Chapter Seven
Inspector Benjamin Ross
CHARLES GRAY, still wearing his expression of otherworldly serenity, greeted me in the gallery and said that Mr Angelis would be pleased to see me in the office.
‘Things are quiet?’ I remarked, looking round. I was the only visitor.
‘Apart from the press, very quiet,’ agreed Gray. ‘Though even those gentlemen seem to have found somewhere else to be today.’
‘Your usual clients don’t care to be associated with vulgar crime, I suppose,’ I remarked.
He nodded. ‘We won’t see any business until all this is over.’
‘How about the owner, Mr Benedict. Has he come into the gallery since the sad event?’
‘No, sir. But one wouldn’t expect it, would one?’ was Gray’s cool response. ‘Mr Benedict is in mourning. Come this way, sir, if you would.’
Put in my place, I followed him.
Angelis greeted me civilly but this time I wasn’t offered sherry.
‘How can I help you, Inspector? I really can’t add anything to what I told you on your last visit.’ He sat back in his chair and folded his manicured hands over his waistcoat, today made of black and gold brocade. A thick gold ‘Albert’ chain was draped across it to secure his pocket watch. He wore rings, too, I noticed, also gold. As before, he struck me as far too exotic for smoky London.
‘I am wondering,’ I said casually, ‘whether among your clients you number a Mrs Scott, who lives in Clapham. She is a widow. Her husband, I understand, was a military man.’
After some lengthy pause Angelis inclined his head. ‘The name is familiar.’
‘She has bought pictures here?’ I asked him.
He raised a thick black eyebrow. ‘May I ask the reason for your interest, Inspector?’
It wasn’t for him to ask me questions, as I could have pointed out. But I didn’t want to antagonise him.
‘You’ll appreciate, Mr Angelis, that our enquiries seldom proceed in a straight line,’ I explained apologetically. ‘All kinds of tangential matters crop up. Most can be disposed of quickly and dismissed from the proceedings.’
It was as good an answer as he was going to get and he knew it.
‘Mrs Scott has bought here. Not often, perhaps, but on a few occasions.’
‘She has a good eye for a painting?’
He pursed his lips but he could not but answer frankly. This was the area of his expertise and he had a reputation to maintain.
‘I will be frank, Inspector, trusting it will go no further than these walls?’
I nodded. Whatever he had to tell me, I doubted it would ever be necessary to reveal Mrs Scott’s taste, or lack of it, in court.
‘The late Major Scott was, as you rightly said, a military man. Both he and Mrs Scott were among those Europeans trapped for five whole months when the garrison at Lucknow was besieged during the Indian Mutiny of fifty-seven and fifty-eight. Major Scott took a fever during the siege and died. Mrs Scott had also taken the fever but recovered when the garrison was relieved and better medical care could be had. She travelled with her husband throughout their marriage and, despite her terrible experience at Lucknow and the death of her husband there, she has retained a liking for pictures of oriental scenes: caravan halts, nomads camped in a desert among the ruins of ancient civilisations, bazaars, the women of the seraglio, that sort of thing. There are plenty of examples to be had. It is a fashionable subject. But not all are of the best quality. Mrs Scott . . .’ Angelis put his fist to his mouth and cleared his throat delicately as he sought the words. ‘The lady cares for the scene depicted and is generally indifferent to the brushwork and ability of the artist, shall we say?’
‘I see,’ I said.
Hastily, Angelis added, ‘We don’t sell daubs here, Inspector. I beg you won’t think that! But the lady has a liking for certain artists, not necessarily ones I would recommend. But I have her instructions that if a work by one of them should become available, I am to let her know.’
‘Money is not an obstacle, then?’ I observed.
‘I don’t think so, Inspector, although I have no knowledge of the lady’s fortune. There are no children.’
‘You’ve visited her house at Clapham yourself, perhaps, delivering some work?’
Angelis was no fool. The heavy lids drooped over his lustrous eyes and then opened again. If I asked this, it was because I already knew the answer.
