The Mysterious Commission (3 page)

‘I very much doubt it. My usual procedure–’

‘A pity, Mr Honeybath. Really a great pity. It is, you see, for no more than a fortnight that Mr X can be – well, put at your disposal. So it looks as if it won’t do, after all.’

‘My dear Mr Peach, do you really suppose that I can paint this thing in fourteen days – and work on it every day of the week? You must–’

‘Well, yes, Mr Honeybath. I do. It has to be regarded as part of the bargain, I’m afraid.’

‘I see.’ Honeybath stared at his visitor in what was – far more than at any previous stage of the interview – a sadly divided mind. Could he conceivably regard himself as retaining any shred of professional integrity if he were to allow this staring nonsense to go a single step further? But, of course, there was another way of looking at it. Peach and his principals (whoever they might be) were plainly persons so vastly ignorant of all aesthetic decorum that it was surely admissible to allow oneself a little licence in dealing with them. Between a finished portrait and what might be virtually a sketch in oils they would not have the slightest ability to discriminate. And he could easily lend to his likeness of Mr X the appearance of being little more than a brilliant improvisation. There would be nothing that wasn’t entirely respectable about such a frankly bravura affair – particularly as nobody was ever likely to know that he had pocketed two thousand guineas for the thing. And, as there didn’t seem to be much prospect of rational pleasure in painting a lunatic (even a harmless lunatic), the sooner the macabre but profitable episode was over the better it would be.

‘Very well,’ Honeybath said resignedly. ‘I’ll see what can be done.’

‘I’m sure I’m very grateful, sir. As Mr X’s relatives will be.’

‘Ah, yes – the relatives. Perhaps, Mr Peach, you wouldn’t mind telling me–’

‘But now another question, Mr Honeybath. If you are likely to feel a little pressed for time, sir, I wonder whether we could assist you in any way? Photographs of Mr X, for example – would they be likely to be of any use to you?’

‘Definitely not. I have nothing against the practice of employing photographs, and am aware that many of my most highly reputed colleagues do so.’ Honeybath was going into an impressive routine. ‘It would be entirely naïve to suppose that a portrait-painter is cheating when he employs such a resource. But it is simply not my habit. I begin by making my own sketches in pencil or crayon. There may be a dozen of them before I think of doing more than merely squaring up the canvas.’

‘That’s very interesting – very interesting, indeed.’ And Peach really did seem genuinely impressed. He was looking sharply at Honeybath. ‘On paper, sir, or something of the kind, these sketches would be?’

‘Certainly.’

‘And they could be passed round? Mr X himself could have the handling of them?’

‘There’s no reason at all why he should not. Hold on to them, if he cared to.’

‘Well, Mr Honeybath, I’ll remember that. Something of a child, Mr X is, as I think I’ve hinted to you. Likes to have something to play with. And to show around.’

‘I see.’ Honeybath was faintly puzzled by this further twaddle. ‘And now, I’m afraid there is at least one question I must ask
you
. Where is this portrait you are requesting me to paint going to hang?’

‘To hang?’ For the first time, Peach appeared to be taken by surprise, and to find himself stumped for an answer. His instructions, perhaps, hadn’t run to this point. ‘Is the question material, Mr Honeybath?’

‘Of course it’s material. The scale of the thing; the pose, whether formal or relaxed; the lighting; the whole compositional key: these are all involved with the matter. You speak of Mr X’s relations as arranging the commission, which makes me incline to the supposition that the portrait is destined for a domestic setting. But I may be wrong. For all I know’ – Honeybath permitted himself a slight note of asperity – ‘your Mr X may be a retired bishop in some more than usually embarrassing stage of mental decay, and the picture destined for Lambeth Palace. Or he may have been a professor of Lord knows what, so that my work will end up in the great hall of Balliol College or Christ Church or in the London Senate House. Or he may have been an Alderman or a Lord Mayor–’

‘He certainly hasn’t been that, Mr Honeybath.’ Peach checked himself, and looked guilty. He had presumably been forbidden to make any positive statement whatever about the shadowy Mr X. ‘But I can tell you this. Mr X is to hang in very distinguished company – very distinguished company, indeed. Make no mistake about it. He’s been a man right at the top of his class in his time.’

