Mr Rinyo-Clacton's Offer

12. Now, Then

‘Now, then,’ said Mr Rinyo-Clacton in his study. The background music for this scene was the Debussy String Quartet in G Minor, coming out of a state-of-the-art Meridian sound system nestling among many shelves of CDs. To me that music always suggested beaded lampshades, oriental carpets, glass-fronted bookcases, and the word neurasthenia.

There was a very imposing desk of lustrous and highly-polished wood and many subtle curves, joinings, pigeonholes, drawers and compartments. I don’t know anything about furniture but this was the sort of thing one sees on the Antiques Roadshow and learns that it’s worth fifty thousand pounds. The desk was presided over by a double lamp of gleaming brass and green glass shades.

The other object that caught my eye was a large illuminated globe, the kind that sits in a wooden ring on handsomely turned legs. There were ranks of box-files and numerous guides to various countries but no other books.

The only picture on the walls was a framed reproduction of a Piero di Cosimo that’s in the National Gallery — a satyr bending over a dead or dying nymph with a wound in her throat. They are on the shore of a bay. A sad brown dog watches the two of them. Other dogs play on the beach; there are herons and a pelican. In the blue distance ships ride at anchor; beyond them are the buildings of a port. The scene is magical, dreamlike, desolate; the nymph, covered only by a bit of drapery over her hips, her girlish breasts pathetically exposed, is so luminously beautiful — her death seems a dream-death. She and the satyr seem to have strayed into a dream of the death of innocence.

‘Do you think they’ll wake up?’ I said.

Mr Rinyo-Clacton turned away from the desk to look, first at the picture, then at me. ‘They won’t and you won’t. This is it.’

The Debussy quartet had ended and the Ravel quartet that follows it on the CD (I have the same recording, with the Pro Arte Quartet) began. ‘Ravel after Debussy is quite nice, I think,’ said Mr Rinyo-Clacton. ‘There’s a good little edge to it. Do you like music? I never thought to ask.’

‘Yes, I like music’

‘This, as they say, is the beginning of the rest of your life. It will be a life of one year, so the music you hear and everything else will be heightened for you. “Look thy last on all things lovely, every hour,” eh?’

See Mr Rinyo-Clacton, his jacket off and his tie undone, bending over the desk, brilliantly caught in my vision like a scene in a film or a dream. A large half-full glass of brandy stood at the edge of the green blotter. There was another in my right hand. Mr Rinyo-Clacton opened a drawer and took out a crisp white document. ‘If you’ll read this,’ he said, and handed it to me. It was a proper piece of calligraphy, written in Chancery hand:

I, Jonathan Fitch, being of sound mind and with my faculties unimpaired, not under duress or the influence of any drug, hereby assign to T. Rinyo-Clacton, for the sum of one million pounds, to be paid on signature, the right to terminate my life at any time from midnight, the 24th October, 1995. This agreement is binding and I understand that it remains in effect even if I change my mind and return the money. The agreement cannot be cancelled except by T. Rinyo-Clacton’s exercise of the right assigned above.

‘What’s the T for?’ I said.

‘Thanatophile.’

‘Nobody’s called Thanatophile.’

‘You asked me what the T was for and I told you. Don’t sign this unless you’re serious about it because you may be quite sure that I am. You might think I’m crazy but don’t allow yourself to think we’re just fooling around here or it’s some kind of a joke. Once you sign that paper this thing is going to go all the way.’

‘I’m serious,’ I said, ‘and I know that you are.’

‘Desmond,’ he said without raising his voice, ‘signature for you to witness.’ Desmond appeared, watched me sign, signed his name after mine, and withdrew.

Mr Rinyo-Clacton put the document back in the drawer and closed the drawer. ‘Now,’ he said, turning to me, ‘for my part of the bargain.’ He swung the Piero de Cosimo reproduction out from the wall to disclose a safe. He dialled the combination, opened the safe, and said, ‘Desmond,’ whereupon Desmond reappeared. ‘Get him something to put the money in,’ said Mr Rinyo-Clacton, ‘but not any of my luggage.’

‘There’s only Carmen’s shopping trolley,’ said Desmond.

‘That’ll do. She can buy another one tomorrow.’

