Clubbed to Death Read Online Free PDF Page A

anything in this place is to demand. They’re so short of staff and the place is so frightful, they have to be a bit obliging. See you back here in about half an hour.’
    The opulent but rather seedy dining-room was dominated by portraits of voluptuous ladies. Most of the tables were small, but three were large and circular: each had an immense silver centrepiece of entwined bodies. Amiss spotted in the far distance an old person who had to be his quarry. No one could be that old and be a junior waiter.
    ‘Mr Gooseneck?’ he enquired as he arrived at the octogenarian’s side. ‘I’m not Gooseneck.’ The old man seemed deeply insulted by the suggestion. Through his ill-fitting false teeth, he whistled, ‘What d’you take me for? An old faggot?’
    ‘I’m terribly sorry. I don’t know my way around here. I’m new.’
    ‘Well, don’t worry. You won’t last long. If you want Gooseneck, try the kitchen. ’ He jerked a dirty thumb towards the swing doors.
    Being little more than sixty, Gooseneck was a stripling by ffeatherstonehaugh standards. He had a certain saturnine charm, and all his hair, and he seemed to lack the malevolence of his colleague in the front hall or the irascibility of his subordinate in the dining-room. Amiss judged him a man resigned rather than soured by his fate.
    ‘I assume you have no experience,’ Gooseneck observed.
    ‘Only as a barman.’
    ‘I cannot pretend surprise. If you’re young and clean and speak English there has to be some obvious drawback. Why are you here?’
    ‘I need time for my poetry.’
    ‘You need time for your poetry. How delightful. Unfortunately I am but a simple head waiter. How should I employ a poet?’
    ‘The Commander said I should relieve Sunil.’
    ‘Splendid. I can always rely on the Commander to make the key decisions. Very good, young man. Come along with me. It’s getting late.’ He led Amiss into an adjoining room where several dozen uniforms hung alongside three or four frock-coats, at which Amiss looked appraisingly.
    ‘Aha. I discern that you would like the more sober garb. I’m sorry, but I fear you are required to wear the more vulgar uniform. Frock-coats are for the old guard.’
    Amiss felt depressed. He’d already taken a rooted objection to Sunil’s uniform, a red and cream affair dotted with brass buttons which was reminiscent of a bellhop in Chicago during the era of Al Capone. The only thing missing was the cap and the elastic band.
    Gooseneck was assessing Amiss’s size with a practised eye. He took two uniforms off the rail. ‘Very good, dear boy. Choose and don the better fit and then ask someone to send you to the staff dining-room. You may have lunch before you start work.’
    Amiss was deeply touched by this evidence of compassion.
    ‘Thank you. And my own clothes?’
    ‘Consign them to the corner. There is no time to waste. You will be able to retrieve them when you come off duty at five. Are you going to live in?’
    ‘Please.’
    ‘There is no accounting for taste,’ said Gooseneck cheerfully. ‘May I leave you now?’
    ‘Just one thing.’ Amiss began to remove his jacket and trousers. ‘I need to make an urgent telephone call.’
    ‘Very good. Return to the main hall and Ramsbum will show you a public box.’
    ‘Ramsbum, ’ said Amiss faintly.
    ‘Mr Ramsbum to you, young man. He is, after all, the head porter.’
    ‘Thank you, Mr Gooseneck,’ said Amiss.
    ‘Do you have a moment, sir?’
    Detective Chief Superintendent James Milton looked up from his depressed perusal of the latest guidelines for senior officers and smiled at his young sergeant.
    ‘Yes, Ellis. Come in.’
    Pooley bounded across the room, his face wearing that expression of pent-up excitement that always filled Milton with a mixture of amusement, curiosity and apprehension.
    ‘Sit down. What’s going on?’
    ‘I’ve had a phone call from Robert. He’s been given a job at ffeatherstonehaugh’s.’
    ‘Oh God!’ Milton ran his