The Talisman (55 page)

Alex arrived in New York and went straight to Ming’s apartment. She did not return until evening, and even then she had to make four or five business calls before she could sit and relax over dinner. Unable to divert her mind from work, she consistently questioned him about the business, about the club. Had they had good press coverage on the decor, had he brought any of the press cuttings with him? Alex took her hand, pulled her to him. ‘I’ve come here to get away from the club, away from business.’

Ming smiled, kissed him. ‘I’m sorry, but I have been with my accountants all day – it just gets to me sometimes, all the money I have to carve up and hand over to Edward – and for what? He doesn’t do a damned thing.’

Alex didn’t want to get into an argument with her, but he still made his own feelings quite plain. ‘Not quite that, Ming. He did front your business, and without him you might still be in the south of France.’

‘You know that is not true. I would have made it. Maybe not quite so fast, but I would, on my own – without Edward. You can tell him that, and you can also tell him I am about ready to buy him out of his share in the company as he agreed I could, if the time came.’

Alex released her hand and ran his mind back over Ming’s accounts. She must have been making a lot more money than she accounted for, because Alex knew precisely how much she was declaring.

Ming sensed his withdrawal, and she slipped on to his lap, kissing his neck. ‘You know, you should be my partner – is there any way you could get Edward to give you his contract, make it over to you? Don’t tell him it would be me buying him out, you do it, and then . . .’

Alex buried his face in her neck, kissing her softly, but his mind was racing. Could Edward have been right about her, was she out for all she could get? Did she really care for him? ‘Have you given any thought to getting married? We will have to tell Edward sooner or later . . . and then, well, I would like a son . . .’

He felt her tense in his arms, although she still held him, still stroked his cheek. ‘We’re just fine as we are, and, well, I don’t think I am really the maternal type . . . Did I tell you I have arranged for us to fly to Dallas? I’ve already made some drawings for Mrs Hunter Hardyman, and Alex . . . all I need is one good contact, she is like royalty out there, and rich.’

She slid off his knee, glowing as she told Alex that every time Barbara Hunter Hardyman drew breath she made a million. ‘I just need one intro, just one, then I can take it from there . . .’

Suddenly Alex felt tired, his head throbbed. He excused himself, saying he would just lie down for a while, it must be jet lag. Ming was very attentive, bringing him iced water and aspirin. She laid a cool cloth on his head, and he closed his eyes. She sat next to him, looking down into his handsome face as she spoke. Her voice was soft, distant. ‘Alex, I can’t have children, I’m sorry, I should have told you.’

He lay still with his eyes closed and said nothing. Eventually he felt her move from the bed and leave the room. He got up, opened his briefcase, took out his calculator and began to go over Ming’s accounts. If there were discrepancies, she had covered them, but still he felt uneasy, in some way betrayed. Edward’s voice echoed in his brain: ‘She’s old, she’ll never give you a family . . . she’s out for all she can get. You’re her meal-ticket, only you’re too dumb to realize it . . .’

Unconsciously Alex began to twist the gold medallion; it had become a habit when he was disturbed. He also thought that perhaps Ed had been right, just as he was right about so many things, almost as if he had second sight.

At breakfast the following morning Ming was as sweet as ever, teasing him that he had been in such a deep sleep that she had not liked to disturb him. She was dressed in a neat black suit over a white blouse with an Eton collar. She was ready to travel. Together they caught the flight to Dallas.

Ming had brought all the brochures for the auction, and she showed Alex the details of what they hoped was a bed. It was described as, ‘Various Kang table legs, made from Huang-Hua-Li wood, apron carved with dragon design’. There were also a number of other pieces from the same period, as the old billionaire had been a renowned collector. Alex was fascinated, and at last he began to relax, asking Ming what she knew of the Hunter Hardyman family. She told him they were oil barons, and what she had gleaned from the society columns. Then, as businesslike as ever, went on to say she had cabled the ranch, they were expecting him, and she had booked them into a hotel, in adjoining rooms. She laughed. ‘We may be in luck, we are three weeks ahead of the auction and the valuation officers are still there. They have been sent from both Sotheby’s and Christie’s, but I am sure if you offer the right price you will get the pieces, everything, everyone, has a price . . .’

