Ten Word Game

by Jonathan Gash

  “Going ashore, Millicent?” I asked, judging the throng queuing at the gangway.

  “Yes, are you? Poor Jim,” she said. “He had far too much last night. He always does. Headache city.”

  “Can’t he come?” I saw she had two tickets. I’d seen the Tours Office in the Atrium printing them out. “Look. Could I have his ticket, pay you back later? Only I’m desperate to see the, er…” God, where were they going?

  “The Rijksmuseum? Certainly!”

  I gave her hand a friendly squeeze, in my eyes the sincere love I always feel for any woman who falls for a con trick. I’d miss her, once I reached dry land.

  We shuffled down the gangway. Only one heart-stopping moment, when I forgot to show my I.D. plastic, but after that it was plain sailing. We boarded a coach and rolled grandly into Amsterdam. I was free.

  * * *

  Dry land? Not so you’d notice. Canals were everywhere, but not like Venice. Amsterdam’s waterways are alongside streets, not instead of. On the coach we chatted, a happy band of oglers. Ivy sat in the seat next to me, silent as ever. No Billy the Kid, I noticed. She just looked out of the window.

  Tourists aren’t good news nowadays, what with pollution and crowds adding to problems. East Anglia villages – Dedham, East Bergholt – are leaving official tourist trails, unable to cope with the numbers who overwhelm their hamlets. Except, what’s a city to do if it has Rembrandt and Co? Van Gogh too has his own museum, so people flock and bring money galore. Tourists spend, spend, spend, so fierce arguments begin, conservationists versus developers. Even at this early hour Amsterdam was awash with visitors thronging coffee shops.

  Millicent was so considerate when I admitted I’d left my money behind. She lent me a small bundle of Euros. I loved her even more.

  “Make sure he pays you, dear!” some old crone wheezed.

  Another blue-rinse chipped in, “But not in kind!” I added a grave ha-ha to the riot, and we disgorged at the Rijksmuseum.

  There are two other museums that matter, the Van Gogh and the Stedelijk Modern Art place. I ignored the latter, of course, and managed to dawdle and lose myself. I simply sat on the grass and became part of a crowd watching some jugglers, a fire-eater and unicyclists who banged drums in noisy procession. My Melissa mob trundled on without me. I thought I heard Millicent call, “Now where’s he got to?” I lurked for ten minutes, and saw the last of them entering the museum.

  It was Ivy. She paused on the top step, and saw me. Then she walked in. Not a word, not a sign. I thought, why on earth didn’t she tell the others, shout, beckon? She did none of those. If I ever saw meek little Ivy again, I owed her one for keeping shtum. I was at liberty, with gelt and time to think.

  The urge was too great for idleness. Two paintings were recently nicked from the Van Gogh Museum. Interested, I walked round its walls. The thieves had used a simple ladder, which they left against the brickwork after owffing Vincent’s View of the Sea at Scheveningen and the dour Congregation leaving the Reformed Church in Neunen. Got away scotage free. I gazed at the wall, guiltily trying not to feel that twinge of admiration, then went back to sit and ponder among the frolickers.

  * * *

  Antiques is a truly desperate business. Nobody knows that better. I often joke that antiques is a war in search of a wardrobe, but it really can be blood-curdling mayhem. You can’t stay pure. I’ve seen all sorts, even murder, for a few sticks of furniture. I saw two sisters stab each other in a terrible fight over an old auntie’s bread-bin in which they imagined, quite wrongly, there was a hidden fortune. God’s truth. And I’ve seen a dealer top himself, deliberately crashing his car because he missed buying a rare and valuable silver epergne made by the brilliant, dazzling mid-eighteenth century Edward Wakelin. (Epergne? Think of an impossibly ornate silver table-centre, fashioned as a central basket attached to either four or six smaller baskets, sometimes so extravagantly shaped you can hardly tell what it is trying to be.) The dealer, R.I.P., was Veen, an old bloke from Hamburg who arrived late at a country auction, first time I’d ever seen him suicidal. And last.

  Misery and despair abound in antiques, and so does crime. I’ve done a few robberies – always from the undeserving, mind you, because I’m straight – and helped in others when I’d no way out. So I know methods. And I know famous exalted robbers who are household names. My experience as a divvy has rubbed most of my corners off, so I know when some scam carries the whiff of doom. On the other hand, I can also spot the truly golden rarity that emits the fragrance of success.

