Snatched (15 page)

Kanda said: ‘We come back again and again to that same word: it is
life
.'

‘My God, dot the Is and cross the Ts, won't you?' Itagaki said.

Simberdy leaned forward a little and began to throw up ostentatiously near his highly polished black patent shoes. He groaned once or twice.

Kanda's tone became extremely kind and gentle: ‘Nobody says you are in tip-top condition, Dr Simberdy. How could you be – the enforced sedentary life? But these things are easily corrected. It would be alarmist in the extreme to suppose internal damage.'

‘And then Dr D.Q. Youde,' Itagaki said. ‘Remarkably unflustered, scarcely even breathing fast.' She stood back and put a finger to her lips coyly. ‘I feel sure I'm not the only one to have noticed this, but you have a remarkable resemblance to a self-portrait by Degas. It is obvious to me, despite recent stresses in your face.'

‘Really?' Youde replied. He obviously wanted to smile in thanks for such a compliment, but resisted this in case showing his famously comical teeth ruptured the moment.

‘Has this never been pointed out before?' Dr Itagaki asked.

‘I think, perhaps, I have heard something of the sort. One forgets these things,' Quent Youde replied, ‘flattered as one might be. Occasionally also Byron, but in profile only.'

Lepage moved around the group to be nearer Simberdy and make sure he was all right. He heard Olive hiss something at her husband, not all of it clear, but along the lines of: ‘You brought this on yourself. Grossness. Tonguing Penny and buttock-fondling her. Oh, you freight-train-load of miserable, pastiche lech. Don't ever forget we have secrets together. I could finish you.'

Dexterously holding up the skirt of her black gown as she and Kanda passed Simberdy and his indisposition on their way back to the dancing, Itagaki called: ‘Oh, no, I'm afraid that in Japanese museums these stimulating, untimetabled events are just not bloody on. Such a dreary crew over there, folks. We've got more rectitude than Toyotas.'

‘So, finally, why museums, ladies and gentlemen? Why, indeed, the Hulliborn?' Lepage was concluding his speech, standing at the microphone on the platform where Youde and Simberdy had recently started their conflict. People were packed around, listening. Looking out, he could see at their various spots in the crowd, Ursula, Nev, the archbishop and his wife, a couple of the editors and
their
wives or partners, Angus Beresford, Pirie the Museum Secretary, Pinnevar, Itagaki and Kanda, the BBC contingent, and Kate and her hired man, Adrian – he would be required by the agency to enjoy whatever she enjoyed, which would cover a fair range. Lepage thought they all looked passably interested. ‘After all,' he continued, ‘we live in a period which sets much store on modernity, and rightly sets much store on being up-to-date and at the forefront of development and knowledge. This, we are told, and are frequently told, are the prerequisites of survival. One would find it difficult to argue.' He strengthened his voice, got it into rebuttal state. ‘And yet one has to ask, is there no place in this gospel for recognition of the wonders of the past – indeed, for cherishing, for learning from such wonders?'

‘Yes,' Falldew cried, giving a kind of Black Power salute without the power or the blackness. It might have been an error for Nev to pinpoint himself like that. Lepage saw Angus Beresford home in on Falldew and begin to move purposefully through the audience, his face contorted by fury, towards where Neville and Ursula stood.

‘There is a living spirit in the Hulliborn,' Lepage continued.

‘Oh, yes, yes,' Falldew cried. ‘I bear witness to that. Gladly bear witness, gratefully bear witness.'

Lepage said: ‘Myself, I see the Hulliborn – as I see all this country's good museums, and, indeed, as I see the arts and humanities faculties in our universities (grand word that, “humanities”) – all these I regard not as mere repositories of relics and dust-shrouded works and learning, but inspirational points of confluence, where the glories of man's history meet the equally glorious prospects for his future, in a rich union that offers fruitfulness, improvement and satisfaction. Do they, does the Hulliborn, deserve to be under governmental threat because they offer nothing measurable, graphable, visible towards Britain's gross domestic product?'

‘Never!' cried Falldew.

‘No, I think not,' Lepage said.

Lady Butler-Minton and Olive Simberdy were tending to Vince. He had stood up, looking very white and doddery, and both women held an arm and were bent forward to speak encouragement to each other around his great belly. Youde, still seated, watched his exit triumphantly. It might irritate him, though, that Penny Butler-Minton should help an enemy, sick or not.

