Not to Disturb (9 page)

‘Bite his finger and keep him quiet,' says Clovis to
Sister Barton.

‘He was only doing his thing,' says Hadrian.

Lister says, ‘Kings and queens of olden days used to
consummate in public. They had four-poster beds with curtains. The court had to
stand by to see the curtains shake when Mary Queen of Scots married the Dauphin
of France, compared to whom our friend from the attic, here, is an Einstein. And
so, my dear Heloise, nobody can now contest the validity of your nuptials on the
grounds that they haven't been consummated.'

‘They were not consummated,' say Heloise. ‘Only
almost.'

‘To the eye of the candid camera,' says Lister, ‘the
marriage was consummated. Isn't that so, Mr Samuel?'

‘Yes,' says Mr Samuel. But nobody is listening. Lister is
offering a pen and two sheets of typewritten paper to the Reverend. ‘The
marriage certificate,' he says. ‘Will you sign your witness, Reverend? I have
already signed. In duplicate.'

The Reverend is looking round him as if wondering where
he is.

‘Sign?' he says. ‘Oh yes, of course, I'll put my name.
And the happy couple has to sign, too.' He beams at everyone, takes out his
glasses, rests the piece of paper on Eleanor's flat prayer book and signs. ‘The
bridegroom,' he says, ‘then the bride.'

‘Bite his finger,' says Clovis to Sister Barton, ‘or
you're fired.'

Tearfully, she takes the little finger of the trumpeting
patient in her mouth and bites. He starts to giggle and, although she lets go,
does not stop. Lister places the pen in the giggler's hand and raising the paper
and the hard book to a convenient level, moves the limp and helplessly amused
hand over the space provided until the name is traced, Gustav A. Klopstock. ‘The
Anthony would have taken too long,' says Lister, very satisfied in his
expression of face. ‘You never know when his milder spells will stop. Now,
Heloise.' Heloise takes the pen and writes her name above the typed address, in
the space reserved for her. ‘We register this tomorrow,' says Lister. ‘It's a
quarter to seven. Time has flown. Sister Barton, Pablo will assist you. Give him
a nice warm drink and an injection.'

‘I must go home to bed,' says the Reverend. ‘Where did I
leave my bike?' He looks around the very untidy drawing-room.

‘In this storm,' Lister says, ‘you can't ride back to
Geneva, Reverend. We have a bed for you. We shall always have a bed for you,
Reverend. Eleanor, show the Reverend to his room.'

‘Nice of you, very kind under the circumstances,' says
the Reverend. ‘I want to show a press-cutting to Cecil Klopstock. Where is
he?'

‘The Baron is not to be disturbed.'

‘Tell him I want to see him when he wakes up.'

V

‘Bear in mind,' says Lister, ‘that when dealing with the
rich, the journalists are mainly interested in backstairs chatter. The popular
glossy magazines have replaced the servants' hall in modern society. Our
position of privilege is unparalleled in history. The career of domestic service
is the thing of the future. The private secretaries of the famous do well, too.
Give me another cup of coffee, please Eleanor. It's almost time to go up and
change.'

They are seated round the large table where breakfast
seems to be as rapidly begun as nearing its end. The storm has retreated from
the near vicinity of the house, but continues to prowl on the lake and the
mountain-sides. Every now and again there is a banging of fists, a shouted
demand, on the back door. Nobody takes any notice.

‘Are there any grapes in the house?' says Heloise.

‘No, you had the last of them,' says Clovis.

‘Well, you're wrong,' says Irene, ‘because I brought her
a huge big bunch from Geneva. They're in the pantry. I got them from that
boyfriend who's a steward on the first class TWA.'

‘Irene, what a treasure the Klopstocks have lost in you
by their death!' says Lister.

Irene looks modestly at her crumby plate.

Clovis yawns and leans his elbows on the table and his
head on his hands. ‘I'm worn out,' he says. ‘I'll be glad to get to bed.' He
gets up, goes into the pantry and returns with a tray on which are set a plate
of large green grapes, a bowl of water in which to dip them and a tiny pair of
scissors with which to snip them off their twigs. He places them before Heloise.
‘Long live the Baroness!' he says.

Heloise pats her stomach.

Mr Samuel then goes to open the back door. He can be
heard saying, ‘You'll have to wait. Victor Passerat's not available just
yet.'

‘We've lost the keys of the car,' says the woman's
voice.

‘Well, look for them.'

‘The ground's all wet. We're soaked through. Can't we
come in and telephone to a garage, or something?'

‘Sorry, strangers aren't permitted.'

‘What can we do? We can't get in the car, and we can't
get out of the gate. The porter won't open it for us.'

‘Take a stroll in the grounds,' advises Mr Samuel.

‘It's wet. We'll get caught in another downpour. This is
a terrible place.'

‘You should always,' says Mr Samuel, ‘avoid terrible
places.'

