Matthew, sitting down again, unaware of the memory he had triggered, indicated the chair in front of his desk.
“We should talk about the job,” he said. “There are a few things to sort out.”
Pat nodded, and sat down. Then she looked at Matthew, who looked back at her.
“Now then,” Matthew said. “The job. This is a gallery, see, and our business is to sell paintings. That’s it. That’s the bottom line.”
Pat smiled. “Yes.” This was surprising. But why was the sale of paintings the bottom line? She was not at all sure what bottom lines were, although everybody talked about them, but perhaps he would explain.
Matthew sat back in his chair, propping his feet on an upturned wastepaper basket at the side of the desk.
“I freely admit that I haven’t been in this business for very long,” he said. “I’ve just started, in fact. So we’ll have to learn together as we go along. Is that all right with you?”
Pat smiled encouragingly. “I like paintings,” she said. “I did a Higher Art at school, at Edinburgh Academy.”
“The Academy?” said Matthew.
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“Yes.”
He looked thoughtful for a moment. Then he said: “I used to go there. You didn’t hear anything about me there, did you?”
Pat was puzzled. “No,” she said hesitantly. “Not that I remember.”
“Good,” said Matthew, with the air of one changing the subject.
“Now, the job. You need to sit here when I go out. If somebody comes in and wants to buy a painting, the prices are all listed on this piece of paper over here. Don’t let a painting out of the gallery until they’ve paid and the cheque has cleared, so tell them that they can collect the painting in four or five days, or we’ll deliver it. If we know them, we can take their cheques.”
Pat listened. Matthew was making it clear enough, but surely there must be something else to the job. He could hardly be expected to pay her just to watch the shop for him when he went out.
“Anything else?” she asked.
Matthew shrugged. “Some bits and pieces.”
“Such as?”
PEPLOE: Samuel John Peploe (1871-1935), Edinburgh-born artist much influenced by French Impressionist painters such as Cezanne. In his later years, his still-life works brought him recognition as a colourist.
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He looked about him, as if searching for ideas. He looked at the paintings and then turned his gaze back on Pat. “You could do a proper catalogue of stock,” he said, and then, warming to the idea, explained: “I had something like that, but I’m afraid that it got lost somewhere. You could go through everything and find out what we have. Then make a proper catalogue with the correct
. . . correct . . .” What was the word they used? “Attributions.
Yes, attribute the paintings. Find out who they’re by.”
Pat glanced at the wall behind her. There was a painting of an island, in bright colours, with strong brush strokes. She could just hear the voice of her art teacher at school, intoning, reverentially:
“That, boys and girls, is a Peploe.”
But it couldn’t be a Peploe. Impossible.
Bruce worked in a firm of surveyors called Macaulay Holmes Richardson Black. In spite of the name, which implied at least four partners and a global reach, it was not a large firm. There were in fact only two partners, Gordon Todd and his brother, Raeburn, known to the staff as Gordon and Todd. They were good employers, and both of them were prominent in the affairs of their professional association, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. Gordon always wore a tie with the Institute crest on it, and Todd had a gold signet ring on which the same crest had been engraved. Both were strong golfers. Gordon had become a member of Muirfield (after a rather long wait), and Todd was hoping that the same honour would one day befall him.
“I can’t understand why I have to wait longer than he did,”
Todd said to his wife, Sasha.
“Does it matter?” she asked. “What’s so special about that place? Surely one golf course is much the same as another.
Fairways, greens, holes. What’s so special about Muirfield?”
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Todd had looked at her with pity. “Women don’t understand,”
