Stone Barrington 36 - Scandalous Behavior (4 page)

“I like it,” Stone said.

“The late Lady Bourne had turned this into a nest of Victorian frilliness, which made my skin crawl. I think, in view of the gender of the new owner, something a little more masculine would be better.”

“I agree.” Stone was standing next to a window, and something outside caught his eye. He squinted and saw a man in some sort of tattered cowl crossing the lawn, carrying a heavy staff. “Who do you suppose that is?” he asked Susan.

“Oh, that’s just Wilfred, the hermit. He lives in a little hut in the woods that Charles built for him.”

“A hermit?”

“A lot of the big estates had them in the past. It’s supposed to be good luck to have a hermit living on the property. He doesn’t bother anyone, and no one bothers him. I think he stops at the kitchen for food on a regular basis, though. Don’t worry, he’s harmless.”

“If you say so,” Stone said. “I’ll look for him on the list of furnishings being conveyed.”

“Speaking of furnishings, Charles has a rather nice art collection that I assume will come with the house. It’s mostly middling stuff, chosen because Charles liked them, not for investment purposes. He does have a middling Constable, though—one of his many renderings of Salisbury Cathedral, and he has a very nice Turner. I’ve sent the best things out for cleaning and, in some cases, minor restoration. A lot of cigars have been smoked in this house over the decades, and smoke doesn’t do much for pictures.”

“Good.” Stone looked at his watch. “It’s time for me to make some calls to New York,” he said. “Will you excuse me for a few minutes?”

“Of course.”

Stone went into the dressing room, took out his iPhone, checked for a signal, and called the managing partner of Woodman & Weld, Bill Eggers.

“Are you back?” Eggers asked.

“Not yet. It’ll be another week or so.”

“Having fun?”

“Italy wasn’t much fun. I’ll tell you all about it when I get home.”

“Where are you now?”

“In Hampshire, in England. God help me, Bill, I’ve bought another house.”

“Good God.”

“I’m going to balance things out, though, by selling you my house in Washington, Connecticut.”

“I didn’t even know you
had
a house in Washington, Connecticut, but I like the village very much. So does my wife.”

“Run up there and have a look at it this weekend. Stay for a couple of nights. You’ll love it. Joan will send over the keys and the security code.”

“What the hell, all right. What do you want for it?”

“Don’t worry, it’ll be cheap, for Washington, Connecticut. I’ll hold off listing it until I hear from you. In the meantime, will you call the London office and have them give me a bright young real estate lawyer to close this sale? Tell him to call me on my cell. I’m going up there in a day or two, and I’ll want to see him.”

“I’ll take care of that now.”

“See you next week sometime.” He hung up and called his broker, Ed.

“Good morning, Stone.”

“Good afternoon. I’m in England, and I’m buying a house, so I have to move some money to my London account at Coutts & Company.”

“How much do I have to shake loose?”

“Ten and a half million pounds, not dollars.”

“Good, the pound is down against the dollar right now.”

“I’ll leave it to you which stocks to unload. Try not to make me any capital gains, though.”

“All right, Stone, I’ll get right on it. I’ll want a written confirmation for this big a transfer, though.”

“Will a handwritten note do?”

“That will be fine.”

“Hang on a minute.” He covered the phone and yelled, “Susan?”

“Yes?”

“Is there a working fax machine in the house?”

“Yes, down in the property manager’s office.”

“Okay, Ed, you’ll have it in a few minutes. Start selling.”

“Will do.”

They both hung up, and Stone called Joan.

“Are you still in Rome?”

“No, now I’m in England for a week or so.”

Joan sighed. “I suppose you’re buying another house.”

“How did you guess?”

“Oh, God, you don’t mean it!”

“I’m afraid so. Don’t worry, I’m going to sell the Washington, Connecticut, place to Bill Eggers.”

“Has he agreed to buy it?”

“Not yet, but wait until he sees it.”

