Spend Game (13 page)

By the time I left town on the Medham road I was chirpy as a cricket and singing that Tallis madrigal which changes key a million times in the first bar. I was in good voice. When a crisis comes to the crunch I’m full of this alert feeling. I think it’s a sort of realization that honesty’s the best policy.

Something like that.

The damaged doors were repaired. New frosted glass glittered in the windows. Old George and Wilkinson were busy supervising the unloading of some stuff in the cobbled yard. A few people milled about, an early viewer and a dealer or two. I put my crate facing down the yard’s slope in case of possible engine non-cooperation and strolled inside.

‘Out of it, Lovejoy,’ Wilkie called bossily, arms a-dangle.

‘Get stuffed, Wilkie.’

I was up the ramp and inside as the vannies sniggered. Wilkie came after me. I shook him off. There was only the office girl Brenda there, and she was behind the glass partition near the posh entrance. For once she seemed to be engaged in work.

‘I said, out.’

‘Wilkie,’ I said in my business voice. He shuffled a bit at that. ‘What did you do with the escritoire?’

He shrugged. ‘It got smashed up. You saw it.’

‘Where are the bits?’

‘Chucked out at the back. We’ll burn it.’

I got him to show me the heap. They’d piled it among other broken bits against the yard wall out of the way of the traders’ cars. There are some old sheds for storing stuff they can’t sell. The escritoire still looked a cheap Edwardian copy smashed up, yet something was niggling me. The wood was honestly fairly new when looked at closely. The Bramah lock was obviously nicked from an old piece and screwed into this feeble reproduction furniture to make it seem older. It had been only recently done judging from the scratches, and inexpertly done at that. This is a common trick to make a relatively modern piece of furniture seem old. It shouldn’t deceive an infant. The lock was hardly worth taking, because lock-and-key collectors are rare and the items are many.

I let Wilkie go and stayed in the warehouse yard an hour, scrutinizing every splinter and handling it all inch by inch.

No good. I rose at last, stiff as hell, and wandered out to watch them loading. After a few minutes I gave George the bent eye. He came over after a glance at Wilkie, who nodded at him once. Wilkie must have warned him I was around and being critical. I took him to see the heap.

‘Nobody to see us or hear us, George,’ I began. He looked about. I shook my head warningly.

‘Look here, Lovejoy . . .’

‘You’re an old geezer, George. And you know me,
tough and nasty with it. Old geezers fall and break legs, right?’ We both analysed the situation. Charitably, I gave him an extra minute.

‘I don’t know –’

‘– Nuffink?’ I capped cheerfully for him. ‘But you do, George.’

‘Don’t touch me, Lovejoy. I’ll shout out.’ If he hadn’t helped to kill Leckie I’d have felt quite sorry for him, a shaky old sweat scraping a meagre living. The way I felt, though, I wouldn’t piss on him in hell to cool him down. He takes a few quid to tip dealers off when good items are coming in for auction. That’s all he’s good for. And it got Leckie crashed.

‘What’s it to be, George?’ I gripped his arm. He winced and finally nodded. ‘Nodge did the place over, right? He told me.’

‘Then what’re you asking me for? It’s bleeding killing me –’

‘Who else?’

‘Him with the fancy whistle.’ Whistle-and-flute, suit. Only Jake wears fancy bright green gear.

‘Jake. And Fergie?’

‘No.’

It had the ring of extorted truth. I let go. Nodge and Jake had known Old George dossed in the warehouse when there was stuff passing through. That meant any day before or after an auction. They’d probably just knocked on the door and barged in past him. A few threats probably shut him up.

‘Here, Lovejoy,’ he quavered. ‘Don’t tell them it was me grassed, eh?’

‘Cross my heart, George.’ And, I prayed kindly, God help you, because that’s the first thing I would do.

The funny feeling was there still as I watched him
shuffle off down the yard to the corner where the vans were standing. I turned the shattered wood pieces over with my foot. It was simply modernish wood, poor quality with horrible varnish and wrong staining. So what was there to worry about? And why was I dithering like this? I decided to get back to town at the finish. Maybe I should go over to the late Dr Chase’s surgery and suss it out.

