Noonday and Night

CHAPTER 1

Pottery and Porcelain

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The invitation to dinner was accompanied by two slightly unusual requests. One was that Dame Beatrice would bring another woman with her, preferably one who was interested in ceramics; the other was that she would also bring her two blue-dash English delftware dishes, chargers which had been made round about AD 1640, although whether in London or Bristol was uncertain.

One sentence in Basil Honfleur’s letter appeared to explain this otherwise curious request. ‘I’ve recently become possessed of a particularly fine early nineteenth century Welsh dresser, and I would love to see how your two pieces look on it compared with some which my crockery scout Vittorio has managed to pick up for me.’

This, Dame Beatrice thought, was an elliptical way of indicating that, if her pieces looked well on his shelves, there would be an offer to purchase them. After the dinner, she supposed, the company would adjourn to the kitchen and the dishes would be put on display. Then would follow a bargaining battle between the knowledgeable woman Dame Beatrice would have brought with her if she could think of anybody suitable, and Vittorio (whoever he was), to fix upon the price to be offered.

Dame Beatrice was not particularly attached to her delftware, which had been left her by a distant relative for whom she had had little affection. It was neither uncommon nor, she supposed, very valuable. She considered it, in fact, to be rather ugly and, compared with her collection of Sèvres porcelain (actually made in the factory at Vincennes before that was transferred to Sèvres itself), extremely crude. One charger was decorated with a figure on horseback which might or might not represent Prince Rupert; the other showed Adam, Eve and the serpent, Adam chastely upholstered in an apron of fig leaves which appeared to depend upon faith alone for its support, Eve content apparently with her Godiva-like mantle of hair. The serpent, writhing down from a loaded fruit-tree, was focusing its attention upon the apple (or whatever) which was being passed from hand to hand by the other two.

‘Take Conradda Mendel,’ said Laura Gavin, the secretary, when Dame Beatrice showed her Basil Honfleur’s letter. ‘They’ve got another thing in common besides an interest in antiques.’

Laura meant by this that both Honfleur and Miss Mendel had once upon a time attended Dame Beatrice’s clinic for psychiatric treatment. It had happened, Dame Beatrice remembered, that she had arranged for the decorators to take over her Kensington house where, at that time, her clinic was held, and so she had fitted up a room on the first floor of her Hampshire residence, the Stone House on the edge of the New Forest, and for a few weeks she had carried on her work there. Those whose commitments did not permit them to attend had been referred to another psychiatrist in London and their case histories handed over to him.

Both Honfleur and Conradda had found the change of venue acceptable and, in Honfleur’s case, convenient, since it saved him the longer journey to London. He and Conradda had met at the Stone House on one or two occasions, owing either to unavoidable delays on the road or to the vagaries of the train services, and had taken tea together at the Stone House.

Honfleur had been in a Commando unit during the war; Conradda had suffered persecution under the Nazis. He was now well settled in an occupation which suited him. Conradda was a dealer in antiques who did a little very high-class pawnbroking on the side, although her clientèle was not subjected to the sight of three golden balls above her extremely exclusive Mayfair premises. It was she who had found the Sèvres for Dame Beatrice and it was her proud contention that the only collection which could match it was that at Waddesdon, the former home of Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild.

Dame Beatrice knew that this statement on Conradda’s part was a wild distortion of the truth, but she treasured her pieces and no servant was ever allowed to put a finger on them. She had seen Miss Alice de Rothschild’s collection in the enormous French-Renaissance-style mansion administered nowadays by the National Trust and had admired but did not covet it, and she had treated Conradda’s contention with mirth.

‘Conradda Mendel?’ she said, in answer to Laura’s suggestion. ‘I thought perhaps you yourself would like to come. It may be a dinner well worth eating, and you would do better justice to it than I shall.’

‘No,’ said Laura. ‘Reading between the lines, this Honfleur wants to get his hooks on to your dishes. You take Conradda and watch the fur fly when she and this Italian really go into a clinch over the price. If it isn’t an impertinent question, shall you consider selling?’

