Beggars Banquet (collection)

by Ian Rankin

  We were judicious, Jance and I. We chose our works with care. One or two a year – we never got greedy. The choice would depend on a combination of factors. We didn’t want artists who were too well known, but we wanted them dead if possible. (I had a fear of an artist coming to inspect his work at the Tate and finding a copy instead.) There had to be a buyer – a private collector, who would keep the work private. We couldn’t have a painting being loaned to some collection or exhibition when it was supposed to be safely tucked away in the vaults of the Tate. Thankfully, as I’d expected, Jance seemed to know his market. We never had any problems on that score. But there was another factor. Every now and then, there would be requests from exhibitions for the loan of a painting – one we’d copied. But as curator, I would find reasons why the work in question had to remain at the Tate, and might offer, by way of consolation, some other work instead.

  Then there was the matter of rotation. Now and again – as had to be the case, or suspicion might grow – one of the copies would have to grace the walls of the gallery proper. Those were worrying times, and I was careful to position the works in the least flattering, most shadowy locations, usually with a much more interesting picture nearby, to lure the spectator away. I would watch the browsers. Once or twice, an art student would come along and sketch the copied work. No one ever showed a moment’s doubt, and my confidence grew.

  But then… then…

  We had loaned works out before, of course – I’d told the dinner party as much. This or that cabinet minister might want something for the office, something to impress visitors. There would be discussions about a suitable work. It was the same with particular benefactors. They could be loaned a painting for weeks or even months. But I was always careful to steer prospective borrowers away from the twenty or so copies. It wasn’t as though there was any lack of choice: for each copy, there were fifty other paintings they could have. The odds, as Jance had assured me more than once, were distinctly in our favour.

  Until the day the Prime Minister came to call.

  This is a man who knows as much about art as I do about home brewing. There is almost a glee about his studious ignorance – and not merely of art. But he was walking around the Tate, for all the world like a dowager around a department store, and not seeing what he wanted.

  ‘Voore,’ he said at last. I thought I’d misheard him. ‘Ronny Voore. I thought you had a couple.’

  My eyes took in his entourage, not one of whom would know a Ronny Voore if it blackballed them at the Garrick. But my superior was there, nodding slightly, so I nodded with him.

  ‘They’re not out at the moment,’ I told the PM.

  ‘You mean they’re in?’ He smiled, provoking a few fawning laughs.

  ‘In storage,’ I explained, trying out my own smile.

  ‘I’d like one for Number Ten.’

  I tried to form some argument – they were being cleaned, restored, loaned to Philadelphia – but my superior was nodding again. And after all, what did the PM know about art? Besides, only one of our Voores was a fake.

  ‘Certainly, Prime Minister. I’ll arrange for it to be sent over.’

  ‘Which one?’

  I licked my lips. ‘Did you have one in mind?’

  He considered, lips puckered. ‘Maybe I should just have a little look…’

  Normally, there were no visitors to the storerooms. But that morning, there were a dozen of us posed in front of Shrew Reclining and Herbert in Motion. Voore was very good with titles. I’ll swear, if you look at them long enough, you really can see – beyond the gobbets of oil, the pasted-on photographs and cinema stubs, the splash of emulsion and explosion of colour – the figures of a large murine creature and a man running.

  The Prime Minister gazed at them in something short of thrall. ‘Is it “shrew” as in Shakespeare?’

  ‘No, sir, I think it’s the rodent.’

  He thought about this. ‘Vibrant colours,’ he decided.

  ‘Extraordinary,’ my superior agreed.

  ‘One can’t help feeling the influence of pop art,’ one of the minions drawled. I managed not to choke: it was like saying one could see in Beryl Cook the influence of Picasso.

  The PM turned to the senior minion. ‘I don’t know, Charles. What do you think?’

  ‘The shrew, I think.’

  My heart leapt. The Prime Minister nodded, then pointed to Herbert in Motion. ‘That one, I think.’

