Long Time Coming (15 page)

‘What if they slam the door in our faces?’ I put in.

‘Then we’ll know they’re party to the fraud. But if you get past the door and convince them you’re genuine Quilligan enthusiasts, there’s no telling what you might learn. It’d be useful if you could establish whether Quilligan’s brother, Ardal, is alive, for instance, and, if so, where he lives. He’s another who may be in on it.’

‘How current is the information you got from Quilligan’s landlady?’ asked Rachel.

‘It’s twenty years out of date,’ I answered.

‘Then, they could have moved. Or died. This could all be a waste of time.’

‘The frequency of your visits to the Royal Academy suggests time is something you have on your hands, Miss Banner,’ said Eldritch. ‘I’m suggesting how to put a little of it to good use.’

‘Don’t let him get to you,’ I said, staring at Eldritch to let him know I wasn’t on his side in this.

‘I won’t,’ she said. ‘I guess it makes sense. Follow every lead, however tenuous.’

‘Exactly,’ said Eldritch. ‘So, unless you have something less tenuous …’

She nodded. ‘I’ll go. Stephen?’

‘Gladly.’ I wasn’t exaggerating. A trip to Hampshire with Rachel was an enticing prospect. Whether Eldritch knew how enticing I couldn’t have guessed. The reason he’d given for staying behind was sound enough. But that didn’t have to be the only reason. Face value wasn’t a coinage he generally dealt in.

‘Do you have a car, Miss Banner?’

‘I can borrow one.’

‘How soon?’

‘Probably right away.’

‘In that case, what are you waiting for?’

We walked to the phone boxes by the entrance to Green Park Tube station. Rachel went into one to call her friend, Marilyn, owner of the car she was hoping to borrow. I stood by the park railings with Eldritch. Tube passengers, tourists and
passers-by jostled amidst the noise and fumes of the Piccadilly traffic.

‘Why didn’t you tell me what you had in mind, Eldritch?’ I shouted to him above the ferment.

‘Because I didn’t know whether she’d turn out to be someone we could safely collaborate with.’

‘I’d already told you she was.’

‘I reckoned you might be biased.’ Before I could rise to that, he went on: ‘Tread carefully with the Linleys, Stephen. Don’t even hint you’re related to me, or that you know anything about me.’

‘I thought you and Linley were friends.’

‘So did I, before—’ He broke off. ‘Ah. Here she is.’

Rachel had emerged from the phone box. She hurried across to where we were standing. ‘Marilyn’s fine about us using her car,’ she announced. ‘We just have to go collect it.’

‘I’ll leave you to it, then,’ said Eldritch. ‘Good luck.’

‘What are your plans for the day, Mr Swan?’ Rachel asked him.

‘I’m an old man,’ came his deadpan reply. ‘I need my rest.’

We watched him walk away, slowly threading a path through the crowds in the Ritz arcade, a stooped and solitary figure from another age.

The same thought, it transpired, had occurred to Rachel as it had to me. ‘What’s he up to, Stephen?’

‘I don’t know. Perhaps he really does need a rest.’

‘Could be, I suppose, after that performance he just put on.’

‘I’m sorry. I had no idea he was going to be so … unashamed.’

‘It’s OK. I get the feeling I passed some kind of test.’

‘You shouldn’t have had to.’

‘We all have to.’ I turned to look at her, surprised by her tone. She sounded almost grateful to Eldritch for putting her through the mill. ‘Sooner or later.’

Marilyn’s car was parked near her flat in Islington. We began the Tube journey out there in silence. Only after the mass exit at King’s Cross did Rachel suddenly turn to me and ask, ‘What do you know about these people we’re going to see, Stephen?’

‘About Isolde Linley? Nothing. But her husband’s not such a blank. He and Eldritch were at school together. Ardingly. Eldritch was his fag.’

‘His
what
?’

‘In public-school parlance, a younger boy who runs errands and does chores for an older boy.’

‘Oh, I thought … Never mind. So, Linley’s a few years older than Eldritch?’

‘Four or five, at a guess. But he might look better on it in well-heeled retirement from the Diplomatic Service. Hatchwell Hall doesn’t sound like a hovel to me.’

‘And he was at the British Legation in Dublin when Eldritch was put away, right?’

‘Right.’

‘So, he must know
why
he was put away.’

‘Probably. But we can’t ask him. We have to stay incognito.’

‘Yeah. But is that to protect us? Or Eldritch?’

‘You don’t trust him, do you?’

