So Hector led Maggie out into the autumnal garden where the roses were almost over and the late blooms mildewed by the rain. He led her round the corner of the house into a stable yard and unlocked the old tack room to which he’d removed his treasure to show it, in strict confidence, to a local dealer.
‘I’m not an expert in any way,’ he said, ‘but one picks up a sort of nose for what’s right if you’ve got any taste at all. Anyway, I want you to be the first to see it. I don’t want the others to influence you.’
‘I’m quite capable of making up my own mind,’ she told him. He’d shut the door and she smelled old leather and sour hay.
‘Not a word about this to Ma,’ he was saying, ‘or to Nanny Tucker,’ and then, like a triumphant conjurer, he whisked a piece of sacking off a canvas propped against the wall to reveal a dark picture, much in need of cleaning. ‘It’s the Rubens touch, am I right? Not quite as usual, because the girl with the kids kept her clothes on. Even her hat, would you believe it?’ Maggie said nothing and he asked her, ‘What do you think it is?’
‘I know what it is.’ She had no doubt about it. ‘It’s Helene Fourment, with two of her children.’
‘This Helene, friend of Rubens, was she?’
‘I suppose you could say so. He married her when she was sixteen.’
‘Did he, by God! I suppose a lot of that goes on in the art world.’
‘A lot of what?’
‘Sex!’ Hector was laughing. ‘You know, the moment I saw you I knew we’d hit it off.’
‘Did you really?’
‘Of course, I could offer it to Sotheby’s or Christie’s.’
‘I suppose you could.’
‘But, well, I’ve always had a soft spot for old Klinsky’s.’
‘Very touching.’
‘A Rubens would be a huge plus for you, wouldn’t it? Picture of the year and so on.’ He waited for her reaction and, when none came, he called the evidence in support of his great find, ‘I mean, Rubens came to England, didn’t he?’
‘Knighted by Charles I,’ she told him. ‘Given a degree at Cambridge. Struck by the beauties of the English countryside.’
‘So some of his stuff might have been picked up by the Bovington family?’ Hector seemed to think the case was made out.
‘It’s possible.’ At which he smiled and made her a proposition, ‘Of course, if I promised you, you could sell this masterpiece at Klinsky’s, you personally – and not any of your rivals. You and I could become really close friends, Maggie.’ He put an arm tentatively round her waist. She moved away but looked at him with apparent interest. ‘Have sex, you mean?’ she asked innocently.
‘Well, you do come straight out with it, don’t you?’ Hector was delighted.
‘You’re suggesting I’d have sex to get a Rubens for Klinsky’s?’ Maggie smiled at him sweetly.
‘Wouldn’t you?’
‘I don’t know.’ She seemed to be thinking it over. ‘Perhaps I might. I haven’t really thought about it. Luckily the matter doesn’t arise.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, whatever I’d do for a Rubens, I wouldn’t do for that daub!’
‘That what? Why do you call it a daub?’
‘Because the real painting of the beautiful Helene and her children is safely in the Louvre and what you were asking me to take my clothes off for is a rather indifferent copy. Bought by some gullible Bovington in the last century, I imagine.’ She moved to the door. ‘This visit has been a complete waste of time.’
‘I’m so ... I’m sorry.’ He looked, unattractively, like a small boy caught out in some disagreeable net.
‘So you should be, Marilyn,’ Maggie said, and left him.
While Maggie was disappointing Hector, Ben had used his time to make a truly unexpected discovery. The party had coffee in the library, another long, icy room with leather-bound volumes which looked as though they hadn’t been read for generations. Ben, bored with the after-lunch chatter about the strange absence of apples and of routes to London, wandered down the shelves and started to pull out some old family albums, bound books of watercolours, drawings, letters and poems left by visitors to mark a happy stay with the then prosperous family in the 1840s and 1850s. Some of the poems were illustrated with drawings. Here and there he found a pressed flower, a lock of hair or a marked dance card. And then there was something more substantial, about thirty pages written over with brownish ink, crossed out again and again, rewritten and clearly agonized over. They were held together by a strip of white ribbon and on the front page there was an inscription in the same small handwriting. Nick came up with a cup of coffee and looked over Ben’s shoulder. They were both able to read a confident, unaltered dedication with much difficulty: TO HENRIETTA BOVINGTON. THIS LITTLE GHOST STORY FROM WHICH WE TOOK THE PLAY YOU ACTED IN SO CHARMINGLY. A TRIBUTE FROM HER FELLOW PLAYER AND A GREAT ADMIRER, CHARLES DICKENS. THE MOAT HOUSE, SUMMER ’59. ‘I say, Ben. Is that important?’ Nick wondered.
