instructions, I was led to believe.'
'Wrinkle.' I cleared my throat, scared to ask. 'He was —'
'Billia is helping him to sort out his furniture factory,' Wendlesham said calmly, as Bert and his team flopped out onto the mud among their coloured markers. 'Wonder those blokes don't catch their death of cold. Marvellous, such enthusiasm. I suppose this foreshore'll be a designated War Graves Commission place.'
'No,' Mortimer said. He'd been listening. 'I shall order an interment on Saffron Fields by the giant mulberry.'
'Very good, sir,' the policemen said politely together. Wendlesham went on, 'We shall have to obtain permission to exhume Mr Goldhorn. Further tests, in the light of what's transpired about Gluck, and what Saintly admitted at police interview. There's a question of digitalis.'
'Very well,' said Mort. 'Please keep me informed.'
'Very good, sir. Oh, Sir Jesson Tethroe has decided to advance your pal Wrinkle's collection as a special contribution to Anglo-Chinese relations.' Wendlesham made a sarcastic quotation of it. 'There's already mention of an honour coming Wrinkle's way.
And Billia sends her love, Lovejoy.'
'Great.'
'Politicians for you.' Mr Herald grimaced.
I could just see Billia, all dolled up, at Henley Regatta, Lord's, Handel's Messiah in St Paul's at Easter.
Mortimer said, 'Lovejoy, I shall need teaching about antiques, please. For a fee, of course. Distinguishing genuine from fake is easy. They simply feel different. But then what do you do?'
Indeed, I thought. That's the bit I always make a mess of. Where had he inherited the divvy gene?
'I'll teach you for nowt, Mort. Ta-ra, Mr Hartson.'
'Which ends it, Lovejoy,' Mr Herald said. 'Except you're due in court. Holloway University versus you. Need a lift?'
'Ta,' I said. I didn't look at Lydia. The plod don't offer. They command.
The old duffers on the bench looked moribund. Court's a funny sort of place. I've been in better bus shelters. Mr Herald sat there among a dozen lowlifes, me to the fore. I swear he was reading a folded tabloid, our eagle-eyed vigilant constabulary.
Shar, beautiful and serenely indifferent to justice, sprang to my defense by making out a fair case for having me hanged at Tyburn. The magistracy agreed, fined me a fortune. I had a few coins.
'I'm sorry. I'm broke,' I told them.
Shar rose, a picture of misery. Glaring at me, she told them the fine had been met. I was dismissed with dire warnings not to be innocent again, or else. Outside in the corridor I collared her.
'Thanks, love.' I tried to embrace her. 'I mean that most sincerely.'
She stared, hatred in every erg. 'You don't think I paid your fine? You miserable worm!
You're not worth Dieter's little finger!' There was more, invective being the hallmark of the lawyer-client relationship.
'Look, love. Any chance of a sub? Only, I'm—'
With a sweet smile she handed me an envelope. Aren't people marvellous? I said a husky ta as I opened it, and brought out no money, but a bill that stunned my last threadbare neurones. I screwed it up and deposited it in a litter bin.
In despair I rang Lisa, fearless reporter, with my begging whine, and was instantly told that she'd murder me if ever she saw me again, for one Judith Falconer had broadcast every detail over the Home Counties that morning. Then Yamta and Saunty who, fornicating breathlessly, gasped that they'd ring me back. I rang Hello Bates, Deeloriss, Palace Alice, Puntasia, Gaylord, Sturffie. They all laughed about my blubbering cowardice when facing no possible harm.
As a last try I rang Dosh Callaghan.
'Dosh? Lovejoy. Y'know, the padpa job?'
'What job? I never hired you. You're a criminal. Get lost.' Click. Burr.
On the way to the Tube, a Martian on a bike thundered alongside and rocked to stillness.
'Lovejoy? Tel O'Shaughnessy sends this. Your suss for nicking that Dulwich place's Old Masters.'
A thick envelope, full of circuit diagrams, typed pages, photographs. I said ta and watched him roar off. Lucky Tel hadn't sent it to me in court. As it was, I saw some people in a bus queue staring curiously at me. I smiled weakly.
'Film script,' I said, and got to Dulwich an hour before closing.
There's no doubt about buildings. They're not lifeless. They breathe, form opinions of us just as we do of them.
Architects don't know this, which is why modern buildings look like a heap of slabs. Not Dulwich Picture Gallery, though I'm biased. To me, a mansion containing a Rembrandt becomes heaven.
Within seconds of entering the long gallery I'd reeled to a seat, sat there with my head between my knees.
'Are you unwell, sir?' a pair of security boots asked. I dripped sweat onto the shiny toecaps.
'It's all right,' a pair of neat brogues replied. 'I know this gentleman.'
A woman artist had been copying a Turner - frigging nerve - as I'd ambled in. Oddly, her voice was
