Moonspender (30 page)

She gave me a wet rapacious kiss, her tongue everywhere, but I'd
already put her cheese on a separate plate for God's sake, so pulled away. We
parted like rubber bungs, pop.

The riot continued, with more cars squealing outside and people
calling up at the window. Lize ran angrily and drew the curtains. I put a small
table lamp on. She looked radiant, rocketing on a high.

"This, Lovejoy," she cried, "is ultimate
reporting!"

"How the hell'm I going to get out tonight, Lize?" I had
the little leopard to bury, at spot X in New Black Field. I didn't want the
paparazzi spoiling my least favorite murderer's surprise.

"All arranged, Lovejoy." She spread her hair. "When
you've finished that revolting concoction, prepare for your reward. You've put
me at the pinnacle of my profession. It's rape for you, my lad."

"Can I have your cheese first?" I said. I'd a lot to get
through in the next forty-eight hours.

At eight-thirty a plum-voiced Hooray Henry knocked, announced he'd
prepared the documents, and pushed a couple of envelopes under Lize's door. She
and he held an intent whispered conversation through the letterbox. The
envelopes contained blank paper. Lize waited a second, then called loudly that
he should meet Lovejoy as arranged.

"Decoy," she whispered to me.

The cars outside roared, doors slamming and blokes shouting. Like
a car-chase serial. Two minutes and they'd all gone.

"Clever girl," I told her.

"See?" She showed her watch. "Nine o'clock. You're
free as air. Want me to come?"

"Yes," I said. "But no."

By eleven I was back, muddy but unbowed, and laughing in the bath
about today's success. I even let her show me her 
Advertiser
 pen
drawing of me, wild and threatening. Midnight on Saturday, Antique Dealer

Lovejoy would "replace" a priceless bronze antique at
the very spot where George Prentiss had met his savage death. "It's what
my pal would have wished," A.D.L. told Your Reporter today. "I have
every faith our wonderful police will soon solve the tragedies that have so
lately beset our fair countryside."

Lize smirked. I said, awed, "You wrote 
this?
 
Strewth
, Lize." "Great, eh?" She was Toffee,
purring with delight. "It's called heightening the dramatic tension."
She lodged her chin on my shoulder, her arms round me so she could read on.
"It's even better further down. I've got Ledger's Sterling Values."

The report was full of naught shall avails. I felt ill. "You
deserve a good spanking for this gunge, Lize." She hugged, thrilled.
"Thought you'd never ask, Lovejoy." I made her feed Toffee first,
then awoke early as a daisy into Saturday. Eve of All Hallows, aka Halloween.

Today, Big Frank's wedding day with Ro. Today Suzanne York's final
cast of the dice in Sandy and Mel's epoch-making restaurant at Dogpits Farm.
Today the confrontation with Veronica Gold, star of stage, screen and
telephone. Plus the showdown with killer swine Ryan. Plus the exposure of his
nefarious scheme with the mad major and Candice. Plus the revelation, to let
Sir John recover his poise. Then the neutralization of Sykie, Uncle Tom Cobley
and all.

Loving calms you. It's the only true antitoxin. I smiled about
everything, did my teeth, and got ready. I was tranquility itself. Lize spruced
me up like a
fourpenny
rabbit, with a new shirt and
tie.

At two o'clock I phoned Veronica Gold. She was ready, her camera
crew merrily clinking bottles in the background. At two-ten I rang the White
Hart and told Tinker to drop by and collect me and Lize for the wedding.

Lize screamed, "Wedding? Am I coming?"

"Eh? Course."

She was there aghast in her dressing gown,
mopstick
in one hand and a sudsy pan in the other. Her hair was everywhere. "You're
taking me to a wedding and 
didn't tell me?”

I'd always thought women liked weddings. "You look great,
love. Anyway, you've twenty minutes—"

She went berserk. I had to grab Toffee and scarper. I honestly
think

she'd have killed me. See what I mean? You try to please them and
never a bit of gratitude do you get. I think that's real thoughtlessness.

From the Welcome Sailor I called Sir John's secretary. She barked
a breathless "Hello?" on the first bell.

