Tell him Lovejoy sent you. Take your shawl, if you want to sell it, to Blossom Arrance in Williams Walk in the Dutch Quarter. Don't sign anything, okay? Real antique deals are all done on the nod.'
She stared at the shawl in awe. 'Tinker?'
'You'll know him by his cough. It's like a foghorn.'
'The old man in the churchyard?' Her nose wrinkled. 'Who smells and spits?'
'That's him. Don't be snooty, love. He might not look much, but he's the world champ barker.'
'What's a ...?'
Listening to the others is painful. I couldn't stay to see the rejects banished, so lurked in St Peter's until Tina came for me, scoffing.
'You're too soft, Lovejoy. Know that?'
'My granny always said.'
We assembled in the Castle Bookshop's upper room, where Heidi Pansock shut us away from pryers. I looked at them. Not much of an army.
'You'll be well paid. It's one hour's acting.' I extinguished the hope in their eyes by adding, 'Not a TV, er, movie.' I always try to sound American, and fail. I lied in a flare of genius, 'There might be one if this goes well.'
'Okay!' they exclaimed eagerly. Even Larch looked stirred.
'I'm Lovejoy. I'm the paymaster.' I chuckled. They didn't. Maybe they'd spotted that I hadn't a bean. I kept up my lazaroid grin. 'Names, please?'
'Larch,' said Larch. 'I kip in the park,' et angry cetera.
'Wilhelmina,' said the shahtoosh lady. 'I'm thirty-five, two children. A widow. My interests are the Romance poets, Tennyson and Ben Jonson with reference to ...' and so on.
The nervy bloke who'd wanted us to go once more into the breach dear friends, was the third. I glanced at Tina. She avoided my eye.
'I'm Jules. I've been ... away.' He coloured slightly, forged gamely on. 'I'm in the Refuge, no other fixed abode.' He waited anxiously, but nobody threw him out. The Refuge is a doss-house where violence holds sway, so I'd guessed right. He was newly out of prison.
'What've you done on the stage?'
'I did a series of leads,' he said, eyes shining. 'Ayckbourns, Shakespeare, two Cowards.'
'You're all hired,' I said. I'd placed him. I only knew of one Refuge inmate. He'd starred in prison shows, had a past nearly as interesting as mine. He wasn't called Jules, though. Fine by me.
'The pay is basic Equity rate. It's . . .' I paused. I didn't know exactly what Equity was.
And what style of acting, for heaven's sake? That Yank actor, who called his stage improvisations art. 'It's improvisation. Hidden cameras.'
'Where? On stage?'
'In a manor house hired for the purpose. You,' I said, pacing, well underway, 'must pretend. There's no script. It's, erm—'
'Off the top of your head,' Tina put in with a narked glance.
'That's it. Tina will lead. You're all supposed to be divvies in the antiques trade. The plot will evolve as we go, okay?'
'We're all interviewed together?'
'By an American lady with a massive track record in,' I coursed on in a blaze of inventiveness, 'Channel Eight- Seven-Zed in Hollywood. She's starred in thirty-one soaps and two major documentaries.'
They gasped. I smirked modestly, really making their day.
'What must we do?' asked anxious Wilhelmina.
'We go in together,' I explained. 'The lady will scrutinize us, and be especially rude to me. That,' I lied serenely on, 'is deliberate. You must pretend to be in the antiques trade. Wilhelmina, devise a background in an antiques shop down the coast. Larch, you're a hawker on the Saturday barrows. And, er, Jules, you're an auctioneer from the Midlands, okay?'
Jules looked at the floor. 'Thank you, Lovejoy.'
'Pretend that you're each a divvy. That's somebody who can detect genuine antiques by simply being near them. Right?'
'How on earth do we do that?'
'I'll have four test objects. You guess. I'll signal whether they're genuine or not. Tell you how on the way. Above all, keep in character. Any questions?'
'Will she be acting too?' Wilhelmina asked apprehensively.
'Superbly,' I answered. 'You won't be able to tell she's not genuine. There will be sixteen hidden cameras. If you start looking round, you're fired on the spot and don't get paid.'
'And what am I, Lovejoy?' Tina asked innocently.
'You're somebody who wants to be a divvy and hasn't got it,' I said cruelly, put her in her place. She was heading for a tanking. I wanted no loose ends. 'I don't know what script she'll choose. That's the scheme. I'll send to tell you when.'
'Like an audition?' Wilhelmina breathed, thrilled.
