Finding Secrets

by Westwood, Lauren

  ‘He’ll be dangerous,’ Robbo said, cradling his camera in his lap.

  ‘No!’ Spider said. ‘We’ve known him all our lives.’

  ‘Have we?’ I fixed my eyes on the dark road. ‘Do we really know him?’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘Let’s just see.’

  We followed the ambulance in front around Highbury Fields, towards Angel, then up towards Camden Town. I almost missed him as he took a sharp left through Primrose Hill, to the edge of Regent’s Park. He pulled into the service drive of a newly derelict terrace of once-grand houses. The street sign was blackened over. I turned down the nearest side street and stopped the ambulance.

  ‘Now what?’ Spider said.

  ‘We confront him.’ In my head, guns are blazing.

  ‘Wait a second, son.’ Damn’d Robbo laid a hand on my arm. ‘Have you thought this through?’

  I jerked away. ‘What’s to think about? We talked about this – we had a plan.’

  ‘Assuming you “catch him” – what then? As I see it, you have two options: turn him in to the police, or take over his turf?’

  ‘What?’ I stared at him.

  He shrugged offhandedly. ‘Of course, I’m sure you’ll do the “right” thing – grass on your mate. Make things hard for him and his family, if he has one. I’m not sure the powers that be will thank you for it, but you’ll have a clear conscience.’

  ‘Damn right,’ Spider said.

  ‘Just something to think about.’ Robbo got out of the passenger side, and lifted his camera.

  ‘You stay here,’ I said to Spider. ‘In case we need to make a quick getaway.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ He looked relieved.

  ‘I’m sure.’ I turned to Robbo. ‘I’ll handle this. You just stay in the background. Shoot what you can – but don’t let him see you.’

  He sniffed. ‘I’ll send you a bill for the film.’

  - Chapter 36 -

  As I enter the workshop, the clocks chime. But this time, it doesn’t sound like a greeting. Compared to the outside world, the workshop is dim and shadowy except for the circle of bright light that illuminates Chris’s worktable. I blink a few times until my eyes adjust. Chris is hunched over his books and doesn’t look up. I take in the planes of his face, the slight curl of the ends of his dark hair brushing the top of his shoulders. I want to go to him, mould myself to him, feel those strong arms around me and the heartbeat in his chest. Those sensitive lips on mine. But when he finally looks up and sees me, there’s a subtle distance between us that wasn’t there before.

  ‘Hello, Chris,’ I say.

  His brief smile disappears all too quickly. ‘Alex… thank you for coming.’ His tone is formal and lacking warmth. Even so, I’m glad to see him.

  ‘You said you found something.’

  ‘Yes… maybe.’ Standing up, he gathers a sheaf of papers and moves them to the centre of the worktable. I notice an absence of tools and wood and metal shavings – like he hasn’t been doing much clockwork. That makes me sad – and a little bit angry too. As things seem to be over between us – if there ever was a ‘thing’ – I may as well get it off my chest.

  ‘You know, Chris,’ I say sharply, ‘just for the record – I’ve never had any intention of dragging your family name through the mud.’

  His face narrows. ‘What?’

  ‘I guess you’ve got a right to be angry – me waltzing in to your cosy little workshop behind Daddy’s big auction house and setting a cat among the pigeons. I guess you must think I’m no better than the Edwards – worse even. At least they have a wrong to right.’

  ‘Is that really what you think of me, Alex?’ His eyes darken. ‘That I’m just some rich toff idling in the back of my father’s business, driving fast cars and chasing women?’

  ‘Well, you certainly do seem to have a lot of women “friends”.’ As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I regret them.

  He moves around the desk towards where I’m standing and crosses his arms firmly across his chest. Then, without warning, he begins to laugh.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ I demand.

  ‘You.’

  And a moment later, I’m swept up in those arms, and I’m drinking in his mouth, his tongue, my fingers wandering through that soft hair and down his back. I press myself against him. We stay like that for a long moment, but I can sense his hesitation and tension. I stiffen and push him away.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ I say.

  He looks down at the floor. ‘You’re right,’ he says. ‘It is.’ He moves back around the desk.

