Deep Six by Clinton Smith

Author:Clinton Smith [Clinton Smith]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780730401476
Publisher: HarperCollins

45

SHIPMENT

Within days Blake was installed in her home, one of the few Park Lane mansions not converted to an office or hotel.

They were wafted there in her Rolls-Royce Silver Seraph—a computer-stabilised leather and walnut cocoon with a chauffeur as regal as the car. He recalled Cooper’s words about Infandus being his entree to the Establishment. When they reached the building’s inner court, uniformed lackeys insinuated his bags within. Behind its iron railing and ornamental balconies the place was a time capsule of objets d’art, patchily chosen, ineptly placed.

She conducted him through gloomy ground-floor reception rooms. ‘Your assessment?’

‘Looks like a props department storeroom.’ He examined a wall mask. ‘Beswick?’

‘One of his finest.’

He upended a geometric vase. ‘Fielding Crown Devon. Not worth much.’

‘So how would you improve this?’

‘Send the less valuable pieces to the manor. Then you’d have half what you need over there. And room here to display the best of your collection.’

‘What a marvellous solution. I agree. Now, we must get you ensconced. Sophie, take him up, dear.’

‘Yes, Madam.’ Her personal assistant, a woman in a rayon-crepe dress, led him to a creaking lift with a folding metal grille.

The top floor guest suite had a carpet with Berber motifs and furniture featuring lacquered wood, metal and burr veneer. The PA showed him around. Bedroom, study, period bathroom and dressing room. His cases were already in the last. ‘Madam says you’ll be our guest for some time.’ She paused beside a door guarded by an odalisque on a plinth. ‘This connects with her suite.’ A sly look. ‘She has the key.’

After she left, the butler knocked. ‘Excuse me, sir. Dinner is served in fifteen minutes and madam requests the pleasure of your company.’

The dining room had murals reminiscent of Renaudot. Its table featured Baccarat candlesticks and Russian porcelain plates by State manufacture, Leningrad. Traill had changed into a bead-embroidered flapper dress with sleeveless side-slits open to the waist. The material clung to the part of her breasts still not exposed—proving that the twenties flat look had been the biggest tease of all.

When the butler and maids left the room, she suggested he propose a toast.

He raised his glass. ‘To William Morris. Truth to the machine.’

‘Most appropriate. You’ve no idea how delightful it is to have someone who relates to all this.’

They chatted about the Glasgow Four, Hoffmann, Nevinson, the evolution of the cinema wall sconce and the effect of the 1907 invention of Bakelite. She told him that as well as the Rolls she had a 1928 supercharged Bentley, and a blue 1937 Bugatti in the basement. He mentioned that Bugatti had studied art, which pleased her greatly, and that Rolls and Royce had modelled their radiator on the Parthenon. By the time dessert wine was downed, she was semi-drunk. ‘A pleasant meal. But nothing ever tastes the way you wish.’

A knock. Sophie came in and spoke to her in a whisper.

Traill frowned. ‘Excuse me a moment.’

She followed her into the adjoining reception room through large double doors. One door remained ajar and he could see her standing there.

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