The Lies of Fair Ladies

by Jonathan Gash

  Wittwoode's Auction Temple.

  "Drift. Don't look. Don't seek or search."

  Luna was puzzled. "But you said—"

  “I've told you before, Lune." I pulled her roughly behind the stack of chairs and occasional tables the whizzers chuck together near the long wall. Nobody was close. "The antiques will pull you. They're here—somewhere. They'll shout, call, maybe just touch your mind as you walk by. But they're here."

  "They'll ..." She looked at the chair legs sticking out at all angles from the mound. "Are they here now?"

  "Yes. And when you find one,” I begged, pleading, "don't shriek and wave your handbag. Just tell it hello, then tip me the wink." I shook my head. Give me strength. "Not really a wink, Lune. Metaphorically. Direct my attention."

  "How?"

  "Lune. You directed my attention the other night—"

  "Shhh!" She pulled away, prim. "Twice you've mentioned that episode, Lovejoy. Don't think I don't deplore my—"

  "Shhhh," I said. "Please, Lune. We're in public."

  "Yes, well."

  "Here." I stopped as we emerged. Something she'd said. "What registration? The impertinent lass?"

  "Registration? Oh. The motor car." She lowered her voice. I bent, anxious. "Do you think I ought to complain? Officially, I mean? The girl's rudeness—"

  "No, love." I was broken. She'd worn me down. "Don't complain. She might have trouble at home. But what car?"

  "At the garden center. Poor Mr. Benedict's. Don't you remember? It belonged to a Mr. G. F. Cooley, Waylance Street, Weston Hammer. It's quite a nice village, in Staffordshire I think ..."

  Hopefully, sanity lived. Somewhere. I left her, and drifted.

  It happened in the first pass. I called Luna over. She came eyeing the dealers, mistrustful. I held up the bottle-shaped carafe to the light, smiling.

  "See the medallion on the side? Enamel. Trying to be German eighteenth century."

  "I think it's rather nice."

  Loud with merriment, I chuckled and wagged my head. "Sorry, love. Fake. Look through the other side. The glass is quite clear. Somebody's ground out depressions, enamel pastes in and fired it anew. It seems true enameling. Authentic enameled glass has no sign of grinding. The grinding wheel's marks show up as a slight prismatic effect. See them?"

  "Well, no."

  There weren't any to see, so I was glad she said no. I replaced the lovely antique carafe among the job lot of pressed glass jugs and butter dishes, mentally apologizing to it. It stood there, regal.

  "That's inexperience, love," I said airily. "It'll come."

  There was a small collection of decoy ducks in a wicker basket. They're collectors' items, but take care. Most aren't genuine, because wandering fairgrounds have started selling new ones, suitably aged, on the now-fashionable "country antiques" stalls

  among their sideshows. I make some myself when I’m desperate. As ever, antiques bring surprises. Some collectors'!! pay a year's average wage for some rarities. I think they're horrible, but A. Elmer Crowell's Black Duck Preening—East Harwich in the U.S.A.—or Black-Bellied Plover are current favorites. I mean, who wants a wood duck? Once you've seen one, and all that.

  I called loudly to Betty O'Connors—lives down on the wharf postal-selling thimbles and stitchery by subscriber catalogue—to bid for a porcelain firemark for me.

  "Bid yourself," Betty called back.

  "Misery," I grumbled. "I can't stand this heap of dross. Just bid, eh? I'll owe."

  Dealers snorted, but sidled across to inspect the firemark.

  "All right, Lovejoy," Betty relented.

  "Ta, love." I waved a piece of paper between my fingers, and left it with Alf, a whizzer famous for having lost a leg in the service of antiques corruption. He fell through a wardrobe one night. He'd been bribed to swap the decorated surrounds of two pieces of furniture before the following day's auction. It's a common practice (swapping, not falling through wardrobes). Alf was trapped. His leg went bad, and he was discovered by a char lady who had hysterics. He's a blabbermouth. We call him Radio Alf. I'd chosen carefully. The price I'd pay—a month's wage—was about right for an Atheneum Fire Office porcelain firemark. They're rare, especially mint.

