The Caroline Quest

by Barbara Whitnell

  I sat for a moment in a kind of trance, until strange noises from the receiver made me replace it hastily. I went to the window, opened it wide and leaned out. Early greyness had given way to sunshine and scudding clouds; spring at its loveliest, full of easy promises — promises, I was well aware, that were not always kept. Still I was conscious of hope, of a sudden excitement that couldn’t be denied. ‘Love you’, he’d said; and he hadn’t absolutely vetoed my suggestion of a partnership. Surely it wasn’t such a bad idea? I knew nothing now, but I could learn. I wanted to learn. I had felt, just as Steve felt, a dawning love for old things and good craftsmanship. It seemed to me that the entire world of art and antiques was waiting for me, offering me pleasures I had barely been aware of.

  Meantime I had some thinking to do. Aunt Caroline’s warning that I, too, could be on the gang’s hit list had come as a shock. Such a thing had not occurred to me but it did explain the interest that my arrival had caused. For a split second I wondered whether I was mad to stay here, especially with the knowledge I now had that Caroline and Jamie were in the Slates.

  And what about having to watch my back for the next few years, never mind having to dismiss once and for all the thought of bringing Jim’s killers to justice? I could just imagine what Mom would say about that. And what about Steve?

  No, I said to myself. I wasn’t about to go anywhere. Instead I concentrated on trying to think what steps I could take to make sure Higginson and his gang met their comeuppance, and it struck me that the first step would be to find some way of proving that there was in fact an illegal connection between Higginson and the rest of the gang.

  But Higginson was above suspicion, well thought of by his peers, the last man anyone could imagine being crooked. He sat on committees, Steve had told me. appeared on TV panels as an art critic, wrote pieces for specialist magazines. It simply wouldn’t be believed if wild accusations were to be levelled against him, and even if forgery were proved to have taken place he would find some way of shifting responsibility for it on to the shoulders of some unfortunate underling. That was the kind of thing he was good at, Steve said. And if even that proved to be impossible, he would pass it off as a genuine mistake, the sort that even an expert might make once in a while. He might, under those circumstances, be forced to eat a slice or two of humble pie, but still no one would believe he had been wilfully authenticating forgeries for years in order to line his own pockets.

  There had to be a way to prove his involvement, and I thought long and hard to bring it to mind. There had to be some way of proving that he knew exactly what he was doing when he gave his seal of approval to paintings he knew full well weren’t the real thing. I longed to be able to discuss it all with Steve, but in his absence I spent my solitary evening creating wild plots that would unmask Higginson as the villain of the piece, only to dismiss them as unworkable. I thought the matter over from every angle, but I was no nearer finding a sensible solution by the time sleep overlook me.

  The following morning I received the answers to my ad in The Times. The first was from a detective agency, offering to be of assistance in return for a (so-called) reasonable fee. The second was from a woman in a place called Southport who said when she was a girl at high school in Oxford she had been taught English by a Miss Caroline Bethany, but had seen or heard nothing of her for the past fifteen years. (I was lucky, I realised, bearing in mind the girls that Miss Bethany senior must have had through her hands, not to have received hundreds of letters giving the same information.) The third was a great deal more interesting, though hardly shed any light on the Caroline question.

  It was typed on heavy, cream-coloured paper of a very high quality, and bore the address 7. Morse Guards Court. Pierre-point Gardens. London SWI. But what made me gasp with astonishment was the name that was engraved above the address. It was none other than that of Sir Timothy Crofthouse, Bt.

  ‘Dear Miss Crozier.’ it read.

  I was interested to see your advertisement in today’s Times. I am afraid I have no information regarding the person you are seeking, but I have reason to think you must be the daughter of the late Martha Crozier of New York. She and I were old friends, and if, indeed, you are her daughter, it would give me great pleasure to meet you while you are in London. Perhaps you might even spare the time to have dinner with me?

  Do, please, give me a eall on the above number.

  He was, he said, sincerely mine, Timothy Crofthouse.

