Classic in the Barn (5 page)

I recognized Simon – he'd brought a mid-fifties Austin Metropolitan in to Frogs Hill last year. Normally, Len would have turned up his nose at a yellow and white Custard Torpedo, as this Anglo-American hybrid was charmingly nicknamed, but I persuaded him otherwise, with dull old thoughts of mortgages in my mind. I hadn't taken to Simon, even though he was a prissy sort of chap and, in my appraisal of his sexual leanings, was hardly likely to be in the running for Polly's affections. Nevertheless, they seemed pretty chummy from his arm possessively round her as she picked out the raffle tickets.

I decided to rest content with my progress and not seek Polly out again, so after the speeches I began to wander round the show once more. By mistake, I found myself among Lorna Stack's work – the lady who apparently liked beefy guys. I was jammed in there, so I had no choice but to study her work with close intent. She had, after all, won one of the prizes – though that, I thought, was hardly surprising.

‘What do you think?' came a husky voice from behind me, and I leapt sky high at being unexpectedly addressed. Had Lorna Stack been stalking me? No, it was Polly, to my amazement.

‘Daren't say,' I replied briefly.

I'm no art critic, but I do know what I
don't
like. I don't like fussy neat landscapes of gardens and parks that tell me less than a photograph would convey.

She laughed. Polly? Oh the joys to come if she could laugh so seductively. There was a warmth between us now. ‘Very wise of you, Jack. Especially as the artist is right behind you.'

Alarmed, I turned round, but there was no one there who could possibly be Lorna Stack.

My turn to laugh. ‘I may not call,' I threatened her.

‘I may not answer.'

No mistake. There was sex in that voice, and surely, surely sex in the air. And yet she was holding back. Something seemed not to be resolved. It was as if what Polly wanted, Polly wasn't sure if she should have. I'd seen that look too often on wistful would-be buyers faced with the classic car of their dreams. If I was right about my diagnosis, I could surely change all that.

But at that moment Lorna Stack
did
arrive. Fate seemed to be saying that my luck might be in, but I couldn't be given too much of it. Sharp dark eyes in a sexy face switched from Polly to me and rapidly summed the situation up.

‘Darling, how nice,' she cooed at Polly. ‘I thought I'd find you with Rupert. You so often are. But here you are with a new admirer. How do you manage it?' Her voice sounded flattering; her eyes revealed she had a bitchier motive in mind.

‘Easily, Lorna.' In a trice Polly had turned into the ice queen again as she delivered this cool shot. ‘As for Rupert, he brings pictures to be framed every now and then.'

‘Whenever he puts a deal to bed, I expect,' Lorna fired back. Her eyes turned to me. I was next for the rack. I felt their power, but they left me inexplicably cold. Her sex appeal could batter itself against me all it liked, but it would be in vain. Sharp eyes incandescent with promise, but I wouldn't be taking up their offer, even though Polly pointedly excused herself to leave us together.

‘I've seen you in the village.' Lorna made it sound like the sexiest rendezvous imaginable.

‘That or the pub maybe. I've seen your Bentley around.' I hadn't, except on their forecourt, but it made the point that cars, not black-eyed witches, were my thing.

‘Not the pub. We never have the time. Rupert brings work home with him, and I'm an artist.'

I gulped. ‘And a talented one too.' I indicated the ghastly pictures. What else could I do? She looked pleased anyway.

‘There's not much to do round here, so painting fills in the time I don't spend at the gym.'

Not much to do? When there were walks over the downs and in the fields and woods, drives around the lanes, country pubs, birds, animals, history lurking in every corner of this wonderful county? And yet she drew pictures of flower beds. I smiled, and she must have read it as an invitation.

‘You must make your own entertainment, and I'm sure you do it beautifully. You're the –' she broke off, and I nearly finished ‘beefy sort' for her, but she found her own word – ‘innovative sort.'

‘Too busy to be innovative,' I said hastily. ‘I'm in classic cars.'

‘I'm sure there's a lot of mileage in you.' Her gaze swept appraisingly over me, until I felt like a stud gigolo.

Fortunately, my honour was saved by the bell. Her husband arrived, took a look at me, blinked, smiled, chatted and then to my relief removed his wife from my presence. I prefer to eat dinner, not be eaten for it.

