The Fraud (47 page)

‘She was bidding for the Prince of Wales!’

‘So I have heard it suggested. But I do assure you she is, actually, merely an Acquaintance of mine. It was a Risk, but it was worth it.’

She was astonished, stopped walking, stared at him. ‘You put that about as a Rumour, about the Prince?’

He walked on. ‘My dear Grace, it is easy to start a Rumour. You merely whisper something loudly at a Social Gathering. The rest takes care of itself.’

‘But - we might have lost everything!’

‘There would have been enormous Publicity once it reached nearly six hundred guineas, which it did unaided because the Duke of Portland was so keen to acquire it also. That is unheard of for any such Painting and - if my Accomplice had unfortunately acquired it - we would have been able to auction it again. There had not been a whisper that it might not be as it seemed - for which you must take great credit.’

And because her heart was high and her defences down she still went on. ‘And I can lead my own Life at last, James. Thank you.’ And then she added, ‘I would have the money at once, my Plans are all made.’ And she looked up at him, still smiling.

He did not smile back. He stared at her in silence and for once she could not read his face. She stopped walking again abruptly: she stood there in the evening light, very, very still: alert now. He was looking at her yet, and she could not read his face. ‘What is the matter?’ she said.

‘What Plans?’ said James Burke.

‘I am leaving Pall Mall. You knew that. You’ve always known that.’

‘Now?’

‘Yes, now.’

‘But where are you going?’

‘That is nothing to you. It is not your business.’ Something - pain - flashed in his eyes.

‘Grace—’ but she interrupted him.

‘I wish to get away from that house now as soon as possible. I have seen and heard the great and the worthy praise my Work - even Mr Gainsborough, James - it is wonderful, and it makes me proud, but it also makes me . . . I cannot stay another moment longer in my brother’s house.’

He began walking again so that she must walk also. Then he spoke and this time his voice was grim.

‘Your Nephew believes the Painting to be by you.’

She was so taken by surprise that she tripped: quickly he caught her arm although they had been walking separately until now. Somebody turned to stare. ‘You must keep walking naturally,’ he said lightly, and the couple walked, her arm on his to support herself, so great was her shock, with all the other couples and crowds who promenaded there, flirting behind fans, and laughing: a summer evening in London as if the morning storm was only a dream. And down a path, looking delighted with one another, came Mr Bounds and Isabella. The aunt stood stock-still, her hand still upon the arm of Mr James Burke.

‘Whatever are you doing here alone, Isabella?’ she said, and then, collecting herself, she stood apart from the art dealer (as if the young people would have noticed old people). Isabella blushed but Mr Bounds the frame-maker’s son stepped forward manfully.

‘
Signorina
, I have asked Isabella to become my wife and she has made me the happiest man in England by agreeing.’

‘But - ’ Her mind whirled, so far away were her thoughts from this matter. ‘Mr - Mr Bounds you must know, surely, that you must speak to her Father, not to Isabella. This is not how such things are done!’

‘
My
Father said I must first ascertain the feelings of Signorina Isabella. I have tried for weeks to find her,’ he smiled at his beloved, ‘but she has had - other Interests.’

‘No!’ cried Isabella, ‘I did not!’

‘I have now however ascertained her Feelings and I shall now at once return to Pall Mall and ask permission of Signore di Vecellio.’

Grace could hardly stand; she saw her niece’s shining face. Somehow she made herself smile. ‘Go quickly then to the house,’ she said and the two young people, thus blessed, hurried away. At once she turned back to James Burke. ‘It is absolutely impossible that Claudio should know that,’ she said. ‘It is
impossible
!’

‘He said he was speaking to you in your room.’

‘He never, ever comes to my—’ but already she saw him, throwing himself upon her small sofa, talking of the cock-fighting men, crying, actually knocking his aunt to the floor, and she saw herself, so anxious to get to Frith Street to paint the girl: she closed the door, yes, but she ran down the stairs
before Claudio
: quickly the movement replayed itself in her mind: she saw herself pick up her basket, close the door and then hurry past him and down the stairs. Later she had believed only that he had gone back into her room because he saw she had some money, saw where she kept it. ‘I thought he had only stolen my money,’ she said.