Desmond got the shopping trolley, a blue-and-red-and-yellow plaid number, brought it into the study, and was gone. Mr Rinyo-Clacton reached into the safe and brought out two thick stacks of fifty-pound notes, each sealed in clear plastic. ‘There’s twelve thousand, five hundred in each bundle,’ he said, ‘so you get eighty of them. Count.’ He handed me bundles of notes and I counted and loaded the trolley. I managed to get sixty bundles into it and Desmond fetched carrier bags from the kitchen for the rest of the money.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘that’s it then. Off I go to live out my million-pound year.’

The Ravel quartet had ended. Now Mr Rinyo-Clacton put on the same trio Mr Perez had started earlier that day, the first-time-with-Serafina-music. He gripped my shoulder. ‘One for the road?’

‘No more brandy for me, thanks.’

‘I wasn’t talking about brandy, Jonathan.’

‘Give me a break! That wasn’t part of the deal.’

‘You’re absolutely right; this isn’t business, it’s personal. I need to feel that death in you again.’

‘And I need you not to.’

‘Tell you what — I’ll wrestle you for it. We’ll both enjoy it more if you put up a fight. If you’ll just step into my dojo…’

‘You’ve got a dojo?’

‘With mats on the floor, You’ll find it quite comfortable.’

He was about six inches taller than I and two stone heavier and I had reason to know that he was a whole lot fitter. As he turned to lead the way I grabbed the desk lamp and would have brained him with it — what a wonderful, wonderful feeling of rightness and release! — but it was taken away from me by the magically appearing Desmond, who then clamped my arms behind me with his left hand while applying a stranglehold with his right arm. Thus restrained I was taken to the dojo where I was stripped to my underpants while Mr Rinyo-Clacton also took off his clothes. Then I was released, put up the best fight I could, and lost.

The rest of it took place in the dojo as well, with Mr Rinyo-Clacton synchronising his movements to those of the Ravel trio and the violin and cello sonata that followed it. He continued with Ravel and me through the violin and piano sonata that came next on the CD, finishing triumphantly as the last movement, Perpetuum mobile, reached its climax.

‘Nice bit of fiddling, that, don’t you think?’ he said.

‘I think I don’t ever want to hear it again.’

‘Sure you do. Your problem is that you don’t really know yourself, Jonny. You’ve got a lovely little death in you, a really charming little death — we’re going to be good friends, it and I. But now it’s time you were getting home. Thank you for the pleasure of your company; we’ll be in touch.’ Still naked, he turned his back on me and walked out of the dojo, leaving his clothes where he’d dropped them while the CD concluded with the Berceuse sur le nom de Gabriel Fauré.

I got dressed and Desmond drove me and my million pounds home. I felt no resentment towards him; I recognised that although he clearly enjoyed his work he was only doing his job and I had no one but myself to blame for what had happened. As we slipped through the quiet streets I replayed that wonderful moment of rage when, if not prevented, I’d have killed Mr Rinyo-Clacton with no thought whatever for the consequences. If I’d been able to do it and get out of the flat I’d have happily left the million pounds behind and called it quits, which was of course not a viable fantasy because consequences would have followed thick and fast.

Here we were: my place. Desmond helped me out of the Daimler with the shopping trolley and carrier bags, said, ‘Good luck,’ and drove off with the engine purring like a well-fed big cat. I went up to my flat and turned on the lights. The whole place shrieked silently at me. ‘For Christ’s sake, it’s me!’ I said but the place kept shrieking. I went to the bathroom and looked in the mirror to see if I was who I said I was. In the mirror I saw Death wearing my face.

‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘I’m not having that — you can’t wear my face.’

It’s not your face any more, sweetheart, said Death, it’s mine. And it made disgusting kissing noises.

For the second time I had a shower that did not cover me with cleanness. Then I got dressed, turned out the lights, put the shopping trolley and the carrier bags in the kitchen, and looked at my watch: quarter to three. I had the feeling that Katerina was someone I could ring up in the middle of the night; maybe she was even expecting my call. I picked up the telephone and dialled her number. She answered after one ring. ‘Hello,’ she said, sounding wide awake.

‘It’s Jonathan,’ I said. ‘Did I wake you?’

‘No, Jonathan — I was reading Schiller.’

‘Can I come over? I can be there in fifteen minutes.’

‘Yes, come. See you in fifteen minutes. Tschuss.’

I opened one of the bundles of banknotes, counted out fifty fifties, thought about muggers, put the notes in an envelope, lowered my trousers, taped the envelope to my leg, hitched my trousers up again, and took my poor little mysterious being out into the small hours of the night.