Skin and Other Stories Read online

  He arrived back at his house in Acacia Road at about half past four and parked his bike in the garage alongside the car. Suddenly he found himself running along the little concrete path that led to the front door. 'Now stop that!' he said aloud, pulling up short. 'Calm down. You've got to make this really good for Betty. Unfold it slowly.' But oh, he simply could not wait to give the news to his lovely wife and watch her face as he told her the whole story of his afternoon. He found her in the kitchen packing some jars of home-made jam into a basket.

  'Robert!' she cried, delighted as always to see him. 'You're home early! How nice!'

  He kissed her and said, 'I am a bit early, aren't I?'

  'You haven't forgotten we're going to the Renshaws for the weekend? We have to leave fairly soon.'

  'I had forgotten,' he said. 'Or maybe I hadn't. Perhaps that's why I'm home early.'

  'I thought I'd take Margaret some jam.'

  'Good,' he said. 'Very good. You take her some jam. That's a very good idea to take Margaret some jam.'

  There was something in the way he was acting that made her swing round and stare at him. 'Robert,' she said, 'what's happened? There's something the matter.'

  'Pour us each a drink,' he said. 'I've got a bit of news for you.'

  'Oh darling, it's not something awful, is it?'

  'No,' he said. 'It's something funny. I think you'll like it.'

  'You've been made Head of Surgery!'

  'It's funnier than that,' he said. 'Go on, make a good stiff drink for each of us and sit down and I'll tell you.'

  'It's a bit early for drinks,' she said, but she got the ice-tray from the fridge and started making his whisky and soda. While she was doing this, she kept glancing up at him nervously. She said, 'I don't think I've ever seen you quite like this before. You are wildly excited about something and you are pretending to be very calm. You're all red in the face. Are you sure it's good news?'

  'I think it is,' he said, 'but I'll let you judge that for yourself.' He sat down at the kitchen table and watched her as she put the glass of whisky in front of him.

  'All right,' she said. 'Come on. Let's have it.'

  'Get a drink for yourself first,' he said.

  'My goodness, what is this?' she said, but she poured some gin into a glass and was reaching for the ice-tray when he said, 'More than that. Give yourself a good stiff one.'

  'Now I am worried,' she said, but she did as she was told and then added ice and filled the glass up with tonic. 'Now then,' she said, sitting down beside him at the table, 'get it off your chest.'

  Robert began telling his story. He started with the Prince in the consulting-room and he spun it out long and well so that it took a good ten minutes before he came to the diamond.

  'It must be quite a whopper,' she said, 'to make you go all red in the face and funny-looking.'

  He reached into his pocket and took out the little black pouch and put it on the table. 'There it is,' he said. 'What do you think?'

  She loosened the silk cord and tipped the stone into her hand. 'Oh, my God!' she cried. 'It's absolutely stunning!'

  'It is, isn't it.'

  'It's amazing.'

  'I haven't told you the whole story yet,' he said, and while his wife rolled the diamond from the palm of one hand to the other, he went on to tell her about his visit to Harry Gold in The High. When he came to the point where the jeweller began to talk about value, he stopped and said, 'So what do you think he said it was worth?'

  'Something pretty big,' she said. 'It's bound to be. I mean just look at it!'

  'Go on then, make a guess. How much?'

  'Ten thousand pounds?' she said. 'I really don't have any idea.'

  'Try again.'

  'You mean, it's more?'

  'Yes, it's quite a lot more.'

  'Twenty thousand pounds!'

  'Would you be thrilled if it was worth as much as that?'

  'Of course I would, darling. Is it really worth twenty thousand pounds?'

  'Yes,' he said. 'And the rest.'

  'Now don't be a beast, Robert. Just tell me what Mr Gold said.'

  'Take another drink of gin.'

  She did so, then put down the glass, looking at him and waiting.

  'It is worth at least half a million dollars and very probably over a million.'

  'You're joking!' Her words came out in a kind of gasp.

  'It's known as a pear-shape,' he said. 'And where it comes to a point at this end, it's as sharp as a needle.'

  'I'm completely stunned,' she said, still gasping.