"Good girl." At least one woman wide awake and eager.
First taste of sin. Or her umpteenth, seeing she was
Winstanley's
longtime partner? "Lovejoy. Ready?"

"Which is the forgery?" she said.

I drew breath to say the fake ivory tankard, then paused. Telling
her the truth would unleash that high-quality fake onto the market. Instead, I
could spring a genuine antique to glorious freedom, and leave Sir John gloating
over a dud.

Well, which? I admit I'd promised him honesty, but why change the
habit of a lifetime? In my visits I'd noticed a lovely night clock by Edward
East, complete with oil reservoir and two wick burners, genuine, rare, and
clever. I coughed a bit, and said, "The fake's the East night clock by the
left
cornish
, love. Fetch it to Dogpits at five
o'clock." She started asking all sorts, so I rang off and watched the
street.

26

What's more boring than a wedding? Answers on a postcard. Yet
boredom, unlike beauty, really is in the eye of the beholder. I mean, each of
us was taking this jaunt differently. As we breezed through town at nigh twenty
that afternoon, even my little Ruby was feeling a sense of occasion, what with
a white satin rosette on the bonnet and streamers.

"Like me gaudies?" Tinker too. The old devil had shaved,
nearly, and had a white carnation in his filthy beret. "Fixer's lads did
that at nine this mornin', silly get."

"Fixer's been helping to arrange it," I explained to
Lize, as always trying to be nice. "But I've had all the worry."

Lize was still thin-lipped in the back seat. "You could have
told me weeks ago, Lovejoy. Ten minutes' notice!"

She was really pretty in her best suit, gloves, a hat, all peach,
with matching shoes and handbag. I'd never seen her dressed nice before.
Usually she strives for the
roadmender
look, and
achieves it. I tried, "You don't look too bad." She shot me one of
her specials so I gave up. Sigh.

As we hit the village road I reflected on Mrs. Ryan. Not comparing
her and Lize, honestly, but just wondering as Manor Farm's outermost acres
crept into view. How does a husband condone his wife's nefarious activities? I
mean, does he say casually over breakfast, "Oh, darling. A spot of spying
for you today. Just give Lovejoy the old how's-your-father, a rape or two. Find
out what the blighter's doing. Give him the estate manager's job, if it'll
help." And what about the bird herself? Is sex loyalty negotiable? There
are some beautiful examples to prove it's so. The exquisite Louise de
Querouaille's
my favorite. Louis XIV of France sent her to
spy on his cousin Charles II after our Restoration. Mind you, the odds were on
her side, her being gorgeous. She was so successful that she conceived one of
Charles Two's illegitimate offspring in a lull between horseraces at Newbury.
She became Duchess of Portsmouth ". . . starting at the bottom," her
commentators say with brilliant malice—

"God," I muttered.

The old church is at the end of a lane. A couple of cart tracks, a
pond, the squire's hall, and fields. That's it, normally. Today though the
place was heaving. Cars were everywhere. People milled about. The women were
really pretty, colors and flowers. I grinned, delighted. Everybody had showed.

Suited blokes were flagging us along. Two
charabancs
were already there, their drivers having a smoke. Bells were ringing— bells!
Our church's bells were stolen in 1408. Yet there in the grassy churchyard was
an entire set of cage bells, four stalwart ringers. I'd thought only East
Bergholt
had a genuine set. ... I swallowed and hoisted a
firm grin. What the eye doesn't see you can't get nicked for.

We went clattering among people like royalty, the mob parting and
giving us gladness. We had difficulty nearing the lych-gate, but Tinker's cry
of "Best man 'ere,
y'idle
sods," got us
through. A couple of dealers mouthed questions. I gave them a meaningful wink,
mostly because their guess was as good as mine.

Fixer Pete was there, more like Errol Flynn than ever, when I
gallantly handed Lize down into the throng. She was smiling herself now,
infected by the general gaiety and slyly checking the other birds to make sure
her clobber wasn't being bettered—or, worse, copied—by some enemy. Fixer really
comes into his own on these occasions. He wore a morning suit, pinstriped
trousers, gray topper, and self-delight.

