The Crystal Cage (3 page)

‘Looks as though you’ve got your hands full,’ the girl two seats away whispered loudly.

‘More than my hands,’ I muttered.

I was beginning to dislike Nick Heysham with a passion. After hours of reading and several moments when I thought I might be on to something, not a single solid clue had emerged to bring me closer to my goal, and I still had seven more boxes of prospectuses to trawl. I let my mind wander and began idly to calculate the number of books shelved behind the lofty ironwork balustrade which encircled the room. I lost count somewhere around the second wall. It was time to return to volume ten.

By five o’clock I’d discovered nothing, and I’d had enough. Any thought of professional glory had fled and I was ready to ring Nick and tell him he was free to say whatever he wanted to the Royde Society. His concerns were no longer mine. A hot bath and a glass of wine were. I started to repack the papers on the trolley and dislodged the final box, which was labelled trade advertisements and trade cards. Sheer curiosity pushed me to open the box and flick through the various publicity sheets. There were dozens of them advertising the most diverse assortment of goods: Henry Edwards’ highly esteemed custard powder (with directions) to make custards without eggs, Dewar’s brown Durham mustard, Appold’s centrifugal pump for draining marshes. Beneath the pile of advertisements lay price lists that told me how much J. S. Fry’s chocolate and cocoa cost in 1851, or how much money I would need to afford Anderson’s Exhibition patent Victoria car. Fascinating stuff but useless for my purpose.

I felt foolish in having invested my hopes in so little. Irritably I bundled price lists, trade cards and advertisements back into the box. There was one I hadn’t seen before but that now caught my eye, a beautiful picture; I think in fact it must have been a painting of a scarlet-and-black wall hanging. I looked more closely. According to the motto beneath, it was made of Italian silk from the Veneto and quite exquisite in its vibrant colours and intricate pattern. The name of the company offering these wares had been largely obliterated, but if I’d been around in 1851 I could have seen this work of beauty and others like it at a pavilion constructed in association with Daniel de Vere and Partners, Great Russell Street. The question that immediately sprang to mind was the nature of that association. Were de Vere’s the middlemen, the importers of these sensuous silks, or perhaps they were the company charged with marketing the goods, including producing this very advertisement? But might ‘association’ in fact mean that de Vere and Partners were responsible for designing the display space? It was a notable name, in fact so notable that it hadn’t registered with me on my original trawl through the list of architectural practices involved in the Exhibition. I felt my heart beat a little too loudly.

I scrabbled my way back through the discarded mounds of paperwork and pulled out the official Catalogue again. Hastily I skimmed the list of practices but there was no trace of de Vere and Partners. Next I read up the column rather than down. I don’t know what I expected to find that would be different. But still no de Vere. I began to feel a tingling at the base of my neck. Of course the advertisement might not be significant. Even if de Vere’s had been the original architects for this pavilion, they might have been replaced at some time by another practice, one that
was
listed in the Catalogue. But if not, here was a firm who had designed an Exhibition space for a company selling Italian silk—and the Italian connection might be pertinent—a firm of architects who did not in fact feature on the Exhibition’s official list. Could it be that I’d finally alighted on a clue?

Chapter Two

But I was getting ahead of myself. I needed to find out the precise nature of de Vere’s business; or rather, Nick Heysham did. I strolled towards South Kensington station thinking over what I should say to him. Away from the thunder of the Cromwell Road traffic, it was a pleasant enough walk in the late afternoon sun through tree-lined side streets, and I took my time. I should have been delighted that I’d found any kind of clue, but during the slow walk my earlier euphoria had almost evaporated. In retrospect it seemed such a tenuous link that I couldn’t in all faith imagine it would stand up to scrutiny. But since I wouldn’t be the one scrutinising it, I was happy to pass on the information I had. I reached for my phone and called the number Nick had given me.

‘Grace, hi! Great to hear from you.’

I wondered if his enthusiasm was a permanent state. It could prove wearing if I saw too much of him. But that was hardly likely to happen. There was no reason for me to be involved any further since I’d gone as far as I could in satisfying my researcher’s curiosity. If he wanted to take it further, he could.

I thought I’d get straight to the point. ‘I haven’t very exciting news for you. I’ve spent all day reading but without a single mention of Lucas Royde coming to light.’