‘Absolutely not.’ She turned to look at me for emphasis. ‘And neither should you.’

Marilyn’s flat was the basement of a large semi-detached house in Barnsbury Square. I had little chance to gain much impression as Rachel swept me in. A postcard, addressed to her, with a foreign stamp on it, was lying on the mat. ‘From Joey,’ she said, scanning the message. ‘He often writes me.’ She plonked the card on the hall table, by a vase of lilies, and went to collect the car key.

The picture Joey had chosen was of Antwerp Cathedral. I turned the card over, wondering what he’d said. To my dismay, the writing was so minute and spidery I’d have needed a magnifying glass to decipher it. The message ran to about thirty lines.

A sudden silence told me Rachel was watching what I was doing. I turned. She was frowning at me from a doorway down the hall. ‘Sorry,’ I said sheepishly, laying the card back down. ‘I shouldn’t have pried.’

‘It’s all one sentence,’ she said as she came towards me.

‘Really?’

‘You won’t find a full stop or a comma anywhere. His cards are always like that.’

‘Can you read them?’

‘Oh yes. It’s easy with practice. And I get plenty of practice. Sometimes I wish I didn’t get so much. And sometimes …’ She patted the card gently with the tips of her fingers. Her gaze lost its focus. Contemplation of her family’s misfortunes was compressed into a silent second. This was her sad, wounded side showing itself. But she wasn’t about to indulge the mood. ‘Poor Joey,’ she sighed. Then she tossed her head back and dangled the car key in front of me. Her smile was a touch rueful. But it was a smile nonetheless. ‘Let’s go.’

The drive down to Hampshire in Marilyn’s Mini had, in retrospect, an improbably light-hearted, carefree quality to it. The thrill of the chase had taken us over. In my case, it was also the thrill of Rachel’s company. Her beauty was heightened by her vibrancy. I couldn’t have failed to be attracted to her. There was just so much life bubbling within her. Of course, I already had good reason to believe she was a creature of moods, but I wanted her current mood – laughing, teasing, bewitching – to last for ever. We talked about her work at the UN and mine in the oil industry. We tried to outdo each other with suggestions for improbable pseudonyms. The miles vanished. And several hours with them.

Hatchwell Hall stood in affluently farmed countryside between Basingstoke and Alton. I’d said it didn’t sound like a hovel, but I hadn’t quite expected the sweeping lawns, exuberant topiary and large red-brick William and Mary mansion that came into view as we crested a gentle fold of land a few miles south of the village where we’d stopped for a pub lunch. It was a house from another century, set amidst fields and coverts its original occupants would have noticed little change in. It was the dream of rural ease and order, preened and pointed in the early spring sunshine.

‘Jesus,’ said Rachel. And that pretty much said it all.

Hatchwell Hall’s wrought-iron entrance gates stood open to
visitors. Rachel drove slowly through and up the curving gravel drive. Several cars were parked in front of the house. Most were at least twice the size of Marilyn’s.

We stopped and got out. The air was aloofly cool, the quietude almost tangible.

‘All this on a government pension,’ mused Rachel.

‘Inherited wealth?’ I suggested. ‘Or extorted?’

‘Let’s try and find out.’

We walked to the half-glazed front door and pulled at the bell. It clanged antiquely in the hallway, which, we could see, ran the depth of the house. There was a glimpse of rear garden beyond a farther door. Floral-patterned rugs and an oak staircase filled the middle ground.

A plump, aproned housekeeper answered the bell. ‘Good afternoon,’ she said quizzically, in a local accent. ‘What can I do for you?’

‘Is Mrs Linley at home?’ Rachel asked.

‘
Lady
Linley is, yes. But she’s busy with her charity group. Was she expecting you?’

‘Not exactly. We really called on the off chance. I’m not over here for long. It’d be so great if she could spare just a few minutes.’

‘It’s about her brother,’ I put in. ‘Desmond Quilligan.’

The housekeeper looked even more quizzical at that. ‘You’d best come in for a moment. I’ll see if she can have a word with you.’

We stepped inside and she bustled off, leaving us to the ticking of a longcase clock and the company of several paintings that clearly weren’t the work of Desmond Quilligan.

‘What’s with the
Lady
Linley?’ Rachel whispered to me.

‘It means her husband’s a knight of the realm.’

‘She’s done well for herself, hasn’t she?’

‘That’s marriage to a public servant for you.’

‘These people need bringing down.’ I sensed she was talking more to herself now than to me. ‘They truly do.’

