Crime Writers and Other Animals Read Online Free PDF Page B

papa taught me. It’s really the most important thing he left me with – knowing the right way to behave.
    And I never thought it was cruel. He had my best interests at heart. I know he did. If there was any cruelty involved, then he was only being cruel to be kind. He often used that expression. ‘Edmund,’ he’d say, ‘I’m only being cruel to be kind.’ And I respected that. Even though the things he did sometimes hurt, I could still respect his reasons for doing them.
    It’s a matter of justice, you see. Being fair to people. Not just being fair to yourself – that could so easily become selfishness – but being fair to everyone else you come into contact with. ‘We’re social beings,’ Papa would say. ‘Humankind’re social beings, and one’s success as a member of humankind is demonstrated by how well one relates to other human beings. You have to behave, Edmund. Never knowingly do harm to another member of the human race.’
    Those were the values Papa dinned into me from a very early age and, from the time I could understand what he was talking about, I very quickly came to respect what he stood for.
    He was entirely consistent, you see. His rules were clear. He never punished me for something that I didn’t know at the time – or at least understood pretty soon afterwards – was wrong. ‘Bad behaviour must never go unpunished,’ Papa used to say. ‘Otherwise it’s bound to lead to worse behaviour.’
    Papa didn’t have any truck with the view that, equally, good behaviour should be rewarded. ‘Good behaviour should be instinctive. Good behaviour brings its own reward. Though, in fact, for you, Edmund, good behaviour is not good enough. Any son of mine must always be on his
best
behaviour.’
    So that’s what I always aspired to. And, most of the time, achieved. When I fell short of Papa’s high standards – no, of
my
high standards (‘It’s within
you
, Edmund,’ he always used to say. ‘It should be instinctive within yourself.’) – then I knew punishment was inevitable. But it was perfectly fair. I knew the rules. I’d broken them. I had failed as a member of humankind.
    Papa himself avoided doing unwitting harm to other members of the human race by not having a lot to do with them. We didn’t see many other people as I was growing up. There was just Papa, Mama and me. ‘We don’t need other people,’ Papa used to say. ‘We’re self-sufficient. We are fortunate – unlike a lot of the poor bastards out there – to be a secure, loving family unit.’
    And he was right – we were fortunate. Money was never a problem – we always had enough to eat, we lived in a nice house, I was sent to a private school. It was all very nice.
    And I’m proud to say, Mama and Papa never had any of the problems with me that you read about other families having with growing children. They were never going to see my name in the papers . . . not, that is, until this current business. And now they’re both dead, so it’s not as if any amount of cruel lies in the tabloids can cause them any anxiety. Not now. Not any more.
    My father’s teaching stood me in good stead, though, you know. I didn’t backslide after he died. No, the training Papa had given me was so good that Mama never had to raise her voice to me. I was permanently on my best behaviour.
    But I don’t want to sound like I’m a goody-goody, not to give that impression, no. I do have my . . . I was about to say ‘vices’, but I think ‘vice’ is probably too strong a word. ‘Vice’ means doing things to other people, body things, things with your secret bits. And I’ve never felt the urge to do any of that, don’t understand why people make such a fuss about it. No, for what I do, ‘indulgences’ is the word I prefer.