Death of an Old Master (33 page)

Imogen laughed. She said she would take a walk for a while to ensure Orlando was left in peace. ‘What are you forging now?’ she asked as she set off. ‘I’d like to
know.’

Orlando explained that he was working on a lost Giovanni Bellini. It had adorned the walls of a church in Venice until the building was ravaged by fire about twenty-five years before. Everybody
assumed the painting of Christ with a couple of saints had been destroyed. But the canvas was about to be rediscovered, having left Venice with the family who rescued it. First, the lost
masterpiece had to be born. In Orlando Blane’s Long Gallery.

‘These people know their business,’ said Orlando. ‘A picture known to have existed is much more likely to be believed in than one that turns up out of the blue. It has a
history already.’

The wind had dropped from the night before as Imogen stepped out of the front door, the redhead a respectable few paces behind her. Rain was falling steadily across the countryside. A tattered
group of crows was flying across the fields. She walked away from the house to a path that led on to the main drive. She wondered how far down the drive she would be allowed to go. To her right the
fields stretched out for a couple of miles before they stopped at a wood. Ahead, set back from the path, was a little church. Even at a hundred yards Imogen could see the holes in the roof, tiles
blown away by the wind. To her left a red-brick stable block where she presumed there must be horses. Horses. She wondered if she and Orlando could creep down in the night and ride away. Steady,
she said to herself, steady. We don’t even know where we are yet. The great Jacobean house, the derelict fields, she could be anywhere. She set off down the drive, remembering that she must
have come this way the day before. Ten paces behind her, like a faithful guard dog, the redhead maintained his vigil. She was passing a pond and another group of abandoned buildings. Perhaps this
had been the home farm in better days. As the path rose up a little hill Imogen wondered if it was time to talk to the redhead. What was his name? Where did he come from? Did he like it here? She
rehearsed the opening moves in her mind and decided against it. Too soon.

Six hundred yards away a man was fiddling with the aperture on his binoculars. It was as though he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. The man was lying in a circle of trees to the right
of the drive and was virtually invisible from all directions. Yes, it was. It was definitely a woman, young and very attractive if these German glasses were to be believed.

Johnny Fitzgerald had seen the redhead before. He had seen all the guards. He had heard the carriage coming to the house the previous evening but he could see nothing at all. This girl must have
been inside, Johnny decided. Was she a prisoner? Was the redhead a warder? Or a nurse in some form of mental asylum? Were these people guarding some dangerous lunatic in there? Was the girl the
lunatic? Was the girl deranged?

Johnny Fitzgerald had based himself in one of the few hotels left open on the sea front of Cromer. The main rooms looked out over the grey sea, occasional fishermen venturing out for crab or
lobsters. The waiters were bored, serving bored food in a bored dining room where only one other couple came to dine. They were so bored that they scarcely spoke to each other. Even Johnny’s
bottle of Beaune, a cheerful draught in happier places, seemed bored. It tasted flat as if it had had enough of Cromer and its beach.

He watched as the little drama continued on the drive. When the girl was about three hundred yards away from Johnny’s hiding place, the redhead came up to her. They spoke a few words. The
girl turned round. Johnny could not hear what was said. He watched as the slim figure walked slowly back to the house, possibly deep in thought, or lunacy. This afternoon, Fitzgerald said to
himself, I’m going to work my way round to the other side of the house. I’ll go to those woods at the back and see how close I can get.

Imogen thought later that she could so easily have missed it. A grey stone blended into a grey wall between the house and the stable block. The stone made her heart beat faster and the blood
rush to her face. It was a milestone, aged and worn now but with the legend still faintly legible through the green lichen. She pretended to retie her boot as she bent down and tried to read the
words. The redhead was about twenty paces behind her, approaching fast. She peered desperately at the milestone. One arrow pointed in a southerly direction. Norwich, twenty miles, it said. Another
arrow pointed north over the woods. Cromer, three miles.

Imogen and Orlando were on the north coast of Norfolk.

Alice Bridge had declined Powerscourt’s invitation to Markham Square. Instead he was making his way to 16 Upper Grosvenor Street on one of those rare winter days when
the sun shone on London for tea at four o’clock. He wondered how Johnny Fitzgerald was faring up in Norfolk.