  "People had them on their houses," I explained to Luna. "The fire insurance firm would reward the firefighters." I didn't explain the fertile grounds for corruption and extortion that fire insurance provided in early days, as now. Luna would find some reason not to believe me.

  "Now, love," I said, having sussed the entire place. We were outside, strolling down a riverside walk by some cottages. I quite like trees now and again, even in towns, as long as they don't gang up and threaten to start their own countryside among our harmless streets. "Your first job."

  "I've done several, Lovejoy." Her lip was quivering. What the hell now?

  "This one's your own. Pick seven or eight pieces of furniture. Any. Buy them, changing your mind, hesitating. Now and then start bidding, then drop out. Look ..." I searched for a word that described her to a tee. "Incoherent."

  "What if I guess wrong?"

  I smiled. I was going to turn them into antiques anyway. "You can't. You won't. Believe me, love. I know.''

  Her eyes filled. "Oh, Lovejoy. You do trust me!"

  "Eh?"

  She sniffed, did the hankie bit. "You wanted Betty O'Connors to bid for you, when I'm perfectly—"

  Well, I rolled in the aisles. "Betty? She won't."

  "But she said she would, Lovejoy."

  "Of course she did—so I'd say how much I'd pay. I wrote it down. She'll buy it for herself."

  Luna instantly went nuclear. "But that's . . . dishonest, Lovejoy! Actually to resort to such—"

  I heard her out, shaking my head sadly at the perfidy of an unkind world. "Go in this afternoon. Bid for the German carafe, the one shaped like a retail sherry bottle. And that job lot of decoy ducks."

  "But you said they were fakes, Lovejoy." Wide eyes and all.

  "Er, did I?" I'd just deplored Betty O'Connors's lies. "Er, yes. But the vendor's been in hospital, and wants to move near his daughter's. To, er, Bognor."

  She looked about for lurking observers, decided and gave my arm a surreptitious squeeze. "You're sweet, Lovejoy."

  "Lune. A little kindness to an old soldier . . ."I welled up at my fictitious old git, controlled myself manfully.

  "Should I bid higher than necessary, Lovejoy?" She was thrilled again. "I mean, the old gentleman would appreciate a little extra. Is his daughter married? Just think how happy he'll—"

  Luna got out of hand fast. "No, love," I said firmly. "He's very proud. He would hate charity. Some of these old folk ..."

  "You're so wise, Lovejoy! I had a great-aunt once—"

  "Look. I'd better go. Remember what I've told you."

  "Yes," she said solemnly. We walked to the road by the bridge. "That horrid Mr. Cooley was looking at the carafe after we looked at it. Did you notice?"

  "Cooley?" I didn't know any Cooley.

  "Who owns the motor you wanted to know about."

  Cooley? I halted. Who had been in, milling around among the women non-dealers? Acker Kirwin, Betty, Marjorie, Olive Bremner from Stirling, a few of the Brighton circus. Big Frank, Jeff for ten seconds, Chris who collects hammered silver, Mannie the maniac clock faker in his caftan and cowbells, Connie Hopkins, Deg the parchment forger, Lonnie Marklin who makes model coaches. Who else? Stan Tell who's furniture. Liz Sandwell, today unfortunately guarded by her jealous rugby-playing monster lover. A scattering of lesser dealers. One I like particularly is Rhea Cousins. She's Georgian furniture—pays in very personal services administered in the privacy of her own home. Her husband, Willis, is her accomplice. They're very, very rich. I ran down this list, checked myself. I was speaking aloud. Luna's eyes were like saucers, the list making her weak at the knees.

  "Cooley?"

  "The one I told you about at the other auction, Lovejoy."

  "Acker Kirwin?" I described him.
<
br />   "Yes. He's not very nice, Lovejoy. Shifty. He's the same one who . . . conned us before. I told you."

  "Give us a lift to the mill, love?" It wouldn't take long. A breath of country air would do us no harm.

