“Any other offers?” the auctioneer said, scanning the sea of faces whilst allowing the gavel to hover threateningly over the block.
“Nine million, nine hundred thousand pounds to the lady here,” he said, gesturing to the scarlet woman. “Any further offers, ladies and gentlemen?”
He delayed tantalizingly … the room was dead silent.
“Going once … going twice … GONE!”
He dropped the gavel with a sharp “thock.”
“The Freiburg Cabinet twin is sold to the lady for nine million, nine hundred thousand pounds!” he boomed across the room.
Constanta turned to Tarquin with a look of absolute shock.
“My God! My fucking God!” she said, staring at him … but without seeing.
* * *
A few weeks later, they were driving down the Embankment in London.
“Your mobile’s ringing,” she said, as they took a left turn onto Albert Bridge.
“Well, can you answer it then,” he said, swivelling the steering wheel. “It’s in that pocket.”
She pulled it out.
“Hello?”
“Hello, it’s David,” came the Russian reply.
“Oh, hi,” she said, suddenly focused.
“Is this Anya?”
“Erm … yes. Yes, it is,” she said quickly.
“Good. We have to meet. As I said in my email after the sale in Paris, money transfers for these amounts take time … that’s why you haven’t heard from me for six weeks. But now everything is in place. I’ve spoken with Oliver.”
“Okay … so where and when?” she said.
“Thursday … in the evening at seven o’clock … Chelsea Harbour. My father is bringing his cruiser into the Thames; he has mooring there. I will send you precise instructions by email. Are you absolutely sure you can make that time?”
“Thursday, seven o’clock at Chelsea Harbour,” she said loudly, looking at Tarquin. He nodded.
“Yes, that’s fine. Do we need to bring anything?”
“It is not ‘we,’ it is ‘you’ only! Are you crazy? My father must never meet or see Tarquin or our cover will be blown! He lives next door to Oliver, for love of Lenin!”
“Oh … er, sure … I’m sorry,” she said, feeling foolish, “I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
“Just don’t be late.”
“Okay, see you then,”
The phone went dead.
“Shit …I’m so dumb sometimes!” she said, sliding her hand under Tarquin’s thigh. “Of course his father can’t meet you! That would be crazy. But you can still drop me at the harbour . Those weirdos may try and play some funny game and then you can come and rescue me, yuh?”
“But of course my angel. Your wish is my command,” Tarquin said with a grimace.
* * *
Oliver sat on one of Melvyn’s scruffy chairs pulling heavily on a cigar.
He looked haggard. His face had lost the florid plumpness of a few months earlier and deep lines were etched into the grey skin. He looked like he hadn’t slept properly in weeks.
“So I had no choice, Mel, it was that or full exposure. They knew everything!”
“I just can’t get my head around them being in the house watching us!” Melvyn said, looking at Oliver in horror. “Taking those photos and listening to our conversations … so bloody close! I’ve been getting panic attacks just thinking about it,” he said, tumbling a peg through his fingers nervously.
“I know, I know,” Oliver agreed. “There we were, thinking they were out of the frame, not really interested … going about their other business, and then this! I think I very nearly had a heart attack when I opened that envelope...”
“I bet. To be honest, I reckon I would have had a heart attack,” Melvyn said with feeling. “I understand why you couldn’t face coming over; you’ve been in shock, you poor sod. Seeing those photos of us all on the stairs, moving the cabinet; it’s just too terrible to think about. I mean, how in the hell did they get into the place and not be seen? It’s … it’s just unbelievable!”
“I know, Mel,” Oliver agreed.
“Nearly ten million quid … ten million pounds … and he takes half! And he even has the fucking nerve to let you pay the commission from your half,” Melvyn said in exasperated tones.
“What could I do, Melvyn? What the hell could I do? I couldn’t pretend it sold for less; it was out there for all to see. It was Fabien that I really dreaded telling, Mel. You know Zoltan … the Russian lot, his father. You know the setup. We know each other very well … but Fabien … he was an outsider. I’d assured him it was safe, that the project was bulletproof, that he could trust me … us … to deliver. And then this.”
