Over To Melbourne

8

Over To Melbourne

    Not unexpectedly Cassie was very nervous, but the flight went very smoothly and she only asked me three times if I was sure she looked all right. I was always sure of that, but I assured her that she looked very smart in her very best jeans, a pristine white tee scored from Mrs Crozier’s leftovers, and a light tan leather jacket ditto. (“However could she have left this behind?” had been the wondering reaction. Well, possibly because it didn’t look nearly as good on her as it did on Cassie?) The outfit was completed by a large cream gaberdine mackintosh, cut trenchcoat style, which according to Stella Forrest “the woman” had “flaunted all over Morphettville racecourse” about ten years back “so as to make all the fancy hags look hopelessly overdressed.” I was in no doubt it had done. To Cassie’s relief the smart cream beret which her mother was almost sure had been worn with it seemed to have vanished.

    She hadn’t needed to wear either the jacket or the coat in Adelaide but it was a different story when we reached Melbourne. It didn’t bode well for the Cup next day.

    Sir Peter Sale had sent a car and driver for us. The polite door opening and cap touching business lasted until Cassie informed the fellow chattily: “We’re going to the Cup tomorrow, isn’t it exciting?” The floodgates then opened…

    “This can’t be it!” she gasped as we drew up outside a tallish, oldish but very apparently well-cared-for apartment block. “I thought it’d be a house!”

    “Nah, this is right. They’ve got the penthouse,” the driver informed us. “See, Mr an’ Mrs Walton, they’re not interested in racing—why live in Melbourne, ya might well ask! So they always get out of it when the Cup’s on, can’t take the crowds. Nothink to stop them just staying up there, but no, she always makes ’im take off for somewhere where she can shop. Think it might be San Francisco this year—it was Florida last time, I remember that. See, I drive them quite lot, they always use our firm. The car could prolly find its way to South Yarra blindfold!” He laughed.

    “It’s, um, an up-market area, Alex,” said Cassie faintly.

    “I see.”

    “No, don’t you get out yet,” the chap then admonished Cassie. “I’ll get out and shelter you with the brolly—oke?”

    Uh-huh.

    “Just ring, Norm’ll let you in, he’s expecting you,” was the helpful advice as we reached the closed and forbidding-looking front door.

    Right. Norm turned out to be the porter, though possibly the term wasn’t used in Australia. Possibly combined caretaker and porter. He didn’t just let us in when we rang the unobtrusive bell on the jamb, he spoke to us on the door phone, Cassie jumping a foot when the small grille above the bell emitted sound. However, he was, indeed, expecting us and we were admitted. He did not turn out to be one of those grey-haired retirees who so often were misguidedly given such posts—no. Mid-forties, burly, with the sort of nose that indicates a pugilistic history. He could clearly have thrown any would-be intruder across the marble-floored lobby with one hand.

    “Heck!” gasped Cassie, gaping round the said lobby. “It looks like a bank!”

    Norm rejoined in offended but superior tones: “Genuine Art Deco, this is, Miss. The residents are very proud of it. One of the few examples left in Melbourne. See the doors?”

    He meant the lift doors and one other which probably led to his own domain. Beautifully grained timber, several shades: unmistakably Art Deco, yes.

    “They’re gorgeous!” she beamed.

    Norm beamed right back. Uh-huh.

    He insisted on taking us up in the lift, though as it only entailed pushing the button and our luggage wasn’t heavy— Oh, well.

    I had been in some modern apartment buildings where the lift doors opened straight into the flat, but these doors opened onto a small lobby, featuring another beautiful wooden door and a somewhat surprising mural—double mural, really, on either side of the door—of attenuated 1930s figures, male and female, leaping off diving boards. All in muted shades of fawn, peach, light tan and dull blue on cream. Cassie goggled at them.

    “The light fittings are all original,” offered Norm.

    “Very attractive,” I replied.

    “Just ring: they’re expecting you, sir.”

    And with that we were mercifully left to ourselves.

    “Look at it, Alex! Whatever can it have been meant to be?” she gasped.

    “Er… does Melbourne have beaches?”

    “Um, out at St Kilda, I suppose… No, I mean, was it always flats, do you think?”

    “I’d say so. Ever seen that rather good Poirot television series with David Suchet? –Yes, well, this’d be about the same vintage as his building, I suppose.”

