The Rich And The Profane

by Jonathan Gash

  Gesso’s refrain. Tiptoeing to the prior’s study, I began to remember how unreliable Gesso actually was, with his perennial urge to brag to the lads at the pub. He was always keen to show his thefts, explain to anybody how he’d actually popped the bottom lock on a mortised french window.

  We creaked open the prior’s study door. It would have to be here, right? I mean, if he’d discovered a da Vinci in some theological seminary, surely to God he’d keep it under his own eagle eye?

  But he wasn’t your average mundane prior. How many do you see selling plants at your weekend boot fair? And how many religious leaders send for a criminal like me to help out with antiques, legit or otherwise? None.

  ‘Gesso?’ I hissed, a brainwave. ‘Is there a chapel?’

  That’s what a priory is for, after all.

  ‘Yes. This way.’

  He still shone his torch through his fingers. I saw that his tactics had changed. He used to have a thin plastic glove painted blue, because blue light is hardly visible in the dark. His confidence had grown. We went down a lengthy corridor past a refectory, and Gesso opened a door, miming for absolute silence.

  ‘Sometimes one prays all night,’ he whispered in my ear.

  Great, I thought bitterly. An audience. Just what I needed.

  The door, mercifully, was oiled. Not a squeak. A small chapel of a dozen pews, a central aisle. A pulpit, altar dressed in feria green, a red oil lamp giving an amazing amount of light, a central crucifix. That scent of polish, Stations of the Cross round the walls. A statue or two, heroic or mournful according. Too garish for me, but whatever turns God on.

  No nuns, no monks at nocturnal penance. Too holy, no doubt.

  Gesso silently closed the door. Above was a gallery, presumably the organ loft. Flowers with that rather rankish perfume they get in the candle hours, gleaming brass vases.

  ‘It’s OK, Lovejoy.’ Gesso spoke almost in an unwhisper, frightening me out of my skin. ‘This is soundproof. I’ve knocked a nail in here a few times.’

  ‘Wait.’ I listened inside myself, rummaging about my senses. Not a blip. There was no antique here. But Prior Metivier was no normal prior, and this had to be the place. ‘Can I look round?’

  ‘Don’t be too long.’

  Why not, if it was as safe as Gesso said? I walked, silent, down the aisle, round to the sides. A plaque, in memoriam for some brother long gone. A list of nuns who’d died overseas in the missions. A brass rectangle commemorating four monks who’d died ‘in service’, dates twenty years since. It was all so transient. Were they in fact remembered, prayed for? I felt so down. This is what life amounts to, a pious memento read by a night-stealing stranger.

  ‘What’s that noise?’ I whispered in a sudden panic.

  ‘What?’ Gesso whispered back, dowsing his torch.

  ‘Thought I heard a motor car.’

  He chuckled. ‘You always were scared, Lovejoy. That’s why you’ll never be any good.’ That from Jack the Pad, expert cat burglar.

  ‘If you say so.’ I walked along the south wall.

  This painting was on the wall beside the plaque. I don’t suppose I’d have paid it any attention whatsoever if I hadn’t been struggling to pick out the lettering on the reflecting brass.

  It was about three feet by two, badly framed in dark greenish bulbous wood. I thought, What on earth is that a painting OF? It seemed to be squirts of colour put on in strips and blobs, so thickly that the surface looked - and felt - corrupted. I reached up and tilted it to one side, trying to catch the reddish oil lamp’s shine. Gesso’s torchlight cut into my brain and almost made me yelp. No signature. Was it a child’s daubed landscape, of houses among fields? Dull as ditchwater. Except it wasn’t. The painting was eccentric, but you had to look at it. I knelt, my trick to get an oblique slant on any painting I see for the first time. Had I forged anything like this? Yes, definitely. It wasn’t Van Gogh, but certainly one of his followers. Could it be O’Conor? I crouched lower, peering up, always the best way to see the brushwork on any—

  And I heard ‘ Who’s there?' in a loud stern feminine voice. Marie?

  I almost bleated in fright, but heard her advance, high heels striking the marble flooring, and hunched down. The chapel’s electric light came on. I was blinded. Like a fool I almost stood up and said sorry, but cowardice came to my rescue.

  ‘Sorry, Miss Metivier,’ said Gesso’s nervous voice. The echoes took time dying away. I felt a perverse glee, that he was caught, not me.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Marie said sharply.

  Her footsteps stopped. I was still below eye level. I kept silent, my heart banging away so hard I was sure she must hear.