  Equally sincerely intrigued, I read the letter over again. Crozier wasn’t such a singular name. How come he’d been so sure that I was Martha’s daughter? And how come he’d been such friends with Mom when all the world knew how little she liked Englishmen? She’d certainly never mentioned him as far as I could remember.

  Should I ring him as requested? What a question! I knew perfectly well that my curiosity wouldn’t allow me to resist it. and as soon as I finished breakfast I went back to my room and dialled Sir Timothy’s number.

  I hardly expected to gel through to him light away, but to my surprise he answered the phone himself.

  ‘Crofthouse.’ The voice was crisp and assured and very, very upper-crust English.

  ‘This is Holly Crozier.’ I said.

  ‘Well, hullo! How good of you to call.’ That better. Now, though still upper crust, he sounded warm, ami much more human. ‘Where are you? In London?’

  ‘Yes at Quentins Hotel. But tell me. how did YOU guess I was Martha (Yozier’s daughter?’

  ‘I recognised vour brother’s name! never met him. but I heard your mother speak of him.’

  ‘Oh!’ I was silent, thinking this over. ‘But...but when and where did you know her? I had no idea my mother had any English friends. She never came to England at least, only once, and that was only for a couple of days.’ I didn’t elaborate on this. She had come to London to attend the inquest on Jim and to bring his body back to the Stales and to my certain knowledge she had been in no mood then to forge friendly relations.

  ‘Ah, but you’re wrong,’ Sir Timothy told me. ‘She came here in the summer of I975.’

  ‘She came here? To England?’

  ‘She did indeed. She never mentioned it?’

  ‘No. Never. But, of course, that was before I was born.’

  ‘Yes, of course; I guessed that. She only ever spoke of her son. What happened to him, and why does his girlfriend need friendship and support?’

  ‘He... he died. Nine years ago.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘You sent flowers to my mother’s funeral. That was good of you.’

  ‘I thought a great deal of her. I never forgot her.’

  ‘But how did you know about her death?’

  ‘Lilian phoned me. Lilian Wheeler? You know her, of course. We kept in touch over the years Christmas cards, and the odd dinner with her and Frank whenever they were in England or I was in New York. You do know them?’ he added, when surprise kept me silent.

  ‘Yes,’ I said faintly, more and more bewildered. ‘Yes, I know them well.’

  Yet they’d never said a word about this English baronet, who was apparently so friendly with my mother. And if so friendly, why had he called on Lilian and Frank when he visited New York while, apparently, ignoring her? It didn’t make sense. Why hadn’t they, or Mom, ever mentioned him?

  ‘Well, how are you fixed about having dinner?’ he said. ‘Is tonight too short notice? Tomorrow evening I have an engagement and the following day I must go down to Fincote my country house. It’s my wife’s birthday and we’re expecting a houseful of people.’

  ‘Tonight would be fine,’ I said.

  ‘Then how about the Athenaeum at eight? It’s a club, quite close to St James’s Park.’

  Where Steve had found a parking meter, I remembered, the time we went to the wine bar. It seemed about a hundred years ago.

  ‘I’ll be there,’ I said.

  ‘I shall look forward to it.’

  Baronets are human, too, I reminde
d myself as I put the phone down — but even so, I found myself feeling just a little daunted at the thought of meeting this aristocratic mystery man.

  What, I wondered, did one wear to have dinner with a titled gentleman at his club? Were trouser suits out? Was a long skirt necessary? Was this, maybe, an excuse for buying something new and gorgeous? An opportunity for a little retail therapy? It must be some kind of record that I hadn’t engaged in it long before this, and an indication of how the problem of Caroline had occupied my mind. A lack of interest in shopping was never an accusation that could be levelled at me.

  On the other hand, was there anything I ought to be doing this day to bring Higginson’s comeuppance ever closer? Much as I tried, I couldn’t think of anything. I didn’t want to go anywhere near Lovells in case he saw me, which would only serve to warn him of my continued interest. It went against the grain merely to hang about waiting to ask Steve’s advice, but he knew this world so much better than I that it seemed the most sensible option. So, taking one thing with another, I came to the conclusion that a day off might prove therapeutic.