“Exactly,” Melvyn said gravely.
“I’ve already leant him a couple of hundred thousand on the back of this, for Christ’s sake, before the cabinet was finished, to help him get his life back together with Cecile and push them into the chateau. It worked beautifully. She changed overnight and looked at the place with fresh eyes. But now … well, you know the position. You know what building costs are. And the cabinet … well what’s left has to be split between you two after I’ve taken back what I paid out in material costs.
“He’s got all sorts of commitments on that place which is going to cost a pretty fortune … how can I pull the plug on that now that he’s moved in? By announcing I made a cock up in my planning. How? She’d probably leave him for good. And then there’s you, Melvyn. You’ve broken your back to get this thing airborne, and you’ve had a fair few people in the trade to pay as well. You need your cut. It should be more, for God’s sake, but … well, there’s nothing we can do. I really don’t want to go to prison, Melvyn, I really don’t,” Oliver said, looking with tired eyes through the window onto Melvyn’s walled garden. “That would kill me.”
“You’re not going to prison, Oliver,” Melvyn said quietly. “You’ve paid the money, they’re off your case now. Zoltan has a sense of rules in that Russian head of his, if I know him at all. I think you’re off his hook now.”
“I bloody hope so. You hear about blackmail—you read about it in detective novels—but to experience it is something else. It’s always there; a pair of hands around your throat.”
“As I said, Oliver, I think it’s behind you. Look forward. Look at what we achieved. We really scaled the heights this time!”
Oliver stayed silent for a few moments, lost in his own thoughts. Then he replied quietly, as though half asleep.
“We did, Mel. We certainly did.”
Chapter 40
Bernard sat eating breakfast in an outbuilding off the courtyard at Chateau Clery, which was now his and Jeanne’s permanent dwelling. He was surrounded by plates of cheese, salami, and chunks of bread. His dogs lay sprawled on the flagstone floor on either side of his chair, their eyes watching his hands moving from the plate to his mouth with hypnotic intensity. Suddenly, one of them leapt to its feet, growling, its ears pricked, quickly followed by the other.
“That’ll be Marc,” Jeanne said, wandering into the room with a pair of towels over her arm.
“Yeah, guess so,” Bernard said, standing up, draining his coffee cup and wiping his mouth. “I’m quite looking forward to this.”
The sound of a distant tractor outside on the drive became steadily louder and eventually stopped nearby.
“As I said, Bernard, just be careful with that tree. I’ve grown fond of this place. I don’t want you destroying his precious folly and getting us kicked out!” Jeanne said with a cackle.
“You worry too much, Jeanne,” he said, putting his cap on and heading out of the door. “We’ve got it all planned out. You coming to watch the thing fall?”
“Yeah, I’ll be down in three-quarters of an hour,” she said, tidying the table.
“Reckon it’ll take an hour to get it all roped up, so don’t hurry,” he shouted over his shoulder.
Down at the folly, Bernard and Marc began clearing the dens
e undergrowth around the tree trunk, revealing the old lichen-mottled masonry that lay in its shadow.
“What a place,” Marc said, wielding his hook on the tangle of brambles, bindweed, and other creeping plants. “I’m keen to see what’s going on down those steps …. it’s so blooming dark down there. Perhaps the monster is waiting for us!”
“Don’t get too excited, Marc. I reckon it’s an old ice vault or something like that. Could even have been a sort of changing room for those events they had down here,” Bernard said, grabbing a bunch of greenery in his gloved hands.
“What sort of events?”
“I reckon they had musical evenings, shows … that sort of thing,” Bernard said, breathing heavily from the exertion. “This was once a very important chateau, you know. They had royalty to stay on certain occasions, so it had to have some outside entertainment, or the king would have got pissed off!”
“Well, it makes sense, doesn’t it? I mean, why else would they have found that cabinet here last year?” Marc said. “I’ve heard that they had the exact same one at Versailles.”