  'You wouldn't have thought half a million, would you?'

  'I've never in my life had to think in those sort of figures,' she said. She stood up and went over to him and gave him a huge hug and a kiss. 'You really are the most wonderful and stupendous man in the world!' she cried.

  'I was totally bowled over,' he said. 'I still am.'

  'Oh Robert!' she cried, gazing at him with eyes bright as two stars. 'Do you realize what this means? It means we can get Diana and her husband out of that horrid little flat and buy them a small house!'

  'By golly, you're right!'

  'And we can buy a decent flat for John and give him a better allowance all the way through his medical school! And Ben ... Ben wouldn't have to go on a motor-bike to work all through the freezing winters. We could get him something better. And ... and ... and ...'

  'And what?' he asked, smiling at her.

  'And you and I can take a really good holiday for once and go wherever we please! We can go to Egypt and Turkey and you can visit Baalbek and all the other places you've been longing to go to for years and years!' She was quite breathless with the vista of small pleasures that were unfolding in her dreams. 'And you can start collecting some really nice pieces for once in your life as well!'

  Ever since he had been a student, Robert Sandy's passion had been the history of the Mediterranean countries, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria and Egypt, and he had made himself into something of an expert on the ancient world of those various civilizations. He had done it by reading and studying and by visiting, when he had the time, the British Museum and the Ashmolean. But with three children to educate and with a job that paid only a reasonable salary, he had never been able to indulge this passion as he would have liked. He wanted above all to visit some of the grand remote regions of Asia Minor and also the now below-ground village of Babylon in Iraq and he would love to see the Arch of Ctsephon and the Sphinx at Memphis and a hundred other things and places, but neither the time nor the money had ever been available. Even so, the long coffee-table in the living-room was covered with small objects and fragments that he had managed to pick up cheaply here and there through his life. There was a mysterious pale alabaster ushaptiu in the form of a mummy from Upper Egypt which he knew was Pre-Dynastic from about 7000 BC. There was a bronze bowl from Lydia with an engraving on it of a horse, and an early Byzantine twisted silver necklace, and a section of a wooden painted mask from an Egyptian sarcophagus, and a Roman red-ware bowl, and a small black Etruscan dish, and perhaps fifty other fragile and interesting little pieces. None was particularly valuable, but Robert Sandy loved them all.

  'Wouldn't that be marvellous?' his wife was saying. 'Where shall we go first?'

  'Turkey,' he said.

  'Listen,' she said, pointing to the diamond that lay sparkling on the kitchen table, 'you'd better put your fortune away somewhere safe before you lose it.'

  'Today is Friday,' he said. 'When do we get back from the Renshaws?'

  'Sunday night.'

  'And what are we going to do with our million-pound rock in the meanwhile? Take it with us in my pocket?'

  'No,' she said, 'that would be silly. You really cannot walk around with a million pounds in your pocket for a whole weekend. It's got to go into a safe-deposit box at the bank. We should do it now.'

  'It's Friday night, my darling. All the banks are closed till next Monday.'

  'So they are,' she said. 'Well th
en, we'd better hide it somewhere in the house.'

  'The house will be empty till we come back,' he said. 'I don't think that's a very good idea.'

  'It's better than carrying it around in your pocket or in my handbag.'

  'I'm not leaving it in the house. An empty house is always liable to be burgled.'

  'Come on, darling,' she said, 'surely we can think of a place where no one could possibly find it.'

  'In the tea-pot,' he said.

  'Or bury it in the sugar-basin,' she said.

  'Or put it in the bowl of one of my pipes in the pipe-rack,' he said. 'With some tobacco over it.'

  'Or under the soil of the azalea plant,' she said.

  'Hey, that's not bad, Betty. That's the best so far.'

  They sat at the kitchen table with the shining stone lying there between them, wondering very seriously what to do with it for the next two days while they were away.

  'I still think it's best if I take it with me,' he said.

  'I don't, Robert. You'll be feeling in your pocket every five minutes to make sure it's still there. You won't relax for one moment.'

