The Gondola Scam (5 page)

The house inside was beautiful. The inner chimes from the antiques
all around reverberated in my chest so strongly I had to pause and clutch at
the doorway for support.

"This way." The bird was narked by the delay.
Impatiently she waved away a motherly-looking serf who was coming forward to
process this stray nocturnal visitor. There was a world's wealth of antiques
everywhere on walls and floors and furniture. Mesmerized, I advanced reverently
over the Isfahan carpet which partly veiled the mosaic hall floor. It was hard
work. A Turner watercolor radiated its dazzling brilliance on the wall, and you
can't say fairer than that.

In contrast, the study was not well lit. Panels of original oak
(none of your modem imported Japanese stuff), shelves of books with delectable
white parchment covers, a Gainsborough nude drawing, furniture mainly by Ince
and Mayhew, and a real Canaletto I failed to recognize but which finally
fetched out of my anguished throat that moan I'd been hoarding.

The old man in the chair, Mr. Pinder, was pleased.

"You are impressed by my possessions, Lovejoy," he
piped. His voice was a pre-Boehm glass flute, sonorous yet

high-pitched and miles off. "I cannot convey how gratifying
your response is."

"
Are
there people
who puke at fortunes?"

He tried to roar with laughter, actually falling about and swaying
in the great leather chair. His roar was practically inaudible. I've heard
infants breathe louder. Politely I waited while he choked and the bird
resuscitated him with well-meaning pummels between his shoulders. She had to
blot his eyes, blow his nose, find his specs, and generally cobble the old
geezer together. It took a hell of a time. I was drawn to a jeweled snuffbox
set on an illuminated covered stand. It looked very like Frederick the Great's
cartouche-shaped favorite which Christie's sold for nearly half a million quid.
The Emperor was a great collector of them, but this thing was never one of his
famous three hundred. It was a clear fake. Not a tremor of love in it.

Somebody gripped my arm, broke the spell.

"Sit down when you're told." The bird, clearly an
apprentice matriarch, shoved me at a chair. "Grandfather shouldn't have to
suffer your rudeness."

"Caterina." The gentle reproof was enough to shut her up
and leave her seething with irritation. I sat and waited humbly.

Sometimes it's difficult not to grovel. If the old man's task for
me was pricing the mixed antiques and fakes I'd seen so far, I was in for a
windfall. Obviously this geriatric was the owner of a significant chunk of the
antique universe. The situation called for the classic whining Lovejoy fawn.

"I am astonished you are not older," the old man said.

"I'm trying."

"Mmmm. Caterina recounted your behavior at a village
auction." There was a pause. Good old Caterina had flopped across an
armchair somewhere behind me. Her irritation beamed straight onto my nape. The
pause lengthened.

I gave in. "You want me to say anything in particular?"

"Mind your language," Caterina snapped. "Just
remember the gentleman to whom you're speaking could buy you and your
village."

The old man winced at her bluntness and flagged her rage down with
a tired gesture. Money was beneath mention, which meant the bird spoke the
truth.

"Can you account for your perception, Lovejoy?"

"You mean about the painting?"

"Of course, dolt!" from the sweet maid behind.

"Is there," the old man fluted, "is there really
such a person? A ... a diwie? You can detect antiques unaided?"

Oho. Caterina had taken the trouble to suss me out pretty well.

"Yes. I'm one."

He asked the girl to offer me sherry. She slammed about and
glugged some. I was scared to touch it. Maybe it was polite to let it hang
about an hour or so. Better wait till he'd slurped his, if he was strong enough
to lift the bloody thing.

"How is it done?"

"I don't know."

Caterina snorted more free scorn.

"Six out of six dealers with whom I have discussed the
matter, Lovejoy, pronounce you to be an authentic . . . ah, divvie."

"They're in league with him. Granddad!"

The old man smiled. "Now, Caterina. Lovejoy hardly looks
affluent. May I?" he added benignly to me.

"Yes," I said, wondering what he was asking.

