False Picture Read online

  Maggie had turned on her computer, while still talking on her phone. Bea went through the tiny vestibule and out into the open air at the bottom of the steps. Maggie’s perky little bay tree was doing well, and the steps were swept every day. The green recycling box was there, and the bag with paper for recycling was in it. Good.

  Not so good was the fact that the most important letters were not in it. Including the ones from the taxman and the solicitor.

  The rain had turned to a mild sort of drizzle.

  Bea went back inside and stood over Maggie till the girl looked up from her phone call and realized something was up. She told her caller to hold on a moment and smiled up at Bea, all eager beaver.

  ‘Maggie, have you been doing some shredding?’

  ‘Uh-huh. Anything with our details on it. OK?’

  During his time in the office Max had bought a new shredder, one that turned paper into confetti, and not strips. Bea closed her eyes for a moment. She told herself it wasn’t Maggie’s fault. The girl had merely been doing her job.

  It was Bea’s fault, and heaven alone knew how she was going to get out of this one. A grovelling letter to the taxman for a start. That is, if she could remember which tax office she was supposed to be dealing with, which she couldn’t. Perhaps there was something in the back files … oh, and the solicitor’s letter must be attended to, somehow.

  ‘Maggie, how would you like to go undercover on a special job?’

  They dragged Oliver away from his computer and sat in Bea’s office with the lights on, for the rain hadn’t let up.

  Bea opened the packet Velma had given her, and extracted the cheque. She hid the shock which the total gave her, and put it in her top drawer without comment. Nevertheless the amount made her pulse beat fast. Why, it would cover almost all the bill from the tax people and wouldn’t that be a good thing!

  She emptied everything else out of the envelope on to the desk. ‘We’ve been asked, as a special favour, to undertake an investigation into an incident in which an elderly lady died. It may have been an accident, or manslaughter, or murder. The death was reported last week. Here’s the cutting from last Friday’s local paper.’

  Bea laid it on the desk and they both leaned forward to read the print, and look at the Forties-style photograph of a glamorous blonde.

  ‘But we don’t “do” that sort of thing,’ said Maggie.

  Oliver gave her a sharp look. ‘It would make a change from finding people a new nanny or housekeeper.’ Oliver liked a challenge.

  Bea hid a smile. ‘That’s an old photograph. The subject was Lady Farne, widow of a man who left her very well off. When she died she was in her eighties, reclusive, miserly, sitting on a fortune in antiques in a large flat nearby. Oliver, would you like to see if you can dig up a more recent photograph and any other information about her? I expect there were obituaries in some of the better class papers.’

  Oliver nodded. ‘It says the death was due to a burglary that went wrong.’ He flicked at the paper. ‘There’s a lot about her lurid life, but hardly anything about her death.’

  ‘The police are probably working through their list of professional burglars who might have had a go.’ Bea teased out another photograph from the pile. ‘You don’t need to know who our client is for the moment but she’s done a good job assembling information for us. She suspects that a family member called Philip Weston knows more about the death than he should.’

  Bea glanced sharply up at her two assistants. Oliver, swarthy, fidgety, still wet behind the ears, had a good memory and a clever mind. His eyes narrowed and sought Bea’s. She could see him notching up the information that a Mrs Velma Weston was one of Bea’s friends. He’d made the connection all right.

  Maggie hadn’t. She was grinning at the photo Bea was holding up for them to see. ‘Grrr … just my type; tall, dark and handsome.’

  Bea wondered if they were talking about the same photo, because to her Philip Weston looked very average, rather ordinary, perhaps a bit weak about the mouth. Discontented. ‘You can’t tell his height from a head and shoulders photo.’

  ‘You can from this description, though,’ said Oliver, who had pounced on a handwritten note in the pile. ‘Five ten, dark, clean-shaven, dresses formally except at weekends when he shifts into casual gear. Works out at the local Virgin Active gym, no particular girlfriend, no car. Wonder if he’s gay.’

  Bea hadn’t thought of that.

  ‘He’s not gay,’ said Maggie, still focused on the photo.

  Oliver flicked a glance at Bea, and looked away. Would Maggie know if he were?

