Iain Pears - The Last Judgement

‘Hello,’ Argyll said in a tone which suggested he was expected for tea. ‘You must be Lady Byrnes.’

Drawing her dressing-gown more closely around her for protection against sudden attack, she cautiously admitted this was the case.

‘We’ve never met,’ said Argyll, stating the obvious. ‘I used to work for your husband until about a year ago.’

‘Really?’ she said coolly. As far as she was concerned, even had he been her husband’s fairy godmother that was no excuse for turning up at such an hour.

‘Is he in?’

‘Of course he’s in. Where do you expect him to be at this time of day?’

‘It is a bit early, I know,’ Argyll persisted. ‘And I know he likes his sleep, but we would like to see him. This, by the way, is Flavia di Stefano of the Rome art police. She nearly arrested your husband once.’

Why he thought this piece of information would convert a frosty reception into a warm embrace was unclear, but having delivered the partial anecdote, he stood back like someone waiting to be welcomed into the bosom of the Byrnes household. And Elizabeth Byrnes, well-brought-up lady that she was, who had always done what was expected, stood back and said:

‘You’d better wait inside while I wake Edward, then.’

All was serenity. They had been ushered into a small sitting room with velvet curtains, chintz sofas and loudly ticking clocks. The weak morning sun shone through the French windows, the paintings on the walls and the statues on their plinths looked well established and secure. The air was full of the scent of flowers and pot-pourri. It all seemed awfully safe, an entire universe away from the past couple of days.

‘Dear God. Just look at you two,’ came a quiet, cultivated but somewhat sardonic voice from the door. Sir Edward Byrnes, swathed in his silk dressing-gown, yawned mightily, blinked several times and looked puzzled.

‘Hello,’ Argyll replied, more cheerfully than he felt. ‘I bet you didn’t expect to see us here.’

‘Indeed not. But I’m sure you have an entertaining explanation. Could you drink some coffee?’

That was the good thing about Byrnes. Imperturbable. In the years Argyll had known him, he’d never seen him bat an eyelid at anything. Not even a vague tremor round the eyebrows. They followed as he slid into the kitchen then watched him fuss away. Here his weak spot emerged: whatever his eminence and however sophisticated his connoisseurship, culinary matters were not his strong point. After he had puzzled for a few moments about how to switch on the coffee-pot, fretted about where his wife might keep the milk — Argyll suggested the fridge — and asked whether icing sugar would do, Flavia took control. She hated such incompetence and ordinarily would have left him to get on with it, but she was feeling desperate. She liked sleep, and became a touch short-tempered when deprived of a reasonable supply. The sight of a tubby art dealer, whether or not swathed in silk, displaying his inadequacies for all to see could well have made her brusque. And considering that they wanted to touch him for some money, that would not have been such a good idea.

‘Oh, splendid,’ said Byrnes, lost in admiration over the way she poured the coffee into the machine.

‘Just a question of practice,’ she said sharply.

‘We, ah, have a favour to ask you,’ Argyll put in rapidly. ‘We seem to be in a bit of a pickle. You know how it is.’

Byrnes didn’t. In his entire life he had never been engaged in anything remotely exciting, except for that brief moment when Flavia had thought of arresting him. That, of course, had been Argyll’s fault as well. On the other hand, he loved listening to other people’s stories of the adventurous life, once he was awake.

‘Do tell me.’

It was Argyll’s language, so he summarized the state of play to date, leaving out little details like Flavia’s picking people’s pockets. You can never tell when people are going to go all moralistic on you.

‘How dreadfully complicated,’ Byrnes said when the tale was finished. ‘Someone seems awfully keen to head you off at the pass, so to speak. I wonder why? Are you sure it has something to do with this picture?’

Argyll shrugged. ‘I suppose it does. I mean, until I came into contact with it, my life was very routine and straightforward. Nothing untoward at all, except the usual business of paying the bills.’

‘Business bad, is it?’

‘Very.’

‘Do you want a job?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘We can talk about it later, if you like. One thing at a time. Tell me, what would happen if you went back home and forgot all about this?’

‘Nothing at all. But Flavia here is in one of her stubborn moods.’

‘I’ve heard of Rouxel,’ Byrnes said meditatively. ‘Wasn’t he awarded—’

‘Yes,’ said Flavia wearily. ‘That’s him.’

‘And you’ve established that he wasn’t telling the entire truth.’

‘Yes. Of course, there’s no reason why he should. He wasn’t under oath.’

‘And if possession of this picture leads to a nasty demise, there’s every reason why he might think that a small falsehood would be excusable,’ Byrnes went on. ‘After all, if my wife took Argyll here for a miscreant, isn’t it likely that Rouxel might think the same? If I had a painting stolen, and all of a sudden some total stranger turned up asking if I wanted it back, my first reaction would be to wonder whether he’d stolen it himself. And if he then came out with some story about murders, I might wonder whether he was delivering some oblique threat.’

Argyll was not impressed by this. ‘And if I’d wanted to kill him, I could have done it then and there.’

‘So he doesn’t know what you’re after. He’s confused, and perhaps a little alarmed. Somebody is behaving threateningly, it seems to be something to do with him and his picture, so the best course is to deny it. After that—’

‘After that any sane and sensible person calls the police,’ Flavia said. ‘Which he didn’t do.’

‘But you do get a visit from this man with the scar, and you tell me he may be a policeman after all. Or is it a murderer he’s meant to be? I assume he can’t be both.’

‘We don’t know,’ said Argyll miserably. ‘But there was this man Besson, you see, who was arrested, and a couple of days later this man turns up at Delorme’s gallery in the Rue Bonaparte. That sort of indicates—’

‘That he was a policeman after all,’ Flavia said reluctantly. ‘But.’

‘But what?’

‘But he was in Italy without asking permission; Janet denied all knowledge of him...’

‘Different branch?’ Byrnes suggested.

‘When he approached Argyll at the Gare de Lyon he didn’t try to arrest him, which would have been the obvious thing to do. If he is a policeman, he’s acting in a very odd way.’

‘No need to get heated with me,’ Byrnes said. ‘It was only a suggestion.’

‘Yes. I’ll bear it in mind. Meanwhile...’

‘Meanwhile you’d better tell me to what I owe the pleasure of this unexpected visit. Nice as it is to discuss such exciting matters with you.’

‘I was hoping to ask you a favour,’ Argyll said.

‘Obviously.’

‘We’re a bit short of money. A loan, you understand, to be replaced when Flavia can fill in an expenses form.’

Byrnes nodded.

‘And a car. I was going to rent one, but neither of us brought our driving licences.’ He smiled wanly.

‘Oh, very well. But on one condition.’

‘What’s that?’

‘It’s a clean car. Before you get into it, you have a bath, go and buy some fresh clothes. Then you eat and rest. Otherwise, you can’t have it.’

They agreed to this. Byrnes bustled off in search of keys and cash, and the pair of them sat and finished off their coffee.