The Shortest Way to Hades

He’s gone to lunch and I don’t know when he’ll be back.”

In the restaurant in Chancery Lane, Timothy was seeking the views of Ragwort and Cantrip on one of those fine questions of professional propriety which are so dear to the Chancery Bar.

“Suppose,” said Timothy, “that your instructing solicitor is one of the trustees of a settlement. He is being urged by his co-trustee to concur in the investment of trust funds in a manner not authorized by the provisions of the settlement or by the Trustee Investments Act. The consent has been obtained both of the income beneficiary and of the person presumptively entitled to capital, but your client wishes to know what steps, if any, he should take to ensure that it is an informed and genuine consent: that is to say, that the beneficiaries understand the nature of the transaction and are aware that they are not obliged to agree to it.”

“I suppose,” said Ragwort, “that the life tenant is a person of advanced years, whose intellectual powers have for some time been failing and who is now—” He paused and sighed.

“Completely round the twist,” and Cantrip, perceiving his friend at a loss for the mot juste. “Too nutty to tell the difference between a letter of consent and an old bus ticket.”

“As it happens,” said Timothy, “the difficulty is not with the life tenant. Although she is in her eighties and not, alas, in the best of health, her mental faculties are unimpaired. No, the difficulty is with her great- granddaughter, who is entitled to capital contingently on surviving her. She is a sensible, well-educated girl, and could normally be counted on to take care of herself. It so happens, however, that she is the daughter of the importunate co-trustee: your client fears that filial respect and affection may prevent her from exercising an independent judgment. She is at present abroad, and he is unable to discuss the matter with her in person. Still, he has been presented with a letter of authority bearing her signature, and he would find it embarrassing to refuse to act on it unless firmly so advised by Counsel.”

“I can see,” said Ragwort, “that it is a somewhat delicate matter. I don’t see, though, that it presents Counsel with any problem of professional propriety.”

“Not even,” said Timothy, looking at the ceiling, “if Counsel has reason to believe, on the basis of information from an entirely different source, that the beneficiary has in fact declined to sign the letter and that there is therefore a strong possibility that the signature is forged?”

“My dear Timothy,” I said, “do you mean to tell us that Rupert Galloway—?”

“I don’t mean to tell you anything,” said Timothy, directing his gaze towards some point in the middle distance beyond my left shoulder. “That is to say, I don’t mean to tell you anything which would involve a breach of professional confidence. The problem, as I have said, is a hypothetical one.”

Before I could comment further, the sound of coatstands being knocked over and handbags being dropped on the floor proclaimed the arrival of Julia. She was clutching, but too agitated by its contents to read aloud, another letter from Selena. While she restored herself with gin and tonic, we passed it round the table.

SV Kymothoe at anchor off Paxos.

Friday morning.

Dear Julia,

As you will see, I have cut and run for it. The Remington-Fiske family may be free of any homicidal tendencies; but they are remarkably accident-prone, and it seems to be catching.

On Wednesday evening, when Sebastian seemed fully recovered from his misadventure with the motor- scooter, I ventured to suggest that we might be outstaying our welcome: we had, after all, only been invited to dinner. It appeared that the same thought had already occurred to him, and he had said something to Dolly about not wishing to impose on her hospitality; this had brought down on him many reproaches for even thinking of such a thing, and assurances that neither she nor her husband would willingly see us leave any sooner than we had to.

“But I do see,” said Sebastian, “that you may not be getting as much sailing as you’d like. You will say, won’t you, when you want us to be on our way?”

He looked so downcast, however, at the idea of leaving that I could not have accepted the offer without feeling selfish and mean-spirited, and seeing myself in a bad light: this, as I have said, is something I wish to avoid. I proposed by way of compromise that on the following day we might sail down to Gouvia, and from there visit Corfu town to see the Museum and the Castle; if there was not enough time to sail back to Casiope, we could leave the boat at Gouvia and return by bus or taxi to the Villa Miranda.

When during dinner we told the others of these plans, I felt obliged to say that if any of them would like to join us they would of course be very welcome. Dolly’s children all declined; but Camilla said that she would be delighted to come with us. I tried fairly hard to persuade myself that I would enjoy having on board a girl of forceful personality who knew more than I did about sailing in these waters and would probably expect to take the helm all the way to Gouvia.

As it turned out, the effort was unnecessary. After breakfast, when Dolly was preparing to drive us down into Casiope, Camilla said that she was feeling “a bit fragile” and thought she had better stay at home.

I had a feeling, as we went aboard the Kymothoe, that something was not quite as it should be; but decided, seeing nothing to account for it, that this must be another example of my interesting neurosis. Still, I opened the after-hatch with caution and peered suspiciously down into the cabin as if expecting it to be full of armed desperadoes. Having satisfied myself that it wasn’t — the cabin is only eight feet by six and they would have been conspicuous — I went below, leaving the crew on deck to make ready to weigh anchor. I looked round carefully to make sure that everything was in order, and could see nothing out of place apart from a dead wasp on the floor beside the stove: this I swept up and disposed of.

I found, as I began to go back up the companionway, that I was rather worried about the wasp. I thought it had chosen an eccentric place to expire: wasps, it seemed to me, do not make a habit of dropping dead on the floor; they usually try to escape from a confined space through a window or porthole; when exhausted, they breathe their last somewhere near the window-frame. I decided, feeling rather foolish, to take a closer look at the stove.

The fuel supply to the stove is from a cylinder of bottled gas, connected by a pressure valve to the pipes which lead to the burners. I noticed that although the taps had been turned off the valve was still in the “on” position. Well — a safety expert might have raised an eyebrow, but many people leave the pressure valve on the whole time: it ought not to matter provided the pipes are sound. I tested them with soapy water and saw no ominous bubbles. Thinking, however, that if I was going to do a safety check I might as well be thorough, I lifted up the burners and examined the pipes underneath the grill: there was no need to make any more soapy water tests — at the junction between the pipe and the pressure valve there was a clearly visible crack, nearly an eighth of an inch wide.

The gas cylinder had been full when we went aboard at Preveza and we had made comparatively little use of the stove. Since bottled gas is heavier than air and therefore sinks, I concluded that most of its contents would by now have settled down peacefully in the bilges.

At this point the crew called down the after-hatch saying that all was now ready above decks and offering to make coffee while I started the engine.

“No,” I said. “Don’t let’s do either of those things for a little while. Let’s pump the bilges instead.”

It is wrong for a ship’s captain to spread unnecessary alarm among the crew. I therefore thought it better not to mention that the Kymothoe was at present not so much a sailing-boat as a floating bomb and liable, if the engine were started or a match struck, to disperse herself rather messily all over the harbor.

“Sebastian,” I said, when we had been pumping for ten minutes or so, “it is one of the duties of a ship’s captain to prevent the crew from falling into the clutches of sirens.”

“Sirens,” said the crew, “are predatory birds with the voices of women, who lure men on to the rocks and devour them alive.”

“That seems to me,” I said, “a very fair description of Camilla and Lucinda. I have been observing them closely, and they both look at you as if you were something savory on the breakfast menu.”

“Skipper,” he said, with an astonishment understandable in a man who for three days has paid no attention to anyone but a middle-aged Greek poet, “you don’t seriously think—?”