His audit of timber complete, Bill decided he probably had enough of the right lengths of old oak to do all of the straight pieces, but panels for the carved back of the new chair would have to be sourced. He had been through the sale catalogues they got from the auction houses and seen two items that might just do. Both were chests.
One, listed as Jacobean, was being auctioned by Taunton’s top-dollar dealers, Messrs Teasel and Oats, Fine Antiques and Auctions Since 1950, or so their catalogue proclaimed. They were known in the trade as ‘Weasel and Stoats’ but the business was, in fact, run by one Tristram Hoare-Bennet. He was ex-public school with all the right connections and as sharp as knives. He sold mostly to serious collectors.
The other chest was listed as being a ‘large coffer or blanket chest, possibly seventeenth century’. It was being auctioned by Fortnum’s Fine Arts, a concern run by two brothers, Harry and Dave Snelling. Their handle in the trade was ‘the Smellings’, not because they had problems with body odour but because some of their deals really stank. Both brothers were as bent as nine bob notes, one of them having done time in years past for selling stolen goods.
As Bill had explained to Lucy, he could not be seen to have any interest in the chests because it would arouse speculation and might be remembered later, so she would be the one doing the bidding. Bill was sure that with only a small amount of coaching she could do the job, but the fact remained that he would have to look at both chests himself to make sure they were indeed what was needed.
Both sale rooms held a preview the day before their auctions, but Bill wanted to play it safe and avoid those as well if he could. Teasel’s auction was on Thursday, which meant the preview would be held on Wednesday (the Smellings’ auction was not until Saturday). Bill knew one of the porters at Teasel’s and, more importantly, knew where this bloke did his drinking. Therefore, it was decided that Bill would drive to Taunton that evening and slip his contact a £20 note for a preview of the preview. Fortunately, this auction also had a set of top-notch Chippendale chairs up for sale; if Bill could get into the store room, ostensibly to weigh these up, he could just ‘happen’ to spot the chest and give it a quick once over. But when he got to Taunton there was good news and bad news.
The good news was that his pal the porter was indeed at his usual pub enjoying a quiet pint. The bad news was that he no longer worked for Teasel and Oats.
Just on the off chance, Bill walked around to the auction warehouse after leaving the pub. This was down a side street at the back of the sale room and had huge wooden doors the height of the building. In one of them was a small wicket door, and standing by this was a dealer he knew. The man was acting like someone outside a brothel, looking left and right, up and down, as shifty as hell.
Bill sidled up, clapped a hand on his shoulder, and said, ‘You naughty man, Morris. You’re not waiting here for a sneaky once over, are you?’
Before the man could answer, the wicket door opened a little way and a florid face under a flat cap peeked out. Bill didn’t know him, which was a bonus, and he squeezed through the door close behind Morris, who was still recovering from the shock of Bill materializing out of nowhere.
‘Who the hell are you?’ enquired flat cap.
‘I’m with him,’ said Bill, pointing at Morris and edging further into the big warehouse. ‘We’re married, you know, been like it for years.’
‘I wasn’t told,’ said flat cap truculently.
Bill eased a £10 note from his pocket into the man’s hand with the skill of a conjurer. With a grunt and a scowl, flat cap muttered something about them only having half an hour, and went back into his office somewhere in the gloom.
‘What the fuck are you doing here?’ hissed Morris. ‘I thought you had retired.’
‘I have, but I know someone who’s after a nice set of Chips for their dining room.’
‘You sod off, that’s why I’m here,’ said Morris. Then he added with avarice aforethought, ‘How much are they willing to give? Maybe we could split the deal if there’s enough meat on the bone.’
‘That depends. Who else is dipping their wick on this lot?’
‘The usual, I expect, but these are going to make big money so it narrows the field a bit.’
