Carson's Conspiracy by Michael Innes Read Free Book Online Page A

military bearing from the waist up, from there downwards there was something that seemed immaterial about Punter, so that at times you could swear he was levitating rather than treading the carpet or the parquet. It was hard work conversing with Punter; he had no apparent fondness for saying anything other than ‘Thank you, sir’, and a particular fondness for saying it when told to go away. Carson suspected that this wasn’t quite right in a butler. He had from time to time been in the houses of other men who kept butlers, and had noticed that a little familiar chat between employer and employee seemed to be quite the thing. So he had become, as we have seen, suspicious of Punter, and inclined to wonder whether he was quite what he seemed to be. Carson wasn’t prepared to see this suspicion as madness (one mad person in a household being quite enough) but he knew there was a word for it – one of those troublesome para-something words – and that those were particularly liable to it who were occasionally troubled by the fussy and importunate curiosities of other men’s accountants and of beastly little lawyers on the make. Nevertheless he did insist on talking to Punter from time to time.
    â€˜Punter,’ he said, on the day following the completing of the portrait, ‘has your mistress said anything to you about preparing Mr Robin’s room?’ Carson wasn’t sure about ‘your mistress’, although it was certainly what people said in the rather old-fashioned novels he dipped into from time to time. Punter didn’t appear put out by it. He had an air of slight surprise, all the same.
    â€˜Mr Robin, sir?’ Punter asked – and perhaps with eyebrows ever so fractionally raised.
    â€˜Yes, damn it – Mr Robin. My son.’
    â€˜No, sir. But Mrs Carson would more probably speak to my wife.’
    â€˜Well – has she?’
    â€˜No, sir.’
    â€˜Mr Robin is coming on a visit. From America.’
    â€˜Very good, sir.’
    This struck Carson as a singularly idiotic thing to say, and for a moment, in the vulgar phrase, he lost his cool.
    â€˜Blast it, man!’ he said. ‘I sometimes can’t make you out. Don’t you like the job? There’s a remedy, if you don’t.’
    This time, and very understandably, Punter’s eyebrows did go right up.
    â€˜By no means, sir. And I only trust we give satisfaction. If I may venture on a remark, a household like your own – that of a gentleman of great wealth that is yet conducted in a modest manner – is particularly agreeable to persons like Mrs Punter and myself. On account of our having been, as we always so fortunately have been, only in the best service.’
    This speech astonished Carson. It astonished him – so taciturn was Punter’s normal habit – merely as being a speech (or ‘remark’) at all. There was something gratifying in being judged a gentleman of great wealth, which unfortunately wasn’t quite his own idea of himself. And ‘only in the best service’ was gratifying as well. He was in two minds, all the same – uncertain whether to embrace Punter and suggest they have a drink together, or to dismiss him on the spot on the strength of a monstrously impertinent irony. This dubiety (which speaks, after all, for that acuteness of perception which seldom deserted him) held him silent for a moment, so that it was left to Punter to sustain the dialogue.
    â€˜Would you yourself, sir, have any instructions to give in view of the young gentleman’s imminent arrival?’
    â€˜No, no – nothing of the sort. We’ll let you know when anything is required.’
    â€˜Thank you, sir.’
    Punter gave a bow – rather as a prime minister might do at the conclusion of an audience with a monarch – and withdrew.
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    So the moment for giving Cynthia her treat had come. Affording the first news of