  This St Petersburg gambado? It stank. Rob the Hermitage, join this gaggle of duckeggs enacting a crazy Priscilla-of-the-Lower-Third dream? It wasn’t even silly, and would end in catastrophe. I might as well have chosen a team from some Women’s Guild – in fact, the Women’s Guild would get organised. From what I’d seen of Lady Veronica, Amy, Purser Mangot, Les Renown and June Milestone, they’d as much chance of stealing Russia’s priceless treasures as of winning the Lottery. Less, in fact, the Lottery is 1 in 14 million; better odds.

  It was a hot day. How long did I have before they emerged to return to the ship? Not even tourists could do the Rijksmuseum in less than an hour. I’d never felt such relief. Dozily I rested on the greensward. The clowns clowned, youths aped, girls laughed and the fire-eaters spewed flame. Children played improvised volleyball, and a couple on a nearby bench made enthusiastic groping love ignored by all. I sat under a tree looking at a nearby phone box. Tempting, but phone who?

  Back home I had Jane Markham – posh magistrate’s wife who was willing but full of deep suspicions. She wasn’t speaking to me because I went to Leicester with her cousin Agatha who had a collection of eight Staffordshire spill-holders. These valuable mid-Victorian ceramics go in pairs, one for each side of the fireplace, and held waxed rush-piths so the lady of the house could light her nocturnal candles or touch her husband’s pipe to a gentle smoke. Agatha’s were leopards prowling near a hollowed-out tree (to hold the spills) the boles of which were coloured an exotic orange. They are unbelievably ugly, but you’d have to sell your best car to buy an undamaged pair of these utterly useless, unbelievably rare, ornaments. Before Agatha, I’d only ever seen one such pair, and that was in a car boot sale. Agatha had four pairs, all mint.

  I made smiles with her in a despairing attempt to woo them off her. I failed. Full of the information I’d given her about the Staffordshire pieces, she sold them by phone while I slept, which only shows how cruelly insincere women are. They lack trust. I’m glad I’m not like that. Mrs Markham ignores me now. She lacks basic loyalty.

  Then there was Mortimer, my teenage youngster. It had been a shock discovering I had offspring. Barely out of the egg, he lives wild in Suffolk though he owns an ancient manor house and an estate, from his adoptive father Arthur now deceased. Like me, he’s a divvy – the only other one I know – but has a serious ailment called honesty, which puts him out of reach. I couldn’t very well ring Mortimer and tell him I’d been kidnapped to thieve Russia’s wealth – he would simply write to the Prime Minister giving a succinct account of crooks in general, naming me in particular. Honesty’s a pest.

  Elise also crossed my mind. I like Elise. She plays the clarinet, lives with a double-bass player in Feltham. I’d been seeing her for a fortnight. She unnerves me because she tells her bloke everything. Hopeless, though, because Elise’s always on a gig in Luton. I think she’s got other blokes. She’s enormously rich, so is the sort I should stay friendly with. The chances of reaching her were remote – you have to ring her agent or her husband, who is a policeman.

  Any others? Tinker is my barker. A barker is a fetch-and-carry bloke who helps an antique dealer. I pay him when I can. He is loyal (always), thick (always), drunk (usually) and filthy (most of the time). He has a police record. Still, you can’t chose your friends, or have I got that wrong? I found I’d dozed off, wasting half an hour. I decided to move away in case I was spotted by marauding tribes of Melissa passengers.

&n
bsp; One thing I didn’t want was to get killed hang-gliding into St Petersburg’s Hermitage Museum or spending life in a Siberian salt mine. I’d done the right thing to escape. If conscience plagued me in later life, I could quell it – I’m good with guilt – by posting Millicent a few zlotniks to repay her loan.

  When in doubt, return to your roots. I rose, dusted myself off and plodded into sunny Amsterdam in a hunt for antiques.

  * * *

  Odd what things surprise you in a strange place. I had a cup of coffee and was astonished. It was good! I thought only Yanks could brew coffee, but here was some perfect stuff in Holland. I felt I’d invented the wheel. How do people do it? I used to make coffee in my cottage, but gave up. My coffee’s horrible, like all other coffee in England. I honestly don’t know what I, we, do wrong. I tried watching an American woman brew coffee for me, and slavishly copied her every action only to be told, “What have you done, Lovejoy? It’s dreadful!” et shaming cetera. Now here was little old Holland among the coffee-making big guns. Well, well.

