“But surely, Charles, that’s just what you did do?”
Ozanne glanced at his sister impatiently. “Yes, yes – I went to Littlefair’s house, as you know. But I ought to have followed him up to his studio. He didn’t look right. In fact, he looked damned wrong. Kind of look I’ve seen before.”
Appleby appeared mildly interested. “In what circumstances, Mr Ozanne?”
“Trenches. Breaking-point. Moments, you know, when it seemed wise to get a subaltern’s service revolver away from him. But one gets old. And forgets.” Ozanne had a staccato manner of speaking that seemed to be rather conventionally in accord with his profession. “And my mind was taken up with the bloody picture.”
“I don’t think you should speak of poor Rupert’s portrait in that way.” Lady Heritage was reproachful but not angry. “It was very nice, and a great solace to me after my husband’s death.” She had turned to Appleby. “Rupert died suddenly, you know, only a few days after Mr Littlefair finished his painting. I had it hung in my bedroom at once. And now I wish very much that I hadn’t offered it to those shockingly careless Comfiters.”
“There certainly appears to have been negligence.” Appleby was unobtrusively tactful. “Did you send the canvas directly to the Comfiters’ Hall?”
“No, Sir John. It went back to Littlefair, because he wasn’t satisfied about the varnish. And he had it delivered yesterday afternoon.”
“And some firm that does that sort of queer job carried out the curtaining business this morning.” Ozanne offered this information. “After that, the hall was left deserted, and this valuable picture quite unguarded. Incredible – eh? Asking for monkey-tricks. And now Littlefair takes the offensive joke to heart, and blows his brains out. Poor show.”
Appleby concurred. “I suppose,” he then said to Lady Heritage, “there was nothing about the portrait of your late husband that might be wounding to any individual, or arouse resentment?”
“Certainly not. It was a very nice portrait, very homely and informal, with Rupert in his purple velvet smoking-jacket, smoking a cigar, and with one or two things from his collection around him. There was a window, too – a wonderfully clever idea, I thought – with several of the Heritage tankers coming up an estuary, and the Heritage refinery in the background. It was all in beautiful taste. And so many pretty colours.”
“You’ll agree, I’m sure, that my sister makes it sound enchanting.” Ozanne’s ironical tone indicated that in artistic matters he owned a sophistication of which Lady Heritage was utterly innocent. “It would have looked well, hung beside some of my brother-in-law’s other things: the Velasquez Infanta, for instance, or the self-portrait of Cézanne.”
Appleby was visibly impressed. “I know that Lord Heritage’s collection was notable. I believe it goes to the nation?”
Ozanne nodded. “With one or two exceptions – yes. This portrait by Littlefair, of course, was my sister’s property, and not involved. We’re having a little trouble over valuation for probate, and so on. That’s why I’ve moved in.”
“Charles is very kindly spending some months with me,” Lady Heritage explained. “Of course the whole collection has been very carefully catalogued as it grew, and we know exactly what Rupert paid for
nearly
everything. But it seems there are all sorts of difficult questions, all the same.”
“I’m sure there are.” Appleby showed a proper sympathy for the burdens that go along with great wealth. “Did the Comfiters ask especially for this particular portrait, Lady Heritage?”
“Oh, no. I don’t think they knew about it. It had never, of course, been exhibited. But they asked for
some
portrait of Rupert – naturally, there have been a great many – to hang in their beautiful hall. And – as the Master wrote – in a
prominent
position.”
“Naturally. And you decided on the Littlefair yourself? Did they then send an expert to look at it?”
“Dear me, no. The Master came to see it himself, along with Lord Godlet who owns the multiple stores, and Sir James Georgano who makes all the wireless sets. Of course they were delighted. Lord Godlet is a great authority. He bought something extremely important only the other day. By one of those Italians whom people admire so much.”
“In fact, he bought the Bleistein Leonardo.” Ozanne favoured Appleby with a rather wolfish grin. “You could hardly have higher credentials than that.”
Appleby nodded. “I’ve seen that Leonardo. But I wish I’d seen Jethro Littlefair’s Lord Heritage.”
Ozanne’s grin broadened. “I’m afraid,” he said, “you never will.”
