Her vase was covered, I retreated, Phoebe smiled out of the way, and on came Steve Yelbard. He was a real artisan, decisive, no cackle, just put his piece down, lifted the cover and stood aside.
Thin, in overalls, scuffed boots, pencil behind his ear, he looked ready to make another ten soon as somebody got a furnace started. Another Portland Vase. Fake, of course. Which is the truth word for a copy, look-alike, reproduction, simulant.
I didn’t need to go over to it. Excellent work. Interestingly, his was the full amphora type, base dropping to a rounded point in its stand.
Now the Portland Vase is famous. Everybody knows it, and its story. Any Roman cased glass —layers made separately then heat-fused—is beautiful. The most gorgeous of all is the Portland. Cobalt-blue translucency, it looks solid black unless you try to shine a light through. Opaque white glass figures adorn it—Peleus and Thetis, a tree, a cupid, some sort of sea dragon, you know the sort of thing; all those deities whose names you can never get the hang of. That’s about it, really, except that there’s only one. The British Museum has it. And here we were with two. Isn’t life grand?
Corse the charm-school graduate grunted, “Shift. Let’s look.”
I stood aside. Steve Yelbard waited, talking technology with Phoebe. His eyes never left her Portland. She talked attractively and laughed merry laughs. The three rollers stalked round, looking at the two glass pieces. They hadn’t a clue. A roller is a big investor in antiques. Any old, or even new, antique will do as long as it’s worth a lot. They’re nerks on the whole, but usually dangerous. I cleared my throat. Nobody stopped talking. Steve was the only one who looked at me.
“I saw your exhibition in St Edmundsbury, Steve. Not bad.”
He brightened. “My prototype?” He grimaced. Real glass-makers always apologize, knowing nowt is perfect.
“Two prototypes,” I reminded him. “One’s base was disced, like Phoebe’s. You decided against it?”
“I believe the original was in a true Greek amphora shape. The point removed and later replaced with a disc. Lovely, but twelve centimetres —”
“Twelve point one.” I nodded. “And a different blue.”
He took instant offence. “I wasn’t shunning the challenge, Lovejoy. It’s a question of what’s artistically right.”
“No talking!” Corse snarled.
I leapt away and shut up. Jan was chattering, displaying his awesome vocabulary, making an impression on everyone listening, chiefly himself.
“There’s a positive vibrancy of intellectualization, risk for risk’s sake, atavistically speaking…”
And all that jazz. Phoebe was smiling, pointing out features of her superb vase. Lights were being trained while the gelt men peered and squinted at the two Portland Vases. Talk about a bloody pantomime. They got fed up after a few moments and strolled back to their chairs. Josh fetched me, plucking at my elbow as if trying to unravel my shabby jacket.
“Well? Which, Lovejoy?” Time for me to point the finger, and get either Steve or Phoebe a fortune or penury.
The floodlamps were extinguished. The shade cast its golden cone over me. I stood there like on trial. For an ugly second I thought how frigging unfair this all was. I mean, just because I’m me, they shovel this responsibility—
“Yelbard.” I ahemed to clear the squeak, tried again.
Jan swivelled, looked at Sheehan, Corse, then me.
“That’s preposterous!” he exclaimed. “The American piece is fabulous! It’s perfection! Why, the Yelbard replica is…”
Silence is refuge when tyrants differ. I stayed silent.
“Lovejoy?” Big John interrupted.
Corse was darting suspicious glances. His goons came off the wall. So did Big John’s. Jan pranced to the table desperate to prove me wrong.
“What’s the point of asking Lovejoy?” He indicated Phoebe’s piece. “I’ve made a lifetime study of ancient glass. I tell you this divine piece could be the original Philip Pargeter replica! It’s totality is perfection —”
“What’s this pansy mean?” Corse grated. “I came here for a ’ckin’ definite. No maybes! You can’t put money on a frigging maybe!”
“I think you’ll find, gentlemen,” Phoebe interposed smoothly, “that Mr Fotheringay is correct. I based my work on the famous reproductions of the original Portland Vase made by Pargeter and John Northwood, dated 1876. You will find —”
“Lovejoy,” Big John said quietly. “The arts man says you’re wrong. Why?”
I’d rather have stayed in the rain to catch my death of cold among the trees. I swallowed to get my voice going.
“Because he’s right, John. Because the American girl’s right, too.” I nodded at her Portland. “It’s beautiful. But she didn’t make it, did you, Phoebe?”
“What’s this beautiful shit?” Corse spat a stream of saliva in disgust. I moved my foot in time. “We’re here to back the best fake.”
“There’s only one fake here.” I glanced at Steve, who was starting a slow smile. “Steve’s.”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to pull, Lovejoy—”
Phoebe’s face suddenly went ugly with fear. Her voice pitched higher. Odd that terror uglifies a bird, when passion beautifies them so. But it was either her or me, with Corse signalling his suits into their ominous lean. I cut in.
“There are several copies of the Portland in glass, Mr Corse. Not counting Josiah Wedgwood’s famous pottery jasperware efforts. It started with Edward Thomason at Birmingham Heath, 1818 —unfinished. Then Pargeter and Northwood had a few goes. Some bloke called Locke in mid-Victorian times…”
I petered to silence, not because I’d run out of things to say, but because Big John had frowned slighdy. Slightly’s enough, to cowards.
“How come the lassie knew his name?” he asked.
“Whose name?” Jan said, face draining. Big John meant him.
Nobody answered, far worse than uproar.
“Look,” Jan said, trying a laugh that convinced nobody. “I’m well known. I write for a dozen periodicals. I—”
“As Tiffy Tiffany,” Sheehan said. “Your newspaper name.” His voice goes softer, the more threat within. “You’re anonymous.” Hurt showed in his brogue. “I paid for that information.”
All the suits were edging closer now, glaring. I looked about but there was nowhere to go.
“Please,” Jan was saying, tone ascending like a prayer. “Please. I had to make sure. Don’t you see, Mr Sheehan? I couldn’t leave an investment this big to mere chance!”
He was squeaking in fright. The girl was trying to get out but the circle of hoods closed. She struggled genteely a second, then tried indignation.
“Well! If you can’t listen to reason…” All that. Useless.
“We been done, John?” Corse scraped a cough, cast his fag end in rage. “The Yank bitch and this poofter?”
“It isn’t like what it seems!” Jan was shrilling, frantic, appealing desperately to Big John. “This is serious money! A fortune —”
“Ronnie,” Big John said.
Three cube-shaped hoods came and hauled Jan away. When I looked, Phoebe was already being bundled out of the rear door. It slammed with echoing finality. I tried drying my clammy hands on my trousers. Steve seemed frightened. It’s the safest way to be. I know.
“Lovejoy?” My cue from Big John.
“Phoebe was showing you a genuine old Pargeter copy. She’d not made it herself. That way, she’d win this contest and get the job.”
“And our money…” Corse choked, his face a vast sweaty plum.
“Josh,” Big John intoned.
Josh Sparrow came at a low creep, quivering and bleating. “John, I swear to God. On my mother’s life. My baby’s head. I never had any notion there was a scam. I honestly don’t know what’s happened —”
“What did?” Corse grunted.