by Simon Brett
Don’t mind telling you, I felt a bit of a grapefruit sitting on this wooden shelf with nothing on but this towel. When I first went in I sat on the top shelf, but blimey it was hot. Soon realized it got cooler the lower you went, so I went to the bottom one. Still uncomfortably hot, mind. Geyser my size really sweats when he sweats.
I tried to work out why Mr Loxton had chosen this place for the meet. I mean, a sauna’s good if you’re worried the opposition might’ve got shooters. Isn’t anywhere you can put one when you’ve got your clothes off. Nowhere comfortable, anyway. But this wasn’t that kind of encounter.
On the other hand, it wasn’t bad if you didn’t want to be identified. The lights in the sauna was low and it was a bit steamy. Also, people don’t look the same when they’re starkers. Oh, I know they do lots of corpse identification from secret birthmarks and moles on the body and that, but the average bloke without clothes on looks very different. For a start, next time you see him, chances are he’ll be dressed, and you’d be surprised how many clues you get to what a person’s like from what they wear. I reckoned Mr Loxton was meeting there to maintain the old incog.
I felt even more sure of that when he come in. He had a big towel round him under his armpits like me, but he also got a small one draped over his head like a boxer. He didn’t turn his face towards me, but immediately went over to a wooden bucket in the corner, picked out a ladleful of water and poured it over this pile of stones. Well, that really got the steam going, and when he did turn towards me, he wasn’t no more than a blur.
“You are Billy Gorse.”
I admitted it. Wasn’t spoken like a question, anyway, more a statement.
“Thank you for coming. Wally Clinton recommended you for a job that needs doing.”
He might have hid his face with all the towels and the steam, but he had a voice that was really distinctive. Private school, you know, and a bit prissy. I’m good with voices. Knew I’d recognize his if I ever heard it again.
I stayed stumm, waiting for the details, and he went on. “What I want you to do, Gorse, is to steal a painting.”
“Blimey,” I said, “I don’t know much about art.”
“You don’t need to.”
“But surely . . . paintings . . . I mean specialist work, isn’t it? Not like walking in and nicking someone’s video. If a painting’s any good, it’s got security systems all round it. And then finding a fence who’ll handle them sort of goods—”
“All that side is taken care of. All I said I wanted you to do was to steal a painting.”
“You mean I’d be, like, part of a gang?”
“There’s no need for you to know anything about anyone else involved. All you have to do is to follow instructions without question.”
“I can do that.”
“Good. Wally said you could. You do the job on the last weekend of October.”
“Where?”
“Have you heard of Harbinger Hall?”
I shook my head.
“Then I suppose you haven’t heard of the Harbinger Madonna either.”
“Who’s she?”
“‘She’ is the painting you are going to steal.”
“Oh. Well, like I said, I don’t know much about art.”
“No.” His voice sounded sort of pleased about that. Smug.
He asked me where he could send my instructions. I nearly give him my home address, but something told me hold my horses, so I give him the name of Red Rita’s gaff. She often holds mail for me, on account of services rendered what I needn’t go into here.
Then Mr Loxton reached into his towel and pulled out a polythene bag. Thought of everything, he did. Didn’t want the notes to get damp.
“Five hundred in there. Two thousand when you get your instructions. Second half on completion of the job.” He rose through the steam. “Stay here another ten minutes. If you appear in the changing room before I’ve left the building, the contract’s cancelled.” He reached for the door handle.
“Oh, Mr Loxton . . .”
His reaction was that half-second slow, which confirmed that he wasn’t using his real name. No great surprise. Very few of the geysers I deal with do. Not for me, that. Always stick to “Billy Gorse”. Only time I tried anything different, I forgot who I was half-way through the job.
“What did you want, Mr Gorse?”
I’d got what I wanted, but I said, “Oh, just to say thank you for the job, Mr Loxton.”
He done a sort of snort and walked out the sauna.
Long ten minutes it was in that heat. When I come out I was sweating like a Greek cheese.
