Tickled to Death and Other Stories of Crime and Suspense

by Simon Brett

  Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t planning anything particular, just sort of going through the possibilities in my mind. Like I said, I don’t know anything about art, but I do know that you need extremely specialized help if you’re trying to unload a well-known stolen painting.

  One of the advantages of Red Rita’s line of work is that she does get to meet a big variety of people and when I mentioned, casual like, that I wanted a bit of background on the art scene, it turned out she did just happen to know this geyser who was a dealer in the less public transactions of international art-collectors. And he was another of the many who owed her a favour and yes, she’d be quite happy to fix up a meet. For me, darling, anything.

  I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, if I’d thought about it. I mean, bent bookies are still bookies, bent solicitors do their stuff in solicitors’ offices, but I really hadn’t expected a bent art dealer to work out of a posh little gallery off Bond Street. Still, that was the address Red Rita give me, and when I got there it seemed that Mr Depaldo was expecting me. The sniffy tart at the desk said she would just check he was free and left me looking at a series of pics of what seemed to be a nasty accident in the kitchens of a Chinese restaurant. I don’t know how people buy that stuff. I mean, if you can’t tell what it’s meant to be, how do you know you’re not being taken for a ride? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against all art. My brother-in-law’s got this collection of sunsets painted on black velvet and with those, well, you can see they’re good. But a lot of this modern stuff . . . forget it.

  So I’m shown up to Mr Depaldo’s poncy little office, and he’s a real smoothie. Striped shirt, bow tie, you know the number. If I didn’t know about his connection with Red Rita. I’d have put him down as a wooftah.

  But her hold is clearly strong. Plain from the start he don’t want to see me, but Rita’s threatened to blow the lid on something if he won’t. So he just about managed to be polite.

  I ask him if it’s possible to sell a stolen picture and he says, through a lot of unnecessary grammar, that it is.

  Then I mention the Harbinger Madonna, and he sort of perks up like a conman spotting a mark. And I ask him how much he reckons it’s worth.

  “Well, it’s hard to tell. Prices at auction are so unpredictable. I mean, there aren’t many Palladinos around, certainly no others of that quality. The last one to come on the market was a Saint Sebastian back in sixty-eight. Went to eight hundred.”

  Didn’t seem that much to me. I mean, paying me five grand and only getting eight hundred for the goods, well, that’s no way to run a whelk-stall.

  Old Depaldo must’ve twigged what I was thinking, because he says, rather vinegary, “Eight hundred thousand, of course. But that was fifteen years ago. And an inferior work. If the Madonna came to auction now, she must go to at least two.”

  “Two?” I queried, not wanting to be caught out again.

  “Million.”

  “That’s at auction?”

  “Yes. Of course, a . . . private deal wouldn’t realize nearly as much.”

  “Like what?”

  You know, all fences give you the same pause before they come up with a figure. Doesn’t matter if you’re talking a colour telly, a lorryload of booze or a “Last Supper”, they all hesitate before they cheat you. “Maybe one. Say seven hundred and fifty to be safe.”

  Even if he’d been telling the truth, it sounded like a lot of money. Made my five grand for actually taking the risk and doing the job look a bit pathetic.

  “And if it did . . . become available, you could handle it?”

  He nodded, looking sort of eager. Obviously he knew there was a lot more in it for him than he let on. “There are only two people in London who could make the arrangements, and I’m one of them.”

  “But I’m the first one who’s talked to you about it?”

  “Yes.”

  So perhaps my bosses had got a deal set up with the other geyser. “What’s your commission rate, by the way?”

  “Sixty per cent,” he says, cool as an ice-cream down the neck. “You see, in these matters the risk must be judged in relation to how much one has to lose.”

  Meaning he’d got his poncy gallery and his sniffy tart downstairs and his international reputation; and I was just a cheap heavy. I let it pass. Reckoned I could work out some fine tuning on the figures later if it became necessary.

  “Any idea,” he asks, really keen now, “when this exceptional property might come on the market?”

  “No,” I tell him. “Only asking for information, aren’t I?”

  He looks a bit miffed.