    “It wasn’t this fancy,” she said faintly.

    “No: quite restrained, really!” I agreed with a laugh, ringing the bell.

    The door was opened to us by a tall, very pretty brown-haired woman of perhaps forty but hardly more, in a large and well-stained apron over jeans and a red tee-shirt.

    “Hullo!” she beamed. “Have you been looking at the wall painting? Isn’t it extraordinary? So kitschy that it’s gorgeous, really! Peter says it’s such good value we can’t possibly call it a mural, it’s gotta be a Muriel!”

    “Ooh!” gasped Cassie. She clapped her hand to her mouth but failed to stifle the giggles. “Yes!” she gasped through them. “It is! Isn’t it, Alex?”

    “Definitely a Muriel!” I agreed.

    And with that we were warmly invited in, Lady Sale ascertaining that we must be Cassie and Alex, of course, informing us that she was Lalla, and leading us unceremoniously into the kitchen.

    “I’m trying to make lasagna,” she explained. “I’ve been so spoiled since I married Peter and we came to Australia: our lovely Mrs Beattie usually does the cooking, it’s ages since I had to make a bolognaise-y sauce. Do you think this looks all right, Cassie?”

    Obediently Cassie peered into the big saucepan. “Um, I’d’ve said it was a bit thin.”

    “Blow! I was afraid it was. You never know what they mean, do you, when they say ‘a tin of tomatoes’? I mean, some are chopped tomatoes, and some are whole tomatoes and some seem to be in juice. These are Italian, and they’re supposed to be reliable, aren’t they, but we got them at Coles, and at home our nearest supermarket’s a Woolie’s: I think they might be a different brand from the ones Mrs Beattie uses. Either that or it’s just me,” she ended ruefully.

    “No, I’m sure it’s the tomatoes,” replied Cassie. “You do have to watch them. Our local shop’s terrible, Mum gave up shopping there except for basics, he only seems to have the whole tomatoes, and they go nowhere, they’re hopeless for a sauce. Half the tin’s water. I think it’ll thicken up if you let it simmer for a while longer.”

    “Right, I will. Turn the heat up, do you think?”

    “Um, no,” she said, pinkening. “It might burn. Have you put any sugar in it?”

    “Not yet: Mrs Beattie says not to put any in till last.”

    “Good. Mum reckons it’ll always catch if you put it in before. Um, you’ll need to stir it fairly often, I think.”

    “Yes. Well, I’ll just show you your rooms. Would you fancy a coffee? I think I’ll have one: I need it.”

    Agreeing that we would, we were shown our rooms—each with its own bathroom, the unseen Mr and Mrs Walton clearly didn’t do things by halves. Mine was a masculine bedroom, but of its kind inoffensive. Oatmeal carpet, dark brown drapes, bedspread and duvet cover, and some very pleasant, simple, rather chunky oak furniture: a tallboy, a lowboy, and the bedhead. Possibly 1940s, er… Utility? It was all very well polished and looked surprisingly good. Rather a relief not to find oneself in Art Deco with another Muriel!

    Instead the walls featured one painting in a simple oak frame, very possibly made to order, to match the furni… ture. Hang on! I goggled at it. Never mind that Mr and Mrs Walton weren’t interested in racing—and presumably not in horses—this was a copy of a Robert Bevan equine work that was in the Ashmolean! I peered. No, wait. The horse at the centre rear of the original study was a bay or black, while this one was a warmer shade of brown. The one in the right foreground, however, was exact. The picture had presumably been chosen to tone with the room: browns, fawn and tan predominating. Well, of course it wasn’t illegal to paint in the style of… But this was just too much, after all those fake Munningses!

    I reached out to turn it over, and thought very much better of it. Judging by the style of the Waltons’ flat, not to say its building, the thing would be alarmed if they’d bought it as an original. And frankly I couldn’t see anyone who lived like this bothering to buy copies.

