Lord Malquist & Mr. Moon: A Novel Read online

  ‘Jane…’ He spoke very quietly. ‘Let me. Please. I’m alone.’

  She lay with her eyes closed, breathing gently.

  ‘Would you do something for me, darling?’

  ‘Yes,’ breathed Moon. ‘I’d do anything for you, Jane.’

  ‘Would you rub away the tickle on my nose.’ She screwed up her face into a porcine snout to get at it.

  Moon dropped his head onto the edge of the tub and wiped his forehead along it. Jane rubbed her face against his hair and he trembled all over again with love.

  ‘That’s better!’

  When he looked up at her, her face was recomposed, expressionless. Moon stood up.

  ‘That cowboy, the one in the street.’

  Jane said nothing.

  ‘He called you Fertility.’

  She said nothing.

  ‘Fertility!’ He let out one cracked bitter laugh and got up to go.

  ‘You’ve forgotten your notebook.’

  He looked around the bathroom without seeing it. When he had searched the shelves, the window-sill and the corners he gave up and opened the door.

  ‘Here.’

  Jane’s arm stretched out of the foam holding high the notebook. He took it, held it limp and buckled.

  ‘You left it in the bath when you fell in.’ She closed her eyes.

  Jane and the ninth earl lay like corpses in the billowing shroud. They did not look at him and he stepped out into the cold of the corridor closing the door behind him.

  Moon paused again at the top of the stairs. The Risen Christ leaned in the doorway of the drawing-room grinning like a minstrel. The gin stayed on his face, completely immobile, defying Moon’s stare. The Risen Christ changed the angle of his lean and fell over but managed to keep the glass upright, rolling and twisting underneath it like a trained seal, and rolled back onto his feet with the grin intact.

  ‘Ah it’s a treat you look,’ he said. ‘We shall go forth loined in fine linen and chuck the pharistines and the philisees out o’ the temple o’ Saint Paul, sure an’ sure.’

  He belched, touched his free hand to his lips with ham actor’s gentility, bowed, winked, crossed his legs and fell on his back, his glass clutched upright on his chest.

  Moon went down and stepped over his body. The overhead light – a chandelier – had been turned on. He switched it off leaving the lamp glowing on his desk and another on a corner cupboard among variously coloured bottles. He turned on the electric fire and held the notebook against its warmth, trying to unstick the pages. His handwriting was smudged into paling shades of blue. He put the notebook on the flat top of the fire and opened his desk. After some little trouble he found a list of names which he read through thoughtfully. He replaced it and picked up a letter and read that.

  Sunday.

  Dear Mr Moon,

  This is to confirm the arrangement we arrived at in conversation. I intend to engage the services of Boswell Incorporated, namely yourself, on an annual basis and I accept the terms of two thousand guineas per annum, payable quarterly in advance, for no more than twenty and no fewer than twenty-two working days per calendar month; your obligation being to accompany me at my request for no more than six hours per day with an option on a further four, payment to be negotiated; and to record such of my pensées and general observations, travels, etc., fully and fairly, and to provide me with two transcripts of your daily journal.

  As you will have realised when you receive this, I write to you on the day of the death of a national hero. I mention this because I think it makes an appropriate moment for the commencement of our venture. I sense that the extravagant mourning exacted from and imposed upon a sentimental people is the last flourish of an age whose criteria of greatness are no longer applicable. His was an age that saw history as a drama directed by great men; accordingly he was celebrated as a man of action, a leader who raised involvement to the level of sacred duty, and he inspired his people to roll up their sleeves and take a militant part in the affairs of the world. I think perhaps that such a stance is no longer inspiring nor equal to events-its philosophy is questionable and its consequences can no longer be put down to the destiny of an individual. For this reason, his death might well mark a change in the heroic posture-to that of the Stylist, the spectator as hero, the man of inaction who would not dare roll up his sleeves for fear of creasing the cuffs.

  For Style is an aesthetic, inbred and disengaged, and in such precarious times these are virtues. We all have an enormous capacity for inflicting harm, and hereto the only moral issue has been the choice of the most deserving recipient. But the battle is discredited and it is time to withdraw from it. I stand aloof, contributing nothing except my example.

