“Millions,” she said firmly.
“Wow.” I grinned. I told myself that I didn’t care about money, but twenty million smackeroos? The art world must have gone mad in the last four years. My mother had thought she had done well to negotiate a price of four million, and she’d been assured that was at least one million above the highest auction price. But twenty? At least twenty, Jennifer Pallavicini had said. “You could buy a lot of boat for twenty big ones,” I said wistfully.
“You could indeed,” she said icily.
“There’s just one snag,” I went on, “which is that I don’t have the painting.”
“But you know who does.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement. This girl, just like my sister and the rest of my family, was convinced of my guilt.
“No,” I said gently, “I don’t.”
Jennifer Pallavicini sighed, as though I wilfully exasperated her. “Before she died,” she said flatly, “your mother found evidence of your guilt. She told us as much. One of your accomplices confessed.”
“Whoopee,” I said, “except it isn’t true.”
“Your mother wished to confront you with that evidence” – she ignored my denial – “and to make one last appeal to you.”
I leaned back. The washboards were out of their slots and rain was flicking down into the cabin. I rubbed my face and winced as I put pressure on my sore gum. I looked up at the barometer, which happily wasn’t broken, and saw that the air pressure was rising. Too soon for me. I needed a few days to make my repairs, but as soon as the next depression had passed up-channel I’d use the backwash of northerly winds to take me away from England.
“And that man” – Jennifer Pallavicini shivered at the memory of the thin man – “told me you’d come home to sell the painting.”
That caught my attention. “He said what?”
“That you’d come home to sell the painting. But he said it wasn’t yours to sell.”
I stabbed at the faltering tobacco in my pipe with a shackle-spike. “So if his argument was with me,” I asked, “why go to work on you?”
She seemed to consider whether or not to answer, then gave a small shrug. “When he first came aboard he asked me if I knew anything about the painting and I was foolish enough to say I did. When I told him I worked for Sir Leon he wanted to know how much we were paying you for the painting, and just when you were going to produce it. I said we had no agreement, and he didn’t believe me.”
“So he beat you up?”
She paused, then nodded stiffly. “And I think he rather enjoyed doing it.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, but my sympathy only irritated her.
“The important thing,” she said distantly, “is that at last we’ve succeeded in making contact with you. All that we now ask is that you deal with us rather than with anyone else.”
I shook my head. “But I can’t deal with you because I didn’t steal the painting, and I don’t know where it is.”
“So you say.”
That churlish answer tempted me to anger. It would have been easy to give in to the impulse, for I was tired and irritated, but on the other hand I was beginning to see that Jennifer Pallavicini was a very beautiful girl indeed, and it’s astonishing how pretty girls can make men’s manners. So I hid the anger.
Jennifer Pallavicini was collecting together the contents of her handbag, which the thin man had spilt across the bunk. “You should know,” she said as she restowed her bag, “that the painting is legally your possession. Your mother’s will can’t change that.”
I shrugged. “I haven’t even read the will.”
“She left the painting to your twin sister, but as your mother had already transferred its ownership to the Stowey Trust before your brother’s death, then the legacy is unenforceable.” She looked up at me. “In effect, my lord, you stole your own property.”
I could feel a pulse throbbing in the pulpy place where my tooth had been prised out. Jennifer Pallavicini’s words were reminding me of the dull responsibilities I had fled after the disappearance of the painting. The Stowey Trust was, in effect, the wealth of the Rossendale family, but formed into a trust to minimise taxes and death duties. These days the Trust was bankrupt, made so by the loss of the painting. However, the chief beneficiary of the Trust had always been the Earl of Stowey, which meant that if I had stolen the Van Gogh then I had indeed robbed myself. No one seemed to think that was an odd thing for me to do, probably because they were all convinced I was stupid as well as guilty.
“Sir Leon is willing to overlook any complicity of yours in the painting’s disappearance if you’ll now assist in its recovery,” Jennifer Pallavicini told me.
“How very kind of him,” I said.
She heard the scorn in my voice, and shrugged. “We’re only trying to help you, my lord.”
“Don’t call me that!” Despite her looks, anger had snapped into my voice. I heard the sudden emotion and did not like it. “Listen,” I said patiently, “my mother never had any proof that I stole the painting, because I didn’t. If she did have such proof, then she should have gone to the police. I assume she didn’t, because no policemen have paid me a call since I returned to England, so I suspect her proof was all imaginary. So go back to Buzzacott and tell him I didn’t nick the painting, that I don’t know where the thing is, and that I can’t help him. Tell him that four years ago the police questioned me for two days, and didn’t charge me because they knew they couldn’t make a charge stick. In short I know nothing about the painting, and that’s the end of the matter.”
Jennifer Pallavicini didn’t blink an eye at my denial. “Sir Leon is offering twenty million pounds for the painting, Mr Rossendale, payable in any currency you desire and in any country you choose.” She paused for a response and, when I made none, went on. “You may take that as a negotiating position rather than as a final offer, Mr Rossendale.”
In other words I could name my price for returning the painting, and the price would be paid far away from the prying eyes of the taxmen. The only fly in that ointment was that I hadn’t stolen the Van Gogh in the first place and didn’t know where it was. I was also angry at the continued accusations. Four years had not lessened anyone’s greed for the canvas, nor their conviction that I had stolen it. Doubtless my mother had thought a deathbed appeal would make me reveal its whereabouts, while now Sir Leon Buzzacott had sent this attractive messenger to try and bribe the information from me. But I did not share their obsession with the picture, and I was offended by their accusations. I was also offended by Jennifer Pallavicini’s patronising assumption of my guilt and, to show my irritation, I picked up her mug of tea and poured it down the sink drain. “Goodbye, Miss Pallavicini.”
If she was startled by my action, she was too proud to show it. She gathered up her handbag. “You expect me to swim ashore, my lord?”
I rowed her. There was no sign of the aluminium dory nor of the two men. Jennifer Pallavicini said nothing during the journey, but it was clear she was not enjoying the ride. She had gone out to Sunflower in one of Salcombe’s water taxis, but, without a VHF radio, I could not summon one for her return journey. Instead we rowed through the drizzle in sullen silence. She didn’t speak until I had safely delivered her to the town’s pontoon where, once she had clambered safely out of the inflatable, she turned back to me. “Where shall I return your sweater?”
“Take it to an Oxfam shop. I’m going back to sea.”
For a second she was tempted to take off the Aran sweater and throw it contemptuously into the dinghy, but modesty and the rain prevailed. She turned away; then, surprisingly, turned back. “One last question, Mr Rossendale?”