    I sat down on the bed and had a bit of a think…

    The eventual lasagna turned out well, the delightfully sans façon Lalla blushing and disclaiming as we praised it, and Sir Peter turned out to be, if not as down-home as his wife, just as easy to talk to, a mild-mannered, softly spoken Englishman in his fifties who struck just the right note with Cassie: neither patronising nor over-kindly. He had returned from a foray to the galleries empty-handed but accompanied by his mother, a brisk, no-nonsense little Frenchwoman who had obviously been very pretty indeed in her day. She and Lalla Sale appeared to be the best of friends, never mind all the mother-in-law clichés.

    “So you didn’t find anything you fancied, Peter?” I said as we finished dessert. –Apple pie, Mrs Beattie’s, carefully packed and flown down from Sydney with the Sales. Plus either vanilla ice cream or yoghurt. Considering what we’d probably be offered on the morrow, I stuck to the yoghurt, but both Lalla and Cassie had the ice cream, Lalla earnestly recommending it as the best Aussie brand. –She was, it had now had time to dawn, not an Australian but a New Zealander.

    “No, all too modern for our house, I’m afraid,” Peter replied. His shrewd grey eyes twinkled. “Circa 1912, two-storeyed, plus an extraneous turret that our son Petey adores and has adopted as his den.”

    “We hear,” said Marie-Louise, his mother, “that there are more galleries in a suburb called South Yarra, so we think, per’aps the day after the Cup? It will be a nice shange. No crowds, and we are sure to find a pleasant little restaurant for lunch.”

    Er… possibly not by French standards, but however. I approved the idea, was urged warmly to join them, accepted not merely to be polite, and asked if they’d seen all the pictures in the bedrooms here.

    “I like the one of the horses in your room,” said Lalla, smiling at me. “I think the decorator must have chosen it, the Waltons aren’t into horses!” she added with a giggle.

    “Er—I don’t think, darling, that in their socio-economic bracket they’d let the decorator choose for them,” said Peter dubiously.

    “No, well, source it for them. –We’ve got a lovely decorator in Sydney,” she informed us smilingly, “but he says it’s really hard to find anything decent of the right period for our house, these days.”

    “So I would imagine. Er—did the one in my room ring any bells with you, Peter?” I ventured.

    He eyed me wryly. “Since you ask, Alex, yes, but one doesn’t like to tell one’s kind hosts that they’ve bought a lemon, does one?”

    “What do you mean?” cried Lalla in astonishment. “I think it’s lovely!”

    “Er—mm.” He glanced at me and cleared his throat. “The Ashmolean?”

    “Definitely,” I agreed.

    “Peter, what are you on about?” Lalla pursued.

    “Well, darling, don’t for God’s sake breathe a word to Merv and Diana Walton, but the painting in the bedroom Alex has got is an exact copy, apart from the shade of one of the horse’s coats, of a work I’ve seen in a museum in Oxford.”

    “Mm,” I agreed. “Robert Bevan. Showing at Tattersalls. Dates from around 1920. Very typical of his later works.”

    “Quite.”

    “A copy?” said Lalla in bewilderment. “But Merv told me all their paintings are originals. He spends quite a bit on art.”

    Cassie had been biting her lip during this exchange. Now she burst out: “I think the one in my room’s a copy, too!”

    “Really?” said Peter in surprise. “I’d have sworn it was an original Bevan.”

    “I—I don’t know who the artist is, but I’ve seen it in the art gallery in Adelaide, I’m absolutely sure!” she gulped.

    “The one of the lovely green house?” said Lalla.

    “Mm,” she admitted. “I specially noticed it at the art gallery because it’s all nice straight lines and they’ve got a lot of, um… squashy stuff—sort of muddy.”

    “Oh, Lor’,” said Peter. “One might be overlooked, but two… You are sure, are you, Cassie?”

    “Yes. I liked it so much that I tried to look it up online, I thought I might print it out, but it wasn’t there. There was an old man there looking at it, too: he told me that they’d like to put the whole collection online but they can’t afford it yet. Um, I’m no expert, of course. Um, I don’t think the one in my room’s signed.”

    “Nor is the one in my room,” I agreed.

    “The one in the Ashmolean is, however,” said Peter on a grim note. “I noticed it particularly: he didn’t always sign his stuff.”

    There was a short silence.

    “Do you think we ought to tell them, then, Peter?” said his wife in a small voice.

    “Mais oui, mon chéri!” cried her mother-in-law. “There is clearly a forger at work here, one cannot let it go unnoticed!”

