You Think You Know Me
Page 20
‘We’re just off to The King’s Head,’ Seb said, ‘if you want a quick drink before you head off?’ I could tell he didn’t want extra company, but felt he ought to ask.
‘No, no,’ Lawrence said, ‘I’ll let you two get on with it, thanks all the same.’ And he drove off up the road, the car’s engine purring like a pedigree cat.
In my bag there came the sound of a text coming in. I peered in at my phone for a moment. Darrick.
Seb seemed to hear my intake of breath. ‘Trouble?’ he said. ‘Do you want to deal with it?’
I shook my head. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘I’ll leave it until later.’
Chapter Thirty-Five
‘You’re very quiet,’ Seb said, looking at me as we went through the oak swing door and into The King’s Head. It wasn’t too busy and we found a place in the snug to the left of the bar. I opened my mouth, anxious to dive in and get it over with, but Seb said, ‘Drinks first,’ holding up a hand, and so I waited until I’d got a gin and tonic in front of me before I started. As I worked out where to begin, Seb picked up his whisky. I noticed the whiteness of his knuckles as he clutched the glass.
‘So,’ he said, looking up at me at last. His eyes were wary, his face pale next to the black shirt.
So. I took a deep breath. ‘I ended up seeing Darrick again. It’s already several days ago now, and I haven’t contacted him since.’ I pushed out my words in a rush and waited for him to say something, but he just looked back at me, his jaw set.
‘I wasn’t intending to deceive you, or let you down,’ I said, ‘but I really did like him. I thought if I saw him one more time it would help me make up my mind. I took what you said seriously, so I knew I had to decide whether I wanted to give him up, and stay on at the gallery, or whether …’ I took a large swig of my gin. ‘… I actually liked him so much that I’d have to hand in my notice. It wasn’t a judgement I could make without seeing him one last time.’
Still Seb said nothing. It was almost as though I was alone in the room, talking into a vacuum. ‘Seb?’ I said at last, wanting some kind of response before I carried on.
Eventually he said, ‘So, did it help you to decide, being with him again?’ He seemed to have to drag his mind back from somewhere far away to form the question.
‘That’s not really what I came to discuss with you,’ I said. ‘It’s what I’ve found out that’s important.’
Seb took a mouthful of whisky. ‘I see,’ he said. Then after a moment’s pause he went on, ‘Though I don’t understand why you’ve waited until now to tell me whatever it is that you know.’
‘At first I wasn’t sure that I had to, but after what Lawrence said to me today, I knew there was no getting away from it.’
Seb’s eyes flicked away from mine. ‘So what is it, then, this thing that can’t be avoided?’ he said at last.
So bit by bit I explained – without admitting how far our relationship had gone – about how I’d come to find the photograph of Julia at Darrick’s flat.
For a second he was silent, and I was momentarily conscious of the noise around us: the clinking of glasses, the laughter, Ruby Tuesday emanating from a jukebox, all permeating the small, private space we shared.
At last he said, ‘What sort of a picture was it?’
And I knew what he was thinking. ‘Perfectly innocent. It was taken at a wedding, by the look of it. Julia was wearing a waitress’s outfit so I think she must have been there to earn some extra cash. There were several other guests in the photograph too.’
His expression was still guarded.
‘You can see why I didn’t come and talk to you at that point, can’t you, Seb?’ I said, leaning forward. ‘I mean, what good could it do? Okay, so Darrick had had some kind of fleeting connection with Julia at some stage, but I felt bringing it up could only hurt you.’ I sat back again and took up my glass. ‘I wouldn’t have come to you at all, except that what Lawrence told me today makes me think you do need to know. Have a right, even.’
Seb’s eyes seemed to sharpen their focus and at last I felt I had him with me. He sat back suddenly, his shoulders sagging, and let out a long breath.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I can understand if you think I should have come to you sooner. I just did what I thought was best at the time.’