“Cor, we do know our history,” Bernard said with a hint of sarcasm.
“I’m interested, Bernard, that’s all, and it was splashed all over the papers. Nothing much exciting happens in these parts, so of course we’re all listening for tidbits.”
“True,” Bernard conceded, as he yanked a length of creeper from the nettles.
“Life’s so bloody unfair,” Marc continued. “Why couldn’t I discover some piece of treasure in my roof, Bernard!”
“Well, because you live in a cottage, Marc, which royalty probably didn’t have a lot to do with,” Bernard said, throwing a branch onto the trailer.
“Did you meet the roofer?” Marc said, stopping.
“You mean the guy who discovered the cabinet?” Bernard said, looking up. “Yes, of course I did. That was a day to remember! Fabien had the roofer coming around at ten o’clock, and then some official from the university in Troyes coming in a bit later to give him a historical tour of the house. I remember Cecile was very excited about the tour.”
“Okay.”
“So the roofer arrived … on a Saturday morning, I think—yes, must have been, because they were both here, Fabien and Cecile, summer last year. So the three of them, the roofer, his mate, and Fabien, went upstairs to check out what needed doing up there. The roof was quite bad in places … tiles missing, leaks, and so on. I remember Fabien had a big torch with him so they could really see what was going on up there.
They had been gone for about half an hour when Fabien came rushing down the stairs in a right state and told Cecile she had to go back up with him because they had discovered something in a box up there. He was really excited; I’ve never seen him like that! His eyes were bulging out of his head!”
“Oh?”
“Yes. He told me later what happened. They were up there in the roof, you know, measuring, taking a look at the state of the place and, and they suddenly spotted this wooden box hidden in a recess in the wall. It was really old, covered in dust. Fabien asked the roofer to help him pull it out, but it was bloody heavy and wouldn’t budge! Roofer said it was gold! Anyways, they did drag it out in the end by yanking its feet. But then they couldn’t open it! So he had to come back down to his truck and get a tool. Anyway, they did open the bloody thing, and there it was!”
“What?”
“The cabinet you, fool … the thing you’ve seen in the bloody newspapers!” Bernard said with feeling.
“Wow!” Marc said.
“And then half an hour after that, the university guy arrives and he takes a look at it as well. He couldn’t believe his luck!”
“Shit, that is incredible … what a find!” Marc said, agog.
“It certainly was incredible … and as you know, it sold for an incredible price in Paris … millions I think.”
“Shit! Lucky bastard!”
“It’s the way of the world, my friend,” Bernard said, lifting his cap to scratch his forehead.
“So why did this place get so bad over the years?”
“Money. The family ran out of it, I think. You know, the revolution, it destroyed a lot of the big families back then. A lot of them were guillotined.”
“Jesus!” Marc said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Those were rough times. Hope the blade was sharp! So the guy who’s coming down tomorrow … he owns the place, does he?”
“Yes, Fabien. It was his grandmother who was living here all those years. You know, the recluse everyone used to speak about. Used to live in a hell of a state, apparently; dirty as hell in the house. She didn’t have much help, said she couldn’t afford it, but I guess she was a bit cuckoo, to be honest. Anyway, she died four years ago or so, and he took over. Didn’t do much to start with, but then suddenly got interested and began to ask tradesmen in to do things. It was such a mess. It’s been cleared up now, though, thanks to me and Jeanne. Quite presentable, really. Bloody cold in the winter, though. We had to live in a small room near the kitchen with a bloody great fire!”
“Wow!” Marc said, removing a thorn from his glove. “Bit of a change from the cottage, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was. Took some getting used to. Dogs bloody love it, though … so much space and a stack of rabbits.”
“Bet they do,” Marc said, beginning to lose focus as he fiddled with some rope. “Okay, I’m heading up the tree now to take out some of the branches. I’ve roped up the chainsaw, so when I give you the word, I want you to steady it as I yank it up.”
“Okay, son.”
