Dovetail

by Bernard Pearson

  ‘Be careful,’ said Bill, ‘and remember to keep the hammer head straight and leave a gap between each nail like I taught you.’

  The sound of hammering filled the workshop, which gave Bill and Gloria a chance to talk without being overheard.

  ‘I’ve been a bloody fool most of my life and I’ve done some slightly dodgy deals as you have to now and again to make a shilling, but not for years now. Don’t need to anymore.’

  He paused, looking around his workshop as if the place itself would confirm the truth of what he said.

  ‘I know that sounds daft, but I love what I do, I’m still good at it, and I really don’t want to embark on something shady at this time of life. I don’t need the money and I don’t need the stress.’

  Gloria nodded sympathetically, but said nothing, not wanting to interrupt his flow of thought.

  ‘What it boils down to is that I’m being asked to fake up a set of chairs that will then be worth big money – really big money – and that’s when things always start to get interesting. By which I mean difficult and possibly dangerous.’

  ‘Why is that?’ asked Gloria.

  ‘Well, lass, when a lot is at stake, including reputations, then what’s being sold is looked at very carefully indeed. The history of the piece—its provenance—well, that has to match with what the furniture looks like, feels like, tells you about itself. There can’t be any gaps or mistakes. The right joint, the right age of the wood, those are the easy things to replicate. It’s the subtle traces that experts will really be looking for, and those are the hardest to reproduce.’

  Gloria was fascinated. Philip had told her that his father was a master of some of the dark arts in the antiques trade, and she knew by the furniture he had given them that Bill was a superb craftsman, but this was a side of the business she knew nothing about.

  ‘How would you go about doing it? If you were going to do it, I mean.’

  Bill walked over to a pile of chairs that stood against the wall, selected the top one, and brought it back to sit between them like a third at bridge.

  ‘Consider,’ he said. ‘This is a nice little Hepplewhite-inspired, shield-shaped dining chair, 19th century, and in quite good condition, considering. But it’s only one chair and therefore not worth very much.’ As he spoke, his hands stroked the carved wood, his fingers following the arabesques, curves, and elegant shapes in the mahogany chair back. ‘Lovely, isn’t it?’

  ‘Not my taste,’ said Gloria, ‘but mummy has a set just like them.’

  ‘Well, let’s say your mum’s chairs are the real thing. Hepplewhite, Sheraton, or even Chippendale dating from the 1760s and a set of four without carvers. Let’s also say that two of them are a bit worn and rocky and in need of some care and attention. And let’s also say your mum wanted to trade them in for a few bob and get something else with the cash. Not that she would of course,’ he added hurriedly, ‘but just as an example.’

  Gloria smiled. ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘Dealers always like to sell chairs in sets of four, six, or eight. And they charge a premium for supplying the whole set; a big premium if they can get away with it. So it would be worth your mum’s while to have her two distressed chairs tidied up a bit before trying to sell them. Now, it is not wrong or illegal to restore a piece of furniture. It’s not even wrong or illegal to copy a piece of furniture outright. Plenty of people make an honest living from doing so. What is a crime, however, is passing off the result as an original, known in the trade as a ‘naughty’.’

  ‘But could you actually make a chair good enough to fool an expert?’ asked Gloria.

  Bill couldn’t help smiling at the question. ‘Well, yes, a very good craftsman could. You see, a chair has four legs, sometimes two arms, a stretcher – that’s the bit that keeps the legs apart and strengthens them – a seat, and a back. Lots of clever bits of wood shaped to do what they need to do so the chair will support a bum as heavy as mine or as pretty as yours.’

  Gloria laughed. Bill really was an old charmer. He continued the lesson, warming to his theme in spite of himself.

  ‘You take the two damaged chairs, strip them down, and you mix original parts with new as far as you can. When it comes to backs and seats, you usually have to make up new ones, but always using the originals as a guide. Use the same sort of wood, use the same method of jointing, and use the right glues, such as rabbit skin or hoof. Make everything just the same, but don’t make exact copies. All antique furniture was handmade, so there are always slight differences in the carving or shapes. You use old tools, or new tools forged or made in the same ways the old ones were. That way if some suspicious bugger uses a magnifying glass to examine a piece, the work marks are the same. But the real skill, of course, lies in the finishing.’

