by Debbie Rix
‘Dear girl,’ he said, embracing her as she opened the door. ‘Here I am. Let’s get this party started; where is my cake and where is my favourite girl?’
Georgie thundered downstairs and threw herself into his arms.
They sat at the kitchen table and Miranda took off the red-checked ribbon that she and Georgie had tied so carefully round the cake only a few days before. She had hoped to show the cake to Charlie in its pristine untouched state but he had left so suddenly.
‘The cake appears to be up to your usual high standard,’ said Jeremy, shovelling a large piece into his mouth. ‘Delicious, Miranda. You really should go into business doing this. And the decorations are, as usual, fabulous. I presume your talented daughter created the stunning, if slightly psychotic, fantasy arrangement of woodland animals, ballerinas and footballers that I see before me?’
Georgie laughed and cake flew across the table from her over-stuffed mouth.
‘Georgie!’ Miranda snapped. ‘Manners – please.’
Georgie covered her mouth. ‘Sorry, Ma,’ she said. ‘Yes, the decorations are all mine. I took everything out of the decorations box and just shoved them all on top. I had the animals on my cake for my third birthday, the ballerinas when I was four and the footballers I think came from my football-crazed years – age seven, from memory. Is that right, Mum?’
Miranda was staring out of the kitchen window into the dark garden beyond.
‘Mum!’ exclaimed Georgie.
‘Sorry. I was miles away,’ said Miranda.
Jeremy helped himself to another cup of tea and a mince pie. ‘Georgina,’ he said dramatically. ‘I would like you to go upstairs and bring your suitcase down here, please. Can you do that for me? We ought to be getting off soon; don’t want to be stuck in traffic all the way to Granny’s.’
Georgie happily complied.
‘Now, Manda,’ he said gently as soon as heard Georgie’s tread on the stairs, ‘what on earth is the matter?’
‘I’m just feeling a bit down. That’s all.’
‘Why?’ asked Jeremy. ‘You’ve got a wonderful daughter, a great best friend, we’re off to have a lovely Christmassy time with your parents. Oh – and you’ve just got a fabulous new boyfriend.’
‘Yes, you’re right. I’m just missing him I suppose.’
‘But you’re seeing him on Boxing Day, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, that’s the plan.’
‘Well then, stop moping and go and get your bags, honey. Where are the presents for all those hideous aunts of yours?’
‘They’re already in the car. And they are not hideous aunts.’ Miranda smiled.
* * *
Christmas passed much as usual. Miranda hoped for a phone call or at least a text from Charlie, but none came. She rang him on Christmas Eve but he didn’t pick up. He was probably driving, she thought. She left him a voicemail message. ‘Hi Charlie – hope Devon is fun. Really looking forward to seeing you on Boxing Day. Miss you. Bye.’
On Christmas Day there was still no word. As the family opened their presents around the tree, their normally happy atmosphere was infiltrated by Miranda’s growing sense of anxiety.
‘Good heavens, Miranda,’ thundered her father, ‘do put that wretched phone thing down. You look as if you expect it to implode or something.’
‘Sorry, Dad. I’m just expecting a call.’ Miranda put her mobile down on a side table. Jeremy and Georgie exchanged worried glances.
But as another present was handed out – a boxed set of Hitchcock movies from Jeremy to Georgie – Miranda retrieved her phone and texted Charlie: ‘Happy Christmas. Hope you’re having a great time. We’re all fine here. See you tomorrow! Xxx.’ It came back ‘undelivered’.
‘Oh Miranda,’ said Jeremy when she expressed concern over pre-lunch drinks. ‘He probably has no signal. Have you ever been to Devon? It’s in the dark ages down there darling.’
But Miranda couldn’t relax. Christmas day came and went and she was increasingly irritable with everyone. Finally, Boxing Day arrived. She woke early, and reached for her phone. Was it too early to text? It was seven-thirty. She got out of bed and went next door to the bathroom. She checked her phone when she returned to her room. There was still no word from Charlie. Was he deliberately ignoring her? Perhaps he was ill or had had an accident. Her mind raced with possibilities. She knew she shouldn’t text again. But she was unable to stop herself: ‘Looking forward to seeing you later… what time?’ After all, it was not unreasonable to need to know what time he was intending to arrive.