Lepage continued: ‘And so, ladies and gentlemen, as we have assembled happily here tonight to honour our great Founder, let us resolve to safeguard the fine traditions of the Hulliborn.' Beresford had reached Nev, but to Lepage's relief did not attack him, at least not yet. Instead, he stood close behind Falldew in the press of people, and seemed content to listen to Lepage's concluding words. Perhaps, after all, things were beginning to come right, and the best really could be brought out of people with patience. ‘It is my task, and perhaps the task of all of us, to convince sceptics and doubters outside, at whatever level, that, in fact, far from being moribund, or even already extinct, the Hulliborn is alive with promising activity, and has its own positive, throbbing vigour.'

‘True! How true!' Falldew yelled.

Kate Avis nodded and smiled beautifully.

‘We must act together – a team, sinking absurd, petty enmities,' Lepage declared. ‘I am confident the Hulliborn can count on you, as I hope and trust it can count on me, to carry everywhere this message of faith in the institution and the values it represents. And to convince those who decide policy for our nation that this museum is a symbol of much that is fine and indispensable; that its continuance as a centre of excellence is not merely merited but will be a boon and splendid asset. Thank you.'

Applause broke in full, thrilling volume. James Pirie, beaming in the front row, reached up to shake Lepage's hand. ‘Grand, Director,' he said. ‘Words of a true leader, and disregard any who say you're not. Words of vision.'

Others pressed forward to congratulate Lepage. Itagaki exclaimed: ‘Top bracket! None of this can be gainsaid.'

Although Lepage shook many more hands, he made sure he kept a watch on Angus Beresford and Nev, especially on Beresford. But Beresford moved away from Falldew now. Yes, he might indeed have been affected by Lepage's words calling for an end to foolish rifts, despite Beresford's reasonable anger. Angus was clapping very heartily as he walked and, from his lip movements, Lepage judged he might also have been shouting, ‘Bravo! Well said!'

As Nev turned to leave with Ursula, though, Lepage became aware of another kind of rift. He saw now that the back seam of Falldew's smart tux had been cleanly severed for its entire length, so as he edged towards the exit, the jacket opened at the rear and flapped gently, trailing cotton strands and some dreary segments of lining. Falldew appeared not to notice, and Ursula, walking ahead, had not seen it. Lepage realized that the damage could have been done by some exceptionally sharp instrument, standard in Beresford's trade for dissecting. When Nev took the suit back from hire he would have some considerable talking and, most likely, paying to do, unless Urse was hot stuff with a needle. Lepage felt suddenly very down. He had spoken of unity, yet here was glaring division.

Julia came to the edge of the platform. Half-automatically, he put out his hand for her to shake in congratulation, too. She ignored it. ‘I'm going to help Olive get Vince Simberdy home. Penny thinks it will annoy Quentin if she seems too concerned about Vincent. This will be some of that selfless teamwork you were rabbiting about. I can call in at the kiosk, too, and see that Rowena's managing. Will you be all right alone?'

He dearly hoped it would not come to that: this had been a damn rough and wearing night, and Lepage felt the need of consolation. As the Ball came to an end, he went to the medieval breakfast room, in case Kate had meant what she said about rendezvousing there. He was surprised to find the door unlocked and, half opening it very quietly, became aware of two people on the floor, using the mock straw as mattress, as he had himself. There were no lights on, and for a nonsensical moment he thought the male figure, fully dressed in dark clothes, was the defaced patriarch. Then he saw that the jacket hung open because of its slashed back, and he heard a voice that could be Ursula's purr from beneath, ‘Just like the old times, Nev.'

‘But what
is
Time?' Falldew replied, thrashing about to get his clothes off. ‘What the fuck's happened to this jacket?'

‘Decide later,' Ursula answered, ‘about the jacket and Time.'

Lepage thought he could make out on the primitive table, alongside the basic old feast, a diamanté shoe and a pair of rumpled green silk trousers. He closed the door and, just then, saw Kate approaching the tableau room in her fine gown. ‘It's engaged,' he said. ‘What happened to Adrian? You seemed very matey.'

‘I paid him off. We can go to your room instead, can't we, George?'

