Picture Perfect (31 page)

‘What do you want?’ Jack demanded huskily and Annabel was on the verge of telling him that all and everything she wanted in the world was Jack himself when he continued, ‘What would make you give up this dangerous pursuit?’ He sounded quite desperate and Annabel almost felt sorry for him.

‘It’s not what you think…’ she started to say when footfalls behind them made them spring apart. Never before had Annabel been more dismayed to see Dermot Leahey even though she had planned not to take her eyes off him for the whole evening. He was looking at them, a too knowing smile playing over his lips and she felt herself blushing furiously and a quick glance showed her Jack was equally annoyed at the interruption, he was looking daggers at Mr Leahey and was clearly about to send him packing. Annabel suddenly realized that she must intercede or she would lose her quarry, and at the worst possible time, Leahey would surely see that with Jack occupied he would have the perfect opportunity to steal a painting.

‘Mr Leahey,’ she said breathlessly, her own voice sounding unnaturally high in her ears, ‘is some of your work in the exhibition? I would be delighted if you could show it to me.’ She could almost feel Jack’s eyes on her even though she wasn’t looking at him, bewildered by her sudden switch of focus, but she couldn’t possibly explain everything to him with a single look, so she didn’t try, instead she offered Mr Leahey her arm. He tried to conceal the ill grace with which he took it and Annabel felt a thrill of triumph, he had never been reluctant to have her company before or to show off his work, he must have been hoping to seize the moment and take a picture.

He escorted her back to the first gallery and took her over to two pictures of landscapes. Annabel had the impression that Mr Leahey had tried a little harder with these paintings than those which he had shown at the Dulwich Picture Gallery, one was quite recognisably of Waterloo Bridge, perhaps he felt he had to work to a higher standard to ensure his pictures were accepted into the summer exhibition.

‘Very pretty,’ Annabel said, nodding at his other picture which featured an old church with several unfeasibly large rosebushes to its side.

‘Thank you,’ Mr Leahey said, rocking a little on his feet as if he were anxious to get moving, ‘it’s not done to linger over one’s own work here, you know,’ he said. ‘So I hope you will excuse me…’

‘Of course,’ Annabel said, pleased, if she were glued to Mr Leahey’s side he would never attempt to steal a picture, and she needed to catch him in the act to prove her innocence. Mr Leahey went over to join a group of people who were admiring the large painting of Troilus and Cressida which had caught Colonel Black’s eye earlier and Annabel glanced around quickly to see if her cousins had arrived yet. She spotted them almost immediately, Augusta was hovering nearby, apparently engrossed in a painting of three black cats on a wall while Lord Seaforth studied the picture next to it, Madeline was across the room, but dressed in vivid fuchsia and she stood out rather garishly among the white and pastel muslin frocks which surrounded her. She was chatting gaily to Lord Kent and Annabel wondered if she would need to remind her that it was important to let the suspects have a chance to make their moves, but she decided to let things be for the time being. Casually she glanced back over at Mr Leahey, he was still with Troilus and Cressida but now the group of people were focussed on him rather than the painting and Annabel surmised he was lecturing them on the subject. Keeping to herself she worked her way slowly around the room, never becoming part of the group listening to Mr Leahey, but keeping him firmly in view as he progressed from one picture to the next, holding court on each of them. Eventually he came to the doorway and Annabel felt all her senses become alert, but he passed through to the next gallery and continued with his lectures.

Jack was absolutely determined not to let Annabel risk stealing a picture that afternoon, he could see how the summer exhibition, with its unprecedented access to Somerset House, presented the perfect opportunity for the thief to strike again but with a hundred odd Royal Academians present the chances of her being caught smuggling out a Raphael or a Velazquez were at their greatest ever. He still harboured a faint hope that she wasn’t the thief, but at this point he didn’t care anymore about apprehending the perpetrator, he simply wanted to keep Annabel out of the clutches of the law. If the thief were someone else he could steal every Old Master in the building as far as Jack was concerned as long as Annabel wasn’t implicated. He followed her at a discreet distance, the paintings before him not registering at all and he marked when she abruptly walked into the other gallery. He was about to do go swiftly after her when disconcertingly he found himself standing face to face with her.

