A French Affair (6 page)

‘Yes, you’re probably right. Be careful! It’s heavy.’

‘I must say, the Volvo is quite Tardis-like, isn’t it? I would never have guessed all that would go in the back of an ordinary estate car.’

‘That’s why we antiques dealers love them.’

As they walked into the building together, both with their hands full, he went on, ‘I’ll give it all the once over and price it before I put it out.’

Once everything was safely stored away Matthew said, ‘Now, would you like a grand tour of the place?’

Gina looked at her watch and gave a small scream. ‘Is that the time? I’ve got an appointment with the
Advertiser
in fifteen minutes. I want them to put my PR leaflets in their paper. I thought I had loads of time.’

‘Well, don’t panic. I’ll take you home. Where is the appointment?’

‘In Summerwick!’

‘No problem. Jenny?’ he called out into the depths. ‘Can you mind the shop for a bit? I need to take Gina back.’

Minutes later they were speeding through the roads and lanes, Gina half terrified at how Matthew threw his old Volvo around and half pleased to think she wouldn’t be late.

‘Sorry, did I frighten you?’ he said as they drew up outside her cottage.

‘It was fine. You got me here. I’ve just about got time to change my top and then run into town. Thank you so much.’

He tipped his hand to her and drove off as she let herself in.

‘That was really quite dashing,’ she said to her reflection as she pulled a clean shirt down over the jeans. ‘Matthew Ballinger is rather a surprising man.’

Sally had invited Gina for supper that evening to hear all about how she’d got on at the fair, and, as hoped, Gina arrived in time to help the girls with their bath and read to them. Alaric was cooking and Sally was finding homes for a large population of Sylvanian Families. As Gina read stories, cuddled up with the girls in their parents’ bed, she knew her sister was finding the right home for each fuzzy animal. No throwing it all in a box for her. Would her attention to detail make her a good antiques dealer? Sorting fuzzy toys didn’t seem like a transferrable skill in this particular case, but you could never tell.

‘The trouble is,’ said Gina later, a glass of wine in her hand, her elbows on the kitchen table, having eaten a wonderful lentil curry, ‘antiques are so diverse. I don’t think we can possibly learn enough about them – even one tiny aspect of them – to make a profit in the time Aunt Rainey intended us to.’

‘And you didn’t have a chance to look at the stock she left us?’

Gina shook her head. ‘No, I had to dash off. But the point is we wouldn’t know if things were worth a pound or a thousand pounds.’

‘Well, Matthew will know,’ said Sally. ‘We’ll get him to price everything up and we’ll sell it. It can’t be that hard, can it?’

Gina sighed ‘I think it can. On those TV programmes the experts offer tiny amounts for things. Are they ripping the dealers off or do the dealers overcharge hugely? You see? We have no idea.’ And whilst Matthew had seemed quite encouraging today, how long would it be before his patience wore out? He had his own part of the business to run, and the centre to look after.

‘Are you staying over?’ asked Alaric, a bottle poised over her glass.

‘Yes please. I’ve got rather fond of your sofabed over the years,’ she said. In fact she was fonder of her own bed but she needed to really put it across to Sally how difficult things would be and more wine would help. She was the one who had wanted to make a go of it but once Sally agreed to something she would often ignore the ‘little things’ like practicalities. If they were going to succeed in this venture it was important they both knew what was involved. ‘This is going to be tough, Sally.’

‘It’ll be fine,’ said Sally, true to form. ‘Anyway, I plan to sell my own stuff and not just antiques.’

‘You’ve really got good at them recently and they are gorgeous, but I don’t think Matthew will let you put things that aren’t antiques in the French House. I think you need a specialist shop.’

Sally overlooked the compliments and cut to the chase. ‘You mean everything there is over a hundred years old?’ She sounded sceptical.

‘That is the definition of an antique,’ said Gina. ‘Look, I don’t know if Matthew stocks newer stuff, Sal, but I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t allow cushions and lampshades.’ She was annoyed to hear herself sound apologetic.

‘He certainly seems very set in his ways,’ Sally observed.

Gina wasn’t as certain about this as Sally was but she kept her thoughts to herself. ‘When do you think we could go over and see what’s there?’ she said after a tiny pause.

‘When my darling husband can look after his beautiful girls,’ said Sally, rubbing her husband’s arm affectionately. ‘When can you make it?’