‘Indeed? He is, then, truly a Gentleman, your Nephew.’ James Burke forced her to keep walking. ‘He told me that he went back into your room - he did not tell me about the money, of course - and then he opened the door to your sewing-room where he used to play as a child and saw how it was, with many canvases and boards facing the wall.’

‘But he knows I am an
amateur
in my little room. They all know that and laugh of it.’

‘Claudio is not entirely a fool. He is used to looking at paintings. He knows what an
amateur
is.’

‘But the Picture was not finished then! He did not see the face!’

‘The Painting of the girl reading was on your easel. I told him he must be mistaken, I told him it would be impossible for you to have done such a thing, but he insists it is the same Painting.’ Now it was James Burke who stopped walking, and now his eyes burned with suppressed rage. ‘He said he had been greatly surprised by the Painting sitting there in your sewing-room, and also that he had studied the gown you had painted carefully - he thought it beautiful, he said, like one he had seen in Amsterdam. And as soon as he saw the Painting at the Auction-rooms, he realised that, somehow, whatever had been done to it, it was the Painting he had seen in your room. Claudio is a foolish, weak, immature, unstable and . . . cunning boy, and is a great danger to us. He came to my house in an inebriated fashion and was seen and heard not just by me but by my Wife and by my servants. I took him into my Study but great damage has been already done. He was wild with his plans and his schemes.’

She could hardly make any sound. ‘What are they?’

‘That we give him money, of course. He will otherwise, anonymously, inform - I told you he was cunning, he has thought it through -
not
your brother, but Sir Joshua Reynolds and Mr Hartley Pond that the Painting is a Fake. You know we cannot risk that.’

It was at that moment that she realised just how much she had depended on her world changing at last: her heart began to beat violently, she could feel it pumping and pounding. ‘Where is he?’

‘I have no idea. I told him his plan was preposterous, that I had collected the Painting in France. I told him I did not believe him, that I would inform his Father if he repeated such nonsense. But I also had to say that I would speak to you when I could. Of course we will have to tie him to us in some way.’

‘What do you mean by that?’

A pieman wandered by in the dusk, carrying his wares on a tray on his head. There was a smell of onions, and of bacon. James turned away impatiently, led her away from anyone, even a pieman, who might overhear.

‘I have made a decision.’ He spoke briskly. ‘We may have been found out, but we must under no circumstances be caught. We do not want him racing about London imparting this Information - indeed I would wish quite frankly to throw him into the Thames!’ He breathed angrily. ‘There will have to be certain Guarantees from him, but I know enough of young Claudio to handle him. His Debts will have to be paid.’

She watched his face. She knew him so well. There was more.

‘We will have to use your Brother’s money to do all this. You will begin another Painting at once—’

‘No!’

‘—you will begin another Painting and we will pay you for the second one.’

She heard the words.
The second one
.

‘It is extraordinary what we have achieved and we can achieve it again - not in London, that would be too dangerous - but in Paris or Rome or I will take it to Russia where the Empress Catherine is known to be an extremely avid Collector. I have done business with her agents before, when the Walpole collection was sold. It can all be done in a year.’

She tried very hard to speak normally, to breathe normally, to speak very quietly. ‘James, I cannot wait another year. You must do as you wish but I will not paint another. I
cannot
paint another.’ And then she suddenly grabbed his arms, as a child in Bristol used to do so long ago, so great now was her sudden, chilling fear that everything was lost. ‘
Where is the money now?
’

He disentangled himself carefully, walked on so that once again she must follow if they were to converse. ‘The money has been arranged by your Brother. The money has been paid.’

‘Then give me my share, I do not care about anything else.’

‘He is your Nephew, Grace. Not mine. We were undone by your carelessness, not mine. His Debts will be paid and part of that money will have to be that which would otherwise have been paid to his Aunt.’ His voice was hard now and whatever the expression was earlier when he looked at her, it was gone.