    “I agree with Maman, I’m afraid,” Peter admitted, grimacing.

    “Oh, dear: poor Merv’ll be so angry,” said Lalla in dismay.

    “It’s not surprising he was taken in. They are very good,” Peter allowed.

    “My one is, certainly,” I agreed. I got up. “May I look at the one in your room, Cassie?”

    “Yes, of course.”

    “Come on, we’ll all look at them!” decided Lalla.

    So we did. The viewing, in my case and Peter’s, merely reinforced the feeling that the unfortunate owners needed to be notified. Marie-Louise was all for alerting the police.

    Over coffees in the Waltons’ charming sitting-room I admitted: “Look, while I do agree that it should be a police matter, there is a slight problem. Which police force?”

    “But the Australian one, bien sûr!” cried the little Frenchwoman.

    “Er—yes. The thing is, Marie-Louise,” I replied awkwardly, aware that her son’s clever eye was upon me, “each Australian state has its own police force. And I’ve already come across several examples of art forgeries—in particular, equine art, but also others—in both South Australia and New South Wales.”

    “You don’t mean that that poor lady with the gallery in Byron had some of them, too?” cried Cassie.

    “Mm, ’fraid so,” I admitted.

    “Why didn’t you say?” she cried.

    “Er—well, the fellow had taken to his heels, there were already charges of arson, embezzlement, and GBH against him, it seemed pointless and—er—too complicated, really. He had quite a clutch of the damned things: I assumed they were the last of them. Er—Munnings again, and several in the style of the lady artist from Adelaide—the one Christina identified for us, who did the two ladies in white in the swing.”

    “She mentioned just the other day that that lady hardly produced anything: after she got married she gave up painting for a while, and then she died in the big Spanish flu epidemic. Nobody’s ever heard of her, these days.”

    “No. Possibly quite a fruitful little field for the forger—they are charming. But there were also several landscapes—beachscapes, really—purporting to be by a better-known woman artist.”

    “Ooh, heck.”

    “Mm. And—er,”—I glanced at Peter—“Ferneley’s portrait of Riddlesworth slap, bang in the middle of the window.”

    “What?”

    “Mm. The gallery owner doesn’t know anything about equestrian art.”

    “I think you’d better explain the lot, from go to woe, Alex,” Peter said firmly.

    “Yes,” his mother agreed. “It begins to sound most serious. But first we have some cognac, non?”

    The answer being definitely oui, we all sipped gratefully, and I told them the whole story.

    Peter’s reaction was: “Good God,” Lalla’s was: “That’s terrible, Alex! He could have killed you!” and Marie-Louise’s, far more logical, was: “So this man, he sells his father’s work in Byron Bay, that seems clear, but why do we find more forgeries of a ’orse painter in Melbourne?”

    “A very good question, Marie-Louise,” I replied tightly.

    “We don’t know that Merv bought them here,” murmured Peter.

    “No,” I agreed. “I really think we’d better check that out, and—well, then the police? The fraud people in Adelaide already know about Andrews—or Brownloe, as he was calling himself there—but we hadn’t connected him with the art at that stage.”

    “No, quite,” murmured Peter. “Ah… How old would the father be now, do you have any idea, Alex?”

    “Well, Andrews is about forty. I’d assume, in his mid-sixties? He looks very young in the photo I mentioned, which was taken in the 1970s.”

    “Hm. Many artists produce their best work in their sixties,” he noted drily.

    “Mon Dieu! You think he is still producing?” cried Marie-Louise.

    “It’s entirely possible, Maman. On the other hand, possibly he merely accumulated a considerable body of work over the years which the son has been systematically selling off to unsuspecting galleries all over the country.”

    “Yes. Or, another possibility,” I suggested, “the father is now running a small gallery specialising in equine art, perhaps here in Melbourne, perhaps elsewhere, but I’d plump for Melbourne in view of the Cup’s being run here.”

    “Isn’t that a bit far-fetched, Alex?” ventured Cassie.

    I shrugged. “Once a crook, always a crook. But we need to find out where Walton bought his two paintings before we can proceed.”

    “Indeed,” Marie-Louise approved. “I think we delay until after the Cup, okay? Just enjoy ourselves tomorrow. Then we contact the poor Merv.”

