“Now, here’s a nice one.” Browne tried to foist Andy Warhol on him.
“No.” Melrose pulled down some lackluster study on Flemish art, then reshelved it. Only one book bore at all on the subject-that is, to get the subject going: Early Renaissance Art. He started thumbing through the thick slick pages. “Ah. Brunelleschi… Donatello… Masolino…” he read in a whisper.
“What are you looking for, Mr. Plant?”
“Italian Renaissance paintings.” And he continued in that reverent way: “Giotto… Masaccio…”
“Oh!” said Theo, happy to recognize a name, happier to have bad news to impart. “Mr. Trueblood’s so-called painting.”
“ ‘So-called’?” Melrose managed to look confused. “I don’t know why you say that. We’ve just got back from Florence.” He turned back to the book and muttered, “The Church of San Giovenale a Carcia-”
“And-?” Theo prompted him.
“And what?”
“You said you just got back from Florence.”
“That’s right.” Melrose continued his whispered communion with the book. “San Gimignano… Monteriggioni…” The pages fluttered. Melrose hadn’t the vaguest notion what he was doing. But he had some dim idea that it would come to him.
Frustrated, Theo insisted. “You said you just got back from Florence.”
“Uh-huh.”
“But you said it as if that explained something.”
“Florence-” Melrose paused. “Florence explains everything!” He clapped an arm about Browne’s shoulders, a gesture that completely stumped Theo. He tried to step back, but Melrose had him in a lock.
“The Brancacci Chapel!” Here Melrose threw out his other arm and drew, between thumb and forefinger, a banner in air and, as if reading the print thereon, exclaimed, “The Brancacci Chapel! You’ve seen it, of course?”
“I? Uh, no, no. Now if you’d just let me get back to-”
Melrose’s arm tightened and he began to walk both of them to the store’s big bay window. “Imagine!” he exclaimed. Across the street were his friends seated at their favorite table-Trueblood, Diane Demorney, Joanna the Mad, Vivian Rivington. “Imagine we are within this glorious chapel, face-to-face with the frescoes. Just close your eyes-”
Theo didn’t want to.
“And imagine seeing Adam and Eve and the expulsion from Paradise.” Trueblood had his head in his hands much like the figure of Adam, and Joanna, her head thrown back in a rictus of laughter that bore a stunning resemblance to Eve’s howl. Melrose was rather enjoying this reenactment. “Then we have Tribute Money-” Dick Scroggs had entered the perimeter of the window. “Next, we have St. Peter Healing the Sick with his Shadow.” Melrose made a wiping motion with his hand, as if scenes were appearing and disappearing, as if they were watching a dumb show. Mrs. Withersby hove into view, the veritable model for the poor wretch begging for St. Peter’s help. In the case of Withersby, it was bumming cigarettes and whatever else life had on offer.
“Uh, Mr. Plant, I think, yes, I think that’s my phone ringing!”
Melrose hugged him closer. “Let it ring, let it ring. Let me tell you about San Gimignano-” And Melrose did so, told him about San Gimignano and Siena, in mind-withering detail, all the while enclosing the bookseller in an iron grip. Finally, he released him and said, “I must be on my way. Coming to the pub, are you?”
“Uh, no. No, I think not. Not this evening.” He took several steps backward.
“Pity. Good evening, then.” Melrose whistled himself out the door.
“Good lord, Melrose! Where have you been? We’re all dining at Ardry End tonight. It’s Christmas Eve.” Diane Demorney made these announcements as if they had just then come to mind unbidden by outside exigency. “Are we exchanging presents tonight, then?”
Marshall Trueblood lit a cigarette. “You mean for what you actually want?”
“Very funny. But were we to get something for everyone? That would make-” she counted the people around the table by actually pointing her finger. “If Agatha’s coming, that’s, let’s see, six. If everyone is to give everyone else a gift, that’s-” Running out of fingers, she squeezed her eyes and put her hand to her forehead.
Joanna said, “Count me out, Diane. I’ve got to be on my way to Devon this afternoon. Promised I’d turn up for Christmas dinner tomorrow.”
“Where in Devon?” Diane asked, not happy with a further refinement on a problem she hadn’t yet solved.
“Exmoor.”
Diane’s martini actually stopped on its way to her mouth. “Exmoor? But people don’t live there, do they? It’s a moor.”
“You’ve never been righter, Diane.”
People waited patiently, for Diane’s present count. Finally, Vivian said, “Diane, if there are six people and all six are giving each of the others a gift, then-” Vivian made an encouraging noise.
“Easy for you to say, Vivian, you’ve already done yours.”
“That’s beside the point; the point is the number.”
Melrose wished he was back in the Brancacci Chapel. “Actually, there will be seven, not six.”
Diane looked as if he had thrown the final spanner in the works. “Who else?”
“I’ve invited Mr. Steptoe.”
They all looked blank.
“Our new greengrocer.”
They still looked blank. Finally, Vivian said, “That’s sweet of you Melrose. He can get to know people.”
“Yes, I thought so.”
From the bar, where he was reading the Sidbury paper, Dick Scroggs called over, “Don’t see your horoscope column today, Miss Demorney.”
“The stars are on holiday, Dick.”
“No presents,” said Melrose. “You have to do that on your own, go house to house, or whatever.”
Diane heaved a sigh of relief, tapped a red fingernail against her empty martini glass and gave Dick Scroggs a little wave. “Did you set a time, Melrose? I mean will we be having drinkies beforehand?”
“We’re having drinkies beforehand right now.” He smiled. “But, yes, more drinkies will be on offer this evening. Come at seven.”
Forty-eight
Richard Jury reached over to the ice bucket Ruthven had left, at Jury’s request, plucked up a cube and dropped it in his whiskey. He had inclined lately toward as bitter a cold as he could get-cold walks, cold drinks, cold rooms, bitter and anesthetizing cold. He did not know why other than wanting to arm himself against the specter of Christmas past, present and probably future. He did not like Christmas; he felt depleted by it.
“That’s a thirty-year-old single malt you’re watering down,” said Melrose Plant. They were seated in comfortable chairs next to the fire.
“It’ll be gone before the ice melts. Now, back to St. Jerome.”
“I think it’s John, St. John.”
“You didn’t see whatever’s left of this polyptych in the church in Pisa?”
“It’s no longer there. That’s part of the point. Parts have found their way into various churches and museums in Europe. And some of the panels are still missing.”
Jury nodded and drank his whiskey. “What’s this dealer’s name?”
“Jasperson. The woman who’s selling them is named Amy Eccleston.”
Jury leaned over and set his empty glass on the table. “I’d like a word with Jasperson. Do you have his number?”
“Here.” Melrose handed over a card from his jacket pocket.
“Where’s the phone?” Jury rose.
Melrose waved him down. “No, sit down. Ruthven can bring it.” Melrose pressed the enamel button beneath the table beside his chair.