Returning to the servants' dining-room he says,
‘Amateurs. Where's my camera? It's just possible I could get a few shots of them
to fit in an educational film I've got going. The young have to be taught about
the average aberrant in the street.'

He takes his camera to the window and focuses.

Lister, dressed smartly for the day's work, stands at the
open front door like a gloomy shopkeeper looking at the dark, rumbling sky as
Theo comes up the drive on his bicycle. Theo makes a questioning sign, pointing
round to the back of the house. ‘No, come here,' says Lister.

Theo tremulously parks his bicycle against the dripping
hedge and walks the rest of the way.

‘I called for you, Theo, because there is something
strange to report,' Lister says. ‘Come right in.'

The others are coming downstairs, with sleeplessness in
their movements and on their faces. The servants are dressed in their morning
overalls. Behind them come Mr Samuel in a knee-length blue bath-robe and Mr
McGuire in a black and white striped dressing-gown.

‘What's going on?' says Mr Samuel.

Theo says, ‘There's something peculiar been going on all
night.'

‘Do you like the job, Theo?' says Lister.

‘Yes, Lister,' he says.

‘Well, you can keep it. Only remember that nothing
peculiar has been going on, as indeed it hasn't. I want only to inform you here
and now that the light is on in the library as it was last night when we went to
bed with orders not to disturb the Baron Klopstocks and their guest and,
furthermore, this morning the door is locked from the inside and there is no
response.'

‘What's happened?' says Theo. ‘You know, my Clara has had
dreams, terrible dreams. Have you knocked hard enough?'

Lister goes to the library door, tries the handle, shakes
it, then knocks loudly. ‘Sir!' he says. ‘Madam!'

‘We'd better break it down,' says Theo, looking at the
others one by one.

‘I have orders not to disturb,' Lister says. ‘We shall
call the police.'

‘Clara will be frightened,' says Theo.

‘Tell her to confide in the police about her dreams, and
get it off her chest,' says Lister. ‘The more she says about her dreams when
questioned, the better. As far as you two in the lodge are concerned we have
been such stuff as dreams are made on all through the stormy night.'

‘There's a couple been wandering the grounds all night,'
says Theo. ‘They came in the car and I wouldn't let them out, as you ordered.
Now they've lost the keys of the car and they're taking shelter under a tree.
They look a suspicious pair to me.'

‘Forget them,' says Mr Samuel. ‘They're only extras.'

‘Better go back to Clara,' says Lister. ‘It's nearly
eight o'clock. See that the gates are opened.'

‘All right, Lister,' says Theo in a hushed voice, looking
towards the library. Then he departs quickly through the open door, mounts his
bicycle and starts off up the drive. He gets drenched almost immediately for at
that moment the storm descends with full concentration on the Klopstocks'
country seat. Theo pedals vigorously, and rounding a bend he is forced to get
off his bicycle and press forward on foot along the loud storm-darkened avenue,
streaked every now and then as it is with a dart of lightning. On the way he
passes a clump of trees under one of which, shrinking into the bark, are the
couple of wandering friends from the car. Theo staggers onwards up the twisting
drive and at the porch of his house lets fall the bicycle, bends through the
torrent to the gates of the house, unlocks them and throws them open. Then he
returns to the lodge and tumbles indoors.

Meanwhile the lightning, which strikes the clump of trees
so that the two friends huddled there are killed instantly without pain,
zig-zags across the lawns, illuminating the lily-pond and the sunken rose garden
like a self-stricken flash-photographer, and like a zip-fastener ripped from its
garment by a sexual maniac, it is flung slapdash across Lake Leman and back to
skim the rooftops of the house, leaving intact, however, the well-insulated
telephone wires which Lister, on the telephone to Geneva, has rather feared
might break down.

Having alerted the police and quiveringly recommended an
ambulance with attendant doctors and nurses, Lister now telephones to the
discreet and well-appointed flat in Geneva which he prudently maintains, and
extends a welcome to the four journalists who have been Very waiting up all
night for the call, playing poker meanwhile, with the ash-trays piled high.

‘Our four friends,' Lister then instructs the household,
‘are to have first preference in anything you can say to them. They will, of
course, have the scandal exclusives which Mr Samuel and Mr McGuire have prepared
in the form of typescript, photographs and sound recordings. The television,
Associated Press and the local riff-raff are sure to question you wildly: answer
likewise — say anything to them, just anything, but keep them happy. Isn't that
right, Clovis?'

‘Yes, the arrangements between our four special friends,
ourselves, and our numbered accounts in the Swiss Trust Corporate can be left to
Lister. We don't have any arrangements with the others. Keep them happy, that's
all. For the television, throw your heads into your hands and sob, or display a
sad disapproval of your late employers.'

‘I want to go to bed,' says Heloise.

‘I shall see that you are allowed to retire at the
earliest possible moment, Heloise.'

‘Listen to Lister,' says Eleanor.

