The Grail Tree by Jonathan Gash Read Free Book Online Page A

our itinerant workers, bargees, caravan-dwellers, tinkers and gypsies alike.
    ‘I’m so very glad you came, Lovejoy.’ I was brought back to earth. Martha Cookson came to say hello, both hands outstretched. I found her hands in mine. She was suddenly likeable, but I suppressed the fond feeling. I had to find a way to return the money she’d given me. ‘Have you quite forgiven us?’
    ‘Hello. Forgiven?’
    ‘For offending you yesterday. Weren’t we awful?’ She drew me into the hall the way they do. I started to explain why I’d rushed off with such ill grace but she would have none of it. ‘We quite understand. We’re appropriately ashamed of our clumsiness, Lovejoy. Now, first names immediately. Absolutely the minimum of fuss.’ She led the way into the same living room. Sherry was ready on an occasional table. As we entered this bird turned to inspect us, smiling economically. Last seen this morning with Honkworth. This was all going to be rather a drag, her sour expression announced, so everybody keep illusions out of it and no hang-ups, okay? ‘You must hear all sorts of ridiculous stories in your occupation, Lovejoy,’ Martha Cookson said. ‘We can’t blame you in the least.’
    ‘Er, well, Martha, I actually came to, er, say . . .’ I started a stumbling explanation that I wanted out.
    ‘This is my niece, Dolly,’ Martha Cookson introduced brightly. ‘I made her come along in case you were still angry with us. Dolly, Lovejoy.’
    ‘Er, I think we’ve met.’ I gave Dolly a nod.
    ‘So we have.’ No change out of me, Lovejoy, her tone said loudly. She turned and poured sherry for us all.
    ‘Really?’ Martha was all agog. ‘When and where?’
    ‘He’s a friend of Alvin’s,’ Dolly said. She held out a glass distantly, avoiding actually seeing me. I had toplod across a few million leagues of carpet to reach it. I felt like a passing pilgrim thrown a crumb. Alvin? Was poor old Honkworth actually called that?
    ‘Not a friend,’ I said. Let there be no fobbery, my tone said back. I saw Martha’s quick glance but I don’t go for all this coy stuff.
    ‘You’re both antiques experts,’ Dolly said, innocent.
    ‘No.
I
am.’ I moved across to a de Wint watercolour, drawn by my clanging bell. Genuine, the boat reflected and the moonlight just right. I did my infallible watercolour trick. Always half close your eyes and step back a few inches more than seems necessary. Then do the same from a yard to its right. Then ditto left. Do this and you’re halfway to spotting the valuable genuine old master. It works even for painters as late as Braque. You need not know anything about the art itself. Forgeries and modem dross look unbalanced by this trick, full of uneven colours and displeasing lines. It’s as simple as that.
    Dolly was still bent on battle, woman all over. ‘If you’re an expert,’ she was demanding sweetly, ‘what does that make Alvin?’
    I sighed. There’s no hinting to some people. ‘I’m an antiques dealer, love,’ I told Dolly kindly. ‘I’m the best I’ve ever seen, heard or come across. Alvin Honkworth is a nerk. Even other nerks think he’s a nerk.’
    ‘I’ll tell him your opinion,’ she threatened sweetly.
    ‘Woe is me,’ I said politely. I moved aside. The Imari plates called. Dutch copies, as I’d thought. Lots of pretty famous porcelain is really artistically poor. Among the poorest (and somewhat ‘overpriced’ at provincial auctions nowadays) I rank these Continental Imaris, plus soft-paste Lowestoft, the enamel-painted hard-paste Bristol porcelain figures of 1775 vintage,and much of the underglaze-blue transfer-printed hard-paste porcelain garbage from Staffordshire’s New Hall China Manufactory of the mid 1780s. Seriously underpriced, though, if you can currently believe that of anything, is the eerily glowing mother-of-pearl Belleek porcelain from Fermanagh, though it’s more modern. (Incidentally, the mark ‘Ireland’ was only added to the