  “But if it ever was to come up,” I go on, “you’d be interested in handling it?”

  “Oh yes,” he says.

  I haven’t made any plans yet, mind. But it is nice to have things sorted out in case you need them.

  Saturday morning I do like a good boy should. Get to Cavendish Square car park on the nose of nine, find the car in Bay 86. Red Peugeot, like they said. Ordinary saloon, not one of the hatchback jobs. The key opens the door and fits the ignition. I try it on the boot, which seems to be locked, but it doesn’t fit. Needs a different key. Never mind.

  On the back seat there’s this suitcase as per. One of those that sort of opens up like a big wallet with a zip three-quarters of the way round. Then inside there’s straps to hold your clothes in. One side, strapped in, is this hard rectangular package wrapped in cloth. Got to be the copy of the painting, but I don’t think it’s the moment to have a dekko. I take my gear out of the polythene carrier I got it in and strap the lot in the other side. Just clothes, shaving tackle. And a pair of metal-cutters. Oh, and a thing called a priest. Little stick with a weighted tip. Fishermen use them to finish off fish. Mine’s clobbered a few slimy customers in its time, and all. Wouldn’t ever carry a shooter, but the priest’s handy.

  Car starts first turn of the key, so I reckon it had only been left there that morning. In the glove compartment there’s the parking ticket. Clocked in 8:12. Pity I hadn’t thought to arrive earlier. Be nice to know who I was dealing with, apart from the steamy “Mr Loxton”.

  There was the right money in the glove compartment for the parking. Seemed a bit steep for such a short stay, and I mentioned this to the bloke at the barrier.

  “Rates just gone up, mate. Here’s the new tariff.” And he give me a printed sheet with my receipt.

  I shoved it in my pocket. I should worry. Wasn’t my money I was spending.

  I never really thought it would be, but the Stately Home Weekend was way off my scene. I mean, we was treated all right, you know, all the staff deferential and that, trying to give you the feeling of being privileged, but you got the feeling they didn’t really mean it, like they was sniggering behind their hands all the time.

  Okay, some things we was allowed to do that the ordinary day-trippers wasn’t. We could leave our cars directly in front of the house, we could go through most of the doors marked “Private”, we was actually allowed to sit on the chairs. But all the time they was pretending to treat us like regular house party guests, the staff seemed to be just watching out for us to make fools of ourselves. I mean, like turning up in the wrong clothes or not picking the right knives and forks at meals, they really seemed to be on the lookout for that sort of thing. And I’m afraid for me it was particularly difficult. Social graces didn’t figure large in the Borstal educational curriculum.

  Mind you, the other punters seemed to lap it up. I saw they was getting the old sneers from the staff just as much as I was, but they didn’t seem to notice. They really thought they was being treated just like house guests, like they was there by personal invite of Lord Harbinger and not paying through the nose for the privilege of lounging around his gaff and seeing him for a rationed hour and a half of tea and farewells on the Sunday afternoon.

  Also, let’s face it, they wasn’t really my sort of people. I daresay I got a lot of flaws in my character, but one thing nobody’s ever called me
is a snob. And that’s what this lot was, every one of them.

  A lot of them was Americans and in fact they was generally less offensive than the English ones. I mean, their grasp on culture was so sketchy that all they seemed to do was keep saying how old everything was. Apparently Harbinger Hall had been featured in some naff television series that they’d seen over there and they spent a lot of time walking round the place acting out their favourite bits and taking photos of each other in various settings. Funny lot, the Yanks, I always thought that.

  Still, they was at least friendly. The English punters reckoned as soon as they saw me that I wasn’t “their sort of person”. Dead right they was too. I wouldn’t want to be some nasty little factory owner who, just because he’s made a bit of bread, reckons he can go around buying breeding. I may not have a lot in the way of social gloss, but at least it’s all mine.

  Anyway, the English ones certainly disapproved of me. I’d catch them talking behind their hands about me when I come in the room. “Sticks out like a sore thumb,” I heard one cheeky little pickle-manufacturer say. “You’d think they’d vet the applications of people who come on these weekends.”

