Bernard Cornwell - Sea Lord

I laughed. It was an odd moment. At one instant we had been at each other’s throats and suddenly, for no apparent reason that I could snatch from the air, we were smiling at each other.

“If you must know,” she said, “I thought you were an idiot to give it away.”

I nodded. “That’s probably a very fair assessment.”

“Do you regret doing it?” she asked in genuine interest.

I pretended to think about it. “If it didn’t impress you then it was clearly a wasted gesture.”

She smiled, and I thought how beautiful she was. “It impressed me,” she confessed, “but if you regret it, then I promise you my stepfather won’t keep you to it.”

“I don’t back out of contracts.”

She didn’t pursue the subject. “Did you see the television news last night?”

“I don’t have a television.”

“They gave our press conference a lot of time,” she said, “and they were especially kind to you. They didn’t show you hitting anyone and they didn’t let anyone hear you swearing.”

“Untruthful bastards, aren’t they?”

“And here are the morning papers.” She spilt the big bag at my feet. I picked up the papers one by one. The serious papers had given us a fair bit of space, but nothing compared to the tabloids, which had jumped all over the story. There were a lot of pictures of me, most of them in Sunflower , but a fair number also showed me sitting in the hotel with Jennifer Pallavicini. ‘Vagabond Earl Sails Home’, one caption said. “You will notice,” Jennifer said, “that your presence guaranteed us a heavy coverage.”

“My presence? Not yours?”

“I’m not newsworthy,” she said disparagingly. “No, it’s the vagabond earl who caught their fancy.”

I lifted a tabloid which had printed her picture larger than mine. She looked very sexy in the picture, perhaps because the photographer had been almost under the floorboards to aim his camera up her skirt. I thought again how good she’d look in a bikini. Or out of one.

“Do you ever go sailing?” I asked her suddenly.

“Sometimes.” She sounded defensive.

“With Hans?” I sounded defensive.

“Hans doesn’t have time for sailing. No, a friend of Mummy’s has a ketch.”

A friend of Mummy’s would, I thought. “A big ketch?” I asked instead.

“At least twice the size of Sunflower ,” she said airily.

“You should try small boat sailing,” I said. “It’s wetter, and more intimate. Why don’t you come for a sail in Sunflower ?”

I expected her usual refusal, especially after I’d used the word ‘intimate’, but surprisingly, and after a moment’s hesitation, she gave an abrupt nod. “All right. Maybe. One day.”

“Only maybe?” I asked.

She smiled. “A definite maybe.”

It was worth giving up a Van Gogh for that feeling. It really was. I must have smiled, for she smiled back at me, but then I had to look away because running footsteps were suddenly loud on the pontoon bridge and a voice was shouting for me. “Johnny! You bastard! Johnny!”

I twisted round, already reaching for the weighted boathook, but my importunate visitor was neither Garrard nor Peel, but Charlie. I noticed one of the plain-clothes policemen running along the quay towards the pontoon’s bridge, but when I stood with a welcoming expression on my face, my guardian angel relaxed. “Charlie!” I shouted.

“God Almighty!” He ran down the pontoon, leaped on to Sunflower ’s counter, then jumped down on to the mass of newspapers in the cockpit. “You bastard!” He was clearly pleased to see me.

He slapped my back. I introduced him to Jennifer, who nodded very coolly. “Mr Barratt,” she said in acknowledgement of the introduction.

Charlie looked from Jennifer to me, then back to Jennifer. “I’m not interrupting, am I?”

“No, Mr Barratt, you are not.” All her previous coolness had returned. She retrieved her bag. “I’ll see you this evening, my lord.”

“Where?”

“At the studios, of course. A car will pick you up here at one o’clock. You’re supposed to be in London by five-thirty, so that should give you more than enough time. It’s nice to have met you, Mr Barratt.”

Charlie watched her walk all the way down the pontoon, then sighed. “That is tasty, Johnny. That is very tasty.”

“And engaged to a Swiss cheese zillionaire.”

He snapped his fingers suddenly. “She’s the one who was on the telly with you last night?”

“That’s the one.”

“Hell fire.” He sat down heavily. “Tell me it isn’t true.”

“Tell you what isn’t true?”

He was staring up at me with a very worried expression. “You didn’t really give the picture away, did you?”

“Yes.”

He closed his eyes. “Christ on the cross. I saw you on the telly last night and I couldn’t believe what you were saying! He’s mad, I thought, off his poor little twist! You’re as bad as Georgina!”

“Come on, Charlie!” His accusation had angered me. “What the hell am I supposed to do with the bloody thing?”

“Sell it, you bloody fool,” he said, just as angrily.

I laughed. I couldn’t stay angry with Charlie. I sat opposite him and told him all about Georgina and Elizabeth, and how I’d visited Perilly House and seen the two caravans which I suspected were intended to be Georgina’s new home. I explained how Sir Leon had promised to take care of her future for me, and how that was more important than some damned picture, however glorious that picture might be.

Charlie leaned his head against the lower guardrail. “Elizabeth was going to shove Georgina into a caravan?”

“Yes.”

He uttered a crisp judgment of Elizabeth, then another, less crisp, on me. “But you still gave it away. I don’t believe it!”

He seemed extraordinarily worried, and it suddenly occurred to me that perhaps he had thought that, should I succeed in finding the picture, I would pay him back for all the thousands he had spent on Sunflower . “If it’s the money, Charlie,” I said, “then don’t worry. Sir Leon will give me enough to pay you. I might have given up the purchase money, but I don’t mind asking for a few thousand as a reward.”

“Bugger the money! I’m thinking about you!” He helped himself to the mug of coffee Jennifer had abandoned. “I suppose you realise that Elizabeth will probably take you to court and challenge your right to give it away?”

“Perhaps.” But not, I thought, if she was hiding it.

Charlie sighed. “You have a rare talent, Johnny, for going up shit-filled creeks and chucking away paddles.” He offered me a lit cigarette, then lit one for himself. “Who’s the copper on this one?”

“Harry Abbott again.”

“Jesus wept.” He was truly disgusted. “You’re not bunking up with bloody Harry, are you?” He frowned, evidently thinking of the press conference. “And Harry knows who’s got the painting?”

I smiled, knowing my next answer would amuse Charlie. “Elizabeth.”

Charlie stared at me in surprise, then scornfully rejected the idea. “Harry’s off his twist! He reckons Elizabeth stole the painting?”

“Or someone did it for her.”

“Bloody hell! But Elizabeth married money, didn’t she?”

“They’re skint.”

He thought about it for a few seconds, then tacitly conceded that his initial scornful rejection might have been mistaken. “She always liked money, didn’t she?” He stared at me, and I saw the penny drop. “Johnny! She tried to have you killed?”

“That’s what Harry thinks.”

“Which means she’ll try again…” Charlie was smart, very smart, and he twisted on the thwart to stare at the man who had chased him down the bridge on to the pontoon. He snapped his fingers at me. “You’re being guarded, Johnny!”