The Montague Portrait

by Matt Drabble

  ‘Hell, Chris, you have to believe me when I tell you that I would walk away from this if I could, but I can’t. Any help you can give me would be much appreciated, even if you can just point me in the right direction,’ he said, hating the pleading tone in his voice.

  ‘I wish you would just leave this alone, but if you’re not going to, then I’ll give you what help I can. But there is a line here my friend and we are dangerously close to it.’

  Despite all the warnings Travis waited with bated breath; he couldn’t help finding the whole thing intriguing. His old senses were stirring, regardless of his attempts to drown them in alcohol for the last two years. ‘Whatever you can give me,’ he said hopefully.

  ‘All right. None of this is public knowledge and I don’t think it would be accessible by anyone other than someone in my … uh … position.’

  Travis grabbed a pen and a scrap of paper, waiting for the golden nugget.

  ‘It’ll be a chain, but I can give you the first link. You need to start with a guy called Joseph Delaney. He’s in a retirement home by the name of Shady Oaks down on the south coast – a small town called Wellsby.’

  Travis started to thank his old friend, but the line was already dead.

  ----------

  Charlotte woke from a listless sleep when Travis Parker’s front door slammed shut as he left the house. In a flash she was up and alert and had started her engine.

  She pulled out into the street and began to follow Parker through the steady traffic. Commuters were only just beginning to step out into the day and the roads were light.

  Following patiently as they passed through the pleasant residential areas and into the more commercial districts, she pondered their destination. Parker was heading towards the motorway, eventually pulling out into the fast moving traffic.

  As the journey ahead now seemed long, Charlotte relaxed into the drive and allowed her mind to rest. It wasn’t long before her thoughts turned homeward on their familiar but painful journey.

  CHAPTER SIX

  SHADY OAKS RETIREMENT HOME

  Charlotte did her best to shake away the bad thoughts from her childhood and concentrated once more on the road. They had been driving for several hours now and the air outside had turned decidedly salty. The soft call of seagulls drifted on the wind as she followed Parker’s car into a turnoff lane.

  As they meandered left and right through the growing urban sprawl, the one name that became more and more prominent was for a town called ‘Wellsby’.

  ----------

  Travis followed the Sat Nav first to Wellsby and then to the Shady Oaks Retirement Home.

  The day was brightening as he drove. The month was April, but it looked set fair for an early warm blast of summer’s warmth. The deep blue sky with only a hint of wispy white clouds was the perfect accompaniment to the seaside setting.

  Wellsby was a charmingly small town built adjacent to the ocean. In preparation for the tourist trade, Council workers were out in force laying the bountiful floral decorations to line the town and roads. Some of the bucket and spade shops were occupied with slumbering owners waking from their winter hibernations.

  Driving along the main street, Travis saw tall houses converted to B&Bs being readied for the season ahead as landlords and ladies busied themselves with cleaning and mowing.

  As he drew closer to the retirement home he pondered his friend’s reluctance to help him. Having been his friend since their schooldays, he could not ever remember an occasion where Chris had sounded the remotest bit uneasy, let alone scared. In his boyhood and later as a man, Chris always had an answer regardless of the question. He was always a rock of granite and Travis could not help being a little concerned at his friend’s insistence that he should just walk away from this project. If it had been any other case he probably would have, but he had broken his promise to Amy to look after the gallery – her legacy and dream – and he now had an opportunity to put that betrayal right. Whatever Vargas was, and whoever he represented, his crisp white cheque had saved the gallery from repossession. The promise of another one to match would ensure the future of the gallery – enough money to get it up and running again, to enable Amy’s spirit to live and breathe once more.

  Gripping the steering wheel with determination he pulled into the grounds of the Shady Oaks Retirement Home. The building reminded him of a plush hotel; tall and broad with care and careful maintenance exuding from every pore. The large glass windows sparkled and gleamed under the sunlight, the guttering was pristine and looked new. And beautifully crafted wooden furniture stood in gardens manicured and landscaped to perfection.