  'I suppose you're right,' he said. 'Very well, then. Shall we bury it under the soil of the azalea plant in the sitting-room? No one's going to look there.'

  'It's not one hundred per cent safe,' she said. 'Someone could knock the pot over and the soil would spill out on the floor and presto, there's a sparkling diamond lying there.'

  'It's a thousand to one against that,' he said. 'It's a thousand to one against the house being broken into anyway.'

  'No, it's not,' she said. 'Houses are being burgled every day. It's not worth chancing it. But look, darling, I'm not going to let this thing become a nuisance to you, or a worry.'

  'I agree with that,' he said.

  They sipped their drinks for a while in silence.

  'I've got it!' she cried, leaping up from her chair. 'I've thought of a marvellous place!'

  'Where?'

  'In here,' she cried, picking up the ice-tray and pointing to one of the empty compartments. 'We'll just drop it in here and fill it with water and put it back in the fridge. In an hour or two it'll be hidden inside a solid block of ice and even if you looked, you wouldn't be able to see it.'

  Robert Sandy stared at the ice-tray. 'It's fantastic!' he said. 'You're a genius! Let's do it right away!'

  'Shall we really do it?'

  'Of course. It's a terrific idea.'

  She picked up the diamond and placed it into one of the little empty compartments. She went to the sink and carefully filled the whole tray with water. She opened the door of the freezer section of the fridge and slid the tray in. 'It's the top tray on the left,' she said. 'We'd better remember that. And it'll be in the block of ice furthest away on the right-hand side of the tray.'

  'The top tray on the left,' he said. 'Got it. I feel better now that it's tucked safely away.'

  'Finish your drink, darling,' she said. 'Then we must be off. I've packed your case for you. And we'll try not to think about our million pounds any more until we come back.'

  'Do we talk about it to other people?' he asked her. 'Like the Renshaws or anyone else who might be there?'

  'I wouldn't,' she said. 'It's such an incredible story that it would soon spread around all over the place. Next thing you know, it would be in the papers.'

  'I don't think the King of the Saudis would like that,' he said.

  'Nor do I. So let's say nothing at the moment.'

  'I agree,' he said. 'I would hate any kind of publicity.'

  'You'll be able to get yourself a new car,' she said, laughing.

  'So I will. I'll get one for you, too. What kind would you like, darling?'

  'I'll think about it,' she said.

  Soon after that, the two of them drove off to the Renshaws for the weekend. It wasn't far, just beyond Whitney, some thirty minutes from their own house. Charlie Renshaw was a consultant physician at the hospital and the families had known each other for many years.

  The weekend was pleasant and uneventful, and on Sunday evening Robert and Betty Sandy drove home again, arriving at the house in Acacia Road at about seven p.m. Robert took the two small suitcases from the car and they walked up the path together. He unlocked the front door and held it open for his wife.

  'I'll make some scrambled eggs,' she said, 'and crispy bacon. Would you like a drink first, darling?'

  'Why not?' he said.

  He closed the door and was about to carry the suitcases upstairs when he heard a piercing scream from the sitting-room 'Oh no!' she was crying. 'No! No! No!'

  Robert dropped the suitcase and rushed in after her. She was standing there pressing her hands to her cheeks and already tears were streaming down her face.

  The scene in the sitting-room was one of utter desolation. The curtains were drawn and they seemed to be the only things that remained intact in the room. Everything else had been smashed to smithereens. All Robert Sandy's precious little objects from the coffee-table had been picked up and flung against the walls and were lying in tiny pieces on the carpet. A glass cabinet had been tipped over. A chest-of-drawers had had its four drawers pulled out and the contents, photograph albums, games of Scrabble and Monopoly and a chessboard and chessmen and many other family things had been flung across the room. Every single book had been pulled out of the big floor-to-ceiling bookshelves against the far wall and piles of them were now lying open and mutilated all over the place. The glass on each of the four watercolours had been smashed and the oil painting of their three children painted when they were young had had its canvas slashed many times with a knife. The armchairs and the sofa had also been slashed so that the stuffing was bulging out. Virtually everything in the room except the curtains and the carpet had been destroyed.