  ‘I forgot my torch, miss. And my feeler gauges. I need them for a car job.’

  He was trusting to her ignorance.

  ‘How come you left them here?’ She didn’t believe him. Who would? I seethed. Even I could have invented a better tale.

  ‘The prior’d complained that one of the pulpit’s risers was loose.’

  ‘Very well.’ She paused, probably doing that woman’s circular look. She hadn’t come far enough in to see me. ‘Collect your things and leave.’

  ‘Thank you, miss.’

  ‘One thing,’ she asked. ‘How did you get in?’

  ‘The side door was ajar, miss.’

  Feeble, I screamed silently. I heard her say something as she left with him, but couldn’t quite catch the words in that small echoey place.

  Click went the light, leaving me dark-blind, and thunk went the door. I was alone. Or was I? The trick is to stay motionless. When you’re burgling a place, and you think they’ll come back for another quick gander, then you must clear out before they do. These are the golden rules the lads tell you in the auction rooms and junk shops - after they’ve got away scot-free. But what rules work when you’re trapped? I’d be sure to choose the wrong one.

  I heard a distant door go. Marie, letting Gesso out?

  My vision slowly returned. I wondered about the vestry. Priests never come in from the front, do they? They emerge dolled up and ready to go from the vestry. I eeled, keeping to the wall. A door led off to the right. I tried it. It opened! I entered, felt ahead, found myself in a confessional, a kneeler and a hatch to pour forth my sins. No exit. Well, I’d no sins. I got claustrophobic and crept out, made the only other door by the red oil lamp’s sheen.

  Ahead, I could see a faint grey-stencilled arched area, face height. A window. I almost knocked off a brass candlestick in my eagerness, but caught it in time. It was a narrow window, hardly room for me to escape.

  Door? I felt round the walls, came upon a door with an old Suffolk latch and a heavy lock, the key still in. We’d had one almost exactly the same at home. I put my weight on it, and almost floored myself when it turned with astonishing ease. There was the outer courtyard. Freedom!

  Except there was that painting. I stood there like a prune.

  Now, Prior Metivier had definitely asked me to come and look at an antique - all right, stretch a point, a near antique, though Customs & Excise define antiques as fifty years or older. I’d come, at vast expense and trouble, hadn’t I? O’Conor lived a century ago, and that isn’t quite old enough to set my antiques bell clonking. But O’Conor’s in the Tate Gallery. Multo gelt hung uselessly on the chapel wall.

  Here I was in the gloaming, within yards of riches. I had a choice. I could either scarper to safety or I could go back for the painting. But I might get caught, and they’d not believe that I was only doing my job.

  Could I take the painting?

  Who’d know it was me? Answer: nobody, except Gesso. He’d never tell. Let’s face it, I’m not a thief. No, honest. And I’d not be stealing as such. Good heavens, I’d never do that. I’m more truthful and reliable than anyone I know. I mean, hadn’t I given up my entire night just to take a look at a painting I’d been invited to examine?

  After a quick listen, I left the door slightly ajar, glided back and hefted the pai
nting down. I was careful, because they’re tender things. Quietly, I left via the vestry door, keeping to the wall until I was close to the hedge, then walked slowly - that’s the trick in the dark - until I blundered through the hawthorns, heading for where I imagined Gesso had left his motor.

  It was gone. The selfish swine had done a flit, leaving me. That’s friends for you, I thought bitterly. I checked the direction of maximum skyglow, and struggled through the undergrowth until I came on a feeder path of an apple orchard. It gave me the way to Aldeburgh, from where I knew the way home.

  Five hours later I tottered into my cottage. No sign of Gesso. The night was a success, one way or another. I lit my candle and stared at the painting.

  ‘Roderic O’Conor, as ever was.’ I actually said the name aloud, marvelling at what I’d nicked - I mean borrowed, for research purposes.

  Now, the ‘squirt-and-flirt’ school of painters, exemplified by Vincent Van Gogh, were laughed off from mid-Victorian days until the 1930s. Derided, ignored by all except close friends or perceptive shrewdies. This is where greed comes in, because there were scores, hundreds, of starving new-style artists.