When Appleby got home he found his wife entertaining Mr Hildebert Braunkopf. No doubt the art dealer had been summoned. It was like Judith to guess that the particular sort of information in which he abounded might be required. At the moment she was resisting, without much difficulty, the suggestion that she should buy one of the three Littlefairs which Braunkopf was fortunate enough to have in his gallery. He now turned enthusiastically to his host.
“Three hundred kinnies, my goot Sir John Abbleby, for a puttikler early mature masterpiece this now irreplaceable dead painter.”
“My dear fellow, I haven’t got the money.”
“Or two-seven-five quiet transaction no publicities one-pount notes.”
“Look here, Braunkopf – my wife and I are meaning to drop in on you later this week and pick up a drawing or two at a reasonable price. But I certainly don’t want to buy anything by Littlefair. All I want is some information about him. He tried to get you to place things from time to time?”
“Certainly, Sir John. That marches without speaking. All the best most established high reputatious artists–”
“Quite so. Did he ever say anything about his commission for Lord Heritage?”
“But yes. It was to be exhibited at Burlington House, he said, and make great sensations in the worlt of art. When Lady Heritage decided to keep it unexhibited, Littlefair was down in the damps.”
“In the damps, was he? And when she decided on the presentation to the Comfiters?”
“Littlefair was quite applauded up again.”
Not unnaturally, Appleby took a moment to interpret this. “Did you gather there was anything out of the way about the painting?”
Braunkopf nodded. “There was somethings. Perhaps a new formula for composings of an official portrait – yes?”
“I see. Now, there’s something else. Did you ever have any dealings with Lord Heritage?”
Mr Braunkopf could be seen to hesitate. No doubt vanity prompted him to declare that he was perpetually transacting business with all the established high reputatious collectors of Europe. But something in Appleby’s eye constrained him to veracity. “Not directly, my goot Sir John. Many the largest most important buyers approach the market only through agents.”
“Quite so. And sometimes highly confidential agents? While an important negotiation is going on, it might be difficult to know who was acting for whom?”
“That is so. But most always I know, Sir John. I have big intelligence all that side the great worlt of art.”
“I know you have. Could you find out whom Heritage was employing on anything that he wanted treated as more or less top secret?”
Braunkopf made a gesture indicating large confidence. “Two – three hours, Sir John.”
“I want the fellow, whoever he is, on that mat.” And Appleby pointed to the hearth-rug. “I expect you know enough about almost anybody in the trade, my dear Braunkopf, to make them feel it healthy to pay any little call you suggest.”
“But certainly.” Braunkopf received this ambiguous testimonial with obvious gratification. “Only that takes larger time – yes?” He considered. “Tomorrow evening – at six.”
Appleby sought out Mrs Littlefair next morning, and found her in an unassuming terrace house in a dull suburb. It didn’t appear that she had been allowed much share in the prosperity attending her late husband’s more recent labours. Perhaps she had been conscientiously opposed to accepting any of the fruits of so debased an art.
“Must I really answer more questions?” Mrs Littlefair, who was handsome in a forbidding way, looked Appleby straight in the eye. “You know that your men were here yesterday evening, and even obtained my permission to search the house? I’d have thought that was about enough.”
“I certainly don’t want to attempt anything in the nature of an interrogation. It’s rather your opinion that I seek.” As he made this pacific speech, Appleby let his glance wander round Mrs Littlefair’s environment. It was austere; there was nothing in the room that Hildebert Braunkopf would have judged worth twopence; but there was an impression, nevertheless, of an absolute perfection of taste. It did seem conceivable that the spectacle of her husband accommodating himself to the world of the Heritages might drive this woman to some act of bizarre fanaticism. “I wonder what you think about the woman your husband was living with?”
“I don’t. There isn’t really a person there to think about. Julia Parnaby has good looks, and nothing else. And one can’t
think
about good looks.”
“If she felt any reason to suppose that Jethro Littlefair was going to throw her over, do you think she might have done anything drastic?”
“Certainly not. She would simply have sat back and worked out the stiffest terms she could safely demand.”
“You would call her mercenary?”
“She’d do a good deal for hard cash.”
Appleby smiled. “Unfortunately,” he said, “that’s true of so many of us.”
