Katherine Woodfine - Spies in St. Petersburg

For a moment more, she watched Rupert fold his arms and sprawl back against the mantelpiece. Then she crossed the room towards him.

‘These balls are so dreadfully dull – don’t you think?’

Rupert turned in surprise. Wrapped up in his boredom, he hadn’t noticed her approaching. Now, she stood just behind him, leaning against the wall as though she was as bored as he was himself. He looked up at her – for she was taller than he was – and his eyes widened. Well-brought-up young ladies did not normally go wandering about the ballroom, starting up conversations with young men to whom they had not been properly introduced.

‘Oh yes . . . er . . . rather,’ he stuttered in reply.

‘I’d much rather go out on the town, wouldn’t you?’ She flipped her ostrich-feather fan open and began fanning herself lazily. ‘Perhaps to the Café Royal. Now that’s quite a place. You never know who is going to be there, or what is going to happen.’

‘Oh rather !’ said Rupert, more enthusiastically this time. He’d never actually been to the Café Royal himself, but he’d heard it was a wild and exciting sort of place – a thousand miles away from his mother’s sedate ballroom.

The girl let out a sigh. ‘If only we could escape! But I suppose we’ll have to put up with all this instead.’ She gestured dismissively towards the waltzing couples.

‘Would you . . . I mean . . . do you think that you might like to . . . ?’ Rupert found himself asking, looking awkwardly from her to the dance floor, and then back again.

‘To dance ?’ The girl laughed, as though he’d made a joke. ‘Oh, good heavens, no, Mr Grenville! I don’t care for that kind of dancing. If it was a ragtime tune, now that would be different. But I know – why don’t you show me around the house instead?’ She flashed him a dazzling smile. ‘Perhaps we could find somewhere to sit and talk? That would be much better than a stuffy old waltz, wouldn’t it?’

‘Oh yes, absolutely ,’ Rupert replied fervently. He didn’t think he’d ever seen this girl before, and he wanted very much to know her name, but somehow he felt embarrassed to ask the question – especially when she obviously knew who he was. Before he could say anything more, she had placed her hand on his arm, and they were going out of the ballroom and into the long hallway.

‘Your father has a simply wonderful art collection,’ she was saying. ‘I’m tremendously interested in art – aren’t you?’

‘Oh rather !’ said Rupert again, although the truth was he’d never given very much thought to his father’s art collection, besides the fact that it was worth a terrific lot of money. Sir Edwin Grenville was a wealthy merchant banker, and buying art was just one of the things he did as a matter of course – like dining at his club, or playing golf with his business associates.

‘Where does he keep the rest of his paintings? Perhaps you could show me?’

Rupert found himself blushing. Most of the debutantes he met were so polite and demure – it was hard to know how to respond to a girl who started conversations, and asked questions, and looked at him so directly with her large dark eyes. He opened the door to his father’s study, explaining: ‘Most of them are in here.’

The girl glanced quickly around, taking in the panelled walls hung with oil paintings in heavy gold frames. ‘What a lot there are,’ she observed. ‘Where did your father get them all?’

‘Oh, you know. Here and there,’ said Rupert, trying to sound confident – though honestly, he was not entirely sure. ‘Auctions and so on. He’s travelled abroad a lot for his work, and he always seems to come back with something new. Actually, he said he’ll take me with him on his next trip,’ he couldn’t resist adding, feeling a swell of pride at the thought.

‘Oh, really? I’m fond of travelling myself. It’s always thrilling to see new places and have adventures.’

Rupert felt rather surprised. ‘I didn’t think young ladies were allowed to do much of that sort of thing.’

‘Didn’t you?’ She had turned to examine a painting more closely, now she turned back to him. ‘It’s not a bad selection. One or two nice pieces, I suppose,’ she said, flipping her fan open once again.

‘This isn’t all of them, of course,’ Rupert said hurriedly, keen not to disappoint. ‘There are more paintings in the dining room – and some of the very special ones aren’t on display.’

The girl’s eyes brightened. ‘Very special ones? Like what?’ she asked.

‘Well, he’s got some Turner sketches,’ said Rupert, remembering a name he knew.

But the girl wasn’t impressed: ‘Oh – Turner . I mean, they’re wonderful of course, but I’ve seen dozens of them in galleries before.’

‘Or there’s a Benedetto Casselli,’ Rupert added, knowing that , at least, was certain to be impressive. Still, he was unprepared for her awed reaction:

‘A Benedetto Casselli? Not really ? Now that’s something! His work is terrifically rare.’

‘It’s a very important painting,’ Rupert boasted.

‘I say, how splendid. Will you show it to me?’

Rupert was struck by a sudden prickle of anxiety. He’d forgotten for a moment that the Casselli dragon painting was supposed to be a secret. His father kept it hidden away in his safe, rather than hanging on the wall with the rest – though he’d told Rupert and his older brother Oliver that it was the most valuable and important work in his entire collection. ‘If anything should ever happen to me, you must make sure you take the utmost care of it,’ he’d said in a very serious voice.

‘I’ve never seen a Casselli painting before. They’re supposed to be perfectly magnificent! It would be such a thrill to see it for myself,’ the girl was saying.

Rupert frowned, battling with himself. He knew he’d said too much already, and he was about to try and explain that he couldn’t show her – but the girl was still talking: ‘And then – do you have a motor car? I’ve got rather a wicked idea! Why don’t we slip away together, and drive into town to go to the Café Royal? We’d be able to have a bit of real fun that way – and I bet we could be back before anyone noticed we’d gone!’

All thoughts of the painting fled at once from Rupert’s mind. ‘I say . . . could we really? That would be a lark!’ As a matter of fact, he didn’t have a motor car himself, but his brother did, and Rupert was pretty sure he could drive it just as well as Oliver. He could already imagine how marvellous it would be to roll into town in the fine new motor, and then pull up at the door of the glamorous Café Royal with a beautiful young lady at his side . . . He felt ready to charge out of the door at once, but the girl laid a restraining hand on his arm.

‘Don’t forget the painting,’ she said. ‘ Do just let me have a quick peep before we go.’

‘All right,’ said Rupert, unable to resist. ‘But it’s supposed to be a secret – so you won’t tell anyone about it, will you?’

The girl looked even more excited by the prospect of a secret painting. ‘Of course I won’t tell a soul,’ she said breathlessly. ‘How perfectly thrilling!’

Feeling rather excited himself now, Rupert hurried over to the large mahogany cabinet in the corner which housed his father’s big metal safe. Luckily he knew the combination, and a moment later he had removed the leather folder stamped with the shape of the twisting golden dragon, which he knew contained the painting. He laid it on the desk and lifted the cover with awkward fingers. Beside him, the girl gave a gasp of admiration.