The Grail Tree

by Jonathan Gash

  ‘I’m afraid so.’ He wore his cleric’s dog collar like a slipped halo.

  ‘Er, excuse me please, Reverend.’ I edged past. It was beginning to look like somebody’s big scene. Rather private, but undoubtedly big.

  ‘Don’t go, Lovejoy.’ I dithered uneasily. ‘I apologize for having disbelieved you,’ she added to me, wrenching the words out before lashing back at her frail old pal. ‘But why, Henry?’

  He shuffled like a caught child. ‘Those wretched Council rates, Martha.’ He tried to appeal to me but I wasn’t having any. Definitely neutral, I began examining the Pembroke table’s hinges. ‘So tiresome,’ he cried. ‘Always more taxes, more charges.’

  ‘You promised to ask me, Henry,’ she said sternly, ‘before making any more things.’ My ears pricked. I’d found the forger, the cunning old devil. ‘You promised.’

  Hey-ho. The good old sexual stand-off. Woman versus man again. They said their lines a few more times while I moved gently to one side. Pembroke tables are among the most copied items of furniture on earth. Both of the natty little folding flaps must have three hinges. Each flap lifts up and rests on fly runners or rails. This luscious Pembroke was serpentined, double fly rails both sides. Glancing at Henry and Martha to check they were still at it, I stood on tiptoe and peered downwards. The inner aspects of the slender legs tapered elegantly, so maybe 1790. Definitely eighteenth-century, anyhow.

  I came to, smiling. Henry and Martha were watching me. Silence.

  ‘Oh, er . . .’ I cleared my throat and looked innocent. ‘You rang?’ Not a flicker of a smile from either. ‘Er, just looking.’

  ‘Henry. May I introduce Lovejoy.’ We bowed. That’s what a lovely old house like this does for you, puts back your manners a couple of hundred years. ‘Lovejoy, may I introduce the Reverend Henry Swan.’ We bowed again. No wonder people do nothing but slouch and yawn and scratch nowadays. There’s no point in bothering with things like manners if everything all around you’s plastic junk, is there? I even pulled out one of my cards and presented it with a flourish.

  ‘Lovejoy Antiques, Inc.,’ he read through lowered steel-rimmed specs. ‘Sotheby’s Authorized Expert, London.’

  Christ! I’d given him the wrong card. A quick improvisation was called for. ‘Ah,’ I said casually, ‘I’m no longer with – er – Sotheby’s. Not right now.’ You can have too much elegance. It’d made me forget which pocket held my legitimate cards.

  ‘Were you ever, Lovejoy?’ Martha Cookson was smiling now.

  ‘Well, not really.’ I shrugged at her but women get me really narked, always guessing more than is good for them. No wonder they get under your skin.

  ‘Ahem.’ Swan’s eyes twinkled. ‘A . . . freelance,’ he brought out proudly.

  ‘Yes,’ I replied. And broke, but I didn’t say that.

  ‘Is this the young man of whom you have spoken, Martha?’

  Of whom you have spoken, I thought. Dear God. I’d even have to get my tenses right. It was becoming one of those days.

  ‘Yes, Henry.’

  ‘Then why did he need to inspect the Pembroke?’ he asked. A shrewd old nut.

  ‘To find out what it was,’ I explained. ‘My bell only tells me if.’

  They glanced at each other, signalling with looks. I watched with sudden interest. You can always tell when people are more than just good friends.

  ‘Very well, Lovejoy.’ Martha Cookson came to a decision. Henry nodded agreement as she spoke. ‘We wish to commission you, Lovejoy, if that’s the right expression.’

  I sweated with relief. If things improved this quickly I’d be eating again soon.

  ‘Fine by me.’

  We all waited, some more patiently than others.

  ‘Oh!’ Henry Swan came to, a dusty little beam lighting his countenance. ‘Oh. Quite, Lovejoy. We . . . dig, don’t we, Martha?’

  ‘Dig, dear?’ She was lost.

  ‘Yes,’ he exclaimed impatiently. ‘You know, Martha. To understand, comprehend, appreciate.’ He gave a crumpled grin, unexpectedly toothy. ‘We may live in deepest East Anglia, Lovejoy, but we do move with the times. The retainer, dear. Deposit.’

  ‘Oh, the fee.’ She did the handbag bit. I felt the blessed ecstasy of notes in my digits. After listening to Henry’s dated slang, I deserved every penny.