  As the twentieth century rolled in and on, collectors, museums, galleries all infarcted in horror at their ghasdy oversight. They’d passed up valuable works of art that they could have got for a groat! The great scramble began. Gaugin, Van Gogh, Mondrian, all the now-famous names were hunted. Greed spread. Fortunes were made as folk bashed and cashed in. A glimmer of realization, maybe even understanding too, God help us, shone on lesser artists like Gilman and Roderic O’Conor. This latter bloke is typical. He was 1860 to 1940, give or take, and hung out with Gaugin’s followers at Pont-Aven. Never super-famous, or ever likely to be, he’s still notable. And very, very collectable.

  Which raised the question of what should happen to works of art like this. I stared at the picture until the candle guttered and left me only the glow of its dying red wick. Some days you can’t depend on anything. I carried the painting out to the workshop and set to.

  11

  Next morning i was wakened by a pounding on my door. Normally it’s only bailiffs. I clad my waist in a towel. It was Prince, in high dudgeon.

  ‘Lovejoy!’ He used to have a waxed moustache, to twiddle in outrage, but now he’s gone native and does without. ‘You trick me!’

  ‘How?’ I had, but in which way specifically?

  He stood quivering. Pistols for two, coffee for one.

  ‘My furniture is unready!’

  ‘Well, yes, Prince.’ Florida can wrap herself in a towel and it’ll stay put all day long. It’s because women have waists. We men are cylindrical, so I had to clutch my towel. ‘There’s a good reason. The gloss on furniture—’

  ‘You flannel me!’ He marched off. ‘Come this instant!’ Blinking, I followed into the drizzle, donning my hat, a tweed business with a feather. I nicked it from the Treble Tile hatstand one rainy eve. Three little children were in the lane. One shouted.

  ‘Lovejoy!’ He’s a little brute called Roy, famous for stealing tortoises. He has six so far. ‘Your mam’ll tan you for not having anything on!’

  Little Charlotte called, ‘You’ll catch cold, Lovejoy. Get dressed.’ Females are born with the right to tell you off. ‘Right, love. In a sec.’

  She said to an overcoated man, ‘His new auntie’ll be here soon.’

  ‘Will she?’ Summer asked her politely. ‘So early?’

  ‘Yes,’ said little Charlotte Blabbermouth. Five years old, she knows everything which she tells everybody so they’ll know everything too. ‘She sleeps on top of Lovejoy, but you’ve not to tell or she’ll be cross.’

  ‘Will she?’ Summer didn’t know whether to be intrigued or amused. He glanced my way. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because she’s secret.’ Charlotte was really motoring, a harbinger of doom and loving every syllable. ‘She laughs in bed at night. I hear her.’

  ‘Charlotte,’ I called, not wanting Summer to hear of Florida’s bedroom vocals. ‘The bus’ll come soon, love. Don’t be late.’

  Some hopes. Charlotte was determined to have the last word. ‘Mummy says you have too many aunties, Lovejoy.’ ‘Right, love,’ I said weakly. ‘Tell your mummy OK.’ Charlotte puts these strong views in her free-writing compositions at school.

  ‘Here!’ Prince shook the workshop door. ‘Witness all!’ Summer followed us. I hate wet feet almost as much as I hate a wet head. I stepped on to the wood shavings. They hurt like hell.

  ‘See!’ Prince brandished his cane. ‘Unreadiness!’

  ‘I can explain,’ I said wearily, but I couldn’t think up a single excuse. I’m useless in the morning until I’ve had my stand-up bath and a shave and breakfast.

  ‘How?’ Prince howled. He marched to the painting on the easel, sending my heart into my throat. I’d killed myself working at it. I’d only been abed an hour before the wretch had arrived ranting. ‘Doing superfluousness!’

  Summer strolled in, shavings crunching. ‘What is it, Lovejoy?’

  Prince yelled, ‘I tell what iss, commissar! Iss Lovejoy daubs!’

  ‘It’s a copy of a copy,’ I said, stung. ‘Better than the original.’

  Summer tried to scratch it, the disbelieving swine. I stared truculendy at him, but praying inwardly that he wouldn’t have the wit to sniff the canvas. Phenol and formaldehyde will ‘dry’ new paint pretty quickly. I’d gone like a mad thing, covering the O’Conor with a new thin canvas (please protect the surface with gelatin if you try this) then over-painting its surface. My new painting was a Klee, white and a stringy stylized bird. Klee did hundreds of the damned things. So did everybody else.

  Summer looked intently at the frame. I’d deliberately carried thick pigment over. It was rock hard, thank God.

  ‘Damage that,’ I complained, ‘even police slush funds couldn’t buy me off.’

  He gave a sleet-filled smile at Prince. ‘Lovejoy’s joking, sir. One of our famous East Anglian wags. Imagine how amusing I find him.’

