Free Faces in the Pool by Jonathan Gash Page A

never get between two warring women. Whoever Miss Farnacott meant, I didn’t give much for her chances. Hang on, I thought suddenly. Old Smethirst had been mistreated. Bint was lingua franca. Arabic, was it, for a female?
    ‘Sorry, missus, but I don’t know who you mean.’
    She rocked back. Everybody else sags when they loll, but not Miss Farnacott. Her body stayed shapely. I sat upto match the room’s mood of subservience.
    ‘My father’s in hospital, Lovejoy. He had a heart attack after your visit to his workshop. Two things.’ She leant forward. I leant back.
    No hesitation now. I wanted to escape with one bound. She honestly scared me. I could imagine her gazing at the sun, and the sun giving up from lack of nerve.
    ‘My father may seem like an old chickenwallah to your lunatic team, but he was once a gentleman of influence. Don’t treat him like a kutch-nay. Understand?’
    What the hell was she saying? I got the general idea. Her dad was a gent. I said, ‘Yes, Miss Farnacott.’ Kutchnay was old soldier’s slang for a nobody. Hindi?
    ‘Two: My father stays out of your mad scheme.’
    ‘Yes, Miss Farnacott.’
    Those terrible eyes saw I was crushed and saw that it was good. ‘No evil touches Father, or I shall have you hunted down by pig-stickers. You can go.’
    Shaking, I made it to the door. I didn’t ask for a lift back to town. Closing her office door behind me, I saw a crowd of little tap-dancers clattering down the stairs, the children laughing amid wrong arpeggios. The world was still normal. As I left, three miniature ballerinas passed wearing those frothy non-skirts that always remind me of Degas and biscuit-tin paper. One was saying, ‘Let’s ask Miss Farnacott if we can watch the principal dancers tomorrow.’ They all cried, ‘Yes! Lovely!’ And they piled into Miss F’s office. I drew breath to shout a dire warning – I mean, dragon’s cave and maidens, right? We heroes know our duty. Then I glimpsed her looking up with the sweetest smile as the titches piled in. And the dragon said,‘Good heavens! My very best dancers! The answer is yes, darlings, whatever you want…’
    The door closed. I reeled out through the press of jugglers and wandering brass trios. A dragon with a heart? The Winter Queen a secret angel? Not to me.
    Plodding back to civilisation, I reflected on how the antiques trade is everybody’s whipping-boy. It’s wrong. Antiques are only as good or bad as people. Don’t blame a penny for being in the wrong slot when you put it there.
    People are people, the old saying goes. La Farnacott mentioned evil as if she knew it well.
    Evil? You can only start with the beautiful Lady Alice.
    This bad lass began as humble Alice Kyteler, the world’s historical front-runner for true evil. Born in Kilkenny in the late 1300s, she had a succession of wealthy husbands. None lived long. In fact, they died with speed. Her last husband was Sir John le Poer, who one day noticed his hair and nails were tumbling out. His anxious children came. Neighbours realised they’d seen it all before. Lady Alice’s rooms were searched. Poisons were found. The minute her cell door clanged in the pokey, Sir John recovered, and Holy Ireland confidently awaited a good, sensible outcome, like burning Lady Alice at the stake after a quick Ave Maria.
    No way. The prosecutor was the Bishop of Ossory. Rich Lady Alice had lawyers, a tangled lot even in those far-off centuries. She appealed to the Lord Chancellor of Ireland. And, lucky, lucky, he was her kinsman, Roger Outlawe (real name; I’m not making this up). He got her off. She skipped the country.
    The story’s grand finale? Her loyal maid Petronilla was  burnt instead. The moral? Evil is a survivor, and innocence is not.
    Not so antiques. They are so-o-o-o different. Remember that.
    Maybe Miss Farnacott just hated men, I thought, trudging to town, hoping to cadge a free nosh. To gloak, incidentally, is to watch somebody else eat, in hopes. I