Free Corpse in a Gilded Cage by Robert Barnard Page A

charges,’ said the Countess bleakly. ‘The fact remains: one gets four years and a record he’ll never live down; the other goes scot free. That’s not what I call justice.’
    â€˜They nabbed Phil when he was just beginning the job,’ protested Chokey, his hands fluttering in the agitation of his grievance. ‘I hadn’t more than passed the time of day with the drivers before the police came and called them out. They couldn’t pin anything on me.’
    â€˜Seems to me you make a speciality of that,’ said the Countess, unmollified.
    â€˜Come off it, Mother,’ put in the Earl. ‘Nobody’s blaming you, Chokey, least of all Phil himself. You’ve been a good pal to Phil, and I know he appreciates you going to see him. I blame myself we haven’t been more often.’
    â€˜I went when he was in Maidstone,’ said Trevor virtuously. Then he spoilt it by adding: ‘Just for the giggle. Christ, what a pong in there. Worse than the loo in Piccadilly Underground. Turned me right off.’
    â€˜Just you take warning, then,’ said the Countess, who was at her most doom-ridden tonight.
    â€˜I don’t think it’s a place to take children,’ said Dixie. ‘I said to Phil, I said: “You get caught and I’m not bringing the kids to see you.” It’d give the little buggers nightmares.’
    â€˜It wouldn’t,’ protested Gareth. ‘We wanted to see Dad.’
    â€˜Don’t you stick your oar in, my lad, or you’ll get what-for on your b.t.m.’
    â€˜Anyway, no point in poking at old wounds,’ said the Earl, beginning to feel uncomfortable. ‘He’ll be out in three weeks, and I know he won’t be bearing any grudges.’
    â€˜We could have another party for him,’ said Trevor. ‘There’s this bloke—film producer, actually—that Michele and I would like to get downhere. He’d go bananas over this place. He could use it for one of the class-trade films.’
    â€˜Evie and the Merry Monarch,’ said Michele, who only really perked up when her own career was involved. ‘Charles the whatever-it-was. All those dreamy wigs and ruffles and things.’
    â€˜Over my dead body,’ said the Countess. ‘I’m not having that kind of filth filmed anywhere near me, thank you very much.’
    â€˜He’d only need three or four rooms,’ said Trevor, ‘We could be at the other end of the house, and you wouldn’t hear a thing.’
    â€˜I’d imagine,’ said the Countess.
    â€˜In three weeks’ time we’ll be so far away you wouldn’t even imagine,’ said the Earl optimistically. ‘Any party for Phil will be in dear old Clapham. We could get up some kind of street party, like for the Coronation or the Silver Jubilee.’
    â€˜I do think, Dad,’ said Dixie, speaking carefully, ‘that you ought to give Phil a chance to see this place. It’s silly to make a decision in a hurry, isn’t it? When Phil comes out he could come straight here and you could talk it over, face to face. At your leisure, so to speak.’
    The Earl frowned.
    â€˜ ’Ullo, ’ullo, ’ullo,’ he said.
    â€˜Where did you go this morning, Dixie?’ asked Trevor. ‘Could it be you popped in on old Lillyprick, or whatever the name is?’
    â€˜I knew it,’ said the Countess, swathed in still deeper gloom, like Cassandra on a bad morning. ‘We’re not going to be allowed to do what we want with our own. I’m going to be condemned to spend my old age in this rotten dump.’
    â€˜That’s not it at all, Mum. It would be Phil and me and the kids who stopped here. Look, all I’m suggesting is that you wait till Phil gets out, and talk it over with him. After all, he’s the one most concerned.’
    â€˜We’re the ones most concerned,’ amended the