A Rather Charming Invitation (37 page)

“My brother is a desk man, who must fill every moment with activity,” Honorine murmured while watching him, not without affection. “How often I have heard him say that it bores him to do ‘nothing’. Whereas Papa says ‘doing nothing is one of life’s sweetest joys’.”

I glanced back at Philippe, who had closed his eyes and turned his face to the sun, like a flower.

“The way he does it,” I said, “it’s not ‘nothing’.”

Finally, the man in the well stopped digging. He called up to the other men, but he couldn’t have said anything exciting, because nobody summoned David back. The guy only handed the shovel to his coworkers, and then climbed out, looking a little muddy. Philippe walked toward him, asking him something in French. The man shook his head. Then I heard him say a word I recognized.

“
Rien
,” he said, shrugging. “
Rien
.”

“Nothing?” I said in huge disappointment. “At all?”

“What if it was buried
around
the well, not in it?” Philippe suggested to us. So, the other workers, under Philippe’s orders, began to dig around the well’s immediate circumference. Honorine and I eventually had to move to get out of their way as they dug closer. But when they were done with this, the answer was the same. “
Rien
.”

They had made lots of holes. Everyone was very careful, but it was simply inevitable that we had uprooted a number of precious plantings. It did not escape my notice that David, who’d come back to survey and inspect the damage, was now glowering at Jeremy and me with undisguised disapproval. Jeremy pointedly ignored him, but I could feel myself blushing apologetically.

I turned my attention to some of the sketches and pictures which I’d brought with me. The tapestry borders and cartouche were decorated with a flower pattern that was very pretty—a bright, violet-colored bloom comprised of four separate petals, that were as delicate-looking as those of a sweet pea. The leaves, which looked like oval pods, were a silvery green color.

“What is that?” Honorine asked, peering over my shoulder.

“Moonwort,” I said. “It was all over the tapestry. I looked it up before we came here. It was considered a ‘magic herb’ that protects against evil spirits, and enhances memory, so that a person can ‘recover that which is lost’.”

Glancing meaningfully at Jeremy, I added, “Moonwort also stands for honesty, integrity . . . and money and prosperity. It’s known by lots of other names, too: silver bloom, silver dollar, ‘twopennies-in-a-purse’ . . . and penny-flower.”

Jeremy said affectionately, “Penny-flower? So you have a flower named after you, for honesty and prosperity. Not bad.”

“Well, I was just thinking,” I said. “
Moon
wort. The Latin name for it in the flower books is
Lunaria annua
. See? Like Lunaire. If we found it growing here, that might mean something.”

“You won’t find any moonwort here,” David said crossly. “It’s not the sort of thing we’d ever grow for perfume!”

“Not ever?” I persisted. “Even in Armand’s time?” But by now even the kindly Philippe shook his head and was looking a bit exasperated. After all, we’d dug up his expensive flowers, and for what?

I simply couldn’t believe it. Had the path gone cold? Was the whole thing a wild figment of my fevered imagination, while I was lost in the cryptic world of the tapestry? Its images surely would have been instantly recognizable metaphors to the people of its day, but perhaps the meanings were now lost forever to a modern world that has long forgotten what such symbols once meant.

Jeremy was thinking along more practical and possibly diabolical lines. “It’s possible that Armand hid his treasure here. But I wonder if, centuries ago, somebody else got here first, and dug it up!”

“Ah! Anything is possible,” Philippe agreed.

Disappointed, we all tromped back across the fields to the gate by the side of the road, where Monsieur Felix was calmly waiting for us. Jeremy had a brief chat with him; then, everyone headed for home—Honorine and her family to Mougins, and Jeremy and I to Antibes.

It was only when we were pulling into the driveway of our villa that Jeremy told me another possibility he’d been considering in private. “Someone may have gotten there first, all right,” he said darkly, “but maybe not so many centuries ago. Suppose it was Parker Drake who somehow figured it out and beat us to it?”

I said worriedly, “The ground around the well
was
a bit disturbed, and it may or may not have been field workers who did that.”