‘Oh, yes, I expect so, if Mr Honfleur wants them; I don’t at all care for the chargers.’

‘Me neither, as Fowler would hardly permit us to say. Shall I ring up Conradda, then? They do actually know one another, don’t they?’

‘Yes, they met here at the Stone House when I had that room next to mine converted into a consulting room for a while.’

Conradda, apprised over the telephone by Laura of the probable reason for the invitation, accepted it with alacrity, but warned her that if Vittorio was also ‘in the business, although I do not know anyone of that name,’ he would know her by repute if not by sight.

‘I might call myself Leah Cohen, don’t you think?’ she suggested. Laura said firmly that Dame Beatrice would not like that.

‘Besides, Honfleur knows you, even if this Italian does not. Anyway, we mustn’t go in for subterfuge,’ she said. ‘Not ethical.’

‘Business precautions, that is all,’ said the Jewess. ‘Will it be a good dinner? I do not insist upon kosher food.’

Vittorio was a tiny, monkey-like little man, sinuous and very thin. When the introduction was made, it seemed, surprisingly, that Conradda’s name meant nothing at all to the olive-skinned, shifty-eyed Italian: if he was the expert he seemed to be – there was no doubt, from the conversation over cocktails and again at the table, that he certainly knew a great deal about antiques of all kinds – it was odd, to say the least, that he had not heard of Conradda, who was a well-known figure at all the important auctions, besides being a collector in her own right. There was no obvious reason for him to dissemble. Although Conradda could drive a hard bargain, she was known to be scrupulously fair in her trade dealings, even refusing to take advantage of the ignorant beyond what she called ‘my pickings, because I have had to pay for my knowledge on my way up, so only right I should expect just a small profit, don’t you think?’

Dame Beatrice, who could always keep several streams of thought, unconnected with one another, in her mind at one and the same time, covertly studied Vittorio while conversing amiably with her host on the subject of his business. Honfleur was in charge of the main booking office of a motor-coach company which ran extended tours, as they were called in the official brochure, to the various scenic or historic parts of England, Wales, Scotland and Eire, and also to France, Germany, Austria and northern Italy. Part of his job (and the pleasantest part, he explained to Dame Beatrice), was to leave his office on occasion in order to follow up the various tours and report upon the hotels which the coaches used for overnight stops en route.

He was a short, powerfully-built man of about fifty-five and gave the impression of being vigorous and capable. Dame Beatrice, however, having once had him as a patient, knew a good deal about him. He always sent her a Christmas card, but beyond that their acquaintanceship had not made any progress until she had received the unexpected invitation to dinner. This, however, explained itself because it was clear, she thought, that it was her delftware and not her company which was important to him.

While she was listening to his description of a trip he had made that summer to two Continental hotels on which his firm desired a confidential report since there had been adverse criticism of them from some of the passengers, she heard the tiny, olive-skinned Vittorio say to Conradda Mendel,

‘You have a personal interest in ceramics?’

‘Oh, I run a general little junk-shop,’ she replied. ‘All is grist to my mill, not only ceramics.’

‘You work in London?’

‘I also have a place in Oxford, but the students, they have no money for nice pictures and china nowadays. I think I shall sell up and perhaps go to Bath.’

‘I wonder whether there is much money in Bath, either? There might be some nice things to pick up there, though, which you could sell in London. Do you have good connections?’

‘I welcome any customers who come in, that is all.’

‘I suppose one has to do that if one keeps a shop. I myself am a free-lance, following my nose and picking up here a little something, there a little something else. I have clients, people who tell me what they want and who trust my judgement. You are not interested particularly in ceramics, you say?’

‘That takes specialised knowledge.’

Dame Beatrice could have explained that a knowledge of ceramics was Conradda’s particular line of country. However, she did not avail herself of the opportunity, but left such a confession to Conradda herself, if she chose to make it, which apparently she did not. Dame Beatrice concluded that such a claim in Conradda’s opinion, since there might be a chance of selling the delftware dishes to Honfleur, might be bad for business. She was secretly amused by this thought and looked forward to being an observer of the various ploys which would be involved when Greek met Greek, or, in this case, when clever Jewess skirmished with wily Italian.

