The Gondola Scam (8 page)

"What is it? Keep reading!"

She dropped the receiver in a panic. "Darling. He said to put
you on."

"Eh?" We stared at each other.

"He said, 'Just put Lovejoy on the blower, lady."'

Slowly I unwound Connie's stocking and listened at the receiver.

"You there, Lovejoy?" Ledger asked wearily. "Stop
tarting about."

"This is a recording," I said, embarrassed.

"So's this. You seem to think we do bugger all here. We've
checked out everybody who was known to be at that auction, at the caff, on the
trunk road—including your posh lady Caterina and her dad Colonel Norman,
especially as you've been seeing so much of her these days. You still
there?"

"Aye." I felt a right twerp.

"Then pay attention. I'll only say this once." He
sniggered at nicking one of our lines. "You're meddling, lad. And I don't
like it, because meddlers usually have a reason. And your reason is vengeance.
Don't think I don't know. I can read you like a bloody book. Last warning.
Understand?"

"You can't arrest me. Ledger," I said weakly.

"There's such a thing as protective custody. Just remember
that if you're on my patch I've signed for you. Oh, one more thing. The
Eveline
has sailed. She was clean as a
whistle. We looked."

My heart sank. What a flaming mess.

"I hear your lady is a cracker, Lovejoy," Ledger said
pleasantly. "Funny voice, but I don't expect that worries you too much—as
long as Ken Bridewell doesn't find out, eh? Cheers."

Click. Burr.

We left the phone box, me ashamed because the trick had failed,
and Connie still shaking. She looked worried sick. We were near the football
ground in town.

"Darling," she quavered. "It's . . . it's become
rather serious, hasn't it? All this, I mean."

She must have caught Ledger's final threat. I sensed an incipient
farewell, the state she was in.

"No more serious than usual, love."

She stood there drooping. "The police, Crampie, and the other
man, the whole business. I'm frightened, darling."

"Only temporary difficulties," I said like a cheery
weather forecaster in an unexpected blizzard.

"You're going to Venice to find them, aren't you,
darling." Another lovely woman who could make a simple question into a
flat accusation.

"Of course not,” I said, beaming. "Honest." And I
looked into her eyes with all my innocence.

"Really honest, or Lovejoy honest?"

"Same thing, love."

"Is it?" She shivered, but only listlessly from habit,
and looked about. Her car was nearby. Women never trust a bloke when he's
trying to be truthful.

I fumbled in my pocket to see what gelt I had left. Maybe enough.

"Come on, love," I said, pulling her across the road to
the shop. "I'll buy you a replacement stocking. Can I put it on your
lovely leg?"

"I've two legs, darling." She managed a wan smile.

"A whole pair, then," I said recklessly. "Hang the
cost."

Any woman leaving is the end of an era. No two ways about it,
Connie's absence was bad news. Lucky I was so busy, or I'd have suffered even
more. The worst bit is realizing how sad she'd be too. I couldn't see the point
of her going, but women are always boss in a relationship, and if that's what
she felt was timely, I suppose it had to be. I mean, a man can't simply leave a
woman, not off his own bat. He simply gets pushed out by the bird. A woman on the
other hand has that inner power to sling her bloke or her hook any day of the
week. Oh, of course birds complain about blokes "leaving," but that's
only punishment for failing to live up to her expectations. At least Connie had
given me the sailor's elbow for a material—not emotional—reason, which is good
going for Lovejoy Antiques, Inc.

I'd just put her stocking on her. It had taken three hours. She
was overlaying me the way she liked to afterwards.

"If I asked you not to go, Lovejoy . . . ?"

I gave her my million-watt stare of transparent honesty. "Who
said anything about going anywhere, love? Where's this daft idea come
from?"

She sighed then and dressed slowly, because she knows I like to
watch. I could tell she didn't believe a word, but women are notorious cynics.
She came back to give me a kiss before she went, blotting her eyes. I waved her
off from the bed. She was just in a funny mood.

A ten-point turn to negotiate the gateway, the engine sounding
horribly final.