There was a pause at the other end of the line.

‘That
could
be exciting,’ he said slowly. ‘I can report to the Society that I’ve had an expert confirm my initial findings that the Carlyon chapel was the first Royde design in this country.’

‘I’d rather you didn’t bring me into any conversation you have with them.’

‘It surely can’t hurt for me to mention you.’ He sounded almost indignant. ‘Come on, help a guy out!’

Annoyance at being coerced must have communicated itself in my silence, because his tone changed abruptly. ‘Listen, Grace, it would help me sound convincing and I won’t name you.’

‘You’re not being realistic. They’re certain to want to know exactly which expert you’ve been talking to.’

‘I guess so, but I can skirt round that. No worries.’

I was sure he could since he seemed fluent in not quite telling the truth. But I didn’t fancy being dragged into his scheming. It was time to plant a question in his mind.

‘There was
something
you might want to follow up.’

‘What’s that?’ He sounded taken aback. Good.

‘Among the stacks of paper I waded through today, I found an advertisement for a company selling fine Italian silks. I couldn’t read the company’s name, but the advert mentioned an associated firm who might just be architects.’

‘So?’

‘If they were architects, they’re not listed officially in the Exhibition Catalogue, which is odd.’

I could hear that I’d lost him, but he was trying to keep up.

‘Why would that be?’

‘It could be for any number of reasons. Maybe the company changed their architects at some stage—after the ad was printed—and it’s the later architects who appear in the Catalogue.’

‘I’m sure this is fascinating stuff to you, but I’m grappling with why this could be important.’ His enthusiasm had deserted him at last. I decided to be kind.

‘If Royde worked on a pavilion for the Exhibition, it may not have been under his own name. He may have worked for one of the architects listed in the back of the Catalogue, or he may have worked for a firm that
doesn’t
appear there.’

‘I don’t see how that gets me any further.’

‘It probably doesn’t, but it may be worth a try. He doesn’t appear in the Catalogue under his own name, and if you can’t trace him working for another architect, then you can be pretty sure there’s no connection between him and the Great Exhibition.’

He was uncharacteristically quiet, and I could see that I was going to have to spell out his options.

‘As I see it, you have the choice of going through the official Catalogue and checking every architect’s practice listed in the hope of discovering from their records who they employed in 1851. Or you could take a chance and just research this one firm who seem mysteriously to have been omitted from the record—that is, of course, if they
are
architects.’

He caught on fast. ‘I’ll take a chance.’

‘I thought you might. The name is de Vere and Partners, and they operated from Great Russell Street. It’s possible that if they were architects, their offices are still used for the same purpose. The buildings are very old there and sometimes stuff doesn’t get jettisoned from one generation of workers to another. They might just have something hiding in the attic!’

‘I’ll get on to it, although it sounds like a dead end.’

‘More than likely, but this is the only clue you have and once you’ve investigated, you can claim your prize from the Royde Society with a clear conscience.’

‘Whatever would that be?’ His voice bubbled with laughter. Nick Heysham was bouncing back and it was probably time to go.

‘Let me know if you turn anything up.’ I was quite certain I wouldn’t hear another word from him.

‘Sure thing. And thanks. I won’t forget that drink.’

‘Dinner, wasn’t it?’ I teased. ‘I’ve just spent a day immured in the V and A’s Reading Room for you.’

‘I’m glad you enjoyed it,’ he said, and I don’t think he was joking. I went to put the phone down and then ‘Hey, Grace, are you still there? Where do you think I should start with de Vere’s?’

I took a deep breath. ‘Kelly’s first to confirm they
were
architects.’

The unvoiced question hung in the air. ‘Kelly’s Post Office London Directory of 1851,’ I said crisply and rang off.

* * *

I left Hampstead underground station and turned into Heath Street. Sometime during my journey the weather had transformed from warm sunlight to cold splinters of rain that sliced their way determinedly through an inadequate jacket and short skirt. The walk home seemed interminable, and I arrived at Lyndhurst Villas cascading water. Oliver darted out into the hall as soon as he heard the key, but my drowned state seemed to pass him by.