‘I rather wish you were more interested in pottery, because, as a matter of fact,’ said Honfleur, who had finished his description of a new coach he had just put on the road, ‘I wouldn’t be averse to parting with one or two of my own pieces, if you would care to look them over, Miss Mendel.’

‘Oh, but, now, now!’ cried Vittorio. ‘After I go to all that trouble to collect them for you? You break my heart when you say you are willing to part with them.’

‘Well, it’s that Welsh dresser I bought,’ explained his client. ‘It will only hold just so much, if the dishes are to be displayed to advantage. We have some duplicates…’

‘No, never! I do not buy duplicates for you. Those which are something alike are of different years. Look at the marks on the back! You speak of your Bristol delft, no doubt, but consider and do not be so hasty to part with your treasures.’

‘Oh, well,’ said Honfleur pacifically, ‘after dinner we’ll take the pieces down and have a look at the date-marks. I had no idea you’d be so upset at the thought of selling. I might even give one or two of the dishes to you for your own collection. How about that?’

‘Very kind. We shall see when the time comes.’ Vittorio did not sound at all enthusiastic, Dame Beatrice thought. She changed the subject to that of the ex-Emperor Charles V and his Swiss palace full of clocks and this topic lasted the company for the rest of the meal.

After coffee had been served amid conversation which did not include the subject of ceramics, an adjournment was made to the kitchen. Honfleur’s was not a large house, but all the rooms were spacious, the kitchen not less so than the rest.

‘I call it the kitchen, but, of course, no cooking is done in it,’ said the host. ‘Most of my food comes in ready cooked from outside, except for my breakfast. I go to the Regal for that, and quite often, if I’m not entertaining at home, I go there for dinner too. Well, what do you think of the set-up?’

‘Remarkable,’ said Dame Beatrice, gazing around at the furnishings. ‘Most interesting.’

There were two immediately impressive objects in the room. One was a tremendous kitchen table, but even more noticeable, because of its loaded shelves, was the magnificent Welsh dresser. On its three shelves, the lowest of which was formed of a dozen very small drawers, each with its rounded wooden knob, were arranged Honfleur’s collection of plates and dishes.

‘The dresser is large, but not large enough. That’s my trouble. There isn’t room enough on the dresser itself to display the whole collection,’ he said.

‘Why don’t you show the best pieces in your dining-room?’ asked Dame Beatrice. ‘Surely that would be a suitable setting?’

‘Oh, no, not in my view. If I had gone in for figures and vases and that sort of thing, I would have had them displayed elsewhere, but plates and dishes belong in the kitchen and nowhere else.’

‘You could spread the extra pieces out on this table, couldn’t you?’ asked Conradda. ‘It would take a dozen large plates or dishes at least.’

‘People might handle them. I wouldn’t want that. They are hardly likely to reach up and take a dish off the dresser shelves, but it’s asking too much of human nature not to pick up a plate which is lying out on a table and take a look at it. You simply cannot keep people’s fingers off things if it’s possible to handle them.’

‘So you will not take your dishes down for us?’

‘Oh, I had intended to do that. Vittorio, the step-ladder.’

He mounted it when it was brought in from the adjoining scullery and took down in turn three dishes from the top shelf.

‘Leeds creamware, about…’ he turned the first one over.

‘1780,’ said Vittorio. ‘The strange bird in black overglaze is quite typical of the period. A good piece, not especially notable. Now this I like better, perhaps because it is of earlier date.’ He handed the second dish to Dame Beatrice.

‘1760, or thereabouts,’ said Honfleur, ‘Derby Heart-Shaped. No other factory used this particular underglaze of blue. Chinese motifs, as you see – a pagoda, some rather strange trees, a spray of flowers and, of course, a fenced bridge.’

‘Reminiscent of the willow-pattern china of my childhood,’ said Dame Beatrice, handing back the dish.