She pulled on her dressing gown and went downstairs for breakfast. She put the kettle onto the old Aga and leant against it. Over breakfast, as the family began to drift into the kitchen, she announced that she was taking Georgie back to London before lunch.
‘Oh Miranda,’ said her mother, ‘we get to see so little of you these days. And particularly of Georgie. Can’t you go back tomorrow?’
‘No, sorry, Mum. I’ve got something I’ve got to do this evening.’
They had planned to go for a walk before lunch, but Miranda was concerned it would delay their departure. ‘The last thing I need is to get caught in traffic and be late,’ she said exasperatedly.
In the end they left her parents’ house at twelve o’clock and Miranda drove furiously back to London. She dropped Jeremy at the bookshop around two thirty. ‘Thanks for a wonderful crimble,’ he said, kissing Miranda on both cheeks. ‘Have a good time tonight both of you… And give me a call tomorrow?’
‘Sure, will do. Take care.’
As they brought their bags in from the car, Georgie said to Miranda. ‘Where’s the vase, Mum?’
‘Oh, Charlie took it. Well, he bought it from me; he’s going to put in a sale.’
‘Oh,’ said Georgie.
‘You don’t mind, do you?’ said Miranda. ‘You always said you hated it so much…’
‘Yes, but it’s funny isn’t it? The place doesn’t feel quite the same without it.’
‘No,’ said Miranda. ‘Now go and unpack and could you take my bag upstairs too, darling? I ought to get on with cooking supper.’
‘Sure,’ said Georgie. ‘What are we having?’
‘I bought a bit of venison on Christmas Eve from that nice butcher that’s just opened in the High Street. He was selling it cheap, as they were about to close for the holidays. I thought I’d make a nice casserole.’
‘Hmm,’ said Georgie uncertainly.
Miranda fried the pieces of venison with onions. She assembled the casserole and filled the pot with a bottle of cheap red wine and placed it on a low heat in the oven. She wandered into the sitting room and turned on the Christmas lights and the television to keep her company as she tidied up. Dial M for Murder had just started. She checked her watch. It was half past four and already getting dark. She pulled the curtains in the sitting room, half expecting to see Charlie’s car pulling up outside the house. But there was no car. She wandered back into the kitchen and checked her phone. No messages.
She dialled his number. It went straight to voicemail. She hung up. Half an hour later, she dialled again. This time she left a message: ‘Hi Charlie, it’s Miranda. I just wondered what time you were planning on getting here?’
At five o’clock, Georgie came back downstairs. ‘Hi Mum, what are you doing sitting in the dark?’
Miranda sat in the gloom at the table, her head in her hands. The smell of venison casserole filled the kitchen.
‘He’s not coming, is he?’ said Miranda dispiritedly.
‘What time was he supposed to be here?’ asked Georgie anxiously.
‘He never said. He just said he’d come up on Boxing Day evening.’
‘Well, it’s not the evening yet. Come on, let’s go and watch the telly.’
The two lay together on the sofa and watched the Hitchcock classic. As it finished, Georgie said to her mother, ‘God, you can’t believe people can be so cunning, can you? Do you think real people are ever that bad? Fancy planning all t
hat.’
‘Yes,’ said Miranda, ‘I do think some people are capable of that sort of thing. I think they call it psychopathic behaviour these days, don’t they? Or sociopathic – people who have no scruples about getting what they want.’
Suppertime came and went. At eight thirty, Georgie reappeared in the sitting room. Miranda sat watching the television dazed and unblinking.
‘Mum, do you think we could eat? I’m a bit hungry.’
‘Sure, of course, darling,’ said Miranda, leaping to her feet. As she served up the overdone casserole, she began to cry.
‘Mum,’ said Georgie, standing up and putting her arms around her mother, ‘I’m sure there’s some explanation.’
‘Are you?’ said Miranda. ‘I think the explanation is that he has dumped me. I just don’t think he’s bothered to tell me yet.’ And Miranda ran out of the kitchen in tears, leaving Georgie alone with a venison casserole.