  ‘Do you mean the polish?’

  ‘That’s part of it,’ said Bill, ‘but what I really mean is ‘making age’. Carefully, ever so carefully, recreating the wear and tear of the centuries.’

  He got up and went over to a dining chair that stood nearby. ‘Furniture gets lived with and lived on for years and years; wear happens in all sorts of ways. Hands and clothes rub on the arms and back, chair legs get scuffed from being dragged across floors, and everything just generally gets knocked about in a busy household.’ As he explained this, he showed Gloria the way time and use had made marks on the piece. He went on to tell her of the methods that could be used to replicate age; the careful rubbing down of certain surface areas, and the use of wire wool, scrapers, and subtle blades to pair away the new to reveal the old.

  ‘What about woodworm and the like?’ asked Gloria.

  Bill lit his pipe, filling the space with fragrant smoke. The regular sound of hammering told them that Jack was still engaged in bashing nails into wood.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘woodworm holes are very difficult to fake. The little buggers leave holes that have bends just fractions of an inch in from the surface, so a small drill hole or hot nail won’t do. No bend, see, and that’s suspicious.’

  ‘What happens if you get found out?’

  ‘You’re in a world of pain, my love,’ said Bill. ‘A world of pain, and possibly prison.’

  ‘And someone is trying to pressure you into doing this?’

  ‘I’m afraid so.’

  ‘Well, just tell them no!’ said Gloria. ‘They can’t make you do it, for heaven’s sake. What can they do apart from get angry?’

  ‘Lots,’ said Bill. ‘And none of it nice.’

  ‘Can’t you go to the police?’

  ‘My darling,’ said Bill, ‘the police are the last ones to go to. Bloody useless, they are. All these people have to say is that they asked me to make a reproduction. Nothing illegal in that, and I’m left looking like an idiot and still on the hook.’

  The banging stopped. Jack came over to where they were sitting and proudly showed his grandfather the piece of wood he had decorated with small nails.

  ‘What do you think, Granddad?’ he asked, his eyes alight with enthusiasm and his clothes covered with dust.

  ‘Wonderful job!’ said Bill. ‘All in line and neatly done. You’ll be my apprentice in a year or three if you want.’

  Jack looked pleased at that. He really wanted to be a Star Wars fighter pilot, but he thought he might be able to do both, if his mother let him.

  Gloria was still looking worriedly at Bill.

  ‘I’ll sort it out, don’t you fret,’ he said, patting her hand and smiling with a confidence he didn’t feel.

  They stood up and Gloria kissed him, after which he bent down and picked up his grandson for a goodbye hug.

  As their car started off, he looked at his watch. It was half past three. Before Gloria’s car could even reach the gate, Skates’s Range Rover drove in, blocking her exit. She backed up, giving him room to pass, then continued on her way. Jack turned to wave from the back seat, and Bill could see him smiling at him as they drove away. ‘Family?’ asked Skates, walking over from where he’d park
ed.

  ‘Just a customer,’ said Bill. ‘Looking for a table.’

  ‘Oh, I thought it was your daughter-in-law,’ smirked Skates. ‘She drives a remarkably similar car, and that boy in the back looked just like your grandson.’

  Skates’s eyes were hard and stared meaningfully into Bill’s. ‘I don’t have a family myself,’ he said. ‘No ‘hostages to fortune’ for me. So many nasty things can happen; I’d be a nervous wreck.’

  He turned to Warren, who was getting the chairs out of the back of the vehicle. ‘You haven’t got family either, have you, Mr Warren? No little Warrens to impede your ‘great enterprises of virtue or mischief.’ As he stressed the last word, he winked at Bill, obviously very pleased with himself for being able to continue the quotation.

  Warren said nothing, as usual. He carried the chairs, wrapped in blankets, into the workshop. Bill could just make out their shapes. Polished wood showed through a gap in the cloth.

