Page 4 of A Death in Cornwall

“How are they possibly managing?” Julian removed his mackintosh and hung it on the coat tree. He wore a chalk stripe suit and a lavender necktie. His plentiful gray locks were in need of a pruning. “What in heaven’s name is that awful sound?”

“Could be the telephone.”

“Shall I answer it?”

“Do you remember how?”

Frowning, he snatched up the receiver and raised it resolutely to his ear. “Isherwood Fine Arts. Isherwood himself speaking... As a matter of fact, she is. One moment, please.” He managed to place the call on hold without disconnecting it. “It’s Amelia March from ARTnews. She’d like a word.”

“About what?”

“Didn’t say.”

Sarah picked up the phone. “Amelia, darling. How can I be of help?”

“I’d love a comment from you for a rather intriguing story I’m working on.”

“The Charlotte Blake murder?”

“Actually, it concerns the identity of the mysterious art restorer who cleaned the Van Gogh for the Courtauld. You’ll never guess who he is.”

3

Berkeley Square

“Where do you suppose she got the story?”

“It certainly wasn’t me,” said Gabriel. “I never speak to reporters.”

“Unless it suits your purposes, of course.” Chiara gave his hand a gentle squeeze. “It’s all right, darling. You’re entitled to a little recognition after toiling in anonymity all these years.”

Gabriel’s enormous body of work included paintings by Bellini, Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese, Caravaggio, Canaletto, Rembrandt, Rubens, and Anthony van Dyck—all while serving as an undercover operative of Israel’s vaunted secret intelligence service. Isherwood Fine Arts had been complicit in his decades-long deception. Now, having officially retired from the intelligence trade, he was the director of the paintings department at the Tiepolo Restoration Company, the most prominent such enterprise in Venice. Chiara was the firm’s general manager. Which meant that, for all intents and purposes, Gabriel worked for his wife.

They were walking in Berkeley Square. Gabriel wore a mid-length overcoat atop his zippered cashmere sweater and flannel trousers. His Beretta 92FS, which he had carried into the United Kingdom with the approval of his friends in the British security and intelligence services, pressed reassuringly against the base of his spine. Chiara, in stretch trousers and a quilted coat, was unarmed.

She plucked a phone from her handbag. Like Gabriel’s, it was an Israeli-made Solaris model, reputedly the world’s most secure.

“Anything?” he asked.

“Not yet.”

“What do you suppose she’s waiting for?”

“I imagine she’s hunched over her computer trying desperately to put you into words.” Chiara gave him a sidelong look. “An unenviable task.”

“How hard can it be?”

“You’d be surprised.”

“May I offer a more plausible explanation for the delay?”

“By all means.”

“Amelia March, being an ambitious and enterprising reporter, is at this moment fleshing out her exclusive story by gathering additional background material on her subject.”

“A career retrospective?”

Gabriel nodded.

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