‘That interfering bloody platypus is there.'

‘Put a cloth over it,' she replied.

Simberdy recovered pretty fast from his tussle with D.Q. Youde, and so managed to get to this meeting with Wayne Passow – ‘Nothing Known' – at Wayne's club, the Blague, late next night. There'd been a phone call to Vince at home first. Wayne said the topic would be money, but wanted a full, detailed discussion face-to-face. ‘This requires mutual presence in discreet surroundings, Fatman.'

Olive came with Vince to the Blague. The three took a table in the bar. ‘You'll soon see why this isn't something to be said on the phone. No, no, no,' Wayne told them. ‘We've entered the world of art. It's a world worth giving respect and attention to. This is not your chicken shit.' He put his hand through his short, blond hair, a bit bottle-aided, and gave one of those tragic, small smiles he specialized in. As Olive sometimes said, Passow had the face of a saint: long, ungenial, made for suffering, stronger than sin. If he ever did get charged, she reckoned a jury would be won by his looks and not just acquit but award huge costs against the police, then ask Wayne for personal blessings. He whispered: ‘We're talking millions.'

‘We're talking what?' Simberdy screeched.

‘Please, keep the noise down, Fatman,' Wayne said. ‘Don't advertise. This club – well, if all the jail time done by members was laid end to end and pointed backwards we'd be with the Pharaohs or that Clementine Attlee.'

Olive said: ‘But how sure of this are you, Wayne?'

‘There's a great career here for all of us, doubt me not,' Passow replied. ‘A real load of heavy noughts. I been wasting my time. It's obvious now. All that mini-activity when this art realm was just asking for yours truly. Well, I'm grateful, so grateful, to you two for pointing me that way and, as you already got evidence of, when he's grateful Wayne Passow shows it.' He leaned across the purple, mock-onyx table and squeezed first Olive's arm, then Simberdy's. ‘Still partners, still a premier division team.'

Glancing around the glossy, frenziedly décored interior of the Blague, Simberdy could see what Wayne meant about the clientele. There were faces here that Ronnie Acton-Sher might have jibbed at as being too savage and frightening for public display in his Zoology (Mammals) gallery. A couple of men seated not far from them, and exhaustively eye-inventorying Olive's body, moved their lips in great convulsive surges when chatting, as if taking bites out of a roast. Passow waved to them. ‘Crispin, Redvers, lovely to see you both. I'm with friends prominent in Asian Antiquities, or I'd join you.'

‘I heard they got a lot of antiquities Asia way,' one of the men said.

‘Unconfirmed, but very, very possible,' the other said. ‘If Redvers here believes it, it got to be very, very possible.'

‘The thing about antiquities is their age,' Redvers said. ‘You can't have antiquities without age. Asia's been there quite a time.'

‘This is a fact,' Crispin said.

‘If there hadn't been an Asia, what would have been in its place?' Redvers asked. ‘I'll tell you: the sea, ocean. But oceans already cover one fifth of the world's surface. So, if there hadn't been an Asia there, the amount of sea would really be over the top, in my opinion. Right out of proportion. I don't know if your friends ever considered that.'

‘We go in for the smaller Asian items, not Asia itself, in bulk,' Simberdy said.

‘Exhibits,' Passow said.

‘That's fair enough,' Crispin said. ‘But if there'd only been sea where Asia is there wouldn't be no exhibits, so it's great that Asia is definitely in that area known as Asia. All right, you might get flotsam and jetsam washed up, but this is not the same as exhibits.'

‘And what would the flotsam and jetsam be washed up on if there wasn't no Asia?' Redvers said.

‘The thing about exhibits is they go back centuries and centuries,' Passow answered, ‘therefore proving Asia must of been there.'

Crispin and Redvers nodded. Wayne Passow's remark seemed to have brought a satisfactory end to this conversation.

Simberdy turned to Wayne and lowered his voice. This was not for Crispin and Redvers: ‘I don't want to sound hostile, Nothing Known,' Simberdy said, ‘but to be frank, Olive and I would prefer no further involvement in the Hulliborn paintings episode. This is how we see it – an episode. An episode that's over, as far as we are concerned. We'll put ourselves in the clear and stay in the clear.'

‘“In the clear”? How, Fatman? We're a unit. Everybody knows it.'