‘If it’s right, it certainly might be. I mean, I’m not a manuscript man, but ...’
‘Not as important as a Rubens? I wonder where the hell Marilyn’s taken Maggie?’
‘Are you jealous?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ But Nick gulped his coffee. ‘Yet she might like me to keep my eye on her ... They always find a bit of anxiety flattering, don’t they?’ So Nick went. Hester had been drawn back to the garden, the two wives were talking and Mike had gone off somewhere. Ben sat in a chair by the window and started to read ‘The Spectre at the Feast; A Ghost Story by C.D.’. And then he began to decipher an opening paragraph:
It is not unknown for an aged relative to appear, unannounced, at a family board and require to be given pride of place at dinner. Such an occurrence would be by no means out of the way and would make but a tame beginning to a story which, in the telling, seeks to chill the bones of the most rational reader at the most cheerful fireside. But when I tell you that the life of the relative in question had undoubtedly been terminated by a ball shot from a French cannon some twenty years before the night I am about to describe, it may take on a different and more alarming complexion.
When Ben had read it, he looked through the window and saw his hostess cutting off dead heads with a pair of secateurs. He put the book he had found under his arm and went out to join her.
‘Those dusty old albums,’ she said when he’d shown it to her. ‘Nanny Tucker wouldn’t let the children touch them. She said they’d get their clothes grubby and we always thought they looked terribly dull.’
‘Well, perhaps not so dull as that. You said Charles Dickens visited Bovington?’
‘Well, that was the story we were told. It may have been pure fiction.’
‘He certainly left some fiction here. A ghost story called “The Spectre at the Feast”.’
‘My father never read us that one.’
‘So far as I know, it’s never been published, Mrs Bovington, I’ve got it here.’ He opened the pages of the album and showed her the loose leaves of the story. ‘It would seem to be in his handwriting. I’m not an expert at all. Henry Quarles is our man on manuscripts. But an unpublished story by Dickens might be worth, well, a very great deal of money.’
The rain had stopped and the garden was lit by low sunlight. Hester Bovington looked distressed. ‘Oh, dear. I’m so sorry to hear that.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, I haven’t got a lot of money. We can’t have the heating on much and Mike’s wife complains. Usually we don’t drink very much – an occasional sherry when we have visitors. But I’ve got this house and the garden, of course. We get on very well here and Nanny Tucker’s a tower of strength. A lot of money? That might be very embarrassing. I really wouldn’t want anything to change.’
‘But would you let me show this to Henry Quarles?’ Ben suggested. ‘Then at least you’ll know what sort of money we’re talking about.’
‘Well’ – she was still doubtful – ‘I suppose
so. Is that what you’d advise me to do?’
‘There’s no harm in knowing.’
‘I suppose not. Well, yes, then, Mr Glazier. But please don’t say anything to the family about this. Especially not to Hector. I wouldn’t want anyone to be upset.’ She walked with him back to the house, and they passed
Nanny Tucker, well wrapped up, sitting on a kitchen chair by a yew hedge, doing a pile of mending.
Henry Quarles, in Manuscripts, was a pale young man who must have been born with the quizzical look, the lopsided smile and the myopia of the confirmed bibliophile. He wore a three-piece suit, boots and a gold watch-chain; he also had a surprisingly beautiful girlfriend and spent three evenings a week playing poker. He was holding the pages of ‘The Spectre at the Feast’, and telling Ben about a possible connection with Bovington Moat House: ‘Ned Bovington was a member of the Garrick Club and had taken Dickens’s side during the row with Thackeray. Charles was in a bit of a turmoil. Marriage broken up, in love with a younger woman.’
‘Poor chap.’ Ben was understanding.