  ‘Knightsbridge, here I come,’ I said out loud.

  It was much, much later in the day when, bags with famous names suspended from several fingers, I managed to hail a taxi to take me back to the hotel. I subsided thankfully on its back scat with a sigh that was part weariness, part satisfaction.

  An entirely successful expedition, I thought, leaning my head back and closing my eyes, picturing again the garments I’d bought; the lovely lines of the soft wool dress in that heavenly colour, half green, half blue. Such skill, I marvelled. How did they cut a length of material so that it hung like that?

  Then there was the suit. Well, every girl should have a black suit, but not every girl was lucky enough to be able to be able to secure one like the little number I had swooped upon in that boutique in Beauchamp Place. And then, of course, I had to buy the top that went with it...

  ‘Shocking, innit?’ I opened my eyes to see the taxi driver grinning at me in the rear-view mirror. ‘Wears you out, spending money.’

  ‘But what a blissful way to go,’ I said.

  We were stuck in a traffic jam — hardly an unusual occurrence in London, I had found. It gave me time to look assessingly at the various other garments displayed in the shop windows along Knightsbridge, and I was gratified to see nothing that I would have dreamed of trading for the clothes in the bags that clustered round my feet.

  We made a little progress before coming to a full stop again, and this time I found we were opposite a small boutique selling ethnic sculptures and primitive paintings.

  ‘Provenance’ was the name of the shop, the letters scrawled in black against a terracotta background. The sight of it dragged me back to the problems I had temporarily put out of my mind.

  Provenance, I thought. Provenance. That was the key to everything. Paintings couldn’t just appear in a saleroom from some anonymous donor and be sold for exorbitant prices. Their origins had to be known, their previous owners documented, which was, of course, where Higginson came in. Surely there had to be some way of proving that the provenance of Higginson-authenticated forgeries were as much a fake as the paintings themselves?

  I needed to ask an expert. Steve himself was the first to say that this was not his field, not in the way that it had been for Jim. But there must be someone else —

  Sir Timothy Crofthouse! A good chap, Steve had said, and involved in the arts, anxious to save the nation’s treasures from being sold overseas. Of course, that might not necessarily mean he was an expert on paintings — the term ‘arts’ covered a multitude of different skills -- but at least he would be concerned. And, in view of the fact that Jim’s death might be involved, his regard for my mother would be an added incentive to help.

  How much should I tell him? So much depended on him and how we got on together that I felt I could make no plans. I’d have to play it off the cuff.

  I was aware, suddenly, that the taxi had come to a standstill and that the driver was looking over his shoulder at me, a big grin on his face.

  ‘Penny for ’em?’ he said.

  I opened my purse and fumbled inside for the money.

  ‘Oh, they’re worth a great deal more than that, I promise you,’ I said, casting a jaundiced eye at the meter. ‘And so, I see, is my ride.’

  He grinned again, pocketed the notes I handed over, picked up another couple who were just leaving the hotel, and disappeared in the direction of Piccadilly.

  *

  I wore the black silk suit to go to dinner with Sir Timothy even though I had a few misgivings about the brevity of the skirt.

  A taxi dropped me at the door of the club just after eight. I went in and was greeted by some kind of attendant who, when told that I was a guest of Sir Timothy Crofthouse, pointed me in the direction of a tall, silvery-haired man standing at the foot of the stairs. I approached him, smiling a little tentatively, and for a moment I thought the attendant must have got it wrong and that this wasn’t Sir Timothy after all, for there was no answering smile on the man’s face — in fact, I had the impression that he was taken aback to see me walking towards him. Shocked, even. But then he appeared to take himself in hand and came to meet me with a charming smile, his hand outstretched.

  ‘Holly? How good of you to come! I’m delighted to meet you.’