  Skates turned to Bill and said, ‘I’m off to attend some auctions in New York, which should give you plenty of time to look over the chairs and decide how you’re going to deal with them. But don’t worry; Mr Warren here will be close by in case you get lonely.’

  As Bill stood there helplessly fuming under another of Skates’s significant leers, the two men got back in the Range Rover and drove away.

  Going back into his workshop, Bill uncovered the chairs and carried them to a section of bench that could be illuminated by a whole battery of lights that left no shadows. Kept clean of dust, mostly, it was where he could photograph furniture or examine it in forensic detail. Each of the three chairs was looked at more closely than it had probably ever been before. He utilised all his skills as a maker and restorer, as well as that expert eye that comes only after years of study and experience. He wanted a reason, any reason, to duck out of having to do this job. If a chair had been faked or there was even any doubt as to its credentials, that might be enough, though Bill was starting to worry if even that would convince Skates to back off.

  Two of the chairs were good, with slight damage commensurate with their age in places where he would expect such damage to occur. Their patina was lovely, and one that only age (or a very, very, skilful hand) could give. The highlights in their polished surfaces were golden with hints of light raw umber merging into a brown madder by way of a van Dyke brown. Beautiful. His hands traced the centuries written upon the silk surface of the wood. If there was artifice here, it was beyond his ability to see, and therefore there probably wasn’t any.

  The back panels of the chairs were carved in a vigorous rustic style, the central motif being the Tudor Rose. This alone would not date the chairs, though, as it had been used from King Hal’s time onward, being one of the first pieces of royal branding. Henry had them stuck all over the place, and many a piece of furniture was given a patriotic makeover by carving these roses on them.

  Underneath, in large, simple letters, the initials ‘ER’ were carved, again in relief. Bill looked closely at the carving. It was well done, but not abbey quality. That indicated a local craftsman rather than one of the elite who travelled from job to job on the ecclesiastical payroll.

  The panels themselves were definitely from the original chairs and, looking at the slight variation in the angles of some of the petals in the rose, were probably carved in situ rather than on new wood. Sure enough, when Bill took a rough measurement of the thickness of the chair back, it told him a lot of wood had been taken away; the rose and the initials were a sort of bass relief. All the undercuts that gave depth to the design left the wood thin in places where the carver had gone in deep with his gouge. All this made sense because wood had to be cut, planed, and shaped by hand in those days, which took a long time and was very expensive.

  The rose was set in a simple border with no foliage to the flower head; that was definitely an Elizabethan rather than a Jacobean addition. The Queens’s initials would probably have been added later, but with old furniture you never really knew for sure. The problem with pieces of this age was that they were always being mucked about with. Extra carvings were done to make something look new or to tart up a plain piece. Even the Victorians did this, and later on, fashionable homeowners who were bitten by the ‘Gothic Revival’ bug became downright vandals and chipped bits off to sex up perfectly good late medieval furniture. But as hard as Bill looked, both these chairs seemed ‘right’.

  The third chair could have been from the same set, but it was difficult to be sure. Age had certainly wearied and the years condemned this poor bugger. Only three legs were complete and all the stretchers were damaged. Thankfully, the frieze rail was still good, as was the seat. One arm was missing, and the carved back panel was split but repairable. One seat rail was split and the other water-damaged. It was not good, not good at all. It could be restored, but it would not be easy. However, when finished, one would be able to get away with describing it as ‘original with some restoration’.

  There was, of course, no fourth chair. That would have to be made from mixing and matching with bits of the other chairs and making the missing parts from scratch. That would be a hugely difficult job, especially now that Bill was not firing on all cylinders. He had a vast stock of old timber, both in antique furniture parts and in rough-cut planks and baulks lurking in the dark, dust-encrusted corners of his workshop, so finding English oak would not be a problem, but working old oak was a right bastard. Nothing blunted even the best steel as quickly as old oak.

  But the real problem, Bill decided, would be the back panel carving. He had done a bit of carving once upon a time, but never to the quality this job would require.

