Piper stared at both of them hard, with his weird, cold eyes. For some moments he drummed a rat-a-tat-tat beat on the top of his desk with his manicured nails, then he opened his arms expansively and pointed at some of the pictures around the walls, before zeroing in on one. ‘Recognize this person?’

  It was a head and shoulders portrait of an arrogant-looking man, with hair that looked too young for his aged face, and dressed in a red tunic with gold braid. The background was dark and sombre.

  Potting and Wilde shook their heads.

  ‘It is one of three portraits of General Arthur Wellesley, first Duke of Wellington, painted by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya in 1812. It was stolen from our National Gallery in 1961 by a bus driver called Kempton Bunton and not returned for four years. He claimed to have taken it as a protest against the introduction by the BBC of licence fees. But there has been speculation ever since whether this was his real motive – and whether during that time one or more perfect copies were made of this painting.’

  ‘What are you saying?’ Velvet Wilde asked. ‘That is a copy?’

  ‘No, I’m not. It might be, or it might be the original. Sometimes with clever forgers it is impossible to tell. But this is not my point – I appreciate this painting for the beautiful work it is regardless of provenance. I love the history it represents.’ He fell silent for a moment then continued. ‘I see you both looking at my disfigured face. Maybe you are wondering what happened, but as you are detectives, I will credit you that you already know. Yes?’

  He waited. They both nodded.

  ‘What happen to me changed my life and my thinking. The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard said that life must be lived forwards, but it can only be understood backwards. From that moment when I began to recover from my assault, I turned to the past to try to understand. I have little interest in current news, the past is where I live my life.’ He raised his arms and pointed around the room. ‘These great people and the past great artists who preserved them for us so we can still see them today. This is the world I consider my manor, not the twentieth or twenty-first century.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry to have to bring intrusive twenty-first-century technology into your world, Mr Piper,’ Potting said. ‘But the reason we are here is that one of the persons we believe murdered Charlie Porteous had your number on his phone and we need to know why. Can you explain that?’

  Piper stared coldly back at both of them for a few moments, then simply said, ‘No, I cannot.’

  ‘And you definitely never had any business dealings or social interaction with the late Charles Porteous?’

  ‘What part of the word no don’t you understand?’ Piper’s body language was impatient. ‘Who is this person who has or had my number in his phone contacts list?’

  ‘We don’t know that,’ Wilde said. ‘We were hoping you might be able to help us identify him.’

  He looked at her sharply. ‘Your accent – you’re from Belfast?’ he questioned, abruptly changing the subject.

  ‘I am. Have you been there?’ she smiled, attempting to soften him a little.

  ‘My brother was there, in the army, during the Troubles. He was blown up by a parcel bomb, lost both his eyes and both his arms.’

  There was an awkward moment of silence. ‘I’m very sorry to hear that,’ she said. ‘It was a bad time.’

  Piper did not respond and sat drumming on the desk surface again. ‘Is there anything else I can help you officers with?’ he asked, finally.

  ‘Does the eighteenth-century French artist Jean-Honoré Fragonard mean anything to you, Mr Piper?’ Potting asked.

  Piper gave him a withering look. ‘Is the Pope Catholic? Is Luxembourg small?’ He stared at them in silence.

  ‘You’ll have to forgive me, I’m not an expert on art.’

  ‘Clearly.’

  ‘Do you have any of Fragonard’s works in your collection?’ Potting continued.

  Both detectives noticed the minutest hesitation before Piper replied. ‘That would be a dream for any art collector, Detective Sergeant Potter.’

  Potting stood, not bothering to correct him, and Wilde followed his cue. ‘We won’t take up any more of your time, Mr Piper. Thank you.’

  Piper said nothing, he just gave a faint nod of his head in acknowledgement.

  The doors opened behind them.

  47

  Sunday, 27 October

  The taxi dropped Harry and Freya Kipling at their house. Harry was always extra generous when he’d had a few drinks, and tonight he’d had more than a few at the dinner party at their friends, Jim and Katie Morgan. He pressed a £20 note into the palm of the driver, on top of the fare.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he said.