‘In 1859 he started The Tale of Two Cities, working flat out.’ Quarles found a page in a book. ‘But in a letter to Wilkie Collins he says this: “A friend from the Club is summoning me to a week in the country. A house among apple trees and flowering cherries, also ornamented by a flowering of daughters. There is a rumour that we may have theatricals!” That might be where he wrote this ghost story – at the house you went to.’ Quarles picked up the manuscript again. ‘The paper’s right. The handwriting. The watermark. The history. Yes, Ben, you have dug us up a bit of buried treasure.’
‘How much would you say?’
‘A reserve of ... What? Seventy-five thousand? I’d hope we’d get more.’
Ben shook his head. ‘I’m afraid the owner’s going to find that rather worrying.’
Since her embarrassing visit to Bovington Maggie hadn’t been hugely pleased with Nick who had taken her on a wild goose chase to see a man she described as a complete wanker. But Hector had called in at Klinsky’s Wine department and, though he didn’t dare approach Maggie again, asked Nick if he had any idea what Ben had taken from the Moat House because his mother was being distinctly cagey on the subject. Nick did a little research, having been promised a commission by Hector from any eventual sale, and got hold of Quarles.
When he heard the magic figure of seventy-five thousand, Hector said it was his mother’s duty to arrange a family meeting so the Dickens manuscript could be fully discussed. As he was a hugely busy man it would have to be an evening. Ben was invited back to the Moat House to stay a night, give his advice, and bring the entirely welcome ‘The Spectre at the Feast’ with him.
The family gathered in the library after dinner, a company of which Hector, having had more than a little too much to drink, had appointed himself the chairman and managing director. Hester, sitting on the edge of the group, her attention often straying to the bulb catalogues on her lap, looked as though she would rather be anywhere else. Mike was scowling, Lucky was shivering, Mousekin was so supportive of her husband that it got terribly on his nerves, and Ben wandered up and down the shelves, found nothing else worth his notice, and thought he’d better leave the Bovingtons to make up their own minds, although he had a clear idea who was going to do it for them.
‘The price seems excellent. Who knows what’s going to happen in the future? As I read the market, now’s the time to sell. Would Mr Glazier agree?’ Hector opened the debate.
‘It’s not a bad time.’ Ben told them. ‘But whether we sell it for you is entirely Mrs Bovington’s decision.’
‘So what’s it to be, Ma?’ Hector hadn’t got all night. ‘I mean, it’s not doing a damn thing for us stuck in the bookshelf, gathering dust.’
‘I’m not sure. I can’t be sure. What do you really think, Mr Glazier?’ Hester asked.
‘It’s not what Mr Glazier thinks.’ Hector stayed in charge, it’s not only just what you think, Ma, quite honestly. This is family property. Like the house, it’ll go to the family. Here’s a chance for the family to improve its cash flow situation.’
‘Improve yours, you mean?’ Mike spoke with slow sarcasm in the classless voice he had acquired.
‘I’m thinking of the family. People seem to forget family values nowadays and just run around joy-riding in other people’s Volvos.’ Hector slid easily into his political tone of voice.
‘Personally I wouldn’t give two p for a ghost story, scribbled by Dickens for so much a bloody commercial line.’ Mike sighed, looked bored, and, to his surprise, Ben saw Mousekin grant him a quick little smile of solidarity.
‘If you feel like that, Michael’ – Hector was trying to sound entirely reasonable – ‘there’s absolutely no need for you to share in it.’
‘Of course, there’s a need for Mike to share in it!’ Lucky was angry. ‘He could take time off. He could do his book on Lawrence. That might get him tenure in California.’
‘You and Michael don’t have the same responsibilities as myself and Mousekin.’ Hector stoked Lucky’s rage. ‘There are just two of you. Hardly a family in any meaningful sense of the word.’
‘You mean, we don’t have a brat to send to a highly expensive boarding school?’
‘Malcolm isn’t a brat, Lucky. Malcolm is the next generation – the future of England!’
‘Tongue-tied, tedious and sexually frustrated!’
‘Well, that’s not a complaint you suffer from,’ Hector told Lucky and Hester, confused and distressed, appealed to them both, ‘Please. Oh, please. There’s absolutely nothing for you to quarrel about.’
