Snatched (30 page)

‘I hope you'll congratulate Quent Youde personally, Minister,' Lepage said. ‘He's surprisingly vulnerable, and sets store by these things.'

‘I have already – the eternal, posturing, Degas-wannabe twat,' Vaux replied. His wife approached with Gadarene Timberlake and
his
wife.

‘Felicitations, felicitations, George,' Mrs Vaux cried. ‘The Hulliborn is where it should be, on top again. You've shown how to fuse commerce and culture, a very modish skill. But, tell me, have you discovered yet how not only the Monet reappeared on its Hulliborn wall, but also the El Grecos?'

‘No, but the day after their proven authenticity became known they were suddenly back, just like that. Same procedure as the Monet. Same source? Who knows? But we'll gladly do without the El Greco insurance, as long as they're here and real.'

‘Inside job?' Gadarene suggested.

‘What about Simberdy?' Mrs Vaux said. ‘Couldn't it be him? Wasn't there a fat man involved? He fits.'

‘But Simberdy is Asiatics,' Lepage said.

‘Just an idea,' the Minister's wife replied. Then she stepped in among Lepage's special uncertainties and worries. ‘Look here, George, I don't think Julia is looking too great. There's been a change since I last came to the Hulliborn with Sam on one of his official visits. Is the potato thing taking too much out of her? I heard she runs a late-night kiosk.'

‘Something's disturbed her,' Lepage said. ‘I wish I knew what. We happened to see a burglar captured in the act at Penny's place. That did bother Julia. The trouble is, the police say he's hard and won't talk to them about anything. I'm puzzled as to what the incident meant.'

Gadarene said: ‘The story is around. I gather he was carrying a piece of Kangxi porcelain. Would Julia have been perturbed in case he broke it – or simply at the sight of someone's treasures being abused? I mean, a sort of symbol: vandals bearing off a revered thing of beauty. People can be so sensitive over such matters.'

‘Oh, get stuffed, Gadarene,' Mrs Vaux replied. ‘Why not try living in the real world? A pretty burglar, Lepage? Quite possibly local?'

Lepage thought back to the holy face. ‘Well, yes, I suppose he was pretty. Local? Yes, again, the police recognized him.'

‘Women can be very susceptible that way,' Mrs Timberlake pointed out. ‘You've heard of “a bit of rough”, I expect. Good body – I mean thighs and so on?' She grew breathless.

‘And you, preoccupied in your various ways, George,' Mrs Vaux said. ‘Is it any wonder, poor girl?'

There was a joyous call for silence by the master of ceremonies. This afternoon, Falldew had on a good, properly fitting tails suit that made him look like the enlarged snapshot of a black-handled penknife. He went now with Ursula to the spot on the balcony where he had started his previous speech at the Founder's, so briskly terminated by Penny B-M. ‘Friends,' he began, ‘we are in a wonderful treasure palace of the past this afternoon, perhaps the most wonderful in the world, and the past will always be the creator of today, the necessary foundation of today. Thank God for the past and those who brought it to us, such as Sir Eric Butler-Minton, alas now deceased. Yes, finally deceased.' He smiled, as if freed from a burden, like the traveller in
Pilgrim's Progress
.

Keith Jervis – full-time staff at last – and standing just behind Lepage, said: ‘He's pissed, of course, but not too pissed. Doesn't Keeper Wex look regal? You can't beat a blue silk suit for class.'

Falldew continued amiably: ‘At this lovely wedding –' he turned and kissed Ursula on the cheek – ‘at this lovely wedding we see the Then and the Now sweetly cohabiting. And that is how it should be, must be. In one way, Ursula and I are the Then – she Urban Development, myself Palaeontology (involuntarily retired). Yet, though we both have inhabited a distant past and reverence it, we are also so much part of Now, even, perhaps, if I may be permitted,
stars
of this glorious, unique Today. Yes, in this resplendent Now, we two come together, come together vividly, infinitely satisfyingly, elements of the beautiful present.'

‘Is he getting crude?' Beresford asked Lepage. ‘Shall I go and thump him?'

‘He's fine,' Lepage replied and led the applause. Ursula shook hands with herself, hands above her head, like a victorious boxer.