Last Nocturne (42 page)

‘But he couldn’t have known that,’ Guy said. ‘And dash it, a painting – especially one as nebulous as that – it’s no proof of anything, let alone a murder. It’s all in the mind of the beholder, after all.’ Were people really expected to believe this sort of tosh? It summed up everything he disliked about the art world, and was one of the reasons he could never have followed in his father’s footsteps.

‘But, Guy, if Carrington
believed
Theo knew,’ Grace said, ‘wouldn’t he also believe there was the danger that he might, sooner or later, tell what he knew?’

‘If the case was closed, and if he was technically innocent – and Mr Lamb seems to believe he was – then he’d nothing to fear.’

‘Except for the loss of his reputation, his highly respected name being dragged through the mire,’ Lamb said. ‘To a man like Carrington, that would mean everything. If it was brought to the attention of the police – even if it came to nothing and the case was not reopened – it would look bad for him, show that he’d played a less than heroic part in Miriam Koppel’s demise. Especially would it affect his future plans with regard to Mrs Amberley.’

He paused. ‘Only, Carrington got one thing wrong, you see. It wasn’t
Carrington
Theo thought he’d seen struggling with Miriam, but Viktor Franck. He and Carrington are remarkably similar in build, and, in any case, Theo had no reason at that time to believe Carrington was in Vienna. He confronted Viktor, and Viktor, of course, denied it. Theo had nothing to prove what he’d seen, only what he believed. The case seemed closed, over and done with. Theo left Vienna. Then, recently, he wrote to Franck and apologised, told him he had been wrong, that the man he’d seen wasn’t Viktor, but Carrington. Viktor came over here, they talked and Viktor decided to take his own revenge for his brother, and perhaps for Miriam Koppel, too.’

‘What happened to make Benton change his mind?’

‘That’s something we still have to find out, Miss Thurley.’

‘Perhaps,’ Dulcie intervened suddenly, ‘continually painting the scene like that triggered his memory. It’s not like relying on a photograph to record what’s there. You’re right, Mr Lamb. You have to look, and look, and remember what you’ve seen, and the more you concentrate, the more you do remember.’

‘I think it more than likely that was what happened.’

‘What’s going to happen to Franck?’ Guy asked.

‘If Carrington dies, he’ll be charged with murder. If he doesn’t, Franck will in any case be staying in this country for a long time. He committed a serious offence, stabbing Carrington with every intention of murdering him. He shows no remorse for this, he is more concerned with trying to make us believe the only reason he wanted to see Sophie was to make sure it was really Carrington she and Theo had seen.’

‘And this little Sophie really
is
Miriam Koppel’s child?’ The look Mrs Martagon and her son exchanged, then turned on Lamb, was peculiarly intense.

‘And Viktor’s, too, or so he believes. I understand that’s debatable. Although there was a portrait, very likely of her, in Theo’s studio and having seen them both, I would not rule out the possibility entirely.’

Isobel, at her sitting room window, would have known the young man walking down the street towards her house anywhere, even had he not been accompanied by his sister, whom she recognised: Eliot’s daughter, the young girl she had met with him in the park. His firm stride was just like his father’s, as his handwriting had been, as was his tall, strong figure. There were three of them: Guy, Dulcie and a young woman. He was carrying a bulky parcel.

The meeting did not promise well, despite the biscuits, the good coffee she had herself prepared, until Guy, evidently feeling the same way – that small talk between them would be impossible – took the initiative and plunged in, breaking the ice by indicating the parcel he had leant against the wall. ‘It is good of you to see us, Mrs Amberley. We have brought you something we feel you might appreciate.’

He handed the parcel to her and she began to undo the string but her trembling fingers made her fumble. ‘Here, let me,’ he said, his features relaxing. His eyes were his father’s, too, silvery grey and thickly lashed. This is the woman who caused all the trouble, she thought they were saying, mistakenly, for Guy was in fact a little unnerved to find that she was not the predatory harpy he had sometimes envisaged, but a stylish woman, elegant and collected, with a smile which, if presently wary, promised warmth. How could he have imagined his father being attracted to someone less? Older than he had thought, with grey silvering the crown of her dark hair. She could not hold a candle to his mother for looks and presence, but there was something about her that, despite his reservation, would have disposed him to like her, had the situation been different. He unwrapped the brown paper.

‘Sophie’s portrait! Where did you come by this?’

‘It was found in Theo Benton’s studio, after he died. His father was going to take it, but then Chief Inspector Lamb had an idea it was the little girl who lives with you.’

‘It is.’

‘Mr Benton wishes you to have it.’

Joseph Benton had been only too happy to hand over the portrait when it had been explained to him who the little girl was and that it had largely been the work of some other artist, and not Theo. Deciding to keep it had in any case been a mistake, he said. Anything of Theo’s could only be an unbearably painful reminder to his mother of how and where it had been acquired.

‘Sophie will be pleased to have this, though perhaps I will not let her see it, just yet. She and Theo were such friends, it might upset her.’ She had a faint but unmistakable French accent. ‘Though it was not all Theo’s work, you know. It was finished by Viktor Franck.’

The name brought a chill into the air, a subject none of them wished to talk about. Viktor, who was still languishing in police custody. One had to believe his stated reasons for wanting to see Sophie was the truth, that taking Sophie back to live with him could surely have formed no part of the dark path of revenge he had plotted for himself. She would never live with him now.

The stilted conversation lurched on while they finished their coffee, and Isobel puzzled over the motive behind this strange, uncomfortable visit. The portrait could have been sent to her. There had been no special need to bring it in person. ‘What do you want of me?’ she asked suddenly in a low voice.

