on the actual house, but even so it was not very compatible with my cherished image of Mr Baxter, being altogether too philanthropic for his tastes. However, in answer to my question as I got out of the car, Bassett confirmed the situation. ‘Yes. It’s held over two days in the summer, Sir. It’s in aid of the local Catholic church, St Teresa’s. In Guildford.’
‘Is Mr Baxter a Catholic?’ The thought had never occurred to me. Not that I mind Catholics. It was just strange to think of Damian subscribing to any religion.
‘I believe so, Sir.’
‘And does he do this every year?’
‘He does, Sir. Since he first came here.’ I attempted to conceal my cynical amazement as I was shown directly to the library. When I walked into the room I realised at once why I had been sent for. Damian was dying. He had of course been dying before, when I was last there on the visit that started it all, but one may be dying without having death written all over one’s face. This time it was not so much that he had a fatal illness. Rather, at first appearance, he looked as if he were already dead.
He lay back, stretched out, on his daybed, eyes shut. Were it not for the faintest movement of his emaciated chest I would have assumed I had come too late. I suppose I must have appeared shocked, as just at this moment he opened his eyes and let out a rasping, little laugh at my expression. ‘Cheer up,’ he snorted. ‘I’m not quite as bad as I look.’
‘That’s a relief,’ I said. ‘Since you couldn’t look worse.’
Naturally this bucked him up. He rang the bell by his chair and when the ever vigilant Bassett put his head round the door suggested, in that diffident way of his, that we might have some tea. ‘Are you staying the night?’ he asked when Bassett had gone off on his commission.
‘I don’t think so. I was planning to continue the search tomorrow, and I don’t believe I should put it off.’
‘No. For pity’s sake don’t put it off, whatever you do.’ But he raised his eyebrows to make this reference to his coming demise, into a sort of joke. ‘So, how have you been getting on?’
I told him about Lucy and Dagmar. ‘They seem very fond of you.’
‘Don’t sound so surprised.’
Of course, that was the point. I was surprised. But I didn’t feel I could word this acceptably so I didn’t try. Instead, I repeated their separate messages of goodwill and felt glad I had delivered them faithfully. ‘I don’t think I was aware how well you knew them.’
‘You weren’t aware of a lot of things about me.’ He waited, perhaps for me to contradict, but I was silent. ‘Poor little Dagmar.’ He gave a semi-comic sigh, inviting me to join in his contemplation of her hopelessness, but after my recent visit I would have felt disloyal so I resisted. He continued, undeterred. ‘She should probably have been born in 1850, been married by proxy to some German grand duke, and just lived out her life observing the rituals. She would have done it very well and no doubt been much loved by all those loyal subjects who would never get near enough to find out how boring she was.’
‘She’s less boring now,’ I said. ‘Less boring, less diffident and less happy.’
He nodded, absorbing my report. ‘I was surprised when she married him. I thought she’d go for dull and respectable, and end up in a farmhouse in Devon, with a lot of huge, Royal portraits looking out of place and filling the half-timbered walls from floor to ceiling. I never expected her to go for nasty and successful, and end up back in a palace and miserable.’
‘Well, she’s got the portraits, anyway.’
‘Did she tell you she wanted to marry me?’ He must have caught my expression on hearing this, as he read it very accurately. ‘I’m past being ungallant. I’m nearly dead. At that point you truly can say what you like.’ Which, on reflection, I feel is probably true.
‘She did, actually.’
‘Really?’ I could see he was surprised.
‘She said she longed for it, but you weren’t interested. She said she had nothing to offer that you wanted or needed.’
‘That sounds rather peevish.’
‘Well, it wasn’t. She was very touching.’
He nodded at this, somehow acknowledging Dagmar’s generosity with a kinder tone than he had used before. ‘I never said she wasn’t a nice woman. I thought she was one of the nicest of all of you.’ He considered for a minute. ‘It was hard for ex-Royals.’
‘I agree.’
‘It was all right for the ones still on thrones,’ he added, thinking more on the topic. ‘After all the nonsense of the Sixties and Seventies was over, they were in an enviable position. But for the others it was hard.’
‘I suppose you didn’t want to take all that on. Not once you knew more about what it would entail.’
‘There were lots of things I didn’t want to take on, once I knew a bit more about them.’ He looked at me. ‘If it comes to that, I didn’t want to take on your whole world, once I knew more about it.’ He returned to the matter in hand. ‘But you’re quite sure she wasn’t my pen pal?’
‘I am.’
‘And it wasn’t Lucy either?’ I explained further about the hereditary condition of the daughter. Thoughtfully, he absorbed the detail that ruled him out. ‘So, how was she?’
‘All right.’ I tipped my head from side to side, in that gesture that is intended to signify so-so.
He was quite curious at this. ‘You don’t seem to be waxing lyrical. I always thought of you two as very thick.’
‘Her life is more her own fault than Dagmar’s.’ The truth is I did feel more tepid about the Rawnsley-Prices. The