“When are you coming home?”

“A week or so, don’t rush me. Oh, will you go up to my dressing room and overnight me a couple of tweed jackets and my riding clothes and boots? I’m wearing borrowed clothes, and
they stink of tobacco. Send them to the Connaught, in London. Mark the package ‘Hold for arrival.’”

“Anything else?”

“Include another evening shirt and a couple of turtleneck sweaters, please.”

“Right.”

“See you next week, maybe late next week.”

“Bye-bye.”

He rejoined Susan. “Where will I find the fax machine?”

“I’ll take you down and introduce you to Major Bugg.”

“He’s the property manager?”

“Oh, yes, very much so. He’s ex–Royal Marines.”

Stone took the elevator down to the lower level of the house with her. “This is newly installed,” she said.

“Good idea.”

Major Bugg didn’t snap to attention, but he did rise from his desk. He seemed in his mid-fifties, cropped gray hair, military mustache, three-piece tweed suit, gold watch chain. Susan introduced them.

“How do you do, Mr. Barrington?”

“Very well, thank you. I expect you and I should sit down and have a talk about the place later on, but right now I need to send a fax. May I have a sheet of the house letterhead, please?”

Bugg handed him a sheet, and he scrawled instructions to his broker, looked up the fax number on his iPhone, and Bugg sent it for him. He took care to retrieve the original note
after it went through. “There,” he said, “that’s enough business for one day.”

“I’ll walk you out,” Susan said, handing him a card. “My numbers in London.”

Stone gave her his own card. “How about tomorrow evening?”

“That would be fine.”

“I’m staying at the Connaught. May we meet in the bar there at, say, seven o’clock?”

“Yes, that would be convenient.” She came with him to the front door, where Stan awaited with the cart.

“I’ll look forward to seeing you in London.”

“I, too,” she said.

5

F
elicity was returning to work the following morning, so he drove up to London with her in the Aston Martin.

“I think you should take out Susan Blackburn,” she said as she whipped around a truck. “She’s unattached, at the moment, I think, and you’ll need to be entertained when I’m not around.”

“I’ll consider that,” Stone replied.

“What do you have to do in London?”

“I’m lunching with my new attorney at the Reform Club to sign some documents that we discussed on the phone yesterday. I’ll see my tailor and shirtmaker, and I suppose I’ll need some transport, so I’ll take a look at cars.”

“Sounds like you have a full day.”

“When will you return to Beaulieu?” he asked.

“Maybe this weekend—depends on work. The Middle East is a mess these days. We should call it the Muddle East. I gave you a key, didn’t I?”

“Yes, you did.”

She dropped him at the Connaught, but his suite had not yet been vacated, and he was asked to come back after lunch. He walked up Mount Street to his tailor, Hayward, and ordered some suits, a tuxedo, and a reefer suit, which was a double-breasted blue suit with yacht club buttons. He also ordered an overcoat, in case he was at the house in winter. He would need clothes to fill his new dressing room at Windward Hall.

—

T
he Reform Club was a grand edifice in Pall Mall, whence Phileas Fogg had departed on his eighty-day wager around the world, both in the novel and in the film, which shot the opening scenes on-site. His attorney, whose name was Julian Whately, met him in the dining room. “Let’s lunch first, then take our business to the library,” Whately said. “We’re not supposed to flash papers at table.” They passed a pleasant lunch with Whately trying to explain cricket to him, and even after dessert, Stone still hadn’t grasped either the rules or the point.

Ensconced in a corner of the magnificent library with coffee and papers, Whately produced a contract sent over by Sir Charles Bourne’s solicitors. “This is the most extraordinary thing I’ve ever seen,” he said, handing it to Stone, “concerning a sale agreed at a first meeting. Virtually everything in the house included in
the sale is listed—six or seven pages of it. They must have been working on it for weeks.”

“Charles Bourne has known for weeks that he is dying,” Stone said.