  Suddenly, though, there was something wrong. They glanced at each other shiftily. We were waiting too long.

  ‘Good, good,’ Reverend Henry said, clearing his throat. ‘Ahem.’ He actually pronounced it A . . . hem. ‘Good heavens! Is that the time?’

  ‘Are you free for lunch tomorrow?’ Martha Cookson asked affably.

  ‘I’ll be here.’ Another nasty wait. ‘Look,’ I said at last. ‘Sooner or later you’ll have to tell me what you’ve commissioned me for.’ I was beginning to lose patience. ‘Or do I have to guess?’

  ‘Goodness me,’ old Henry said. ‘How careless of us, Martha.’

  ‘You’d better explain, Henry.’

  ‘No. You, Martha.’

  ‘Both together,’ I suggested. A sudden thought. ‘It isn’t something you’ve half inched?’ They seemed quite blank. I translated. ‘Pinched. Stolen.’

  ‘Certainly not.’ They were indignant enough to be truthful.

  ‘Sorry. Well, funnier things have happened.’ I tried to help. ‘You want me to find some particular antique?’ This is the commonest thing.

  ‘Oh, no,’ said Henry earnestly. ‘We already have it, you see.’

  ‘And you want it examined? Dated?’

  There were three Imari plates in the cabinet. The lovely precious colours were exactly right, but nowadays dealers will call any porcelain ‘Imari ware’ if it’s got those delectable royal blues and mandarin reds even vaguely approximated. I’d known since I’d arrived they weren’t legitimate. Oh, genuine antiques. But Dutch copies of the true Japanese. No Nippon potter ever drew bamboos in layers with a ruler like that. It’s the really wooden feeling of the artistry that gives these copies away every time, so beware. I came back to earth.

  ‘Your porcelains?’ I nodded at the Imaris.

  ‘Er, no.’

  ‘But you want something authenticated?’

  ‘That’s correct.’ More glances. I felt part of one of those music hall melodramas.

  ‘Is it here?’

  ‘Er, no. I’ll bring it. We must explain about it first.’

  ‘What is it?’ I demanded. ‘I might have to bring documents, references.’

  Martha took a quick breath. ‘It’s –’ She smiled at me with something approaching defiance. ‘It’s – it’s the Grail.’

  ‘Grail?’ For a moment the penny didn’t drop.

  ‘Yes.’ They stood together, gazing at me.

  ‘I only know of one Grail,’ I jibed pleasantly, still stupid. ‘And that’s –’ I looked from Henry to Martha. Then back. Then from Henry to Martha again.

  ‘Exactly, Lovejoy.’ Henry let me in on it gently. ‘I have it.’

  I gaped back at the two lunatics for a second. Then turned on my heel and walked out, blazing.

  I’d cripple Tinker. That was why he’d been evasive in the pub, the great Neanderthal buffoon. He’s always doing this. Bloody barkers are all at it, hoping something will turn up without doing any proper bloody legwork. Supplying me with duds when I was on my uppers for proper worthwhile collectors. No wonder I’m always starving.

  I swung the Ruby’s starting handle viciously. It knows me too well to push its luck when I’m wild. An obedient first-time start.

  ‘Lovejoy.’

  Martha Cookson had followed me. As I clunked the handbrake down I saw old Henry peering anxiously from the doorstep behind her.

  ‘You won’t forget lunch tomorrow?’ she said, rather pale. ‘And he really has got it, you know, Lovejoy.’

  ‘Missus,’ I gave back like ice, ‘you had Excalibur till this afternoon.’

  She said something more but I was too upset to listen. I coaxed all ten ccs into th
robbing power and spluttered the Ruby down the gravel drive. What a waste of a whole bloody day. First, Betty. Then, Jean Evans getting mad at me. Then, Martha Cookson and her tame nutter. Tinker had better not be around for a day or two, that’s all.

  You get times when everything goes wrong all at once. And it’s always women at the back of them, every blinking time. Ever noticed that?

  Chapter 3

  I STORMED ANGRILY homewards down the Buresford road. The Ruby’s G-force even made me blink once or twice on the slope past St Margaret’s Well. Who the hell makes up all these tales of Grails and tombs I don’t know. Only I wish they’d pack it in.