  ‘We’ve had a good week!’ Harry said, slurring his words, ignoring his wife’s disapproving stare.

  ‘Very generous of you, gov.’

  As they walked up to the front door in the mild night air, Freya, who’d drunk only marginally less, held on to his arm in case he stumbled. ‘Shit,’ Harry slurred. ‘That the time?’ He glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to two.

  She smiled. ‘I did suggest we left a good hour and a half ago.’

  ‘Yeah, but that Armagnac – that was so good.’

  ‘Hope it still feels that good at eight o’clock in the morning – when you go off to play golf.’

  ‘Hmm,’ he murmured, fishing in his pocket for the front door key. He got it in the slot and pushed the door open. As he did so, Jinx shot out past them.

  ‘Hey, boy!’ Freya called out to him, concerned. He never normally went out the front.

  Harry tripped on the doorstep and would have fallen flat on his face if she hadn’t been holding on to him.

  ‘Darling, was that a twenty-quid tip you gave the driver?’

  ‘Was it? I meant to give him a fiver.’

  She looked at him, grinning. ‘You are totally sloshed.’

  ‘What the hell, we’re rich! Pay it forward! Brighton cabbies have been struggling ever since they let Uber into the city. We can afford to be generous to them.’

  ‘Not yet,’ she said. ‘We still don’t know if what we have is real.’

  ‘Trust me,’ he replied. ‘It is. Think I’ll just have a quick nightcap.’

  ‘Darling, don’t you think you’ve had enough? And keep your voice down, you’ll wake Tom.’

  ‘Wake him? He sleeps with bloody headphones on! I dunno how, but he does!’ He staggered through into the living room, went over to the drinks cabinet, picked up a brandy snifter and poured himself a generous slug of cognac.

  ‘I’m going to get Jinx back in,’ she called out.

  ‘Yesh, sure.’ He sat down on a sofa, more sharply than he had intended, spilling some of the brandy into his lap. Then he heard Freya calling out, ‘Jinx! Jinx!’ Then after a few moments the tone of her voice changed. ‘Good boy! Very good boy!’ He heard the sound of the front door closing and she said, ‘Biscuits? Like some biscuits?’

  He looked up at the painting on the wall and smiled. Raised his glass towards the courting couple. ‘Your health!’ he said. ‘Your very good health indeed, eh?’ He winked at them and took a large sip of his drink.

  Then Freya screamed. ‘Harry! Jesus, Harry!’

  He put his glass down on the coffee table and jumped up, wobbling for some moments, then made his way through to the kitchen, fending off the walls and door frames on the way. Freya was standing in the conservatory, her face sheet white, pointing at the back door and looking in total shock.

  For a moment he couldn’t see the reason for her concern. But then, moving closer, holding onto the worktops to keep his balance, he entered the conservatory and saw it, too.

  The glass door, leading from the conservatory into the garden. One of the panels was broken, with shards of glass lying on the floor. Despite his inebriation, he felt a cold flush in the pit of his stomach.

  ‘The door’s unlocked,’ she said. ‘Has Tom left it open or has someone been in here?’ Then, lowering her voice, she said, ‘They might still be in here.’ Her eyes darted in panic. ‘Tom?’ She raced to the stairs.

  Harry looked around for a weapon. His golf clubs? But they were in the garage. He grabbed a carving knife from the block and brandished it, stumbling up the stairs after her, then lurching along the landing. Freya opened Tom’s door and switched on the light. To her relief he was there, headphones on as Harry had said. He blinked at them in confusion.

  ‘Are you OK, darling?’ she asked.

  Tom lifted away the headphones and replied sleepily, ‘What’s – what?’

  ‘A window’s been broken. Did you hear anything, darling? Anyone downstairs?’ Stupid question she knew. He never heard anything.

  Tom frowned. ‘I dunno. Like what? I didn’t break the window.’

  ‘Go back to sleep, darling,’ she said, backing out of the room, switching off the light and closing the door.

  Harry was opening the spare room door.