"Caterina. Lovejoy was given the freehold of his cottage by a
lady now living abroad. Subsequently he has raised money on it by two
mortgages, fraudulent. Both are now in default. The building society is suing
for possession—"

"Here, dad," I interrupted, annoyed. "That's
libel."

"You mean slander," he said absently. "Furthermore,
he has a police record. I was advised by all six dealers not to employ him. He
owes money to nine dealers in Colchester and approximately eleven others."

I found my sherry had emptied itself into me of its own accord.
This gentle old man was a deceptive old sod. Well, I had nothing to lose. I was
unemployable after that heap of references.

"Which raises the question why you asked me here, dad."

"Quite so, quite so." Too much good literature makes
these old characters talk Dickens, I suppose. He girded his loins for the
plunge. "I wish you to perform a task on my behalf, Lovejoy."

A sweat of relief prickled me over. Maybe I was back in.

"A valuation? An auction deal?"

"Ah, no." The old man was suddenly apologetic, evading
my eyes. And I remembered Caterina's determined bidding for a fake. And in a
dealer's ring, that highly illegal enterprise. My throat went funny.

"Bent?" I asked. He gazed at me blankly, so I
translated. "Illegal?"

"Ah, well, you might say there is a rather, ah, clandestine
aspect to the activities, ah, which . . ."

I stared. Dear God. Geriatrics were in on antique scams these
days. Still, a zillionaire with Turners and Canalettos would not think in
groats. Whatever it was, I'd soon be eating again. And the ill-tempered lass
might revert in time .

"An antique scam?" I struggled to suppress my
exultation. Nicking antiques lifts the lowest spirits.

"No." The old man's gnarled hand gestured to calm my
alarm at his denial. "Not 'an.' The."

The scam of all time? I could only think of the British Museum and
the National Gallery.

"How big?" I asked. Naturally I assumed the old geezer
wouldn't want to reveal all, but I was wrong.

"It's Venice."

"Venice, eh? Exactly what in Venice?"

"Venice itself. All. I am in process of, ah, borrowing
everything Venetian." His opaque eyes stared into me. God, he was
wrinkled.

Well, lose some, win some, I thought bitterly. I managed to smile
indulgently. You have to make allowances for idiocy. The daft old sod was rich,
a possible future customer whom I couldn't afford to offend even if he was
barmy. "Look, Granddad," I said kindly. "You can't nick Venice.
It's fastened to the floor in that lagoon. I've always wanted to nick the
dome-dialed Castle Acre church clock, but I've more sense. The village bobby'd
notice. Get the point? I'd give anything to possess its marvelous dead-beat
escapement, but daren't risk trying it."

"I'm serious, Lovejoy."

I got up and said compassionately, heading for the door,
"Good luck getting Venice through the Customs, but don't say I didn't warn
you."

"Stop him, Caterina," the old bloke quavered.

Some hopes, I thought. Short of undressing there wasn't a lot she
could do, but women are wily. "Money," she said casually as I passed,
not even bothering to look up.

"Eh?" My treacherous feet rooted.

She gazed calmly at me then, idly perched there on the chair arm,
swinging her leg. "How much will you earn in the next hour, Lovejoy?"

"Erm, well," I lied bravely. "I've a good deal
on."

"Unlikely. But we'll buy one hour."

"To do what?"

"To sit and listen."

I looked at that walnut visage, then back to the bird. She too was
serious. For a family of lunatics they seemed disturbingly sure of themselves.
Well, money's nothing, not really. But without it the chances of acquiring any
antiques at all very definitely recede. I weakened.

"What's an hour between friends?"

The old man nodded approvingly at the luscious bird as I sat down.

"Lovejoy. You speak fluent Italian, I believe?"

How did he know? "Not really."

"Oh, but you do. You learned the language to, er, rip the
Vatican." He leant forward earnestly, the elderly perfectionist.
"Rip. The word is correct?"

As a matter of fact he was right, but my past sins are personal
property.

