venting his fury on the idiot. No, what was particularly irking him was that he had offered the imbecile Yapp such extraordinarily generous terms forresearch the raving lunatic would have gladly done for free. There was the added irritation of wondering if Yapp, for all his reputation, would prove the right man for the job. His politeness at dinner hadn’t suggested the ruthless hatchet-man Lord Petrefact would have chosen to let loose on his family. With the thought that he would have to point the brute in the right direction, Lord Petrefact trundled off to his bedroom and the ministrations of the resuscitation team whose female members had the unenviable task of getting him into bed at night and out in the morning.
In the drawing-room Yapp finished studying the contract and, conscious that he was keeping the servants up until a quite unnecessarily late hour, made his way along the corridor and up to his room. As far as he could tell, and he had studied the fine print with particular care, there was absolutely nothing in the contract to prevent him from writing the most scurrilous history of the family imaginable. It was most extraordinary. And for this gift of socio-economic-fiscal data he was to be paid one hundred thousand pounds. It was an unnerving thought – almost as unnerving as knowing that he was about to sleep in a bed once occupied by the tyrant of the Congo.
It was hardly surprising that Walden Yapp had difficulty in going to sleep. While Lord Petrefact lay below him considering which of his relatives would least appreciate Yapp’s enquiries into their private affairs, the great Demotic Historiographer found sleep almost as awkward. He kept waking and staring at the shape of thewindow, wondering at his good fortune before dozing off again. When he did sleep it was to dream of pigs in wheelchairs and Lord Petrefact horribly distorted with his slippered feet more or less where his shoulder blades should have been. To make matters worse, there was no reading lamp beside the bed and he couldn’t lull his imagination into a comfortable torpor by dwelling on the sufferings of knife-grinders in Sheffield in 1863, a doctoral thesis of one of his students he had brought with him to serve as bedside reading. Above all, there was no modem. If only he could have fed the contract to Doris he felt sure she would have seen the flaw in it somewhere. But that would have to wait until he got back to his apartment at Kloone.
Even Croxley, normally an excellent sleeper, found himself for once prey to insomnia. He had managed to escape the immediate fury of Lord Petrefact in respect of the makeshift sucking pig, but the morning would undoubtedly see an explosion of wrath. Croxley resigned himself to this inevitable outburst. The old man might blast him to hell and gone, but Croxley knew his own worth and his job was not in danger. No, there was something more insidious going on, and for once he had no insight into Lord Petrefact’s motives. Why had he invited this subversive scholar to Fawcett? It was beyond Croxley. And if Lord Petrefact cursed himself for having offered such a large sum to Yapp for his research, Croxley blamed himself for not having used the opportunity at dinner to find out from Yapp why he was there. Anyway,whatever the reason, Croxley disapproved of it. Searching back in his mind for a motive, he could only suppose it had to do with the proposed closure of the plant at Hull. That was certainly on the cards and perhaps Yapp was a possible arbitrator in the dispute. In which case the old man might be trying to buy him off. But that didn’t explain the way in which he had fawned on the wretched creature. In half a century of self-indentured loyalty to Lord Petrefact and total devotion to the family, Croxley could remember only very few occasions when the old man had attempted so ferociously to hide his true feelings. There had been the time he needed Raphael Petrefact’s holdings in American Carboils to
In the drawing-room Yapp finished studying the contract and, conscious that he was keeping the servants up until a quite unnecessarily late hour, made his way along the corridor and up to his room. As far as he could tell, and he had studied the fine print with particular care, there was absolutely nothing in the contract to prevent him from writing the most scurrilous history of the family imaginable. It was most extraordinary. And for this gift of socio-economic-fiscal data he was to be paid one hundred thousand pounds. It was an unnerving thought – almost as unnerving as knowing that he was about to sleep in a bed once occupied by the tyrant of the Congo.
It was hardly surprising that Walden Yapp had difficulty in going to sleep. While Lord Petrefact lay below him considering which of his relatives would least appreciate Yapp’s enquiries into their private affairs, the great Demotic Historiographer found sleep almost as awkward. He kept waking and staring at the shape of thewindow, wondering at his good fortune before dozing off again. When he did sleep it was to dream of pigs in wheelchairs and Lord Petrefact horribly distorted with his slippered feet more or less where his shoulder blades should have been. To make matters worse, there was no reading lamp beside the bed and he couldn’t lull his imagination into a comfortable torpor by dwelling on the sufferings of knife-grinders in Sheffield in 1863, a doctoral thesis of one of his students he had brought with him to serve as bedside reading. Above all, there was no modem. If only he could have fed the contract to Doris he felt sure she would have seen the flaw in it somewhere. But that would have to wait until he got back to his apartment at Kloone.
Even Croxley, normally an excellent sleeper, found himself for once prey to insomnia. He had managed to escape the immediate fury of Lord Petrefact in respect of the makeshift sucking pig, but the morning would undoubtedly see an explosion of wrath. Croxley resigned himself to this inevitable outburst. The old man might blast him to hell and gone, but Croxley knew his own worth and his job was not in danger. No, there was something more insidious going on, and for once he had no insight into Lord Petrefact’s motives. Why had he invited this subversive scholar to Fawcett? It was beyond Croxley. And if Lord Petrefact cursed himself for having offered such a large sum to Yapp for his research, Croxley blamed himself for not having used the opportunity at dinner to find out from Yapp why he was there. Anyway,whatever the reason, Croxley disapproved of it. Searching back in his mind for a motive, he could only suppose it had to do with the proposed closure of the plant at Hull. That was certainly on the cards and perhaps Yapp was a possible arbitrator in the dispute. In which case the old man might be trying to buy him off. But that didn’t explain the way in which he had fawned on the wretched creature. In half a century of self-indentured loyalty to Lord Petrefact and total devotion to the family, Croxley could remember only very few occasions when the old man had attempted so ferociously to hide his true feelings. There had been the time he needed Raphael Petrefact’s holdings in American Carboils to
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