  The cafe was in a square. I’d walked for an hour, twice crossing streets I’d already been through. They served me cake of unspeakable sweetness – therefore inedible – but I didn’t mind, seeing they’d scooped the European coffee-making championship. I was offered some tobacco, oddly scented. Startled, I recognised the aroma of ganja, hash, and almost panicked until I saw some police stroll by. They were quite unconcerned that here was a caff peddling marijuana. When in Rome.

  Pretty squares abounded, with trees and shops round the edges and people already starting midday nosh. On canals you could hire a kind of water bicycle or board a water-bus. Long canal boats were already hard at it, one with a jazz band aboard. I looked closely, but no Elise, presumably still parping in Luton. I was tempted to drift towards Amsterdam’s famed Spiegel Quarter, but was uneasy. That was the one place they’d hunt for me when they realised I’d legged it. I sat in a church for a long while because it felt old and friendly. I haven’t got much of an eye for architecture – Early English, fan-tracery, Norman buttresses and all that – but antiques huge and small always have the same effect.

  They’re warm, genuinely responsive, like meeting someone you just know you’re going to get along with. I really do believe that buildings, even houses, have feelings. They look at us as we look at them. This church felt welcoming. I stayed in the gloaming while shoals of tourists trooped in and out. I almost laughed aloud, though, when a courier guide came through saying, “Count Floris the Fifth stormed Amsterdam in 1274, so repairs on this Oude Kerk were temporarily discontinued!” A lull happened about noon. I went to stand a moment by the grave of Saskia, Rembrandt’s beloved missus, just to say hello and tell her I admired her old chap. A brownish skinned miniature bloke came to stand beside me.

  “This Mr Rembrandt’s wife?” he asked in stilted words.

  “Aye.” He was dapper, busy, eyes everywhere.

  “She nice woman?”

  “Everybody should be so lucky.”

  “I am Mr Moses Duploy.”

  “Er, wotcher.” I left him to it. A tourist hustler, offering to show stray visitors the sights, the best night-clubs, the red light districts, for a fee and percentage of the drinks.

  Twice I had to duck from sight when a tour mob from our ship passed to photograph and sight-see, but they didn’t stay. They trailed after a guide carrying a pole surmounted by the Melissa’s rainbow logo went into the sunlight. I felt safe again. The ship, I knew, sailed today. I only had to bat out the afternoon. Easy. Except, I knew Amsterdam was famous for its flea market in Waterloo Square. The temptation was too much, and anyway, what were the chances of being seen in a major capital city like this? I strolled out, walked the red lines of my Amsterdam map, and entered Waterlooplein’s open-air market with a sense of relief. I decided I’d do a quick once-round then wave the Melissa off from the harbour wall. As ever, my legend didn’t fit my reality.

  Flea markets are never up to much. Old clothes, a scatter of books, old pots and new pots, plastic every-things, imitation Delft ceramics, religious emblems, rusting bits from motor bikes, toys, and one barrow would you believe selling worn shoes. I always look at trinket stalls. The offerings mostly consist of trinkets masquerading as jewellery, and priced as such. I look for jewels masquerading as trinkets, and priced as such. Find one, and you’ve got your next holiday, plus that excellent fitted kitchen you’ve always wanted. The Waterlooplein flea market disappointed me, though folk were buying stuff in cart-loads.

  Mr Moses Duploy bumped into me while I examined some wood carvings (modern fake Indonesian). He tried to get into conversation with dreadful pedantic slang straight out of a 1930s Boys Own Annual, “Ho, there, sir! We meetings anew, no?” I smiled distantly and wandered on. No harm trying, and I don’t suppose I could speak a single word of his language, but I was at risk here and couldn’t risk chatting to a Cling-On, as I call chisellers like him.

  Yet in any auction, boot sale, village market, junk fair, there’s always pure gold somewhere. I almost wept when the familiar distressing clanging started up in my chest, and edged my way through the press. A couple were running a stall. They looked off the road, and had an eleven-month bab strapped to an improvised cot. They smoked a strangely scented cigarette, which they shared turn and turn about. I stood looking. So far in the flea market I’d seen nothing, except a collection of brass oil lamps about ninety years old. For once common sense prevailed. I’d not the money to buy them, and I’d need a van to ship them to a dealer who’d buy them as a job lot. I’d make a week’s survival money on it, and still owe for the truck. Nope.