“We’ll know soon enough,” Jeremy said ruefully. “If Drake has found it, he won’t be able to resist blowing his trumpet and letting the whole world know. So, all we can do is proceed as if he hasn’t found the gold,” he concluded. “And keep moving full speed ahead, to get there first.”

W
hen we entered the villa, we were both so exhausted that we went right to bed, and slept the deep slumber of little kids who’ve been outdoors playing—or digging—all day. The next morning, I awoke thoroughly refreshed, and ready to do battle again. Jeremy was sleeping soundly, so I crept downstairs, made coffee and then went to take another look at the photographs still spread out on the dining table.

Later, when Jeremy came searching for me, I was still peering through the magnifier, examining two photographs in particular, very closely. “What’s up?” he asked. “Find anything?”

“Take a look,” I said, passing the magnifier to him. “Something doesn’t match up here.”

“What do you mean?” Jeremy asked, peering at it.

“This is the photo we saw yesterday, the one of the cartouche, in the bottom border of the tapestry,” I told him.

“The cartouche,” Jeremy muttered. “Oh, right, that tiny framed picture with the Latin on it,” he said, staring at it.

“Notice how most of the cartouche sits inside the lower border,” I said. “But, the little bow-ties at the top of the picture frame overlap into the main body of the tapestry.”

“Right,” Jeremy said, staring at it. “The top loops of the bows. So?”

“And the stuff on either side of the cartouche—the head of the swan, and the wings of the cupids—they also overlap beyond the border, into the main part, too, right?” I continued.

“Yes,” he replied.

“Okay,” I said excitedly. “Now, take a look at
this
photo of the
top
border of the tapestry.” I slid the other photo over to him, and he moved the magnifier there. “See where the inside line of the border meets the top section of the main body of the tapestry?”

“Yeah?”

“What’s the first thing you see, beneath the top border?” I demanded.

“Looks like some curlicues, and some bunches of white grapes, and maybe some white feathers,” Jeremy reported, squinting hard now.

“But—I think all that stuff is actually the bottom edging of another cartouche!” I said triumphantly. “See? What you describe as ‘curlicues’ could be part of a bow-tie on a cartouche. And, the white feathers could be swans’ wings. And as for the ‘white grapes’, why, those aren’t grapes at all, those could very well be the little toes of the cupids.”

“Let me see yesterday’s picture of the bottom cartouche again,” Jeremy said, sounding excited. I shoved it back to him. He scrutinized it, then went back and forth between the two photos. “You know, you’re right,” he said slowly. “It’s as if there was once a matching cartouche on the top border of the tapestry, but most of it got chopped off, leaving only the bottom part of it—these snippets that overlapped into the main body of the tapestry.” He looked up at me now. “But where’s the rest of it? Maybe Armand started out making a matching cartouche for the top, then, what, he changed his mind?”

“Or,” I said triumphantly, “he
did
put a matching cartouche on the top border. But this isn’t the
original
top border!” I waited a moment for the significance of this to sink in. Then I said, “Suppose
somebody replaced the original top border with a new one
?”

Jeremy looked up at me and said nothing, at first. Then, when he spoke, it was in a low, quiet tone—because Jeremy is the exact opposite of me, and when he’s on the scent of something important, he doesn’t jump up and down about it, he just gets very, very quiet.

“Can they do that?” he said. “Can they replace one border with another?”

“Sure,” I said. “There were weavers who specialized in only making borders. Because some tapestry patterns, like the ones based on Greek myths or Bible stories, were used again and again, sold to different clients, only with customized borders. You know, you could have your own family crest or coat of arms put onto the borders of a tapestry, to make it more personalized. Besides, borders sometimes wear out, from hanging on nails and poles, with the whole weight of the tapestry pulling on them. They can be repaired . . . or sometimes, replaced.”

“So, if the top border, which is now on the tapestry, is merely a replacement,” Jeremy said, “then maybe the guy who made the new border didn’t bother to duplicate all of the original, complicated artwork from the old one?”

