by Nina Jon
Jane thought she had enough to go on for the time being. As it seemed the gallery in London would want to hang on to Graham’s sketches for a while, she’d have enough time to make any further investigations she needed to.
Once back at the gallery, she noticed a small sign to the side of the door:-
Beech Hill Art Gallery, 116 Beech Hill, Southstoft, Hoven.
For all enquiries contact Lionel Scott on…
Jane took note of both name and number, before walking back inside the gallery.
“Are the sketches here?” she asked.
His face lit up. “I hoped you’d say that.”
A door to the rear of the main gallery led to a small room. There was little in the room except for an empty easel, some wooden picture frames resting against a wall, and a long table covered with a cloth. Graham lifted the cloth to reveal a blue plastic binder. After putting on some white gloves, and asking Jane to do the same, he removed the sketch-pad from its binder and allowed Jane to see sketches it contained. Most of the sketches were made by charcoal or graphite pencil, but a few were watercolours. Many were incomplete, no more than a few strokes or dabs of different colours over a pencil drawing, as the artist selected his shade. Graham stopped at the most complete watercolour in the pad. It was a portrait of a beautiful young woman of Scandinavian descent with pale blue eyes, flaxen hair cut into a neat bob, and lightly freckled skin. She sat at an angle, her head tilted, looking away from the artist. There was something elfin about her, Jane thought.
As though he could read her thoughts, Graham said. “Don’t be fooled by that waif-like vision of angelic loveliness. There was nothing angelic about Angela. She was half fire-breathing dragon, and half she-wolf!” He shuddered.
“Really? She certainly doesn’t come across as such in this.”
“Really!” he said curtly. “Appearances can be deceptive, you know. I’ve printed off some details of the gallery who will buy it. Here let me fetch them for you.”
He left Jane studying the sketches, and returned a few minutes later with a printout of a webpage. She hadn’t had very long to read it, when he said, “I don’t want to sound pushy or anything, but when would you be able to visit the gallery? I’m really quite desperate for the money, you see. It’ll take time to authenticate the sketches and I’ve creditors threatening to put in the receiver. It’s getting harder and harder holding them off, whilst putting on a brave face.”
For the first time that evening, he looked vulnerable. He turned away but Jane still saw the tears his eyes.
“I can go tomorrow if you want,” she said. “I’ll need to drive down, if I’m to take the sketches with me. Any time in the afternoon should do it.”
“I’ll book an appointment for you then,” he said.
She returned to her car and from there she telephoned Lionel Scott, the owner of the Beech Hill Gallery, taking the part of an amateur artist and enquiring if the gallery was available for her to show her work in. When he said it was, she asked if they could meet there in a day or two, and with an appointment arranged, she drove home, stopping on the way to call in on her friend, Ant Dillard. Ant was a lay magistrate, with a son in the police force and she thought he might be able to help.
“I need help in establishing the authenticity of a client of mine,” she explained to him, after he’d invited her inside. “I know I’m breaching my duty of client confidentiality in telling you this but I can’t take the risk that I might be party to a fraud.”
“Tell me only what you need to Jane, on the understanding that everything you say will be in the strictest confidence,” Ant replied.
“In that case, I won’t tell you why the person concerned has instructed me only that he has and I need to make sure he is who he says he is. This is the passport of the person in question.” She handed the passport to Ant. “Could you have the same checked out to ensure it isn’t stolen or a counterfeit? It goes without saying I have the authority of its owner to carry out these checks, but it should remain as confidential as possible.”
“Understood.”
“It’s a bit unorthodox, I know, but I also need to make sure there aren’t any reports of any stolen Jasper August sketches, even reports made many years ago. Whilst you’re at it, maybe you could ask your son to confirm the owner of the passport hasn’t got any previous convictions, particularly for fraud.”
“I suppose you want all this by yesterday?”
“Would tomorrow afternoon be possible?”
Ant laughed at her cheek, and promised he’d do what he could.
CHAPTER TEN
Can it Be?
The gallery Graham Burslem hoped would purchase his sketches was called the Diamond Gallery. A Diamond Gallery run by a diamond geezer, no doubt, Jane thought as she read the gallery’s printout before going to bed. It was located in a side street between Marylebone High Street and Harley Street, a few minutes walk from Regent’s Park. To Jane’s relief, the gallery had a car park. She studied the gallery’s address on her A-Z and calculated it would take her about three hours to get there, door-to-door. With her appointment at two o’clock in the afternoon, and allowing time for a pit stop, she would leave the next morning at ten a.m.
This she did, and when she pulled into the car park at the rear of the gallery, she was seven minutes early for her appointment, leaving her just enough time to call Ant Dillard.
“The ID seems to check out,” he said. “The passport was definitely issued to a Graham Burslem at that address. It hasn’t been reported as stolen or missing and judging by the stamps collected over the years and well worn condition, it’s not a counterfeit. There aren’t any reports that we could find of any stolen Jasper August sketches, and Graham Burslem’s as clean as a whistle.”
So far so good, she thought.
“Let’s hope he didn’t paint it himself in the garage,” Ant said.