  I feel stunned and hurt, like I’ve just been dumped or jilted. I want to run away from this place – and the humiliation I feel. While there might be a strong attraction – on my side at least – I sense that he’s humouring me. And I hate him for that. I press my lips tightly together, not trusting myself to speak.

  ‘I said I had some information.’ Avoiding my eyes, he resumes his business-like manner. ‘Do you want to know what I’ve found out?’

  I open my mouth, and close it again without speaking. I want to cover my ears; walk out. Clearly, this is all just a game to him. But I remain there, rooted to the spot.

  ‘I had a good snoop through the records for Churchley & Sons. I went back as far as 1960.’ He points to the stack of papers. ‘Remember I told you about provenance? The paper trail for every piece of art auctioned off has to be complete – i’s dotted and t’s crossed.’ He takes a few pieces of paper off the top of the stack that are each marked with a yellow sticky and hands them to me. ‘These all have the correct paper trail,’ he says. ‘That is, until you start looking a little more closely.’

  I flip through the papers. Each one of them is a dossier for an artwork or piece of jewellery – a cover sheet charting the dates that the item was bought and sold, stapled to the original or carbon copy invoices backing up each entry.

  ‘What am I looking for?’ I say.

  ‘All these lots were inserted in the sale the day before the auction. The seller was a Mr D Kinshaw of Grand Cayman. We’re talking fifteen different works sold between 1960 and 1980.’

  ‘Is that unusual?’

  ‘Not in itself. And the items all have invoices for when they were purchased – a provenance. Mostly in France, though a few from elsewhere. It’s just… the signature…’

  I look at the scrawl across the bottom of the documents from Churchley & Sons approving the item to be included in the auction. ‘Whose?’ I say.

  ‘My great-grandfather Jeremy was never involved in the Heath-Churchley auction business. He sometimes did repairs and valuations – like I do now. But that’s it.’ He taps his finger on the scribble. ‘So why is his signature on these lots, and no others?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ I feel a bit thick for not grasping the significance. ‘Maybe he was filling in for someone.’

  He shakes his head. ‘No. It must have been more than that.’

  ‘Well… what?’

  ‘There are no records of D Kinshaw after 1985.’

  ‘Maybe he died?’

  ‘That’s the year my great-grandfather died.’

  I shake my head. ‘I don’t understand what you’re saying, Chris.’ I wish I had the right to take his hand, wipe the stricken look off of his face.

  ‘Don’t you?’ His pale blue eyes flash like sunlight on ice. He writes the letters D Kinshaw on the paper in front of me. ‘One of my annoying little foibles, as my father would say, is that I like to take things apart and put them back together – clocks, electronics, words…’

  ‘Words?’ I look harder but don’t see anything.

  ‘It’s an anagram.’

  Crossing out D Kinshaw, he scribbles: H Dawkins.

  - Chapter 37 -

  I stare at the pencil-written name. ‘Hal Dawkins? But how can that be?’

  ‘You tell me,’ Chris says. ‘I thought you said the poor bloke was sent to the front—’

  ‘…where he was shot and killed,
’ I finish for him. ‘I saw the telegram informing his next of kin of his death.’

  ‘Though…’ Chris muses, ‘we’re talking about criminal acts here. If Hal Dawkins really was a looter, then what’s a little forgery on top? A paper trail for art, a telegram he sent himself…’ He spreads his hands. ‘The sky’s the limit.’

  ‘And how convenient if everyone thinks you’re dead.’

  We stare at each other and I feel like we can read each other’s thoughts. But right now, all I can focus on are the permutations and possibilities.

  ‘But maybe D Kinshaw forged your great-grandfather’s signature on the auction documents,’ I say, ‘to get his looted goods into the auction.’

  ‘That seems pretty far-fetched.’ Chris’s shoulders droop. ‘He wouldn’t have had access.’

  ‘I suppose not.’

  ‘Another possibility is that either Jeremy or…’ he winces, ‘maybe Frank Bolton – could have used Hal Dawkins’s identity to sell their looted property.’

  ‘Yes, but why take on the identity of a man who’s dead?’