Alex looked at her, then turned to stare out of the plane window. He wondered if Ming, too, had her price.

On their arrival in Dallas, they booked into the exclusive Del-a-Mare Hotel, then hired a helicopter to take them on to the Hunter Hardyman ranch. Ming handed Alex a local newspaper with an article marked for him to read.

Already there had been some press coverage of Alex’s visit, and he knew Ming must have organized it as the article said that Alex Barkley, the previous owner of one of the most magnificent châteaux in France, was in New York to discuss further projects with Ming, the successful and most sought-after designer, and to talk about possible residence in Texas. He had to hand it to Ming, she wasted no time, and already the hotel desk clerk was passing him numerous invitations from Texan high society, requesting his presence at charity balls.

‘Well, you have been a busy girl . . .’ He couldn’t help feeling irritated, and his mood worsened when she took the invitations and sifted through them.

‘Good, this is good. I will make sure my secretary sends them my own brochures, there is a property boom over here, perhaps you should think about buying some land.’

Again Alex had that niggling feeling at the pit of his stomach, but he said nothing.

They had been travelling for over three-quarters of an hour when Alex asked the pilot, Jeff, how far it was to the Hunter Hardyman ranch. He shouted back over his shoulder. ‘We’ve been over their land for the past ten minutes. Far as the eye can see, everything from now on belonged to the old man . . . He was one helluva guy, take a look below and you’ll see what I mean.’

Alex was stunned. There were hundreds of square miles of land from which rose oil wells and refineries, buildings with bright-red letters twenty or thirty feet high saying, ‘Hunter Hardyman’. They flew over what looked like silver-topped warehouses, but were actually aeroplane hangars. Alex shouted to the pilot, ‘Those hangars filled with private planes, Jeff?’

‘Hell, no, they’re filled to the rafters with stuffed animals. The old guy was the last of the great white hunters, crammed the place with all his trophies. There are more stuffed tigers in there than they got left in the goddamn jungles . . . They say he was after the white buffalo, an’ shot everything in sight hopin’ it’d be the poor bastard . . . Okay, now you’re hittin’ their cattle land, look, far as the eye can see, and it’s still Hardyman land. And off to the right, that’s the biggest tile factory in the United States, ships them all over the world . . . More cattle coming up on your left . . . An’ up ahead you see the herd of horses, thoroughbreds all of ’em – you ever seen a herd like it?’

As they flew on and on, the overpowering wealth of Hunter Hardyman began to dawn on Alex. He had thought himself rich – now he was seeing wealth beyond his wildest dreams.

‘You can see the oil wells, the fields stretch for two hundred miles east, see the pylons?’

Coming into view in the distance, rising out of the heat haze, was a sprawling ranch house, four storeys high with eight white pillars before an arched entrance. Miles of velvety lawns were sprayed constantly with water to keep them lush and green. A vast swimming pool at the side of the house was surrounded by changing rooms, a barbecue and a tiled patio. Sunbeds with brightly coloured canopies littered the poolside. Alex’s stomach lurched as the ’copter began its descent. Now he could make out the guards patrolling the white perimeter fence.

‘Are those guards armed, Jeff?’

‘Yep, sure thing, sir. They got a hundred of ’em, the old boy was paranoid about kidnapping . . . Okay, here we go, buckle up and sit tight.’

Way below them by the Olympic-size swimming pool, two figures lay sunbathing. Ming stared down at them through a pair of binoculars, then turned to Alex. ‘I think they must be her daughters, she has two. She’s divorced now . . . she must be older than I thought, they look quite old. Here, do you want to see?’ She offered him the binoculars, but he refused, and she began to survey the ranch.

‘Oh, by the way, she’s called Mrs Taverner, Barbara Taverner.’

The entrance hall was so vast it could have been a ballroom, with a tiled floor and marble in such profusion it dazzled the eye. Alex found the hall cool, almost cold, the chill of the marble adding to the effect of the air conditioning. No servant appeared to greet them. She looked at Alex and shrugged. The crystal chandelier, out of place in the ranch house, tinkled in the cool air.