Lister then books a telephone call to the residence of
Count Rudolph Klopstock in Rio de Janeiro, and having done this, says to the
others, ‘There's a delay to Brazil and they're five hours back. We should get
the Count somewhere between 4 and 5 a.m. Rio time, and allowing for human nature
on the telephone exchange between here and there the news will get around pretty
quickly.'

‘The brother ought to know,' says Eleanor.

‘Know what?' says Lister.

‘About the brother,' says Eleanor.

‘At the present moment,' says Lister, ‘all we ourselves
know is that the library door is locked with the Baron, the Baroness and their
young friend unresponsive. We're justifiably apprehensive, that's all. Here
comes the crime squad. Group yourselves apprehensively.'

He opens the front door to the sound of sirens in the
storm. Two police cars pull up at the door followed by an ambulance. An
inspector of police, a police detective, two plain-clothes men, three uniformed
policemen and a police photographer troop in the open door. The ambulance crew
alight and come in out of the rain.

‘This is the door, Inspector,' says Lister, leading the
way to the library.

The Inspector turns the handle, rattles it, bangs on the
door and listens.

‘Are you sure there's somebody inside?'

‘We fear so. The light's still on as it was last night.
The Baron gave orders they were not to be disturbed,' Lister says. ‘I have
already put through a call to the Baron's brother, as I felt it was right.'

‘Open the door,' says the Inspector. Two hefty policemen
break it down. The Inspector and his men crowd into the room. Lister follows
while the rest of the household approaches the threshold. Mr Samuel's camera
clicks. Mr McGuire has a small, light apparatus dangling from his wrist. The
body of the Baroness is lying on the floor by the window in a large dark red
stain. That of Victor Passerat lies curled against a bookcase which is well
splashed with his blood. The Baron's body is slumped over a round table with a
revolver not far from his fingers.

The women scream.

‘Take the girls away,' says the Inspector to a
plain-clothes man. ‘Put them in the kitchen and make them calm down.'

Clovis leads the way to the servants' quarters while the
Inspector says to Lister, ‘Didn't you hear anything during the night? No shots?
No shouting or screaming?'

The wind encircles the house and the shutters bang. From
the attic comes a loud clatter. ‘No, Inspector. It was a wild night,' says
Lister.

Up the drive comes a caravan of cars.

The doctor has scrutinised the bodies, the police have
taken their statements, they have examined and photographed the room. They have
confiscated a letter written by the Baron, to the effect that he has just shot
his wife and his secretary and is about to shoot himself, that this is the only
solution and that he has no ill feelings against anyone. The Inspector has
permitted Lister to read it but has refused it to the reporters who now swarm in
the great hall and make a considerable hubbub.

The women have been released from the kitchen, having
given their shaken and brief testimony, and again join the household group at
the door of the library.

‘I must have a last look,' says Eleanor. Heloise casts a
doleful eye at a television camera which does not fail to register it. The noise
from the reporters swells as, one by one, the covered bodies on their stretchers
are borne out of the room. ‘Here they come,' says Lister to his troop,
‘Klopstock and barrel.'

The bodies are stowed away in the ambulance. The police
seal off the main quarters of the house, pushing the reporters out into the
subsiding storm and requesting the servants to retire to their wing.

The doctor then suggests he takes away the ladies to be
treated for shock, but they bravely resist. ‘The porter's wife,' says the
Inspector, ‘could do with a bit of treatment. Better take her.'

‘I should take them both, sir,' says Lister.

The reporters now crowd in the back door. ‘Inspector,'
says Lister, ‘I shall deal with them briefly then turn them out. We're all
rather shaken. If you want any further information we are here.'

‘Very helpful,' says the Inspector. ‘I'll leave a couple
of my men to guard the house. Don't let anyone into the library or upstairs, any
of you.'

Heloise says, ‘They won't go upstairs, you can be sure of
that. My Monet and my Goya are upstairs. One can't be too careful.'

‘I beg your pardon?' says the Inspector.

‘She is overwrought,' says Lister and says a word or two
in the Inspector's ear.

‘Yes, yes,' says the Inspector, eyeing Heloise.

Lister murmurs another few words, gesturing towards the
ceiling.

‘Oh yes,' says the Inspector, looking up. ‘We know about
him. Relative of the Baroness.'

‘No, the Baron.'

‘Really? — Oh, well. An unfortunate family.'

Lister adds a further piece of information in an
undertone.

‘Yes, well, if he's the father, you did the right thing,'
says the Inspector, anxious to join his men in the police car which is now
waiting at the back door. He shoves his way through the crowd, refusing comment,
and drives off.

•

Very soon Lister's four friendly journalists
go to their car with their brief-cases under their arms, and drive away.

‘Now for the riff-raff,' Lister says to his clan,
‘Eleanor and Clovis can take one bunch in the sitting-room. Heloise and I will
hold our press conference in the pantry. Hadrian and Irene can sit round the
kitchen table with Pablo, representing the young approach. Mr Samuel and Mr
McGuire — you can go the rounds.'