The drawing room in Upper Grosvenor Street was formal. Portraits lined the walls. A fire burned brightly in the grate. Cucumber sandwiches and a fruit cake were already in position. Powerscourt
thought the house was probably run like a military operation.

Alice Bridge was not alone. The room was dominated by her mother, Mrs Agatha Bridge, who sat very erect in her chair, her hair tied in a formidable bun, her ample bosom jutting forward like the
prow of a ship. Her daughter sat nervously by her side, looking as if she were in protective custody. Powerscourt felt the interview might prove difficult.

‘Lord Powerscourt,’ Mrs Bridge boomed out to him as he faced her on the sofa, ‘I understand you want to ask my daughter some questions.’

Powerscourt put on his most deferential manner. ‘Yes, I do, Mrs Bridge,’ he said, ‘just a few simple questions. It shouldn’t take long. And thank you so much for inviting
me here to tea.’

‘Do you make it a habit, Lord Powerscourt, to go about London making inquiries about people’s private lives?’

‘I am an investigator, Mrs Bridge. It is my profession.’

‘A profession?’ Mrs Bridge was peering at him as if he were some lowly form of pond life. ‘A profession of prying and peeping into respectable citizens’ privacy? Surely
this great city of ours has other professions which might occupy your time more properly?’

‘In my time,’ said Powerscourt, determined not to be engulfed by this wave of hostility, ‘I have been an officer of Her Majesty’s armed forces. I have letters from the
Prime Minister thanking me for services rendered to the Government and the country. Please, Mrs Bridge, I am sure it would be better if I asked my questions and troubled you no more.’

Tea arrived, an enormous silver teapot polished to perfection. ‘Tea, Lord Powerscourt?’ Powerscourt wondered if it was a peace offering, or merely a truce before hostilities were
recommenced.

‘Thank you very much,’ he said, watching Alice Bridge carefully out of the corner of his eye. She looked very uncomfortable, but whether that was caused by her mother’s manners
or the delicacy of her own position he could not tell.

‘Tell me, Miss Bridge,’ Powerscourt moved to take the initiative, ‘how well did you know Mr Christopher Montague?’

Alice Bridge blushed bright red. She glanced quickly at her mother before she replied.

‘I knew him quite well.’

‘Did you go with him to the opening of the Venetian exhibition at the de Courcy and Piper Gallery in Old Bond Street?’ asked Powerscourt.

‘I did,’ said Alice Bridge, avoiding her mother’s gaze and looking down at the carpet.

‘I was not cognisant of the fact that you had accompanied him to that exhibition,’ said Mrs Bridge, looking at her daughter sternly. ‘And how did you come by this information,
Lord Powerscourt? More snooping about, I presume, more impertinent questions?’

Mrs Bridge was beginning to irritate Powerscourt considerably.

‘I would remind you, Mrs Bridge,’ he said firmly, ‘that Christopher Montague is dead. So is his greatest friend, a man called Thomas Jenkins of Emmanuel College, Oxford. They
will, unfortunately, be in no position to attend any more exhibitions in future. Tell me, Miss Bridge,’ he turned to look at Alice, still staring sullenly at the carpet, ‘when was the
last time you saw Mr Montague?’

Alice Bridge took a deep breath. ‘Mama says I’m not to answer any more questions.’

Her mother drew herself up to her full height. Some mighty broadside was about to be delivered into the centre of HMS
Powerscourt.
He just managed to get in first.

‘I put it to you, Miss Bridge, that you were perhaps very close to Christopher Montague in the last months of his life. I put it to you that you had kept your family in the dark about the
affair. I put it to you also that refusing to answer any perfectly innocent questions may make people suspicious, more suspicious than they would have been if they knew the true story.’

‘Mama says that I’m not to answer any more questions.’ Powerscourt wondered if the answers would have been forthcoming if her mother wasn’t there. He felt sure that
Christopher Montague would not have seemed a very desirable catch to the mistress of 16 Upper Grosvenor Street. Powerscourt heard a sort of blowing sound from Alice’s right. The broadside was
coming.

‘Suspicions? Suspicions, Lord Powerscourt?’ Mrs Agatha Bridge was in full cry. ‘Are you saying that you suspect my daughter of being involved in some way in this murder? I tell
you, Lord Powerscourt, I never met the young man. I would not have considered him a suitable escort for Alice, or indeed any other respectable young woman. People like Montague are a danger to the
nation’s morals. Look at that terrible man Wilde. They should all be sent to prison.’