Three men wearing light suits and open-necked shirts, with their ties pulled loose, appeared through double doors from a room off the hall. Alex introduced himself, but the men seemed none too interested. Alex was not prepared to turn round and go back after coming all this way. The men were about to move on. Firmly, Ming took charge. ‘Mr Barkley cabled from New York that we would be here, surely there must be a secretary, someone we could speak to?’

One of the men hesitated, and Alex cornered him. ‘Would it be possible for me to look at the pieces I am interested in?’

The man pointed towards the room he had just left, and said that Alex should talk to their head man, Mr Dean.

They were taken aback by the appalling taste of the vast lounge. Although the place was cluttered with boxes, and various pieces of furniture had been dragged to the centre of the room, the awful decor was obvious. The room was dominated by a painting of a man with white hair, wearing a linen suit that even in the painting looked crumpled.

‘That’s the old man himself, impressive, isn’t he?’

Alex made a point of charming Mr Dean, and was given a brief rundown on the family. Mr Dean was the head man from Sotheby’s – pleasant, open-faced and balding, sweating even with the air conditioning and constantly wiping his head.

‘The old boy seems to have had various families, no one can quite work out the intricacies of the family feuds. But after he died there were three women and three families grabbing . . . he lost his sons in a plane crash, perhaps you read about it? The fortune’s been divided up and this place left to a granddaughter. Have you met Mrs Taverner? Well, she wants this place sold as fast as possible – hates it, and hated him from what I’ve heard. But it means we are working night and day to get everything catalogued and ready for the auction.’

Alex chose his words carefully. First, he asked about Hunter Hardyman’s china collection, and Dean told him they had not even started assessing that yet. The porcelain experts were flying in next day, and in the meantime the men were just listing the articles. The pricing would be done by the experts. Alex mentioned the lists he had already seen.

‘Yes, but they’re incomplete – there’s fifty times more than that. We had no idea the job would take so long. You know the ranch itself is up for sale? Are you interested?’

Alex was not interested, and there was nothing worth looking at in this room. Somehow he had to steer the conversation around to the seventeenth-century furniture. ‘I’m wanting to have a look at a couple of pieces – not of immense value, but I’m just starting my collection . . . You think I could take a look at items 500 and 600?’

Dean was no fool. He smiled at Alex. ‘They’re in the dining hall, but I have to tell you, they’ve not even been valued yet.’

Alex said he would still like just a quick look at them, and eventually Dean led him from the room.

Alex followed him through the double doors at the far end of the room and down a long corridor. When they reached the far end, Mr Dean looked over his shoulder, then unlocked the door. ‘I would have liked to have been at his funeral, rumour has it a couple of the old boy’s ex-wives turned up, and all hell broke loose.’ He lowered his voice to a confidential tone, ‘He was a real money-grubbing old buzzard – made his fortune from scrap, bought land, and the rest is history, but I’ve never met anyone who has a good word to say for him. And he was paranoid, believed everyone was trying to kidnap him. That’s why the place is wired up like a fortress. There are more bells and wires around this place than Fort Knox . . . Freezing in here.’

The room was dark, shuttered, and there was the icy blast of air conditioning. ‘Old man kept the place ice cold, at least he knew that much. The pieces in here are in excellent condition, and some of it he never even used. There’s a Queen Anne desk over there – in all my life I have never seen one in such condition. Look, would you mind if I leave you, come back in a few minutes? I still have a lot to do.’

The door closed behind him, and Alex stared around the cold, draped room. Just one look told him that Dean was right. Even to Alex’s untrained eye some of the furniture was indeed special. He searched around for the seventeenth-century pieces, lifting cover after cover away from highly polished Queen Anne, Tudor, Victorian chairs, desks and card tables, but he could not find the treasures he had travelled so far to see. Frustrated, he was about to give up when he saw a chair in a corner, piled high with old newspapers. Removing the papers, he stood back.

The yoke-back armchair, Huang-Hua-Li hardwood with a perfect matted seat, was in superb condition. Alex got down on his knees to touch the smooth wood. Then he spotted the legs of a bench seat, horseshoe-shaped, and he knew it was the same period. Excitedly, he uncovered three more pieces, and began to think he might be right, somewhere here there might just be the most sought-after article for any collector, a bed.