The Hogarth Conspiracy

by Alex Connor

  “What?”

  “Dogfighting; do you like it?”

  “No. I don’t.”

  The man shrugged. “They’re funny animals, dogs. You can train them to kill fast or slow. Some of them even enjoy it. Killing slow, that is. It’s like they know they’re inflicting pain and relish it. The dog I used on Lim Chang knew it. He liked what he was doing.”

  The warning wasn’t lost on Victor.

  “You have a week, Mr. Ballam. Get the Hogarth for me and I’ll give you back the girl. Fail and I’ll kill you both.”

  Fifty-Seven

  IT WAS SIR OLIVER PETERS’S TURN TO BE SURPRISED WHEN HE SAW Victor waiting for him at ten to nine the following morning. It had been raining in London overnight, and the streets were greasy, with puddles throwing up iridescent colors in the hesitant morning sun. There were few people about, only a couple of tourists staring morosely into the window of Noble Jones and a street sweeper hurrying to finish before the morning rush.

  “Victor,” he said by way of greeting, opening the gallery door and turning off the alarm. The heating had clicked in half an hour earlier, the warmth welcoming as Oliver ushered Victor into his office. This time there were no tea roses, no perfume that spoke of past summers or spring to come. “What can I do for you?”

  Sitting down, Victor stared at Oliver and wondered how much longer he had left to live. The disease was working its malignant transformation, and his thinning body had assumed a sudden aging stoop.

  “How are you?”

  “As you see,” Oliver replied. “But you didn’t come here to talk about my health, did you?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “From the look on your face I assume it’s something very important.”

  “It is. Can I speak plainly?”

  “You always did.”

  “You’re the only dealer left alive from the Bernie Freeland flight.”

  “Kit Wilkes isn’t dead, is he?”

  “No, but he’s dying. Not expected to recover.” Victor was surprised by Oliver’s composure, his stillness. “I’ve discovered that the Chinese had the Hogarth, but then they lost it.”

  Oliver’s face betrayed nothing. “They lost it?”

  “Yes. Lim Chang managed to get hold of the painting, but then it disappeared again.” Victor paused, but Oliver wasn’t forthcoming. “You told me you were in touch with Lim Chang, and since you’re the only dealer still alive, I’m guessing that you have it.”

  “I didn’t kill Lim Chang.”

  “Of course not. You wouldn’t do anything like that,” Victor said calmly. “But if somehow you managed to get hold of the painting, perhaps you’ve kept hold of it. I could understand why. You might want to keep it hidden away, or in your condition you might have other plans for something that could raise a great deal of money and provide for your family after you’ve gone.”

  His perception was oddly comforting to Oliver. Perhaps his decision was not so dishonorable, after all.

  But he wasn’t about to show his hand. “Even if I had the Hogarth, selling it would be wrong.”

  “Because of what it represents?” Victor asked gently. “But wouldn’t that depend on who it was sold to? The right person would be someone who’d appreciate the work and what it meant, someone who would not abuse it but own it in secret. That would be acceptable, surely?”

  Oliver felt a sudden desire to confide, to divide the burden whose weight was crippling him.

  “It would be understandable,” Victor went on, “for a dying man who had to provide for his family.”

  Coughing, Oliver leaned back in his seat, unable to meet Victor’s gaze. “I don’t have the Hogarth.”

  “Have you sold it already?”

  “How dare you!”

  Victor put up his hands to calm him. “Over the last few days I’ve been thinking back, remembering things like what Fraser Heath-Lincoln told me years ago about a royal bastard. The son of Frederick, Prince of Wales.”

  “Fraser Heath-Lincoln was an ass.”

  “He was a gossip but not an ass,” Victor argued. “And then I remembered something else. One night we were talking, and Fraser wondered out loud if the royal bastard had survived and, if so, whether there was a living descendant.”

  The words bellyflopped on the still air.

  “Is there?”

  Oliver smiled dismissively. “What utter nonsense!”

