Bereden remained bordered by woodlands to the north, even less a ‘forest’ than I remembered, fenced off from the roadside with official-looking notices declaring it remained part of the Amberstone Estate, and that trespassers would be prosecuted. The Square remained much as it had always been, smaller than I remembered, more contained, buildings and shops far more of an entity. A few of the houses, Georgian mostly, remained intact, but Carter’s Fish-Fry Delight had become a travel agency, the newsagent’s was now an up-market wine bar, and a bus shelter now stood where the greengrocer had set out his goods. Later we wandered past St Matthias, stopping to place a posy of cornflowers – always her favourite – on Enid Quintock’s grave, and searched among the ivy for the spot where Tobias still guarded the east transept. Over the bridge, past Cowpat Meadow, we paid respect to the house where I’d been born, a further ten-minute walk taking us past the Amberstone Estate No Entry notices, to trace, beyond the high wire fencing, what remained of Third Class Cottage.
‘Another country,’ Helen consoled me. ‘They do things differently there.’
‘Clever,’ I said.
‘L. P. Hartley,’ she replied. ‘The Go-Between.’
We had no such problems in locating Amberstone Hall, a matter only of following signs pointing us in the direction of Bereden Conference Centre and Residential Retreat (BERCEN). Mounting debts and school fees had obliged Giles – ‘Gerundive’ as we’d once called him – to sell the property, together with most of the estate, reserving a small but comfortable apartment for the family use. Now a member of the board of management, he’d arranged for us to have one of the dozen or so rooms reserved for visiting tutors. The director, hovering in the foyer, was expecting us. Giles had been called away on business and sent his apologies for not being there in person. His wife was visiting their daughter –currently completing her education in Switzerland – but hoped we’d join him for dinner at the Amberstone Arms that evening.
The Jugged Hare as it had been in my day. Giles was full of apologies. The change of nomenclature had been the brewery’s brainwave, wanting to ‘add a little class’ to the establishment, nor was there much he could have done to stop them, the Squirarchy having more or less died out with his father. He seemed to have lost none of his personal influence though, being treated with the greatest deference by the waiters as we entered, and pausing to shake hands with several of the guests as we made our way to the private dining room.
The loss of the estate had proved less calamitous than it might have been. Some years back he’d established a consultancy advising those faced with a predicament similar to his own; Giles, with his soft-spoken manner and the pale blue Amberstone eyes, having no difficulty in winning their confidence. He’d always been tall, currently around the six-foot mark by my estimation, with square shoulders and cleft chin – even more pronounced now than when we’d teased him about it as children – lending him a rugged charm. He’d made quite a name for himself on the rugby field as well, hence the scar now visible beneath the receding hairline and the loss of an ear lobe. But this, again, was a matter of history; currently he coached a team made up of youngsters from the surrounding villages.
It was not until coffee had been served and we’d settled into easy chairs at the bay window overlooking the square that childhood days were mentioned. We were unsure how much Giles knew about his father’s wartime activity, nor was I certain there was much to be told. We’d selected our drinks from decanters set out on a silver tray and Giles was bringing us up-to-date on how the old gang had fared.
‘Andrew became a teacher, head of a school in the Midlands last I heard. Must have retired by now. Charlie Dowse – nose always in a comic – went into journalism, wrote for the tabloids. No messing with Chunky, into the army the moment he left school, demobbed as a sergeant, but our paths never crossed. And Tim’s no longer with us you may have heard. Died a few years back, behind the counter of his tobacconist shop.’
‘And Jimmy?’ I asked, seizing the moment. ‘He never returned? No clue as to what happened to him?’
‘Not even in the runes.’ Giles laughed. ‘Remember his teaching us the script? How to sign our names, with your lot using it to send secret messages? His pictures are worth quite a bit these days, so I’m told, thanks largely to that television programme.’