I told myself I had achieved what I had come for more or less. Fifty per cent, anyway. The Lagonda mystery was no further forward, but at the very least I was on talking terms with Polly. I even met Guy Williams on my next promenade, with a woman at his side who was presumably his wife. Thankfully, it wasn't Polly. He glared at me suspiciously, as if I was about to make a dash to pinch his Volvo. I grinned at him in return. The grin wasn't so much for him as for the fact that I had just spotted Polly again. She was talking to both the Stacks now, though Rupert left them as I came sauntering up. It was pushing my luck to talk to Polly again, but that's the trouble with lucky dice. One's tempted to keep on throwing and throwing.

I was just in time to hear Lorna say viciously to Polly: ‘Just keep away in future, darling. Rupert's mine, remember, and
only
mine. You really must remember that, because I'd hate a pretty face like yours to be rearranged. Why not stick to that new bloke of yours? He's a hunky softie.'

I never did hear Polly's reply.

As usual, Rob had arrived at the wrong time. ‘We're ready for the Green Dragon, Jack,' he told me, clapping me heartily on the back. I gave in gracefully. After all, I'd got halfway to Paradise this evening, and if Paradise could have a Lagonda thrown in so much the better. Whatever its story, it was probably something quite innocent. Something to do with Polly and Mike, perhaps, not the car itself. How could there be anything odd about something so sleek and handsome? I thought of that old never-ending song: ‘You'll never get to heaven in an old Ford car,' which my Dad used to sing non-stop.

No, but I could in a Lagonda V12. Especially with Polly in it too.

FOUR

I felt like a kid again at a prospect of a first date. When to make the move? It shouldn't be too soon or she might back off. Not too long, either. What ‘reason' should I give for calling? Come out for a drink? Come out to the Ritz? A casual ‘I was just passing and I fancy you'? Fancy was hardly the right word where Polly was concerned, but I'm not sure that the English language, subtle and beautiful though it is, includes a word for halfway between fancy and love when potential hovers in the air. I suppose Blake's poem got nearest with ‘catching the joy as it flies' – and I had a suspicion that Polly might fly out of my reach at any moment, so I had to get this dilemma sorted. None of the above approaches pushed the right buttons, but I couldn't just turn up on the doorstep grinning fatuously; I needed some cover story, however transparent.

On Monday morning I was prowling around the Pits, where Zoe and Len were still grappling with the Bugatti firewall, and trying to pretend I had a mission in hand. Not very well, as I knew Zoe's sardonic eye was on me, whenever she could spare it from the far sexier firewall. Today not even the Bugatti was tempting me to stay. I had other wheels to spin.

‘Take her a picture to frame,' she threw at me off handedly.

‘Good idea.' I meant it. It was a brilliant idea, even though it raised another dilemma. ‘But I don't think she'd be overwhelmed with the job of framing a print of Canterbury Cathedral.' I'd inherited a house whose walls were full more of family memories than artistic jewels. ‘Have you any lying around? I'd pay.'

‘Nope. Haven't seen any Rembrandts I fancy recently.' Zoe relented and gave my problem all the attention that she normally reserved for work (or Rob). ‘You've got some yourself.'

‘I have?'

She regarded me pityingly. ‘The Glory Boot.' She might justly have added, ‘dumbbell'. She'd be within her rights.

Glory be, I exulted, the Glory Boot. I went over to give her a hug and got a whiff of that indescribable smell which is the mix of petrol, grease and a bit of the wild outdoors that adds up to Zoe – and occasionally Len, but I rarely rush over to hug him. I sometimes wonder whether Zoe keeps a bottle of that smell at home so that she isn't parted from it in the evenings. The wild outdoors in her case comes from her love of long walks, especially in the rain. Don't ask – I don't know.

Of course the answer to my problem lay in the Glory Boot. One of my father's ‘finds', of which there were many, had been a car artist called Giovanni Berazzi, who was struggling away in a garret in Milan painting out his vision of cars. He did very few on commission because classic car owners who pay up front tend to expect every loving detail of their Lancia or Lamborghini captured in paint, and Giovanni doesn't paint that way. He's more of an impressionist, so he likes to paint the cars in somewhat ethereal settings, thus blending the cars into particularly magical and mystical landscapes that would be in harmony with the subject car. Imagine a red Ferrari Testa Rossa on a misty Venetian canal, a Porsche floating through clouds, a Lotus in the midst of a Monet flower garden.