‘I have done so on occasion,’ he agreed.
‘Could you tell me when was the last occasion?’
He didn’t want to do it, but he couldn’t break off the conversation now. He rose from his chair, made a majestic progress to a shelf, and returned with a stout ledger. He turned the pages carefully. ‘Here, you see, Inspector, I delivered “Bedouin tribesmen before the Great Pyramid”, by a minor French artist, to her two months ago. I do not undertake to deliver the paintings to everyone, you understand. But Mrs Scott likes my advice on hanging the subject.’
‘She takes your advice on that, but not on the quality of the painting!’ I said with an attempt at humour.
But for Angelis it was a serious matter. ‘Quite, Inspector. In this case I did explain to her that if she would wait a while, it was more than possible that a better work with a similar subject would come on the market. But she was in a hurry to have a replacement painting on her wall.’
‘Replacement?’ I asked.
Angelis flushed. He had said more than he intended. Good, that’s what I wanted a witness to do.
‘A painting had been taken down. It left a gap. Mrs Scott was less interested in the quality of the painting than the size of the frame. The absence of the previous one left a paler rectangle on the wall covering. She wanted to disguise it.’
I felt that prickle run up my spine that always signifies something of real interest is about to be revealed.
‘Why?’ I asked simply.
He gave a rueful smile. ‘So that her friends would not notice the other one had been sold, I dare say.’
‘Sold?’ I exclaimed.
‘Yes, by us.’
‘For how much?’ I asked tersely.
‘That is a very private matter . . .’ he began feebly. But then he sighed and went to fetch a second ledger. ‘Here,’ he said.
I looked at the entry beneath his pointing finger.
‘That is a great deal of money,’ I said, when I found breath.
‘It was a very fine painting.’ Angelis gave a kind of muted growl. ‘And she replaced it with a bread-and-butter piece by a virtual unknown!’
I sat for a moment digesting the implication of all this. ‘You said she had no money problems,’ I said at last.
‘I told you I have no knowledge of the lady’s fortune,’ he corrected me gently. ‘But even if a person is in comfortable circumstances, he – or she – might want to raise an extra lump sum of money for something special. Something, let us say, that she would not wish her usual financial advisers to know about?’
‘And you think that is what she was doing when she sold the good painting and replaced it with a cheaper one?’
‘I had that impression. But I repeat, only an impression. I can give you no details. I may have been wrong.’
No, I thought, you weren’t wrong. I’d wager my month’s wages on it, and I think I can guess where that sum of money was going.
‘May I ask,’ I began and Angelis looked wary, ‘if you have ever called at her Clapham house socially? She holds soirées, I understand.’
‘Never, Inspector,’ Angelis said coolly. ‘Have you further questions? Because if not, I think I shall close the gallery for the day now, and let Gray go home.’
I left the gallery well satisfied. Now I knew the question I had to put to Signor Tedeschi the following day.
I arrived at the Burlington Arcade promptly at eleven the following morning. Harry Barnes was on duty and greeted me by name. He was the sort of employee who would remember all regular customers by name – and an inspector of police, if he should turn up. If Mrs Benedict had asked him to call her a cab that fateful Saturday afternoon, Barnes would have remembered that, too. I was surer than ever that she had not.
Tedeschi was waiting for me in his private sanctum, a tiny room above his shop. It was a pity the room was not larger because the jeweller himself was a big man. Whereas Angelis presented a well-built but elegant figure, Tedeschi was simply fat, with curling grey hair and sharp, pouched eyes. He didn’t attempt to rise from the chair in which he was wedged. Perhaps it would have been an ungainly action and he didn’t wish me to see his struggle. Instead, he waved a podgy hand at the one other chair. I sat down.
‘They told me,’ he said, ‘that you would be coming today. I have already spoken to a Sergeant Morris.’
‘Yes, sir, but matters have progressed a little since then.’