‘Nobody is suggesting that your daughter is involved with the murder,’ said Powerscourt. ‘That is why I find this refusal to answer any questions so very strange. Miss Bridge,
I am asking you for the last time, how close were you to Christopher Montague?’

Powerscourt thought later that she might have been on the edge of tears. Perhaps it was Montague’s name that did it. But the answer was the same.

‘Mama says I’m not to answer any more questions.’

As he made his way back to Markham Square, Powerscourt wondered just how close Alice Bridge had been to the dead art critic. He thought again about the clues and the suspects in this case. He
thought about de Courcy and Piper and the benefit their gallery had derived from the death of Christopher Montague. He thought about Roderick Johnston, a man who might have lost most of his
considerable income if Montague had lived. He thought about the wine glasses and the tea the murderer must have washed up each time he struck. He thought about the tie in Thomas Jenkins’
rooms on the Banbury Road in Oxford. He resolved to summon reinforcements of a sort in the person of William McKenzie, a tracker who had worked with Powerscourt and Fitzgerald in India and on
several other cases since.

Afternoon rain had replaced morning rain in the bleak countryside of North Norfolk. Orlando was staring at his preliminary drawing for the Bellini on his easel. Imogen, still
exultant from her morning discovery, was staring out at the woods behind the house.

‘I’ve been here for months,’ had been Orlando’s verdict on his past record, ‘and I never saw that milestone. You come here and find it on your first morning in the
place. I’m ashamed of myself.’

‘Never mind, darling,’ Imogen had whispered back, fearful of being overheard by their captors. ‘At least we know where we are.’

Later that afternoon, when Orlando had finished his work, they were to go on a reconnaissance mission up into the woods at the back.

Inching his way forward through the same woods, Johnny Fitzgerald was beginning to wish that Norfolk could be moved somewhere else, somewhere drier, the south of Spain perhaps, maybe even the
Sahara, where the damp wouldn’t work its way through the toughest clothes he possessed. He could see the back of the house now. If he moved another thirty feet to his left he would be able to
see if any of that part of the house was inhabited. He dare not go any closer in case one of the guards came out on afternoon patrol.

Now he could see clearly through his glasses the Long Gallery on the first floor, the five great windows, some with their shutters half open, looking out on the sad remains of the garden and the
lake to his right. He worked his way slowly across the windows. There, at the end furthest away from him, was the girl he had seen that morning. Next window, nothing, only a dark interior. Third
window, he thought he made out a small sofa, by an enormous fireplace. Fourth window, he could see a door in the far corner. Fifth window . . . Johnny took his glasses off and wiped the lens with
the only dry cloth he still possessed, tucked in under his shirt. The cloth felt warm against the surrounding damp. He put the binoculars back to his eyes and squinted through.

There was a man and an easel. Johnny was sure it was an easel. Making a minute adjustment to the aperture he thought he saw a line of paintings stacked up against the wall next to the door. The
man was now working at his easel with a pencil or a brush, Johnny couldn’t tell. But he felt strangely exultant up there in the squelchy mud of the de Courcy woods, rain dripping down his
forehead, finding its own way into his boots. Had Powerscourt known all along? Had he divined somehow that here, in this remote spot, guarded by an unbroken length of redbrick wall and a couple of
unfriendly lodges, was the man who might hold the key to the whole investigation? Johnny Fitzgerald put the glasses back in their case and began to crawl up the hill towards safer ground. Johnny
didn’t think any strangers found in the de Courcy woods would be invited in for a comforting glass of sherry.

Ten minutes later he was lying in a clump of trees at the top of the hill. The house was only just visible through the trees. It was the voices he heard first, the girl’s voice asking the
man if he had walked up this way before. Then he heard the man reply, saying something about not having gone very far up this path as it was so damp. The wind was carrying their voices up the hill.
Johnny peeped out. On his left he saw the long red-brick walls of the home garden, unpruned fruit trees and untended vegetable patches no doubt concealed within. Christ, they were coming straight
for him. If they kept walking for another ten minutes they would virtually fall over his feet.