Gone.

I lay there thinking. Money. I must get money. Venice is such a
hell of a way. This called for one of my antique orgasms.

By four o'clock I was going full steam. I'd sold my papier-mâché
fake chair—as a genuine antique, of course—in a part exchange high-mark deal to
Elena on North Hill, coming away with a rough old oil panel of a long-haired
bloke with lace cuffs and a cravat. Genuinely oldish—say late eighteenth
century—but poor artistry. You can still get them for a song in any antique
shop in East Anglia. I inscribed some famous-sounding name on the reverse, like
"Port of Abraham Cowley" and an illegible signature, and decided to
flog it for twice what Elena could, and before nightfall too. A high-mark deal
is one where you part-exchange items and come away with money as well, because
your item is worth more than the other bloke's. I did well out of Elena and my
chair.

With the money I put a deposit down on a nineteenth-century
wrought-iron church porch lantern, all bonny hexagonal panels intact, told Brad
I'd pay him the balance by the weekend, and carted it to Patrick's (resplendent
today in a vermilion poncho). There I sold it for a profit and used the gelt to
buy a group of six French hand shlittles, Georgian, from Margaret Dainty. These
little things come in old engraved steel, ivory, or wood, and are avidly sought
by collectors nowadays. I borrowed John Cronan's phone in the Arcade to contact
a Midland shlittle collector from my book, priced them high and got him to
promise to post off a money order within an hour. I told John I'd owe him for
the phone call when the stingy swine moaned, and sent Tinker to the post office
to wing the shlittles off northwards.

Ten minutes later I sold the "Abraham Cowley" portrait
for a good price to Markie and Beatrice in the Red Lion. I pretended to be
broke—this comes easy—and desperate for money. "I'd meant to restore
it," I said, hoping to God the marker-pen signature which I'd scribbled on
the bottom comer wouldn't rub before they got it home. I'd thoughtfully penciled
a Christie's auction number on the frame beneath the canvas tacking, and
pretended not to notice when Markie spotted it and nudged Beatrice
surreptitiously. They claim to be Expert Antique Picture Restorers. They’d need
to be, I thought, fervently, pocketing the gelt.

Crossing the Arcade to Jessica's place, I took a deep breath and
plunged into her incense-riddled alcove. Ten minutes later I staggered out
stinking like a chemist's shop but happy with my loot (got on deposit, 10 percent),
which consisted of a Waterford crystal comfort dish, jug, and decanter. I'd
persuaded her they were "new-factory" wares— post-1951—instead of the
"old-factory" crystal, which extends back from 1851 to the 1720s. Of
course, I'd lied in my teeth, and agreed to pop round her house tomorrow night
and settle up what I owed.

Meanwhile, Tinker had a brass chandelier with a brass Bristol dove
finial at the top (no feathers, smooth wings closed). It was mixed-period,
because some know-all has always mucked about with them, but it looked fine. I
bought it there and then, added a 30 percent markup, and told Tinker to phone
Sandy and Mel (not got time to tell you about them, thank heavens). They agreed
to buy it. Tinker would ferry the chandelier out, get the money, zoom it to the
Arcade, and there buy Margaret's small Japanese shouldered tea jar outright. It
had its original tiny ivory lid (think of a decorated draftsman off a
checkerboard). I told him to up the price by half, phone a London dealer in
Museum Street, say I had flu, but needed the cash by morning. It broke my
heart. If I had clapped eyes on it again, I'd never let its dazzling little
body out of my sight ever again. As it was. Tinker knew enough to hand it to
one of the long-haulage drivers who run England's unofficial nocturnal antique
delivery service nationwide faster and safer than ordinary post. It would be in
Museum Street by midnight. Then Big Frank from Suffolk bought the Waterford
crystal at a good price.

