Losing Ground Read online

‘Who they?’ asked Detective Constable Crosby predictably.

  ‘A nouveau riche couple – he married money – wanting the world to know how well they’d done,’ said Fixby-Smith.

  ‘There’s a lot of that about,’ said Crosby.

  Not as much, thought Sloan to himself, if the Proceeds of Crime Act got to them first. He had high hopes of this new piece of legislation – and the Assets Recovery Agency – succeeding with the fraud case he was working on now. When he could get to it, that is.

  ‘In 1748 in the case of the Andrews,’ added Fixby-Smith, pedantically. ‘I’m not sure offhand of the date of Peter de Vesey’s portrait of Sir Francis Filligree.’

  ‘Nothing changes, anyway,’ said Crosby, patently unimpressed.

  Hilary Collins kept her gaze on the damaged door to the gallery. ‘I believe the view of the house in the painting was thought to be an unusual one. We will have a photograph of it in our records – I’ll look it out for you, Inspector.’

  Detective Inspector Sloan looked up alertly. ‘Unusual?’

  ‘As Mr Fixby-Smith has pointed out,’ she said with careful loyalty, ‘it was – I mean, is – typical for its time but I see from their notes that there was something our predecessors here in the museum found noteworthy when they accessed it all those years ago…’

  Detective Inspector Sloan listened with attention as Hilary Collins balanced the difficult tightrope between tact and toadying. The curator obviously hadn’t found anything interesting about the portrait at all.

  ‘It was the particular view of the house,’ she said. ‘Apparently Tolmie Park couldn’t be seen in the ordinary way later – certainly not in our time – from the aspect in the painting.’ Unlike that of the curator, Hilary Collins’ mousecoloured hair didn’t need tossing about to make a point. ‘Not afterwards.’

  ‘Afterwards?’ queried Sloan.

  ‘After some subsequent improvements by Humphry Repton,’ she said.

  ‘And the Victorians,’ snapped the curator. ‘Mustn’t forget them. If they could ever be said to have improved anything.’

  ‘Later drawings and photographs always show the front of the house flat on,’ persisted Hilary Collins in a detached way.

  ‘Full frontal,’ murmured Detective Constable Crosby almost – but not quite – inaudibly.

  ‘And the view in the portrait?’ asked Sloan swiftly. Informality might be the watchword for today’s policing but it could go too far.

  ‘If my memory is right, Inspector,’ said Hilary Collins, primly ignoring the detective constable’s observation, ‘that showed the house as seen from the south-east as it was in the beginning.’

  ‘Before Humphry Repton got his hands on the landscape.’ The curator reasserted himself with practised ease. ‘There should be one of his little red books about it here in the museum somewhere.’

  ‘Really, sir?’ The only little red book that Sloan knew about had political rather than architectural connections but all information was grist to the police mill. He tucked the fact away in the back of his mind. ‘Now, about your alarm system here…’

  Hilary Collins waved a hand in the direction of the window but before they could get near enough to look at it Detective Inspector Sloan’s personal mobile telephone started to ring.

  It was Superintendent Leeyes from the police station at Berebury on the other end of the line. ‘Get yourselves over to Tolmie Park as quickly as you can, Sloan,’ he commanded. ‘The house there is on fire.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  Somewhere where they most definitely did think of change as progress was at the firm of Berebury Homes Ltd. The local development and construction company had its offices in Berebury’s business quarter down by the river. A Project Team meeting was in progress there now.

  There were four people present. One of them, Robert Selby, their financial controller, was in full voice. As was usual with those of that ilk, the money man was downplaying anything in the nature of good news. Since the others there knew only too well of Selby’s infinite capacity to cast a decided blight on any proceedings involving money, the downside of what he had to say was accordingly discounted by them all.

  ‘So the finance for the Tolmie Park development project is now at an important juncture…’ Selby was saying, tapping the notes on the table in front of him for greater emphasis, when he was interrupted by the arrival of Lionel Perry, Chairman and Managing Director of Berebury Homes, Ltd.