‘Almost any time. I haven’t got a lot of work on at the moment.’ Gina sighed.

‘You sound worried, hon,’ said Sally.

‘I am a bit. We need to make this antiques thing happen. People are just not spending money on PR at the moment.’

‘You can always move in with us. The girls would love it.’

‘That’s very sweet of you but it would drive you mad after a couple of days.’ Gina didn’t add that it would drive her mad far quicker. But she was very touched by the offer.

‘Well, you need never be homeless.’

Just for a second Gina remembered her life a couple of years ago. Business was booming, she had a boyfriend, she went on mini-breaks and stayed in lovely hotels. Then the boyfriend had decided that one girlfriend wasn’t enough and somehow she had missed the signs. Apart from everything else, it made her feel so desperately stupid. And he still owed her money – quite a considerable sum actually.

‘I could do tomorrow, couldn’t I, my darling?’ Sally held her husband’s hand and toyed with his fingers. She liked to wrap her entreaties in little gestures of affection. ‘The girls will be at nursery in the morning, so you could get some work done?’

Alaric raised an eyebrow. ‘So I have to pick them up?’

Sally nodded. ‘We can’t leave them there all day, we can’t afford it. But if Gina and I could have a day to sort out this business, it would be just fabby.’

Alaric agreed and Gina called Matthew. Tomorrow would be fine, he said with a lack of enthusiasm Gina felt was characteristic.

She went back to the table to find Alaric had cleared it of supper and retreated to his studio and Sally was making tea.

They sipped in silence for a few moments before Sally said, ‘You know, I find it quite hard to see Matthew and Aunt Rainey working together. She was so eccentric and off the wall and he’s so – stuffy!’

Gina thought for a few seconds, trying to work out how Matthew and Rainey did get along so well. ‘I don’t think he’s stuffy exactly. Just a bit of a young fogey.’

‘Not that young. Forty if he’s a day!’

Gina chuckled. ‘Forty is still too young to be a fogey.’

‘Whatever. What did our batty and unstuffy aunt see in him?’

Gina shook her head. ‘We may never know. But she must have found something in him that was loveable. Maybe she needed someone to mother and he needed some mothering.’

Later, as Gina settled her hip bone so it missed the hard bit of the sofabed that night, she thought about how much she valued her sister. She was fun and positive and didn’t see problems everywhere like she did. Tomorrow Sally and she would discover their Aunt Rainey had left them treasure and they would make their fortunes. Perhaps things would work out for them after all? It might even be fun!

‘
I’D FORGOTTEN HOW
full of old things these places are,’ said Sally as Gina led the way up the stairs of the French House the following morning. ‘When we came before I was too taken up with the girls to look around much.’

‘Antiques tend to be old,’ said Gina. ‘It’s kind of part of their job description.’

‘I know,’ said Sally, ‘but I’m not sure I like them. I like things that are newish. It’s all a bit old and moth-eaten here.’

Gina had to admit that the place did seem as if no one had been near it for years, but she suddenly felt territorial on its behalf. ‘These things are clean,’ she said. ‘Look at the shine on that table.’

‘Hmm. I didn’t mean things were dirty. I don’t know . . . it’s just a bit – dead.’

Gina knew exactly what her sister meant. Once again, there didn’t seem to be anybody around, neither stallholders nor buyers. She knew that the stallholders took it in turns and they wouldn’t all be there at one time, but there was a distinct lack of bustle.

To Gina’s relief, Sally managed to be calm in the face
of Oscar, who to his credit didn’t actually move when they went into Matthew’s office: the door was open and as they were now part of things they felt they didn’t need to knock. Oscar stayed in role as a large furry rug, which today was placed just to the left of the door.

‘Actually,’ Sally whispered to Gina as they tiptoed past him, ‘he’s so big he’s not like a dog at all really. More a sort of cut-down horse.’

Matthew appeared not to have heard this remark and when he did look up from the books on his desk he seemed not to register they were there either. Even when he did, he failed to look delighted to see them, although he managed a polite smile and said hello.

‘Hello!’ said Gina. ‘Did we disturb you? I thought you were expecting us.’ This wasn’t a good start.

‘Sorry. Yes I was. I got caught up with the accounts. Not exactly edifying reading.’ He looked down at the page in front of him for a moment, then closed the book and got up. ‘Let’s go and find Rainey’s stuff and see if it’s enough for a cabinet.’