    This being agreed, we finished the cognac and chatted mildly until the ladies took themselves off to bed.

    My eyes strayed to the large painting over the Waltons’ understated cream ceramic Art Deco fireplace. It was a large abstract impressionist work, something like six feet high and nearly as wide: splashes of colour on a white background: a lightish orange, an off-bright yellow and peach as to the top, different shades of subfusc blue, right and lower left, and in the lower half fawns, a little navy, a tinge of grey, a little green, with a splash of black in the centre. Circa 1970, perhaps? I couldn’t place the artist.

    Peter had followed my gaze. “No: genuine,” he said, his lips twitching. “Sotheby’s. Sydney, two years back. Merv outbid the lot of us. Probably just as well: it wouldn’t have looked right anywhere in our house, and Lalla would have been horrified at the price it went for.” He grinned.

    I smiled weakly. The Cartwright family money was small beer compared to what Peter Sale was worth. “Glad to hear it.”

    “I believe Diana Walton had the room designed to suit it. Well, they had to do something, it was in a dreadful state: the original parquet floor was horribly sprung, not worth salvaging, and the walls were smothered in a William Morris-based design in a dark maroon. The whole place was filthy, the previous owners must have been heavy smokers. It was on the market for quite a while, in spite of its location.”

    “I see. They’ve done wonders with it.”

    He smiled. “I think so. Lalla finds this room a bit too modern, but she likes the colours they’ve used.”

    I nodded. The walls had simply been painted white and the flooring was softly glowing narrow golden boards, with rugs in subfusc blues that picked up the colours in the painting. Several large, plain sofas were covered in a heavy-weave linen in the palest of greys, with scattered cushions making simple blocks of colour, again picking up the painting’s shades: one dull green, one light orange, one that exact off-bright yellow, two peach, and two dull blue like the rugs. The row of windows along the far wall was shielded by plain curtains in the same dull blue as one of the rugs. There was one feature chair: an Eames recliner, upholstered in white leather.

    Peter’s glance followed mine. “That chair was a real find: abandoned on the roadside in a shocking state: ‘dislocated’, according to Diana! Merv couldn’t believe his eyes. He leapt out and loaded the bits into the Bentley!” He laughed. “Of course the white isn’t authentic, but it looks good, doesn’t it?”

    “Wonderful. I’d never have thought of white.”

    “Me neither: it was an inspiration.”

    “And the coffee tables?” I asked. They were very plain heavy glass oblongs with brass mounts.

    “Genuine Seventies. Diana’s mum’s. About to be thrown out as old-fashioned.”

    I looked at him limply. “All I can say is, some people have all the luck!”

    “Yes, well, and the dough to buy that,” he said, nodding at the painting. “I still covet it!”

    Fervently I agreed. The artist was, according to Peter, Sydney Ball, Australia’s foremost abstract painter of his day. He had worked in various styles, all abstract, but Peter didn’t care so much for his hard-edged earlier stuff. This one was from his “Stain” series: he’d done about a hundred of them, evidently, but what was the likelihood of another one coming onto the market? Many had been snapped up by serious collectors, corporate buyers and the big state galleries long since.

    “I don’t think there’s much chance of your forger picking on him,” Peter ended lightly.

    “No, not his thing. It’d necessitate the purchase of a considerable amount of canvas, too, and if he’s anything like his damned son, he’d be too mean to shell out a groat of his own dough!” I ended viciously.

    “Unpleasant,” he acknowledged distastefully.

    “To put it mildly.”

    The bloody leg was aching—whether it was the Melbourne weather or just what slashed legs did, who knew?—perhaps both—and the cut was itching into the bargain. I was damn glad when Peter suggested we’d better pack it in: we’d have a long day tomorrow.

    The weather was wet for the Cup but it didn’t dim our enjoyment, spoilt rotten in the luxury of the Quinn Sale Australasia corporate box as we were. Arnie Simpson was there, complete with a smiling, pretty, plumpish wife of about his own age on his arm, and greeted me like a long-lost brother. He turned out to be second-in-command at QSA. His wife, in a floral outfit featuring about seven different shades of light blue and lilac, with a madly frivolous matching hat frothing with feathers, flowers and fluff, was unaffectedly excited.

