The Shell Seekers (27 page)

"For a bit I thought I might, but then . . ." He shrugged. "I changed my mind. Went to Horticultural College instead."

"How old are you?"

"Twenty-four."

She was surprised. He looked older. "Do you like working for Autogarden?"

"It's all right. It makes for variety."

"How long have you worked for them?"

"About six months."

"Are you married?"

"No."

"Where do you live?"

"In a cottage on Sawcombe's farm. Just outside Pudley."

"Oh, I know the Sawcombes. Is it a nice house?"

"It's all right."

"Who looks after you?"

"I look after myself."

She thought of the horrible white-bread sandwich. Imagined the cheerless cottage, with an unmade bed and washing hung around the stove to dry. She wondered if he ever made himself a proper meal.

"Were you at school in Edinburgh?" she asked him, sud-denly intrigued by this young man, wanting to know what had happened to him, the circumstances and motivation that had brought him to such a humble life.

"Yes."

"Did you go straight to Horticultural College from school?"

"No. I went out to America for a couple of years. I worked on a cattle ranch in Arkansas."

"I've never been to America."

"It's a great place."

"Did you never think of staying there ... for good, I mean?"

"I thought of it, but I didn't." .    "Were you in Arkansas all the time?"

"No. I travelled around. I saw a lot of the country. I spent six months in the Virgin Islands."

"What an experience!"

He had finished his soup. She asked him if he would like more, and he said that he would, so she filled his bowl again. As he picked up his spoon, he said, "You said you'd never had a gardener before. Have you looked after this place all by yourself?"

"Yes," she told him with some pride. "It was a wilderness when I came here."

"You're obviously very knowledgeable."

"I don't know about that."

"Have you always lived here?"

"No. I've lived most of my life in London. But I had a big garden there, too, and before that, when I was a girl, I lived in Cornwall, and there was a garden there. I'm lucky. I've always had gardens. I can't imagine being without one."

"Do you have a family?"

"Yes. Three children. All grown up. One married. I've two grandchildren as well."

He said, "My sister has two children. She's married to a farmer in Perthshire."

"Do you go back to Scotland?"

"Yes. Two, three times a year."

"It must be very beautiful."

"Yes," he said. "It is."

After the soup, he ate most of the chicken, and all the stewed apple. He wouW not drink the beer, but accepted grate-fully her offer of a cup of tea. When he had drunk the tea, he glanced at the clock and got to his feet. It was five minutes to one.

He said, "I've finished the hedge. I'll bring the logs up to the house, if you'll show me where to store them. And perhaps you'd like to tell me what you want done next. And, as well, how many days a week you need me to come."

"I suggested three days to Autogarden, but if you work at this speed, I may only take two."

"That's all right. It's up to you."

"How do I pay you?"

"You pay Autogarden, and they pay me."

"I hope they pay you well."

"It's all right."

He reached for his jacket and put it on. She said, "Why didn't they give you a van to come to work in?"

"I don't drive."

"But all young people drive nowadays. You could easily learn."

"I didn't say I couldn't drive," said Danus Muirfield. "I said I didn't."

When she had shown him where to put the logs and had set him to work again, double-trenching her vegetable plot, Penelope returned to her kitchen to wash up the lunch dishes. "/ didn 't say I couldn 't drive. I said I didn't." He had not accepted the can of beer. She wondered if he had been caught for drunk driving and had had his licence taken away from him. Perhaps he had killed some person, had taken the pledge, and sworn that alcohol, no more, should cross his lips. The very idea of such horror filled her with chill. And yet, a tragedy of such massive proportions was not beyond the bounds of possibility. And it would explain a lot about him . . . the tenseness in his face, the unsmiling mouth, the bright, unblinking eyes. There was something there, veneered by wariness. Some mystery. But she liked him. Oh yes, she liked him very much.

At nine o'clock the next evening, which was a Tuesday, Noel Keeling turned his Jaguar into Ranfurly Road, and drove down the dark, rainy street to stop outside his sister Olivia's house. He was not expected, and had prepared himself to find her out, which she usually was. She was the most social woman he knew. But, surprisingly, the lights burnt behind the drawn curtains of her sitting room window, so he got out of the car, locked it, and went up the little path to ring the bell. A moment later, it was opened, and Olivia stood there, wearing a flame-red woollen housecoat, no make-up, and her spectacles. Obviously not dressed for company. He said, "Hello."

"Noel." She sounded astonished, as well she might, for he was not in the habit of dropping in on her, despite the fact that he lived only a couple of miles away. "What are you doing?"

"Just calling. Are you busy?"

"Yes, I am. Trying to do some reading for a meeting tomorrow morning. But that doesn't matter. Come on in."

"I've been having a drink with some friends in Putney." He smoothed down his hair, followed her into her sitting room. As usual, it was marvellously warm, firelit, filled with flowers . . . he envied her. He had always envied her. Not just her success, but the competence with which she seemed to handle every facet of her busy life. On the low table by the fire was her brief-case, sheaves of papers, pages of proof, but she stooped to bundle these into some sort of order and remove them to her desk. He went to the fireside, ostensibly to warm his hands at the flames, but actu-ally to cast his eye over the invitations that she had propped on the mantelpiece, and generally check on her social engagements. He saw that she had been asked to a wedding to which he had not, and also a private view at a new gallery in Walton Street.