It wasn’t long before the lady of the house joined us. Isolde Linley appeared from one of the reception rooms to our left. A
broad-belted green plaid dress and a string of pearls helped her look exactly what her title suggested she was: a privileged woman entering comfortable old age with the means and the wish to present herself as elegantly as she could. High cheekbones, sparkling blue eyes and a lingering trace of red in her hair added several natural advantages. She might have looked radiant if she’d smiled. But she wasn’t smiling. Nor did I have the impression she was about to.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, her original Irish accent overlaid with Home Counties English. ‘I’m in the middle of a meeting. What is this about?’

‘We’re sorry too, Lady Linley,’ said Rachel. ‘To interrupt, I mean. We should have written ahead, but I have to fly back to the States in a few days and— Oh, I guess we should introduce ourselves. I’m Liz Spelling.’

‘Peter Fordham,’ I put in. (The names actually belonged to two people I’d worked with in Houston.)

‘What exactly do you want?’

‘I’m helping Liz with her thesis,’ I replied. ‘She’s researching the later lives of Irish men and women who fought in the Easter Rising.’

‘That’s right,’ said Rachel. ‘People like your brother, Desmond. He’s particularly interesting because he finished up in London and, of course, he had an artisitic strand to his life, didn’t he? Now, his old landlady, Mrs Duthie, who gave us your address, mentioned you took all his paintings after he died and we—’

‘You’ve spoken to Mrs Duthie?’

‘We certainly did. And she was as helpful as she could be, but—’

‘She had no right to discuss my brother with you. He’s been dead twenty years and I’d have hoped he could be left to rest in peace.’

‘We’re not trying to sully his memory in any way, Lady Linley. I’m engaged in serious historical research. I thought you might be pleased to discuss his life and what the Rising meant to him.’

‘Well, you thought—’ The heavy closure of a door somewhere to
the right drew Isolde’s attention at once. She stepped back and looked along a passage that was out of our sight. ‘Miles,’ she called.

‘What is it?’ came the gruff, bellowed response.

‘Can you help me with these visitors, please?’

‘Visitors?’ We heard approaching footsteps. ‘I thought you had your charity ladies here.’

‘I do. And I’d like to get back to them.’

Sir Miles Linley emerged into the hall, breathing heavily. He was ruddy-faced and white-haired, with an almost feminine softness to his chin that sat oddly with his brusque tone and impatient expression. He was dressed for gardening, in stout shoes, brown corduroys, check shirt and green padded waistcoat. ‘Good afternoon,’ he said, frowning suspiciously at Rachel and me.

‘I’m Liz Spelling, Sir Miles,’ said Rachel politely. ‘This is my friend, Peter Fordham. We—’

‘They’ve been asking me about Desmond,’ Isolde cut across her. ‘For some kind of research project.’

‘My thesis, actually,’ said Rachel.

‘Which university?’ snapped Sir Miles.

‘Yale.’ I was impressed. We hadn’t settled on one as far as I knew. But I was also worried. If Sir Miles started nit-picking, our cover story might come apart at the seams. ‘I’m particularly interested in Desmond Quilligan’s paintings, which—’

‘Can you deal with them, Miles?’ asked Isolde. ‘I really don’t have the time. My meeting …’

‘Yes, yes, my dear. You go. Leave this to me.’ There was a hint of dismissal behind his husbandly smile.

‘Thank you.’ She glanced fleetingly at us. ‘Goodbye.’ The farewell was cool and final. She walked briskly away, closing the door she’d emerged from earlier firmly behind her.

‘What’s the subject of your thesis, Miss Spelling?’ Sir Miles asked as soon as his wife was gone.

Rachel trotted out her rehearsed answer about the Easter Rising and the loose end in Desmond Quilligan’s biography of his artisitic career. ‘Sir Miles look unimpressed throughout, though not, it seemed to me, unconvinced.’ When Rachel mentioned Brenda
Duthie, he darkened thunderously. But no storm broke.

‘You’ve had a wasted journey, I’m afraid,’ he said when she’d finished, though I had the impression the statement had been prepared before she even started. ‘My wife’s done her level best to forget her brother and, frankly, so have I. You’ve chosen a strange time to research the lives of the IRA’s original members, I must say, when their successors are blowing up pubs, restaurants and trains and assassinating innocent people all over Northern Ireland
and
Britain in pursuance of their blood-soaked agenda. At least Desmond Quilligan saw the error of his ways in the end and abandoned the cause. The kindest thing I can say about him is nothing at all.’