I was actually in my crate fumbling for my keys when the light came on and I froze.
Keys.
Keys have locks. Locks are in escritoires. But who on earth takes a genuine Bramah lock
recently
from a genuine piece of antique furniture and plonks it in a piece of trashy reproduction furniture? I dropped my keys and hurtled back up the yard. A dealer called, grinning, ‘What’s the hurry, Lovejoy?’ the burke. The lock was still there, still screwed on its piece of backing wood among the rubbish. I’d been right. It had only recently been put on. You can always tell from the screw lines and the lock edges, especially if it’s been done by somebody who has never done it before. And it looked a botch job, done by somebody with no skill but a lot of determination. Somebody maybe like Dr Chase?

The crowd by the loading ramp was still watching the new items coming in for auction. I went inside the warehouse. Wilkie was talking to Brenda in her illuminated glass cell. He quickly looked away from me. On my hands and knees I crawled about the floor, feeling along each board as I went. I crisscrossed the site where the escritoire had stood. Every yard I got a new splinter but the weight of the Bramah lock in my pocket goaded me. The key was in a corner, a cylindrical rod on a fixed ring.

The key probably didn’t matter, though, only the
lock. I just had to have both because there were endless possibilities. I slotted the key in. It fitted. Tired now, I went out to my crate the back way.

Wilkie called, ‘Here, Lovejoy. Did you pinch anything . . .?’ but only when he knew I’d not bother to turn back.

I ignored his shout, smiling to myself. Aren’t people odd? We work like dogs to trick ourselves. Maybe we all know we don’t admire the real bits of our own personalities. I’ll bet I’m the only person on earth who’s really honest about myself, honest and fair minded.

It took a real effort to switch the engine on. I knew most of the story now. Who killed Leckie was obvious – Jake, Nodge and/or Blackie. Possibly, Mrs Leckie egged them on. Motive: greed. For what? Well, that would be revealed once I got the lock home and took it to bits.

My chirpiness had gone. I didn’t sing a note this time as I clattered along the main village street towards the exit road.

I’d better explain at this stage how I killed him. It’s clear in my mind still, and nothing trains your mind to be retentive like antiques. Of course, some antiques dealers have better memories than others. Patrick, for example. He can even tell you if a single Staffordshire figure had been seen in the district during the past ten years. And Tinker’s like that with auctions. I once asked him about a silver-topped walking-stick, plain as a pikestaff and monogrammed 1881 in Cheltenham. Somebody had auctioned it locally six years ago. I only had the vaguest recollection. If it had been an eighteenth-century cane swordstick with a gold-mounted ivory or porcelain figurine handle – worth a year’s wages – well, anybody can remember gems like
that. But this particular stick even nowadays would only bring in a week’s wages. They’re still common. Tinker just wrinkled his gnarled face and said, ‘Top-angled, straited, monogram not edged, ebony with horn-based tip? Thirty-quid, Easter auction six years back. Elsie. She sold it to Brad. He’s still got it.’ Margaret’s good too, but keeps careful files and clippings on everything she sees, same as me. It’s good observation. So I remember killing him in some detail.

I told you I was subdued driving homewards from Virgil’s that day. There was trouble ahead, but Fergie and Jake seemed not too much of a threat, not as threats go these days. Nodge would be no bother. My only worry was if Fergus fetched a couple of London lads up to put the elbow on me. Or if he got the Item before I did and reaped all the benefit.

You might be wondering why I instinctively believed in the Doc Chase story, discovering a vital and precious ‘find’. On the face of it, an elderly quack isn’t much of a Hawkeyes when blundering round East Anglia’s scenery. But this old island creaks under the weight of its history. Within literally a ten-mile radius of my crummy thatched cottage there are thirty buried temples, over a hundred pre-Christian burial mounds of tributary kings, numerous sunken treasure ships in the estuaries and graveyards of famous Roman legions. And, in the same area, two hundred important ‘finds’ of rare and precious valuable antiques have been made this year alone – none by Lovejoy Antiques, Inc., worse luck.

As I said, minds are funny things. When you hear of a find, you tend only to think of the great bronze head of Claudius being fished up intact from our riverbed. Your mind lingers on the treasure troves
found in the craziest places, like the Ardquin Treasure in that bloody fishpond or the Winterslow Trove in that chalk pit. Like that gravedigger business in that churchyard, now famous as the Hickleton Hoard. But you don’t have to go digging for antiques. After all, that Vlaminck daub ‘by an unknown artist’ was merely hanging on the wall. People saw it every day for ages. Yet once it was identified Sotheby’s sold it for a fortune.

