Chapter 9 Chez Blinkhorn
Chez Blinkhorn
“Good God, old man, you’ve certainly been in the wars,” Archie said almost admiringly when he opened the door to Flynn.
“Not as bad as it looks,” Flynn said, which was not true. “Here,” he said, holding out the peonies, which were now beginning to look decidedly withered.
“Too kind, too kind,” Archie said. “Mitzi loves flowers.”
Flynn was relieved to find that Archie was dressed down (“Mufti,” he said) in cavalry-twill slacks that were topped with a roll-neck jumper in a rather alarming shade somewhere between canary and mustard. It was the sartorial choice of a confident man, although Flynn was reminded of a budgerigar.
“Not been here long,” Archie said. “We had a first-floor in Knightsbridge. Just near Brompton Oratory, lovely flat. Handy for Harrods Food Hall. We used to buy our coffee there. They’d grind my own blend for me.
Kenyan. But we had to tighten our belts.
On our uppers at the moment, I’m afraid.
Still, ever onwards! Anyway, I don’t know why we’re standing on the doorstep.
Come on in, old bean. Welcome to our humble abode.
We don’t stand on ceremony here.” All this said in a great rush, the flush of alcohol on his mottled, toadish skin.
Flynn followed Archie down a long, narrow hallway that had been papered some time ago in a Regency stripe and was lit by a low-wattage chandelier that might have been Georgian or might equally well have been from Woolworths.
Flynn had to duck to avoid hitting his head on the crystal drops.
The hallway was made even pokier by a substantial console table and wide shelf displaying china ornaments and figurines of one kind or another.
Flynn was no judge of antique porcelain, but to his eye they looked fussy.
There would be no place for such things in Gerald Barry’s pared-down Scandinavian future.
Archie took a roll call, pointing out different objects: “Meissen, Worcester, Chelsea, Dresden,” he said, picking up the figure of a woman and holding it out for Flynn’s appreciation.
The woman carried a shepherd’s crook, and her dress was encrusted with flowers and ribboned bows.
She had a pale, simpering face beneath her powdered hair.
“Bought this little charmer for Mitzi’s last birthday.
She collects these doodads,” Archie said.
“Got it for a knockdown price. Since the war, there’s not much of a market for this kind of stuff. ”
He replaced the figure on the shelf rather negligently, almost sweeping it off with the peonies.
Flynn, following in his wake, repositioned the shepherdess before it could fall and smash on the hard flagstones beneath their feet, where not even a drugget had been laid.
No amount of striped Regency wallpaper and crystal drops could disguise that fact that this had once been the servants’ territory.
After running the gauntlet of the hall, Flynn found himself in a cluttered living room where a dangerous-looking electric fire in the hearth was providing too much of a stuffy kind of heat.
The gloom was relieved intermittently by dim lamps that were fighting for space on the busy side tables.
The lamps were shaded in ruched and ribboned pink.
“Mitzi disapproves of harsh lighting,” Archie said. “Says it’s not flattering for a woman.”
Kitchen smells permeated the airless room, and the claustrophobic atmosphere was made worse by the bric-a-brac that fought for space with the pink lamps.
Some of it looked as though it might be valuable, but it was mingled randomly with what were clearly cheap souvenirs from the Blinkhorns’ travels abroad: a raffia donkey; a Dutch doll; three brass monkeys on a log.
Archie picked up the monkeys and gazed speculatively at them.
“See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil,” he ruminated. “Tricky,” he added. “All three.”
The sunken basement windows were almost at pavement level and there was a regular footfall from passers-by.
“Legs,” Archie said. “Legs and feet. That’s the view from here.
In Knightsbridge…” He sighed, but the memory seemed to peter out as he reached for the comfort of a decanter on the overladen drinks trolley.
“Mitzi’s slaving over the proverbial stove.
I’ll fetch her in a minute, but first—drink? ”
Jesus Christ, yes, Flynn thought. “Please,” he said.
“Sound like you need it, old chap.”
“Sorry—it’s been a long week,” Flynn said, downing the Scotch like medicine.
“Oh?” Archie said, sounding genuinely interested.
“Oh, you know, the office.”
“Wine, women and song—that’s the antidote to routine, Flynn. You can keep the song, mind you. Sadly, it’s the only one that’s free. Don’t get me wrong,” he said, in a sudden urgent whisper, “I worship the ground that Mitzi walks on, but a man has needs, you know.”