  ‘Isn’t that what criminals do?’

  ‘Yes…’ My brain hurts trying to process this new information. ‘So you’re saying that Jeremy and Frank –‘‘Spider” and ‘‘Flea” – or vice versa – were looters who framed their mate Hal Dawkins, aka “Badger”– who wrote the diary – and got him killed. Then over a span of thirty or forty years, they sold their spoils though the auction house?’

  He nods. ‘In a nutshell. Though perhaps Frank wasn’t involved. That part, I don’t know. All I have is the paperwork I’ve shown you.’

  I shake my head. ‘I don’t know. It just seems too improbable. And besides, the items could be legitimate – I thought you said the paperwork for the provenance was all in order.’

  ‘It looks that way,’ he says. ‘So I think the Heath-Churchleys are in the clear at least.’

  ‘That’s a relief. Otherwise I might have been rounded up and shot at dawn by your father.’

  He nods absently, which doesn’t make me feel much better. ‘Here,’ he says, ‘I made you a copy of the paperwork.’

  ‘You’ve thought of everything.’ I shove the papers into my handbag. ‘Thanks – I think.’

  ‘Umm, Alex…’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You didn’t mean all that you said earlier, did you? About my wanting to protect the family name and keep my nice little life in the back of “Daddy’s” auction house.’

  ‘I just… I don’t know.’ I shake my head. ‘You keep pushing me away. What am I supposed to think?’

  His pale eyes penetrate mine. I wait for him to move – to bridge the gap between us. But he doesn’t.

  The clocks tick on for a good few seconds before he finally speaks. ‘Am I allowed to set the record straight, Alex? Would you believe me if I said that it’s not about your family secrets – or mine. Honestly, I couldn’t give a fig about those things.’

  ‘That’s fine, Chris,’ I raise my hand, embarrassed. ‘I can understand if you don’t fancy me. I mean, you’re spoiled for choice aren’t you? You don’t have to explain.’

  He laughs again. ‘It’s funny, Alex, that you suspect me of running around with dozens of women. Is that what you really think?’

  I hesitate, realising that I’m on dangerous ground. ‘Well, there’s your Dad’s PA – the blonde – and then there’s Greta – blonde again, and Sidney-from-the Isle-of-Wight…’ I shift from foot to foot. ‘And those are only the ones I know about.’

  ‘It’s ironic, isn’t it?’ he says. ‘I spend my time in this workshop, practically a hermit – according to my dad, at least. I emerge occasionally to go for a coffee, or sometimes I’m required at the auction house – though you can imagine that they try to keep me hidden away like some kind of embarrassing spinster aunt.’

  I laugh. I can imagine.

  ‘And you happen to run into me on the very rare occasions when I happen to be seeing a friend from school, or someone from front of house.’

  ‘I’m a woman – I see the way they look at you.’

  ‘Well, there’s nothing between me and them.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I was out of line.’ In so many ways.

  He picks up a file from a roll of tools next to the lamp and begins whittling away at a tiny piece of metal. I watch him silently.

  ‘There was someone once.’ He stares down at his work. ‘Someone I met at uni. We almost got married.’

  ‘Almost?’ My insides squeeze with jealousy.

  ‘In hindsight, the story is very dull. For me back then, everything was about rebellion against Dad – and the rich girls from good families he’d spent years parading me in front of like I was some kind of pedigree hound. Hannah was just a normal, middle-class girl from up north. That’s what drew me to her.’ He shakes his head. ‘Plus the fact that she was a bit older than me and looked like Lauren Bacall.’

  ‘Oh!’ My self-esteem takes a swan dive.

  ‘Dad hated her instantly, which was the icing on the cake. We got engaged. There was a huge brouhaha over announcing it – or not announcing it – like I cared about things like that! Anyway, to make a long story short, Dad hired a private investigator. Turns out my “normal, middle-class girl” was a con artist.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘That’s a simple term for it. Dad’s words were a bit more poetic. “Gold digger”, “strumpet”, “foreign whatnot”. Turns out, her family had been some kind of East Prussian nobility. She came to England when the Berlin Wall came down. She was after a good, solid English name, and money to restore some bombed-out old schloss in God-knows-where.’ He pauses. ‘She and her husband, that is.’