Lucky, however, could find plenty. She told Hector, ‘I don’t know what the hell you mean. Mike and I may have our ups and downs, but we’ve talked it through and we’re committed to each other.’
‘And you don’t see why you shouldn’t get your hands on some of the manuscript money?’ Hector asked as Hester begged, ‘I just want the advice of all of you.’
‘We do have a brat’ – Hector began a speech – ‘as Lucky so delightfully puts it. He has been down for my old school since birth. Mousekin and I are determined to see him –’
‘Buggered and beaten,’ Lucky suggested.
‘I don’t think I heard that, Lucky.’ Hector went on, ‘If a capital sum is to come to the family, as a result of Mr Glazier’s lucky find, then I suggest any division should take account of Malcolm’s need to get a proper start in life.’
‘What do you think, Anthea?’ Hester, turned in her bewilderment, to Hector’s wife.
‘Oh, it seems such a pity to sell something that’s, well, part of the family history.’
‘Mousekin!’ Hector looked at her as though she had suddenly appeared, for no reason at all, on the opposition benches.
‘But, of course, Hector’s right,’ Mousekin retreated. ‘We do need to think of Malcolm.’
‘Well, I suppose ... Hester seemed on the point of surrender. ‘What do you really suggest, Mr Glazier?’
‘I don’t think I can suggest anything, Mrs Bovington. It’s really for you to decide what you want to do with your property.’
Hester was silent, drew in her breath, appeared to be about to speak, but, before she could, Nanny Tucker banged in to the room. ‘Are you lot going to stay up all night wasting the electricity?’
‘No, Nanny. No, of course we won’t,’ Hester promised.
‘All right, then. Time to go up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire.’ At which, she turned out all the lights and left them. Hester said, ‘Good-night, Nanny,’ in the dark and, as Hector turned the lights on again, he said, ‘I do wish she’d stop treating us as though we were all about six years old.’
‘Do you, Hector? Do you really?’ Hester wasn’t sure. ‘Life seemed, well, a good deal easier then. I’m rather tired and I think Nanny’s right. We can all come to a decision in the morning. Good-night, Mr Glazier. I do hope you’ll be comfortable.’
The Moat House seemed to move and mutter
in the night, and inexplicable sounds could be heard, which might be footsteps or nothing but the wind. Hector, having a very large, very late brandy alone in the library, looked up at sounds he thought he heard from a floor above. In the bedroom corridor a door opened and Mike, in his pyjamas, started on a journey to somewhere. Ben had finished deciphering the Dickens story, put it on his bedside table, switched the light out and went to sleep. Some time later, Ben’s door swung open, letting in a wedge of light. There was a foot in the doorway and a hand came out of the darkness and felt for ‘The Spectre at the Feast’.
There was sunshine in the room when Ben woke up. He was in a fairly cheerful mood. The family would make up their minds and he could get back to London to lunch, perhaps, with Maggie. And then he was staring at the bedside table where he’d put ‘The Spectre’ he’d finished reading, and he was out of bed, searching in his briefcase, his overnight bag, in drawers and cupboards, with a growing panic and finding nothing.
When he was dressed he went down to the dining room. The family were sitting at breakfast like a committee meeting, or a jury about to come to a verdict. Ben took his place. Hector scraped the last, searching spoonful out of his boiled egg, cleared his throat, and with all due solemnity, as though telling a packed House of Commons that war had been declared, he began, ‘As the eldest son I think it is for me to announce the family’s decision. The decision, I have to say, is unanimous. We are giving you formal instructions, as the representative of Klinsky’s, to sell our rare and much-treasured Dickens manuscript. For the highest possible price, of course.’
‘Oh, dear.’ It was all Ben could think of to say.
‘Why? What’s “oh dear” about it?’
‘I’m afraid I haven’t got the manuscript. Have any of you?’
‘Of course not!’ Mike’s voice was high and mocking. ‘You told us you brought it down with you. To await our decision.’
‘I feel sure I had it in my room. I was reading it before I went to sleep. I didn’t dream that. And this morning it has slowly and silently vanished away.’
Under the Hammer Page 21