  ‘I’m not late?’ I said, thinking that perhaps I had mistaken the time. I could think of no other reason for that strange expression I had noticed a moment before unless my skirt was, after all, too short for the Athenaeum.

  ‘No — no, not at all. Shall we go and have a drink before dinner?’

  He shepherded me to the bar and we sat sipping our Martinis, making polite but not very easy conversation. From what Steve had said, I had expected a man who was worldly-wise and urbane, but instead he seemed almost ill at ease. I felt that we were both hesitant, summing each other up. He was an elegant man, I saw, fastidious in his dress, with an expensive-looking haircut and manicured nails. A nice face, I had to give him that, with a handsome, rather prominent nose and deep brown eyes.

  But an edgy man. Not the kind of man one could relax with. It hardly seemed possible that such a man could be shy, but this was the only conclusion I could draw from his manner, and I began to think that Sir Timothy, after all, was not a man I could confide in.

  But over dinner things improved a little. Perhaps the predinner drink had dispersed his inhibitions, or maybe it was the wine. For whatever reason, he seemed to relax and become the charming host I had expected. He began talking of the first time he had met my mother in New York, it had been, at the home of Claude Reinberg, the big theatrical impresario.

  ‘My father was alive then,’ he told me, ‘and he’d dispatched me to negotiate the sale of Crofts. There were two American firms interested at the time, but maybe I didn’t do my job very well because they both pulled out. I don’t think I was ever quite forgiven, even though sales picked up and we enjoyed years of highly successful trading. And when we did sell to a German company, we were able to get a far more advantageous price. At the time he was not at all pleased, and he didn’t hesitate to let me know it! He said I hadn’t concentrated on the job in hand. He hadn’t sent me there to enjoy myself, he said. I’d allowed myself to be distracted.’

  ‘And had you?’

  ‘You could say so. I met your mother, didn’t I?’

  And had fallen in love with her, I realised, even though at that time she was still married. Well, a number of men had been attracted to her wit and sparkiness, as well as her appearance, but still I was a little surprised that she had been Sir Timothy’s type. She had been younger then, I reminded myself. Softer, maybe, and less abrasive. I found myself warming towards him more and more.

  ‘You said on the phone that my mother had been to England.’

  ‘That’s right. She came to stay at Fincote.’

  ‘I still find it strange that she never spoke of it.’

/>   ‘Well,’ He hesitated, took a sip of wine. ‘Maybe she wanted to forget it. I have to confess it wasn’t a happy time and then, of course, she became very successful in her own right. When I knew her she was just starting out. But tell me about you. What do you do with yourself? Have you followed in her footsteps?’

  Maybe the wine had worked its magic on me, too, because I forgot my earlier reservations, finding that conversation between us seemed easy now. I had no hesitation in telling him about Bower Street and my strong feeling that this represented the beginning and end of my career as an actress, and how I was unsure now of what to do next. And I told him about the house at Corey Cove and my reluctance to sell it. I even told him about Jim, but still I said nothing regarding Lovells or the art scam that I felt sure was being operated by Higginson.

  I had told him, in passing, that Jim had worked at Lovells, and it was he who returned to this as we sat over coffee.

  ‘I wish I’d known him,’ he said. ‘He sounds a young man after my own heart. I’m passionate about art myself and have managed to get together quite a collection at Fincote. I intend to leave them to the nation.’

  ‘I hope your heirs don’t mind.’

  ‘My wife and I only have one child — a daughter, Davina and I don’t think she’s much interested. Of course, she could change. She’s only eighteen. She left school last summer.’

  ‘What’s she doing now?’

  ‘Enjoying a gap year, travelling around the Far East. Youngsters these days are so independent. One has to let them go, but I admit we worry about her. I’ll be relieved to see her back.’

  ‘I’m sure you will.’ I smiled at him. He was nice, I thought. A kind, loving sort of man. Davina Crofthouse was a lucky girl. And suddenly, not altogether logically, it was at that moment I decided to tell him what was on my mind.