  Charles looked put out, while those around him tried to hide smiles. It was a calculated put-down, a piece of politics on the PM’s part. Politics had decided.

  A fake Ronny Voore would grace the walls of Number 10 Downing Street.

  I supervised the packing and transportation. It was a busy week for me: I was negotiating the loan of several Rothkos for an exhibition of early works. Faxes and insurance appraisals were flying. American institutions were very touchy about lending stuff. I’d had to promise a Braque to one museum – and for three months at that – in exchange for one of Rothko’s less inspired creations. Anyway, despite headaches, when the Voore went to its new home, I went with it.

  I’d discussed the loan with Jance. He’d told me to switch the copy for some other painting, persisting that ‘no one would know’.

  ‘He’ll know,’ I’d said. ‘He wanted a Voore. He knew what he wanted.’

  ‘But why?’

  Good question, and I’d yet to find the answer. I’d hoped for a first-floor landing or some nook or cranny out of the general view, but the staff seemed to know exactly where the painting was to hang – something else had been removed so that it could take pride of place in the dining-room. (Or one of the dining-rooms, I couldn’t be sure how many there were. I’d thought I’d be entering a house, but Number 10 was a warren, a veritable Tardis, with more passageways and offices than I could count.)

  I was asked if I wanted a tour of the premises, so as to view the other works of art, but by that time my head really did ache, and I decided to walk back to the Tate, making it as far as Millbank before I had to rest beside the river, staring down at its sludgy flow. The question had yet to be answered: why did the PM want a Ronny Voore? Who in their right mind wanted a Ronny Voore these days?

  The answer, of course, came with the telephone call.

  Joe Hefferwhite was an important man. He had been a senator at one time. He was now regarded as a ‘senior statesman’, and the American President sent him on the occasional high-profile, high-publicity spot of troubleshooting and conscience-salving. At one point in his life, he’d been mooted for president himself, but of course his personal history had counted against him. In younger days, Hefferwhite had been a bohemian. He’d spent time in Paris, trying to be a poet. He’d walked a railway line with Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady. Then he’d come into enough money to buy his way into politics, and had prospered there.

  I knew a bit about him from some background reading I’d done in the recent past. Not that I’d been interested in Joseph Hefferwhite… but I’d been very interested in Ronny Voore.

  The two men had met at Stanford initially, then later on had met again in Paris. They’d kept in touch thereafter, drifting apart only after ‘Heff ’ had decided on a political career. There had been arguments about the hippie culture, dropping out, Vietnam, radical chic – the usual sixties US issues. Then in 1974 Ronny Voore had laid down on a fresh white canvas, stuck a gun in his mouth, and gifted the world his final work. His reputation, which had vacillated in life, had been given a boost by the manner of his suicide. I wondered if I could make the same dramatic exit. But no, I was not the dramatic type. I foresaw sleeping pills and a bottle of decent brandy.

  After the party.

  I was wearing my green Armani, hoping it would disguise the condemned look in my eyes. Joe Hefferwhite had known Voore, had seen his style and working practice at first hand. That was why the PM had wanted a Voore: to impress the American. Or perhaps to honour his presence in some way. A political move, as far from ae
sthetics as one could wander. The situation was not without irony: a man with no artistic sensibility, a man who couldn’t tell his Warhol from his Whistler… this man was to be my downfall.

  I hadn’t dared tell Jance. Let him find out for himself afterwards, once I’d made my exit. I’d left a letter. It was sealed, marked Personal, and addressed to my superior. I didn’t owe Gregory Jance anything, but hadn’t mentioned him in the letter. I hadn’t even listed the copied works – let them set other experts on them. It would be interesting to see if any other fakes had found their way into the permanent collection.

  Only of course I wouldn’t be around for that.