‘Where on earth have you been?’ was his greeting. He didn’t wait for a reply. ‘I’ve been trying to get you all day.’

I felt myself bristling but said as reasonably as any sodden person could, ‘I mentioned last night that I was working at the V and A today.’

‘You had your phone switched off.’ His tone continued accusatory.

‘The museum has a strict policy, you know that.’ I was trying to stay patient, but my pressing need for a hot shower was beginning to triumph.

‘What I do know was that I wanted you and you weren’t available.’

His neck was mottling to a dusky red, which was always a sign that he was seriously upset. He liked me to be on call and felt entitled to my attention. I had one more attempt at placating him.

‘Oliver, I’m sorry, but I had no idea you were in desperate need of my services.’ It came out rather more sarcastically than I intended.

‘Your services, as you call them, are exactly what I needed. And I’ve had to wait for hours to get them.’ He pursed his lips. Very early in our relationship, his ex-wife had been anxious to tell me that Oliver was a ‘petulant’ man and on a very few occasions I’ve had to agree. This was one of them.

‘So, what is it?’

‘What?’

‘Why have you been trying to contact me?’

‘I’m moving the Gorski earlier than I expected. The present show at Newcastle is closing—it was never a good choice and done against my advice. The upshot is that we need something else to fill the gallery and pretty damn quickly.’

‘And?’

‘And I was depending on you to make the necessary arrangements. Except you weren’t around to make them.’

His harping was getting hard to take. He seemed determined to relegate me to an employee who’d fallen down on her duties. But I was still keeping a tight rein on my temper.

‘I’m sorry you were inconvenienced,’ I said as mildly as I could, ‘but I’m not your PA. I do have a job of my own.’

He actually sniffed. ‘If you can call it a job.’

‘What exactly do you mean by that?’

‘I mean that it’s not serious, darling.’ He saw me looking shocked and tried to bluster his way out, while managing to dig an even deeper hole.

‘It’s a casual thing, temporary.’ He waved his hand around as though dismissing the very notion that a job existed.

‘In other words, it’s nothing work,’ I finished for him. ‘Why don’t you say it? But then you were opposed to my taking the job I really wanted, even though you paid my student fees for years.’

His face was annoyingly calm. ‘I saw you had great promise and I was happy to help you fulfil it, but we agreed when you were offered the post at Sussex that you wouldn’t have been happy there. Universities stifle creativity.’

‘You agreed,’ I corrected him angrily. ‘And what’s so creative in researching mundane houses for people with too much money? Or, for that matter, in project managing exhibition schedules?’

I caught sight of myself in the rococo mirror carefully placed to reflect two milk-white cherubs sitting face-to-face on the shelf opposite. Right now the glass was reflecting something a little different: flushed cheeks and glittering eyes. My unruly curls had started to dry in the warm air and were now corkscrewing in every direction, a visual metaphor for the snakes of spleen rampaging through me.

Oliver must have taken a good look at the virago in front of him and decided on compromise. ‘You know I consider your house research business has real potential,’ he coaxed. ‘I wouldn’t have sponsored it otherwise. Right now, though, it’s surely not the most important thing in our world, is it?’

‘Not when it interferes with your plans, apparently.’

‘The whole point of setting you up in your own business was that you’d be free to help me when I needed it.’ His tone now was resigned, patient. ‘Without you, I’ve had to cobble together some very ad hoc arrangements.’

‘That’s good.’

‘It isn’t. It will probably be a complete shambles.’

‘I’m sure not,’ I said briskly and went upstairs.

I stripped off each item of wet clothing and threw it as far away from me as I could, as though I were stripping off every unwanted layer of my life. I was deeply, deeply angry. I despised the work I did and now it appeared Oliver had joined me. His pretence that it was important was sickening. The house research had been his idea and it had been his money that had set up the business. It was a way of keeping me occupied until he needed my help. I’d always known the deal, but this evening the disdain in his voice had shredded me. He’d barely disguised his contempt. I ran a hot shower and spent a long time staring at the bathroom tiles. Even these were Oliver’s choice and not mine. I’d always hated their black and white geometric precision. Oliver’s mix of antique and minimalism could make me nostalgic for my sister’s chintz, though goodness knows I’d shown enough distaste for that before I had left for good.