  ‘Sorry to be late, everybody,’ Perry said breezily, slipping into the empty chair at the top of the table. Hung on the wall behind him was a photograph of Mont Blanc, the Swiss mountain. ‘Puncture. Haven’t had one for ages. Do carry on Robert. You were saying something about Tolmie Park, I think…’

  ‘Yes, Lionel,’ lumbered on Robert Selby ponderously, ‘I was just about to point out that the development there is only going to come right financially if we get planning permission for the whole area from the word go to do it our way.’ He looked round at them all. ‘I hope that you all realise that. Otherwise…’

  ‘I’m sure they do,’ said Lionel Perry. He glanced round with a quick complicit smile at all the others. ‘That’s very important.’

  ‘And getting planning permission itself costs a lot as well,’ continued Robert Selby, his pencil still beating a steady tattoo on the outside of his file. Like the chairman, he was dressed in a sober business suit. On the wall behind him was a photograph of the Jungfrau.

  ‘Bean counter,’ whispered Derek Hitchin, their project manager.

  Selby, who hadn’t heard him, carried on. ‘I’ve got my people working on some additional figures now but as you know Section 106 agreements are no help to man nor beast.’

  ‘Would someone please have the goodness to explain to me what a Section 106 agreement is?’ Auriole Allen was the only woman present at the meeting and didn’t pretend to be knowledgeable about building development, only about advertising and public relations. The photograph behind her chair was of the Silberhorn bathed in the evening Alpenglow.

  ‘Legally binding agreements between local authorities and developers and landowners,’ spelt out Robert Selby.

  She looked bewildered. ‘But we own the land at Tolmie and we’re also the developers of it, aren’t we?’

  ‘Too right, we are,’ said Selby sourly. ‘That means it’s just us and them.’

  ‘I don’t think any of us need any reminding of the initial costs, Robert,’ intervened Perry, effortlessly resuming the lead. ‘It’s not new. It happens every time we start talking about a major development project like this.’

  He might not have spoken, so quickly did Selby go back to his theme. ‘And quite apart from the application charges, Lionel, there’s what Berebury Council are going to sting us for in the way of all the new roads they’ll want putting in,’ he persisted. ‘Let alone roundabouts.’

  ‘Require us to put in, you mean,’ said Derek Hitchin, giving a little snort. He was a short peppery man and the mud-spattered donkey-jacket he affected was as much a statement as what he was saying. The photograph on the wall behind his chair was as craggy as his personality: the north face of the Eiger. ‘At least they’re not charging us for planning gain any more.’

  ‘But you all know that roundabouts cost a bomb, too,’ said Robert Selby, reasserting his role as the finance man. ‘You’re talking big money there.’

  ‘They’ll want one of those where our land meets the road to the village.’ Derek Hitchin banged the pile of papers on the table in front of him and said sharply, ‘Bound to. We all know that the existing entrance won’t do, coming out on a blind corner like it does. May I point out, too, Lionel, that straightforward outline planning permission is not the only thing that this Tolmie Park undertaking is dependent on. Don’t forget that the final planning footprint isn’t even fixed yet.’

  ‘Go on,’ said Lionel Perry, stealing a surreptitious glance at his wristwatch. He was due on the first tee of Berebury Golf Course in exactly ninety minutes’ time but had no i
ntention of saying so.

  ‘And if we don’t get enabling permission for the land beyond the ditch…’ resumed Hitchin.

  ‘The ha-ha, if you don’t mind,’ put in a man called Randolph Mansfield in a pained voice. He was an architect and had never taken to wearing a collar and tie. He did, though, favour shaggy pale blue denim trousers that he thought made him look younger than he was and really with it. ‘It’s called a ha-ha, not a ditch and it’s designed to make gardens look bigger while keeping the livestock out.’

  Derek Hitchin pointedly ignored him, going on, ‘As I was saying, we must get planning permission for all the land beyond the ditch, outside the village envelope or not. We need it to make the project viable. Every bit of it.’

  ‘The Muster Green, you mean,’ put in the chairman, demonstrating how conversant he was with the matter in hand.

  ‘If we don’t get planning permission for the Muster Green on top of the go-ahead for the rest of the parkland then we won’t be able to do anything with the old heap because we won’t have enough decent access to satisfy the Highways people and that’s that,’ finished Derek Hitchin flatly. ‘Knockdown bargain or not.’