  Number 10 sparkled. Every surface was gleaming, and the place seemed nicely undersized for the scale of the event. The PM moved amongst his guests, dispensing a word here and there, guided by the man he’d called Charles. Charles would whisper a brief to the PM as they approached a group, so the PM would know who was who and how to treat them. I was way down the list apparently, standing on my own (though a minion had attempted to engage me in conversation: it seemed a rule that no guest was to be allowed solitude), pretending to examine a work by someone eighteenth-century and Flemish – not my sort of thing at all.

  The PM shook my hand. ‘I’ve someone I’d like you to meet,’ he said, looking back over his shoulder to where Joe Hefferwhite was standing, rocking back on his heels as he told some apparently hilarious story to two grinning civil servants who had doubtless been given their doting orders.

  ‘Joseph Hefferwhite,’ the PM said.

  As if I didn’t know; as if I hadn’t been avoiding the man for the past twenty-eight minutes. I knew I couldn’t leave – would be reminded of that should I try – until the PM had said hello. It was a question of protocol. This was all that had kept me from going. But now I was determined to escape. The PM, however, had other plans. He waved to Joe Hefferwhite like they were old friends, and Hefferwhite broke short his story – not noticing the relief on his listeners’ faces – and swaggered towards us. The PM was leading me by the shoulder – gently, though it seemed to me that his grip burned – over towards where the Voore hung. A table separated us from it, but it was an occasional table, and we weren’t too far from the canvas. Serving staff moved around with salvers of canapés and bottles of fizz, and I took a refill as Hefferwhite approached.

  ‘Joe, this is our man from the Tate.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ Hefferwhite said, pumping my free hand. He winked at the PM. ‘Don’t think I hadn’t noticed the painting. It’s a nice touch.’

  ‘We have to make our guests feel welcome. The Tate has another Voore, you know.’

  ‘Is that so?’

  Charles was whispering in the PM’s ear. ‘Sorry, have to go,’ the PM said. ‘I’ll leave you two to it then.’ And with a smile he was gone, drifting towards his next encounter.

  Joe Hefferwhite smiled at me. He was in his seventies, but extraordinarily well preserved, with thick dark hair that could have been a weave or a transplant. I wondered if anyone had ever mentioned to him his resemblance to Blake Carrington…

  He leaned towards me. ‘This place bugged?’

  I blinked, decided I’d heard him correctly, and said I wouldn’t know.

  ‘Well, hell, doesn’t matter to me if it is. Listen,’ he nodded towards the painting, ‘that is some kind of sick joke, don’t you think?’

  I swallowed. ‘I’m not sure I follow.’

  Hefferwhite took my arm and led me around the table, so we were directly in front of the painting. ‘Ronny was my friend. He blew his brains out. Your Prime Minister thinks I want to be reminded of that? I think this is supposed to tell me something.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m not sure. It’ll take some thinking. You British are devious bastards.’

  ‘I feel I should object to that.’

  Hefferwhite ignored me. ‘Ronny painted the first version of Herbert in Paris, ’forty-nine or ’fifty.’ He frowned. ‘Must’ve been ’fifty. Know who Herbert was?’ He was studying the painting now. At first, his eyes flicked over it. Then he stared a little harder, picking out that section and this, concentrating.

  ‘Who?’ The champagne flute shook in my hand. Death, I thought, would come as some relief. And not a moment too soon.

  ‘Some guy we shared rooms with, never knew his second name. He said second names were shackles. Not like Malcolm X and all that, Herbert was white, nicely brought-up. Wanted to study Sartre, wanted to write plays and films and I don’t know what. Jesus, I’ve often wondered what happened to him. I know Ronny did, too.’ He sniffed, lifted a canapé from a passing tray and shoved it into his mouth. ‘Anyway,’ he said through the crumbs, ‘Herbert – he didn’t like us calling him Herb – he used to go out running. Healthy body, healthy mind, that was his creed. He’d go out before dawn, usually just as we were going to bed. Always wanted us to go with him, said we’d see the world differently after a run.’ He smiled at the memory, looked at the painting again. ‘That’s him running along the Seine, only the river’s filled with philosophers and their books, all drowning.’