‘The third dish,’ said Vittorio, ‘I find very pleasing. Worcester, as you see, and dating between 1770 and five years later. Very rich style of painting round the border in dark blue and gold, the scene in the middle done by somebody else, probably by Jefferyes Hamett O’Neale. Almost as good as a signature is this style of his. A charming scene, do you not think? Observe the house with its twin towers, the lake, the heavy trees, the hills in the background and the suggestion of a rocky island where the central painting meets the fruit and birds at the bottorn of the border. Nice, wouldn’t you say?’

Next the visitors were shown the plates which occupied the two lower shelves. Once or twice Conradda, as though instinctively, stretched out a hand to take one of the plates either from Honfleur or from Vittorio, but each time neither man appeared to be conscious of the appealing gesture; both handed the piece to Dame Beatrice.

When all the plates had been admired and descriptions and details of them provided, Conradda said:

‘And now what about the pieces you say you have not room to display? The dresser is nice and I am curious to know what is hidden away in those cupboards and drawers.’

The Welsh dresser was well furnished with the receptacles she mentioned. There were three deep drawers side by side below the succession of small ones which formed the bottom shelf, and below the middle one of the three deep drawers were three more, the lowest of which, except for the skirting planks, reached the floor. On either side of these middle drawers were cupboards of considerable size.

‘Oh, there’s nothing more to see,’ said Honfleur, ‘except the less important china and the cutlery I keep for everyday use.’ He pulled open the drawers and the cupboard doors and proved the truth of his words. Conradda turned to other items of interest. On one of the walls was a fine collection of carved wooden love-spoons, the traditional gifts which young Welshmen in former times had presented to young women whom they expected to marry.

Dame Beatrice had seen modern replicas of such spoons, much less intricately fashioned, which were sold to tourists, but those on Honfleur’s wall were museum pieces, delightful things which must have occupied hours of patient and loving work.

She showed so much interest in them that Honfleur took each one down so that she could examine it more minutely. Conradda became restless and went apart to talk to Vittorio, who also showed no interest in the spoons.

‘1856,’ he said. ‘Well, around that time. Of nothing but local interest, I think. What of your friend’s two chargers? I see she has placed them on the table. Are they for sale, do you know?’

‘I could not say. You might make an offer, I suppose.’

Vittorio approached the other two with the intention of doing this. Honfleur turned round to him and said,

‘Put Dame Beatrice’s chargers on the dresser, so that they show to the best advantage.’

Vittorio moved two of the pieces and then, with an eye to colour and size, placed the delftware in what seemed to him a pleasing position on the shelves. Conradda expressed her approval.

‘Very nice,’ she said.

‘Is that where you would have placed them?’ asked Vittorio, surveying his arrangement by standing further back with his head on one side. ‘I think I like them like that. Now we get to business, perhaps, if Dame Beatrice is willing to part with the chargers.’

‘She has already agreed to part with them,’ said Honfleur.

‘But there has been no talk!’ said Conradda, scandalised.

‘Plenty of talk,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘Mr Honfleur is going to take the platters in exchange for the love-spoons.’

‘Well!’ exclaimed the experts with, as it seemed, one voice. Dame Beatrice cackled and Honfleur laughed.

‘Oh, well,’ said Conradda philosophically, ‘it was a very nice dinner. A lot to drink, too.’ With this naive observation she went upstairs.

‘And,’ said Vittorio, ‘I did not collect those wooden spoons for him, so it is not the spoons I regret, but only the loss of a little business and a little fun. What does it mean, in English sport, to be given the wooden spoon?’

‘This, as it happens, was Welsh sport,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘These particular spoons are love-spoons.’

‘Love? Ah, we understand it well, we Italians. I kiss my hand to these spoons.’ He did so.

‘To be handed the wooden spoon is an English metaphor signifying that one or one’s team has come last in a sporting contest,’ explained Honfleur.

‘Like this cricket, which I do not pretend to follow?’

‘What with bouncers, body-line and one-day, limited-over games, they’ve ruined cricket,’ stated Honfleur. ‘At one time it was a gentleman’s pastime, but nowadays you injure the batsman or frighten him to death. Soon there won’t be stroke-play any more. It will be a case of the long handle and he who ducks quickest lasts longest. Look at this knock-out tournament of sixty overs an innings! Disgraceful! A travesty of a once glorious and classic game.’