Tedeschi’s chest wheezed faintly as he expelled his breath. I thought he was probably asthmatic. But he said nothing, waiting for me to go on.
‘Mrs Benedict came with her companion to visit you last Saturday afternoon, the afternoon of the fog. She brought you a brooch.’
‘She did,’ he agreed.
‘You still have the article?’
‘I do.’
‘May I see it?’
In reply, Tedeschi reached for a bell pull. From beneath our feet I heard a jangle and then footsteps on the spiral stair. A middle-aged assistant appeared.
‘You wish something, Signor Tedeschi?’
‘Open the safe,’ ordered the jeweller.
The man went to a steel safe in a corner and opened it as bid. Kneeling before it, he turned his head and looked at his employer.
‘The Benedict brooch,’ said Tedeschi.
The man brought over a rather worn blue velvet case and placed it reverently before the jeweller. Tedeschi nodded, and the man returned to the shop below.
I watched as Tedeschi opened the case, took out a brooch from it and placed it carefully in the centre of a square of black velvet laid on his desk. He put the case to one side and sat back, looking at me. When I hesitated, he gestured towards the brooch.
I leaned forward and studied it.
‘You wish a glass?’
I realised Tedeschi was offering me a jeweller’s magnifying eyeglass.
‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I am, alas, not well enough versed in gems to make good use of it. I take it these are real gems, and not paste?’
‘They are real gems, Inspector. Three small medium-quality rubies and one larger, very good stone. A ring of small diamonds, also of medium quality. Three small freshwater pearls. Excellent craftsmanship.’
‘Of your own workshop?’
A faint smile crossed the jeweller’s soft white countenance. ‘The brooch is at least sixty years old, or even a little more. I would say it was made shortly before eighteen hundred. After the establishment of the Directoire in France, in the seventeen nineties, Roman and Greek antiquity was very much in fashion. There is no assay stamp on the gold because it is not of British manufacture. I suspect it is Italian.’
I looked down at the thing. It was larger than I’d expected. An intricate net of woven gold strands formed a shape like a Grecian urn, which was ornamented with gems. Three small pearl drops were attached, one to the base and one either side where, if it had been an urn, there would have been handles or rings. The resulting impression was vaguely classical; some Italian admirer of the new French Republic had ordered this made for the lady of his affections. I hoped she’d liked it. It was a very fancy piece but not one that appealed to me.
‘I see in your face that you don’t care for it,’ Tedeschi observed. ‘It is old-fashioned.’
‘I can’t tell if it’s old or new in style,’ I admitted. ‘Mrs Benedict wanted a ring made of this? Could that be done?’
‘It could. It would mean destroying the piece.’
‘It would make a very good-sized ring,’ I murmured.
‘Yes, or even two rings,’ Tedeschi agreed, ‘or a ring and a pair of small earrings.’
‘Did you discuss the design of the ring, or rings, with Mrs Benedict?’
‘No, that was to be done at a later date.’ The jeweller’s voice was curt. His chest wheezed more audibly. He took out a lawn handkerchief and mopped his brow.
‘So what will you do with it now?’
‘At a suitable moment,’ Tedeschi said, ‘I shall write to Mr Benedict and ask him what he wishes done. But the time is not right.’ He paused. ‘He is in mourning. It would be inappropriate to ask him about it now.’
‘It would be even more distressing, perhaps,’ I said, ‘to tell him the real reason why his wife had brought you the brooch.’
The silence was broken only by the wheezing from the other man’s chest. Then Tedeschi said quietly, ‘There is no need. The lady brought me the brooch for it to be converted into something else. She was entitled to do so. The brooch is part of a collection of jewellery, family jewellery, which she inherited on the death of her mother. As her mother had died when Allegra was only twelve, her father kept it in safety for her until her marriage. When she became Mrs Benedict, the casket of jewellery was handed to her and she brought it to England. I doubt Mr Benedict has ever known exactly what it contained.’