  I think it would be satisfactory if the fruits of our collaboration were to be published biannually. I have taken steps therefore to arrange publication of the first volume in July. I have every confidence in your recording skills and in my own fascination as the object of them. One of my concerns, incidentally, is to contribute my name to the language (e.g. Lord Cardigan, Sandwich, etc.) and I hope to have your co-operation in this.

  If you are agreeable perhaps you would present yourself at Queen Anne’s Gate at four p.m. on Friday next. After our preliminary discussions I hope you will accompany me to my club for dinner. The food, I’m afraid, will be execrable, but my imagination flourishes in adversity.

  Yours faithfully,

  Malquist.

  Enclosure: Five hundred guineas. (Kindly delete all references to money, including this postscript, and file under ‘Stylist as Hero: the Malquist Letters.’)

  Moon placed the letter in a cardboard folder and after some consideration wrote on the file: Malquist Letters.

  And thought: I agree with everything you say but I would attack to the death your right to say it – Voltaire (the Younger).

  Moon smirked.

  Schizo.

  What?

  Would you describe yourself as a schizophrenic?

  Oh really! It’s simply that my emotional bias towards the reactionary and my intellectual bias towards the radical do not survive each other, and are each interred by my aesthetic revulsion of their respective adherents…

  Wha’?

  I mean I’m not bigoted – I can see both sides of a question.

  And subscribe to both.

  That doesn’t make me schizophrenic.

  What about interviewing yourself?

  No harm in that, nothing sinister in that at all, merely an attempt at rationalisation.

  Rationalise what exactly?

  Everything. That I’m not schizophrenic.

  What are you?

  I’m disabled … by my inability to draw a line somewhere and – make a stand. I’m—

  The doorbell.

  Moon went out into the hall and opened the front door to an elderly upright man who stood leaning elegantly on his cane, rheumy eyes bright, pink-rimmed and pouched, signalling dismay over his ragdoll face in the streetlight.

  ‘I say! Did I get you out of the bath, old man?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ said Moon.

  ‘I’m most frightfully sorry.’

  ‘That’s quite all right. What can I do for you?’

  ‘I say look here, don’t catch cold, old man – can’t we step inside?’

  ‘Whom did you want?’

  ‘Marie – is she in?’

  ‘I don’t think so, no – can I help you at all?’

  ‘It’s quite above board, old man, it’s not my first time. Look, can we just step into the hall… talking on doorsteps, you know.’ He chuckled.

  Moon stepped backwards inside and allowed the man to come in.

  ‘Thank you so much. Customers having to answer the door, is that it?’

  They stood just inside the door, looking at each other for guidance.

  Moon said, ‘What exactly …?’

  ‘The modelling, old man.’

  ‘Modelling?’

  ‘Photographic.’ The man
pulled aside the lapel of his overcoat to show a camera slung round his neck. ‘I just popped round on spec, don’t you know.’ He looked up over Moon’s shoulder and flapped one hand cheerily. ‘What ho, Mamselle!’

  Moon turned and saw Jane, striped by banisters, walking nude along the upstairs hall trailing her dressing-gown behind her.

  ‘That’s not her,’ Moon said. ‘I haven’t seen Marie since …’

  He frowned, shivering inside the towel.

  ‘Could you wait here a moment.’

  Moon padded back into the drawing-room. He crouched down, putting his cheek against the carpet, and stared into the dark under the chesterfield.

  ‘Marie?’

  He got up and pushed the couch backwards and looked down on her and carefully turned her over on to her back. They stared amazed at each other. He went back into the hall.

  ‘Is she there?’

  ‘She’s dead,’ Moon said.

  ‘Dead, old man? What do you mean?’

  ‘She’s been shot.’

  ‘Murdered, old man?’

  ‘Well…’ Moon held himself in, trying to organise time into a comprehensible sequence. ‘Well, there was a cowboy in the street… He shot her through the window.’

  ‘A cowboy, old man? How very extraordinary.’

  ‘Yes,’ Moon said. ‘I don’t think he meant to kill her.’

  ‘Just wing her, so to speak.’