Dad had fallen in love with Giovanni's work, which was unfortunate because it led to a tussle between them. Giovanni wanted to be sure that his beloved paintings were going to a good home, and what Dad told him of the set-up at Frogs Hill did not appeal to him. He had to be wooed, he had to be convinced, and the tears of sorrow at parting with his treasures had to be wiped from his eyes after he eventually agreed to sell Dad eight unframed.

That's one of the reasons Harry Prince is hanging around for the happy day when I really can't pay the mortgage. But I have news for him. Giovanni got the hang of what it was like to have money in his pocket and came to a compromise with an Italian dealer. The result? I'd have to sell everything I have to afford to buy just one more of them now, although occasionally Giovanni allows me to drool over them in his studio. Even I can see he's a terrific painter.

So why didn't I frame one and put it up for auction? Because I could almost hear Dad breathing down my neck in fury at the very idea. He'd made me promise never to part with them. Never? I'd queried dubiously. He'd glared at me. Never – unless you're starving. I wasn't yet starving, and, though Harry Prince didn't know this yet, even if the worst came to the worst and I had to sell up, I'd be lugging those Giovannis into my one-roomed garret to gaze upon their glory, ignoring my hunger pains. So no auction room would be seeing them yet awhile. Framing one was a different matter, however. ‘Bless you, Zoe,' I added fervently.

‘Pay me instead.'

Guilt consumed me at the mock stricken look of the girl in front of me. True, she had her usual grin on her face, but I had broken my strictest rule. I hadn't paid either her or Len on Friday, and it was now Monday. Polly and Lagondas had temporarily sent me insane. While I was busy writing the cheques, Len decided to put his oar in. He came over to me, wiping his hands on a greasy rag. In his case, I think he does it to increase the smell, not get it off. He can't bear to be out of reach of the heady scent of petrol.

‘That Lagonda you saw . . .' A pause. ‘Drivetrain problems with that model. Wouldn't mind checking it over.'

‘Fat chance,' I said. ‘The lady won't let anyone near it.'

A longer pause. More hand-wiping while he thought about this. ‘Something dodgy about that. Steer clear of it. If a woman's got in her mind she's not selling, she won't be budged.'

‘Len, I'm an expert at budging.'

He considered this. ‘Number plates?'

‘Off, but could be lying around.'

‘Chassis number?'

‘No time. I was pounced on.'

‘Get back there.'

‘Give me time,' I pleaded. I wanted to be ‘in' with Polly before risking another run-in with Guy the Gorilla. I think I had some vision of sauntering down to look at the Lagonda hand in hand with her.

‘Harry Prince won't,' Zoe piped up.

I winced. ‘Look, how about I get on with the police job to keep the wolf from the barn door, and tackle the Lagonda step by step?' Both ‘police jobs' involved the theft to order of prestigious cars; the Rolls was a left-hand drive, and these were disappearing to the continent so fast that they were sometimes across the Channel before their owners knew they'd been stolen. This one belonged to a retired army officer living near Sandwich. The Merc was owned by a chap called Peter Winter, who lived in Holtham near Maidstone.

I get on well with Dave Jennings, especially as he's a bit of a car buff himself and rather begrudges the fact that he has to farm out interesting cases to me because of pressure of other work. In fact, he looks more car buff than policeman, which is often an asset. He's got a face like an eager wolfhound, sharp nose, fine features, hair sort of streamed back, as if the wind's blowing a Force 10 gale, which makes him look as ready to take off as the Rolls Royce Silver Lady, Spirit of Ecstasy. He had rated the Rolls the more urgent job, since he thought the Merc a lost cause. Reported missing in April, it had disappeared without trace, even though Dave's men had covered the usual channels themselves. So my job would be to think of any
un
usual ones that might be worth checking.

By the time I rang Dave, however, the Rolls had been traced, and I was to hold off on the Merc. So the wolf was back at my door, howling with a vengeance. On the other hand, Dave needed me at HQ to run through overdue paperwork with his team, which left me champing at the bit as to when I could call on Polly ‘casually'. I'd had a pretty full week booked anyway, with some spare-parts runs, visits to potential customers and a couple of car pick-ups and delivery (no, you won't see me on the motorway entrance ramp with trade plates!). On Wednesday or Thursday I'd ring Polly and tell her I'd be dropping in shortly with my masterpiece – I would check which of the paintings seemed most likely to impress Polly and dig it out. Luckily, Giovanni hadn't then got round to a Lagonda, because it might have been a tad obvious if I'd turned up in my Alfa with that.