They walked down aisles of furniture and long tables piled high with goods. At last, finding the Chippendale chairs, Morris began lifting aside the sheets that covered them. He took out a small torch and, bending down, started to examine them in detail. Bill looked as closely as he could in the dim light and thought they were indeed good chairs. He didn’t recognise them, and he would have done if he had been part of their recent history. So, big bucks then.
Morris turned to him and said, ‘These are out of your league, Bill, unless you know something I don’t.’
‘I thought I might,’ said Bill, ‘but now I’ve seen them I’m pretty sure they’re not the ones I was thinking of.’
With that, Bill drifted off as though the reason he had gate-crashed was no longer important. Morris stayed with the chairs, looking even harder in case there was something dodgy about them.
Bill mooched around, occasionally picking up bits to examine in a half-hearted way. As he moved to the part of the warehouse where flat cap had his lair, he saw the man’s face was glued to a television screen, and he slipped quietly past.
Then he saw it. With no dust sheet on it, the dark polished wooden chest sat solidly on its base as it might have done since the time of James I. Even from a few feet away it looked right to Bill, and when he got closer he knew by the carving and patina that it was the real thing. In the half-light it was impossible to tell for sure, but Bill thought it had been catalogued incorrectly. Its size gave it away; this was at least five feet long by two-and-a-half feet wide and a couple of feet deep. Also, there was no large key hole as there would have been on a regular chest or coffer. No, in his mind this was a blanket chest. The three side panels had some nice linen fold carving on them, but they were large enough for his purposes.
Bill moved on up the aisle. He could see Morris’s torch across the room; he was having his own rummage round. Bill decided to make his way down a different aisle and come back to the chest another way. If the base or top were from one piece of wood, then that alone might swing it. The side panels were carved, after all, and might not have enough meat on them for carving anew. No, it was the top or bottom that he would base his decision on. Morris was now making his way towards the small office; his business done, he wanted to get out before anyone else crashed his party. Bill moved quickly back to the chest, but only had time for a brief look at the top. It was solid, no decoration, some cracks, but it looked original to the rest of the piece.
He caught up with Morris by the door and they exited like a pair of prisoners escaping from a nick, looking round in case anyone they knew saw them. Bill suggested they go for a pint. Morris looked at Bill in his old tweed jacket and shabby cord trousers and declined the offer, which Bill had been pretty sure he would.
Morris walked off, but Bill stayed behind, ostensibly to see what kind of car Morris was driving these days. It was a big Jag, the poncy bastard. Fair enough, crime pays, thought Bill, and started to bang on the door. Eventually, flat cap poked his ugly head out, scowling like a bulldog with piles. Bill gave an embarrassed smile and ingratiatingly asked if he could step inside just for a second because he had dropped his keys somewhere.
‘What do you mean, somewhere?’ snarled the merry porter. ‘This place is huge and I’m not putting the fucking lights on just so you can wander about. They’ll be seen by all and fucking sundry and then that’s me in the shit again.’
Bill told the man he was pretty sure he knew where he had dropped them. It was only £5 this time as Bill didn’t want to look too keen. He asked if he could borrow a torch and you would have thought he had asked for the man’s wallet by the fuss he made, but eventually a torch was grudgingly passed across.
In its dim light Bill looked around the floor by the Ch
ippendale chairs. Old flat cap had gone back to his hole and his television by the time Bill got to the blanket chest. Being as quick as he could, he measured the lid with the span of his hands and then lifted it up. One big piece of timber and, yes, some cracks, there were bound to be, but nothing that couldn’t be lived with. The bottom of the chest had been repaired in times past. It was made up of planks and they looked like another wood entirely and not polished at all. Good enough.
He made his way to the office, returned the torch, and was virtually thrown out of the building.
‘See you again soon, I hope,’ said Bill.
‘Fuck off,’ said flat cap, and slammed the door shut behind him. It was late when Bill got home, and the house was in darkness.
As he unlocked the kitchen door and put the lights on, he saw the kitchen table was laid for two, and there, in his armchair by the stove, was Lucy, blinking up at him. She had obviously been asleep.