‘Jack!’ she said loudly and, disconcerted, he realized that he had run into Justine instead. She too was dressed in violet and the cut of her dress was similar to Annabel’s, but her stance and her demeanour were unmistakably different as she smiled up at him as if some private amusement were playing across her mind and she was considering whether or not to let him in on the joke.

‘Good afternoon,’ he said, trying to sidle past her but Justine laid a possessive hand on his arm and he was loathe to simply throw her off, she was a friend and it would be the height of ill manners, besides, this was a very public place and he was sure she wouldn’t let such rudeness pass quietly. ‘I was just on my way into the other room,’ he said by way of compromise, ‘won’t you join me?’

‘Of course,’ Justine murmured seductively as if his invitation had been of an intimate nature, he threw her a sharp look and briefly wondered whether if instead of trying to wean Annabel off her addiction to art crime he could simply marry Justine instead, after the twins were identical. ‘I haven’t seen you since your escapade in the Thames,’ Justine continued, ‘you’ve been neglecting me…’ she seemed to be waiting for Jack to say something but he wasn’t sure what she expected to hear, true he hadn’t seen her for a few days, but what of it? It wasn’t as if he and Justine had an understanding, they were just friends.

‘I’ve been engaged on some business for your father,’ he told her, his preparations for safeguarding the Old Masters in the Royal Academy’s collection had also occupied him in the last few days, but he didn’t want to discuss his role there in public.

‘You made time to call on Annabel,’ Justine said and Jack glanced at her sharply, ‘but it never occurred to you that you should be reassuring me that you were safe and sound.

‘I didn’t actually see Annabel until today,’ Jack began, but Justine didn’t appear to be listening.

‘I know you feel responsible for her, having rescued her from the clutches of evil and all that, but quite honestly I know you, you’d have done the same for anybody. All this calling round, asking to see her will give her the wrong idea, if you’re not careful she’ll start to think she has a special place in your heart, and think how awkward that would make things for me!’ She looked up at him, quietly confident and it suddenly struck Jack that Justine was quite sincere in what she was saying, she had absolutely no inkling of the way he felt about Annabel and what was worse she seemed to believe that he had formed an attachment to her, but he hadn’t. Although it had crossed his mind momentarily a few minutes before, it had been the first and last time he had thought of her that way. Justine was not Annabel, she was lively and fun, she always knew the latest society gossip and she had a myriad of friends but she had nothing like Annabel’s sincerity and spontaneity, not to mention her courage and common sense. But more importantly Justine might have an impeccable position in society and Annabel might be an art thief, but it was not Justine with whom he had fallen in love, it was Annabel. And then he realized that Justine had distracted him and he had lost sight of Annabel, hastily he scanned the room and then darted back into the first gallery, but she was nowhere to be seen. Cursing his own foolishness under his breath he returned to the second room where a stunned looking Justine still stood where he had left her.

‘Sorry,’ he muttered, ‘Home Office business,’ and then he spied it, nothing so helpful as an open door, just a small group of people looking slightly confused as if their focal point had suddenly disappeared. He couldn’t think why Annabel’s abrupt absence should make them look that way, but it was all he had to go on. He prowled over to them and was rewarded by the sight of a door, firmly closed, but being glanced at by one or two of the group as if they expected someone to re-emerge from it at any moment. Jack didn’t hesitate, that door should have been locked, but he swung it open and found himself in a deserted corridor which was certainly supposed to be off limits to the public. The corridor appeared especially dimly lit after the bright airiness of the galleries, Jack looked up and down it, wondering in which direction Annabel had gone, then he heard a faint footfall to his right and slipping off his top boots so he could follow his quarry silently he tracked the sound.