Chapter Twenty-One
Sheen, 27th December 2015
Miranda retreated to bed. She had had no word from Charlie; no text or call or message of any kind. The bracelet he had given her lay unworn on the bedside table. A reminder of something – what exactly?
She told Georgie that she was feeling unwell, but Georgie understood the real reason her mother couldn’t face getting up. As she made herself a cup of tea in the kitchen, Georgie dialled Jeremy’s number. ‘Hi Jeremy, I’m a bit worried about Ma. The love-rat has not called. She’s really broken-hearted. I don’t know what to do.’
‘I’ll come,’ said Jeremy. He arrived half an hour later and sat with Georgie in the kitchen.‘So, she’s not got up at all?’ he asked.
‘No, only to go to the loo. And I took her a cup of tea a little while ago and a piece of toast, but she hardly said thank you, and you know what she’s like about manners.’
‘Yes,’ said Jeremy. ‘Yes, I do. I’ll go up and see her. Oh and G,’ he said as he reached the kitchen door. ‘Well done for calling me. It was the right thing to do.’
Upstairs, he opened Miranda’s door carefully. She appeared to be sleeping, her back to the door. But as he walked around the bed he saw that she was crying, tears pouring down her face, her phone lying next to her on the bed beside the Tiffany box.
‘Manda, darling…’ He lay down on the bed next to her.
‘Oh Jeremy, I’ve been such a fool. I thought it was going somewhere, but now I think I was just a distraction.’
‘Oh, I’m sure it was more than that,’ said Jeremy as soothingly as he could. ‘He wouldn’t have given you that bracelet otherwise, would he? I mean you don’t give presents to people you’re about to dump, do you?’
‘Don’t you? Maybe it was to salve his conscience.’
‘What? I’m going to dump her, so I’ll buy her a nice gift from Tiffany's. How weird would that be?’
‘It’s not even from Tiffany’s.’ Miranda shoved the box with the bracelet inside towards Jeremy.
‘Open it… Take a look. There’s no Tiffany logo on the bracelet.’
‘Since when did you become such an expert?’
‘Since I checked on the Internet. All Tiffany pieces have the logo stamped on them, with the date. This is just a cheap fake – like him.’
‘Oh Miranda – that’s a bit harsh.’
‘But true though. I just feel so… Used.’
Jeremy lay with Miranda for some time, cradling her in his arms until she finally fell asleep. Then he carefully moved her off his now dead arm and went downstairs. In the hall he noticed the vase was missing from the table.
‘She’s asleep now G,’ he said, coming into the kitchen. ‘I’ll hang around if you like for when she wakes up. Shall we have coffee?’
‘Sure,’ said Georgina. ‘Thanks Jeremy. I’m sure she appreciates you being here. I know I do.’
‘Think nothing of it,’ said Jeremy. ‘Where’s that hideous vase by the way? I noticed it’s missing from the hall table.’
‘Charlie took it,’ said G, ‘the last time he was here. Mum said he had bought it from her. He is planning on putting it into a sale sometime.’
‘Did she want to sell it? I don’t remember her saying anything about it.’
‘I know. It was a bit strange. She’s always been rather protective of it, actually. I didn’t like it much, as you know. But whenever I made a rude comment about it she always sort of leapt to its defence.’
‘So why sell it now?’
‘I’m not sure. I think he sort of convinced her and then just took it. She said when he’d left that last time she wasn’t really sure it was the right thing to do. I think she felt she’d been a bit manipulated, if that makes sense?’
‘Georgie darling, did your mother ever think to find out exactly where that vase came from?’ asked Jeremy.
‘From her Aunt Celia,’ said G.
‘No, before that. Is it possible, do you think, that the vase might have been rather valuable perhaps?’
‘Valuable? God, I hope not. We used to fling the car keys in it. How could it be valuable?’
‘We are living in a world where the most unlikely things turn out to be worth a fortune. Now where does the love-rat work?'
'I'm not sure – an auction house in Hampshire, I think,’ said Georgie.
'Right; do we know which one?’