Instructions come the following week as per. I went down Red Rita’s for reasons that aren’t any of your business and after a bit, she give me this thick brown envelope. Just my name on it. No stamps, nothing like that. Just come through her letter-box. She didn’t see who dropped it.
I didn’t open it till I got back to my place next morning. First I counted the money. Fifties, forty of them all present and correct. Then there was this postcard of some bird in blue with this nipper on her knee. That was presumably the picture I was going to nick. I didn’t take much notice of it, but unfolded the typewritten sheet of instructions.
No mention of my name and they wasn’t signed either. Plain paper, no other clues to where it might’ve come from. It was all typed in capital letters, which I must say got my goat a bit. Reckon Wally Clinton’d been casting aspersions on my literacy, the cheeky devil. Anyway, what I had to do was spelled out very clear.
FIRST—FILL IN THE ENCLOSED BOOKING FORM, BOOKING YOURSELF INTO THE “STATELY HOME WEEKEND” AT HARBINGER HALL FOR 29 AND 30 OCTOBER. SEND THE FULL PAYMENT BY MONEY ORDER. (ALL YOUR EXPENSES WILL BE REPAID.)
SECOND—THIS FRIDAY, 21 OCTOBER, TRAVEL DOWN TO HARBINGER HALL AND TAKE THE CONDUCTED TOUR OF THE BUILDING (THESE RUN EVERY HOUR ON THE HOUR BETWEEN 10 A.M. AND 4 P.M.). WHEN YOU REACH THE GREAT HALL, LOOK CAREFULLY AT THE PAINTING OF THE MADONNA, NOTING THE VISIBLE SECURITY ARRANGEMENTS AROUND IT.
WHEN THE TOUR REACHES THE END OF THE LONG GALLERY UPSTAIRS, LINGER BEHIND THE GROUP. AS THE REST OF THEM GO INTO THE BLUE BEDROOM, OPEN THE DOOR LABELLED “PRIVATE” AT THE END OF THE GALLERY. YOU WILL FIND YOURSELF AT THE TOP OF A SMALL STAIRCASE. GO DOWN THIS QUICKLY AND YOU WILL FIND YOURSELF IN A SMALL LOBBY. ON THE WALL OPPOSITE THE FOOT OF THE STAIRS YOU WILL SEE THE BOXES CONTROLLING THE BUILDING’S ALARM SYSTEM. THESE ARE OPERATED BY A KEY, BUT YOU WILL SEE THE WIRES WHICH COME OUT OF THE TOP OF THE BOXES. WHEN YOU ACTUALLY COME TO STEAL THE MADONNA, YOU WILL CUT THROUGH THESE WIRES. HAVING SEEN THEIR POSITION, RETURN AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE UP THE STAIRS AND REJOIN YOUR GROUP. COMPLETE THE REST OF THE TOUR AND RETURN HOME WITHOUT FURTHER INVESTIGATION.
FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS WILL FOLLOW NEXT WEEK. MEMORIZE THE DETAILS IN THESE SHEETS AND THEN BURN THEM.
I done like I was told and before the Friday I got a confirmation of my booking on this “Stately Home Weekend”. I read the brochure on that and I must say it didn’t really sound my scene. Tours of the grounds, lectures on the history of the place, full medieval banquet on the Saturday night, farewell tea with Lord Harbinger on the Sunday. I mean, my idea of a fun weekend is going down Southend with a few mates and putting back a few beers. Still, I’d put up with a lot for five grand.
So, the Friday I do as I’m told. Get the train out to Limmerton, and from there they’ve got this courtesy bus takes you out to Harbinger Hall.
Not a bad little gaff old Lord Harbinger’s got, I’ll say that for him. Don’t know any more about architecture than I do about art, but I can tell it’s old. Don’t build places like that nowadays, not with blooming great pillars in front of the door and all them windows and twiddly bits on the roof.
