The Mortdecai Trilogy (Charlie Mortdecai #1-3)(159)

Yes, well, there on Albert Quay I stood, snuffing the sea breezes until the smell of used beer and vomit and package-tour operators presaged the advent of the Falaise.

I spotted him at once, a great rangy buck-priest in a silk soutane. Evil eyes burned from an ascetic face oddly marred by soft and sensual lips, which were just then snarling at the Customs man.

‘Hello,’ I said, offering a hand, ‘my name’s Mortdecai.’

He gave me a slow leer, disclosing an assortment of teeth which, had they been cleaner, would have done credit to an alligator.

‘And I suppose your friends call you “cheeky”,’ he retorted, sweeping past me to where a group of saucy-looking lads awaited him. He whispered to them and they all eyed me.

‘Isn’t he bold?’ one of them tittered.

Sweating with shame I moved off in quest of the true Fr Tichborne, who proved, when I found him, to be a well-washed, shiny little chap with a face just like that of a Volkswagen. He was sitting on a bench leafing through the latest copy of Playgirl with an air of studious detachment and wearing a snappy, dark-green mohair suit which he shouldn’t have been able to afford on a prep-school master’s salary. Exchanging humdrum civilities, we entered my Mini, where I noticed that he exuded a faint but agreeable smell of seed-cake, which I supposed was really the Pastis escaping from his well-opened pores. As we moved off, he let out a shrill cry of dismay. I clapped the brakes on.

‘My corporal!’ he squeaked, ‘I’ve forgotten my corporal!’ I was alarmed: Johanna is broad-minded about that sort of thing but Jock is not: he would make remarks.

‘Do you mean,’ I asked, ‘that you have brought a, er, Non-Commissioned friend with you?’

‘No no no,’ he said testily, ‘it’s the special altar corporal for the Mass we’re going to celebrate.’

Mystified, I helped him to search and we found, in the Customs shed, a string shopping-bag containing a lot of folded cloth.

‘Do show,’ I said.

‘Well, not here, I think. The embroidery on it might seem a little, well, surprising, to the casual bystander. And that Customs officer is observing us narrowly.’

On the way home we paused at the ‘Carrefour Selous’ for refreshment, early though it was.

‘This is a very characteristic local inn,’ I explained. ‘They drink something here called Pastis, I think, and speak highly of it. Would you care to try?’

‘I have heard of it,’ he said gravely, ‘and I long to try it.’

‘What do you think?’ I asked diffidently a little later.

‘Mmm. Quite delicious. Stronger than sherry, I fancy. I say, it won’t make me tight, will it?’

‘I shouldn’t think so.’

‘But what is that that you are drinking, Mr Mortdecai?’

‘It is called whisky. It is a malt liquor distilled in the highlands of Scotland. I believe they sell quite a lot of it in Jersey.’

We gazed at each other with straight faces. He was the first to laugh – after that there was no embarrassment. It takes one to know one, they say; whatever that means.

Johanna took to him on sight, which was reassuring for she is never wrong about people, whilst I almost always am. She was fussing over him and telling him how tired he must be and what could she offer him to drink (ha ha) when Jock loomed in the doorway and announced luncheon in the doom-laden voice of a servant who is in the mood to give in his notice at the drop of a hat.

‘This is Fr Tichborne, Jock,’ I said brightly.

‘Reelly,’ he said.

‘Yes. His bags are in the car – perhaps you would bring them in presently.’

Jock turned on his heel and clumped towards the door.

‘Oh, and you could bring his corporal in, too?’

Jock ground to a halt and looked over his shoulder in a dangerous sort of way.

‘ ’Is wot ?’

‘It’s in a string bag,’ I explained blandly. It made my day, it really did, although I knew I’d pay for it.

Johanna insisted on seeing the corporal and although Tichborne blushed and demurred she got her way. She usually does.

‘You see,’ said Tichborne anxiously as he unrolled the cloth, ‘one can’t use the consecrated corporal – for one thing it might put off the sort of person we’re hoping to, er, invoke, and for another it would be rude, simply; I mean, I always believe in extending common courtesy to what I might call the Other Side, even though one has to be a bit horrid about Them during the actual ceremony. Do you follow me?’

We made guarded noises.

‘Moreover, this sort of Mass used to be performed on the, er, person of a young person, so to speak, but we’ve found that using a corporal depicting such a young person in the appropriate attitude serves just as well. I mean, I do speak from some experience.’

The cloth was now unfurled and spread out on the sofa-table. I must say that even I found it a little startling: the appropriate attitude of the young person certainly seemed to speak from experience, to use Tichborne’s phrase, and the embroidress had been explicit to the last prick of her needle, if I may coin another. Both Tichborne and I cast worried glances at the gently-nurtured Johanna.

‘Wow!’ she exclaimed politely, ‘that is really out of sight!’ (She only uses Americanisms defensively.) For my part, I wished heartily that the thing were out of sight, lest Jock should come in. (Most brutal criminals are prudes, did you know? Of course you did, forgive me.)