Page 142 of The Hallmarked Man (Cormoran Strike #8)

He led Robin past a couple of doorways bearing the name plates ‘Amarillo’ and ‘Dostoevsky’, finally leading her into an empty room even more opulent than the hallway, which managed to be simultaneously grand and cosy.

The walls were covered in a swirling red paisley fabric; there were many more oil paintings, mostly of dogs and horses; a log fire was burning in the grate; scarlet roses were arranged in large crystal bowls; the velvet armchairs were deep and looked welcoming.

A backgammon board and a chess set were laid out on small tables, and the impression of a private home was reinforced by the few pictures that stood in silver frames or hung on the walls, some of them black and white, mostly featuring Longcaster himself, or his most photogenic daughter.

In one of these pictures, Longcaster was collecting a silver racing trophy from the Queen; in another, he stood in black tie, greeting the Aga Khan at the doorway of his club.

‘Please,’ said Longcaster to Robin, gesturing to a pair of armchairs beside the fire.

He hitched up his trousers at his knees before sitting down opposite her. The dog immediately placed its huge white head in his lap, and Longcaster began to massage it with long, spatulate fingers.

‘May I have the pleasure of knowing who’s been harassing my daughter?’

‘My name’s Robin Ellacott, I’m a private detective, and there was no harassment.’

Still stroking the dog, Longcaster extended his free hand to press a small brass bell on a side table. A uniformed waiter appeared so quickly Robin thought he must have been standing in readiness right outside the door.

‘Martini,’ said Longcaster.

‘Yes, Mr Longcaster, sir. Madam?’

‘No, thank—’

‘Bring her a Majesty,’ Longcaster told the waiter, who smiled and left the room. Longcaster turned back to face Robin. His deep-set grey eyes raked her from head to foot and back up again, before he said,

‘So, you’re trying to track down the jellyfish.’

‘Who’s “the jellyfish”?’ asked Robin disingenuously.

‘ Genus Fleetwood,’ said Longcaster. ‘ Species Rupert.’

He reached out a long arm towards a humidor sitting on another low table, opened it and extracted a cigar and a cutter.

The dog peered reproachfully up at his master at the cessation of stroking, then, with a kind of low groan, settled down at his feet, head on its paws.

Longcaster now set about trimming the end of a cigar, glancing up at Robin to say,

‘You shouldn’t wear black.’

‘What?’

‘Black. It ages you. You can’t be more than, what – thirty-five?’

‘Don’t you think that’s quite a rude thing to say to someone you’ve only just met?’ said Robin, forcing herself to sound amused.

‘Nothing rude about it. I’m giving you good advice.’

‘But I didn’t ask for any.’

‘Presumably because you weren’t aware you needed it. S’pose you think black makes you look thin, do you?’

‘No,’ said Robin, ‘it’s just easy.’

‘Good taste has nothin’ to do with easy ,’ said Longcaster with asperity, now reaching for a large malachite lighter. ‘Black looks elegant on Asian women, on most black women, and on some dark-haired Caucasians, but there’s nothin’ cheaper lookin’ than black on a blonde.’

‘Well, thanks for your input,’ said Robin. ‘Isn’t it illegal to smoke in clubs these days?’

‘Yerse,’ said Longcaster, puffing energetically on his cigar.

The door opened and the waiter reappeared. He set a martini bearing an olive on a stick at Longcaster’s elbow, and put a champagne cup full of some virulently ruby-coloured concoction beside Robin.

‘What is this?’ Robin asked Longcaster, looking down at her drink as the door swung closed behind the waiter.

‘Dubonnet and gin. We call it the Majesty because it’s the Queen’s favourite. Always bothers me, thinkin’ of her drinkin’ something that common.’

Longcaster sipped his martini, his dark eyes fixed on Robin, then said,

‘Drink it. I’m hardly likely to bloody poison yeh, am I? Or are you scared I’ll jump on yeh? Needn’t worry about that. I get more excited about a morning piss these days than I do about women.’

‘I prefer to keep a clear head when I’m working,’ said Robin, and she thought how prissy she sounded.

‘I doubt Decima would begrudge you a solitary Majesty.’

Robin chose to ignore this comment.

‘Do you know where Rupert Fleetwood is, Mr Longcaster?’

‘No.’

‘His aunt thinks he’s got a job in New York.’

‘I think that staggeringly unlikely.’

‘Why?’

‘Jellyfish aren’t noted for their ability to catch flights to New York. Drink your bloody drink.’

Robin picked up the glass and took a sip.

‘Like it?’ said Longcaster.

‘Yes,’ said Robin honestly.

