Dick Francis - Straight

He shook his head. “I haven’t been in a hurry for them before.”

“And... er... how many are involved?”

“About a hundred. Like I said, not the very best color in the accepted way of things but they can look warmer with gold sometimes if they’re not ultra blue-white. I work with gold mostly. I like the feel.”

“How much,” I said slowly, doing sums, “will your rock crystal fantasy sell for?”

“Trade secret. But then, I guess you’re trade. It’s commissioned, I’ve got a contract for a quarter of a million if they like it. If they don’t like it, I get it back, sell it somewhere else, dismantle it, whatever. In the worst event I’d lose nothing but my time in making it, but don’t you worry, they’ll like it.”

His certainty was absolute, built in experience.

I said, “Do you happen to know the name of the Antwerp cutter Grev sent the diamonds to? I mean, it’s bound to be on file in the office, but if I know who to look for...” I paused. “I could try to hurry him up for you, if you like.”

“I’d like you to, but I don’t know who Grev knew there, exactly.”

I shrugged. “I’ll look it up, then.”

Exactly where was I going to look it up? I wondered. Not in the missing address book, for sure.

“Do you know the name of the sightholder?” I asked.

“Nope.”

“There’s a ton of paper in the office,” I said in explanation. “I’m going through it as fast as I can.”

“Grev never said a word he didn’t have to,” Jenks said unexpectedly. “I’d talk, he listened. We got on fine. He understood what I do better than anybody.”

The sadness of his voice was my brother’s universal accolade, I thought. He’d been liked. He’d been trusted. He would be missed.

I stood up and said, “Thank you, Mr. Jenks.”

“Call me Pross,” he said easily. “Everyone does.”

“My name’s Derek.”

“Right,” he said, smiling. “Now I’ll keep on dealing with you, I won’t say I won’t, but I’m going to have to find me another traveler like Grev, with an eye like his. He’s been supplying me ever since I started on my own, he gave me credit when the banks wouldn’t, he had faith in what I could do. Near the beginning he brought me two rare sticks of watermelon tourmaline that were each over two inches long and were half pink, half green mixed all the way up and transparent with the light shining through them and changing while you watched. It would have been a sin to cut them for jewelry. I mounted them in gold and platinum to hang and twist in sunlight.” He smiled his deprecating smile. “I like gemstones to have life. I didn’t have to pay Grev for that tourmaline ever. It made my name for me, the piece was reviewed in the papers and won prizes, and he said the trade we’d do together would be his reward.” He clicked his mouth. “I do go on a bit.”

“I like to hear it,” I said. I looked down the room to his workbench and said, “Where did you learn all this? How does one start?”

“I started in metalwork classes at the local high school,” he said frankly. “Then I stuck bits of glass in gold-plated wire to give to my mum. Then her friends wanted some. So when I left school I took some of those things to show to a jewelry manufacturer and asked for a job. Costume jewelry, they made. I was soon designing for them, and I never looked back.”

I borrowed Prospero’s telephone to get Brad, but although I could hear the ringing tone in the car, he didn’t answer. Cursing slightly, I asked Pross for a second call and got through to Annette.

“Please keep on trying this number,” I said, giving it to her. “When Brad answers, tell him I’m ready to go.”

“Are you coming back here?” she asked.

I looked at my watch. It wasn’t worth going back as I had to return to Kensington by five-thirty. I said no, I wasn’t.

“Well, there are one or two things...”

“I can’t really tie this phone up,” I said. “I’ll go to my brother’s house and call you from there. Just keep trying Brad.”

I thanked Pross again for the calls. Anytime, he said vaguely. He was sitting again in front of his vise, thinking and tinkering, producing his marvels.

There were customers in the shop being attended to by the black-suited salesman. He glanced up very briefly in acknowledgment as I went through and immediately returned to watching the customers’ hands. A business without trust; much worse than racing. But then, it was probably impossible to slip a racehorse into a pocket when the trainer wasn’t looking.

I stood on the pavement and wondered pessimistically how long it would take Brad to answer the telephone but in the event he surprised me by arriving within a very few minutes. When I opened the car door, the phone was ringing.

“Why don’t you answer it?” I asked, wriggling my way into the seat.

“Forgot which button.”

“But you came,” I said.

“Yerss.”

I picked up the phone myself and talked to Annette. “Brad apparently reckoned that if the phone rang it meant I was ready, so he saw no need to answer it.”

Brad gave a silent nod.

“So now we’re setting off to Kensington.” I paused. “Annette, what’s a sightholder, and what’s a sight?”

“You’re back to diamonds again!”

“Yes. Do you know?”

“Of course I do. A sightholder is someone who is permitted to buy rough diamonds from the C.S.O. There aren’t so many sightholders, only about a hundred and fifty world-wide, I think. They sell the diamonds then to other people. A sight is what they call the sales C.S.O. hold every five weeks, and a sightbox is a packet of stones they sell, though that’s often called a sight too.”

“Is a sightholder the same as a diamantaire?” I asked.

“All sightholders are diamantaires, but all diamantaires are not sightholders. Diamantaires buy from the sightholders, or share in a sight, or buy somewhere else, not from de Beers.”

Ask a simple question, I thought.

Annette said, “A consignment of cultured pearls has come from Japan. Where shall I put them?”

“Um... Do you mean where because the vault is locked?”

“Yes.”

“Where did you put things when my brother was travelling?”

She said doubtfully. “He always said to put them in the stockroom under ‘miscellaneous beads.’ ”

“Put them in there, then.”

“But the drawer is full with some things that came last week. I wouldn’t want the responsibility of putting the pearls anywhere Mr. Franklin hadn’t approved.” I couldn’t believe she needed direction over the simplest thing, but apparently she did. “The pearls are valuable,” she said. “Mr. Franklin would never leave them out in plain view.”

“Aren’t there any empty drawers?”

“Well, I...”

“Find an empty drawer or a nearly empty drawer and put them there. We’ll see to them properly in the morning.”

“Yes, all right.”

She seemed happy with it and said everything else could wait until I came back. I switched off the telephone feeling absolutely swamped by the prospect she’d opened up: if Greville hid precious things under “miscellaneous beads,” where else might he not have hidden them? Would I find a hundred diamonds stuffed in at the back of rhodochrosite or jasper, if I looked?

The vault alone was taking too long. The four big stockrooms promised a nightmare.

Brad miraculously found a parking space right outside Greville’s house, which seemed obscurely to disappoint him.

“Twenty past five,” he said, “for the pub?”

“If you wouldn’t mind. And... er... would you just stand there now while I take a look-see?” I had grown cautious, I found.