“Well, that’s for others to establish not us, Ant,” she said, thanking him for his troubles and promising to call around and collect the passport in a day or two.
She removed the still-covered sketch-pad from the boot of the car and carried it with her into the gallery. James Haley, the gallery’s owner, waited for her at the door. He was about the same age as Graham Burslem, but whereas Graham had a mane of thick curly hair, and a beard, James Haley was almost bald and clean shaven. His gallery was more conventional than Graham Burslem’s. Unlike the empty windows of Graham’s gallery, the windows of James Haley’s gallery displayed almost as many pictures as its walls did. This gallery’s collection ranged from oils to still-lives. Paintings of animals hung next to religious works. There were even cartoons.
“I understand you have a collection of sketches you’d like me to value for you?” he said, in a tone of voice which gave Jane the impression that he was merely going through the motions, and didn’t really expect the sketches to have much of interest about it.
“I do, yes. All the sketches are of the same young woman. The signature says the artist is a Jasper August. My research tells me he’s quite well known, although I’ve never heard of him. There is a girl’s name written across the top left-hand corner. We’ve always thought it said Angela,” she said, the binder containing the sketchpad still in her hands.
In front of her, James Haley almost fell over. He had to steady himself by leaning on the counter. Jane could tell that it was all James could do to stop himself from snatching the binder out of her hands.
“It can’t be? Surely not?” he said, more to himself than to her. “May I see them?” Although obviously trying to calm himself down, and stop the excitement from showing in his voice, he physically shook. Jane removed the sketch-pad from its binder and lay it on the counter. Without being asked to, James Haley put on a pair of gloves. He opened the pad, staring at each picture for a few minutes, before turning to the next. When we reached the watercolour, he stretched out his hand towards it, and without touching it, he allowed his fingers to trace the outline of Angela’s f
ace.
“Is it really you?” he asked the girl.
A woman stopped in the street outside, and began to study the various pictures hanging in the gallery’s windows. James Haley hurried over to the door, locked it, and put the closed sign up in the window. The woman moved away.
“I don’t know about you,” he said to Jane. “But I need a drink. Badly.”
“I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea,” Jane said.
“I’ll pick the leaves myself, if this is the genuine article,” he said. “I need some fresh air.”
A few minutes later, Jane found herself in a deckchair on the gallery’s patio roof garden, covered up in a blanket. A wrought iron fence ran around the edge of the roof garden to prevent unfortunate accidents. To her right, sage grew in a pot, and lavender in another. How beautiful they must smell when in bloom, Jane thought. She sipped her lemon tea contentedly. A pair of blackbirds, also enjoying the view of the rooftops of London from the branches of a tall Bay tree in the corner of the garden, chirped happily away. How quiet it is up here, Jane thought to herself – the roar of the traffic on the streets below almost inaudible.
The comfort of the blanket, combined with the aroma from the tea, and the stillness of the roof garden, meant Jane was having some difficulty staying awake. She sat herself up in the chair, while beside her, James, also in a deckchair, drank the large whisky he’d poured himself.
“I can’t believe it,” James Haley said, for the umpteenth time. “I’m actually shaking in astonishment. Literally shaking. Please tell me how you came by those sketches, and then I’ll tell you why I am so excited.”
As she had been instructed to do, Jane told him the story prepared for her by Graham Burslem.
“They belonged to my late husband. He said he fell in love with them, or rather with their subject, the first time he saw them. This was before he met me, of course,” she added. “When he was at college, someone walked into a bar with the sketches under their arm. I know money changed hands, but how much I couldn’t tell you, nor who the original owner was, I’m afraid. We’ve always kept the sketches in some kind of protective binder, in an old chest. Now and then, my late husband would get them out to show people. He was quite proud of his purchase – she’s a beautiful girl, let’s be honest. Neither of us ever thought the sketches might be valuable. I came across them quite recently, and did a bit of research, leading me to believe that they might be worth something after all. I’ll be very happy if they are. I won’t pretend I don’t need the extra money. It’s so hard to make ends meet, being on one’s own.”
“I completely understand,” James Haley said. “I’m going to have to get them validated. But if they are, what I think they are, then I’ll have some very good news for you indeed. I need to make a telephone call. I’ll do that now, and then I’ll refresh your tea for you and tell you all about Angela.”
James returned soon afterwards, with a fresh pot of lemon tea and a plate of chocolate biscuits, which he placed on the small table next to Jane. This time he too drank tea.
“Jasper August was an exceptionally talented, and unusually for his profession, an exceptionally successful and wealthy artist, who died fairly recently. Jasper was not always successful and wealthy. He struggled for success for many years. When he was still a young man going through his starving in a garret phase, he painted some sketches his girlfriend of the time which he ended up giving to a flatmate in lieu of rent, so the story goes. As is often the way of things, Jasper and flatmate drifted apart, and in the course of events, both flatmate and sketches went missing and, despite repeated pleas from Jasper, they have never resurfaced, until this moment that is.” He glanced at Jane. “Jasper went on to paint a portrait of Angela which has just been bought by some rich New York financier,” he explained. “I would be astonished if he didn’t want to buy this collection.”
“What happened to the actual girlfriend?”