  ‘The thing is,’ said Bea, ‘that our client would like Maggie to take up a vacancy in the flat where Philip lives. Get him to talk about himself, his finances, that sort of thing. Particularly his finances. Apparently he doesn’t get on very well with the other people in the flat, so a bit of sympathy from a nice girl like Maggie should do the trick, right?’

  Maggie punched the air. ‘Do I go in as myself, or under another name?’

  ‘As yourself. You’ve been project-managing the make-over of the agency rooms here and that’s your day job, but you need to crash out somewhere else at night. Stick to the truth about yourself. If asked, tell them about your ex-husband, how he did the dirty on you with the bimbo from the telly, that you haven’t yet got the money from your half of the marital flat, that you went home when the marriage first broke down and then moved in as a lodger here, but need your own space and so on and so forth.’

  ‘Couldn’t I invent another name for myself? “Maggie” is so, well, ordinary.’

  ‘Mrs Abbot’s right,’ said Oliver. ‘If you tried to call yourself something else, you’d be bound to forget and they’d notice.’

  ‘Boring, boring,’ chanted Maggie.

  ‘Maybe,’ said Bea, through gritted teeth, ‘but I agree with Oliver. Now Mrs Weston is going to fix it for you with the estate agents, pay your deposit and a month’s rent in advance. She would like you to move in tomorrow’ – and the good Lord knows, I’d like it too, thought Bea – ‘but only if you think you can pack up and move there in time.’

  ‘Where is it?’

  Oliver had been shuffling through the remaining paperwork. ‘It’s one of those flats in that old block that faces on to Kensington High Street. You are to share a large bedroom and bathroom with another girl. It’s not far. I could help you over there with your suitcase tomorrow morning, if you like.’

  ‘All you have to do,’ said Bea, having guilty thoughts about pushing the girl in at the deep end of what might prove to be a very murky pool, ‘is act naturally. You’re a working girl, been around a bit but not too much. Listen and learn everything you can about Philip. Go out for a drink with him, that sort of thing. Turn up here every morning when it’s time to open up the agency, and tell us what you’ve found out. That’s all.’

  Maggie was so excited that she had to get up and dance around. ‘I’m going to be an undercover agent, I’m going to be a star in my own movie!’

  Again Oliver and Bea flicked glances at one another, and disengaged.

  ‘Don’t overdo it,’ said Oliver. ‘Remember, this guy may have killed an old lady.’

  ‘Oh, surely not, he looks such a sweetie,’ said Maggie.

  Bea sighed. Maggie never had been a good judge of character, had she? Bea was having second, third and fourth thoughts about this. ‘Maggie, Oliver’s right. You are not there to investigate anything. You’re there to gather impressions and pass them on to us. Keep your mobile with you at all times, and keep it charged. Walk out of there the moment you feel uneasy. Understood?’

  ‘I’m going to be an undercover star,’ carolled Maggie, waltzing herself out of the room and up the stairs. As the thunder of her footsteps receded, Oliver sat back in his chair and sighed.

  ‘I’ll sign up at the gym he visits, see if I can get close to him there. Just in case he is gay.’

  Bea blinked. What had brought this on? The idea of this unde
r-sized geek working out in a gym had its funny side, but for the life of her she wouldn’t hurt his feelings by showing amusement. Now she came to think of it, this was a better solution than she could have thought up by herself to get him out of the house.

  ‘It’ll be pricey, but yes; you do that and I’ll pay the fees.’

  Oliver shook his head. ‘Let me. I’d rather.’

  Bea stifled an impulse to tell him not to be silly. She reminded herself that he was growing up, a bit. Now and then. She must let him pay for himself if he wished to do so. ‘Very well.’ She shuffled the paperwork back into its envelope. Now she’d manoeuvred Maggie out of the house, she was inclined to think she’d done the wrong thing. ‘I wonder if I ought to have asked Maggie to do this. I suspect she’ll fall in love with Philip because she likes his looks and thinks we’ve got a “down” on him.’

  ‘You can’t stop her now.’

  Bea knew she couldn’t. She rose to her feet, stretching her back, grimacing. This damp weather reminded her to keep doing her exercises, or she’d get sciatica again. ‘Oliver, do you know anything about pre-Raphaelite painters, Millais in particular?’