"Good day to you, Lovejoy. Miss."

"How do. Fixer."

"No changes from now, Lovejoy," Fixer pleaded in an
undertone. "Incidentally, the vicar's Reverend Larkin—genuine," he
said hurriedly as I gave him a sharp glance. "Honest to God."

"Our church big enough for this lot?" All round people
were walking with what they considered becoming gravity up the grass path to
the church porch. A couple of girls trailed two cameramen on wires among the
gravestones.

"No," Fixer said happily. "It's sixty too small.
The service will be

relayed—"

"Great." I took Lize's arm firmly to walk us on. Once
Fixer starts on plans you're stuck for the generation. He passed me a little
box. "I can't do valuations today, Fixer—"

"It's the ring, Lovejoy," he whispered, annoyed.

"Are they exchanging rings?" Lize was getting into it
now, earlier fights forgotten.

"Not likely." Big Frank's fifth wife had had a segmental
platinum-gold ring specially crafted for him. He'd instantly traded it to a
London dealer, part-exchange for a Queen Anne locket, thus sowing the seeds for
wife number six et seq.

Fixer said, more tactfully, "No, miss. Big Frank's a
traditionalist in affairs of the heart."

We walked through the porch, one of Fixer's lads pinning us to
carnations and introducing me to Reverend Larkin, a jubilant spherical cleric
hugging himself by the door. The church was already half full, some young
stranger giving out Purcell on the pump-organ. Lize signaled me to the front
right pew. She and Tinker sat behind. I felt daft on my own, but Hepsibah
Smith, our choir mistress, was in so I wasn't stuck for something to gawp at.
The choir wore black cassocks. They used to wear red locally until the Queen
blitzed some archbishop with the terse reminder that red cassocks were by royal
permission only. The flowers were in great decorative sprays—Sandy's hand here.
The hassocks were silk and white wool: Mel.

In fact I'd quite a lump in my throat. The ancient church looked
glamorous, regal, with sun shining through its fourteenth-century stained
glass. You could feel the waves of lust from the antique dealers busily pricing
the reredos, our ancient font, our alabaster knights sleeping with pious
somnolence and absent toes (villagers still pinch holy alabaster to cure sick
sheep). Leaving all that aside, the dealers had come to support Big Frank. That
counts a lot with me, because friends are friends. Me and Rowena in her cottage
came to mind so I changed the subject. The church filled with a rush as Fixer's
whippers-in were tipped off that Ro was on her way. And, creaking new shoes,
here was Big Frank, eyes on the silver crucifix above the tabernacle. Heartbeat
time.

"Unusual, Canterbury cross, in silver," he whispered.
"Don't suppose any parish has the matching ciborium, Lovejoy? I've an
American buyer—"

"Stop that this instant!" Lize leaned whispering between
us. "Remember where you are!"

"It wasn't me," I whispered, narked. Big Frank sighed.
We sat like lemons while the church
quietened
so that
Tinker's rasping cough could test its raftered acoustics unhindered. People
looked round, shuffled. Tension grew. Somebody dropped something. The organ
played on. Old Peter was pumping away round the side, the long ash handles
shoving his elbows into view. Tension. More tension. In fact so much that I
nodded off and was only fetched conscious by Lize's nudge from behind. Bloody
nerve; she was the reason I was knackered in the first place.

The organ drew breath, and
parped
into
the Bridal March. The congregation rose with thunderous quiet, and there was
Reverend Larkin beaming from the altar steps. Rustle
rustle
of approaching satins, and we were off.

Ro came alongside, on Harry Bateman's arm. I caught my breath. She
was radiant in white silk with lace, though sadly modem, and freesias for her
bouquet. She didn't glance my way. I felt really rather peeved, after all my
friendliness at 2 Sebastopol Cottages and the way I'd slaved over these arrangements.

"Dearly beloved," Reverend Larkin intoned, rapturous.
"We are gathered here ..."

I smiled soulfully at Hepsibah Smith. She looked away, coloring.
Honor among choristers.