The Seventh Scroll - Smith Wilbur - Страница 11
- Предыдущая
- 11/177
- Следующая
he was not afraid to take some extraordinary risks to add to the
collection at Quenton Park.
Duraid had first met him a number of years previously, when Sir Nicholas
had recruited him to act as an intelligence officer for an illicit
expedition to "liberate' a number of Punic bronze castings from
Gadaffi's Libya. Sir Nicholas had sold some of these to defray the
expenses of the expedition, but had kept the best of them for his
private collection.
More recently there had been another expedition, this time involving an
illegal crossing of the Iraqi border to bring out a pair of stone
has-relief friezes from under Saddam Hussein's nose. Duraid had told her
that Sir Nicholas had sold one of the pair for a huge amount of money;
he had mentioned the sum of five million US dollars. Duraid said that he
had used the money for the running of the museum, but that the second
frieze, the finest of the pair, was still in Sir Nicholas's possession.
Both these expeditions had taken place years before Royan had met
Duraid, and she wondered idly at Duraid's readiness to commit himself to
the Englishman in this way.
Sir Nicholas must have had unique powers of persuasion, for if they had
been apprehended in the act there was no doubt that it would have meant
summary execution for both of them.
As Duraid had explained to her, on each occasion it was only Nicholas's
resourcefulness and his network of friends and admirers across the
Middle East and North Africa, which he had been able to call on for
help, that had seen them through.
"He is a bit of a devil," Duraid had shaken his head with evident
nostalgia at the memory, "but the man to have with you when things are
tough. Those days were all very exciting, but when I look back on it now
I shudder at the risks we took."
She had often pondered on the risks that a true inthe-blood collector
was prepared to take to slake his passion. The risk seemed to be out of
proportion to the reward, when it came to adding to his accumulations;
and then she smiled at her own pious sentiments. The venture that she
hoped to lead Sir Nicholas into was not exactly without risk, and she
supposed that a circumlocution of lawyers might debate the legality of
it endlessly.
Still smiling, she fell asleep, for the strain of these last few days
had taken their toll. The air hostess woke her with an admonition to
fasten her seat-belt for the landing at Heathrow.
an phoned her mother from the airport.
ello, Mummy. It's me."
"Yes, I know that. Where are you, love?" Her mother sounded as
unflappable as ever. -'At Heathrow. I am coming up to stay with you for
a while. Is that all right?"
"Lumley's and ," her mother chuckled. "I'll go and make your bed. What
train will you be coming up on?"
"I had a look at the timetable. There is one from King's Cross that will
get me into York at seven this evening."
"I'll meet you at the station. What happened? Did you and Duraid have a
tiff? Old enough to be your father. I said it wouldn't work."
Royan was silent for a moment. This was hardly the time for
explanations. "I'll tell you all about it when I see you this evening."
Georgina Lumley, her mother, was waiting on the platform in the gloom
and cold of the November evening, bulky and solid in her old green
Barbour coat with Magic, her cocker spaniel, sitting obediently at her
feet. The two of them made an inseparable pair, even when they were not
winning field trials cups. For Royan they painted a comforting and
familiar picture of the English side of her lineage.
Georgina kissed Royan's cheek in a perfunctory manner. "Never was one
for all that sentimental fiddle, faddle," she often said with
satisfaction, and she took one of Royan's bags and led the way to the
old mud-splattered Land Rover in the car park.
Magic sniffed Royan's hand and wagged his tail in recognition. Then in a
dignified and condescending manner he allowed her to pat his head, but
like his mistress he was no great sentimentalist either.
. They drove in silence for a while and Georgina lit a cigarette. "So
what happened to Duraid, then?"
For a minute Royan could not reply, and then the floodgates within her
burst and she let it all come pouring out. It was a twenty-minute drive
north of York to the little village of Brandsbury, and Royan talked all
the way.
Her mother made only small sounds of encouragement and comfort, and when
Royan wept as she related the details of Duraid's death and funeral,
Georgina reached across and patted her daughter's hand.
It was all over by the time they reached her mother's cottage in the
village. Royan had cried it out and was dryeyed and rational again as
they ate the dinner that her mother had prepared and left in the oven
for them. Royan could not remember when last she had tasted steak and
kidney pie.
"So what are you going to do now?" Georgina asked as she poured what
remained in the black bottle of Guinness into her own glass.
"To tell the truth, I don't know." As she said it, Royan wondered
ruefully why so many people used that particular phrase to introduce a
lie. "I have six months' leave from the museum, and Prof Dixon has
arranged for me to give a lecture at the university. That is as far as
it goes for the moment."
"Well," said Georgina as she stood up, "there is a hotwater bottle in
your bed and your room is there for as long as you wish to stay." From
her that was as good as a passionate declaration of maternal love.
Over the next few days Royan arranged her slides and notes for the
lectures, and each afternoon she accompanied Georgina and Magic on their
long walks over the surrounding countryside.
"Do you know Quenton Park?" she asked her mother during one of these
rambles.
"Rather," Georgina replied enthusiastically. "Magic and I pick up there
four or five times a season. First-class shoot. Some of the best
pheasant and woodcock in Yorkshire. One drive there called the High
Larches which is notorious. Birds so high they baffle the best shots in
England."
"Do you know the owner, Sir Nicholas Quenton Harper?" Royan asked.
"Seen him at the shoots. Don't know him. Good shot, though," Georgina
replied. "Knew his papa in the old days before I married your father."
She smiled in a suggestive way that startled Royan. "Good dancer. We
danced a few jigs together, not only on the dance floor."
"Mummy, you are outrageous!'Royan laughed.
"Used to be," Georgina agreed readily. "Don't get many opportunities
these days."
"When are you and Magic going to Quenton Park again?"
"Two weeks' time."
"May I come with you?"
"Of course - the keeper is always looking for beaters.
Twenty quid and lunch with a bottle of beer for the day." She stopped
and looked at her daughter quizzically. "What is all this about, then?"
"I hear there is a private museum on the estate. They have a
world-renowned Egyptian collection. I wanted to get a look at it."
"Not open to the public any more. Invitation only. Sir Nicholas is an
odd chap, secretive and all that."
"Couldn't you get an invitation for me?" Royan asked, but Georgina shook
- Предыдущая
- 11/177
- Следующая