‘Thought you would,’ said Longcaster. He blew out cigar smoke, then said,

‘I doubt Fleetwood’s gawn far, unless he’s hit a strong prevailin’ current. S’pose he could be beached somewhere… small children poking him with plastic spades…’

‘Are you at all worried he might have killed himself?’

‘No,’ said Longcaster, ‘no, I can truthfully say I haven’t had a single second’s worry on that score.’

‘He seems to have been under a lot of pressure, before he disappeared,’ said Robin.

‘I don’t know about pressure, ’ drawled Longcaster.

‘He staggered out of here under the weight of a prime piece of seventeenth-century Dutch silverware. Would you say that’s suicidal?

Or is it the behaviour of a young man who fails to comprehend, as Wodehouse puts it, “the nice distinction between meum and tuum ”? ’

‘You called the police, didn’t you?’ said Robin.

‘Naturally, but our brave boys in blue aren’t overly interested in recovering property for the likes of me.

“You’re insured, aren’t you?” is the burden of their song.

You can tell Decima, though, that as soon as I get wind of where the jellyfish is, I’ll prod the police in the right direction.

I’m sure by now he’s realised the thing’s impossible to sell.

No reputable dealer’s going to touch it, not without proof of legal ownership.

It’s a particularly fine and distinctive example of its type and, unfortunately for the jellyfish, it features in photographs of the Dostoevsky room.

’ Longcaster took another pull on his cigar, then said, ‘Didja know I won it from his father?’

‘I did, yes,’ said Robin.

‘Peter and I were at Eton together. ’S’a matter of fact, that nef wasn’t Peter’s to gamble with in the first place, it was his wife’s.

She was bloody livid when she found out what he’d done.

Peter didn’t have a pot to piss in before he married Veronica.

The jellyfish is just like him, hopin’ to marry money. ’

Longcaster pointed a long finger at a photograph on the wall, which featured two men, one recognisable as a younger Longcaster, the other having a thin, raffish face, and three women.

One of the women, who also looked around forty, wore glasses and looked rather stern.

The other two were younger, one dark, one fair, and both very beautiful.

All five were posing, the women in ballgowns, the men dinner jackets, in front of a gigantic castle over which a yellow flag bearing a black lion flew.

‘That’s Peter and Veronica, there,’ said Longcaster.

‘The woman in glasses is Anjelica, Peter’s sister – the jellyfish’s aunt.

She doesn’t like me, as I’m sure she’ll’ve told you, if you’ve spoken to her.

’ Longcaster stared dispassionately at the picture for a few more seconds, before saying, ‘I’m not sure, but I think I might’ve screwed her that weekend.

And the dark woman there’s an ex-girlfriend of mine.

I was resisting her broad hints I should make an honest woman of her at the time, but I was enjoying being between wives. ’

‘Is that the Fleetwoods’ home?’ said Robin, staring up at the medieval castle in the background.

‘’Course it’s bloody not, that’s Gravensteen,’ snorted Longcaster.

He drained his glass, then leaned over and pressed the brass bell again. The waiter opened the door within seconds.

‘’Nother Martini. Nothing for her, she’s dawdlin’.’

When the door had closed again, Robin said,

‘I’ve been told by someone who saw the relationship up close that Rupert genuinely loved Decima. That person didn’t believe Rupert was with her for her mon—’

‘Bullcrap,’ barked Longcaster. ‘Nobody’s going to attach themselves to Decima for her beauty or her charm. The pair of ’em looked like Tweedledum and Tweedledee together – just imagine the moon-faced children. What?’ he said, in response, Robin knew, to the expression on her own face.

‘Just thinking, what horrible things to say about your own daughter.’

‘I reserve the right to speak as I please about my children,’ said Longcaster harshly.

‘Decima’s spiritual home’s a semi-detached in Basingstoke.

She likes second-rate things and second-rate people.

Now she’s made a bloody fool of herself again and doesn’t want to admit it, which is why she’s hired you. ’

‘Rupert’s your godson, isn’t he?’ said Robin.

‘What’s that got to do with anything? You think I should coddle him, because I once knew his parents?

The world’s full of godsons. What I need are decent bloody bar staff.

I did the jellyfish a favour, givin’ him a job, and all I got in return was an attempt to drain m’ daughter’s bank accounts, and brazen bloody theft.

If he thinks he’s hard done by now, it’s nothing compared to what’ll happen when I bloody well catch up with him. ’

‘Did you know Rupert gatecrashed Sacha Legard’s birthday party after stealing your nef?’ asked Robin. ‘That he argued with Valentine, and said something to Cosima that made her cry?’

She was certain, by the very slight rise of Longcaster’s eyebrows, that he hadn’t known this. Removing the cigar from his mouth, he said,

‘I think it highly unlikely the jellyfish would have sought out members of my family, after stealing my property.’