For the next half hour, the quietness of the garden was shattered by the angry growls of the chainsaw as it sliced off branch after branch, showering the ground with wood chippings and eventually leaving the trunk solitary and exposed. Back on the ground, the two men roped the trunk around a neighbouring tree in order to control its fall. On cue, Jeanne appeared.
“Seems I came at just the right moment, boys,” she said with a grin.
“Too right, ma cherie,” Bernard said with a chuckle. “Come and stand with me, Jeanne, he’s going to start sawing through the main trunk now, and I need all the weight I can get on this rope.”
“Are you being cheeky, Bernard?” she said, chuckling.
The motor fired up and they were soon drowned in the tortured screams of the saw at high revs. The blade slowly sliced passed the halfway point, and Marc watched carefully for the first signs of the trunk breaking. Suddenly, he pulled the saw away and shouted at Bernard to pull. As predicted, the pillar of wood fell away from the folly with a loud cracking sound followed by a heavy thud.
“Perfect!” Bernard shouted. “You see, Jeanne, it’s nowhere near the building!”
“Well done, boys!” she exclaimed,. “Now get the rest of that undergrowth away from the steps and let’s see what’s going on down there.”
Chapter 41
Tarquin and Constanta walked tentatively along a planked pontoon in Chelsea Harbour, following instructions on a printed email. Impossibly white seagulls hung on an easterly breeze above them, shrieking at each other through bright cartoon beaks. The air smelt salty; somehow not quite London.
“It says turn right here,” Tarquin said, looking over Constanta’s shoulder.
“No it doesn’t.”
“Yes, look. We’re here,” he said emphatically.
“Oh, okay,” she conceded, striding ahead.
She arrived at another junction and stopped.
“Left here,” Tarquin said, walking ahead.
“Fuck’s sake, Tarquin … slow down!” she muttered behind him.
“The berth was number forty-four, wasn’t it?” he said over his shoulder.
“Yes. I can see it. Shit, look at the size of that thing!” she said, gazing in awe at a huge prussian blue motor cruiser with a gently revolving radar scanner.
The name Pushkin stood out in large elegant lettering on the bow, where polished steel rails parted company and glided
back on either side of the deck. A line of ropes with large rubber defenders hung from these like obedient servants.
“Right that’s me done for now,” Tarquin said, giving her shoulder a squeeze, “good luck and be careful, Angel.”
He turned and headed back out of sight as she continued; eventually she approached the two men standing at the base of the boarding ramp.
“Hi, I’m here to meet Zoltan,” she said firmly.
One of the men shouted to another on deck. A couple of minutes later, Zoltan appeared above, silhouetted against the evening sky, and beckoned her aboard. She nervously ascended the ramp and arrived on a bleached teak deck where he shook her hand formally.
“Welcome on board,” he said without smiling. “You found us okay?”
“Yes, not a problem,” she answered breezily. “This is fantastic. It is your boat?”
“Yes, Anya,” he said pointedly. “It is.” He looked at her as though waiting for another question, but Constanta unhooked from his gaze.
“I never seen the river from this position,” she said, sweeping her eyes around the restless cluster of boats surrounding them. “It’s a different world down here.”
“It is, a very different world,” he replied tightly. “Right … so let’s get down to business; come and meet my father.”
Constanta felt the first pang of fear and wondered if she was being led into a trap. She followed Zoltan forward under a huge white awning which contained the wheel of the vessel with its accompanying host of levers, dials, and screens. A pair of high seats bolted to the floor on an elevated tier, were obviously the navigation positions for the pilots and afforded unimpeded views to the bow of the boat. As she passed underneath, Constanta looked up in awe at the dazzling array of technology and felt the full power of the organization Zoltan belonged to.
They descended some steps and entered a luxurious cabin with polished teak paneling and white leather couchettes. A large, heavy-boned man lounged on one of these, reading a newspaper. At the far end of the cabin, another man sat facing them with an intolerant expression; he was a similar build to Sergei.
The Freiburg Cabinet Page 33