The perfect cue. I was into the narrative almost before I knew it: Floral Lady and her pictures, Frank’s assessment of Fiddlers Three – Giles, if he remembered, had had a hand in its creation. (‘But only as a bystander. Nor there to see it through to the end. God, how I envied you that!’). Helen’s memories of her father’s print; her distrust of the artist – we’d agreed to be quite open about this; the ‘coincidence’ which had led to our undertaking this joint mission. (‘“Quest”, “mission”, “venture”… you’re beginning to talk like Jimmy himself.’) Onto the Quintock papers, Songs of Innocence and Experience, then forward to our meeting with Geraldine. An aficionado dedicated to Jimmy’s art and the nearest he’d come to a biographer, if GL’s encyclopaedic entry counted as such – was all that we said. Next the Grigorio incident – Giles had been away at school (‘Remember the old man cursing that damn-fool brother of yours’) – that and the Codpiece sermon, which the Squire, apparently, had done his best to prevent (‘far too sanctimonious for my father’s taste’).
‘Yet he took the church’s side when it came to those stories about the Jutes, along with all the others, just when Jimmy needed him most.’
Giles shook his head. ‘Never quite understood just how that happened. ‘Nor, for that matter, how the two of them came to be so close.’
‘Nothing to do with campanology, then?’ I eased gently into the real purpose of our visit. ‘Those wartime meetings in the church tower when no bells were to be rung, discussing signal towers or arms dumps?’
‘Observation posts and dead letter drops, runners and plastic explosives? Don’t look so surprised, Peter, you’re not the only one to read the South Hants Observer. No point denying it, either. Not after all these years.’
The very last response I’d expected. After the hours I’d spent rehearsing what to say, arguing over it with Helen, steeling myself for all eventualities: denial, ignorance, prevarication, ejection from the house even.
‘Turns out there were units run in similar lines operating all along the coast.’ Giles gazed out of the window for a moment, gathering his thoughts. ‘Vital at the time but forgotten about once peace had arrived. Rather like those unexploded bombs that keep turning up. Normally it’s fine; they’re defused or there’s a controlled explosion, till someone steps on them or starts monkeying around with their innards, and people get hurt. That article’s a case in point. Jimmy and my father clearly identifiable, reminding folk of the great press invasion back in the fifties. Making a bee-line for all the places associated with the unit, followed by the falling-out between the two of them and Jimmy’s sudden departure. What more proof of his perfidy was needed? Which was when the old man came clean – he had no option once The Observer got hold of the story – and told me what had really been going on under our noses out there in the woods. As far as he felt able, that is.’
‘With Jimmy leaving of his own free will? Not one of those unexploded bombs that needed defusing before it did any further damage? Your father suspecting him of God knows what and sending him packing?’
‘Not a bit of it. Others might have had their suspicions but the old man gave him the benefit of the doubt. An unguarded comment, he reckoned. Sounding off about those Shakesphere prints most like. Bringing the press swarming like bees round a honey-pot.’
Jimmy guilty of loose talk? Collaborating with the media? Unbelievable, unless he really was guilty as charged. Or had Geraldine played an even more active part in his downfall than I’d imagined? Arriving in the village on the track of Saintleys but finding the husband who’d deserted her; knowing how much he detested
publicity and unleashing the press upon him. Unaware that he’d been recruited into a secret army, how serious the repercussions would be. Not at the time, but later maybe, in advance of her second visit. Well known as a writer by then, so she might well have picked up the story on the grapevine – would have had no problem in planting it. Might well have written the article herself. An even more protracted form of revenge. This time calculated. And taken cold.
But could there be a yet more devious twist to the plot?
‘Jimmy wasn’t the only one to go missing,’ I said. ‘His last picture disappeared almost as soon as it was painted. Some say he destroyed it.’ More false information from Geraldine, of course, along with her allegations that it contained further incriminating evidence, branding Jimmy even more of a traitor. With her being the only one with any real information concerning that painting – if it ever existed.
But it had.