For a moment the direct question floored Guy, since he wasn’t entirely clear himself what had been the point in coming here. He had a natural curiosity to see the woman for whom his father, an otherwise honourable man, had broken his marriage vows, but that was not all. He had also wished to meet her in order to discover the child who might have been his father’s. Lamb had said the child was the daughter of Miriam Koppel, the dead woman, but…

‘How long did you know my father, Mrs Amberley?’ he asked abruptly. He kept his gaze averted from Dulcie and Grace, neither of whom said anything, however, though he was aware of surprise and perhaps disapproval emanating from both at his question. It was not part of the plan.

For a long time Isobel said nothing, regarding him ironically. At last she said, softly, ‘Sophie is not my daughter, Mr Martagon. She really is the daughter of Miriam Koppel – whom your father met only a few times, just before she died.’

Guy was discomfited and apologised stiffly. ‘I’m exceedingly sorry if I have offended you, but it was a question that had to be asked. Perhaps you may feel able to tell me why, then, my father arranged for a generous annuity to be paid to her?’

‘Your father was fond Sophie – and angry at the way life had treated her. She is a very talented child, musically, and he simply wanted to make provision for her, to make sure she need never be in want to support herself and that talent, whatever happened, that is all. Life is uncertain, one never knows what is around the corner.’ She watched him steadily as she spoke, but he sensed the deep sadness behind what she said.

Guy was not a romantic. Nor was he made to break the unwritten code he had been taught to respect. He was conservative by nature and felt such laws were necessary for the smooth working of society. But he had also knocked about the world a bit and it had made him less tolerant of a society which allowed a man to stray outside its boundaries yet stood in judgement on the woman who did. It was always the woman who paid.

He had found himself unexpectedly in agreement with Grace over this, angry at the way she was being treated, sickened by the hypocrisy of it all. Mrs Amberley had not been blameless in the affair, but neither had his father. Sympathy now was all for his mother, who no doubt deserved some, but had her place in society, the support of her friends. This woman had nothing. No one gave a thought to her, unless to castigate her.

‘You should not have come,’ she said abruptly, breaking his silence. ‘I should have refused to see you. If your friends knew you were here they would condemn you for it.’

‘Mrs Amberley, there is a higher authority than those so-called friends, and as far as I know, He has not seen fit to condemn,’ said Grace, suddenly and rather sharply, then immediately, mortified, wished it had sounded less – pious, less – Grimshaw-ish. She looked down at her hands and the still unfamiliar glitter of Guy’s engagement ring on her finger: diamonds – a large, brilliant-cut stone set in a thick band of smaller, pavé-set stones – and wondered if she would ever get used to wearing such expensive jewellery, along with learning to be more circumspect in the way she spoke.

Bravo! thought Guy, with an inward smile. One forgot, sometimes, that Grace had been brought up as a daughter of the vicarage, though she would probably have said this even had she not been. But of course Mrs Amberley was right. There was nothing to be gained by coming here except to extend the hand of friendship, which was all that had been intended, but which in itself the world would look askance upon. Eyebrows would be raised if it became known he was consorting with the enemy, and had, moreover, allowed Dulcie to do so. But Dulcie, with her own brand of quiet stubbornness and the confidence gained by the promises her mother had made regarding her future, had insisted that she was not to be left out, and in the end he had given in, as long as Grace consented to be there as well. And of course Grace, who had previously been against him trying to see Mrs Amberley at all, had immediately said he should do it if he felt he had to.

‘If ever you need help, Mrs Amberley—’ he began diffidently.

‘Thank you, but I have adequate means to live. And I have Sophie. As long as I have her I need nothing more.’

Dulcie spoke for the first time. ‘You are kind. I knew that if Papa had a regard for you, you must be good.’

Isobel had learnt not to shed tears, but now they sprang to her eyes.
‘Dulcie is worth loving.’
Eliot’s words. Yes, she thought, hearing the girl’s soft voice, seeing her expressive eyes. She was just about to cast off the ugly duckling stage and one day, soon, she would emerge as a graceful swan, but it was her spirit, Isobel thought, that would always illuminate her. She thought that in other circumstances it would, as Eliot had hoped, have been possible to make a friend of her, and that Dulcie would not, even now, reject such overtures. But she put even the thought from her; it was an indulgence she could not allow herself. Further contact between herself and the Martagons was impossible. She had forfeited that.

Another awkward silence fell. She rose and poked at the small bright fire in the grate, unnecessary since the day was warm, but she had felt the need of its cheer.

‘Do you think we might see Sophie?’ Grace suggested rather hesitantly, recovering herself.

This fiancée of Guy’s was pretty, fair-haired, nicely dressed and had a direct blue gaze which didn’t really tell you anything, though she seemed charming and unaffected. But with a sharpness that added an edge to the sweetness, Isobel thought. She saw the way she and Guy looked at each other with a twist of mingled pain and pleasure, a bitter-sweet recollection, and wished them well.

‘I should like to see Sophie, too,’ Dulcie said. ‘Her portrait is intriguing.’

‘Sophie will not be back for some time. Susan, my companion, has taken her to a matinée.’ Isobel did not add that it was a purposely arranged treat, in order to avoid this meeting. It was not the past which Sophie should constantly be made aware of, but the future.

She stood up, indicating the visit was at an end. She did not think she could endure it much longer, though she found herself touched by the unexpected overtures which had been made by Eliot’s children. ‘I am sorry if I spoke harshly. It was a kind thought, to bring the portrait,
très gentil
. I think Sophie will be pleased.’

‘What are your plans for the future?’ Guy asked, hanging back a little before following the other two out of the gate.

‘I am not sure.’

‘Whatever they are, I wish you well.’ He extended his hand.

‘Thank you,’ said Isobel, taking it. She believed he was sincere. She watched them until they disappeared up the road, and into the waiting hansom, then closed the door behind them.