The Devil in Disguise (3 page)

Matthew winked at Harry and whispered in the woman's ear, ‘We have company, darling.'

She looked over her shoulder and blushed. Plump, with a plain but pleasant face, she reminded Harry of a farmer's wife. He estimated that she was in her mid-thirties, rather older than Matthew. ‘I did warn you that we shouldn't mix business with pleasure.'

To his surprise, she spoke with a slight German accent. Well, a Bavarian farmer's wife, then. Harry was flummoxed: he would have guessed that Matthew's taste was for leggy Sloane Rangers. Matthew disentangled himself from her and strode forward to offer Harry his hand. A half-forgotten phrase sprang to Harry's mind:
the tranquil consciousness of effortless superiority
. This fellow made the average cucumber look hot and bothered.

‘Sorry to barge in on you.'

‘No harm done. Inge is quite right. I should have allowed her to carry on sorting out the eats. May I introduce the two of you, by the way? Darling, this is the Trust's solicitor, Harry Devlin. Harry, meet my girlfriend, Inge Frontzeck.'

‘Oh.' Okay, so he'd misjudged the scene. But why did her surname sound familiar?

The woman smiled. ‘Hello. I do hope you weren't offended a moment ago.'

‘No, no. Really. Not at all.'

Matthew grinned. With his floppy fair hair and amiable manner, it was easy to picture him in a straw boater and striped blazer, punting a girl in a summer frock down the Isis. He was an investment consultant and, having met him at some cocktail party for the great and the good, Luke had persuaded him to become a trustee. He was the younger son of Lord Gralam, but although the family home was in Surrey, he had moved up North the previous summer. Luke had assured Harry that Matthew was anxious to shun the limelight, to the point of being almost a recluse. But just at the moment there were no signs that he was easily embarrassed in the presence of others.

‘We're the ones who should apologise. You must have thought we were enacting a scene taken from the club's private collection. I have been a bit naughty, I suppose. I told Luke that I felt it would be a good idea for us to bring caterers in since the club's facilities are, frankly, rather limited. Inge is in the business and I asked her if she wouldn't mind helping us out. A bit incestuous, perhaps, but it wasn't exactly a big enough contract to be put out to tender.'

‘I quite understand,' Harry said hastily. ‘Very good idea. Excellent.'

Inge beamed. ‘I suppose I'd better leave you two to it, then.' She wagged a finger at Matthew. ‘And no more distractions!'

She disappeared through a door into an anteroom and Matthew motioned Harry into a deep leather armchair. ‘I don't think you'll be disappointed in the service or the food, Harry. Of course, this is only a sideline. Inge doesn't need to work. But it keeps her out of mischief. Or at least it does if I'm not around.'

‘Frances has spoken to you about Luke, I gather,' Harry said.

‘Ye-es,' Matthew drawled. ‘I must admit, I wasn't quite sure why she was getting so steamed up.' He yawned and started to take papers out of a leather briefcase which bore his initials in gold. ‘Oh well, what have we got on the agenda tonight? The usual begging letters from gay and lesbian watercolourists, another approach from that docker who re-wrote
Hamlet
in Scouse dialect?'

‘Vera Blackhurst is the main item on the agenda.'

Matthew's face darkened but before he could speak, the door was flung open and a breezy voice said, ‘Evening, folks.'

Roy Milburn's dark hair was tousled and his tie askew. His cheeks were flushed and, as usual, he was accompanied by a whiff of alcohol. He walked with a noticeable limp, the legacy of a recent crash when he'd driven his old banger into a lamp-post after a night on the ale. Although he was only in his early thirties, the broken blood vessels on his nose and the dark rings under his eyes made him look ten years older. Yet despite that and his developing paunch, he always reminded Harry of an impish schoolboy.

Roy looked around the room. ‘Nice place, even if it is a bit spooky. I'm sure I saw two corpses playing whist downstairs. Any chance of a squint at the dirty books after we've finished? After all, we're famous for being dedicated to the cause of the arts in Merseyside.'

Matthew's eyes gleamed. ‘The collection is reserved for the eyes of members and bona fide students only, I'm afraid.'