‘Mappa Mundi you mean?’ Giles, again one step ahead of us. ‘The picture that upset the rector so much? Would have had it publically burnt, given half a chance. Might well have got his way, too, if the old man hadn’t acted quickly; devised a less conspicuous way of disposal.’
There came a discreet tap at the door: the proprietor, advising us the restaurant was closing in half an hour’s time and asking if there was anything else we required.
‘Not like the old days, I’m afraid. It’s no longer the Jugged Hare, Alf Thomas is no longer the landlord.’ Giles returned to his seat, poured us liberal portions of brandy, selected a cigar from the tray, noted my expression and returned it. ‘And the Lone Granger’s successor somewhat more zealous about closing time.’ He nodded at the police car discreetly parked opposite.
‘So there really was a Mappa Mundi,’ I said, wrenching him back on track. ‘And your father “disposed of it”?’
‘Proves our point, though, doesn’t it?’ Helen pushed her drink to one side. ‘There just has to be something in that picture that had to remain hidden.’
‘Just as there has to be something the pair of you are keeping to yourselves,’ Giles leant back in his chair, arms folded. ‘Such as how precisely you’ve discovered so much about a painting known only to the rector and my father, both of them dead, with myself making a threesome?’ The silence lengthened between us.
No option, then, but to reveal what we’d gleaned of Jimmy’s – or should that be Derek’s – pre-Bereden existence, his marriage and supposed death. An edited version, omitting my youthful dalliance with Geraldine, a recent acquaintance, we claimed, who harboured suspicions that Mappa Mundi had been Jimmy’s way of revealing the Amberstones’ wartime secrets.
‘You don’t really think there’s any truth in her story?’ I asked, attempting to sound confident. ‘Did your father give you no idea as to the nature of the picture?’
‘Nor why it worried him so much that he got rid of it?’ Helen’s belief in Geraldine remained unshaken.
‘Got rid of it?’ Giles was smugness personified. ‘The “last of the Saintleys”. He thought far too much of it for that. “Disposed of” was what I said. Took his inspiration from that break-in at Third Class Cottage, otherwise it might really have been a goner. Put it around that Mappa Mundi had been moved there whilst the gallery was cleaned, that it got stolen along with the other nick-nacks. Not much of a cover story, I know, and don’t ask me what good the picture would have been to tearaways like that. Still, it seemed to work, right through to this day, apparently.’
‘Which means…’
‘… that the picture still exists.’ I finished Helen’s sentence.
No denial from Giles; the silence that followed would have had pride of place in Jimmy’s audio collection. As it lengthened I swear I actually heard the implications rippling outwards, like pebbles slipped quietly into some woodland pool.
‘And no need for me to answer any more of your questions.’ He swirled the last of the brandy in his glass before downing it. ‘Unfair, maybe, stringing you along the way I have, but it’s a game two can play and I needed to find out just how many of the family secrets you knew – or how badly you’d got them twisted – before I opened up completely. Would have saved us no end of time if you’d come clean from the start, told me about your embroiderer friend’s suspicions. Never mind, now we’ve got all that out of the way I’ll introduce you to Mappa Mundi and you can decide for yourselves whether she was right or wrong.’
There was a shout of ‘Time, gentlemen, please’ from downstairs, the saloon bar was pushed open, the sound of cars revving up.
‘Which is what I suggest you do tomorrow. After breakfast shall we say? And, remembering the way the two of you bicker, we’ve a long day ahead of us!’
Chapter Twenty-Three
Moment of Intimacy
Nothing distinguished Giles’s apartment from the rest of the building but, once inside, BERCEN’s drab institutionalism gave way to clean lime-coloured walls. Darkish carpet tiles contrasted with light teak furniture of modern design. A set of neatly framed impressionist prints had been strategically placed about the room. But it was the photographs, arranged on a small table by the door, that caught my eye. Family portraits, so Peter told me. Pride of place having been given to a young man in RAF uniform, cap resting on knee, the emblem of his squadron on the desk beside him. Vernon, Giles’s elder brother, son and heir to the Amberstone estate, lost in the air during the African campaign, whose memorial we’d visited the previous day. An artist, I remembered, and those must be his pictures hung about the walls. Watercolours mainly: still lives, pastoral views, rood screens, stained glass windows. An expressionist portrait of what could have only been the old Squire, and, a little to one side, Some corner of a foreign field that is for ever England – the first-draft of Jimmy’s tribute to the fallen hero.
