got nothing. He'd somehow slipped out of the reckoning.
'Where is Hymie in all this?' I asked.
'He does what I tell him,' she said, laughing at me.
I went red. 'About the money Wrinkle owes me. Can't your brother Hymie lend it? I'll need a bit to bring the mark.'
'Okay. I'll fix it with Hymie. He's the only one with keys.' Her gaze held me, threat in there. 'No tricks, Lovejoy, right?'
Which was how we left things. Me to bring my mark - aka Dieter Gluck, though I wasn't going to tell her his name - to see Wrinkle's glorious work on the sly, and Honor to make sure Wrinkle didn't hear about it.
'Don't let me down, Honor,' I begged.
'Likewise,' Honor said, no smiles this time.
I swallowed and left through Wrinkle's workshop. It was a galaxy, him already hard at it. His wonderful fakes were around the walls. His three genuine originals stood on a dias, under one brilliant redwood canopy. It looked like red eyne wood, that dealers call soymida. I was desperate to feel the wood, because red eyne rubs oily to the finger, dull yet smooth. Its pale streaks give it away. Tough as nails, and insects give up.
'Nice workshop, Wrinkle,' I praised, on my way.
He just grunted, labouring. He was doing a rotary cut veneer from a piece of red eyne.
It looked lovely, though it's hellish difficult because of its knots. Furniture made from it costs the earth. Beauty, like vengeance, doesn't come easy.
I left through the yard, noticing two Chubb locks, standard deadbolts, the fingered interlocks, the electronic alarms. I had a cup of coffee at a corner caff, wondering who I could get. I'd only got tonight to burgle the place. Not long.
Tinker was the man. Hardly the quietest crook on earth, but I wanted reliability. Billia and Dang could help me, because nobody knew them much in the antiques trade.
Worth a go? 32
WAITING FOR TINKER in the Nell of Old Drury, I thought how odd life can be. It's people's attitudes.
I loved this lady, once. Every time we met behind the auction sheds in Stowmarket for a snog, though, I had the uneasy feeling we were being watched. Her bloke was notorious for jealousy, which scared me, but she only laughed. Risk, she kept saying, adds spice. This is my point: The only time I felt safe with Marsha was in Stratford- on-Avon one weekend, and it was exactly then that her aggressive fiance turned up. I escaped by the skin of my teeth. Going to meet Billia and Dang, I felt secure because the stout bowler-hatted geezer wasn't around any more. Was I wrong?
Tinker entered, coughing his way through the throng of complaining actors. He was merry as a sparrow, instantly into the two pints I had ready.
'Wotcher, Tinker. Look sharp. We're meeting Billia in Covent Garden.'
'Why not here, Lovejoy?' he grumbled. 'Daft plodding through London when we're already boozing.'
Pubs and taverns to Tinker are like stepping-stones across life's stormy waters. It was only five minutes' walk to Covent Garden, a distance he saw as the Hellespont. He slurped up. We started out, but not before I loudly asked him what Dang had done wrong. Several people must have overheard.
Tinker was still explaining as we headed up Russell Street. 'Dang dived in the fourth round. The backers'd told him the third. No brains, see.'
'What's the threat, then?' I was glad Dang was thick as a plank. My plan needed two dupes. Dang could be one.
'He's got four days, to pay back the bets they lost on him.' He told me how much. It set me spluttering. 'Or Dang'll get blammed. The fight was a championship eliminator.'
'Who are they, Tinker?' Dang would accidentally die in some hit-and-run accident.
'Cockneys.' Tinker slowed hopefully outside a pub. Cockneys? I needed Sturffie. But was he already in the enemy camp?
Billia and Dang were sitting on the benches in Covent Garden watching a juggler. A nearby carousel whirled gaudily. The Transport Museum was flourishing, crowds surging. It's one of my favourite places.
'Hello, Lovejoy.' Billia budged up, gave me room.
She sounded really down. Dang sat massively there, a vacuous grin on his face. He gasped when the juggler's wooden balls vanished one by one then magically reappeared.
'Wotcher, love.' The crowd applauded. A girl entered the space to catch skittles. Tinker stood by, forlorn, without ale. 'I'm going to do a lift in Dulwich. I'll need Dang. No,' I said hastily as her eyes widened in alarm. 'No scrapping. Just carrying stuff. I've done all the donkeywork. It's tonight.'
'Will you be there?' She shushed me as some colourful Americans came to enjoy the show.
'Yes,' I whispered. Honest to God, we were like joke Russian spies in a West End farce.
'The money's good. It'll pay off Dang's gamblers.'
'How soon?' she asked. Dang gaped as the juggler balanced a huge beachball.
'Pay day immediately after. Coin of the realm, love.'
Dang clapped, huge hands flapping. I tried not to think of a circus sea lion. Not for the first time, I wondered about the attraction between this gormless hulk and the dainty lass seated by me. Could it be solely bedwork? Or was it something deeper, the need of a pretty bird to protect an inept monster who couldn't even count? Enough. I'd sown the seed. In Covent Garden, we were secret as a broadcast. No need to be more explicit. I slipped Tinker a note, told him I'd join him later in the Eagle, the pub of 'Pop goes the weasel' fame.