‘Very unfair, when you remember we're all donating our valuable time out of the goodness of our hearts. There's no bloody money in it for us, so surely there ought to be some perks.' He turned to Harry and grinned. ‘And how's my favourite legal eagle? Did I ever tell you why they bury lawyers under twenty feet of dirt?'

‘Go on,' Harry said gloomily. Roy had an inexhaustible supply of lawyer jokes.

‘Because deep down, they're really good people.'

Matthew raised his eyebrows as Roy belly-laughed at his own wit but merely said, ‘Do I hear footsteps on the floor? Yes, here are Frances and Tim.'

A large heavily built man in an ill-fitting tweed jacket and shapeless trousers held the door open, ushering Frances through before him. ‘Sorry I'm late,' Tim Aldred said as he shambled towards a vacant chair. His tone was defensive, as though he had an excuse ready to deflect any criticism of his tardiness. ‘Where's the chairman?'

‘A very good question,' Frances said grimly.

‘He's otherwise engaged,' Matthew said. ‘No matter. The catering is all laid on.'

Harry was tempted to say that if he hadn't butted in, the caterer might have been laid, but he thought better of it.

‘Well, that's the important thing,' Roy said. ‘Let's not worry about the Dinosaur, eh?'

‘But where
is
he?' Tim asked. ‘I've never known him miss a meeting before.'

Matthew gave a dismissive wave. ‘Just one of those things. Now, if you don't mind, I might as well ask Inge to serve as we talk. Agreed, everyone? Splendid. Are you sitting comfortably? Then let's begin.'

Chapter 3

As the clock in the corner struck eight, Matthew Cullinan leaned back in his chair and said, ‘If you want my opinion, she is a greedy, mischievous, dishonest, scheming bitch.'

For a few moments, there was a hush. Harry thought that he could hear a faint snoring from the card players downstairs. Then Roy sniggered and said, ‘You really must stop beating about the bush, Matthew. Come right out with it. Why don't you speak your mind?'

Tim Aldred cleared his throat. As usual, his demeanour was so hesitant that Harry found it hard to believe that his role on the board was to represent the performing arts. The average church mouse was a foul-mouthed dissident by comparison. ‘But can we be absolutely sure you are right, Matthew? I only met Vera Blackhurst once, but she struck me as genuinely fond of Charles.'

Matthew expelled a sigh worthy of a long-suffering schoolmaster confronted by the irrational stubbornness of the classroom dunce. ‘Oh really, Tim.'

Tim went pink but said doggedly, ‘I realise this is inconvenient for us, but perhaps Vera swept Charles off his feet.'

‘But what did she see in
him
?' Roy asked.

‘Money,' Frances said drily.

Roy feigned amazement. ‘You're suggesting it wasn't a love-match?'

‘Surely her motives don't matter,' Tim said. ‘If he left the money to her, then there is very little that we can or should do about it.'

‘I think you are missing the point,' Matthew said. ‘It is not just a question of money. With all due respect, Tim, a matter of principle is involved here.'

Tim bowed his head, his resistance crushed. Frances contented herself with studying the papers in front of her. Roy Milburn glanced in Harry's direction and winked.

‘Careful, Matthew. This must be music to Harry's ears. When clients start talking about the importance of principles, I guess Crusoe and Devlin's bank manager starts to sleep a little more easily.'

Frances said, ‘Well, Harry, how do you see things?'

He wiped his brow with his palm. The room was as stuffy as Frances's office but that wasn't the reason he was sweating. It was one thing to advise a recidivist in a remand centre; offering words of wisdom to trustees in a tight corner was more of a challenge. He remembered, too, that Luke believed that one of the people round the table was deceiving him. But who - and why?

‘First,' he began carefully, ‘we need to remember the kind of man Charles Kavanaugh was.'

Matthew grunted and Roy chortled. ‘Exactly,' Harry said in his briskest tone. ‘No-one could deny that Charles was an eccentric. And I suspect that none of us shared his taste in
objets d'art
...'

‘You can say that again,' Roy broke in. ‘Forget about never speaking ill of the dead. Now we aren't beholden to him, let's call a spade a spade. He knew less about art than this chair I'm sitting on. And as for his so-called treasures - let's face it, they are utter crap.'