‘Isn’t Rainey’s stuff still on display somewhere?’ asked Sally.

Matthew shook his head. ‘No. As I said before, dealers rent space, they put out what they want and they take turns to mind the shop and take money for all the stalls. When Rainey died, we had to pack up her things and add it to the case where she kept her stock.’ He paused. ‘Jenny did it. Maybe there’s something in there that will make our fortune. Although to be honest, I think Jenny would have told me if she’d found anything valuable.’

‘Maybe we should have a proper tour,’ suggest Gina.

He stopped and shrugged, obviously not keen. ‘OK.’
He led the way into the middle of the house. Cabinets and larger items filled the wide passages and every odd corner between the doors of the rooms, which were all open.

Matthew went into one room. ‘This is Harold’s section – he’s not in today. He’s the expert in antique brass, which is quite a skill as it’s not hallmarked.’ He walked into another room full of furniture. ‘There are some lovely English pieces here but the stallholder, Margaret, has a case in another centre and she’s there more often than she is here.’

In room after room they were shown beautiful objects, and yet the lack of energy both women had recognised the moment they’d entered the French House was evident everywhere. It was more like a museum than a shop.

Eventually, they reached a storeroom at the back. It was smaller than the one Matthew had shown her yesterday and smelt faintly of turpentine.

‘Here we are.’

Aunt Rainey’s legacy was stored in an old suitcase, which, as Matthew lifted it off a shelf, appeared to be quite heavy. He put it on a table covered with a chenille cloth and pressed the catches. ‘Now, what have we got?’

There was a silence as they all looked inside the lid. Gina felt a pang of disappointment. There was nothing that looked remotely valuable. Lots of it seemed to be old bottles. She exchanged a grimace with Sally.

‘Now I know why she didn’t put this stuff out before,’ Matthew said after a couple of seconds. ‘She’s gone in for collectables.’

It didn’t take an expert in body language to gauge how Matthew felt about this.

‘And that’s bad,’ said Sally as if in confirmation.

He nodded. ‘We like things to be genuine antiques here although we’re not draconian about it. Rainey probably planned to put these with another centre.’

‘Do people bring in a whole lot of new stock on the first of January, when it’s reached its hundredth birthday?’ Gina was trying to lighten the atmosphere but Matthew didn’t smile. He sighed and took out the first item.

‘Well,’ said Sally with confidence. ‘Even I know that’s not valuable. It’s a revolting model of a cottage that I wouldn’t give house room. Next!’ She was voicing her sister’s feelings, only Gina felt her pronouncement wasn’t exactly tactful.

Matthew gave Sally a look which made it clear she knew nothing. ‘It’s probably made by Goss and is worth over a hundred pounds,’ he said before handing it to Gina. ‘Look at it carefully, it’s charming.’

As Gina inspected the model she did begin to see it had something about it. ‘I sort of understand what you mean about it being charming but how can it be worth a hundred pounds?’

‘Because people like them – collect them. Some of them are worth up to a thousand, or more if you’re lucky. Now, what about this?’

‘It’s a corkscrew,’ said Sally delightedly. ‘I’m an expert already.’

Matthew handed it to her. ‘OK, tell me something about it.’

Sally took it tentatively. ‘It’s the kind that hurts your hand if you try and open a bottle with it,’ she said eventually.

Gina took it, for some reason eager to be able to say a bit more if she could. ‘Well, it’s old. I’d guess Victorian?’

Matthew nodded. ‘What makes you say that?’

‘I don’t know. It just seems that way.’

‘And what do you think it’s worth?’

‘I have absolutely no idea. About fifty quid? Or is that ridiculous?’ It was like a quiz on a subject you had no idea about.

Matthew nodded and Gina felt ridiculously pleased. ‘You might get that. You’d need to price it up a bit so you have room to come down. What can you tell me about this?’ He handed Sally an item.

‘It’s a pig,’ said Sally, ‘but obviously there’s more to it than that.’

‘It’s a jug,’ said Matthew, removing a bit from behind the pig’s neck. ‘Quite modern but fun, I suppose.’

‘Quite modern? What exactly are you talking, date-wise?’ asked Gina, who found she wanted to learn about this quirky creature.