With a pang I returned her Roman counters, stealing them honestly far from my mind.
'Does Mat want a treasure-hunting job? Only take one night. Tell him,' I said carefully,
'it'll be a cert.'
At last I'd got my team together, and replaced Sorbo, requiescat in pace. Time I got to Camden Passage, met the troops and got on with it. I knew enough - I thought. I was sure of my next move. I said so-long, swore undying devotion, and fled.
On the train I dozed, woke blearily in London, caught the Northern Line from Moorgate to the Angel, Islington, where all antiques, they say, pass. Stand near the old green clock of J. Smith & Sons, still saying the metal firm can be found at 42-54, St John's Square, London EC1. In a year you'll see every antique in the world, stolen or legit. It's not true, but what is? It's the gateway to the great - I mean great - antiques market of Camden Passage.
Pleased at the proximity of antiques in The Mall (ugly building; so what?) and the York Antiques Arcade, I felt optimistic. I had the crucial ingredient - Dieter Gluck's desperate need for money, and his snobbery. Lize had confirmed it. Her boyfriend Mat, lucky swine, was the electronic seek-and-bleep treasure hunter I could get to help Mort with the sunken aircraft in the estuary's sand marshes. My full team would avenge Sorbo and Arthur. Victory was in sight!
Making an outing of it, I had a lovely time wandering the shops, noshing a bit, sussing out antiques. It's the best free day in London, doesn't cost a groat. There are difficulties. One is Camden Passage itself. Take Islington High Street and Upper Street.
Which do you think is the more important? Answer: Upper Street. Because the grandly named Islington High Street starts off as a splendidly wide thoroughfare, then astonishingly gives up, dives into a miserable little ginnel you wouldn't even glance down. But Upper Street, which sounds like a leftover from some manky Lower Street, is wide, busy, and important. That's where Camden Passage is. It looks alley thin, but is the centre of the universe.
Upper Street's called that because it was more elevated than nearby Lower Street. I like it. (Incidentally, never mind what history says - Good Queen Bess really did visit Sir Walter Raleigh there in his Upper Street house across the road. Mind you, she also nipped round the corner to spend candle hours with the Earl of Leicester. I never did like him, untrustworthy sod.)
'Lovely!' I exclaimed at the scent and throb, mobs of agog hunters.
'Ain't it just, Lovejoy!' Sorbo said.
'Honest to God, Sorb,' I said, bliss in my soul. 'This place…'
My mind went, Sorbo? Dead Sorbo? I saw Trout between the dense traffic, and Lydia, smiling in anticipation. I heard Tinker's cough resounding mightily near the Camden Head pub.
I went dizzy. 'You're frigging dead, wack.' I'd put my hand on his dead face in the dark.
His eye had been beaten into a bloody mess.
He stood there just as I remembered him in life. His eyes widened. 'Here, Lovejoy. You didn't think…? Catch him, mate!'
A passing bus inspector got me under the arms. I swayed about for a year or so, came to in the corner nosh bar with Sorbo telling an outraged Lydia how I'd keeled over when all he'd done was say hello. She was all for whisking me to Guy's Hospital for brain surgery. ('Everybody's conduct is disgraceful,' etc.) I settled for a quiet stroll up past St Mary's church and the fire station to the Hope and Anchor pub facing the long thin gardens near Canonbury Lane. I wanted tea, a wad, and explanation.
In that perfect tavern's interior Lydia looked like fresh from Westminster Steps, her loyal skiff doubtless waiting on the Thames. Dealers were lusting away. She, of course, was oblivious.
'What'd I do?' Sorbo was giving indignantly. The caff was crowded. 'Lovejoy said be here, so I come.'
Tinker swigged his bottled nourishment, lying to Lydia that he badly needed fluid, being a diabetic under doctor's orders.
'Lovejoy thought you'd been croaked, silly bleeder,' he grumbled.
'Me? It was Bern. It's in the frigging papers.'
They all looked accusingly at me. Dauntless leader of the pack, I'd discovered a body and not read all about it.
'Listen, everyone.' Lydia rapped the pub's grotty table. 'I must remonstrate. This atrocious language must stop. We each have certain essential information. Sorbo's is that he is not yet deceased.' Her luscious mouth set in a firm line. Nearby West Country dealers groaned. She turned to Sorbo. 'We are delighted to welcome you back to, ah…'
We waited. 'To us,' she ended lamely.
The dead face in the tabloid was Bern's, Gluck's oppo. So who'd killed him? I couldn't help looking at Sorbo. He didn't usually wander this far from Streatham Hill. Had I told him to come? I couldn't remember.
'I was to investigate the paintings sold by Holloway University.' She placed her gloved hands on her lap. 'Gainsborough, Turner, and Constable. They are already successfully sold, via London auction houses.' She beamed. 'Isn't that wonderful? So much money for the poor struggling students!'
'Idle bleeders,' Tinker growled. 'Drunken moronic sods.'
'Mr Dill!' Lydia scolded. 'I shan't tell you again.'
'And Shar the lawyer?'
Lydia held a brief antagonistic silence. 'I was pleased. She acts for Dieter.' Meaning she wasn't pleased at all. 'Dieter tried to buy a Gainsborough from Holloway on credit. They declined.'
Shar acted for Dieter Gluck? Trout caught my eye, his glance saying: Lydia's a liability, so get rid. I wished he'd stop signalling that.
'Shar is very concerned about you, Lovejoy. The magistrates—'
