Free Money from Holme by Michael Innes

destroyed?’ Holme seemed astonished again. ‘Of course they were destroyed. I saw it happen with my own eyes. I can tell you it’s a very nasty thing to see. Almost as nasty as seeing–’ Holme checked himself. ‘Not destroyed!’ he repeated with contempt. ‘What put that in your head?’
    ‘It’s a notion of your wife’s. She thinks they were saved and somehow collared by Braunkopf. She thinks Braunkopf’s holding on to them until your reputation’s at its peak. Then he’ll unload them quietly for the benefit of his own pocket.’
    ‘What ghastly tripe.’
    ‘No doubt. Your wife does strike me as a suspecting sort.’
    ‘She’s an awful woman. You might get on with her rather well. She might even come to tolerate your dirty little tricks. It’s an idea. Horrible Hedda and her heel Cheel.’
    A man unequipped with Mervyn Cheel’s natural magnanimity might have resented this. It did, indeed, produce a moment’s silence. But Cheel could afford not to feel offended. He was pretty sure that he had as good as got Sebastian Holme where he wanted him. Of course there was much that still had to be found out before a master-plan could evolve itself. But the essence of the situation was now clear.
    In one regard, however, Cheel recognized (with his usual penetration) that he had some little way to go. Holme’s last remark might be said to emphasize this. If the situation now unfolding satisfactorily were to be successfully exploited (not that ‘ exploited’ would be the word to employ) then something of an honest and wholesome relation of confidence must be built up with this obviously kittle and difficult young man. Holme must not simply follow along; he must eat out of the hand. Cheel must be not merely manager and impresario; he must be guardian angel as well. Holme must come – and that quickly – to bless the hour at which he had sat down on this particular bench in St James’s Park. It could hardly be denied that, before this could be achieved, there was a certain amount of existing prejudice to overcome. Holme, unfortunately, carried one occasion of this prejudice about with him under his thumb. Literally that. The problem of getting him – this time metaphorically – under Cheel ’s thumb was a little complicated by the fact.
    ‘There’s an impersonal side to this,’ Cheel said. ‘And it’s what chiefly makes me want to help. Mind you, I want to do that simply as a matter of man to man. You must know very well what it is to be liked, because you’re a very likeable person. Although it can’t be said that you’ve been exactly cordial this afternoon, I do myself happen to like you simply as a chap.’
    ‘I didn’t have any lunch,’ Holme said. ‘Otherwise, this is where I’d vomit.’
    ‘But it’s something else I’m talking about.’ Cheel pursued his way determinedly. ‘What I’ve called the impersonal side. The business, I mean, of getting you back to your painting. Or perhaps you are back at it? If so, I’m talking to no purpose.’
    ‘Cut it out. Look at me, Cheel. Look at me sitting in this rotten place and putting in time talking to a blackguard. Of course I’m not back to painting.’
    ‘So I’d have supposed.’ Although Holme’s remarks were still a little lacking in expression of regard, Cheel felt satisfied with the turn the talk was taking. It was bringing into Holme’s eye a glint he wanted to see there. ‘And my point is, you know, that it’s a plain duty to get you back into a studio. You’re a youngster still, if you’ll forgive my mentioning the fact, and moreover quite a bit of your mature production went west in that stupid hotel. There just must be more Sebastian Holmes . Put it that I feel the thing professionally. As it happens, I’ve painted a little myself.’ Cheel was disingenuously modest. ‘I still do from time to time, although I’ve no illusions about the extent of my talent.’
    ‘Illustrations for smutty books – or just designs for