I reeled on, hurtling Tinker about the town and cadging lifts
while I borrowed like mad, spending like a civil servant. Oddly, sometimes when
you go berserk things go for you. We found antiques which were unbelievably
rare. Tinker even dug out a musical book—Victorian 1880, little projecting tabs
trigger a cuckoo's call when you turn to the cuckoo picture, and so on. I'd
never even seen one before. Naturally, you also pick up the dross—two 1671
water clocks "by Ed Larkins, Winchester," for example. People get
really narked when you tell them that these are all repros by Pearson Page.

The day faded into dusk. In the Arcade, lights came on. People
scurried among the closing shops. Traffic queued at intersections. Stores
shuttered for the night. Night schools opened. Car parks filled for our one
theater.

I stormed on like a mad thing, dealing, buying, borrowing,
selling—and above all promising, promising, promising. At the finish, Tinker
and I were knackered and swilling ale in the Three Cups. He's not daft, and got
courage up to ask it after a couple.

"What do we do about all these frigging IOUs, Lovejoy? You
was giving them out like autographs."

"Do the best you can, Tinker."

"Eh? Me?" He felt so faint he drank both our pints.
"Where'll you be?"

"Somewhere else for a few days."

"Leaving me to cope with the whole mess? Jesus." He
stared at me, appalled. "They'll have my balls, Lovejoy." He slurped
his new pint, and gave a sudden gummy cackle. "Hey, Lovejoy. I can't wait
to see Jessica's face when she sees me turn up tomorrow night, instead of you.
I knows you pays her in kind, randy sod." He rolled in the aisles at the
notion.

No real need to worry about Tinker. "Hold them off payment
till I come back." I had the money to reach Venice. That was all that
mattered.

"How, Lovejoy?"

"Gawd knows."

"What about your woman, Connie?"

I thought a minute. The beer seemed to have gone off. "Forget
her," I said, and pushed him my glass.

Which only goes to show how useless I am at knowing women.

Early next morning, as I was putting together my spare clothes in
my grotty battered suitcase, a special messenger arrived at the cottage with a
big manila envelope and an accountant's letter. It read:

                  
I am informed by Mrs. C.
Bridewell, director, that you have
 
accepted
responsibility for purchasing on commission ladies' Italian
  
seasonal styles in pattern for the Bridewell
shoe-shop chain. Please
     
find
accompanying this an open return air ticket to Venice, and
     
funds calculated at average Continental
daily rates, as permitted by
    
HM.
Inland Revenue. We estimate ten days.

They remained mine sincerely.

It was Connie's godspeed. My hand shook as I signed the receipt.

The lad proudly burned off on his motorbike, with me standing
there looking at the air ticket with vision suddenly gone blurred. She hadn't
believed me one bit.

Bloody women, I thought, and locked up.

9

Venice. If you've never seen it you can't believe it. And when you
clap your eyes on it you still don't believe it.

I stood on the Riva waterfront utterly bemused. It really is
waterborne, floating in the sunlit mist of the lagoon. I've never seen anything
like it. Nor, incidentally, has anyone else.

Since meeting old Mr. Pinder, I'd read like a maniac. Even on the
plane to the Marco Polo International Airport— we'd left at an ungodly hour—I
was scrabbling through a potted history without gaining much. Clearly, the
little maritime republic founded on a mudbank on Friday, March 25, in the Year
of Our Lord 421 had done okay for itself. Venice had an eye for the old gelt.
But when I got to the bit about the Venetian calendar starting on March 1 and
Venetian days officially starting in the evening, I chucked it aside. I was
confused enough. I even started on my old Italian course notes, but what can
you do with a language where the words for "need" and "dream"
are so disturbingly similar? I chucked those aside too. My usual Lovejoy method
would have to do—osmosis, fingers crossed, and a penny map.

Like I said, pathetic.

The whole waterfront was on the go. Busy, busy. They were all
there, massive black and white tugs, barges, the water taxis, waterbuses—all
nudging the Riva. I must say, the poles to which they were moored looked
decidedly wobbly to me, but there was a jaunty confidence to the scene, as if
Venice had had that sort of useless criticism before and so what? Crowds ambled
around the
vaporetto
terminus.
Early-season tourists drifted, gazed at the souvenir stalls, peered into canals
from bridges.