Free PearlHanger 09 by Jonathan Gash Page B

Blavatsky? Urgently. It must be important, Lovejoy."
    "I promise," I said, to shut her up, then went into my act. "The police pulled me in for interrogation."
    "That's utterly scandalous!" she bleated. "I shall protest immediately!"
    "Please don't," I cautioned anxiously, but I was delighted because she would, too. Detective Sergeant Ledger would have to tell her why Chandler had been asking after Chatto and Vernon. My way of finding out.
    "No, Lovejoy," she said sternly. "It's a citizen's responsibility . . ."I could imagine her mouth trying to set grimly, showing how empires were won.
    "My coins are gone," I interrupted. The call was costing a fortune, but indulging women's prejudices always
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    does. I've found that. "Look. Suss out Sidney Charles Vernon too."
    "Lovejoy!" Lydia exclaimed, scandalized. "You aren't suggesting. . . ?"
    "Something underhand? Now, would I?" I left smiling. And committed a terrible, terrible crime.
    I forgot Owd Maggie's message.
    »
    "Were those beads really worth all that money?" So much for Donna the dedicated antique dealer. "Those beads" indeed.
    "You'd no right to look at that check," I said. We were slightly befuddled from the wine. Only four other tables were occupied, and the people were not bothered with us. It was an ancient nook-and-cranny place, the sort where lovers go to commemorate anniversaries or start new ones. I needn't add that we'd chosen it by accident.
    "You could have kept it. It was made out to you."
    Michaela had given me ten percent in notes. "I'd got my commission."
    The nosh place was a little dump near The Scores, a tangle of cobbled streets in the old town. I was feeling oddly contented. Donna was defrosting. And we were near my own territory, out on the coastal estuaries where I get to hear of most things by osmosis.
    Neither of us mentioned Sid nor the mysterious Ken Chatto whose name uttered by Sergeant Chandler had sent her pale. Loosened, she talked of this dream she had, of becoming such a good sociologist that she would iron out all the world's problems. I was polite and didn't yawn. I'm kind deep down.
    Then I got reminiscin g, nearly my only fault. The antique
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    fakes, the old fiddle trick pulled with oil paintings. I told her about the boom in antique musical instruments (and who created it). And, laughing, of a hitherto unknown pre-Raphaelite painting (and who created that). And how frantic the East German currency dealers are, now they've learned about Italian middlemen. She was intrigued, her eyes shining. And of a fake called Equal Freedom I'd given to the hospice exhibition. "Filled with Polyfilla and old nails and said it was bronze, nothing fancy."
    She was quizzically amused. "Rob the rich to give to the hospice? It has a familar ring, Lovejoy."
    I was indignant. "People who buy art for investment are the worst sort of criminal. They steal our antiques, then hold them to ransom."
    "You're a romantic. Can't you see that antiques are all simply money?"
    "Can't you see they are all simply not?"
    She did her sad fifty percent laugh again. I had to explain, but why do I bother? Women are rotten listeners. They only hear what they agree with.
    "Tell me, Donna. What do you think you're doing? Not," I continued over protest, "chasing Sidney or whatever. But this very minute." She was puzzled. "Feeding your face? Wondering how much that bird at the corner table paid for her frock? Well, there was no such lax moment for the man who made that chair in 1755." In the corner stood a lovely old chair with a red cord to stop anybody sitting on it, Chippendale period. "That chairmaker had no chance of living to old age. Half of his children died before they were one year old. He slogged a hundred hours a week for a pittance in a slum that'd turn our hair, and slept on woodshavings. He could be sacked at whim, and would
    then starve. He owned nothing except his pants, shirt, and clogs if he were lucky."
    "So? Times change."
    "But his chair hasn't,