  Dusk fell when I still had about four miles more to go. I needed to borrow some matches so I called in at an antiques shop in Dragonsdale, a giant metropolis of seventeen houses, three shops, two pubs and a twelfth-century church. That’s modern hereabouts. Liz Sandwell was just closing up. She came out to watch me do the twin oil lamps on the Ruby. Well, you can’t have everything. Liz is basically oil paintings and Georgian incidental household furnishings. She has a lovely set of pole-screens and swing dressing mirrors.

  ‘I love your little Noddy car, Lovejoy.’ She’s a great leg-puller. Twenty-five, shiny dun hair and style. She wears floral frocks. I know it sounds old-fashioned, but Liz never looks it somehow. ‘Finished,’ she asked blandly, ‘your inspection?’

  ‘Oh. Yes.’ I must have been looking at her too hard and too long. I wiped the lamp glasses and set about trimming the wicks.

  ‘Hard day at the pageant, I hear,’ she said. She accepted my quick glance blithely, all sweet innocence.

  ‘Not too bad.’ I was very preoccupied.

  ‘They say Betty Marsham’s gunning for somebody.’

  I said carefully, ‘That’s women all over, isn’t it? No patience.’

  She was laughing as I got both front lamps alight. The domes slid on with a comforting click.

  ‘One day you’ll get in real trouble, Lovejoy.’ Her hand paused, taking her matches back.

  ‘Who, me?’ I gave her my best angelic face.

  ‘Time to come in for a sherry?’

  The memory of her bloke floated across my mind. He’s the one they wind the rope around at the back of our tug-o’-war line. Our anchor man on account of his size, muscle and weight.

  ‘Er, another time, Liz. Thanks all the same.’ I hesitated. ‘Here, love. One thing.’ I asked her about Martha Cookson and her tame priest.

  ‘Henry Swan? Yes, I know him.’ A couple of modern cars swished grandly past, their headlamps illuminating the houses and trees. ‘He’s a manorial lord, one of those ancient titles. Poor as a church mouse.’

  ‘Poor? In a house like that?’ I began describing the mansion but Liz gave one of those short laughs which show you’ve missed the point.

  ‘It’s hers. Not his. Not any more.’

  ‘You mean . . .?’ I remembered their glances.

  ‘They’ve lived together for years. His family went broke. Mrs Cookson bought it.’ She shrugged prettily. ‘It was a terrific scandal years ago.’ Her dealer’s antennae alerted. ‘Why, Lovejoy? Are you buying from them?’

  ‘Just wondering. Social call, really,’ I lied easily. ‘Look. Are they . . . well, reliable?’

  ‘Never heard anyone ask that about them before, Lovejoy.’ She paused. ‘Pots of money, if that’s what you’re worried about.’

  I nodded thanks, but I was getting one of those feelings. Maybe it was standing about in the evening cold after such a burning hot day. She told me about a couple of Jacobean pewters she’d salted away for me to see and said to come inside because it wouldn’t take a minute. ‘I’ve three lovely pieces of Irish cut glass as well, Lovejoy.’ I wavered, sorely tempted, but that tough anchor man would be back soon and I was in enough trouble.’

  ‘Tomorrow, if I can make it,’ I promised, cranking away.

  ‘I hope those lamps hold out, Lovejoy,’ Liz called as the Ruby creaked into a rather drifting acceleration. ‘Remember what happened to the Foolish Virgins and their lamps.’

  ‘Promises, promises,’ I yelled over my shoulder, but she’d gone in. Women always get the last word.

  It was full dark by the time I reached home. This cottage where I live, occasionally without assistance, lies in a small village a few miles north of our nearest big town. It’s one of those villages which people call sleepy, no street lights. Sleepy in East Anglia’s moribund anywhere else. We only have two streets, a church as old as the hills and a few straggly lanes leading off into rather spooky low-lying mist-filled valleys. A fine evening drizzle began. Welcome home, Lovejoy.

  ‘Good kid.’ I patted the Ruby’s stone-pocked radiator and blew its lamps out.

  The door seemed intact. I always check because antiques dealers are forever being burgled. I found the key and switched off the key alarm to save old George Jilks having another infarct in his police hut. He’s always on at me for being careless with it. That’s our modern police for you. No dedication.

  I washed and put the kettle on. There isn’t much space in the cottage. I had it rebuilt after the original burned down, which is why I’m still broke. A minuscule hallway leads into the one main living room with a curtained kitchen alcove off. This divan I have extends into a double bed.

  I made my tea: two pasties and beetroot, a pint of tea, five slices of bread and marge. You can get some of that sweet pickle but it costs the earth.