  “There is a descendant, isn’t there? Which would account for all the panic about this painting and why I was warned off. It wasn’t some thug, someone working for a dealer, or the triads or the Russians. Oh, they want the Hogarth because it’s valuable, but that’s not all of it, is it? There’s a lot more to this, Sir Oliver.”

  “You’re a clever man, Victor.”

  “There is a descendant, isn’t there? You can trust me because I’m in as much danger as you are.” Victor paused, studying the man in front of him. “I’m the one person who has no reason to betray you.”

  Oliver sighed a long, slow sigh and then returned Victor’s gaze.

  “Very well. I will trust you. I need to trust you. I don’t have much longer to live, and I find myself in a terrible dilemma. Unluckily for you, Victor, you are to be my confidant, my confessor. But I want a promise from you that if anything happens to me, you’ll protect my family to the best of your ability.”

  There was a knock on the office door, and Margaret walked in. She looked at the two men curiously for a moment and then smiled and said good morning.

  “Can I get you anything, Sir Oliver?” she asked Oliver returned his secretary’s smile. “Coffee would be nice. And some of those shortbread cookies.”

  When she had left the room, Victor said, “You spoke up for me at my trial. I owe you for that, and I’ll help your family any way I can.”

  “Thank you.”

  Victor paused for an instant before speaking again. “Is there a descendant of Polly Gunnell’s bastard?”

  Slowly, Oliver nodded. “Yes.”

  The admission seemed to fill the room, its enormity pressing down on both of them.

  “Male or female?”

  “Male.”

  “Does he have children of his own?”

  “No. No children. He’s the last of the line.”

  Victor took a deep breath. “Does he know his real identity?”

  “No,” Oliver replied sharply. “And he never will. And neither will you, Victor.”

  “Have you got the Hogarth, sir?”

  There was no direct reply to his question. Instead, Oliver scrutinized him unblinkingly as if searching for something. “You seem changed,” he said at last.

  “I am changed.”

  “And you seem afraid.”

  “That too,” Victor replied as Margaret returned with the coffee tray.

  The aroma of the fresh shortbread was extraordinarily comforting to Victor.

  The dogfight, the threat from the Chinese men, the wood smoke, and the headlights burning in the country night seemed temporarily unreal in the placid surroundings of the gallery.

  Suddenly homesick, Victor longed for his old life.

  “Sir Oliver, I have to get hold of the Hogarth.”

  “It would be good revenge.”

  “Oh, I’m past revenge! I think I fancied a triumphant return to the fold, my banner the lost Hogarth, my power restored.” He smiled wistfully.

  “It all seemed simple at first, but then people started dying. Suddenly all those violent, ugly deaths for a painting—even that painting—seemed unacceptable, not worth it.”

  “But you still want it?”

  “I’ve been given an ultimatum, Sir Oliver. I have to give the Hogarth back to the triads or they’ll kill Liza Frith.”

  Oliver frowned, his memory strained. “Liza Frith? Wasn’t she … ?”

  “One of the call girls on the jet, yes. In fact, she’s the last girl left; the other two are dead. Murdered. I can save Liza’s life if I swap the painting for her.
”

  Badly shaken, Oliver stood up and walked to the window. He fiddled with the blind, the white cord a sliver of silk in his hand. Every movement of his body told of the pain he was in, of the effort to stay alive. The long legs that had so often been seen striding along Piccadilly, Bond Street, Cork Street, and the Burlington Arcade, the aristocratic bearing that had graced art sales across the globe—now he was emaciated, a candidate for a nursing home rather than an auction house.

  While Victor watched him, Oliver Peters was silently weighing his options. Weighing the life of a call girl against the needs of his family. Was a prostitute worth more than his own flesh and blood? His son, his daughters, and his beloved wife—refined, respected, the perfect consort for a revered man. Was their future to be sacrificed for the life of a call girl?

  “I need the Hogarth,” Oliver said finally, his voice pitched low.

  “So do I.”

  “I need it,” Oliver pleaded as panic took hold of him. Panic and imminent loss of control. How could he relinquish the painting? How could he possibly let go of his only means of raising money? Without the picture he was financially crippled, his dependents’ security under threat.