  He kept looking at the painting, and I could feel the memories welling in him. I let him look. I wanted him to look. It was more his painting than anyone’s. I could see that now. I knew I should say something… like, ‘that’s very interesting’, or ‘that explains so much’. But I didn’t. I stared at the painting, too, and it was as though we were alone in that crowded, noisy room. We might have been on a desert island, or in a time machine. I saw Herbert running, saw his hunger. I saw his passion for questions and the seeking out of answers. I saw why philosophers always failed, and why they went on trying despite the fact. I saw the whole bloody story. And the colours: they were elemental, but they were of the city, too. They were Paris, not long after the war, the recuperating city. Blood and sweat and the simple, feral need to go on living.

  To go on living.

  My eyes were filling with water. I was about to say something crass, something like ‘thank you’, but Hefferwhite beat me to it, leaned towards me so his voice could drop to a whisper.

  ‘It’s a hell of a fake.’

  And with that, and a pat on my shoulder, he drifted back into the party.

  ‘I could have died,’ I told Jance. It was straight afterwards. I was still wearing the Armani, pacing the floor of my flat. It’s not much – third floor, two bedrooms, Maida Vale – but I was happy to see it. I could hardly get the tears out of my eyes. The telephone was in my hand… I just had to tell some body, and who could I tell but Jance?

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you’ve never asked about the client.’

  ‘I didn’t want to know. Jance, I swear to God, I nearly died.’

  He chuckled, not really understanding. He was in Zurich, sounded further away still. ‘I knew Joe already had a couple of Voores,’ he said. ‘He’s got some other stuff too – but he doesn’t broadcast the fact. That’s why he was perfect for Herbert in Motion.’

  ‘But he was talking about not wanting to be reminded of the suicide.’

  ‘He was talking about why the painting was there.’

  ‘He thought it must be a message.’

  Jance sighed. ‘Politics. Who understands politics?’

  I sighed with him. ‘I can’t do this any more.’

  ‘Don’t blame you. I never understood why you started in the first place.’

  ‘Let’s say I lost faith.’

  ‘Me, I never had much to start with. Listen, you haven’t told anyone else?’

  ‘Who would I tell?’ My mouth dropped open. ‘But I left a note.’

  ‘A note?’

  ‘For my boss.’

  ‘Might I suggest you go retrieve it?’

  Beginning to tremble all over again, I went out in search of a taxi.

  The night security people knew who I was, and let me into the building. I’d worked there before at night – it was the only time I could strip and replace the canvases.

&n
bsp; ‘Busy tonight, eh?’ the guard said.

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Busy tonight,’ he repeated. ‘Your boss is already in.’

  ‘When did he arrive?’

  ‘Not five minutes ago. He was running.’

  ‘Running?’

  ‘Said he needed a pee.’

  I ran too, ran as fast as I could through the galleries and towards the offices, the paintings a blur either side of me. Running like Herbert, I thought. There was a light in my superior’s office, and the door was ajar. But the room itself was empty. I walked to the desk and saw my note there, still in its sealed envelope. I picked it up and stuffed it into my jacket, just as my superior came into the room.

  ‘Oh, good man,’ he said, rubbing his hands to dry them. ‘You got the message.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, trying to still my breathing. Message: I hadn’t checked my machine.

  ‘Thought if we did a couple of evenings it would sort out the Rothko.’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘No need to be so formal though.’

  I stared at him.

  ‘The suit,’ he said.

  ‘Drinks at Number Ten,’ I explained.

  ‘How did it go?’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘PM happy with his Voore?’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘You know he only wanted it to impress some American? One of his aides told me.’

  ‘Joseph Hefferwhite,’ I said.

  ‘And was he impressed?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘Well, it keeps us sweet with the PM, and we all know who holds the purse-strings.’ My superior made himself comfortable in his chair and looked at his desk. ‘Where’s that envelope?’