‘I can see that,’ he said, draining his whisky. ‘It’s just so extraordinary to think of Julia knowing Farron. I knew she’d done the odd stint of waitressing at events, to bring in some cash, but I didn’t know she’d made any friends through it.’ He paused and looked up. ‘Do you think they were more than friends?’ His eyes were still tired, but a flash of anger brought back some of their usual vitality.
I shook my head. ‘I wondered, just for a moment, when I first found the photo,’ I said, ‘but Julia wasn’t the sort, Seb, was she?’
‘No,’ Seb said, letting out a breath, ‘you’re right. So what was it that Lawrence said, then, to make you feel you had to talk to me?’
I felt my stomach tense. ‘I pretended Darrick had been quite open about knowing Julia,’ I said. ‘I got Lawrence into conversation about it that way, saying what a coincidence it was.’
‘God, Anna, when I said you might be able to find out a thing or two, I didn’t know just how adept you’d be at it.’
‘It was a spur of the moment thing,’ I said, taking a sip of my drink. ‘Anyway, Lawrence said that it wasn’t such a coincidence really, given that you, Darrick and Julia were all involved in the art world.’
Seb raised his eyebrows.
‘I was surprised too,’ I said. ‘I told Lawrence I’d known Julia wanted to study art, but I’d thought that had been the extent of her interest.’
‘And?’ Seb said.
‘And then Lawrence mentioned her collection of artworks …’
Seb frowned. ‘What?’
‘Exactly. I asked about them, and Lawrence said she’d described them to Darrick in great detail and shown him photographs of a couple. Apparently Darrick had been quite excited about the whole thing.’ I paused. ‘Seb, Lawrence Conran says that Darrick and Julia both thought a couple of them might have been missing drawings from Goya’s Private Albums.’
Seb brought his glass down hard on the table, his eyes fixed on mine now. After a minute he said, quite quietly, ‘No, Anna, that can’t be right.’
‘Lawrence didn’t reckon it was,’ I said quickly. ‘He was quite sceptical about the whole thing. Darrick never got to see them apparently, although Lawrence thought Julia might have shown them to him if she hadn’t died.’ I could feel the implications of all I was telling Seb hanging heavy in the air between us. I wanted Lawrence to be right and the works by Goya to have been a fiction.
‘That’s not what I meant,’ Seb said, his voice so soft I could hardly hear the words. ‘She would have told me, that’s my point. She can’t have had those drawings, because if she had, I would have known about them.’
His hand shook, and I waited for him to compose himself. Eventually I said, very quietly, ‘It really does look as though she had some kind of collection though. Lawrence remembers Darrick telling him about Julia’s description of them at the time, and Darrick went so far as to check old written descriptions of some of Goya’s missing works.’
‘And did they match?’ he asked.
I nodded.
For some moments Seb sat with his head sunk onto his upturned hands. When he looked up at me his face was devoid of all colour. ‘I know why she didn’t tell me,’ he said, and once again now, his eyes had that faraway look.
‘Why?’
His voice cracked as he spoke. ‘What do you think I’d have wanted her to do, Anna, if I’d found out she had some major works of art stashed away?’
I was at a loss. ‘I don’t know. Display them maybe, perhaps at the gallery you were planning to open, to draw people in?’
He shook his head. ‘I’d have wanted her to sell them. That’s what I would have tried to persuade her to do
. To me, art’s business. I make my money out of people who want to own something they regard as beautiful, but I don’t necessarily see it myself. I know what other people will love, but without ever experiencing the same emotion they do. I would have had no patience with her hanging onto something that could have made us a fortune. No.’ He paused to drain his drink again. ‘I would have been a shit about it. Maybe, once I’d had the gallery all set up, I’d have wanted her to have the sale there. Think of the publicity.’
‘Would you really?’ I reached over to touch his arm. ‘I think you’re still punishing yourself, Seb. You always seem to take the blame for what happened to Julia, but what she did was beyond your control.’