  “I need that picture!”

  “Please, listen to me—”

  But Oliver cut him off. “I’m in debt, Victor. Serious debt. I borrowed half a million pounds and gave it to Lim Chang to buy back the painting from his contacts.” He let go of the blind’s cord and leaned against the windowsill, gripping it tightly. “I was relying on the sale of the Hogarth to clear the loan and secure my family’s future. I need that painting, Victor. You don’t know what you’re asking. I’m sorry for the girl, truly sorry, but I can’t give up the Hogarth.”

  “The half a million pounds you raised—”

  “Gone! The triads have the money. They’d have the painting too, but Lim Chang had been very careful. I’d given him the briefcase to carry the Hogarth and the key to lock it. I kept a key myself, of course. But Chang had taken the added precaution of fastening the case to his wrist with a chain. The thieves couldn’t get the case off him.”

  Surprised, Victor stared at the man in front of him. “How d’you know this?”

  As if to ward off the question, Oliver put up his hands.

  “Don’t ask me. I can’t remember … I can’t forget. That painting made me do things, act in a way I despise myself for.” He looked and sounded mortally tired, his voice wavering. “Don’t ask me for the Hogarth, Victor. Please don’t.”

  “A girl’s life depends on it.”

  His face flushed. “My family’s future depends on it!”

  “They’ll kill her like they killed the others.”

  “And I should trade those I love for a whore?” Oliver replied, lowering himself into his chair again. His eyes were heavy; his hands reached for the coffee, and he downed two painkillers. “Why did you have to come here? Why did I have to get on that jet? Why did any of this have to happen?” He was talking to himself, baffled by his situation and the gravity of the decision he was being forced to make. “Let me be, for God’s sake; let me be, Victor. I’ve so little time left; let me do the right thing.”

  “A girl’s life is at stake!”

  Oliver’s head shot up. “What’s Liza Frith to me? Why should I save her if by saving her I penalize my own family?” He swallowed with effort, fighting the pain. “All my life I’ve been an honorable man. I’ve prided myself on that.” He thought of the Hogarth painting, his father and grandfather, and Sir Nathaniel Overton. “I’ve borne a burden no man should have to carry. I’ve kept secrets for others, kept my word above all, and for what?” He wasn’t bitter; he was bemused. “You look at me differently now, Victor. You despise me.”

  “No.”

  “You do,” Oliver contradicted him. “And if the situations were reversed, I’d despise you. But this is my family we’re talking about, the people I’ve loved and protected for many years and mean to keep protecting. How can you come here and ask this of me?” he snapped, losing control. “The triads took the money; they have half a million pounds. Why isn’t that enough?”

  “Because they want the Hogarth.”

  “And if they don’t get it, they’ll kill the girl.” He stared at Victor, and then he saw it, the sliver of anguish. “Oh, no. You too?”

  Victor nodded and bent his head, then heard Oliver sigh and the sound of a spoon being stirred in a cup. He raised his head and watched as Oliver pushed a cup of coffee across the desk to him, his hands shaking so much that some of the liquid slopped into the saucer. Victor took it and a moment later accepted a shortbread cookie. It felt like ash on his tongue.

  Outside in the gallery, the phones started ringing. The working day had begun, and soon people would come to look at the paintings hanging on the gallery walls. If Sir Oliver Peters was lucky, someone would buy something. All the ordinary workings of life were just on the other side of a door, all the everyday noises and activities, while inside Sir Oliver Peters’s office two men sat in silence, two lives hanging in the balance between them.

  Victor was thinking that if he was going to die, he wasn’t going to die ignorant. He had to know who had killed Annette Dvorski and Bernie Freeland. He knew that the Chinese had killed Lim Chang, but who had silenced Kit Wilkes? And before the Chinese got involved, who was responsible for the first killing? Who had destroyed Marian Miller and set the butchery in motion? To die was one thing. To die a fool was quite another.

  “She was kind to me.”