    The CEO, one Clive Wainwright, was also there, a tall, silver-haired man with a rather pompous manner. His wife was present, too. A greater contrast to the happily beaming Marion Simpson could hardly have been imagined: Corinne Wainwright was tall, thin, and coolly gracious, clad in a cool silver-grey dress and matching jacket with a smart little pale grey hat that just managed not to be too severe. She was particularly gracious to Marie-Louise Sale, who was doing the day more than justice in, I rather thought, Givenchy. A suit in a deep grey-blue silk with a slub weave, and a small round hat composed entirely of tiny smooth, silky blue and black feathers. It was immediately apparent from her socially poised, smoothly polite responses to Corinne Wainwright that she couldn’t stand the woman.

    Mrs Wainwright was both over-gracious and slightly patronising to Lalla Sale, stunning in a severely cut shantung suit in deep violet, worn with a string of not-small creamy pearls with a large pendant formed by a baroque pearl, her hair up in an intricate swirl of curls under a small hat of deep violet velvet with a huge pale lilac artificial bloom on behind. The violet handbag came in for special notice: “Hermès, my dear? Haven’t I seen it before?” To which the lovely Lalla replied with complete innocence: “I don’t think so, Corinne, we couldn’t find it for ages: our son Petey finally unearthed it from the top shelf of the wardrobe under an old sunhat.”

    Cassie in my opinion outdid all of the ladies present: under the silly but delightful pink hat her lovely hair was loose down her back in a shiny flood of silver-blonde waves, her cheeks were flushed pinker than the pretty silk suit, and all in all, she looked, as the cheery Arnie didn’t fail to inform her as the day wore on and the champagne flowed: “Good enough to eat!”

    The track was said to be heavy: immediately Marie-Louise declared: “Ah! Splendid! The French horse, it will do well on the ’eavy track!” And she would put a little bet on it.

    True, Américain, relentlessly referred to by the Aussie commentators as “A-Merry-Caine,” was not the favourite, but Marie-Louise duly put a bet on it, more or less deciding that her son should, too. Peter and Lalla also sneakily bet on, variously, the favourite, So You Think (Peter: the New Zealand horse trained by Australia’s Bart Cummings, and winner of the Cox Plate), and Maluckyday (Lalla: the horse being a New Zealander, like her, and she liked its name). Cassie couldn’t decide at first but on consideration thought that maybe Marie-Louise was right and the French horse did stand a good chance on a day like this.

    Terrific excitement in the box—directly opposite the winning-post—as they were off! With about 250 metres to go, So You Think was in front, though Américain was coming up. Cassie jumped up and down screaming with excitement. So did Lalla and the unaffected Marion Simpson. Mrs Wainwright remained cool. Clive Wainwright didn’t jump or shout but I saw his knuckles whiten on his race-glasses. Hm: a heavy better? Good old Arnie Simpson yelled his head off with the best of them: “Come ON, Maluckyday! Move it, ya bugger!”

    “Come on, A-Merry-Caine!” screamed Cassie. “He’s coming up, he’s coming up: come ON!”

    He came on. “…A-Merry-Caine raced past So You Think and then Maluckyday. A-Merry-Caine for France coming right away, A-Merry-Caine… A-Merry-Caine très bien!”

    No, well, he wouldn’t have dared not to win, with the determined little Marie-Louise backing him. Lalla’s choice was second. Peter’s and Bart’s nag was third.

    “Both ways?” I murmured to Peter under cover of the mutual congratulations going on in the box.

    “On So You Think? Mm.” He looked wry. “Ten dollars. And on the winner: Maman thinks one shouldn’t bet heavily. You?”

    The odds had been thirteen to one. “Er—Américain très bien.”

    His shoulders shook. “A hunch?”

    “Er… He won the Prix Kergorlay in August. And I, uh, know the trainer. Er… five thou’ Australian to win,” I admitted. “Sorry.”

    He grinned. “Don’t mention it!”

    Take it for all in all, it had been, as Cassie declared happily, collapsing at last onto one of the Waltons’ soft grey sofas, a perfect day!

    “I’m afraid,” said Peter apologetically as he made coffee next morning in the large Walton kitchen, “that when Maman says we go, we go. So it’ll be South Yarra today: do you mind?”

    “Not at all.”

