flung the playing cards high into the air, scattering them all over the carpet. He then began scampering about the room, bending to pick each card up one by one and stuffing them carelessly into the side pockets of his green velvet smoking jacket.
When he’d pocketed the last one, he straightened, a bit winded, and beamed at Hawke.
“Well, then. What do you think of that?”
“Most impressive.”
“Want to have a go?”
“Good Lord, no. I’m exhausted just watching you. I could use some air. Shall we have a nice walkabout on the grounds and then repair to the bar for a small beverage to celebrate?”
After a long and tiring (for Ambrose Congreve) ramble about the hilly and sometimes rock-strewn grounds, the two old friends went to the small walnut-paneled bar for the restorative cocktail. Congreve sipped his single malt, Macallan; Hawke, his Gosling’s Black Seal rum, neat. The two deep leather chairs they sat in had served other gentlemen’s backsides well for innumerable generations.
“How can you drink that stuff anyway?” Hawke asked Congreve. “Tastes like liquid smoke.”
Ambrose bristled. “I’m a man, sir, who is simply fond of his scotch-the drink, mind, not the nationality.”
Hawke smiled at this riposte, enormously glad to be back in dear old Blighty (as the Americans were wont to call it) again, and had been bringing Congreve up to speed on their mutual friend Stokely Jones, his almost deadly wedding in Florida, and his nearly catastrophic honeymoon.
“Torpedoed, you say?” Congreve murmured, getting his pipe going. “Extraordinary.”
“Hasn’t hit the media, but yes. Stokely saw the trails of two torpedoes moments before they struck the ship. He was lucky to get his new bride up to the muster station and into a lifeboat before the panic began. A lot of people ended up in the water, and a couple of lifeboats overturned in the heavy seas.”
“Where is Stokely now?”
“Back in Miami, trying to save his marriage, I imagine.”
“No one has claimed responsibility for the sinking?”
“No. But these torpedoes were sophisticated weapons. One of them, magnetic, exploded directly beneath the big ship’s keel, breaking her back. It’s why she went down in less than forty-five minutes.”
“Stokely say how many casualties?”
“Bad, but he said it could have been far worse. Fortunately, an American sub was in the vicinity. She surfaced and picked up most of the survivors in the water.”
“Extraordinary. C is joining us for dinner this evening, you know. I’m sure Sir David will have a great deal to say about this.”
“How is the old bachelor? I haven’t seen him since my return from Russia. I know he’s been on holiday, believe it or not. Sardinia, I believe.”
“Well, Alex, he was not at all pleased with you going off the reservation, I can tell you that much. Perhaps he’s had time to cool off a bit. All those lovely beaches and gorgeous Italian women work wonders.”
“Nude beaches there, I’ve heard.”
“Ha! You know who goes to nude beaches?”
“Not a clue.”
“People who should never go to nude beaches.”
Hawke laughed and sipped his drink. He was looking forward to dinner. C was a crusty old bastard but he was smarter than any man Hawke knew, save present company. A monument of unaging intellect. And Diana always served rack of lamb when he was invited, and something very old and delicious from the vast cellars of Brixden House.
“And speaking of nude beaches, how was your month in the south of France?”
“Cannes? Diana was bored to tears. Ennui, you know.”
“Really? France? That mighty horde, formed of two tribes, the Bores and the Bored?”
“Don’t even think you get credit for that one, Alex.”
“No? Who does, then?”
“A certain poet named Lord Byron.”
“Whatever. If you say ‘ ennui ’ one more time, I shall throttle you within an inch of your Francophilic life.”
“One must credit the French for coining a word for that awful yawn that sleep cannot abate.”
“If you insist.”
Congreve, who seemed to have paused in his own conversation, reached into his breast pocket, withdrawing a small rectangular package, wrapped in gold foil and tied with a royal-blue ribbon.
“Almost forgot something,” he said, handing the thing over to his friend. “A little something I picked up for you in town the other day. You’re going to love it.”
“What is it?”
“Don’t ask. Open,” the man said, twirling the waxed tips of his moustache.
“Nothing’s going to pop out at me, is it? Or explode white powder in my face?”
“Alex, do try to show a little appreciation for my thoughtfulness. I know this doesn’t come naturally to you, but give it a decent shot anyway.”
“You’ll recall that the last Christmas gift you gave me was that yellow golf sweater with all the red golf tees on it.”
“Yes, the one I caught you red-handed with, trying to rid yourself of it at the Harrods Returns window.”
“I don’t play golf. If I gave you a red Ferrari baseball cap to wear about town, would you do it?”
“Don’t be absurd.”
“The defense rests.”
Hawke untied the ribbon and removed the wrapping. It was a black box emblazoned with the name of a shop in the Burlington Arcade that he vaguely remembered. He lifted the lid.
“Ah! How awfully kind of you, old hound. What is it?”
“What is it? Just the latest thing, that’s all.”
Hawke pulled the latest thing out and examined it more closely. “I never know what the latest thing is, Ambrose, so, please, just tell me.”
“It’s an electronic cigarette.”
“Ah! An electronic cigarette! Splendid, why didn’t you say so!” he said, leaning forward with an arm on his knee, just like a picture of a cowboy he’d once seen as a child. He twirled the white tube between thumb and forefinger and added, “What does it do, precisely?”
“Do? Why, you smoke it, of course.”
“Smoke it? It’s plastic. Have you ever smelled burning plastic, Constable? Seriously.”
“You don’t light it, Alex, you flip that little switch. Then you can smoke it.”
“Like this?” Hawke said, following instructions. He took a pull, felt something moist and vaguely disgusting filling his mouth, and quickly expelled it, trying not to retch.
“Lovely.”
“You like it?”
“Love it.”
“So… now you just smoke that instead of all those bloody Sobranie black-lung cigarettes you brought back from Russia.”
“I do?”
“Yes! Of course you do! All of the flavor, none of the carcinogens. Ideal, really, for someone like you. An addict.”
“I’m touched, really quite touched, Ambrose. Thank you.”
“Pleasure.”
“You mean to say you actually see me, oh, say at the Long Bar at Black’s, pulling out a fake plastic cigarette, a battery-powered cigarette, and, saying, ‘Look here, lads, it’s the latest thing! Have a puff, you’ll taste the difference.’ Could be an ad campaign, that. ‘Have a puff, you’ll taste the difference!’ ”
“It’s your life, dear boy,” Ambrose huffed, and sipped his drink, sulking. “Do what you bloody well like with it.”