  “Want anything?” the girl said in English.

  “That cot. How much?”

  “The cot?” She looked at her infant. It was warbling some invented ditty and grappling its foot towards its mouth. “You want the cot?”

  The singing babe was lying on a cane recliner, the cause of my chest ache. About the middle of Victoria’s century, fashions changed. We think we’ve invented fashion, but we’re mere beginners. The Victorians, those superb go-getters, have us beaten to a frazzle for inventiveness. They poured into the world new materials, new textiles, paints, machines, styles. Okay, enormous damage was done, and some say the world was utterly ruined back then, but you have to hand it to them. They really did give life a go. One brilliant style was simple bentwood furniture, like the reclining cane chair the baby thought was its cot.

  It was the particular style of a German called Michael Thonet. He used pale woods like birch, so different from the mahoganies then in favour. His recliners look all scroll, deceptively simple. Try to draw a seaside rocking chair without taking your pen off the paper, so it becomes all loops, and there you have the Thonet style. I’m not describing it very well, but to me it still seems terrifically modern. This one was about 150 years old. Canework seating is the best kind, since Thonet’s laminated seats don’t stand the test of time. You can sprawl on it and rock or doze. Thonet curved the wood (hence “bentwood”) in his steam workshop, which paradoxically makes its points enormously strong. My tip to spot one of Thonet’s masterpieces: the recliner/rocker chair is curved in every plane. Look at it with a flat piece of wood in your hand as reminder, you can’t go wrong.

  “You are smiling,” the girl said seriously.

  “Why are you smiling?” her bloke asked, also seriously.

  “It’s beautiful,” I told them.

  “Thank you.” The girl smiled with pride at her offspring.

  “I mean the chair.” No hopes of buying it, no reason to, seeing I was on the run. I lifted the infant out to see the recliner beneath. “Excuse me, master,” I told it. “I want a gander at your cot, okay? Won’t be a sec.”

  “You are so serious,” the girl said, coming to see. She said to her bloke, “He smiles, but is so grave.”

  I told her about Thonet. “Nothing like Sheraton or Hepplewhite, but it’s only half a century later. What stupid moron painted it green?”
>
  “Ah,” the bloke said.

  “Oh. Sorry, mate.” I went red. “Er, it’s better if furniture is left untouched.”

  “Is it worth anything?”

  They stood gazing down at the Thonet. I got an earful of dribble from his lordship, a real performer still entertaining the universe. I find babs really heavy after a minute or two. Women are creased in the middle, so they have a ledge on which to lodge a babe. We males have to exert a constant muscular effort. I was worn out just standing there.

  “How much do you make in a week?” They told me, and I said, “Treble it. You’ll find details of Thonet in any decent library. For God’s sake don’t scrape that hideous green off. Get some paint man to do it, but don’t let the recliner out of your sight until it’s finished because thieves,” I added piously, “are known to nick valuable antiques like this. Thonet’s chairs are highly sought by rich artists…” and so on. I returned their infant.

  I was embarrassed when they said thanks. “I’d best get on. Good luck.”

  They tried pressing some of their queer tobacco on me but I drifted off among the crowd.

  * * *

  Like a fool, I’d forgotten the address of Predgel. I knew his shop was near a bridge, but Amsterdam was a city of canals, and guess what canals have a-plenty. A phone operator said there was nobody of that name; several months before I’d posted off two antiques to him. He’d paid on the nail, a rarity. Something-Strasse, or was that German? I stood in the traffic.

  Then I remembered he’d sent me a photo. His daughter had just graduated. He, his girl and his missus were standing proudly on a canal bridge. He’d inked an arrow on the picture to show a shop with steps and the thinnest shop window you would ever wish to see. He’d written, “Any time you’re in Amsterdam!” Behind, a little theatre advertising a rerun of Cabaret.

  In a market square I found a Tourist Information booth. Open! This is remarkable, because in East Anglia they’re built already permanently shut. In Holland they function. I hope this strange custom will spread. A lady, speaking better English than I ever would, knew exactly where Cabaret had been revived. It hadn’t been particularly well reviewed, she mentioned, like it was a hanging offence. I thanked her, and followed the lines she inked on a city map. Great inkers, the Dutch.