  Auriole Allen stirred uneasily and said, ‘Derek, as the person in charge of press and public relations in this firm, might I point out that it would be as well if we avoided referring to Tolmie Park…’

  ‘What’s left of it,’ interrupted Derek Hitchin, quite unrepentant.

  ‘What’s left of it, then,’ conceded Auriole Allen, ‘as an old heap.’

  It was house policy to keep the belligerent Derek Hitchin, their very able but distinctly short-fused project manager, away from as many outside contacts as possible. His abrasive manner worked very well with sub-contractors and suppliers; it went down less well with officials and local councillors.

  And the press. Especially the press.

  Auriole Allen turned on a winning professional smile and went on, ‘The local papers might get to hear of it and you know what they’re like when they sense a row. And then before you can say knife, it’s in all the nationals.’

  ‘Auriole’s right, of course,’ said Lionel Perry peaceably, well aware that there was nothing the combative Hitchin liked better than a row.

  With anyone. With everyone.

  ‘Not a good idea, Derek,’ he went on easily. Lionel Perry was the very embodiment of a company chairman. Silver-haired and silver-tongued, and of a notably benevolent mien, he photographed well and knew it. It was Lionel Perry’s face that figured on the firm’s advertisements and promotional brochures. It was an image that was worth a lot.

  ‘Don’t forget, Derek, that the history of the bank’s involvement in Tolmie Park has been kept out of the papers.’

  ‘So far,’ Auriole Allen reminded them tautly. ‘Only so far. Don’t forget that you can never be quite sure what the press know but aren’t going to print until the time’s ripe. They’re very good at that.’

  ‘The Calleshire and Counties Bank won’t thank us for making it public anyway,’ said the chairman.

  Robert Selby sniffed. ‘Too right, they won’t. Their Douglas Anderson has always been a bit tight-lipped about what happened there.’

  Lionel Perry added lightly, ‘And you never know when we’re going to need some extra finance from them ourselves.’

  ‘Worse than the press,’ Robert Selby came back smartly in his customary role as Cassandra, ‘is that the Berebury Council’s conservation people might get to hear that Derek here thinks the house an old heap. You know what they’re like with their precious listed buildings.’

  ‘You don’t have to tell me,’ grumbled Randolph Mansfield. ‘They behave as if every single old building in the county of Calleshire belonged to them.’ Even though strictly speaking he was the firm’s architect, Mansfield was still a man with his own ideas about what should be done with all buildings – old and new.

  ‘But they talk about them as if they’re ours all right whenever hard cash comes into it,’ snapped the finance director. ‘They’re not theirs then. Oh, dear me, no. When it comes to paying anything out, then they’re ours.’

  ‘Ours? I ask you!’ spluttered Derek Hitchin, ‘when they won’t let you lay a single finger on them without their permission. Ours, indeed!’

  ‘Which in the broadest sense,’ said the chairman calmly, ‘I suppose they are, since we all live in Calleshire and enjoy them.’

  Of all those present only Auriole Allen appreciated the public relations value of this anodyne statement. The others ignored it for the guff it was.

  Lionel Perry stroked his chin and said sagely, ‘This Muster Green you’re talking about – I suppose if the worst comes to the worst and we can’t get planning permission for it included with the rest of the land we could always deal with it separately as an ALMO.’

  Auriole Allen sat up smartly and said, ‘I may have the body of a weak and feeble woman but I do have the heart and stomach of a public relations consultant. What in the name of goodness is an ALMO?’

  ‘Arm’s Length Management Operation,’ explained Robert Selby.

  ‘Modus Operandi,’ put in Randolph Mansfield in a long-suffering voice.

  Selby ignored him. ‘And let me tell you, Auriole, an ALMO’s nothing like as profitable as a hands-on one.’

  ‘Easier to manage, though,’ said Derek Hitchin comfortably.

  ‘Less work for you, you mean,’ said Selby uncharitably.

  ‘Less hassle for everybody,’ retorted Hitchin, ‘except that in this case it won’t wash. Our access road goes bang through the middle of it.’

  ‘Now then, guys, ease up,’ said Lionel Perry, very much the chairman. ‘It’s early days and nothing’s settled yet.’