Bill said, ‘Sorry I’m late, love, got held up.’
As Lucy put a pile of sandwiches on the table and made a fresh pot of tea, the domesticity of it all struck him. It was like that bit in the middle of a tornado, he thought: the place that was calm while everything else swirled around and around in a destructive circle.
Bill took out his notebook and drew a plan of the blanket chest using the rough measurements he had taken. It would do the job, but he really didn’t like the idea of destroying such a nice object just for the lid. It seemed criminal somehow.
Lucy was far more pragmatic. ‘It’s us or it,’ she said.
Chapter 18
WEDNESDAY–FRIDAY, 12–14 SEPTEMBER
Bill awoke tired on Wednesday morning, having slept badly the night before due to his anxieties about the auction.
Over breakfast, he shared his concerns with Lucy, his primary one being that the Jacobean chest might go for big money.
‘A chest doesn’t have the same desirability as some other antique furniture,’ he said, ‘but Weasel and Stoats don’t sell cheap antiques, and if someone outside the trade really wants the thing, then it could go for a lot more than it’s really worth. And if something goes for a lot more than it’s really worth, then it gets talked about and possibly remembered somewhere down the road. For example, when some exceptionally rare chairs turn up and are being authenticated.’
Bill’s estimate for the chest was in the region of £800. If he had still been in the trade and there was a dealer’s ring at the sale, he could have called in a favour or three and maybe got it for £300–£500. But, with Lucy doing the bidding, a greedy auctioneer might bounce bids off the wall to drive the price up. That was the bugger of having the general public bidding at auctions: if someone got a bee in their bonnet and just had to have the piece under the hammer, then no one was at home to Mr Prudence and silly prices were paid. Bill decided they could bid up to a thousand, which was far more than the chest was probably worth, but they had to have a ceiling.
Lucy managed to calm him down a little bit and suggested he give some thought to what the other auction house was selling, just in case. The catalogue only described the item as a ‘large coffer or blanket chest, possibly seventeenth century’ and gave the measurements, which were about the same as Teasel’s Jacobean chest. The Snellings’ auction was being held on a Saturday, however, which told Bill it was much more downmarket than Teasel’s and would probably have hundreds of lots, most of them junk from house clearances.
They spent the rest of the day preparing for the first auction as much as they could. Lucy went upstairs and tried on the outfit she had bought for the occasion. With her hair worn loose and a pair of fashionably large sunglasses perched on her head, she felt reasonably pleased with the result. She felt even more pleased when, as she came downstairs to show Bill, he exclaimed, ‘Bloody hell, girl, you look the business!’
He wasn’t simply being polite, either. Lucy didn’t just look good, she looked expensive. She had seemed almost emaciated to Bill the first time he saw her back in London, but now, in these clothes, her thinness would be taken as an indication of wealth rather than hard living.
Thursday morning they lodged Clive with Miss Templeton and headed off to Taunton. They arrived at Teasel’s about an hour before the auction was due to start and Bill parked as far away from the building as he could. Lucy’s car was pretty inconspicuous, but he was still mindful of the danger of his being seen and recognized.
Lucy went inside about half an hour before the start of the auction, registered as a buyer, received her bidding card, and was ushered into a big, oblong room that reminded her of a theatre or church. There was a low stage at one end with a viewing platform in the middle and spotlights above it. On one side of this stood the auctioneer’s lectern, and on the other a couple of tables with a row of telephones for the auction house staff. Wide aisles either side of the seats led from front to back, and the seats themselves were placed in rows facing the stage. The main entrance was right at the back, around which there was enough space for people to stand and observe the proceedings.
Bill had said this was a big, prestigious auction with many valuable items up for sale; it would therefore be well attended. Thankfully, the lot number for the chest was after the Chippindale chairs, and he thought the place might empty a bit once these had been sold.
