The great difference between them lay in their faces. The boy who rolled with his back on the ground had fairish hair and a long face. His face was red with exertion; one eye had been partly closed by a blow, so that he appeared to leer up at me with what would be termed in court ‘a malevolent expression’. His cheeks were stained by tears and dust, his hair was full of sand.
His brother had black hair which stood stiffly up from his skull. His face was round, even squat, his brows low, his mouth bright and flat against his cheeks. He also glared at me. I saw immediately that this dark boy had a deformity, a second head, growing from his left shoulder.
These were the Howe twins, Tom and Barry.
‘Hello,’ I said. ‘I’ve come to collect you.’
They turned identical surly looks at me, nimbly leaping up. I thought for a moment they were going to attack as they faced me defiantly. Then they turned as one, still locked together, and went bounding off across the dunes.
It was clear to see then that they were one, inseparably joined in the middle, just as my client had stated.
I stood watching them go, clutching my throat, rattled by coming on them so suddenly. They were making for the huddle of low buildings Stebbings had indicated as their home, the best part of a kilometre distant.
There was nothing to do but follow after, keeping to the trail which now led through rabbit-clipped turf.
Nearing the buildings, I came to a piece of ground which someone had at some time attempted to bring in to cultivation. A few cabbage stumps formed the sum total of its crop. More poor tokens of rural living followed: an old broken boat lying upside down, abandoned lobster pots, a collapsed workshed, a fenced patch of ground which contained a flower-bed and some hens in a coop. Beyond stood the house and another building.
The house was built of stuccoed brick up to window level and lath and plaster above that. One side was painted with tar or bitumen and was propped by a large old beam. The general impression was ramshackle.
Afternoon sun made the windows bleary. It was a sick-looking house. Paint had long since peeled from porch, door and window-frames.
An oddity of the site was that the house had been built directly to the south of a stone ruin, so that all view of the sea was excluded from its chief windows. Presumably the builder had intended to protect the house from the more savage storms blowing in off the sea. Ordnance Survey maps label the ruin L’Estrange Abbey.
Almost as soon as I had tapped on the door of the house, it opened and a man’s head appeared.
‘Yes.’
I said, ‘I am Henry Couling of Beauchamp-Fielding Associates. You are expecting me.’
‘You’d better come in.’ Neither his face nor his voice betrayed much more expression than his windowpanes. He never gave me his name, but it was apparent from the start that he was Albert Howe. Howe was in his early fifties, a spare man with a suggestion of strength about him. His complexion was brown and weathered, and brown was the colour of his sparse hair. His dress was a khaki shirt with a flapping leather jacket over it, stained cavalry twill trousers, and a pair of boots of vaguely military design. He stood aside to let me in.
It was not exactly a welcome, but I was glad to escape from the wind. The door opened straight into a parlour in which a fire of driftwood was burning. So cheering a sight was it that I immediately moved across to the hearth and stooped to warm my hands.
‘Is it always as cold as this on L’Estrange Head?’ I asked looking up at him. He remained – rather stupidly, I thought – by the door.
‘’Tisn’t so bad today,’ he said. ‘We heard the cuckoo this morning, across them marshes.’
He jerked his head in indication of the direction of the marshes to which he referred.
His was a melancholy room. The ruin of the abbey cast permanent shadows into it. A light bulb burned overhead, picking out in sickly detail a profusion of birds and small animals which covered the walls. Rough shelving housed these stuffed mementoes of the living world outside; wherever one looked, dead eyes glinted. A well-loaded bookcase stood in one corner. Table and chairs and two old battered armchairs completed the furnishing. The room lacked, as they say, a woman’s touch; despite the fire, it felt cold and damp, and smelt of old seaweed, as if high tide had been known to lap over the threshold of the door – a not unlikely assumption, I reflected.
A kitchen led off on one side, its door standing halfway open. A dog barked sporadically there, as if tied up and not hopeful of improving its position. I looked in that direction, to find two pairs of eyes observing me; two heads were immediately withdrawn.
As I rose, I saw that a loaf of bread and the leavings of a poor meal lay on the table, together with a dead seabird. The seabird was stretched out on a board with its pinions taped outspread and its gizzard slit open.
Howe came awkwardly back from the door and sat at the table, where he proceeded to finish a mess of bread, cheese and pickle on his plate. As if aware of a certain social boorishness in what he was doing, he glanced up at me and gave a jerk of his head, coupled with a quick funny expression and a wink, as if to say, ‘This is the way I am.’
Drawing myself up, I said, ‘I take it that you are Mr Albert Howe, sole surviving parent of the twins, Thomas and Barry Howe.’
‘Tom and Barry, that’s right. The twins. I expect you’d like a cup of tea. Robbie! Tea, gel!’
This last call was echoed by activity in the kitchen, and presently a girl came forth with a big brown teapot. Setting it down on the table, she poured a mug of tea and shyly proffered it to me.
She was a good-looking girl in a countrified way, with big hazel eyes and a complexion as brown as her father’s. Her hair was plentiful, hanging down between her shoulder blades in an old-fashioned plait or pigtail. Like her brothers, she wore faded jeans and went barefoot, a slovenly habit, especially in women. Her figure was well developed; I judged her to be twenty years of age.
There was less unfriendliness in her gaze than in her father’s. As I accepted the mug of tea and sat down, unbidden, at the table beside the impaled bird, she said, ‘So you are the lawyer as has come to take my brothers away.’
I patted the briefcase I had brought with me. ‘I am acting on behalf of Bedderwick Walker Entertainments, with whom I understand your father is keen to come to an agreement. I have a copy of the contract here, Mr Howe, and will be happy to familiarize you with its contents. We can go over it clause by clause, if you so desire, provided I am able to meet Stebbings and his boat at your jetty in approximately two hours’ time.’
Howe crammed the last of his crust into his mouth, masticated for a while, and then said, ‘It’s for the best, Robbie, I keep a-telling you. The boys can’t hang around here for ever and a day, not now’s they’re growed up.’
‘That’s correct,’ I said, snapping open the briefcase. ‘The contract guarantees you and your sons a substantial salary, payable monthly, for a period of three years. It gives Bedderwick Walker the option of renewal of contract for a further two years, at a fee subject to negotiation. Bearing in mind that Bedderwick Walker will invest a considerable amount of money in training and projecting your sons, the arrangements are eminently generous.’
‘You’re still taking my brothers away from home,’ said the girl. ‘Who will look after them, I’d like to know.’
Ignoring her, I spread the contract out before Howe, pushing aside the butter and a jar of pickle.
‘I trust that your sons are ready to return to London with me?’
‘They’re willing enough to go, yes.’
He looked up with a helpless expression, and said to his daughter, ‘Robbie,