“She and Jasper eventually split up and she was never heard from again either. She’s probably an overweight middle-aged mother of adolescent children now, her Bohemian days as an artist’s muse, long over,” he said, ruefully. “The call I just made was to John Stem, the president of the Jasper August society. He’s on his way here now. If anyone will be able to authenticate those sketches, it will be him.”
She was relieved to find that, so far at least, the story told to her by Graham Burslem being substantiated by James Haley.
John Stem arrived within the hour, clutching a Jasper August sketch of a different woman. He was clearly as excited by the potential discovery of Angela as James Haley. After greeting Jane enthusiastically, he turned his attention to the sketches. They stood two easels side-by-side, and placed some of Jane’s sketches on one, and John Stem’s on the other, to compare. Jane watched on in quiet admiration, while the two men spent hours studying the sketches with magnifying glasses, peering intently at every minute detail. They shone a halogen torch on them. They compared and discussed something very continuously referred to as, ‘the broad strokes technique’ – a technique apparently commonly used by August. They compared his attention to fine detail, his use of shade and light, her features, the backgrounds, the variations in the details, and his signature. They noted that in the watercolour, Angela wore a simple pearl necklace. The use of a single pearl somewhere in his portraits, was a recurring feature in his work, Jane learnt that afternoon. (‘His motif,’ as James Haley put it). The two men stared closely at the sketches and stood some way away from them. They held some of the sketches up to the light and compared them with the others. They turned the lights off briefly, and both stood staring at the sketches in the semi-light, before switching the lights back on. Finally, a decision was made.
“I believe they’res genuine, James,” John Stem declared.
“I can’t disagree,” James Haley said, biting into his own clenched fist.
“I’m going to call Fonebies,” John Stem said.
He moved to the other side of the art gallery, and made the call to the famous art auctioneers from there. Jane watched him, exhilaration written across on his face.
“I’d better take some details from you. Oh hang that,” James said, picking Jane up and swinging her around in his arms. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. I’ve waited all my life for a moment like this.” He put her down again.
“My details,” she said, passing him her passport and a notelet on which she’d written down her name and address. James gave the passport no more than a cursory glance before returning it to her. The notelet he put in the till.
“Would you object to leaving the sketches here with us for a while?” he said. “We’ll need to ask Fonebies to cast their expert eye over it. I’ll give you a receipt obviously. If this sketch-pad of yours is genuine, I’ll give you twenty thousand pounds for it.”
She hesitated. Twenty thousand pounds? Graham had said it was only worth fifteen thousand.
“Okay, okay – twenty-five thousand pounds. You drive a hard bargain for such a sweet lady.”
Jane left the gallery shortly afterwards with the promised receipt, a photograph of herself and James Haley standing outside his gallery holding the sketches, and an offer on the table, ten thousand pounds higher than she’d been instructed to accept. Graham will be pleased, she thought.
How nice to have had a simple, straightforward matter to deal with for a change, Jane thought to herself, as she drove home. There’d been no one to follow, no conundrums to unravel, no clues to decipher, and she still had enough time to investigate Graham Burslem further. Now if she could crack Roz’s case, she’d be happy. She wondered if Orla Wilson’s case was going to be so cut and dried. She doubted it.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Spinsters Spill the Beans!
Jane walked through the doors of one of the oldest pubs in the country, the Maidservant’s Arms, at a couple of minutes past midday. Behind her came the three Bailey sisters, dressed, as always, in floral print dresses, flat pale leather shoes, thick
nylon stockings (Jane wondered where they got them from, in this day and age) and each wearing her undyed hair in a neat bun at the back of her head. Mirabella, who’d swapped her cassock for a dark blue Kaftan covered with tiny white flowers, was last through the door.
Built by monks to sell their beer, the Maidservant’s Arms nestled in the grounds of Southstoft’s mediaeval cathedral by the banks of the river Evening. Not only was it one of the oldest pubs in the country, it was one of the smallest, with a ceiling so low, that tall men had literally to bow when inside. Its unpainted walls were rough to the touch, and its flagstone floor shiny and worn away through centuries of use. A large fire warmed it in the winter, and its flagstones kept it cool in the summer. Although the Maidservant’s Arms still sold Cathedral Beer (which Jane had never been able to abide, finding it far too strong for her liking, although her late husband had enjoyed nothing more than a pint of Cathedral Beer) it wasn’t the Inn’s beer the party had come to sample that day, but its famous cream tea.
The party chose a table in an alcove, close to the roaring wood fire, with views over the grounds and the river. “Who could ever tire of cream tea at the Maidservant’s Arms, ladies?” Mirabella asked with a pretend wistful-sigh. “Not me. Oh, will you look at that?” She pointed to the grounds outside as she spoke. “How adorable.”
The group turned to look at a group of tiny primary school children being frog-marched along the cathedral footpath as it followed the river through the cathedrals grounds towards the city. The children walked hand-in-hand in pairs along the path. A teacher at the head of the line kept turning around to ensure her charges were still following her, while another at its end, kept order by barking orders at the children – telling them to hurry up, not to dawdle, not to run, not to walk too quickly, nor to walk too slowly.