Lucy positioned herself at the side of the room closest to the auctioneer and stood near the wall. From here she would be able to catch the auctioneer’s eye while also being able to see who else was bidding. That is, if they made it obvious. Bill had told her some silly buggers, mostly rank amateurs, thought they looked like big players if they bid with a raised eyebrow or a slightly lifted finger. The only thing likely to come of that, he said, was a lost bid.
The room was filling up quickly, and soon people were sidling along the wall near Lucy, looking for seats. It was the same on the other side of the room, and there was a clump of people standing at the back as well. The room was buzzing with conversations as people came in and milled about.
She was gently nudged by a rather county lady, who asked her if she had a spare catalogue. As she turned to answer, Lucy heard a voice that made her freeze. Thankfully, her back was to the main door, where the voice was coming from, and there were a lot of people between her and that part of the room. She carefully turned her head just a fraction and, out of the corner of her eye, saw Skates standing in the doorway, talking to an elderly couple.
There was no mistaking him, and although she was not in his direct line of sight at the moment, she knew she had to get out of that place before he made his way further into the room. He appeared to be alone, but Warren might be right behind him, or perhaps waiting outside in the car. Either way, she had to do something, and quickly.
The auctioneer had mounted the podium, and porters were carrying the first lot onto the display plinth. Lucy lowered her sunglasses, then edged towards the wall, slightly behind a portly gentleman who was leaning out to get a better view. Once the auction started and all eyes were on the stage in front, she made her way to the back of the hall. Her passage was slow because people were crowded in the aisle, in some cases right up to the rows of seats, but she wormed her way through, muttering quiet apologies as she did so.
To her incredible relief, at the end of the room she found a closed door that had ‘Toilets’ written on it. She dared not turn around to see if Skates had spotted her, so just opened the door and went in.
Lucy found herself in a short corridor that had a gents on one side and a ladies on the other, and a door at the end marked ‘Private’. She entered the ladies and locked herself in a cubicle, then sat and wondered if she should stay there until the end of the auction. She quickly realized, however, that if Skates had seen her, he would be outside the door she had entered no matter how long she waited. She went back into the corridor and tried the door marked ‘Private’, praying it wouldn’t simply be full of brooms. It was locked.
Desperate now, Lucy gave it a good, hard kick. It spra
ng open, the blessedly puny catch on the other side giving way.
Quickly closing the door behind her, she found herself in a small office full of filing cabinets. Luckily, there was also another door, this one unlocked, through which was a larger office containing a desk and other executive trimmings but, more important, a door marked ‘Fire Escape’. It had a crash bar that opened without a crash, thank goodness, and Lucy was at last outside the building.
She stood in a small car park that looked like it must have been for staff only as it was a mixture of small family saloons, plus one enormous Rolls. Adjusting her hair and with her sunglasses still down, Lucy took a deep breath and, looking like she owned the place, walked out into the street. She followed this round till she came to the entrance to the big public car park in front of the auction house. In the disabled bay near the main entrance was Skates’s Range Rover. No one was in it. She walked slowly and carefully, looking round all the while in case Skates or Warren were lying in wait somewhere. They weren’t and her car was where she left it. No sign of Bill, though.
As she reached the car, he emerged from the other side of the car park where he had been hiding behind a small van. They got into the Volvo and, without a word or a backwards glance, drove out and away. Nothing was said until they stopped at a small pub outside Taunton. Then, sitting in the garden with a couple of pints and a packet of crisps, they exchanged stories.
Bill had seen Skates pull up and go into the auction. He could not follow as there were too many other people milling about the entrance, some of whom he knew. He was in a blind panic and considered finding a phone box and calling the fire brigade, saying he saw smoke coming from the building. He hid behind the van so he could see all the car park and the main entrance, and was just about to see if he could get in anywhere else when Lucy turned up. They both reckoned that if Skates had spotted Lucy, he would have done something about it then and there, so he must not have. It had been a hell of a close shave, though.
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