  Under other circumstances I’d have pushed the little git’s false teeth out the other end, but I remembered that I wasn’t meant to be drawing attention to myself so I laid off him.

  You’ll have got the impression by now that the company wasn’t that great, and let me tell you the entertainment, so-called, was even worse. Dear oh dear. I already told you my views on history, and I really thought that old git of a guide had said everything there was to say and a bit more about Harbinger Hall when I done my day-trip. Don’t you believe it. For the Stately Home Weekend they got in blooming Professors of History to take us through the lot, Duke by Duke. Then another berk come and took us through the family portraits and, as if that weren’t enough, some snooty old blue-rinse give us a lecture on eighteenth-century housekeeping. Tell you, I done some boring jobs in my time, but I’d rather spend a solid week watching for some fence to come out of his front door than ever sit through that lot again.

  The Medieval Banquet wasn’t no better. My idea of a good Saturday night is going out for a few beers and, if you’re feeling a bit exotic, ending up at the Chinkie or the Indian; not sitting in front of seventeen knives and forks while gits march up and down holding up stuffed pigs and peacocks. As a general rule, I don’t mind music, either—good sing-song round the Joanna or a nice tape of James Last, Abba, that sort of number; but please God may I never again be put in a position where I have to act natural while listening to a bunch of birds singing madrigals to a lute.

  But I stuck at it, like a right little swot. Fixed my mind steadily on the old five grand. Or maybe on a bit more than that.

  Being the size I am, I got a pretty well-developed appetite, and all them lectures and that had sharpened it a bit, so, even though they wasn’t serving anything I fancied, I had a good go at all this stuffed pig and peacock and fruit tarts and what-have-you. Even forced myself to drink some of the mead, which is not an experience I’d recommend to anyone with taste buds.

  Anyway, result of all this is, I wake up in bed round one in the morning with this dreadful heartburn. Well, it’s more than heartburn, really. It’s that round the chest, but it seems to be moving down the body and turning into something less tasteful. Not to put too fine a point on it, I have to get to the bog in a hurry.

  Well, they’re real mean with the wattage on the landings and, sense of direction never having been my special subject, I go through all kinds of corridors and staircases before I find what I’m looking for.

  And, dear oh dear, when I get there, what a spectacle it is. Blooming great dark wood seat like something out of an old rowing boat, and the pan’s got all these pink and blue roses all over it. Out the back there’s this sort of plunger like it was going to detonate a bomb. You’d really think in a place like Harbinger Hall they’d get decent facilities. I mean, more like the sort of thing my brother-in-law’s got—low-level avocado with matching sink and gold-plated dolphin flush-handle.

  Still, I’m in no condition to bother about Lord Harbinger’s lack of design sense. It’s lock the door, down with the pyjama trousers and settle in for a long session.

  Embarrassing though it is to confess, I’m afraid I must’ve dozed off. Mead must’ve got to me. Because next thing I know I’m hearing voices. I don’t mean “hearing voices” like loonies hear; I mean there’s a couple of geysers nattering outside the bog door. So I holds my breath (amongst other things) and listens.

  Well, first thing is, I recognize one of the voices. Told you I was good on them, didn’t I? Yes, you guessed. Mr Loxton from the sauna, wasn’t it?

  “I saw our contact this afternoon,” he’s saying. “All set up for tomorrow evening. It’ll be a quick handover.”

  “That’s not what I’m worried about. It’s the bit before.”

  “It’ll be fine. I’ve talked to the staff and it sounds as if the other guests are certainly going to remember him.”

  “But if he’s as dumb as he appears, are you sure he’s capable of actually doing what he’s meant to?”

  “It’s not difficult. If he does blow it, we just call the police and have him arrested.”

  “Not keen on that,” the other says sharply. His voice was older, real upper-crusty, sounded like a Cabinet Minister being interviewed, know what I mean. “Police might want to investigate a bit too deeply. No, we’ve got to hope the whole affair goes through as planned.”

  “I’m sure it will.” Mr Loxton sounds all soothing and . . . what’s the word? You know, like a head waiter who thinks he’s going to get a big tip.