Nice position and all. It’s high, like on top of this hill, looking out over all the rest of the countryside. That’s how you first see it in the bus from the station. As you get nearer, you lose sight for a bit, because it’s a really steep hill with trees. So you sort of zigzag up
this drive, which is really a bit hairy and makes you glad the old bus’s got decent brakes. And then suddenly you come out the top and suddenly you’re right in front of the house and it’s blooming big. And there’s car parks off to the right and left, but the bus drops you pretty well by the front door.
I looked around as I got out. You know, some of these stately homes’ve got sort of zoos and funfairs and that, you know, a bit of entertainment. And, since I had to spend a whole weekend there, I thought it’d be nice to know there’d be something interesting to do. But no such luck. Place hadn’t been developed like that. Maybe the grounds wasn’t big enough.
In fact, not only hadn’t the place been developed, it looked a bit tatty. I mean that sort of place isn’t my style. Blimey, if I owned it, I’d knock it down and put up a nice executive Regency-style townhouse with double garage and Italian suite bathroom. But even I could tell this one needed a few grand spending on it.
And if my busload was anything to go by, the few grand wasn’t going to come very quickly from tourists. Okay, end of the season and that, but there wasn’t many of us. Had to wait around till a few more come from the car parks before they’d start our guided tour, and then it was only about a dozen of us. Well, at a couple of sovs a head, takes you a long time to make money that way.
The guide that took us round had done the trip a few thousand times and obviously hadn’t enjoyed it much even the first time. The spiel come out like a recording, jokes and all. Didn’t look a happy man.
And what he said was dead boring. I never got on with history at school, couldn’t see the percentage in it, so all his cobblers about what Duke built which bit and when didn’t do a lot for me. And to think that I’d got a whole weekend of lectures on it coming up. I began to think I was going to earn my five grand.
Anyway, eventually we get to the Great Hall, and I see this picture all the fuss is about. Didn’t go for it much on the postcard; the real thing’s just the same, only bigger. Not big, though, compared to some of the numbers they got on the walls. I don’t know, two foot by eighteen inches maybe. Don’t know why they wanted to nick this one. ‘Some of them was ten times the size, must’ve been worth a lot more. Still, not my decision. And a good thing, come to think of it, that they didn’t want me to walk out with one of the twenty-foot numbers under my arm.
So the picture’s just this Mum and her sprog. Frame was nice, mind. All gold and wiggly, like my brother-in-law’s got round the cocktail bar in his lounge. And at the bottom of the frame there’s this little brass plate nailed on. It says:
MADONNA AND CHILD
Giacomo Palladino
Florentine
(1473–1539)
Never heard of the git myself.
Anyway, I’d memorized my instructions like a good boy, so I have a good butcher’s at the pic. Can’t see a lot in the way of security. I mean, there’s a sort of purple rope strung between uprights to keep the punters six feet away from the wall, but that isn’t going to stop anyone. Of course, there might be some photo-electric beam or some rocker device what sounds the alarm if you actually touch the thing. I step over the rope to take a closer look.
“Art-lover, are we, sir?” asks this sarcastic voice behind me.
I turn round and see this bloke in uniform. Not the guide, he’s up the other end blathering about some king or other. No, this geyser’s just some sort of security guard I noticed hanging around when we arrived.
“No,” I says, with what people have described as my winning smile. “Don’t know a blind thing about art.”
“Then why are you studying the Madonna so closely?”
I’m about to say that I’m just interested in what security arrangements she got, and then I twig that this might not be so clever, so I do this big shrug and step back over the rope and join up with the other punters. I glance back as we’re leaving the hall and this guard’s giving me a really beady look.
Upstairs I follow the instructions without sweat. Dawdle doing the old untied shoe-lace routine while the rest troop in to hear the history of the Blue Bedroom, quick look round to see I’m on my own in the gallery, then through the old “Private” door and down the stairs.
It’s just like they said it would be. These big metal-covered boxes opposite me with coloured lights and chrome keyholes on them. And at the top the wires. Not that thick. Quick snip with the old metal-cutters. No prob.