‘I’m delighted to hear it.’ And it was certainly true that Honeybath’s curiosity was pricked. There had, for once, been an unmistakable ring of truth in Peach’s voice. He meant what he said. But Honeybath was not, in fact, all that pleased. Two thousand guineas tumbling in during a hard-up spell was quite something, but he still had his reputation to consider. Despite the hugger-mugger nature of the proposed transaction, it was not inconceivable that the portrait was really booked for some august place. He didn’t fancy the notion of a skimped and slapdash Honeybath finding itself on a line between a Reynolds and a Gainsborough, or for that matter between a Sutherland and Kokoschka. The mere thought of such a thing turned him cold. He almost saw those banknotes, tucked away so snugly in their drawer, turning to dust and ashes as they lay. ‘It must be thought about,’ he said rather feebly. ‘There must he an interval for reflection, for serious consideration of the decency of the whole thing. I insist on that.’

‘Oh, certainly.’ Peach was instantly amenable. ‘We have till nightfall, after all.’

‘I beg your pardon?’ Not for the first time in the past half-hour, Honeybath could scarcely believe his ears. ‘Did you say
nightfall
?’

‘Just that, sir. Mr X’s relations are very sensitive about the whole matter. Insanity is always a humiliating thing in a family, wouldn’t you say? It oughtn’t to be so, but it is so. They insist that Mr X’s residence should be approached in the dark. You will agree that it is thoroughly natural, I’m sure.’

There was a short silence – occasioned, it need hardly be said, by Honeybath’s inability to find speech. He was obliged hastily to retrieve his sherry and gulp it before contriving further utterance.

‘I’m to be taken to this confounded residence, as you call it, in the dark every night, and positively to work under nocturnal conditions?’

‘Oh, no – nothing of the kind. We quite understand that you will want to paint in daylight. That’s
de rigueur
, I’ve no doubt.’ Peach paused on this expression; he was obviously rather proud of it. ‘But you will go, and come away again, in the dark. I can assure you that you will be most comfortably accommodated during your little fortnight. And there’s quite a good cook.’

Rather like a man registering stress in a stage comedy, Honeybath had produced a handkerchief and mopped his brow. But although his thoughts may have been confused he really knew that there was only one thing to do. He must fish out those banknotes, chuck them at Peach’s irritatingly faceless physiognomy, and order him out of the studio and back to the company of that impressive and patiently waiting chauffeur. And here would be the end of the affair – except, perhaps, that Honeybath would then send for the police. For it could no longer be doubted that there was something uncommonly fishy about the mysterious commission. That was the one true word about it. It had a very fish-like smell.

‘So shall we say nine o’clock?’ Peach had got to his feet. He had contrived – incredibly he had contrived – to shake hands in a familiar manner with Charles Honeybath. Within seconds, the painter was alone in his studio.

Every man has his price, so Honeybath must have had his. It would be untrue, however, to assert that it had been named that afternoon. Locked in a drawer in his desk, indeed, was a carrot (or the half of a carrot) which had been potent enough through the greater part of his interview with Mr Peach. But that it was continuing to exercise its potency, or to control the situation to the exclusion of other factors, is inconceivable. Charles Honeybath was an educated man; he was, it may be repeated, conscious that he had a reputation to guard; his financial embarrassments were not of the sort that constitute a threat to tomorrow’s dinner – or indeed to any subsequent dinner, indefinitely on to the grave. It would be a perfectly well-nourished Honeybath who would eventually present himself for that final banquet at which (as the eminent preacher John Donne once remarked) one is not the feaster but the feasted upon. He was in no state of desperation whatever.