  Twenty-six

  The watermill was on a flow from the river. Artificial, of course, meaning man-made. A small fishing lake lay above, fed from a little tributary that came from a valley a mile or so off. The influx passed through the mill. Undershot, they call it, the water flowing beneath. You don't get as much power as from an overshot wheel, but that's just hard luck. If you have hills, like in Lancashire, you get significant power from big overshots.

  Luna went in the car for the key from the garden center office. It's quite tall as watermills go. Red brick, with a warehouse for sacks, and a loading bay where Suffolk horses clomped in with their wagons. Gingerly I looked, but the rain had washed the flint cobbles clean of crime, except for moss. Did I think crime? Wrong. Everybody saw it was an accident. Witnesses can't be wrong. The victim—sorry, the poor unfortunate—was in full view. Well, nearly full view. One hand was reaching in, out of sight. Taking hold of something, keeping him safe. Dead safe.

  The surrounding countryside was quiet. Somebody was whistling across the river. In the market garden, I shouldn't wonder. A motor started up. A dog barked, was ballocked crossly for not coming when he was told, the whole family was late now, bad dog. Slam. Rev, and off. Two anglers walked the riverside path, turning in to seek the lake. More gear than spacemen, camouflage jackets, rods, wicker baskets. Bet they only lived a hundred yards away. A laugh.

  Somebody had shut the hoist door. A notice said "Council Property Keep Out.'' The mill was closed until further notice, trespassers would be prosecuted. I felt indignant. We common folk owned the frigging place. But once a robber baron, always a robber baron. Calling it politics fools only the perpetrators.

  The mill doors were locked. The windows on the second floor wore wire mesh. You'd have to be Delia, at least, to get inside. That set me thinking. Had Delia himself found something in the office? And later came back to kill Rye? But why? Delia came highly recommended. And asked for more jobs, any time. That's not the chat of a secret murderer, not round here. Also, he seemed as ignorant of antiques as any antique dealer, which is ignorance of a pretty stupendous degree. Here came Luna, with the keys.

  “I want to see the hoist, Lune."

  Oliver's Council hadn't the sense to use the original ancient locks, still functional. They'd spoiled the great doors by adding enormous metal bars, with modern padlocks. Typical.

  The mill inside felt lovely, cool, spacious. The millstones were not turning, which was fine by me. Stairs you could ride a horse up led to open floors, substantial beams across each ceiling to carry almost any weight. "JoHy' millers were hated down the centuries— think of the extortion they could perpetrate, controlling the only means of processing grain. And their ancient technology is beautiful to behold. Normally I would have been smiling. I wasn't. We climbed higher.

  "This is it, Lovejoy. The hoist."

  It was closed, that great wide window through which the sacks were pulled in. I'd expected a gap, like a fool.

  "Why are we here? Do you think Mr. Benedict left a clue?"

  "How the hell should I know?" And why were we whispering?

  I cleared my throat noisily and clumped with giant footfalls down the length of the room. Skylights, walls red brick, patches rimed to white. Only a single sack. One, by the hoist. I'd seen Rye reach out, swing it in. The selfsame sack? Or had Drinkwater taken it away in his extensive investigations of the tragedy? They'd lasted all of ten minutes. Really thorough.

  "Luna," I asked her. "What happened? You were watching."

  "You saw, Lovejoy." She gestured helplessly at the hoist window. "Poor Mr. Benedict leaned out. And fell. It was awful."

  "We saw him do it before. Why didn't he fall then?"

  She thought, trying. "Because he was hold of something?"

  "What?'' I nodded, go and show.

  “That line of sticks, perhaps. There's nothing else. This hand." She spun, aligning her hands. A pretty sight. I'd have reached for her, except this was where Rye was murdered.

  Into a long oaken beam, fixed to the wall, was a line of wooden rods. Belaying-pin fashion, the sort you get on old sailing ships. Basically a simple wooden rod, tapered, thick at the top so it won't fall through. Purpose? To tie a rope on. Several pins. Simple.

  Except?

  Except, take hold of a pin at the top, and move about vigorously, as when pulling in a heavy sack through a hoist window, you might just waggle the stick enough to pull the damn thing out. And down you go. But Rye had no belaying pin in his hand when he fell. Even Drinkwater might have seen one.