  “Yes. And you’re sure he’s not suspicious?”

  “No chance. Picked with great care. He’s as thick as two short planks.”

  “Good. Goodnight.”

  The older voice was moving away. I unlocked the door dead quiet and risked a quick flash through the crack. One who’s just spoken’s out of sight, but I see the other just as he’s said “Goodnight”. Mr Loxton’s voice. Mean-looking bastard he is when you blow the steam away. But important thing is, he’s wearing the striped trousers and that of one of the Harbinger Hall staff. As I suspected, I am part of an inside job.

  That’s not all I’ve learnt, though. Maybe it’s the reference to “two short planks”, which I’ve heard more than once in my passage through life, but I feel sure Loxton and his chum was talking about me.

  I’ve forgotten my gutrot by the time I get back into bed. Can’t be distracted by things like that—need all my mind for thinking.

  I can’t work out what’s happening yet, but I know it’s something I don’t like. I been set up a few times in my career, and there’s a feeling you get when it happens. You don’t know the details, but you know something’s not kosher. Like when your bird’s having it off with someone else.

  I go through the whole thing to myself, listening out for the bits that don’t ring true. I try to remember if there was any little bits struck me as odd at the time. And I come up with a few.

  First, there’s the fact that Wally Clinton put up my name. Now, like I explained, he had no reason to sugar-daddy on me. I nearly shopped him once and he had to give a very big birthday present to the boys in blue to get off the hook. Wasn’t my fault, but Wally was never bothered by details like that.

  My first thought is Wally is just out to get his own back, get me nicked when I cut through the alarm cables, but somehow that don’t match the wallpaper. It’s too complicated. He don’t need to bring in Loxton and all this set-up. And two and a half grand’s a month’s takings to a smalltimer like Clinton. He’s not going to throw it away on me.

  “Picked with great care,” Loxton said. What’s that mean? I begin to wonder. Think about my reputation in the business, where, as I happened to mention, I am reckoned a complete dumbo who’ll do whatever he’s told without question.

  That’s it, of course. Loxton wanted
someone guaranteed thick as a bunch of duvets; and Wally Clinton recommended me.

  Hurtful though this conclusion is, I don’t dwell on it. If that is the case, other things follow. Yes, I am being set up, but set up for something bigger than revenge for Wally. I try to think what else in the deal needs a deodorant.

  I remember that right from the start I’d been impressed by the efficiency of the villains I was dealing with. Attention to detail. They’d given me instructions you couldn’t go wrong with. They’d paid back my exact expenses. They’d even left the right money for the parking in Cavendish Square.

  That thought stopped me. Cavendish Square Garage was where the car was meant to go back to. I was to drive there from Harbinger Hall. On my little lonesome. They’d set the whole thing up real tight until I left the Hall and then I could do what I liked. I know they thought I was thick, but surely even someone thick was going to realize that there was other things they could do with a couple of millionsworth of canvas than leave it in a garage. Considering the care they’d taken with everything else, they really hadn’t thought that bit through. Why?

  Something else suddenly barged into my mind. I went across to where my bomber jacket was hanging and felt in the pocket. The new price-list the bloke at the garage had given me.

  There it was. Give me a nasty turn when I saw it.

  “THE GARAGE IS CLOSED ALL DAY SUNDAYS.”

  They hadn’t bothered to think through the details of the handover once I’d stolen the painting, because they knew I wasn’t going to get that far.

  Then I remembered the other thing that didn’t fit in. The locked boot of the Peugeot. Picking locks isn’t my Number One talent, but I got a decent set of skeletons and I get by. Could’ve done the Peugeot boot quicker with a jemmy, but I didn’t want no one to see I been snooping. So I was patient and after about ten minutes had it open.

  And what a treasure trove my little pencil torch lit up inside. Complete Do-It-Yourself burglar kit. Sets of chisels, jemmies, wire-snips, pliers, big crowbar, the lot. Stethoscope, too, presumable for the old listening-to-the-tumblers routine when opening safes. Not that many villains do that nowadays.