  Normally, I turn on the telly to watch the politicians for a laugh. This evening I couldn’t settle. You know the feeling. Books you’d normally leap at seem suddenly too familiar and the notes you desperately want to bring up to date are too irksome.

  A few tickles had come in, letters replying to my newspaper adverts – I place two a week. My most successful gambit is always the innocent widow (as if there ever was such a thing) struggling to make an old groat from the sale of her pathetic belongings. This week I’d put:

  For sale: Pr. v. old & large Japanese vases, colourful embossed figures; Black Bess flintlock rifle; old silver tea service with hallmark; box of old stamped envelopes. Late husband’s effects. Please write with offers. Recently bereaved widow.

  We call it breading, as in loaf. Just as anglers chuck bread into a river, so we dealers ‘bread’ the public pool. I’d no such articles, naturally, and of course I’d used terms just wrong enough to be convincing. Seven replies, five naturally from dealers taken in by my deceptive innocence. I read their ingenious scribbles with dry amusement, then chucked them away. The other two replies were from collectors. You can tell them a mile off. One, a stamps addict, babbled incoherent enthusiasm but the scent of money was missing. The second was a genuine collector, who wrote gravely that my Japanese vases sounded like Satsuma ware. We call them ‘Second’ Satsumas, in the trade, these gross and horrible pots decorated with too many colours and white-slip outlines. The Japanese made them in the nineteenth century to cater for the crazy European idea of current Japanese elegance. European collectors and Japanese potters finished up equally bemused in a lunatic situation, the former collecting the wrong stuff and the latter turning out hideous stuff they didn’t like. Folk go on collecting it, thank heaven. ‘First’ Satsuma’s beautiful delicate small stuff. I’ve yet to see a single real non-phoney piece anywhere in Europe, so beware. The collector, a Sunderland geezer, went on to ask did I not mean Brown rather than Black Bess? The former is the famous Land Pattern Musket, possession of which is the indelible mark of the flintlock collector. Black Bess, on the other hand, was a highwayman’s horse. The collector offered to have my items priced by independent valuers at his own expense and even offered a deposit to guarantee his good faith. He would supply personal references from banks etc. I filed his name and address reverently. I love a real collector.

  Now, I thought, where the hell do I get a pair of Second Satsuma vases and a Land Pattern from?

  Believe it or not, that was the high spot of my evening. I fidgeted some more.

  I was wo
rried. The point is that tales like the Holy Grail happen every day around here. I hear thirty a week. The commonest is King John’s lost treasure, which gets itself found every few minutes. And next comes the poor tired Holy Grail which nobody will let rest in peace. A mere sniff of good old King Arthur’s enough to set millions daydreaming and digging in back yards from one end of these islands to the other. To a dealer whose next meal comes through finding real antiques these legends are a drag, an absolute pest.

  I played a record of a Mozart flute piece. He hated composing for that instrument and used to write home to his dad moaning about it, but he’d get no sympathy from me tonight. I finally spent the rest of the evening ringing round my mates arranging things for the next day.

  Angela was first, seeing I owed her a fortune. I swore an oath that I’d bring her bloody money in first thing. May I be forgiven. Jim Fleet, who is Japanese militaria and prints, came next. I promised to see him at the next antiques auction about a Kitagawa Utamaro print of 1800 or so, which he said was original. Then I left a message at the White Hart with Ted the barman for Tinker Dill. I omitted the Yours Sincerely bit, seeing I sincerely intended to sincerely cripple him.

  I gave in at last, got the divan ready and switched the light off. Outside it sounded as if it had started to rain quite hard. And I’d forgotten to cover the Ruby up with that ex-army tarpaulin. Great. It would be flooded in the morning. The trouble with my cottage is that you can only see the lights of two other houses. Some nights it feels forlorn. That’s the word. Forlorn.

  I found myself listening for sounds. The odd bat, the odd hedgehog grunt. Nothing else. I don’t care for countryside. There’s too much of it knocking about by far. Anything could happen to me down in this crummy hollow and nobody would know for days. Great.

  The phone rang, making me leap a mile. Betty apoplectic.

  ‘Lovejoy! You absolute pig,’ she blazed.

  This is what I like, I thought bitterly. Compassionate understanding.

  ‘Hello, Betty, love.’

  ‘Don’t you Betty, love me, Lovejoy.’ She began wailing. ‘How do you think I feel? I’m such a fool. I’ve had to say I’m going round to my mother’s to come out and phone you.’