  ‘Well, there was another cowboy in the room-he was trying to kill him.’

  The old man studied Moon carefully. ‘Why was he?’

  His innocent curiosity unnerved Moon. The man stood there, bright-eyed and quizzical like a scrawny long-legged bird.

  ‘Quarrelling over her?’

  ‘That was it,’ Moon remembered. ‘They were quarrelling over my wife.’

  ‘Your wife! My dear chap! I had absolutely no idea, no idea at all! How absolutely ghastly for you.’

  ‘Yes,’ Moon said. ‘Well,’ and made little ushering gestures towards the street.

  ‘What are you going to do – call the police?’

  Moon grasped at the idea with relief.

  ‘Yes, that’s it-they can take over, it’s their job, isn’t it?’

  ‘It most certainly is.’ He paused thoughtfully. They’ll be taking photographs, you know.’

  ‘What?’ said Moon.

  ‘Oh yes, they always do. Photographs of the body.’ He mused on this. ‘Where is your poor wife?’

  ‘Upstairs.’

  ‘Look, I’m sure you’ll think me absolutely impertinent, but I wonder whether you would mind if I took just one shot of her, at the usual rates of course.’

  ‘Shot?’

  ‘Snap.’

  ‘Snapshot?’

  ‘Of your wife. Would you mind awfully?’

  ‘I’m afraid I—’

  ‘Left her in her room, did you?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Moon. He followed the man upstairs, his mind working over a problem he was unable to define. When they reached the top Moon said, ‘Perhaps you’d better wait here a minute.’

  ‘Certainly, certainly.’ The old man was nervously absorbed in some adjustment to his camera.

  Moon knocked on the bedroom door and then furious at such humility, threw it open so that it banged against the wall. Jane was sitting at her dressing-table in the act of piling up her hair, wearing a trouser suit of Paisley silk, flared at the ankles and high-collared round the neck. She turned round petulantly.

  ‘Now we’re not going to have that again. Once a night is quite enough.’

  ‘The photographer is here,’ said Moon.

  ‘What photographer?’

  ‘He wants to take a picture of you.’

  ‘Not at all, old man,’ came the brittle voice behind him. There’s a slight misunderstanding. Good evening, gentle lady.’

  ‘Marie’s dead,’ Moon said to Jane.

  ‘So I understand, old man. Where exactly is she?’

  Jane stood up, coiffed, and came towards them shaking a bottle of nail varnish.

  ‘What are you all talking about?’

  ‘Marie’s dead,’ Moon said.

  Jane asked the old man, ‘Did you have an appointment, General?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid not, I just—’

  ‘You had no right to come round without an appointment,’ she scolded him. ‘I thought that was understood.’

  ‘Marie’s dead,’ Moon said.

  The bathroom door opened and closed, and Lord Malquist was heard humming his way down the corridor. He entered fully and perfectly dressed once more, humming loudly, and assumed a pose in the doorway, feet turned outward in ballet position, left arm by his side, right elbow pressed against his hip, wrist upturned at right-angles.

  ‘Malquist! What the devil are you doing here, you old rascal?’

  ‘Bathing, General,’ said the ninth earl. ‘I come here of an occasional evening expressly to bathe.’

  ‘Splendid! And this delectable creature, no doubt she scratched your back with her scarlet nails?’

  ‘No, with her toe. And you?’

  ‘Photography,’ said the General. ‘Care to see some snaps? They’re extraordinarily detailed.’

  ‘No thank you. I try to avoid detail.’

  ‘Marie’s dead,’ Moon said.

  The General beamed round at them all.

  ‘I haven’t seen Malquist since – when was it?’

  ‘Please,’ admonished the ninth earl. ‘I make it a rule to have no past.’

  ‘Went right through the old Jerry fracas with him,’ said the General.

  ‘Why Falcon!’ said Jane. ‘You never told me you were a warrior. Were you frightfully brave?’

  ‘I don’t care to recall, dear Jane. But I suppose I must have been to bear up against the unimaginable discomfort. Jamaica is a tiresome place at the best of times.’

  Jane breathed on to her painted fingernails and waved them about.