Annabel had been not quite close enough to hear what Mr Leahey was saying when he made his move, but she saw him clearly indicate the next picture which he felt the little group he had collected should admire and obediently they had trooped over to it, while he, with no show of self-consciousness whatsoever, had fiddled with the lock of the door he was next to and then coolly walked through it. He had picked the lock! If she hadn’t been certain he was the thief before, she was sure now, no one who had any business prowling around the back rooms of Somerset House would have needed to pick a lock to gain access. She laid a hand on the door handle and looked around furtively, half expecting to be accosted but everyone around her was engrossed either in the pictures or with their friends and acquaintances, no one was looking her way. Not even Jack. She froze when she saw with whom he was talking, Justine had her hand on his arm in a way which looked intimately possessive, and worse, Jack seemed quite comfortable with her proximity. Suddenly everything fell into place, Jack didn’t want her as his mistress because it would be unthinkable to use the sister of the woman he loved that way, the undeniable attraction he felt for her was simply due to her resemblance to Justine and he was trying to stop her committing a crime rather than arresting her for those he believed she had already committed because he was going to marry Justine and he didn’t want a scandal in the family. Justine had been right all along, or almost right, Jack didn’t see her as a sister, he saw her as a sister-in-law. An unbearable tightness gripped her throat, and as much to get away from the sight of Jack and Justine in an intimate tête-à-tête as to catch Dermot Leahey in the act of stealing, Annabel flung open the door and plunged into the corridor beyond.

She caught sight of his tail coat whisking around the corner and she raced after him as quietly as her slippered feet allowed, but Mr Leahey seemed extremely confident. He went into a crowded store room and selected a picture wrapped in brown paper and string, for a moment Annabel wondered what all these paintings and sculptures were doing here, but presumably they were submissions which hadn’t been selected for the exhibition. Her heart fell, although Mr Leahey was clearly up to no good he could perhaps be planning to smuggle one of his rejected works into the exhibition which would be contravening Royal academy rules but hardly qualified as art theft, he was even whistling softly under his breath and didn’t have what she imagined would be the demeanour of an art thief.

Mr Leahey came back out of the store room and Annabel pressed herself back flat against the wall, if he went back the way he came he would certainly see her, but Mr Leahey continued down the corridor and tripped lightly up a set of stairs, never once looking back. She followed him cautiously, at first unable to believe her luck, but then when she successfully tailed him through a warren of passages she began to wonder if anyone would hear her shout when she confronted Mr Leahey. She knew she could not possibly overpower him and calling for help was an integral part of her plan, but perhaps she could wait until he was nearly back at the galleries before she confronted him, after all, as long as he was still carrying the painting which she hoped he was about to steal, his guilt would be obvious.

Dermot Leahey stopped at an imposing set of double doors, put down his burden and picked another lock effortlessly. Peering at him from around a bust on a plinth Annabel thought she heard a noise behind her and turned sharply, hoping Mr Leahey hadn’t heard it too, but he seemed too involved in what he was doing to be distracted by the sound of a single step, the lock clicked and he was through the doors which he closed gently behind him. Annabel raced up, put her eye to the keyhole and was unable to suppress a gasp of wonderment. Mr Leahey had led her to the very heart of the Royal Academy, the inner sanctum, a large room dotted with clusters of chairs, a small podium to one side and the walls hung with what were surely the most sumptuous pieces of artwork in the Academy’s collection. Annabel recognised paintings by Turner, Gainsborough and Angelica Kauffmann, a Hogarth print and in prime position behind the podium, a beautiful Reubens of Madonna and Child, she narrowed her eyes, surely it was much the same size as the painting Mr Leahey had been at such pains to bring here.

A rustling of paper caught her attention and moving around to get a better view through the keyhole Annabel saw Mr Leahey unwrapping his painting, then with a quick glance towards the door which made her heart contract in fear and then beat in double time, he boldly lifted the work by Reubens down from the wall and hung the painting he had brought in its place. Annabel could hardly believe his audacity, not only was he stealing the most valuable painting in the room, he was rubbing the loss in the faces of the Royal Academians by replacing it with a piece they had not even seen fit to include in their summer exhibition. Swiftly Mr Leahey wrapped the Reubens in the paper and tied it up with string and Annabel suddenly realised that he would be coming back into the corridor at any moment. She glanced hastily around, wondering which way he would go, it wasn’t obvious and she would have to guess, she gambled that he would return the way he came and darted round the corner at the end of the corridor, not liking to think about what would happen if she were wrong.