Page 12 of The Shooting Season

“To warn you…and I’d be honored to do business with you—”

I was outraged. “I would not do business with the likes of you!” I made to stand up.

“Sit down Benedict. Hear me out.” Cavell said softly. There was intimacy in the way he addressed me. I sat and then unthinking, reached for the glass of Port and took a swallow. Cavell’s eyes lit up as if he had bested me.

“You are long acquainted with the Ardmillan family, are you not?”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Stop being obtuse. Answer the question man!”

“Euan and I were friends at university in Edinburgh. But after we graduated we chose diverging paths”, I explained.

“He seems awfully…fond of you at dinner!” Cavell mocked.

I felt my cheeks redden with the hint of innuendo in the impertinent man’s reply.

“In our younger days, we were quite inseparable. But times change… people change.” I said coldly. “This is the first time we have dined together in thirty years.”

“Interesting. I am also…acquainted with him. I’d wager it is in a similar way to you!”

Was Cavell telling me that he too was one of Euan’s many lovers? My stomach knotted at the thought of it. I recalled feeling the constant disappointment and heart-sick pain at being Euan’s dirty secret while at university. I’d longed for a sweetheart to have all to myself. I’d naively believed that he was my beau and I was his one-and-only, but Euan had much wider tastes. His promiscuity became too much and roused the green-eyed-monster in me. I did not like the man I turned me into while loving Euan Ardmillan. I did not like feeling so dependent on his affections for my wellbeing. And I most certainly did not like arriving at the student bar to find him flaunting a new boy he was dallying with, and then after he’d finished toying with him he would slip back into my bed for comfort. The memories of Euan’s manipulations had faded over the years, and remembering sobered me. He was at it again with his desperation to get me to use the Staff with him to revive his flagging manhood!

“It is clear that my reputation goes before me,” Cavell said.

“You are a thief!” I countered.

“I would honestly see myself as more of a Robin Hood, than an outright swindler. Most of what is printed in the news sheets is pure fiction. Stories about me appear to sell papers!”

“I’m sure they do!”

“The items I take were all originally obtained by deceit and murder. The individuals who employ me do so to redress the balance, as it were.”

“So you are a benevolent thief? How very droll.” I said coldly.

“Not one person has ever been harmed by any of my thefts. The victim does not suffer anything but a bruised ego from the loss, not like my clients. And they always have a wonderful story to tell at dinner parties!”

“Why am I here? What is this warning you speak of?” I was growing tired of this charade.

“Do you know the particulars of Lord Ardmillan’s Last Will and Testament?”

“Only what was said in the missive that invited me here.”

“I have seen a copy of the full Will and it makes for interesting reading. Lord Percy stated that his personal collection was to be sold exactly one year after his passing.”

“Aye, that is what my invitation stated”,

“As we know he was a Commanding Officer for the 16th Regiment of Light Dragoon Lancers and his regiment was sent out to India in 1822. He collected many things on his travels, as well as a reputation for brutality.”

I nodded in agreement, I’d heard many stories of his butchery, and not just of the animals he hunted for sport.

“Lord Ardmillan penned a list of collectors of fine art and antiquities that he knew would pay handsomely to own items he had gathered—You were not on that list. In fact, there was a clause in the Will that stated that Mr. Benedict Hannan is to be barred from bidding on anything at all from the Estate.”

“What? That’s preposterous. You must be mistaken!”

“Sadly, I am not. I read the details with my very own eyes. Lord Ardmillan seemed to dislike you greatly. Did you know that?”

“I… I …I,” Words would not form in my mouth such was my horror at hearing what Cavell was telling me.