The Mortdecai Trilogy (Charlie Mortdecai #1-3)(60)

Why we so used to relish the life stories of condemned men, and why so many of us mourn the passing of capital punishment, is because ordinary decent chaps like us have a fine feeling for the dramatic proprieties: we know that tragedy cannot properly end in nine years’ comfy incarceration and useful, satisfying work in the prison bakery. We know that death is the only end of art. A chap who has gone to all the trouble of strangling his wife is entitled to his moment of splendour on the gallows – it is a crime to make him sew mailbags like a common thief.

We loved those tales told at the gallows-foot because they freed us from the tyranny and vulgarity of the happy ending; the long, idiot senescence, the wonderful grandchildren, the tactful inquiries about the life-insurance premiums.





Positively the last day – booking for smoking-concerts now




Since there’s no help, come then, let’s kiss and part. Something has gone wrong. I shall attract no help by firing my pistol, for today is evidently the first of September: duck shooting has begun and since before dawn the Moss and the shore have echoed with sporting musketry.

Martland has found me; I suppose I always knew he would. He came to the mouth of the mine and called down to me. I didn’t answer.

‘Charlie, we know you’re down there, we can smell you, for God’s sake! Look, Charlie, the others can’t hear me, I’m willing to give you a break. Tell me where the bloody picture is, get me off the hook, and I’ll give you a night’s start; you might get clear away.’

He can’t have thought I’d believe that, can he?

‘Charlie, we’ve got Jock, he’s alive …’

I knew that was a lie and suddenly I was filled with rage at his shabbiness. Without exposing myself I aimed the .455 at a knob of rock near the entrance and loosed off a round. The noise deafened me momentarily but I could still hear the snarl of the big distorted bullet ricocheting toward Martland. When he spoke again, from another spot, his voice was tight with fear and hatred.

‘All right, Mortdecai. Here’s another deal. Tell me where the bloody picture is and where the other photographs are and I promise I’ll shoot you cleanly. That’s the most you can hope for now – and you’ll have to trust me even for that.’ He enjoyed that bit. I fired again, praying that the mangled lead would take his face off. He spoke again, explaining how void my chances were, not understanding that I had written off my life and wanted only his. He listed lovingly the people who wanted me dead, from the Spanish Government to the Lord’s Day Observance Society – I was positively flattered at the extent of the mess I had made. Then he went away.

Later they shot at me with a silenced pistol for half an hour, listening between shots for a cry of pain or surrender. The slugs, screaming and buzzing as they tore from wall to wall, nearly drove me insane but only one touched me; they didn’t know whether the shaft turned left or right. The one lucky shot laid my scalp open and it is bleeding into my eyes – I must look a sight.

The American tried coaxing me next but he, too, had nothing to offer but a quick death in exchange for information and a written confession. They must have raised the Rolls from its grave in the canyon, for he knows the Goya wasn’t in the soft-top. Spain, it seems, is due to renew a treaty with the USA about Strategic Air Force bases on her territory, but every time the US reminds them about it, the Spaniards change the subject to the Goya. ‘Duchess of Wellington’ – ‘known to have been stolen on behalf of an American and to have entered the US.’ He wouldn’t have told me about the bases if he thought I had any chance of surviving, would he?

I didn’t bother to reply, I was busy with the turpentine.

Then he told me the alternative, the dirty death: they have sent for a canister of cyanide, the stuff they use on rabbits here and on people over there. So evidently I cannot hope for Martland to come down and fetch me. I shall have to go out to him. It’s of no importance.

I have finished with the turpentine; mixed with whisky it has served beautifully to dissolve the lining of my suitcase and now the Goya smiles at me from the wall, fresh and lovely as the day she was painted, the incomparable, naked ‘Duquesa de Wellington,’ mine to keep for the rest of my life. ‘Donc, Dieu existe.’

There is enough whisky to last me until the light fades and then – who could be afraid? – I shall emerge with my six-gun blazing, like some shaggy hero of the Old West. I know that I shall be able to kill Martland; then one of the others will kill me and I shall fall like a bright exhalation in the evening down to hell where there is no art and no alcohol, for this is, after all, quite a moral tale. You see that, don’t you?





After you with the pistol





All the characters in this book are fictitious: any similarity to real people or corpses is both accidental and disgusting.

The epigraphs are all by Alfred, Lord Tennyson except one which is a palpable forgery. The forgery is signed, after a fashion.





Disclaimer




There is not a word of truth in this book. I have neither met nor heard of anyone who resembles any character in it, I am glad to say. They are all figments of my heated imagination, every one of them. This is particularly true of the fictional narrator, whose only resemblance to me is around the waist-line.

I apologize for what he says about the art-trade. Why, some of my best friends, etc.