  His head snapped round to her, and he gnawed at his lower lip. ‘There’s a good reason? I’ll look him up on the internet.’

  ‘You might try looking up Lady Farne at the same time, and perhaps even more important, see if you can track down any of the purchases her husband made, antiques, pictures, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Pictures equals Millais?’ He stood, his movements precise. He looked like an office boy on his first day in the job and could have walked into a position at NASA if brains were the only criterion.

  Bea nodded. ‘Pictures equals Millais. Specifically portraits in oils. I think perhaps I might take a trip to the library, see if I can track down a book with some reproductions in it, while you research the Farne collection.’

  Dark eyebrows peaked. ‘The burglar stole a Millais?’

  Bea backtracked. ‘I don’t know. Maybe. We need more information about – oh, everything. Meanwhile, is there anything I ought to know about on the agency side? Complaints, letters missing, solicitors in a rage, that sort of thing?’

  He reached in his pocket for his notebook, snapped back the band, frowned at the notes he’d made. ‘Well, yes …’

  She had second thoughts. If she told him the stupid thing she’d done with the tax return, he’d never look up to her again. ‘Oh, never mind. Agency stuff will have to be put on one side for the time being. Maggie’s been keeping the filing under control, hasn’t she? Oh, and she did say she’d got some quotes for a make-over down here. Will you get her to give them to me before she goes?’

  Oliver frowned at his notebook. ‘There is just one thing I wanted to ask you about—’

  Bea tried to sound off-hand. ‘How are we fixed for cash, in case a big bill comes in?’ The bill for income tax, for instance.

  Maggie erupted into the room. ‘Ta-da! Will this do?’ She struck a pose to show off enormous dark glasses, a blonde chin-length wig, a beaded black top, rather too skimpy for her slender figure, and what looked like a short evening skirt in fuschia pink. She glittered with excitement.

  Bea restrained an exclamation of horror and aimed for a kind, affectionate tone of voice. ‘I think that might be a bit overwhelming, don’t you, Oliver? Maggie, you’re meant to be a professional woman. A good white T-shirt and jeans, perhaps?’

  Maggie’s face disintegrated. Was she going to cry? ‘Is it the wig? My hair’s so short now I often wear this in the evenings when I go out to the pub.’ She’d cut off her own long hair a while back but the artist at Bea’s hair salon had contrived her a neat cap of a pleasing auburn colour, which Maggie had pronounced ‘Just not me!’.

  ‘Yes, but …’ Bea ignored Oliver, who was snorting into his notebook. ‘Bear with me, dear. I know you can do “flamboyant” very well but I think in this case it might be better to try to appear ordinary, just till you’ve sussed out the other tenants of the flat.’

  ‘Must I?’ Maggie’s beautiful eyes – really her only claim to beauty – starred with tears.

  ‘I’ll lend you something, shall I?’ Bea had often found herself lending some of her classic garments in restrained colours to Maggie of late. ‘It’s about time I bought myself some new clothes, anyway. I usually …’ She controlled herself with an effort, trying to smile. ‘Hamilton always used to take me away for a week or so to Bruges at this time of the year. There’s a good clothes shop there … and … well, enough of that!’

  ‘You should go again, why not?’ said Maggie. ‘You deserve a holiday.’

  ‘I wouldn’t like to go by myself. Lose the disguise dear, while Oliver and I finish the routine jobs.’

  Maggie flounced out. Oliver, grinning, licked his finger and turned over a page. ‘About our finances. There are a couple of bad debts left over from Mr Max’s time. Shall I organize solicitor’s letters? But even more important—’

  ‘Everything else can wait.’

  Bea looked out of the window through the drizzle to the stately sycamore at the end of the garden, and through that to the graceful spire of the church beyond. She was worried about Max. A member of parliament had certain living expenses both in his constituency and here in London, where the rent of a flat was one of the biggest problems. Max’s wife was no thrifty housewife and mention of his finances recently made him look haggard. He had hoped that Bea would retire to the South Coast and leave her valuable Kensington house to him, but that was the last thing Bea wanted to do. Had Max got into a mess, moneywise, and used the money which was supposed to pay the tax bill?