I think for a minute. I know some of these systems got a sort of fail-safe so’s they sound off if anyone tampers with the wiring. For a moment I wonder if someone’s trying to set me up. Certainly are one or two geysers what I have sort of inadvertently offended in the course of my varied career, but this’d be a bloody elaborate way of getting their own back. Anyway, there’s the two and a half grand I already got. Nobody’s going to spend that kind of bread just to fix me. I hurry back upstairs again.
I’ve just closed the door when I see the security guard coming in the other end of the Long Gallery. Don’t know whether he saw me or not, but he still looks beady. “Looking for something, sir?” he calls out, sarcastic again.
“Little boys’ room,” I say, and nip along to the Blue Bedroom.
Next package arrives the Wednesday, three days before I’m due on my Stately Home Weekend. I’m actually round at Red Rita’s when we hear it plop through the letter-box, but needless to say by the time I open the front door to see who brought it, there’s nobody in sight.
Since the whole thing’s getting a bit close and Red Rita’s tied up with someone else, I open the package there. There’s money in it, which I wasn’t expecting this time. It’s in fives and ones and a bit of change and covers my expenses so far. What I paid to book the weekend, return fare London to Limmerton, even the two quid for my guided tour. Someone’s done their research. Makes me feel good. Nice to know you’re dealing with geysers who knows what’s what. There’s a lot of berks in this business.
As well as the money there’s a car key. Just one, on a little ring attached to a plain yellow plastic tag. And of course there’s the instructions. Block capitals again, which miffs me a bit. Again, they’re so clear an idiot could understand them. I wonder if someone’s trying to tell me something.
ON THE MORNING OF SATURDAY 29 OCTOBER AT 9 A.M., GO TO THE UNDERGROUND CAR PARK IN CAVENDISH SQUARE. THERE, IN BAY NUMBER 86, YOU WILL FIND A RED PEUGEOT WHICH YOU CAN OPEN AND START WITH THE ENCLOSED KEY. ON THE BACK SEAT WILL BE A LARGE SUITCASE, TO WHICH YOU WILL TRANSFER YOUR CLOTHES, ETC. FOR THE WEEKEND. DO NOT REMOVE ANYTHING FROM THE SUITCASE.
IN THE GLOVE COMPARTMENT OF THE CAR YOU WILL FIND MONEY TO PAY THE PARKING CHARGE. DRIVE DIRECTLY TO HARBINGER HALL. GIVEN NORMAL TRAFFIC CONDITIONS, YOU SHOULD ARRIVE THERE AT ABOUT HALF-PAST TWELVE, JUST IN TIME FOR THE BUFFET LUNCH WHICH OPENS THE STATELY HOME WEEKEND.
DURING THE WEEKEND TAKE PART IN ALL THE ACTIVITIES OFFERED AND GENERALLY BEHAVE AS NATURALLY AS POSSIBLE. ABOVE ALL, DO NOT DRAW ATTENTION TO YOURSELF.
THE MOMENT FOR THE THEFT OF THE MADONNA WILL COME LATE ON THE SUNDAY AFTERNOON WHEN THE TOUR GUESTS ARE ABOUT TO LEAVE. AT THE END OF THESE OCCASIONS THE TRADITION HAS DEVELOPED OF LORD HARBINGER, HIS FAMILY AND STAFF LINING UP IN THE FRONT HALL TO SAY GOODBYE TO THEIR GUESTS. THE PREMISES WILL BE CLEARED OF DAY VISITORS BY FOUR O’CLOCK ON THIS, THE LAST DAY OF THE SEASON. THERE WILL BE NO STAFF GUARDING THE MADONNA.