‘Whatever. If I’d known about the drawings I wouldn’t have left the decision up to her. I’d have bullied her and made her life a misery. I wanted her to let go of her parents’ possessions, you see, to make a clean break of it.’
‘Well, she seemed quite interested in finding out the value of the drawings,’ I said. ‘Maybe she wanted to sell them.’
Seb shook his head. ‘She didn’t want to part with anything that had belonged to them. That was one of the reasons she was so short of money.’ He looked up at me, his eyes dry. ‘I wasn’t very understanding about her approach,’ he said. ‘I mean, I pretty much hated my parents. They never had any time for me, only ever cared about making money and, to me, Julia’s parents seemed to have been from the same mould. They’d packed her off to boarding school, mostly not even been in the same country as she was.
‘I wanted her to think the way I did: that parents like that are no parents at all. It would have made me feel less alone if she’d shared my feelings. But she didn’t. She’d adored them and she clung on to all their old things as though nothing else mattered.’
He slumped in his chair. ‘I’d hoped she’d sell everything and come south to be with me; I knew I needed to be in London. But she never would have. She just wanted to stay up in that old house with the walls crumbling round her.
‘I feel awful about it now,’ he added, ‘but I was actually jealous of the things she’d been left. It was as though she loved them more than she loved me. That was why I wanted her to get rid of everything. What was left over just tied her to her past and kept us apart.’
‘I guess she was still grieving,’ I said. ‘I suppose she might have come round eventually, if …’
‘If she’d been allowed to live long enough,’ Seb said, cutting across me.
If she’d been allowed … Seb’s words echoed in my head as I went to the ladies’. I bought us another round of drinks on my way back. In the snug, Seb had gathered himself together, sitting up straight, his eyes clear.
He took the whisky from me. ‘Thanks.’ His tone held new purpose. ‘My turn to tell you some things, Anna,’ he said and I waited for him to begin.
‘How do you feel about Farron now?’ he asked.
I shrugged. I still couldn’t think of him without remembering the sensation of our bodies together – and me deciding to give up my job, and placing my total trust in him – but Seb’s tone made the hairs on my neck prickle. ‘I don’t know what to think,’ I said at last.
‘Let me tell you some things that might influence you then,’ he said, taking a large slug of whisky. ‘After Julia died, all her possessions went to her only living relative, an elderly aunt up in Aberdeen who had no family.’
I didn’t know exactly what was coming, but even at this stage I knew I didn’t want to hear it. As Seb spoke, Darrick’s face filled my mind, his laughing eyes and sensuous mouth.
‘The aunt, Dorothy Mackay, had no room for a load of heirlooms in her house, and no children or grandchildren who might feel sentimental about family belongings. That being the case, she decided to sell off all Julia’s things: everything she had owned, her parents’ house, the lot.’
He looked at me with steady eyes. ‘Despite being elderly and alone she spared a thought for me, and invited me up to see what was in the sale, in case I wanted to pick out something as a keepsake.’ He let out a hollow laugh. ‘It was ironic really. At last there was a grand letting go of all the items that Julia wouldn’t part with, but for that to happen I had to lose her first.’
‘So did you go up, before the sale?’
Seb nodded. ‘I suddenly found that Julia had been right after all. It does help to keep something. There was a pendant she used to wear, with a little Gaelic knot on it. I took that and I still keep it in a box in my bedroom.’ He looked at me. ‘In the way of artworks, there were several watercolours painted by Julia’s mother and a couple of oils by a family friend.’ He sipped his whisky. ‘And that was it. There were no drawings at all. And nothing that Julia could possibly have thought was by Goya.’
I felt my insides go cold, as though someone was slowly dripping meltwater from an icicle into my stomach.
Seb looked me in the eye with that cool blue gaze of his. ‘Between Julia telling Farron about those drawings and the sale, two things happened. Julia died, and the works disappeared.’