Flynn shied away from this intimacy. He was distracted by a silver-framed photograph displayed on the sideboard, showing Mitzi and Archie at a fancy-dress party.
Archie was dressed in a pirate costume, complete with an eye-patch and a (presumably) stuffed parrot perched precariously on one shoulder, while Mitzi seemed to have attended the party as Marie Antoinette, or perhaps a Dresden shepherdess.
Flynn wondered what their chosen guises said about their characters.
And then, standing next to Mitzi, wasn’t that—“Is that Giles Dangerfield?” He picked up the frame to get a better look. No fancy dress for Dangerfield, just the starch of white tie and tails.
“Ah, yes, Giles,” Archie confirmed. He took the photograph off Flynn and gazed at it. “That was an excellent do,” he said, smiling at the memory. “Nineteen thirty-six. The Carlton Club, a party thrown by the Mosleys.”
“The Mosleys? Oswald Mosley? The Fascist?” Sure enough, right at the back of the group there was Mosley himself, looking rather grim considering it was his party. Nonetheless he looked to have the vigour of a man hoping to take command at any moment.
“Persona non grata now, of course,” Archie rumbled on. “Mind you, the man had no sense of humour. Absolutely none. One’s not supposed to admit to ever having known them. Silly, really. I suppose we bet on the wrong horse.”
“Were you a…?”
“Member? Well, no, not me, not exactly,” Archie said, chuckling at the idea.
“Mitzi was a ‘fellow traveller’ for a while. She admired Diana’s style tremendously.
” Archie sighed and looked wistful. “You know, Mosley had some good ideas—‘Britain First’ and all that. It was just a shame that his Blackshirts were such thugs. Still, thugs or not, they got things done. No one gets anything done these days. They just pussy-foot around.”
“And what about Dangerfield? Was he a…?
“Oh, here she is! Mitzi, darling, Harry’s arrived.”
Mitzi was wearing a flounced, bright-red dress that was reminiscent of a flamenco dancer’s costume.
A large red rosette worn over one ear completed her outfit.
Flynn almost expected her to start stamping her feet and clicking castanets; instead, she entered the room with a kind of half-twirl.
“Isn’t she marvellous?” Archie murmured.
Thankfully, no response to this eulogy seemed to be expected.
“Harry,” she greeted, but took a step back when she saw his black eye, which saved him from being kissed.
“Don’t worry, it’s not infectious,” he joked. She looked at him blankly. She was characterized, he realized, by a complete lack of humour.
Archie was still holding the photograph, and Mitzi took it off him and put it back in its place without looking at it. “I thought we were having brandy champagne cocktails, Archie?”
Archie jumped to attention and saluted. “You are so right, my darling. It’ll just take a jiffy.”
“We don’t usually entertain on a Friday,” Mitzi said, a noticeable touch of froideur in her manner. “No one does.”
Flynn would have thought that Friday was the very day that most people did entertain, but what did he know? Like Mitzi’s ardent fans, he was not in the habit of hosting dinner parties.
“Sorry, I was ordered to come.”
“And I was ordered to receive.”
“By Dangerfield?” he asked, and Mitzi held up a hand and gave a facsimile of a smile. “Now, now, no shop talk. I shall bring in the canapés,” she said rather grandly, as if about to introduce new guests. (“Oh, the Canapés, have you met them?”)
Flynn retrieved the peonies from Archie and handed them to her. She eyed them dubiously.
“They need water,” he said.
“I can see that.”
Archie was inspecting the bottles on the drinks tray and eventually came up with a rather dusty bottle of cognac.
Then there was much business with oranges and sugar cubes and a good deal of sloshing and stirring, and that was all before Archie went in search of the champagne.
“Not chilled, I’m afraid,” he said when he returned with a bottle of Bollinger.
“We had the luxury of a refrigerator in Knightsbridge, but here we must make do.”
Flynn was curious. Did Archie have a job?
“Oh, goodness yes,” he said, thumbing the cork from the neck of the bottle with the professionalism of a sommelier. The noise it made was like a shot in the confined space of the room. Flynn jumped and Archie said, “All right, old man? You were in combat, I’m guessing.”
“Not exactly,” Flynn said.
“But you know how to handle a gun?” The question was delivered with unwonted eagerness, as though Archie was expecting the basement flat to be in imminent danger of siege and needed reliable reinforcements.
“Well,” Flynn said, “I know how to shoot. OTC at school.”
“You weren’t in the war?”
“No.”
“Not a Quaker, are you?” (The idea seemed to horrify him.)
“No.”