  But more than anything the faces of the residents caught Travis’s eye. There were only happy smiles that looked devoid of a medication induced haze, and not a single lost and lonely gaze in sight.

  He pulled into the visitor’s car park, exited the car, and stretched his back, relishing the pops and cracks of a spine settling after the long drive.

  As he turned his head he saw at the edge of his vision a car on the main road slowing down then pulling away again. For just the briefest of seconds he thought he caught a glimpse of red hair, but it was gone before he could get a good look. A couple of times on the trip down, he felt as though he was being followed. But he had never managed to catch sight of anything definitive. He used to have excellent instincts, but that was some time ago; he knew that his mind would need time to readjust to working again.

  As he walked up the sculpted path to the main entrance he wondered about Vargas; it wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility that the man would have assigned someone to keep tabs on him. If that was the case, then he didn’t really care. Vargas was paying him to do a job, and he was doing it.

  He rang the bell on the reception desk and was immediately greeted by a woman wearing a pristine white nurse’s uniform with creases that looked sharp enough to cut.

  ‘Good morning,’ she said in a chirping voice.

  She was around five feet four, probably in her mid to late twenties, pretty with a warm open face and blonde curls. Although her welcome was friendly and her face beamed with a smile, Travis felt that her gracious demeanour didn’t quite reach her eyes, which remained cold and watchful.

  ‘I’m looking for a Joseph Delaney,’ he said in his friendliest tone.

  ‘And you are?’ she asked with flinty eyes.

  ‘A long distant relative, third cousin or other of a great nephew,’ he said, grinning nonchalantly. ‘But who can keep track when it’s that far removed.’

  ‘And your business with Mr Delaney?’ she asked, the smile gone from her face.

  ‘Well, I could tell you that I’m tracking down the old man out of family honour,’ he said, leaning in close, ‘but it’s more like an obligation that I promised my old mum. Between you and me I think she’s hoping that if she makes contact there could be some inheritance on the way.’ He winked conspiratorially.

  As the nurse looked him over he felt a slight wilting under her gaze. During his earlier life he had come into contact with homes such as this and never had any trouble obtaining entry. Most of the residents seemed to have so few visitors that the nursing staff were often grateful that anyone was taking the time to visit. After what seemed like an age she made a decision.

  ‘Okay,’ she said warily. ‘I need you to sign in here and provide some identification.’

  Travis didn’t let his surprise or dismay show on his face; he had not even considered bringing any sort of fake ID with him, and he was none too happy to produce his own. He wasn’t wild about leaving a paper trail, but he was boxed into a corner and any refusal would seem suspicious. He smiled pleasantly and showed her his driving licence.

  She took it from him and walked to a back office where the noise of a photocopier sparked into life.

  He pondered the seemingly unnecessary security measure, and wondered about the type of resident who lived here. From what he had seen, the building appeared expensive inside and out. P
erhaps there were celebrities or government ministers in residence. He would have liked to have had much more information on Joseph Delaney before meeting the man, but that would normally have been Chris’s job. Whenever he needed any sort of life dug over, it was Chris’s magic fingers he turned to. He was flying blind now and would just have to rely on his own flaccid senses to carry him through.

  ‘Mr Delaney is out in the garden at the rear,’ the nurse told him on her return. ‘He’s sitting on the furthest bench.’ She smiled as she spoke. ‘He often sits there as it faces the ocean and he does so like the view.’

  Travis wasn’t buying her act anymore; she had dark suspicious eyes that seemed to bore right through him, and he did not trust her.

  ‘Thank you. Do I go through here?’ he said politely as he made for the private corridor into the home, wanting to gauge her response.

  ‘Not that way,’ she said quickly and a little too harshly.

  He paused, grasping the handle of the large glass door as he peered through into the dark corridor beyond. With surprising strength the nurse’s hand clamped down firmly on his forearm. As she delicately manoeuvred him away from the door he wondered how she was able to get around the reception desk so quickly.

