Slowly, in ones and twos, they stood. Elaine spoke once, sharply, when Robert rose. He remained standing determinedly. She nodded to Trembler.
“Very well,” Trembler said, smiling. “Mrs. Michelle will issue your numbers. From now on you’ll wear them. And remember one vital truth: It’s Tachnadray versus all comers.
Everybody understand?” He had to insist on a reply before they sheepishly concurred.
He gave a warm smile as they shuffled out. “The game starts now.”
I called, “Mrs. Buchan has coffee and baps for everybody downstairs.” She fled with a squawk, driving two girls before. I hadn’t warned her. “Then back here for Mr. Yale to allocate your groups.”
Tinker woke at the third rough shake. We were a tired quartet, but we started a quick tour of the house.
“It’s not bad, Lovejoy,” Trembler said. The furniture was parceled, as auctioneers say, meaning arranged in categories.
“It’s bleedin’ great,” Tinker corrected indignantly. They were both seeking my approval.
I said nothing, though I sympathized. It’s always a difficult time when the scammer, he who arranges the entire ploy, does the appraisal. “We wus runnin’ about like blue-arsed flies. I give more bleedin’ scrip out than the friggin’ Budget. Christ, in one afternoon—”
“Shut it, Tinker.” I walked quickly, the three of them in my wake.
Trembler had opted for the ground floor. Ropes were tied across each staircase and crude notices forbade entry. We’d have more imposing barriers by View Day. Heavy furniture stood along one wall of every corridor. Light stuff and assorted massive beds were in the larger drawing rooms with musical instruments. The library was half full of books; books are most trouble when rigging an auction because booksellers want the highest markups. That’s why country-house sales always lack books. It isn’t because squires don’t read.
“Frigging booksellers.” Tinker hawked phlegm. I raised a finger. He went to the window and spat out.
Porcelain, cutlery, decorative ceramics were in the east wing. We clumped, steps echoing, the length of the corridor and worked backwards to the Great Hall. Fireplaces, fire tigers, gasoliers, pole screens in one room. Conservatory furniture and garden items in another. The big east drawing room, once a light bathhouse green, was now hung with sixty or more paintings.
“Thought that was in France,” I remarked in surprise. A Victorian lady admiring a flower in a pale lavender dress.
“Should’ve been,” Tinker grumbled. “More frigging trouble than a square dick.” Barkers are addicted to pessimism for the same reasons as Opposition politicians: There’s more mileage in it.
Farm implements, machinery, carts outside in the bay between the densely overgrown rose beds and the east windows. “Good old Antioch,” I praised. They were arranged in a kind of Boer lager. The presence of a steam plowing engine explained the bulky carrier in midconvoy.
“Fair old lot, that, lads,” I said.
“Ta, Lovejoy.” Tinker smirking’s a horrible sight, but the old soak deserved praise.
The jewelry was in one strip, a grotesque higgledy-piggledy array spread as it had arrived, in bags, trays, boxes, on wobbly trestle tables. Tinker grumbled at the trouble the roomful had caused him. He hates jewelry. “Fiddly little buggers.”
“Shouldn’t we be examining each piece?” Michelle exclaimed.
“Please, missus,” Trembler said.
“Aye,” Tinker added, “gabby cow.”
The glass was in the east wing’s smoking room. The smaller withdrawing room held the first miscellany.
“You described the laird as ‘that well-known collector,’” Trembler said. “So you’d want the collectibles separated?”
“Right.”
A room of bronzes, statuettes, sculptures. Two of silver. One of arms and armor. I left them chatting in the Great Hall as the retainers returned. Michelle seemed rather put out, par for the course, as I went outside and sat on the steps.
When preparing for a divvying job, I can never keep track of time. It must have been nearly an hour when Trembler emptied the whole house of people, Elaine and all. They came out in twos and threes, giving quizzing glances my way, one or two talking softly.
Robert carried Elaine. She waved. Tinker stood waiting behind me, gruffly shutting Michelle up when she started to speak. Some things must be done in quiet. Women never learn. He knows this sort of thing can’t be hurried. Trembler strolled past with a
“All yours, Tinker,” and got a wheezed “Fanks fer noffin’.” Silence. The great crammed house paused.
Afternoon moor light plays oddly on the rims of high fells. I’d often noticed it as a kid.
For quite a while I’d been watching the hues discolor and blend. According to the map, some Pictish houses stood over to the south beyond the loch. I’d love a visit in peacetime. Miles northwesterly, Joseph languished alone. Behind me a bottle clinked. A gurgle, wheeze, a retching cough. Michelle tutted. A cloud slightly darkened the moor, fawns umbered, ochers into russet.
Maybe it was an omen. I rose and dusted my knees off for nothing. My big moment.
Just me and antiques. Probably all I’m good for, showing off to nobody.
“Let’s go,” I said.
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