“Exactly,” I said. “From what I can see in these photos, the current top border is a lot simpler—and probably cheaper—than the bottom one. I don’t see any gilt, for instance, and there’s plenty of gilt on the bottom. In fact, the existing top border bears more resemblance to the
side
borders than the bottom one.”

“Couldn’t Armand just have run out of the good thread?” Jeremy asked. “He was in a bit of a hurry, you know.”

“I don’t believe it,” I said. “This is a wedding tapestry. Why would he spoil it at the very top, with chopped- off pictures and all?”

“Well, now you say so, I must admit it does look as if there’s something amuck with the top of this thing,” Jeremy agreed.

“Which might indicate that the replacement border was made in a totally different workshop,” I said excitedly. “Possibly even in a completely different time period! After all, the tapestry was missing for centuries. Who knows which owners might have done the deed, all those years before—”

I stopped. Then I said briskly, “Well. I’d say it’s time we paid another little call on Venetia.”

“It’s a long way to go if she’s not home,” Jeremy warned. “What if she’s, say, on vacation?”

“Honorine says she never goes away,” I said. “The element of surprise is essential. I want to look her in the eye when we ask her. How soon can we get to Paris?”

W
hen we rang the buzzer, Venetia’s husky voice cried, “Come in, Justine!” and she buzzed us in. “I’ll bet Justine is one of her ballet students,” I whispered to Jeremy. I felt a trifle guilty, but not enough to resist taking advantage of the situation, and we sneaked right in.

The maid must have been out doing the day’s marketing, because Venetia herself came to the door, leaning on a straight cane like an old-fashioned ballet master. She glanced up expectantly, then saw who it was, and her face changed. She looked fearful, apprehensive, but not angry.

“I am expecting a student at any minute,” she said defensively. “You really should have called ahead. I will be happy to see you, but some other time . . .”

I began talking in halting French. She listened attentively, not, I think, because of what I was saying, but more out of the fascinated horror of listening to French being spoken by someone with an Anglo-American accent and cadence. Nevertheless, I ploughed on, having composed this little speech on the way over. Basically, the gist of what I said was, “I am so sorry about the theft of the tapestry. I feel responsible, and wish to make amends. We think we may have some hope of recovering the tapestry, but we really need your help.”

“Oh,
mon dieu!
” she cried, with theatrically exaggerated despair. “Haven’t I done enough, putting up with that awful big ape of a man you sent to investigate me, asking his policeman questions, as if it were I who were the thief? Believe me, I told him everything I know. If it’s gone, it’s gone, there’s nothing more I can say or do to bring it back.”

“If you answer our questions, there won’t be any need for Monsieur Felix to come back and bother you,” Jeremy said, in that lawyerlike way that is ostensibly reassuring but is also is a threat.

Venetia eyed him cunningly, then sighed, and allowed us to follow her into the back room, where she enthroned herself again on her satin daybed. She closed her eyes as if prepared to endure the unendurable. “Make it quick,” she advised.

“We need to know,” I said simply, “if the tapestry was ever changed or remade.”

Jeremy was watching her carefully. She opened her eyes slowly, and said, as if stalling for time, “What do you mean? Can I be expected to know its entire history, when I only owned it a short time?”

I laid out a few photos on the low table in front of her. “You see,” I said helpfully, “here are pictures of the tapestry’s border when it hung in Oncle Philippe’s house. Take a good look, especially at the top border. I hope that these pictures will help you to remember, because we think it’s important.”

At first, she almost refused to look at the photos. She waved her hand and said airily, “It was so long ago. What possible difference can it make now?”

“Did you change the border?” I asked eagerly. Venetia glanced at Jeremy, perhaps mindful of his warning. She studied me carefully, then made an elaborate ritual of reaching for her eyeglass case, and adjusting her reading glasses, and peering at each photo, one by one. She was silent the whole time, and there was a long pause when, at last, she had examined each one. Then she looked up at me imploringly. I gave her my most encouraging, sympathetic smile.

“Ah,” she said finally; then she coughed, somewhat guiltily. “Now that you mention it . . . I suppose . . . yes . . . I would say . . . come to think of it . . . of course, it was so very long ago . . .”