  ‘She was married?’ My own inner wound begins to throb.

  He shrugs. ‘So you can see why, after that, I decided to stick to my clocks.’

  ‘Yes, I can see.’ All of a sudden, I start to laugh.

  Chris looks up, puzzled. ‘Okay, I guess I was a lovesick puppy back then, but it wasn’t that funny at the time.’

  ‘No, it’s not that.’ I swallow a hiccup. ‘What happened to you was dreadful.’ I proceed to ‘make a long story short’ and tell him about Xavier, the married poet. The reason that I too swore off relationships and became a recluse in my bookish little coach house flat on the grounds of Mallow Court. For some reason, here, in this place, with this man, the whole charade seems ridiculously funny.

  When I’ve finally finished laughing and telling my story, I gather together my papers and stand up. ‘I should leave you to your work, Chris,’ I say. ‘Thanks for the papers.’

  He sets down his file and stands up. ‘Alex,’ he says, coming around the long worktable. My breath catches as he stands close to me, without touching me, his tall frame solid and commanding. ‘When can I see you again? I mean… properly?’

  The heat rising between us is delicious and almost unbearable. ‘I… I’ll call you,’ I stammer. I turn and rush towards the door before I can do anything that might spoil the moment.

  ‘You do that,’ he says.

  As I reach the door, I turn back. ‘For what it’s worth, Chris,’ I say, ‘I can guarantee you one thing.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  I give him a slow, languid smile. ‘If you’re still looking for a normal, middle-class girl –then that’s me. As your dad is already well aware, I’m a nobody through and through.’

  He laughs softly as I go out the door and his words follow me. ‘I must admit, that is a relief.’

  - XII -

  15th November 1940 – 12:03 a.m.

  I walked alone down the icy street. The sickly wisps of moonlight barely penetrated the gloom. The street must have once been opulent – white terraces with shiny black doors, London plane trees carpeting the pavement with orange and gold leaves. I pictured the ghosts of people walking, expensive cars purring by. A life I could only have dreamed of.

  And now, the buildings were silent and dark – taped windows black
ed out, some boarded up. There were no signs of life. Were the people asleep, or evacuated? Or all dead?

  At the end of the terrace, one of the houses was still smouldering. It may have been hit earlier tonight, or perhaps it had been burning for a day or more. The upper floors had caved in, leaving exposed rafters to cut across the red glow of the sky.

  I heard a noise then, a scraping sound, coming from around the side of the bombed-out house. I went to look. And even though I was expecting it – even though I knew what was going to happen – the moment I saw him, my stomach roiled with shock and disgust.

  - Chapter 38 -

  On the train home, my mind is full of Chris Heath-Churchley. We may come from different worlds, but both of us have had our hearts broken in the past. Like me, he withdrew from the world to hibernate and heal. I close my eyes and remember the feel of his lips on mine. Just a short time ago, I’d convinced myself that my life was complete and anyone who thought I was hiding away was wrong. But all along, they were right. And now, I am so ready to come back to life.

  But as the colours of the countryside blur by through the window, my thoughts drift to the obstacles. Like the fact that his father already dislikes me – and that’s before I or Mrs Edwards potentially drag his family name through the mud. Or the fact some unknown person out there is determined to wreak havoc at Mallow Court.

  I take out the papers Chris gave me and reread them, trying to fit the pieces together. Could D Kinshaw and Hal Dawkins really have been one and the same? There’s very little concrete evidence, but I’d at least thought I could rely on a death notice. But what if Hal Dawkins did survive, take on a new identity, and was alive and well in 1985.

  He would have been in his sixties then, I suppose. Did he stop auctioning things the year Jeremy died because he no longer had an insider in the auction house? It’s possible. Which means, it’s also possible that he could still be alive now, albeit in his eighties. Could he be the ‘uninvited guest’? It’s much too far-fetched, I decide. While we have elderly men and women touring Mallow Court on a daily basis, I just can’t see how an old man making mischief would fail to be spotted.