She was unable to speak. For in the end it came back once more to the same thing.
Money, money, money
. The sky had darkened as they had been walking, the link-boys’ lights and the promenaders’ lamps could be seen winking around them. James Burke’s face was partly in shadow.

‘But, after all, Grace, Grace - there is much to cheer you! You have triumphed over your Brother at last, have you not? You have a greater Revenge than you could have dreamed of all those years ago.’ And he did smile at her, his old smile for just a moment, knowing his girl, her dreams and desires. ‘I must deal with Claudio somehow, it cannot be helped. You must begin a further Painting at once, one more, and I will sell it on the wider European market for even more money. It will be our Glory, even more than this extraordinary day.’

Again she stopped, held his arms, both of his arms. ‘James, I cannot live in Pall Mall any longer. I must have my own life before it is too late. Nobody will believe Claudio, he could never announce that his Father’s prized Painting is a Fake!’ He said nothing. ‘James, that Painting took many, many months of my life - twenty-five years of my life you might say for that is how long it took me to learn what I have learned. I am glad to have succeeded but I do not want to succeed as a Fraud, I want to succeed as an Artist - you
know
that, James, you of all people. I must do my own work now.’

‘One more, Grace. You cannot make this kind of money without me. You possibly cannot make any money at all. I will buy you your Freedom. After one more Painting. One more and I will pay half of everything we make.’

‘
No!
’

The pieman called PIES, but there were not many people at that end of the park and his cry was half-hearted and dreams crumbled, there in the park.

She put her hand to her face, almost (it might have seemed) to stop herself screaming out, as if she was stopping her own mouth. Then she waited for a moment, breathed deeply. ‘No, James. You will not
buy
me my Freedom. I have earned my own Freedom at last and you know very well that I have. I have worked and worked night after night after week after month after year and I have earned my own Freedom and I must have it at last,’ and to her alarm she suddenly felt tears in her eyes, she who did not weep, and her voice choked in her throat. ‘Please, James,’ she said then, understanding how near she was to failing and falling, ‘
please
let me have the money, you will not be bothered by me again, I have planned everything.’

‘Have you?’ And he asked the question again. ‘What have you planned?’ She did not answer him and he stepped nearer to her and then, in the falling darkness in St James’s Park, he put his hand to her face and very gently wiped at the tears. She was so surprised, so thrown by that old familiar touch that the tears in her eyes suddenly froze. She felt the remembered hand, there on her cheek. Nobody had touched her face since he had touched it last.

A crowd of people suddenly caught them up from behind: people laughing and talking and running in the fading light and several little poodles yapped and ran with them and the pieman seeing custom called loudly now PIES! PIES! and several young men stopped and obtained these edibles. And then from nowhere it seemed some women suddenly stood beside the young men with the pies and one spoke brazenly, ‘Bit of fun, lovey?’, twirling a sheepskin bladder tied with red ribbon between her fingers, ‘Two shillins in the Park, lovey?’ And she laughed and then the young men laughed very loudly but one of them, stuffing his pie into his mouth as he went, followed deeper into the Park the one with the red-ribboned
accoutrement.
Grace Marshall followed them with her eyes, her face expressionless. And then she turned from James Burke and made herself walk in the other direction, across the Park. Perhaps he was thrown: involuntarily he called out ‘Grace?’ to the
signorina
as she went away from him.

The wings she had felt on her shoulders had turned to stone. She walked away from him in the cruel London night and in her head red ribbons danced and drifted and she heard the laugh of the street-girl. She walked almost to the end of the Park in the darkness, almost to Rosamund’s Pond, saw that the stars had come out, bright bright stars, not misty stars as Isabella had decided to prefer rather than to cut up love.

Grace Marshall stared up at the bright stars and then - because she had no other plan left, did not know what else to do - she turned back towards Pall Mall.

 

In the darkness on the step leading up to the big house there was an even darker shadow. She saw his eyes in the light of a coach as it rumbled past and the blood everywhere, coming from the thin jacket.