Chapter Thirty-Six
Seb was oddly calm now, and measured. ‘If they were genuine, and Farron took them, he could never have sold them on the open market of course, but he wouldn’t have needed to. He had the perfect connections to arrange a private sale; the sort that no one ever hears about. Maybe someone put in a bid for them before Julia was even dead. I told you some of the people he deals with are ruthless. With a prize like that he wouldn’t have had to look too hard for a buyer.’
‘But, Seb, it doesn’t make sense,’ I said. ‘I mean, I hear all you’re saying, but if it’s true, why on earth would Darrick be on the scene now? Who carries out a theft like that and then risks coming back years later to make himself look suspicious?’
Looking up at Seb I was shocked to realise he was about to give me an explanation. I didn’t want to know. Everything inside me was in denial, pushing away the evidence he was giving me.
‘When Julia died,’ Seb said, ‘I was just as sure as anyone that it was suicide. She’d been through an awful time, and she was young and often alone. God knows I hadn’t given her enough support. I was convinced it was at least partly my fault.’ He rubbed his forehead. ‘Apart from anything else, the police believed she’d killed herself too. I was younger then and of course I thought if they were satisfied with that conclusion then they must be right.’
I clutched my glass and waited for him to continue.
‘It was only later that I began to wonder,’ he said, staring into space, not seeming to see the room around him. ‘Just before she died, Julia called me and she was actually quite upbeat. I started to think about that call, and to wonder if she’d been coping better than I’d thought.’
He looked at me. ‘It was one of those feelings that gradually built up, until after a while I really convinced myself that she hadn’t taken her own life. We’d had plans,’ he said, ‘and in fact …’ A look of realisation suddenly came into his eyes. ‘… one of the things that she mentioned during that last call was that she had something to tell me. She seemed quite excited about it.’
He paused for a moment and then went on slowly, almost as though I wasn’t there, ‘I wonder if she’d decided to let me in on the existence of the drawings after all. Anyway, her excitement and apparent happiness then jarred with the verdict of suicide. Or at least I started to think so. I didn’t know enough about it, but I kept wondering whether I’d let her down by accepting the official version of events. I never questioned it at the time.’
‘I’m sure it’s only natural to look back and worry about these things,’ I said. ‘But maybe she was up one minute and down the next.’
‘Possibly,’ he said. ‘That could have been the answer. But I went through a patch where I was sure it hadn’t been as they’d thought. I’m afraid I allowed myself to get a bit obsessive about it. You know how these ideas can fester, whether they’re right or wrong.’
‘It’s understandable.’
I looked at him blankly, not seeing where this was leading.
‘The point is, Anna, one of the people with me was Lawrence Conran.’
I still hadn’t caught up.
‘You’re absolutely right about it making no sense for Darrick Farron to come back here after stealing those drawings – if he did take them,’ Seb said. ‘But, Anna, what if word got back to him via Lawrence that I didn’t believe Julia had committed suicide?’
I was silent, staring into my glass.
Seb rested his hands on the table. ‘What if Farron killed Julia? He had a damned good motive. Then he hears, via some general chit-chat with Lawrence, that I’m saying I don’t believe the suicide verdict. What then?’
I waited, not wanting to admit I even understood what he was saying. ‘I still don’t see why he’d be hanging around,’ I said.
Seb sat there necking his whisky. I think he was hardly aware of how much he’d drunk. His attention was wholly focused on his idea. At last he said, ‘Maybe what he heard got him worried. Could he be checking for loose ends that might give him away, or provide proof against him? He’d want to find out why I’d stopped believing Julia had killed herself.’
He waited for me to reply.
‘It’s all very speculative,’ I said at last.
‘Even if he didn’t kill Julia I’d bet my life he knows where the drawings went,’ Seb said. ‘And the timing of her death was very convenient for him. Think of all that secrecy. If things had gone his way we might all still be sitting here thinking of him as Max Conran.’
His thoughts echoed Sally’s so closely that I shivered for a second.
‘Try to remember what you talked about,’ Seb went on. ‘Did his questions make any sense if what I’m saying’s true?’