This being so, some other impulse must have been operative in prompting Honeybath to his immediate course of conduct. Perhaps it was intellectual curiosity. He had learned all that was to be learned about portrait-painting – or at least all that was to be learned about it by one who was neither a Rembrandt nor a Velázquez. His range of other interests was not extensive. He was not the type of the socially accomplished artist: a William Rothenstein, say, who has known everybody and has a story about each of them. A childless widower without the inclination to marry again, he was untouched by those domestic exigencies and anxieties which serve to sop up the surplus nervous energies of many men. Again, he had never had a war to speak of; never fought in the warm rain or at the hot gates, bitten by flies. So perhaps – if very obscurely – he was looking for something. Perhaps he was so looking before it was altogether too late; looking for something to satisfy that much younger man who lurks still within many sedate outward presences, who sometimes shouts, soundlessly but urgently, beneath the plummy utterances of established middle age. Or, perhaps again, Honeybath simply obeyed a prompting to make himself a little more interesting to the world than he had been of late. Whatever the truth about Mr X might turn out to be, he promised to provide a story on the strength of which Honeybath could dine out for months ahead.

Any or all of these things may have been true. Certain it is that, later that afternoon, the painter returned to his modest flat, packed a suitcase, left a note for the woman who came in to do for him, dined early in his favourite Italian restaurant, went back to the studio and did some more extensive getting together of the necessities of his craft there.

And it was thus that nine o’clock came round.

Punctually the bell rang, and Honeybath went to the door. He expected to be confronted once more by the confidential Peach, but the man before him was the chauffeur. The car, since it was parked under a streetlamp, could be clearly seen, and it was evident that it was empty. There was nothing particularly disconcerting about this, but Honeybath nevertheless found that he was annoyed. He had, after a fashion, got to know Peach, and it had been obscurely in his head that during this drive – whether it was to prove long or short – he could, so to speak, go on with the fellow from where he had left off, and possibly extract at least a few additional scraps of useful information. But perhaps this unexpected state of affairs would actually prove advantageous. He might be able to pump the chauffeur.

‘Ah, good evening,’ he said, in a cordial but officer-to-man voice. ‘Have we much of a drive in front of us?’

‘Nothing very out of the way, sir. Would that be your gear?’ The chauffeur indicated Honeybath’s suitcase and artist’s paraphernalia on the floor of the studio. ‘They’ll go very well in the boot, sir, and be quite safe there.’

‘Excellent. Do please bring them out. And the door simply closes behind you.’ Honeybath had been visited by a brilliant idea, and one making evident how promisingly there lurked in him the spirit of private detection. He would nip out before this fellow, appear to take an aimless half a dozen paces up and down the pavement, and thereby contrive to acquaint himself with the registration number of the waiting car.

‘Thank you, sir. But I’ll make you comfortable first.’ The chauffeur stood aside for Honeybath and then – as it were shoulder to shoulder – conducted him to a rear door of the vehicle. ‘If you will be so good, sir,’ he said as he opened it. He might have been a barber of the superior sort, inviting a customer to his seat.

With automatic docility, Honeybath climbed in. The evening was mild, but he hadn’t sat down before the chauffeur was enveloping him in a large and opulent fur rug. Then he shut the door and turned back for the luggage. Honeybath, with a feeling which was for the moment almost one of good-natured amusement, realized that he had lost that trick. The chauffeur commanded confidence – at least to the extent that, unlike Mr Peach, he appeared to be exactly what he was. But it was clear enough that he, too, had his instructions. And he had been much too smart for that one about the registration number.

The car, although not of the kind paraded in the interest of prestige and conspicuous expenditure, was large and of the formally conceived sort. The passengers, that is to say, sat in a big glass box and the driver in a little glass box, and communication between the two was by means of some acoustic device which a more rational disposition of things would have rendered unnecessary. Honeybath realized that the prospects of informative chat were not too good.

He could, on the other hand, at least look around undisturbed. The chauffeur could scarcely suggest blindfolding him, or throw a blanket over his head in the manner favoured by the police when conducting hither or thither some unfortunate individual who has been helping them with their inquiries. Nor did the car have blinds all round, since that was an amenity which had gone out more or less with dear old Queen Mary. Honeybath, who knew his London very well, had little doubt that he could retain a pretty sound knowledge of where this wild-goose affair was taking him. He settled himself comfortably in his seat. The chauffeur was stowing his stuff in the back. It was observable that he took even more care of Honeybath’s professional equipment than of his merely diurnal baggage. This showed tact. It even showed something like refined feeling. A slight sense of personal importance stole over Honeybath. He was glad that it had occurred to him to pack his dinner-jacket. Odd as this affair was, it might nevertheless be bringing him into the company of people with civilized habits.