  Bea rubbed her neck. Then there was the lost solicitor’s letter, which had been somewhat more than faintly alarming. What had their name been? Wasn’t there some saint or other, probably Italian, that the faithful used to invoke to find lost property? She couldn’t for the life of her remember his name, and it would have been useful at this moment. The nearest she could get to it was, If there’s someone up there, and I do believe there is – well, most of the time I do, and Hamilton certainly did – then could you please help me out of this mess? I know it’s entirely my own fault that I’ve lost these papers, but … well, that’s it, really. Please.

  Oliver was looking at her with a degree of impatience. Had he asked her a question, and she hadn’t heard it? ‘Sorry, Oliver. Wool-gathering. There were some letters in the post this morning that … no, we won’t bother with them now. Let’s have a look at those quotes Maggie got for us, and call it a day.’

  The phone rang as she followed Oliver out of the door, so she went back to answer it.

  Velma. ‘It’s all fixed up. Maggie can move in any time after six this evening. Tell her to ask for someone called Charlotte who’s responsible for the lease. Must rush; Sandy’s tummy pains are getting worse, and I’m taking him down to the hospital to get him seen to. Give me a ring when Maggie’s moved in, won’t you?’

  The line went dead.

  Bea cradled the phone, thinking that she now knew what it was like to stand in the middle of a rushing stream, lose your footing and get borne seawards. She wasn’t, unfortunately, a particularly good swimmer.

  Rafael left work with a slight headache. There was so much to think about at the moment, what with the invitations to the new exhibition at the gallery going out late, having to find a new carrier and Philip’s refusal to sell him the picture.

  On the other hand, it had occurred to him that Charlotte would make the perfect mule to carry the goods out of the country for him. Mind you, she was a squawker; heaven only knew how she got on at the library because when the flood-gates opened, she never stopped. Now she was agitating because another girl was going to move into the flat and the place was a tip. Fine. The rent would be shared between five and not four, which would please Liam and Zander, both of whom were perpetually short of money.

  Better get Liam to calm her down. Liam didn’t fancy Charlotte much, but he’d do as he was tol
d for a bonus.

  Rafael had an amusing thought. He had more stuff to move than Charlotte could feasibly take without asking questions. He’d have a look at the new girl; if she was anything like Charlotte, he could use her, too.

  It was worrying, though, that Philip had disappeared with the picture after their little chat the other night. The picture had been genuine enough, though Rafael had told Philip it was just a good copy worth a couple of hundred at most.

  The boy had wavered, tried to beat the price up. Perhaps it had been a mistake to threaten him? Rafael had only shown him his knife to help the deal along, and he’d had no real intention of using it, but Philip had been drinking too hard to realize that.

  If it hadn’t been for the little girl with the waist-length hair that Rafael had been chatting up, he’d have stuck by Philip till a sale had been concluded. It had been a mistake to leave him behind in the pub to go on drinking, but who’d have thought he’d have done a midnight flit?

  However, all was not lost. Philip hadn’t the brains to hide properly, nor the money. He’d be back, and when he returned it would be curtains and not pictures for him, right?

  Three

  Friday afternoon to evening

  Bea tried to get hold of Max up in the Midlands, got through to his PA and left a message for him to phone her urgently. His PA didn’t sound very encouraging; Max was out at some constituency function and would be going on to another meeting early that evening. In other words, don’t hold your breath, Mrs Abbot.

  How do you attract the notice of a busy man like Max, who felt the burden of the Party resting on his shoulders, even though he was a mere foot soldier and might never be anything more? That tax demand …

  Answer; you ring his wife. Bea didn’t actively dislike the over-thin Nicole, but she didn’t cherish warm feelings towards her, either. But needs must. Nicole wasn’t at the house her parents had bought for them. She would be out to lunch with her friends, or perhaps at Max’s side at a constituency event, smiling and not meaning it. Bea dug out Nicole’s mobile number, and rang. Her phone was switched off. Bea left a message, trying to keep calm, trying not to shout. There was no doubt about it, she was thoroughly on edge.