  Before anyone could react to this, there was a tap on the door and a ginger-haired young man appeared, bearing a folder.

  ‘Come in, er…’ said the chairman, who had forgotten the employee’s name. He deliberately avoided catching Auriole Allen’s eye as he said it. He knew without being reminded that he wasn’t any longer allowed to address the young women in the firm as ‘my dear’; he wasn’t even sure now whether ‘my boy’ had actionable overtones too. He decided against saying anything.

  ‘Edward – well, Ned, actually,’ said the young man helpfully, handing over the folder to the Finance Controller. ‘Ned Phillips. I’m new here.’

  ‘Ah, thank you, Ned,’ said Robert Selby, taking the folder from the man and flipping it open. ‘I’ll need these figures presently.’

  ‘You’re settling in well, I hope,’ said the chairman beaming benevolently at the newcomer. ‘Liking it at Berebury Homes and all that?’

  Ned Phillips said politely that he was finding life at Berebury Homes very interesting, thank you. He had a pleasant, unaffected voice and held himself well. He seemed notably unfazed by being in the presence of the firm’s top brass.

  ‘Good, good,’ said Lionel Perry automatically.

  ‘That’s all, Ned, thanks,’ began Robert Selby, looking over the documents and getting ready to resume his dire warnings.

  ‘Just a minute, er – Ned, did you say?’ The chairman began fumbling in his pocket and brought out a bunch of keys. ‘You might just run my car down to Berebury Motors – that’s the garage in the High Street, if you don’t know it – and get them to mend the puncture in my spare wheel. I had a flat on the way in this morning.’

  ‘No problem,’ said Phillips, picking up the keys. ‘It’s the Jaguar in the chairman’s parking bay, isn’t it?’

  Perry nodded. ‘Tell them I need it done pronto. I’ve got another engagement quite soon after this.’

  ‘If you ask me, Randolph,’ said Derek Hitchin, deliberately provocative, as Ned Phillips withdrew, jangling the car keys in his hand, ‘these old buildings are mostly white elephants.’

  ‘Even white elephants have ivory tusks,’ murmured Lionel Perry, almost to himself.

  Hitchin gave another snort and turned back to Robert Selby. ‘Now, a minute or two ago our f
inancial controller was going to tell us something which began with “otherwise”, remember? What was it, Robert? Tell us.’

  ‘Otherwise,’ replied Robert Selby flatly, ‘if we don’t get all the planning permissions we need, not only will we be unable to go ahead with any development at all but we’ll be lumbered with repairing a grade two starred listed building to the local Council’s standards and left in no condition to fight off Calleshire Construction’s hostile approaches or those of anyone else who takes it into their head that we’re ripe for development. That’s right, Randolph, isn’t it?’

  Nobody, but nobody, called the architect “Randy”.

  ‘Not just repairing it,’ Randolph Mansfield, the architect, came back in on the instant. ‘Restoring it, which is very different. And worse. Much worse.’

  ‘Then I’m afraid you’d be talking big money,’ said Robert Selby. ‘Really big.’

  ‘There’s just one other thing,’ Lionel Perry picked up a piece of paper on the table in front of him, ‘which I think I should bring to your attention. Someone called Stuart Bellamy…’ he paused, looked round the table and asked, ‘Does that name ring any bells with anyone?’

  There was a concerted shaking of heads.

  ‘Anyway, this Stuart Bellamy, whoever he is, wants to buy Tolmie Park and all the accompanying land.’

  ‘Just like that?’ said Derek Hitchin.

  ‘Just like that,’ said Lionel Perry richly. ‘He says that if we would be kind enough to refer him to whoever it is who handles our legal matters, he will supply the appropriate references and so forth and then make us an offer.’

  ‘He does, does he?’ said Derek Hitchin.

  Robert Selby, ever the finance man, frowned. ‘He could be a straw man for Calleford Construction. I wouldn’t put anything past them.’

  This brought all the others up with a jerk. Calleford Construction Ltd had been jockeying for some time to be in a position from which to execute a takeover of Berebury Homes.

  ‘That’s a thought, Robert,’ frowned Lionel Perry. ‘Although I must say this approach doesn’t look – well, big enough for that. It could just be some nutter trying to have us on.’