ growled Walter, ‘is Ishmael Jones. A friend of James. So I expect you all to make him feel welcome!’

Everyone in the room reacted when they heard I knew the Colonel; everything from dropped jaws to narrowed eyes. But none of them said anything, even as they looked me over in their own interested ways. Whatever they’d just been arguing about was clearly forgotten now they were presented with the possibility of a new target.

I gave my fellow guests my full attention and smiled easily about me. Most of them managed some kind of smile in return.

Walter took me firmly by the arm and urged me forward. ‘Come over by the fire, Ishmael. Warm yourself up! You must be frozen, after driving so long through the damned snows to get here.’

An attractive young woman in her mid twenties immediately came to greet us, and Walter’s habitual scowl disappeared in a moment as he beamed fondly on her.

‘This is my daughter Penny, Ishmael. By my second wife Melanie, of course. Sometimes, I think Penny is the best thing this family has produced in a long time. Until the credit card bills arrive.’

‘Hello, Ishmael,’ said Penny. Her smile seemed genuine enough, as though she was actually pleased to see me. ‘A new face at Belcourt Manor! How delightfully unexpected. Are you my Christmas present? I can’t wait to unwrap you …’

‘Dear Penny,’ murmured Melanie. ‘Always so ready to say something inappropriate.’

‘Sorry, Mummy,’ said Penny. She didn’t sound it.

She put out a hand for me to shake, and then raised an eyebrow as my hand closed around hers.

‘How very warm your hand is, Ishmael! I’d never know you’d been out in the storm. Don’t you feel the cold?’

‘I’m very warm-hearted,’ I said solemnly. ‘Can I have my hand back?’

Penny let go of my hand, her scarlet mouth making a brief moue of mock disappointment. Melanie sighed quietly, while Walter chuckled. And only I saw Melanie’s pale pink lips silently form the words: Must you always be such a slut, dear?

Penelope Belcourt had long dark hair, flashing dark eyes, a pretty face with a good bone structure, seriously dramatic make-up, and a smile that suggested there wasn’t much she took seriously. As though the whole world was one big joke laid on for her entertainment. Just standing still, she burned with barely-suppressed nervous energy. Like someone who had a lot to give and was just looking for the right person to give it to. She was dressed fashionably, but sensibly, for a weekend in the winter countryside. No jewellery, as though she didn’t want anything about her that might distract you from looking at her.

‘It is interesting that Daddy didn’t see fit to inform any of us you’d be joining the party,’ Penny said smoothly.

‘Well, given the weather …’ said Walter.

‘I didn’t know I was coming here till I got the summons from the Colonel this morning,’ I said.

‘And you always do what James says?’ said Penny.

‘Always,’ I said. ‘Except for when I don’t.’

‘Penny, darling,’ murmured Melanie, ‘do get our new friend Ishmael a glass of our special hot toddy. Just the thing, to warm the inner man.’

Penny shot Melanie a quick look, and then grinned briefly. She picked up a heavy china mug from a side table and presented it to me gravely, holding the mug carefully with both hands so as not to spill a drop. Heavy steam rose up from the mug’s dark contents. There was something in Penny’s gaze as I accepted the mug from her, so I sipped the stuff carefully before giving my opinion.

‘Vile,’ I said. ‘Truly vile, with a creeping undertaste of Oh My God.’

I handed the mug back to Penny, who laughed out loud, delighted. She put the mug back where she found it, beside several other untouched mugs.

‘At last!’ she said happily. ‘Someone who’s actually prepared to speak his mind! How charming … You’re quite right, of course, Ishmael; it is a truly awful family concoction that only appears at Christmas gatherings. I think for the rest of the year they use it as a horse purge.’

‘Really, Penny! It’s an old established family recipe.’ Walter was trying to be annoyed with her, but couldn’t quite manage it. ‘Just a bit of an acquired taste, that’s all.’

‘Then why don’t you ever drink it?’ Penny said sweetly.

‘Well,’ said Walter. ‘A toddy that good isn’t something you want to overdo.’ And he smiled briefly at me, as though I’d passed some kind of test.

Penny nodded, thoughtfully. ‘You’ll do, Ishmael,’ she said. ‘You have possibilities.’

‘Oh, I do,’ I said. ‘Really. More than you can imagine.’

Walter took me by the arm again and led me away. None of us had said anything to the young man who’d been hovering sullenly at Penny’s side all the while. No doubt we’d get around to him, in time.

‘Now this, is Alexander Khan,’ said Walter, as we stopped before a slender, dapper Indian gentleman in his fifties. He wore a sharp business suit, complete with a snazzy waistcoat and shoes so brightly shined that you could see their maker’s face in them. I said hi, and Khan bid me welcome in the clipped English tones of someone who’d learned the tongue as a second language. Sleek dark hair, dark skin, and a round face with deeply-pouched eyes. He looked hard-used and overworked, and not at all interested in partaking of the Christmas spirit.

‘My business partner,’ said Walter. ‘Helped me rebuild the company, many years ago, and make it what it is today. I’m semi-retired now, but I still take a healthy interest in what’s going on.’

‘Not quite as retired as some of us would wish, alas,’ said Khan, looking at me rather than Walter. ‘If you will insist on still being a part of the decision-making process, Walter, you must shoulder your responsibilities. Important decisions will not wait, just because it is an official holiday.’

‘You don’t approve of taking Christmas off?’ I said.

Khan smiled frostily. ‘I am a Hindu, Mister Jones. I do not celebrate Christmas.’

‘That’s Alex for you,’ said Walter, chuckling loudly in an only slightly forced way. ‘This man has a hell of a lot of the old-fashioned Protestant Work Ethic in him, for a Hindu. Always weighed down by responsibilities and worrying where we’re going next. I keep telling him: slow down and learn to smell the coffee, or you’ll be dead of a heart attack long before you reach retirement age.’

Khan nodded absently. He was staring into my face and regarding me oddly. ‘Pardon me, Ishmael, but … It does seem to me you look remarkably like someone I used to work with, back in the eighties …’

Walter let out a sharp bark of laughter. ‘Well, it could hardly be the same man, could it, Alex? That was thirty years ago! Ishmael wouldn’t even have been born, back then!’

‘Perhaps you knew my father, Mister Khan,’ I said. ‘Which puts you one up on me, because I never met the man.’

‘Yes … Of course,’ said Khan. ‘That would have to be it, wouldn’t it …’ He gave me one last curious glance and then turned away, dismissing me so that he could give all his attention to Walter. ‘You and I need to talk, Walter. It is very important! You can’t keep putting it off!’

‘I think you’ll find I can, Alex,’ Walter said cheerfully. ‘I will do whatever I damn well please, in my own home.’

He moved away, and Khan immediately set off in pursuit, still trying to talk business while Walter talked loudly about anything but. I looked after Khan, remembering. He’d been perfectly correct, of course. I had known him in the eighties, back when we both worked for Black Heir. He left years before I did; one step ahead of being fired with extreme prejudice. He’d smuggled out a particular piece of alien technology, when he thought no one was looking, and used it to buy his way into one of the big communication companies. I hadn’t known it was the Colonel’s father’s company.