What I mean is, it’s only natural in these circumstances to believe old Chase had come across a valuable find, something worth killing for. And if you think people won’t kill for antiques my tip is stay innocent. But I was on about how I killed him.

Our roads in East Anglia are only two kinds. One’s the newly built dash-track several maniacs wide. The other’s the ancient and narrow switchback blundering between hedges and round sudden unnecessary blind corners. Both are as daft. Like many motorists, including drivers of the long distance double-trailer wagons, I keep off the new roads because they’re a waste of all the places in between.

Leaving Virgil’s I took the small side road which, signposts promise, will eventually head vaguely in the direction of Norwich should you live that long. I didn’t mind because I had to have time to think. Once I got back to the town the other dealers would be sussing me out as usual and antiques would take over.

Presumably, the Bramah lock would tell me somehow where the old doctor had found the Item. Or maybe where he’d hidden it. Perhaps, I thought excitedly, it was even hidden inside the lock. If it was . . .

My reverie was interrupted by a sharp nudge. The crate gave a sudden jump. My neck nearly dislocated
as the car jerked forward. I have to look round because I have no proper mirrors. An enormous black humped car was practically stuck to my tail. It looked horribly familiar. I quickly tried to use that glance to see who was driving but the sun was coming from behind. It nosed forward and belted my feeble old crate, whiplashing my neck dangerously. I remember yelping with fear and swearing. The bend in the road allowed me to struggle my motor on line again, but the huge black car came alongside and pushed me sideways.

‘Get over! Get over!’ I shouted. I tried accelerating, but it had me for speed and was there again, coming on my right side and slewing my stern round again. My crate only just kept going.

‘Sodding murderer!’ I screamed, foot down. I’d never heard the cylinders so loud. I tried desperately thinking where we were. The nearest village was about five miles. I could only remember a farmhouse a couple of miles ahead, and even that stands back from the road behind hedges. They’d chosen well. A long, narrow, tortuous and undulating road, with no witnesses.

I tried leaving my brakes off going down the next hill, but my nerves gave out. The old banger can’t take the stress of sudden turns any more and I could see the sharp oblique climb up the other side of the slope. We were rushing downhill towards the small stone bridge at the bottom. I was going as fast as I could.

He took me again at the turn. The massive sinister black bulge came on the inside and was forcing my stern across the road as we tore down to the bridge. It was all happening so bloody quick and sudden. I got free this time by risking everything, letting my brakes free and stamping on the throttle. Better to get crisped trying to escape than meekly submit by driving
carefully. The extra speed and the bend saved me for a brief instant.

The stone bridge is an ancient medieval span they built with recesses for people keeping out of the way of horse-drawn carts. The humped roadway was too narrow for the big saloon and it braked, suddenly, revving high with a boom. I made a lunatic ninety-degree screech and clattered on up the hill.

My old crate was gasping now, climbing the macadam between the thick hawthorn hedges with diminishing speed. Every third beat was missing, and something was whining steadily between my back wheels. It wasn’t used to all this. I swear it was as terrified as I was. The black car came thundering close and with a crash belted me again. My head nearly flew off my shoulders. It took a few seconds for my vision to clear.

Then, in respite, my crate gave that giveaway juddering sound, warning me. Something big was coming the opposite way. It always makes my little motor shake. Maybe one of the juggernauts, I prayed, with a bloody great trailer. They’re always in a hurry and come on fast, confident in their smooth air brakes and high-seated power. Frantically, I smashed into second gear, sacrificing a few yards for better control. My engine caught up again and sounded healthy for several beats as the bronchitic cylinders strained easier.

The saloon hammered me again but I’d guessed their timing and corrected early enough for once. I realized I was alternately screaming with terror and babbling abuse. They were going to do me like they did Leckie. I’d end up crushed in a ditch, battered and emptied of life.

The narrow climb had forty yards to go when I took the sudden decision. They wouldn’t kill me.
Not Lovejoy Antiques, Inc. If anybody had to go it would be them, the evil bastards. I went stone cold. My foot lifted once then forced itself down hard. At first I’d determined to go as slowly as I dared on the hill, hoping to save time while frantically praying for somebody to come along to be a safe witness. Now it was time for killing.