  He decided that was his get-out and felt a bit better for it. He covered up the chairs, but left them where they were so he could talk through the problems with Skates and slip out from under this bloody job. The bugger of it was, he thought, that a few years ago, and with a different client, he would have leapt at the project. It would be fascinating, a real challenge, and a damn good earner. But not for Skates, and not now.

  Chapter 5

  FRIDAY, 17 AUGUST

  The next day Bill went hunting. He wanted to find out more about Skates. He was sure in his own mind that the man was dangerous, and that his nasty sidekick, Warren, was a psychopath (if he wasn’t, he made a damned good job of appearing as one). But so far all they had really done was bully him. How serious were Skates’s badly veiled threats? Was Skates the sort of person who would actually use violence against Bill or his family to gain his ends?

  Bill racked his brains to think of someone canny enough to know what Skates’s game was. Jerry Sparks? No, he was too far removed from the scene of action now, but thinking of Jerry reminded him of someone who might be in a position to know (or find out) and, more importantly, one he could trust to keep his mouth shut.

  That meant a trip to London, to Bermondsey market, where for a few years Bill had enjoyed the company and devious wiles of one of the shrewdest antiques dealers he had ever had the pleasure to know. Manny Traviss was a dealer of the old school (i.e., you needed to count your fingers after he’d shaken your hand), but if he took a liking to you, he was as good as gold. He even had a set of highly illegal assay stamps (as used by HM assay offices to mark precious metals) to prove that it really was gold he was as good as.

  Bill had not been to London for a few years and hadn’t been in contact with Manny during that time, so it was a long shot, but it was the only shot he could think of.

  Bill took Bess to Miss Templeton’s and explained that he had to go to London on business and was unsure when he would be back, but he didn’t think it would be more than a day or two. She said it was not a problem and wished him luck.

  Bill drove to Castle Cary railway station and boarded the train to Paddington. From there, he made his way to the Elephant and Castle underground station, from which it was just a short walk to the Bermondsey Road. It was an area he knew well. For years it had been one of the hubs of the antiques tra
de, not least because this market had been one of the few places where dodgy gear could be sold legitimately.

  Thanks to a law going back centuries, if something was stolen and then sold in an ‘open market’ – which Bermondsey was right up until 1995 – then it was fair game, and no matter the provenance, whoever brought it could legally keep it. This meant, of course, that amidst the hundreds of stalls, barrows, and piles of junk, rare gems of antiques could be picked up for a good price, especially if one was in the know.

  As Bill walked through the market thronged with stalls and crowded with punters, he checked out the wares. It was rubbish mostly, but occasionally something would take his eye and he’d have to restrain himself from going to take a closer look. Old habits die hard. He didn’t recognise any stall holders; these people were obviously here just to flog tat to the unwary tourist. What he was looking for was a ‘face’: someone who knew the trade and was a part of it. It seemed it had all changed, but then so had he.

  Disappointed, Bill went into a café he used to frequent and ordered a mug of tea and a bacon sandwich. He was told he could have something called a ‘panini’, but that the café was vegetarian. They did, however, offer a broad range of organic teas, both herbal and estate grown, and which one would he like?

  He got up to leave, but as he reached the door he was stopped by a tall woman with straw-blonde hair piled up in an old-fashioned beehive. She was festooned with costume jewellery and wore a moth-eaten fake-fur coat. Her thick makeup cracked as she grinned hugely, took him by the shoulders, and shrieked, ‘Bill Sawyer, as I live and breathe and fuck on Sundays, what the hell are you doing in these parts? We all thought you were dead!’

  ‘Hello, Dolly,’ he said, trying to extricate himself from her bejewelled talons.

  After a brief but painful coughing fit brought on by her dreadful perfume, Bill found himself returned to the seat he had just vacated and in the company of a dubious contact of years gone by. One with whom he had done some very shady business at one time. As he ate the strange concoction placed in front of him and drank a mug of hot, flavourless liquid, Dolly caught him up on the doings of the market: who had given up the trade, who was still clinging to the wreckage, and who had gone on to that great saleroom in the sky. As Dolly kept saying (far too loudly), ‘We’re old partners in grime, darling!’