Peter was tugging on my arm, reminding me of the purpose of our visit: Mappa Mundi. And there it stood, leaning up against the back of a chair in the corner, draped in a sheet and looking for all the world like some conjuror’s prop. Giles had the sense of theatre to accompany it. No sneak previews, never a hint as to what he was about to reveal. Not till he’d completed the preliminary patter.
‘The old man acted with strict military precision,’ he quipped. ‘Phase one: outflank the clergy. Phase two: pre-emptive strike. Phase three: secure picture. Phase four: cover tracks, outwitting the local press completely. “Burglary at Third Class Cottage”, according to the headlines. But all it took was some rummaging among the vaults, a little light cleaning. And, hey presto!’ Giles whipped the sheet aside. Revealing…
Something of an anti-climax. The picture was blasphemous, no doubt about it. Unerring in its target, subverting the accepted version of history, calling into question everything the rector must have held dear. A persuasive piece of propaganda certainly, but not nearly as extreme as I’d expected.
The painting was a map of sorts, mounted in a thin gilt frame; the setting pre-conquest times, but most of the features recognisable from what I’d been told. There, at the centre, was the site of the future St Matthias. To one side was the crossing point on the river where the bridge now stood. Near it an age-old pathway led into the forest. There was Frogspawn Shallows where Peter and his chums once swam; tucked away in one corner, Cow Pat Meadow. It was larger than most of Jimmy’s other works – those that I knew – and he’d found yet another way of combining graphics and text. Events taking place over a period of weeks were seen occurring simultaneously, on different parts of the canvas.
The villagers, so a small plaque at the bottom of the picture informed us, have gathered by the river, calling on the gods to provide them with a bountiful supply of fish. But, when their nets are pulled ashore, they’ve caught nothing but shells. An itinerant priest arrives. He confers with the Heavens, then stretches a net from bank to bank. Soon it is writhing with creatures of all shapes and sizes. The holy man is pleased with his
quickness of wit; delighted at the outcome he leaps for joy into the river. The fish are gathered up and taken to the church where, to celebrate this miraculous conversion of the heathen, a feast day is proclaimed. The grateful villagers cut corn for the Harvest Festival. They present the best of their catch to the missionary, who is last seen cheered on his way to a well-earned fish-and-chip supper.
But Mappa Mundi had quite a different tale to tell. Brief notations appeared alongside each incident. Here and there a sentence had been printed beneath their feet. Thoughts or motivation floated cloud-like above their heads; speech bubbles allowed us to eavesdrop on the conversations they were having. Jimmy had, in fact, adopted techniques used in mediaeval times to provide his own commentary on the events portrayed.
The deity in question was Morgana, associated from time immemorial with that stretch of the river, where the earliest settlers had made their home. These were Jutes, of course, who’d accepted the goddess’ rights over the surrounding woodlands. Thanks to her their wells had remained fresh, their crops abundant, the river well stocked. In Jimmy’s sub rosa version the villagers are delighted, not downcast, at their catch. The surfeit of shells indicates Morgana’s permission to proceed with the fishing. And it’s strands of myrtle they – not the priest – cut with their sickles, weaving themselves a net, this being her emblem. It is to a site hallowed to her memory that the people take their catch, depositing it at the entrance to the sacred grove. The blunted sickles are taken in, to be placed reverently on the high altar. The priest is presented as a figure of fun throughout. Aren’t those birds hovering above him as he casts his gaze skyward? Can we detect a scar on his bald head, or something more fundamental? There he is diving ecstatically into the waters. But could that be a mediaeval boot assisting his trajectory?
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