  ‘This way,’ she said, leading him by the arm out through a side door to the gardens. Although she was a slight woman, she guided him easily, and he wasn’t sure if he could have objected even if he wanted to. Once outside she released her grip and he had to resist the urge to rub the numb patch of skin where she had held him.

  The rear gardens were even more attractive than the grand ones at the front. The long sloping lawn swept majestically downwards, peppered with fountains, furniture and shrubbery. Travis had little knowledge of the array of plants, but even he felt the calming influence of the grounds.

  ‘Down there,’ the nurse said. She pointed and remained stock still, as if she thought he might be overtaken with the idea of wandering somewhere else.

  He followed her manicured finger and headed down towards a large rustic arbour that offered shelter against the stiff breeze flowing up from the ocean. He reached the carved wooden haven and found a small, frail old man bundled in multiple layers of thick clothing, sitting gazing at the distant sea.

  ‘That’s some view,’ Travis said.

  ‘Yup. Sometimes I think I could sit here forever,’ the man replied with a strong West Country accent. He smiled sadly, tugging at a thick scarf wrapped tightly around his neck. ‘Or at least for as long as I’ve got left.’

  Travis sat down on the bench beside the old man. His hands were scrawny with thin skin stretched over the bones, and his face was wrinkled with a lifetime of experience showing in every crease. Only his deep set eyes still sparkled beneath his thick woollen hat, as though his life-force was still strong if only within his blue-eyed gaze.

  ‘You’re Mr Delaney? Joseph Delaney?’ Travis said casually.

  ‘That’d be me, son. Do I know you?’ he asked in a deep and husky voice, his throat gravely with shards of broken glass.

  Travis paused, he never knew until he sat down with someone which direction to take with them. For some he had to be underhand and sneaky, for others he had to be forthright and honest. Despite his long absence from the game, he still knew instinctively that Joseph Delaney fell squarely into the latter category. The man gave off a no-nonsense aura, one said to be frank and truthful.

  ‘My name is Travis Parker. I’ve been hired to look into the Worthington painting by an insurance company that paid out on a policy over twenty years ago.’

  ‘The Montague Portrait,’ Delaney stated in a quiet voice. ‘I should have known he wouldn’t stay buried. Not that man.’

  ‘Who?’ Travis asked, puzzled.

  ‘Hugo Montague.’ Delaney spoke as though he had something distasteful in his mouth.

  ‘What can you tell me about the painting, Mr Delaney?’

  ‘I can tell you things that would make your skin crawl and your hair fall out, boy, but these are things that are best left unspoken.’

  Travis looked straight in his eyes. ‘I have to know.’

  Joseph Delaney viewed him for what seemed to Travis like an age. His crystal blue eyes twinkled as he struggled with something internally. Finally he heaved a heavy sigh and spoke. ‘I don’t know what your reasons are, son, but I can see that you are not for turning.’

  Travis thought of lost wives and broken promises. ‘No,’ he said firmly.

  ‘The Montague Portrait has a history as black as coal and twice as cold,’ Delaney said. ‘I’m ninety-seven now and I was just twenty-two when I first laid eyes on the bane of my life. It was 1938 and I was working as a security guard at the Harmsbourough National Art Gallery.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HARMSBOUROUGH NATIONAL ART GALLERY - 1938

  Joseph Delaney whistled his way around the gallery. It was late and the place was black and deserted – his favourite time of the day. He loved it when the building became his own personal domain and all the wondrous artworks were his alone to enjoy.

  He was twenty-two, fit and healthy, and strode through the darkened gallery with the confidence of youth. He had little time for flights of fancy, black shadows or the childish fear of the dark. His marriage to his loving and caring childhood sweetheart was happy and fulfilling, and he had little to complain about. The house was always immaculate and the only blot on their landscape was the absence of children. But they were both still young and had time on their side.

  As he walked, his footsteps echoed on the hard floors. The gallery was equipped with state of the art surveillance and security equipment, and no-one could get in after dark. Or out, Joseph sometimes pondered in his more private moments. The job was only to adhere to a clause in the insurance policy and he offered little in the way of real protection.