FOLLOW THESE INSTRUCTIONS EXACTLY. AFTER TEA WITH LORD HARBINGER, THE STATELY HOME WEEKEND GUESTS ARE GIVEN HALF AN HOUR TO PACK AND ASKED TO APPEAR IN THE FRONT HALL AT SIX TO SAY THEIR GOODBYES AND GET THE COACH TO THE STATION OR GO TO THEIR OWN CARS. DO ANY PACKING YOU HAVE TO AND GO DOWN TO THE FRONT HALL AT TEN TO SIX, LEAVING YOUR SUITCASE IN YOUR BEDROOM, WHEN MOST OF THE OTHER GUESTS ARE DOWNSTAIRS, MAKE A SHOW OF REMEMBERING YOUR SUITCASE AND HURRY BACK TO YOUR BEDROOM TO GET IT. THE NEXT BIT HAS TO BE DONE QUICKLY. GO FROM THE PRIVATE APARTMENTS TO THE LONG GALLERY AND DOWN THE STAIRCASE TO THE ALARM BOXES. CUT THROUGH THE WIRES AT THE TOP OF THE BOXES. THERE IS A DOOR TO THE RIGHT OF THESE WHICH
LEADS DIRECTLY INTO THE GREAT HALL. GO THROUGH, GO STRAIGHT TO THE MADONNA AND REPLACE THE ORIGINAL PAINTING WITH THE COPY IN YOUR SUITCASE. IT WILL JUST BE A MATTER OF UNHOOKING THE PICTURE AT THE BACK. WITH THE ALARMS NEUTRALIZED, THERE ARE NO OTHER RESTRAINING DEVICES.
PUT THE ORIGINAL PAINTING IN YOUR SUITCASE AND RETURN UPSTAIRS THE WAY YOU CAME. GO BACK TO YOUR ROOM AND THEN GO DOWN THE MAIN STAIRCASE TO THE FRONT HALL. THE WHOLE OPERATION SHOULD TAKE YOU LESS THAN FIVE MINUTES AND WILL NOT BE NOTICED IN THE CONFUSION OF THE GUESTS’ GOODBYES. JOIN IN WITH THESE AND BEHAVE PERFECTLY NATURALLY. ALLOW ONE OF THE STAFF TO TAKE YOUR SUITCASE OUT TO YOUR CAR, AND ASK HIM TO PUT IT ON THE BACK SEAT.
DRIVE STRAIGHT BACK TO LONDON. RETURN THE CAR TO THE CAVENDISH SQUARE GARAGE, PARKING IT IN BAY 86 OR AS NEAR TO THAT AS YOU CAN GET. REMOVE YOUR OWN BELONGINGS FROM THE SUITCASE, BUT LEAVE THE CASE ITSELF AND THE PAINTING, ALONG WITH THE CAR KEY AND PARKING TICKET INSIDE. THEN LOCK THE CAR BY PRESSING DOWN THE LOCKING BUTTON INSIDE AND CLOSING THE DOOR WITH THE HANDLE HELD OUT.
WHEN YOU RETURN TO THE ADDRESS USED BEFORE, YOU WILL FIND THE SECOND TWO AND A HALF THOUSAND POUNDS WAITING FOR YOU.
AS BEFORE, MEMORIZE THESE INSTRUCTIONS AND BURN THEM.
Now I got my principles, but crime is my business and it’s a sort of natural reaction for me to have a look at any plan what comes up and see if there’s anything in it for me. You know, anything extra, over and above the basic fee.
And, having read my instructions, I couldn’t help noticing that, assuming all went well with the actual nicking, from the moment I left Harbinger Hall on the Sunday night I was going to be in temporary possession of an extremely valuable painting.
Now I been in my line of work long enough to know that nasty things can happen to villains carrying off the goods. You hear cases of them being hi-jacked by other gangs, mugged, somehow getting lost on the way to their handover, all that. And though I didn’t fancy any of those happening to me, I wasn’t so down on the idea of them appearing to happen to me. I mean, if I’m found on the roadside with the side of my motor bashed in, a bump on my head and the suitcase gone, the bosses won’t be able to prove I knew the bloke who done it.