  Victor looked up as Oliver spoke. “Liza Frith; she was kind to me. Asked if I was all right.”

  “She was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “We all were.” Oliver rubbed his right temple. “I keep asking myself why I accepted the lift from Bernie Freeland. Why I didn’t wait for the next commercial flight. I can’t say I had a premonition, any intimation that something was going to happen. I was just glad that I’d be getting home sooner than I thought. When I saw the call girls on the jet, I was embarrassed, concerned that my wife would find out—that anyone would find out—who I was mixing with. When that poor girl was murdered, I was still worried that someone would discover I’d been on the jet.”

  “It’s understandable.”

  “Is it?” Oliver countered. “Pride is a terrible vice. One takes one’s status for granted, but when it’s threatened, it’s something one fights for tooth and nail.” He pressed his hands together to stop them from shaking. “I now see myself for what I am. I had hoped that by the time my death came I’d be proud of myself, but that’s not to be.”

  “You still refuse to give me the Hogarth?”

  “How can I let my family down?” he said, the words almost wailed, his anguish terrifying.

  “Believe me, Sir Oliver, I didn’t want to come here, but I had to. I had to ask. And I’m still asking.”

  Oliver touched his throat with his hand as though speech pained him. “You came here for help. You asked me to save a girl’s life, and I hesitated. I had the power to save your life, and I hesitated. I hesitated. And then I refused. Men go to hell for less.”

  Moved, Victor watched him as he stood up, gripping the side of the desk to steady himself.

  “I’ll get you the Hogarth, but I need a little time.”

  “They’ve given me a week. I have to get the painting to them by then,” Victor replied, his eyes never leaving Oliver’s face. “Are you up to this?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “No, don’t be.” Oliver drew himself up to his full height, his elegance momentarily restored. “I should be the one to apologize, but I won’t let you down. You can depend on that much, Victor. I won’t let you down.”

  Fifty-Eight

  HAVING TRAVELED AROUND EUROPE FOR A FORTNIGHT, LOUIS Freeland was now home. The family doctor had suggested the vacation as a way to take Louis’s mind off his father’s death, but in that he was only partially successful. Mrs. Sheldon ha
d accompanied the young man on his first trip to London, together with one of the family’s lawyers, but later her place had been taken by Louis’s girlfriend, Odette. Her demotion had delighted Mrs. Sheldon, hoping as she did that it was a sign of Louis’s recovery. Perhaps his overwhelming love for his father might be replaced by love for a young woman.

  At times Louis did show affection to Odette, but his capricious moods continued and, worse, accelerated as the little party traveled on to Italy and Switzerland. By the time Mrs. Sheldon was preparing to welcome her charge home, she had heard reports of Louis’s withdrawal, and now she learned that he had banished Odette. All her hopes seemed to have stalled.

  In an attempt to put a positive slant on events, Mrs. Sheldon told the doctor that they had been expecting too much too soon, that it would take time for Louis to settle down. But she didn’t know. No one really knew how his mind worked. Only Louis did. Then, as the days passed, he seemed to slide backward, asking Mrs. Sheldon when his father was coming to visit. Her gentle reminders that Bernie was dead worked for a short time, but before long Louis would start asking the same question:

  Where is my father?

  And so it continued. The lad veered between utter indifference and desperate grief. At times he seemed to forget his beloved father completely, but that state lasted only for an hour, possibly two, and then there would be a massive reaction. He would talk, jabbering about Bernie, multiplying his virtues, making a faultless god of a flawed man. Then, oddly, Louis began to show an interest in the business, but that didn’t last. His mental capacities were limited and erratic, and he certainly had not inherited the commitment and business acumen of his father.

  Louis Freeland would live like a prince because he was well provided for, but the core of his life had disappeared and left him suspended where no one could reach him.

  And so his progress faltered. His little jaunts to New York ceased, and he refused to take calls from Odette even though she tried repeatedly to contact him. The evening classes that had extended his world were abandoned. His life—always small—now shrank within the walls of the house in Connecticut, where the ghost of his dead father was ever present.