“It’s not true of me.”
This had come from the lady like a flash. And Appleby nodded soberly. “I believe that’s so. You, Mrs Littlefair, conduct your life on other principles.”
It hadn’t, Appleby thought, been a very rewarding little expedition. He was standing in Mrs Littlefair’s narrow hall, and preparing to take his leave. But his eye was still active. There was a telephone on a small table, and in addition to the directory there were five or six smaller volumes. One was the handbook of a motoring organisation. “You run a car?” Appleby asked.
Mrs Littlefair appeared surprised. “Yes – a very old one.”
“Awkward – isn’t it? – a house in a row like this. No garage.”
“Yes. But I have the use of a shed in the next road.”
“I see. Did those tiresome police who visited you yesterday search that?”
“They did not. They didn’t inquire about it.”
“Ah.” Appleby put a certain grimness into this. “Would you mind walking round there with me now, Mrs Littlefair?”
“Not in the slightest.” But Mrs Littlefair’s looks – Appleby thought – belied her words. She might have been suddenly frightened. Or she might have just been out of patience and very, very angry.
The shed was a ramshackle affair – decidedly not what is called a private lock-up. But then the car it sheltered was ramshackle too, and nobody could conceivably be prompted to make off with it. There was a pile of sacking and old cardboard boxes at the back. And it was behind these that Appleby found the portrait.
The canvas had been slashed to ribbons, and bits were missing. But it was unquestionably Jethro Littlefair’s ill-starred Lord Heritage. There were the tankers coming up the estuary. One could even distinguish the cigar. When Charles Ozanne declared that Appleby would never see the portrait, he had been wrong.
Mrs Littlefair was very pale. But she remained true to her principles. She touched the ripped surface of the painting, and then drew back in revulsion, as if the very texture was physically intolerable to her. “Horrible,” she said, and fainted away.
On the following evening Hildebert Braunkopf arrived punctually with a man called Carabine. He also brought a large portfolio of drawings; and with these he withdrew to seek Judith Appleby as soon as he had handed over the late Lord Heritage’s agent to Appleby himself.
Carabine was scarcely a willing guest. But, although sullen and evasive, there was a good deal to which he appeared to realise that he must own up. In forming his collection, he maintained, his employer had relished secrecy and devious courses. Heritage had belonged essentially to big business – the very biggest business – and it had been second nature to him to enjoy discomfiting a rival by coming out suddenly with this or that
fait accompli
. And of course the world of art dealing had its own peculiar standards and conventions. Some of them might look a bit queer to an outsider. But he, Carabine, had certainly done nothing that wasn’t quite the proper thing.
“I suppose,” Appleby asked, “that you fixed up the commission with Littlefair?”
“Yes.”
“That was just one of the jobs for which you received a regular salary from Lord Heritage?”
“Of course I had a salary.”
“Nevertheless, you no doubt got Littlefair the job on the condition that he let you have 20% of it back as a rake-off?”
“Only 15%. That’s very usual and moderate.”
“Perhaps it is, Mr Carabine. But did Lord Heritage know?”
“I can’t tell you. No – I suppose he didn’t.”
“I understand that Mr Ozanne, Lady Heritage’s brother, has taken charge of this side of Lord Heritage’s affairs. What would have happened if Littlefair had for any reason felt prompted to speak up about that rake-off? Mr Ozanne would probably have investigated some other of your dealings for his late brother-in-law?”
Carabine moistened his lips nervously. “Perhaps.”
“And Lord Heritage’s fondness for secrecy and so forth gave you a good deal of scope – shall we say to advance your own monetary interests in ways unknown to him. It is very much in your interest that there should be no inquiry?”
“Naturally one doesn’t want a lot of fuss.”
“Moreover it would be your impulse to keep mum, if you came upon funny business by anybody else, since one exposure might lead to another?”
Carabine took a moment to consider this. “You put it all deuced unfairly,” he said.
“Never mind how I put it. Just reflect that Littlefair is dead – and that the police are by no means satisfied as to how he died. That, Mr Carabine, takes this affair quite outside your comfortable territory as a common-or-garden shady person. That being so, I wonder if you have anything more to say?”