  ‘Nearly ready. Falcon is taking me for a drive, darling. Don’t wait up, I shan’t be long.’

  Moon took two purposeful steps towards her and cut his foot on a piece of mirror on the floor. He sat down on the bed and wrapped the wound in the hem of his towel.

  Lord Malquist tapped Moon with his stick.

  ‘Well Mr Moon, I think we may congratulate each other on our first day’s collaboration. I look forward to reading your journal. Come round to my house in the morning, would you, and bring the Saviour with you. Perhaps you would let him have a bath first. If he objects baptise him by total immersion in hot soapy water. Come along, Jane.’

  Moon mopped blood from his foot and rocked himself in his towel. Jane patted him on the head and he saw that Lord Malquist and the General had gone.

  ‘Jane … don’t go now. Let’s leave them.’

  ‘Now cheer up, darling, and don’t mope. I shan’t be long.’

  ‘Why can’t I come then?’

  ‘Darling, are you jealous?’

  ‘Yes,’ Moon said.

  ‘Why darling, how perfectly sweet.’

  She kissed him on his head.

  ‘I do love you, Jane. It’s so awful.’

  ‘I know, darling, I know.’

  ‘Stay … I’ll be gentle with you.’

  ‘Not yet, darling. Not now. Soon.’

  ‘Promise?’

  ‘Promise. And darling—?’

  ‘Yes?’ said Moon.

  ‘Would you do something for me?’ She crouched against him, scented and warm.

  ‘I’d do anything for you, Jane.’

  ‘Sack Marie.’

  Moon said carefully: ‘Sack her?’

  ‘Get rid of her. Before I come back, will you, darling? I find it all so distressing. She won’t be here when I come back, will she?’

  Moon hugged himself and rocked his body into a nod.

  ‘You are a sweet, you’re such a dear.’

  The scented warmth went away from him.

  ‘Jane – what was it about her
modelling and giving French lessons and everything – I didn’t know anything about it.’

  ‘Well, you’re always at the library all day, aren’t you? – you’re never here… Marie had many friends who visited her and I never interfered with what she did in her own time.’

  ‘There was a man on the phone,’ Moon said. ‘He seemed to think that you – Jane you don’t know any French, do you?’

  ‘Oh darling, don’t be so stuffy. I didn’t do anything, you know me. I only watched.’

  She kissed him again and went out. Moon sat quite still watching the blood leak out of his foot. He tried to lick it but couldn’t reach. He heard the front door slam and shortly afterwards the coach creaked and shook itself along the mews.

  When everything was quiet Moon got up and found a clean handkerchief. He took it to the bathroom and soaked it under the tap and tied it round his foot. The bathroom walls ran with sweat but the surfaces had no life in them now that could touch him. The foam had reduced itself to a frothy scum on the dead water. He went out and limped to Marie’s room and went in. It was dark and the switch by the door clicked up and down and up without result. Moon went forward slowly until he fell across the bed, and lay there until the dark paled enough for him to see the lamp beside him. He turned it on and sat up.

  He had not been in the room since Marie had moved into it. He knew it slightly as a maid’s room which belonged at various times to various girls none of whom had much to do with him. They were called Christine and Mabel and Joan, and some others before them. Marie’s room, however, enchanted him. It was untidy but decorated by its untidiness – there were colours tossed around everywhere, pink and blue wisps of nylon, two blue shoes and a white one on the bed, gaudy books scattered about, a scarlet silk cord hanging over a chair, clothes of all kinds half in and out of drawers and cupboards. A cane-handled butterfly net and a white fur-trimmed slipper lay together mismatched on the dressing-table amid coloured bottles. Moon picked up the slipper and rubbed the fur over his face. It came away tinged with blood, and all at once he started to cry.

  He looked at himself in the mirror and his compassion for his image was reflected back into himself but it did not comfort him. When he leaned forward between the hinged mirror-leaves he caught the reflection of his reflection and the reflection of that, and of that, and he saw himself multiplied and diminished between the mirrors, himself aghast in the exact centre of a line that stretched to the edges of a flat earth. He closed his eyes and got up and fell over the dressing-stool. He went back to the bedroom.