‘Mum knows, I think…’
‘Georgie, get your mother’s laptop and bring it to me. I think it’s time we found out a little bit more about Charles Davenport.’
* * *
The Christmas and New Year holidays had fallen awkwardly midweek, and most businesses had opted to remain closed until the 3rd of January. Jeremy did the same with the bookshop over the Christmas period, which meant that apart from taking long, wintry walks in Richmond Park and popping into Miranda's each day to check up on her and Georgie, he had ample time to investigate the apparently opaque life of Charles Davenport.
'You would have thought,’ he said to Georgie one afternoon, sitting in Miranda's kitchen eating leftover Christmas cake, 'that in this day and age, it would be possible to track someone down and know everything there is to know about them – where they live, the names of their family, their job history, the state of their bank account, embarrassing moments – but this guy has covered his tracks. Until I can get to speak to the auction house, I have absolutely nothing to go on. I'm not even sure he really is an auctioneer. His name is not on the list of associates there.'
'Mum did ring them and they knew him, I remember that. When she first got in touch with him about that book she sold him.'
'OK, so he has worked there at some point – maybe as a freelance. The thing is, G, I'm rather worried that he knows more about that vase than he let on. Let’s go over what we know about it again?'
'Apart from the fact that it was a bit spooky and that Mum's great aunt thingummy left it to her, you mean?'
'Yes, apart from that. I don't even really remember what it looked like,’ said Jeremy.
'Oh, that's easy. Mum took a picture a few weeks back and posted it on Facebook. I remember seeing it and thinking it was a weird thing to do.'
'Facebook? Really? That's amazing. G darling, I'm not actually on Facebook. Be a love and log into it or whatever you’re supposed to do.'
'Oh Jeremy! Give me the laptop.'
Georgina logged into her Facebook page and from there to her mother's.
'There, ' she said, swinging the laptop round to face him. 'There's the photo.’
'Great, well that's something. Can you email that to me or something similar?'
'Sure.’
'I think we need to get in touch with an expert and find out what we can about this vase. If it is worth something, it can't just disappear. It will turn up somewhere at an auction.'
'Do you really think it's valuable?'
'Well, darling, it's the obvious conclusion to draw, I'm afraid. The love-rat disappears along with the vase. What other explanation is there?’
There was a c
urious snuffling sound and the pair looked up to see Miranda standing at the door to the kitchen wearing a pair of rather grubby blue pyjamas and some old hockey socks of Georgina’s.
'So he's a thief as well as a lying bastard is he?' she said.
'I don't know,’ said Jeremy gently, getting to his feet and drawing her into the kitchen. He pulled out a chair and guided her to it. She sank gratefully down, resting her head in her hands, as if unable to bear her own weight.
‘I just think it's something we need to consider,’ he continued. ‘Georgie mentioned that he was going to put the vase into a sale of porcelain at his auction house in Hampshire at the end of January. I've been online and so far it’s true. There is a sale, but I can’t see any sign of your vase in that sale.’
‘Well, he only took it down there on Christmas Eve, maybe they’ve not had time to put it in there yet?’ Miranda suggested.
‘Online?’ said Jeremy. ‘It would have taken them five minutes in this day and age. No, I think we ought to call them and find out if he ever actually took it there.’
‘But won’t they be closed?’
‘I can but try,’ said Jeremy.
‘But he bought it from me,’ persisted Miranda. ‘I don’t have any right to take it back surely; he gave me a cheque.’
‘Have you cashed it?’
‘No, I’ve not had a chance.’
‘Did he give you a receipt?’
‘No.’
‘Good, then there’s no proof that he owns it. What we have to establish is that the vase is yours. But first things first. Let me give the auction house a bell.’
It was a brief phone call. Yes, Charles Davenport worked at the auction house from time to time in a freelance capacity. Yes, there was a sale of Chinese and Japanese porcelain on January 23rd. No, a large dragon vase had not been submitted by Mr Davenport for the sale.
No, he had not been to the auction rooms on 24th December, or even been in touch with them for several weeks. And no, they did not know where Mr Davenport was.
‘So,’ said Jeremy, ‘what does that tell us?’