‘If you are right, knock-out appears to be an appropriate word,’ said Dame Beatrice. Vittorio shook his head.

‘I do not understand this cricket,’ he said. Dame Beatrice, summing him up, decided that he understood it in neither the literal nor the figurative sense. Honfleur began tedious explanation of what he called ‘the finer points of the game’ and this was interrupted by the reappearance of Conradda from upstairs.

‘Well, it is getting late,’ said Dame Beatrice, glancing at her writwatch, ‘and I have a forty-mile drive.’

‘I came by train,’ said Conradda, ‘but I have booked in at a hotel for the night.’

‘Which one? Perhaps I could drive you there,’ said Vittorio. ‘I have my car here.’

‘The Parkway, a private hotel in Parks Road.’

‘Then you permit me?’ said Vittorio. ‘I have to go along Parks Road to reach my lodging.’

Honfleur bade his guests goodnight, Dame Beatrice, who had given her chauffeur a rough estimate of the time she would be leaving, got into her own car and was taken back to the Stone House just outside the Hampshire village of Wandles Parva and Conradda and Vittorio went off together. They seemed to have formed an alliance.

On the following morning Dame Beatrice received a telephone call while she was finishing her breakfast.

‘It’s from Conradda Mendel,’ said Laura, who had risen from the table to take the call. ‘She sounds urgent and agitato.’

‘That man Vittorio,’ said Conradda, when Dame Beatrice went to the telephone, ‘was asking me last night whether you are interested in Chinese art. I am cautious, as you know, so I asked him what kind of Chinese art. He says mostly ceramics, although there are carpets and some jade. I stalled, of course, until I found out what he had in his mind. So he asked me if I would like to see what he has. He thought Mr Honfleur might like it, but Mr Honfleur does not like the price. This Italian says he thinks you might be a better bet. Well, I go with him to his digs and he pours me a drink and I say I cannot stay long because my hotel closes at midnight and I do not want to knock people up, so while we are having this drink he says he will show me one or two things which may be of interest and if I get you to buy he will let me have something on the cheap, a really nice price, for my shop.’

‘Is that sort of offer usual?’

‘Not unusual, if a favour is being done. Well, I made no promises, of course, but I said I would like to see what he had to show me, but not carpets. He showed me the collection of jade first. Jade is nice, but there was nothing of any great interest and I did not betray any enthusiasm. I think this made him a little bit desperate. He said, “Well, I have some nice pots.”

Conradda paused as though to allow Dame Beatrice to comment, but all she heard from the other end was:

‘Oh, yes?’

‘Do you think anybody can tap this line?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘Are you alone?’

‘Yes, quite alone. The servants are in the kitchen and Laura is in the dining-room finishing her breakfast.’

‘Good. I shall speak quietly, like this. Are you able to hear?’

‘Perfectly. You are making my flesh creep.’

‘So mine when I saw what was shown me. You know that I have made a special study of ceramics?’

‘I noticed that you were careful not to say so when we were at Basil Honfleur’s house.’

‘It does not do to say too much. Dame Beatrice, I was shown such articles as nobody unknown to the trade could have come by honestly. There was T’ang, there was Famille Rose of Ch’ien Lung period, there was enamelled porcelain of Chia Ching period, Famille Verte of K’ang Hsi period, painted stoneware of Sung dynasty. I have seen nothing like it outside a museum or perhaps the very best of private collections. It is fabulous.’

‘Why could it not have been come by honestly?’

‘Because I have seen descriptions very like some of these pieces before. You know where? In the lists the police issue to people in my line of business. Of course I shall not split on him because I do not want to cause trouble. Also I have not time to spare in police courts.’

‘But, my dear Miss Mendel, if you are sure these things are stolen, you might be in trouble yourself if you do not report your findings.’

‘I shall say nothing. I do not wish to get my throat cut. That Vittorio is an assassin. All I say to you is this: however nice a price he asks you, do not buy.’