Fergus explained he was going to lock the door from the other side, he didn’t want people prying. He handed Oliver another key. ‘Use this if you need to get in and out. I’ll come back in a while, see how you’re getting on.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘thank you so much for letting me spend a bit of time in here. I’ll make sure I’m down for breakfast.’
‘Please do, Susie,’ said Fergus. ‘I’d hate to have to lie about where you are.’
Gosh, he was an honest man.
Oliver turned and asked me to point to my favourite picture.
‘The first one up there, Early Morning Stags on the Moor.’
‘Come then,’ he said. ‘Let’s stand in front of it.’
Side by side we gazed at the dawn scene.
‘What made you choose this?’
‘You.’
‘What?’
‘You made me choose one.’ I smiled but Oliver didn’t get the joke.
‘Why do you like it the most?’
‘To be honest, I’ve never really liked Landseer but I’d never turn down an opportunity to see his work.’
‘But you don’t like it.’ Oliver clearly wasn’t a painter himself.
‘One can learn a lot from well-known artists regardless of whether one likes their subject. I think Landseer’s rather brilliant at the craft. The way the morning mist parts around the stag in this picture and the coat of the dog in that one over there are extraordinarily masterful pieces of painting.’
‘Animal magnetism, that’s what we call it. You’re right, this is what makes his work popular.’
‘I meant the brush work not the subject.’
‘I see. That’s something I know all about too. But first how would you sum up his pictures?’
‘I’d say they were majestic Highland clichés skilfully portrayed.’
‘Hmmm. He does divide people and you’re correct in some sense, but the artwork’s misty mountain background was almost always added later – like a nineteenth-century Photoshop. And occasionally the animals weren’t even from Scotland.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, after the National Gallery had paid several million pounds for The Monarch of the Glen, it was proved the stag was part of a herd in Cambridgeshire where it was painted,’ Oliver sniggered.
‘Surely the point of the scene is its association with Scotland, not where the work was done?’
‘I disagree.’ Oliver shook his head.
‘So, if there was a picture of a Wiltshire man’s bagpipes, painted at his house in Wiltshire, then they wouldn’t be Scottish?’
‘That’s a different matter.’
I didn’t respond; I don’t want to bully this man.
‘Don’t you like any of Landseer’s work?’ he said.
‘I suppose I only meant his breast-beating Highland scenes. I like the loose brush strokes of his oil sketches in the corridor. I don’t know if you noticed them?’
‘I certainly did. Very much of their time. A much freer style but Landseer no doubt. Tell me, surely there’s a reason you chose this painting, Early Morning Stags on the Moor?’
‘I like the way that sprig of heather sparkles in the light and,’ I went up and touched the frame, ‘this gilded wood is lovely.’
‘Yes, his pictures are often presented well. You know the most famous frame, don’t you?’
‘I’m not sure,’ I said as I wiped some dust off my fingers.
‘That of Neptune, painted in 1824. It’s made of beams taken from HMS Temeraire.’
‘The warship that fought at the Battle of Trafalgar?’ I was confused.
‘Yes, in 1805.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, it ties in nicely with the subject of a black and white Newfoundland dog on the seashore.’
Oliver did his penny loafer sliding motion as he moved to the second painting in the row, Rutting Stags, and asked me what I thought of it.
‘It’s okay.’
‘Come on, you’re an artist, you must have more to say than that?’
‘I’ve always been a sucker for foreshortening so my favourite bit is the ridge of that barking stag’s spine. It leads one’s eye into the picture and I think it emphasises his dominance over the two less prominent ones.’
‘The triangular composition. Yes, Landseer liked that.’
Oliver held his face right up close to the canvas and inhaled deeply. ‘Hang on a minute.’
‘Does it smell funny?’
He didn’t laugh. Or speak for that matter.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I think there’s,’ he deliberated as he stepped back a bit, ‘something not quite right with this.’
‘The hanging of it?’
‘It is a little low, but no.’ He sounded irritated. ‘I took an extra module in Landseer of this period.’ His eyes were scanning the picture.
I have no idea what he’s thinking.
‘There’s something uncharacteristic,’ he began, moving his face back up close to the canvas, ‘it doesn’t look good enough to be by Landseer. It doesn’t have the authentic Landseer touch. Another version would have different elements but this is the exact picture and I suppose therefore it may be a copy, I can’t be certain.’
‘A fake?’ I said, instantly doubting the expert. Fergus is proud of his collection; there’s no way this man can be right, we’ve barely been in here twenty minutes.
He cleared his throat. ‘These revelations can come as a surprise but, well, I presumed you were here to see how my job works and as you’re not the owner, or a close friend of the family, I thought I’d share my initial observations.’
‘Yes, yes. But it’s quite something to tell me they’re fakes.’
‘I wasn’t suggesting it’s a fake. I think something’s up. It could be a second version Landseer painted or a copy. Though I wouldn’t go as far as to say either yet.’
‘A copy or a fake?’
‘It might be a very accurate copy. Not a fake, no, not a fake. Only once a false signature has been added does it become a fake.’
‘Are they all…’ having already got in a muddle over fakes and copies I opted for, ‘…slightly dodgy?’
Oliver’s right arm shot out. ‘The final painting over there, Dogs in the Moonlight, has something odd about it too, but your favourite, Early Morning Stags on the Moor, and Horses at Bay are genuine Landseers, I’m pretty sure.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Identifying legitimate paintings is all about whether or not they’re good enough. The painter’s hand is the first thing you look at when deciding what is an original and what