  Prince boomed, stamping with rage. ‘He demeans me!’

  Prince finds words like ‘is’ and ‘daub’ difficult, so how come he’s perfect with demean?

  ‘Has he defrauded you, sir?’ Summer was trying to rile me.

  ‘Certainly not, Tony.’ Florida arrived like a goddess, radiant and alluring. ‘Lovejoy never defrauds. He simply ... errs.’

  ‘He defraud!’ Prince swished his cane. I backed away.

  With no clothes on, you feel vulnerable. ‘That heap not finished!’

  He indicated bits of the Nicholas Brown bookcase-desk that lay about in various states of undress. I knew how it felt.

  ‘Lovejoy,’ Florida said. ‘Why are you practically naked, wet and wearing a stolen hat?’

  ‘Hat and wetness, from rain. Nakedness, from intruders.’ ‘That’s sufficient. Inside, Lovejoy. I shall deal with these two.’

  ‘I didn’t know you knew Mr Summer,’ I said to her as I passed. She didn’t bat an eyelid. I said to Summer, ‘I didn’t know you knew Florida.’

  ‘Mr Champion and I were young constables together,’ he said.

  Florida eyed me to judge the effect. Summer smiled. I don’t like it when the Plod smile. They’ve every reason to, being above the law, but I wish they wouldn’t.

  ‘Police?’ I croaked. Florida’s husband an ex-Ploddite? ‘He’s above all that now, Lovejoy.’ Summer wandered about the workshop, studied the bowl of water by the easel. ‘Isn’t he, Florida? Owns his own security firm. Locks, alarms, vehicles, men.’

  I said nothing. I didn’t want Summer poking around too much, though the O’Conor canvas was concealed under my hasty Klee.

  ‘Lovejoy. Why is your palette under water?’

  ‘Oil paints are expensive. Oil and water don’t mix. Immerse your palette, then take it out days later, blot dry, and you can start painting straight away, see?’

  ‘Clever.’ He weighed out another smile. ‘Not like acrylic paints, then?’


  ‘No. They’d dissolve like watercolours. You store acrylics on kitchen cooking paper in an airtight sandwich box.’

  What the swine meant was, could I have done the whole painting in the night that fast with acrylic paints instead of oils. And what I meant was, whenever I’d painted the fake Klee, I’d used slow-drying oil paints. I hammered it home.

  ‘If I’d had to fake a painting fast, I’d have used egg tempera. Except I’ve no money to buy fresh eggs,’ I added pointedly for Florida’s sake.

  ‘But you can’t remove that. Am I right?’

  ‘Hire me for a lesson. I’m going in. Thank you all for coming.’

  ‘Allow me to present myself, madame,’ Prince was saying as I left them to it. ‘I am His Royal Highness ...’ et regal cetera.

  So Florida knew Summer. What with Barko and now Florida’s bloke leaving police employment the Plod would be pretty shorthanded. I dried myself on an old shirt, and rolled into bed. I would have slept, but Summer walked in.

  ‘Lovejoy? Were you marauding during the night?’

  ‘No,’ I said, muffled. ‘Sod off.’

  He flicked the bedclothes off me. I grabbed, hauled them up.

  ‘Not Albansham Priory? Stealing paintings?’

  ‘If you can find it, we’ll split the proceeds, OK?’ I glowered up from my pillow, one-eyed.

  ‘It?’ he asked smoothly. ‘I said paintingzzz. Plural. You said paintinggg.’

  Wearily I sat up. ‘How the hell can I know what you’re on about if you don’t tell me? I worked until all hours. Ask the milkman. Ask Jill the postie.’ I’d made sure of it, calling out to each at six-thirty.

  ‘I believe that bit, Lovejoy.’ And as I sank thankfully back into my pit, ‘Gesso’s your pal, right?’

  ‘I used to know him. Why?’

  ‘You’ve not the skill to burgle Albansham Priory alone, Lovejoy. I have reason to believe Gesso visited there last night. Someone stole a work of art.’

  ‘Get after them, then. And good luck.’

  ‘There you go again, Lovejoy,’ he said. ‘I implied one burglar. You said them. Why?’

  ‘Because I’m half asleep,’ I said nastily, and flopped down. Dozing, I heard him and Florida talking, mutter mutter. Prince had stopped creating. At least, I heard no more screams. After what seemed hours, I felt Florida slide in beside me. And that, said Alice, was that.