    “Good. I rang Merv Walton a little while ago—it’s yesterday in San Francisco,” he said with a grin. “Muddling, isn’t it? Seventeen hours time difference. It was early afternoon their time. He did buy those two fake Bevans in South Yarra, a gallery called Art on Acacia, in a little side street, Acacia Lane. One can’t miss it, it apparently has what he described as ‘a bloody great inn sign with acacias on it.’ He’s furious, by the way.”

    “So he should be,” I replied grimly.

    “Mm.” He hesitated. “There is one other thing…”

    “Yes?”

    He made a face. “The painting in the bedroom that Maman’s using may also be a fake. They bought it in Adelaide—over there for some wing-ding the state art gallery was throwing—from a place called Art on Acacia 2. Er—that’s the numeral 2.”

    My jaw had sagged. After a moment I managed to croak: “You don’t mean there’s a damned chain of them?”

    “Well, two,” he replied temperately. “The work’s not a Bevan, though.”

    “What is it?” I asked tensely.

    “It’s rather pretty: Edwardian. Merv said the gallery thought it was by a local South Australian artist, but it’s unsigned. Largely white with touches of blue—Maman loves a blue and white bedroom, that’s why we allotted that room to her.”

    I had an impulse to shut my eyes. “Two women in a swing?”

    “Two women relaxing in basket chairs on a verandah with a bunch of blue something-or-others and a clutter of tea things on the table in front of them. Strikes an ’orrible chord, does it, Alex?”

    “Yes. We thought—well, the woman who identified the artist for us thought—that Trethewin’s one, the two women in a swing, was genuine. Subsequently I discovered several in that style at the gallery in Byron Bay, purchased from Andrews. The owner had already sold several more of them. Artist unknown, I suppose that’s a mercy.”

    “Yes, at least she can’t be sued for deliberately selling a forgery,” he agreed.

    “Do you know what sort of price Walton paid for his three, Peter?”

    “Far too much, according to him, especially for the Bevans. Er—bought during the GFC, you understand.”

    “When the Australian dollar was even higher than it is now: right. Go on.”

    “We-ell… They weren’t cheap, but if that one in your room was genuine it’d go for a lot more back home—twice as much, I should think. He paid fifty thousand Australian dollars for it, and thirty for the one in Cassie’s room. The Edwardian one in Maman’s room, without attribution, was nevertheless fifteen thousand.”

    “Mon chou,” said Marie-Louise from the doorway: “are you suggesting that the painting in my room is a forgery, too?”

    “We’re afraid it might be, Maman, yes.”

    She came in, gave me a “Good morning, Alex,” and kissed Peter’s cheek. “Well, it’s pretty. But I think that style, with the loose brush-work—post-Impressionist, non?—it is not hard to fake.”

    “Quite. I gathered from poor Merv’s bitter account that Diana was already mentally designing the room around it, so even though the gallery could only tentatively identify the artist, he gave in and bought it.” He looked at us wryly. “They showed him an ancient catalogue of an exhibition from the Royal South Australian Society of Arts—only a folded sheet of yellowed paper—which looked very genuine, listing amongst others a couple of works by the woman artist they thought might be responsible.”

    “Very clever. –Is this organisation still going?”

    “Very much so.”

    “Then it should be possible to check their archives to see if that catalogue was genuine.”

    Peter gave me an apologetic look. “This is Australia, old man: the concept ‘archives’ is virtually unknown here, alas. Um, I’ve had a chat to a couple of decent people in the field in Sydney. Very bitter about the way organisations regularly chuck out every scrap of their old paperwork. You might be lucky, but I’d say the odds are against it.”

    “I see. In that case I might get my investigators onto it, instead of spending time on it myself.”

    “Well, the more proof of intent the better, mm. Now, there’s coffee, toast, marmalade, and Vegemite for those who can face it: that okay?”

    I agreed it was okay and we decided not to wait for the girls, and sat down to it.

    Afterwards Marie-Louise showed me the painting in her room. It was unmistakably in the style of Edna Whatsername, like the one at Trethewin. Oh, Hell. This was way beyond something that could just be shrugged off as a couple of old fakes turning up. Just how big was this forgery business?

Next chapter:

https://deadringers-trethewin.blogspot.com/2025/07/acacia-lane.html