  He wandered casually down the long open corridor, his heart pounding and thumping as the anticipation grew. He had rounds to make on a quarter-hourly basis, supposedly always on a random schedule, but lately his legs had strayed further than the stipulated schedule laid down.

  Rounding the corner he found his muse. The painting hung at the end of a narrow alcove, illuminated by gentle spotlights and dominating the room.

  Joseph had little prior knowledge of the piece, but it had captivated him from the first moment he laid eyes on it. The brass plaque under it read Benedict Worthington 1923 and under that it gave the title Family Portrait. It was a simple image of a man and a woman standing close together, his arm wrapped around her. But as soon as he saw it, for some inexplicable reason it had stolen his breath. The man’s face seemed to expose more and more emotion every time he sat in front of it. One minute the man was a happy, smiling and contented husband and the next he was a sneering, twisted, malevolent monster of hate. The woman became increasingly morose and unhappy, her pretty face showing increasing signs of distress. The hand that had been so lovingly encircling her became a twisted claw of dominance, a controlling instrument of authority. Just lately Joseph had detected a sliver of betrayal in the wife’s eyes, and he wondered just what she had done to cause such ire in her husband. She looked as though she was silently mocking her husband beyond his perception. Her face was now the one that was shaped in disdain and derision. He could picture the loving husband frantically trying to save his marriage while being blocked at every turn by her contemptuous gaze. The man’s arm was no longer a domineering gesture; it was now a desperate grab at a lifeboat by a drowning man.

  The painting had been in the gallery for around three weeks now and Joseph’s mood had swung violently from being spooked to an uneasy concern, and then to feelings of pity for the husband. A cursory check through the office records late one night had led him to discover that the subjects’ names were Hugo and Eleanor Montague. Hugo, he thought, a regal name for a man of such poise and bearing. Eleanor, considering her deceitful nature, was a distasteful mocking of elegance. It never once occurred to Joseph that he was assigning personalitie
s to painted figures; in his own mind his feelings were only too real to be dismissed.

  He sat down heavily on the stone bench facing Hugo, wondering why his left leg ached so furiously as he could not remember ever injuring it. He sat and stared deeply into Hugo’s eyes, deep dark pools that pulled him in and drowned him in rage and fury. He could feel the impotence of a man betrayed by his wife, a man mocked and scorned at every turn, a man in need of dishing out a little corrective behaviour.

  Day by day Joseph watched and waited, kneeling before Hugo whispering prayers of promise, tales of retribution, and stories of vengeance. As the weeks passed, Joseph felt a kindred spirit grow with Hugo; he could feel the pain and suffering caused by an unfaithful spouse. He caught fleeting glimpses of his own wife, Amanda, smiling secretly beyond his sight. He felt the hard knots of anger deep in the pit of his stomach – anger of betrayal. Amanda had always seemed like such a devoted and loyal wife, but then she would, wouldn’t she? It was in a woman’s nature after all to hide behind the lie of a contemptuous smile.

  He saw a line drawn between himself and Hugo as he limped through his life, his leg bellowing in unexplained pain. After all, was he better than Hugo? Was he really superior to a man of regal bearing such as Hugo Montague? If Hugo had suffered the indignities of betrayal then why couldn’t he?

  He saw Amanda through eyes that had cleared, eyes that had been blessed with the ability to wipe clean her lies and subterfuge. She was a Wheeler and adultery came as second nature to her family. Her gentle kisses and feather light touch now became a spiteful insult to their marriage and vows. She was laughing behind his back, enjoying illicit trysts in their marital bed as she welcomed an army of lovers as soon as his back was turned.

  And all the while he sat before Hugo, he owed the man in the painting his life; he had been shown the way towards redemption and his own injustices could not be allowed to stand.

  He rose on that last night at the gallery and limped towards the exit door. His only regret was that he would no longer be able to stare upon Hugo’s benevolence, but was assured that Hugo would know of his deeds and be pleased.