She said, "Have you had anything to eat?"

He turned to face her. "A few canapes." He pronounced it the way it was spelt, which was one of the few old family jokes that they still shared.

"Do you want something?"

"What are you offering?"

"There's the remains of a bit of quiche I had for supper. You can eat that up if you want. And biscuits and cheese."

"That'd be great."

"I'll get it then. Help yourself to a drink."

He accepted this kind offer, pouring himself a stiff whisky and soda, while she disappeared through to her little kitchen beyond the dining room, turning on lights as she went. There, in a companionable fashion, he joined her, pulling a tall stool to the little counter that separated the two rooms, for all the world like a man in a pub chatting up the barmaid.

He said, "I went and saw Ma on Sunday."

"Did you? I saw her on Saturday."

"She told me you'd been. With a fancy American in tow. How do you think she's looking?"

"Marvellous, considering."

"Do you think it really was a heart attack?"

"Well, a warning anyway." She looked at him, her mouth wry. "Nancy's already got her buried ten feet under the daisies." Noel laughed, shook his head. Nancy was one of the few things he and Olivia had always agreed about. "Of course, she does too much. She's always done too much. But at least she's agreed to getting some help in the garden. That's a beginning."

"I tried to get her to say she'd come up to London tomorrow."

"For what reason?"

"Go to Boothby's. Watch the Lawrence Stern come under the hammer. See what it fetches."

"Oh yes,
The Water Carriers
. I'd forgotten it was tomorrow. Did she say she would?"

"No."

"Well, why should she? It's not as though she was going to make any money out of it."

"No." Noel looked down into his glass. "But she would if she sold her own."

"If you mean
The Shell Seekers
, think again. She'd die be-fore letting that picture go."

"How about the panels?"

Olivia's expression was deeply suspicious. "Did you talk to Mumma about this?"

"Why not? They're dreadful pictures, admit it. They simply moulder away at the top of the stairs. She'd never even notice their going."

"They're unfinished."

"I wish everybody would stop telling me they're unfinished. My bet is that they have a rarity value that is beyond price."

After a little, she said, "Supposing she did agree to sell them." Olivia took out a tray, set plates and a fork and knife upon it, a dish of butter, a wooden platter of cheese. "Are you going to suggest what she does with the resultant loot, or are you going to leave that to her discretion?"

"The money you give away while you're alive is worth twice what you leave when you die."

"Which means that you want to get your greedy little paws on it."

"Not just me. All three of us. Oh, don't look so po-faced, Olivia, it's nothing to be ashamed of. These days everybody's short of capital, and don't tell me Nancy isn't mad to get her hand on a bit of extra cash. She's always drooling on about how expensive everything is."

"You and Nancy, maybe. But you can count me out."

Noel turned his glass. "You wouldn't say no, though?"

"I don't want anything from Mumma. She's given us enough. I just want her to be there, well, and secure, with no money worries, and able to enjoy herself."

"She's comfortably off. We all know that."

"Do we? What about the future? She may live to be a very old lady."

"All the more reason to sell those dismal nymphs. Invest the capital for her twilight years."

"I don't want to discuss it."

"So you don't think it's a good idea?"

Olivia did not reply to this, simply picked up the tray and bore it back to the fireside. Following her, he decided that no woman could look so straight-backed and formidable as Olivia when you were trying to do something of which she did not approve.

She set down the tray with something of a thump on the low table. Then she straightened, facing him across the room. She said, "No."

"Why not?"

"I think that you should leave Mumma alone."

"All right." With easy grace he gave in, knowing that, in the long term, this was the best way to get what he wanted. He settled himself in one of her deep armchairs, perched forward so that he could deal with his impromptu meal. Olivia moved to stand with her shoulders against the mantelpiece, her hands deep, in the pockets of her gown. He felt her eyes upon him as he picked up the fork, sliced into the quiche. "We'll forget about selling the panels. Talk about something else."

"Like what?"

"Like, have you ever seen, or heard Ma mention, or even suspected the existence of, any rough oil sketches that Lawrence Stern would have done for all his major works?"

He had spent the day debating as to whether or not he should take Olivia into his confidence about his discovery of the old letter and its subsequent possibilities. In the end, he had decided to take the risk. Olivia was an important ally to win. Only she, of all three of them, had any influence on their mother. As he asked the question, he kept his eyes on her face, saw her expression stiffen into wariness, alert with suspicion. This was to be expected.

After a bit, she said, "No." This, too, was to be expected, but he knew that she was telling the truth, because she always did. "Never."

"You see, there must have been some."

"What started you on this wild-goose chase?"

He told her about finding the letter.

"The Terrazzo Garden? That's in the Metropolitan in New York."

"Exactly so. And if a rough oil sketch was done for
The Terrazzo Garden
, then why not for
The Water Carriers
and The Fisherman's Courtship and all the other old classics that are now incarcerated in boring museums in every self-respecting capital in the world."

Olivia thought about this. Then she said, "They were probably destroyed."

"Oh, rubbish. The old boy never destroyed anything. You know that as well as I do. No house was ever so full of the junk of ages as Oakley Street. Unless it's Podmore's Thatch. You know, that loft of Ma's is a positive fire risk. If any insurance man saw what's been crammed up there, under the thatch, he'd have a fit."

"Have you been up there lately?"

"Went on Sunday, to search for my squash racket."