"You want to nick Rome as well?" I said cruelly.

'That'll do from you, Lovejoy!" Caterina spat.

"Shush, my dear. Lovejoy, you have never been to
Venice." The knowing old sod was reminding me, not asking. His
gnat's-whine voice became flutier and dreamier. "You poor man, never seen
the Serenissima. It's the ultimate glory of Man." His eyes were on me, but
looking through to some distant image. "I'll tell you a secret. Lovejoy."

"Grandfather!" Caterina warned, but he shushed her.

"I've never experienced either contentment or ecstasy for thirty
years."

"Don't give me that crap," I blurted, "er, sir.
With all these antiques?"

"True, Lovejoy." He seemed near to tears. "Thirty
years ago I first saw the Serene Republic, a routine holiday. Within two days
I'd bought the palazzo and knew it was for life. Ah, the hours I have watched
the
traghetto
men smoke and talk in
the campo below my window on the Grand Canal!" He collected himself.
"I saw Venice, the greatest man-made structure the world has ever known.
Paintings, architecture, sculpture, clothes, weapons, everything living and
vital."

"I know the feeling," I said enviously.

"You do
not
, young
man. You believe I am talking about greed. I am not." Now he sipped his
sherry, hardly wetting his lips. "On that visit I learned of something so terrible,
so near nightmare that I never recovered. I have never felt happiness since.
Despair, too, is absolute."

"You all right, mate?" His nightmare, whatever it was,
had turned him gray.

"Yes. I thank you." He replaced his glass and leant
back, weary. "To avert that nightmare I am prepared to give everything I
own. You see, nightmares should vanish with the dawn, Lovejoy. Mine does not.
It is descending upon that magical city with every minute that passes. In your
lifetime, you too will suffer it. And when you do, Lovejoy, you will never
smile again."

In spite of myself I had to clear my throat and look about to make
sure we were all okay. "My nightmares are pretty boring. What's
yours?"

"Venice is sinking."

That old thing. "Aren't we all?"

"Silence!" cried the old bloke, enraged.

"That does it!" Caterina was rising, also enraged.

I'd had enough. Even hungry cowards get fed up. "Shut your
gums, you silly old sod. And as for you," I said to the bird as I crossed
and poured myself sherry entirely without assistance, "dial nine nine nine
for the Old Bill if you like. But just remember you invited me here to listen
to your lunatic crap. I don't have to agree that it's gospel. Okay?"

After an ugly pause, to Caterina's fury, her grandfather said
unexpectedly, "Okay, Lovejoy." I went and sat down.

The bloke was simply watching. The bird was for Armageddon.

"Right, then," I said. "Venice."

He smiled with a gleam in his eye. "Venice. If you saw a
lorry carrying a small parcel containing a Verzelini drinking glass accidentally
slewed over the wall of the Chelmar Canal, what would you do?"

I wanted to get the hypothesis absolutely clear. "No danger
to me?"

The sly old devil shrugged. "Well, Lovejoy. Broad daylight.
You can swim like a fish, I'm told. Canals are only a couple of feet from the
towpath. Surely . . . ?"

I thought, sensing a trick. Verzelini was a Murano glassmaker from
Venice who made it to Good Queen Bess's London and turned out richly valuable
Venetian-style glass in his little City factory until the late 1590s. A single
glass nowadays would give you enough to retire on. Well, in for a penny . . .
"Okay, I'd try and save it."

"Now. Supposing that Verzelini glass, in its precarious
parcel, was multiplied a million times."

"Still no danger to me?"

His distant-reed voice cut in. "Yes or no, Lovejoy?"

"Well, yes. But there are less than a dozen Verzelini glasses
knocking around."

Somebody said, "What's going on here?"

I looked around. A tall countrified bloke was beckoning
imperiously from the study door. Caterina was obediently crossing to him.
Granddad took no notice, so I thought what the hell. Confidentiality's not
today's big issue. I said, "And Venice isn't a little parcel on a
lorry."