  "Hold the bottom of the belaying pin, love. And lean away from the wall."

  She took it carefully. "Like this?"

  "Keep your feet together, close to the wall. Now lean away."

  Suddenly I pulled the pin up and out, and she fell away, just regaining her balance.

  "Lovejoy! That was a perfectly silly thing to do! I could have got splinters in my hand!"

  "No, love. You couldn't." The pin was worn smooth as silk.

  Rye always used that first pin to hold on to. By its projecting base. Waggle it as you may, it couldn't come out. Unless somebody unseen in the mill, exactly where we were standing, perhaps chatting amiably as Rye had conducted his demonstration for the children below, had quickly lifted the belaying pin from its hole, leaving Rye's hand grasping nothing.

  Acker Kirwin, alias Cooley, whose motor was waiting in the market garden across the river footbridge for him to escape. In the confusion, we'd all been too busy being shocked, running about phoning ambulances, controlling children. A good time to slip away. And it was clearly an accident, no? We'd all seen him miss his footing.

  But a man starting to fall to his death might well scrabble with his feet when the world is taken away from under for the first time. And last.

  "Lovejoy?"

  Her voice seemed miles away. I was sitting on the floor.

  "Lovejoy?" Her arms were round me. She was scented peach, some blossomy thing. "Don't take on, darling. He went quickly. I'm so sorry. Please don't."

  Roughly I got up and shoved her away. "Don't what, you silly cow?'' I rounded on her, narked, pointing a finger into her face. "You stop giving me orders. I won't have it, y'hear?"

  "Yes, darling."

  "Just get that straight, all right?"

  "Certainly, darling."

  Which having been decided, we descended and locked up, and she drove back to the Wittwoode Auction Temple to do her—read my—bidding. And I went to prepare my workshop for the labor that lay ahead. Serious, from now on. I was working for Prammie and Rye Benedict. And, who knows, some old bloke called Fair-clough.

  On the way, I caught a bus. More on a whim than with anything serious in mind. An advert had caught my eye. The sailing barges were gathering. Fifteen minutes later, in the estuary, I stood among a scatter of old salts, children, and the odd housewife, to watch the boats.

  "They loaded up, all ready for the race?" I asked one elderly nautical. A spherical whiskered gnome, smoking a foul pipe. I stood to windward.

  He snorted. "Loaded? You'm thick, booy. Don't load for a race. She'm travelin' loight."

  These Thames barges, few left now, are massive great things. Two masts, with a heavy spritsail. They stain the sails with red ocher and oil. A real mess.

  "Why're they so low in the water then?"

  He spat past his pipe stem, the grottle donging a well-spattered bollard quite ten yards away. I admired that. I knew I'd be trying it myself, soon as I got home. I'd fail.

  "Thames barge is flat-bottomed, son." He scathed me with a look. "These coasts, see? Leeboards instead of keels. Let her move to leeward in shoal water, stay upright if a-grounded. Her mast's lutchet-stepped, so she can go under bridges."

  He told me a lot, the way of co
astal folk yapping about boats. I stared at the three great sailing barges. So they sail up even shallow rivers, these things? And race the Blackwater Race cargo empty? So the use of one as a depot for tons of stolen antiques would be purely temporary, while it was moored. Decoys are temporary. So Prammie's heavy stuff from Cornish Place was still ashore.

  "Ta, Dad," I said to the old seaman. And went to work.

  It isn't much of a place. A converted garage with a homemade furnace and bellows. Tool racks. A window for north light, when painting fakes. A folding bench hinged to the brickwork. Saws, planes, nails in screwtop marmalade jars—they keep moisture out. Paints in a cyclist's plastic expanding box (buy Italian-made boxes; they're cheapest and best). Brushes in earthenware pots (cover them with plastic freezer bags, with a rubber band). Containers of turpentine, various painting oils. Linseed oil I try hardening in sunshine, like the old sixteenth-century painters did. But rushing out with the jar the instant our watery sunshine creeps over the garden has seriously weakened me over the years. Canvas, wood stretchers, glues, ancient nails nicked from various things. It's a mess. Perfect.