Jeffrey Archer - Cometh the Hour

Sebastian hesitated for a moment, then opened his diary. “This Sunday isn’t possible as it’s my daughter’s birthday. But I’m free the following Sunday.”

“It will be too late by then,” said Mellor, without explanation.

Seb hesitated again. “What time are visiting hours?” he eventually managed, but the line had gone dead.

“How many years have you worked for the company, Frank?” asked Emma.

“Nigh on forty, ma’am. Served your father, and your grandfather before him.”

“So you’ll have heard the story of the Maple Leaf ?”

“Before my time, ma’am, but everyone in the yard is familiar with the tale, though few ever speak of it.”

“I have a favor to ask, Frank. Could you put together a small gang of men who can be trusted?”

“I’ve two brothers and a cousin who’ve never worked for anyone else but Barrington’s.”

“They’ll need to come in on a Sunday, when the yard is closed. I’ll pay them double time, in cash, and there will be an incentive bonus of the same amount in twelve months’ time, but only if I’ve heard nothing of the work they carried out that day.”

“Very generous, ma’am,” said Frank, touching the peak of his cap.

“When will they be able to start?”

“Next Sunday afternoon. The yard will be closed until Tuesday, Monday being a bank holiday.”

“You do realize you haven’t asked me what it is I want you to do?”

“No need to, ma’am. And if we should find what you’re lookin’ for in the double bottom, what then?”

“I ask no more than that the remains of Arthur Clifton should be given a Christian burial.”

“And if we find nothing?”

“Then it will be a secret the five of us take to our graves.”

Archibald Douglas James Iain Fenwick, the tenth earl of Fenwick, was among the last to arrive.

When he entered the room, everyone rose, acknowledging that the title had been passed on to the next generation. He joined his two younger brothers, Fraser and Campbell, in the front row, where one chair remained unoccupied.

At that moment Virginia was just leaving the Caledonian Hotel, having enjoyed her breakfast with the chief executive of Teacher’s Scotch whisky. A price had been agreed, and all that remained was for the lawyers to draw up a contract.

She decided to walk the short distance to Bute Street, confident that she still had a few minutes to spare. When she arrived outside the offices of Ferguson, Ferguson and Laurie, she found the front door open. She stepped inside to be greeted by an articled clerk, who was glancing at his watch.

“Good morning, my lady. Would you please make your way up to the first floor, as the reading of the will is about to begin.”

“I think you’ll find they won’t start without me,” Virginia said before she began to climb the stairs to the first floor. The sound of expectant chattering suggested the direction she should be heading for.

When she entered the crowded room, nobody stood. She made her way to the front row and took the empty seat between Archie and Fraser. She had hardly settled when a door in front of her opened and three gentlemen dressed in identical black jackets and pin-striped gray trousers entered the room and took their places behind a long table. Did anyone still wear stiff wing collars in 1978, Virginia wondered. Yes, the partners of Ferguson, Ferguson and Laurie, when reading the last will and testament of a Scottish earl.

Roderick Ferguson, the senior partner, poured himself a glass of water. Virginia thought she recognized him, and then realized he must be the son of the man who had represented her when she had divorced Giles over twenty years ago. The same bald dome with a thin girdle of grey hair, the same beak nose and half-moon glasses. Virginia even wondered if they were the same pair of half-moon glasses.

As the clock behind him struck nine, the senior partner glanced in the direction of the earl and, after receiving a nod, turned his attention to the assembled gathering. He coughed — another affectation inherited from his father.

“Good morning,” he began, in a clear, authoritative voice with a slight Edinburgh burr. “My name is Roderick Ferguson, and I am the senior partner of Ferguson, Ferguson and Laurie. I am joined today by two other partners of the firm. I had the privilege,” he continued, “as did my father before me, of representing the late earl as his legal advisor, and it has fallen upon me to administer his last will and testament.” He took a sip of water, followed by another cough.

“The earl’s final will was executed some two years ago, and duly witnessed by the procurator fiscal and the Viscount Younger of Leckie.”

Virginia’s mind had been drifting, but she quickly focused her full attention on Mr. Ferguson when he turned to the first page of the will and began to distribute what was left of her father’s spoils.

Archie, the tenth earl, who had been running the estate for the past twenty years, was touched that the old man left him a pair of Purdey shotguns, his favorite fishing rod and a walking stick that William Gladstone had left behind after spending the night at Fenwick Hall. He had also bequeathed him Logan, his faithful Labrador, but he had died the day after his master had been laid to rest.

The second son, Fraser, a mere lord, had been running the Glencarne estate, with its extensive stalking, fishing and shooting rights, for almost as many years. He received an oil portrait of his grandmother, the Dowager Duchess Katherine, painted by Munnings, and the sword that Collingwood had worn at Trafalgar.

The third son, Campbell, who had lived at 43 Bute Square for the past fifteen years since his days as a houseman at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, ended up with a clapped-out Austin 30 and a set of ancient golf clubs. Campbell didn’t possess a driving license, and had never played a round of golf in his life. However, none of the brothers were surprised, or displeased, with their lot. The old man had done them proud, as there wouldn’t be a lot of inheritance tax to pay on a fishing rod or a 1954 Austin 30.

When Mr. Ferguson turned the page, Virginia sat bolt upright. After all, she was the next in line. However, the next recipient to be named was the earl’s sister, Morag, who inherited several pieces of the family jewelry and a rent-free cottage on the estate, all of which would revert to the tenth earl on her demise. There then followed several cousins, nephews and nieces, as well as some old friends, before Mr. Ferguson moved on to retainers, servants, ghillies and gardeners who had served the earl for a decade or more.

The senior partner then turned to what looked to Virginia like the last page of the will.

“And finally,” he said, “I leave the five-hundred-acre estate that lies west of the Carley Falls, and includes the Glen Fenwick Distillery—” he couldn’t resist pausing to cough — “to my only grandson, the Hon. Frederick Archibald Iain Bruce Fenwick.” An audible gasp went up in the room, but Ferguson ignored it. “And I ask my eldest son, Archibald, to be responsible for the running of the distillery until Frederick acquires the age of twenty-five.”

The tenth earl looked just as surprised as everyone else in the room, as his father had never mentioned his plans for the distillery. But if that was what the old man wanted, he would make sure his wishes were carried out in keeping with the family motto, “Without fear or favor.”

Virginia was about to storm out of the room, but it was clear that Mr. Ferguson hadn’t finished. A few murmurings could be heard as he refilled his glass with water before returning to his task.

“And last and certainly least,” he said, which created the silence he had intended, “I come to my only daughter, Virginia. To her I bequeath one bottle of Maker’s Mark whisky, in the hope that it will teach her a lesson, although I have my doubts.”