“Ah, that explains it. The only thing of note in the contract is that two paintings, a Constable and a Turner, are held out, but offered for separate purchase for two hundred thousand pounds. Are they worth it, do you know?”

“I’ll find out at dinner,” Stone said, signing both contracts, “and let you know in the morning. If not, you can burn that piece of paper.”

“Do you have the funds ready?” Whately asked on the sidewalk while hailing a taxi.

“Yes, they’re in the bank, and I’ve already given Bourne my personal check.”

“Extraordinary,” Whately said. “We can close whenever you and Sir Charles agree.”

“Call his solicitor and tell him that. I’m headed back to Hampshire tomorrow, but I can stay, if he wants to close in London. Try for nine
AM
at the Connaught, in my suite.”

“I’ll let you know,” Whately said. He got into the taxi and drove away.

Stone strolled up to Jermyn Street to his shirtmakers’, Turnbull & Asser. He ordered two dozen shirts to be delivered to Windward Hall in four weeks, picked out a dozen neckties, and a couple of pairs of gloves, bought a dozen pairs of boxer shorts, half a dozen nightshirts, and a silk dressing gown, ordered them
all sent to his hotel, then headed back to the Connaught on foot. He walked through the Burlington Arcade and found Anderson & Sheppard in Saville Row. He ordered two tweed jackets and some complementary trousers, then went on his way.

Then, in Berkeley Square, he came to the Bentley showroom and walked in.

A gleaming Flying Spur greeted him from a turntable, dark green metallic paint and Saffron leather. He watched it for two revolutions before a salesman materialized at his elbow.

“Shall I wrap it, sir, or will you drive it away?”

“How much?” Stone asked.

“I’m very much afraid this one has been sold. I’ve been waiting for ten days for the buyer to pay for it.”

“Do you have anything else ready to go?”

“I’m afraid not, sir. It will take about three months to fill an order.”

“Ah,” Stone said, disappointed.

“Suppose my buyer backed out?” he asked. “Are you prepared to buy it now?”

Stone looked at the sticker on the window and came up with a figure fifteen percent less.

The salesman countered with ten percent.

“Done,” Stone said.

“Will that be for export, sir?”

“No.”

“Then we’ll have to add Value Added Tax and car tax.”

“Of course.”

“One moment, sir.” The man went to his desk and dialed a phone number. Stone caught snatches of his conversation. “Well, then, sir, we will refund your deposit immediately. Thank you for your custom.” He hung up and returned to Stone’s side. “I’m afraid the gentleman got caught a bit short,” he said. “The car is yours.”

They spent half an hour wading through the paperwork, then Stone wrote the man a check. “I’ll pick it up at midday tomorrow,” he said.

“Of course, Mr. Barrington. We will be ready for you.”

Stone crossed Berkeley Square, passed Annabel’s, and then, at the end of the square, he spotted the Porsche showroom across the street. He went in and found a Carrera 4S, painted umber, with cognac leather, beckoning him. He checked the window sticker, but as a salesman detached himself from his chair and began coming toward him, Stone waved him away, then walked out and turned toward the Connaught.

“No,” he said aloud to himself. “I can’t buy a country estate, a Bentley, and a Porsche all in the same day.” He arrived at the hotel and was led to his suite by a young assistant manager. The hotel had been sold and redecorated since he had last stayed there, and he didn’t see a single familiar face among the staff. Still, he liked his suite.

He unpacked and turned on the TV, looking for some news, but he was distracted and could not concentrate on current events. Finally, he went downstairs, crossed the street, walked fifty meters, and bought the Porsche. He signed the documents, wrote a check, and asked the salesman to have it at the front
door of the Connaught at ten
AM
the following morning, then he called the Bentley salesman and asked him to have the Flying Spur delivered to Windward Hall the following afternoon.

He walked back to the Connaught feeling a little light-headed, but pleased with himself.

6