  'Oh, Robert,' she said, collapsing into his arms, 'I don't think I can stand this.'

  He didn't say anything. He felt physically sick.

  'Stay here,' he said. 'I'm going to look upstairs.' He ran out and took the stairs two at a time and went first to their bedroom. It was the same in there. The drawers had been pulled out and the shirts and blouses and underclothes were now scattered everywhere. The bedclothes had been stripped from the double-bed and even the mattress had been tipped off the bed and slashed many times with a knife. The cupboards were open and every dress and suit and every pair of trousers and every jacket and every skirt had been ripped from its hanger. He didn't look in the other bedrooms. He ran downstairs and put an arm around his wife's shoulders and together they picked their way through the debris of the sitting-room towards the kitchen. There they stopped.

  The mess in the kitchen was indescribable. Almost every single container of any sort in the entire room had been emptied on to the floor and then smashed to pieces. The place was a wasteland of broken jars and bottles and food of every kind. All Betty's home-made jams and pickles and bottled fruits had been swept from the long shelf and lay shattered on the ground. The same had happened to the stuff in the store-cupboard, the mayonnaise, the ketchup, the vinegar, the olive oil, the vegetable oil and all the rest. There were two other long shelves on the far wall and on these had stood about twenty lovely large glass jars with big ground-glass stoppers in which were kept rice and flour and brown sugar and bran and oatmeal and all sorts of other things. Every jar now lay on the floor in many pieces, with the contents spewed around. The refrigerator door was open and the things that had been inside, the leftover foods, the milk, the eggs, the butter, the yoghurt, the tomatoes, the lettuce, all of them had been pulled out and splashed on to the pretty tiled kitchen floor. The inner drawers of the fridge had been thrown into the mass of slush and trampled on. The plastic ice-trays had been yanked out and each had been literally broken in two and thrown aside. Even the plastic-coated shelves had been ripped out of the fridge and bent double and thrown down with the rest. All the bottles of drink, the whisky, gin, vodka, sherry, vermouth, as well as half a dozen cans of beer, were standing on th
e table, empty. The bottles of drink and the beer cans seemed to be the only things in the entire house that had not been smashed. Practically the whole floor lay under a thick layer of mush and goo. It was as if a gang of mad children had been told to see how much mess they could make and had succeeded brilliantly.

  Robert and Betty Sandy stood on the edge of it all, speechless with horror. At last Robert said, 'I imagine our lovely diamond is somewhere underneath all that.'

  'I don't give a damn about our diamond,' Betty said. 'I'd like to kill the people who did this.'

  'So would I,' Robert said. 'I've got to call the police.' He went back into the sitting-room and picked up the telephone. By some miracle it still worked.

  The first squad car arrived in a few minutes. It was followed over the next half-hour by a Police Inspector, a couple of plain-clothes men, a fingerprint expert and a photographer.

  The Inspector had a black moustache and a short muscular body. 'These are not professional thieves,' he told Robert Sandy after he had taken a look round. 'They weren't even amateur thieves. They were simply hooligans off the street. Riff-raff. Yobbos. Probably three of them. People like this scout around looking for an empty house and when they find it they break in and the first thing they do is to hunt out the booze. Did you have much alcohol on the premises?'

  'The usual stuff,' Robert said. 'Whisky, gin, vodka, sherry and a few cans of beer.'

  'They'll have drunk the lot,' the Inspector said. 'Lads like these have only two things in mind, drink and destruction. They collect all the booze on to a table and sit down and drink themselves raving mad. Then they go on the rampage.'

  'You mean they didn't come in here to steal?' Robert asked.

  'I doubt they've stolen anything at all,' the Inspector said. 'If they'd been thieves they would at least have taken your TV set. Instead, they smashed it up.'

  'But why do they do this?'

  'You'd better ask their parents,' the Inspector said. 'They're rubbish, that's all they are, just rubbish. People aren't brought up right any more these days.'

  Then Robert told the Inspector about the diamond. He gave him all the details from the beginning to end because he realized that from the police point of view it was likely to be the most important part of the whole business.

  'Half a million quid!' cried the Inspector. 'Jesus Christ!'