Caroline Minuscule by Andrew Taylor Read Free Book Online Page A

‘We’re not running a post office here.’
    He left the room, exchanging a brief conspiratorial smile with the West Indian typist with a pert bottom, who had to suffer Miss Adlard’s moods on a nine-to-five basis.
    In the privacy of the passage, he examined the envelope. His name and the address of the college were written in a firm, rather elegant hand. He turned the envelope over, and was about to tear it open when he saw there was a sender’s address on the back.
    James Hanbury,
    c/o Messrs Coutts & Co.,
    10 Mount St,
    London W.1.

5
    T he house where Dougal lived was in a turning off Finchley Road. Its front door was set in an archway which was chiefly Perpendicular in inspiration, though there was more than a trace of the glory that was Greece in the pillars which supported the porch. The hall was gloomy now, but refreshingly cool and dark in summer. Its flagstones were laid out in a black and white chequerboard which reminded Dougal of Venetian palazzi and chamber music. Today, for some reason, he found himself thinking of that Emperor of China who laid out a courtyard as a chess board and played with condemned men, suitably attired, as the pieces, their deaths delayed or hastened according to the skills and strategies of the players. And would it have been better to have been a king or a pawn? Or even the Emperor on his balcony?
    Dougal took the stairs two at a time, his eyes gradually adjusting to the dim light which filtered through the stained glass windows at the half-landings.
    Dougal lived in the attic, on the third floor. Originally the space had housed a gigantic billiard table and nothing else; now it supplied him with a sitting room, a bedroom and a minute kitchen. Over all three rooms ran a long skylight which projected like a small aerial greenhouse over the flat roof of the house.
    He found Amanda in the sitting room. She was playing patience – a complicated two-pack version – on the rug in front of the electric fire. She didn’t look up, but when he touched her shoulder said, ‘Hullo, William,’ to the twelve columns and eight depots of cards on the floor. ‘Shan’t be a moment.’
    â€˜Red nine on black ten?’ said Dougal. ‘I’ll make some tea.’
    â€˜It won’t help. All my kings have gone. There isn’t any.’
    â€˜I bought some.’
    Dougal squeezed into the kitchen, filled the kettle and switched it on. While he was waiting for it to boil, he decanted the tea he had bought into the caddy, washed a pair of mugs and found the tray under the rubbish bin. There was a curious smell there again, he noticed, and wondered what exotic growths were thriving in its plastic lined interior this time. The kettle boiled, relieving him of the moral obligation to search for the source of the smell. He filled the teapot, put it on the tray and took it into the sitting room.
    Amanda was scraping the cards together. ‘The skylight’s leaking again,’ she said conversationally. ‘How were the police?’
    â€˜Dull. One was bored and the other picked his nose the whole time. Routine stuff.’ He put the tray on the octagonal table between the two armchairs. Suddenly he couldn’t preserve his facade of nonchalance any more. ‘Look, I had a letter today. From Hanbury. At least I suppose it’s a letter. I haven’t opened it yet.’
    Amanda looked at him incredulously. She wore the expression which always made Dougal feel about five and on the verge of committing some hideous misdemeanour such as putting his knife in his mouth.
    â€˜You mean you didn’t open it?’
    â€˜No. It seemed better to wait. I mean, God knows what’s in it. Why don’t you pour the tea while I open it?’
    Dougal took out his penknife, cut the string and slit open the flap of the envelope. Inside were two smaller envelopes, one containing a letter, the other a bundle of bank notes fastened with a rubber