There was a short embarrassed silence. Harry reflected that Roy had done nothing more than voice the opinion shared privately by all the trustees. Charles Kavanaugh had fancied himself as something of a connoisseur of the arts; he described the substantial Victorian villa in which he lived as his studio and had not only collected pictures and antiques, but also tried his own hand at sketching and painting. Everyone who had ever seen his collection dismissed it as worthless stuff which would give bric-à-brac a bad name. His own pictures were especially deplorable: splodgy landscapes and misshapen nudes composed with a lack of skill that was truly breathtaking. Yet there had always been a tacit understanding that to ridicule them was unthinkable. But now Charles was dead and he had gifted his fortune to a blowsy gold-digger whilst the trustees were left with a house full of junk.

‘You wouldn't be saying that if Luke was here,' Tim said reproachfully. ‘He's always a stickler for the proprieties. And Charles is barely cold in his grave. I rather think the chairman would want us to show our respect.'

Roy said, ‘But the Dinosaur isn't here, so we can all have our say. And frankly, the one thing that has always baffled me is this. How did Charles manage to accumulate so much stuff without even stumbling on anything of the remotest merit?' He laughed. ‘I mean, whatever happened to the law of averages?'

Frances gave him a fierce look and said, ‘Harry, you were interrupted.'

Roy gave an elaborate sigh and picked up his pencil again. He always doodled his way through trustees' meetings, covertly sketching caricatures of his fellow board members. Luke had once caught sight of Roy's portrayal of him as an immaculately groomed Tyrannosaurus Rex and had not been amused. These days he eked out a precarious living as a cartoonist for one of the local free sheets, although he'd trained as an accountant after university before spectacularly failing his exams. On that slender basis, he'd been asked to act as honorary treasurer to the Trust. After glancing at the last balance sheet, Jim had said it was like appointing a train robber as Lord Chief Justice.

Harry said, ‘We've always known that Charles intended to donate his collection of artistic ephemera...'

‘Crap,' Roy murmured, directing a provocative wink at Tim.

‘...or whatever you may like to call it, to the Trust, in the fond belief that the sale proceeds would generate substantial funds. Obviously a fantasy. But he always led everyone to believe that was merely the icing on the cake. He never married, there were no children, nothing but the Trust to carry on the Kavanaugh name. There was every reason for him to leave his estate to the Trust to make sure that it was able to keep up its good work. Until he met Vera Blackhurst.'

‘I still say she's on the make,' Matthew burst in. He thrust out his lower lip, as if daring anyone to disagree. ‘She was a housekeeper, nothing more, the latest in a long line.'

‘A housekeeper with peroxide hair and tits that Juno would die for,' Roy said. ‘Don't underestimate her. She's as tough as a Birkenhead barmaid. Let's face it, she had to be. Living with Charles for forty-eight hours would be enough to send most people off their head.'

‘He wasn't so bad,' Tim said defensively. ‘Granted, he had his funny little ways, but most of us do.'

Roy gave him a withering look but Harry said quickly, ‘Miss Blackhurst's story is absolutely clear. I've discussed the position at length with her solicitor. She's instructed my old boss, Geoffrey Willatt, of Maher and Malcolm.'

‘A very prestigious firm,' Frances said grudgingly.

Harry nodded. Like Jim Crusoe, he'd been recruited by Maher and Malcolm at a time when the demand for trainee solicitors had far exceeded the supply. It had been rather like a couple of kids from Toxteth being offered a scholarship to Eton. ‘And correspondingly pricey. She means business, all right. Geoffrey tells me he's convinced she would make a first class witness, should it ever come to that. Besides, the will is crystal clear.'

‘She made sure of that,' Matthew muttered.

‘Are you suggesting she forged it?' Frances asked.

‘Why not? Charles was a sick man. He'd scarcely had a chance to get to know this Blackhurst woman before he fell ill. Soon he was in a nursing home and never left it again. What had she ever done for him? Yet we're supposed to accept that two days before he died he wrote out a will in her favour in his own fair hand.'

‘It was properly witnessed,' Harry said. ‘There is no question of its being a forgery.'

‘And who were the supposed witnesses? Two part-time care workers who didn't have a clue what they were signing. How can we be sure it was the so-called will that they put their names to? It could have been any scrap of paper.'

Harry shook his head. ‘Sorry, Matthew. Charles told them it was his last will and testament. He even mentioned that he meant to be generous to Vera - because she had been very good to him'.