  ‘Be careful!’ she urged. Speaking quietly, she said, ‘We need to call the police.’

  ‘Jinx might have broken it,’ he said.

  ‘And unlocked the door?’

  ‘Are you sure it was locked?’

  She looked at him. ‘We double checked all the windows and doors.’ She lifted the landline phone from its cradle and dialled.

  48

  Sunday, 27 October

  Twenty anxious minutes later, during which Harry had downed a double espresso while standing near the foot of the stairs still brandishing the carving knife, they heard a car pull up outside, and saw blue flashing lights through the glass panels at the top of the front door.

  Two officers came into the house, a tall, burly man who introduced himself as PC Alldridge and a shorter police officer whose warrant card showed PC Dave Simmons. Freya explained they’d recently been in a broadcast of the Antiques Roadshow, at which they’d shown a painting that might possibly be of very high value.

  ‘Has that been taken?’ Simmons asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is anything missing?’

  ‘We’ve not had a good look around, but if someone was going to break in that’s what they would most likely have been after.’ She led them through into the lounge and pointed the painting out to them.

  Over the next fifteen minutes the two police officers made a thorough search of the house, opening all wardrobe and cupboard doors, as well as checking the loft, then the garden, the shed and the greenhouse.

  Back inside the house, PC Alldridge said, ‘You have a CCTV camera at the property. Is it active?’

  ‘It is,’ Freya said. ‘But it’s pretty basic – we’d have to take the card out and look through it on a computer.’

  Alldridge nodded. ‘That will take you a little time. I think we’ve established there isn’t any intruder present in your house now – are you both comfortable with that?’

  ‘We are, thank you, officers,’ Harry said, glancing at his wife for confirmation.

  ‘And you’ve not been able to establish that anything is missing?’

  ‘Not that we are able to tell so far,’ Freya said.

  PC Simmons was looking puzzled. ‘It’s possible you might have surprised the intruder by arriving home unexpectedly.’

  ‘At a quarter to two in the morning?’ Freya replied sharply.

  Simmons looked nonplussed. ‘Perhaps you should do a careful check on all your possessions to make sure nothing is missing – any watches, jewellery, anything like that.’

  He gave them his card. ‘When you’ve checked, if you find any valuables have been taken, get in touch immediately.’

  They thanked the officers and saw them out into the night.

  49

  Monday, 28 October

  Daniel Hegarty’s dad, Len, had been a small-time career criminal, who had missed his true vocation. That had been a real talent for drawing wildlife in his spare time, and, spending over half of his adult life in and out of prison, he’d found himself with plenty of spare time on his hands. The art forger’s fondest childhood memories had been the times he’d gone fishing with his dad, sitting on the banks of the river Arun, keeping an eye on the bobbing float while his dad worked away on his easel.

  His dad had committed burglaries when Daniel was growing up. From when Daniel was ten, Len Hegarty had taken him out with him, sending him climbing in through tiny windows to open up bigger ones or doors. But, Daniel rued, the old sod never gave him a cut of anything he had stolen. By the time he reached seventeen, his dad had graduated to bank and post-office robbery, and, two months after getting nicked for the last time, he’d dropped dead of an aneurism in prison, leaving Daniel to care for his mother and three younger siblings.

  All he had inherited from the old bugger was an eye for the main chance, and a talent for drawing. His last school report had damned his consistent lack of attendance with the faint praise that if he could ever bother to apply himself, he could have a future as a graphic designer.

  And that chance presented itself two years later, when Daniel had been on a fishing holiday in Ireland with a couple of mates and was returning on the car ferry from Dublin to England. Going through customs, he’d overheard two Border Control officers talking to each other, saying how hard it was to identify faked Irish vehicle logbooks.

  Hegarty set up a studio in his little bedroom in their council house and created a lucrative business forging logbooks, making enough money over the next year to buy his mum a small house on the outskirts of the city, which he paid for in cash.

  His bigger chance came in the form of the looming handover of Hong Kong, when the British Government were due to cede it to China on 1 July 1997, after 156 years of British rule. Many of its citizens were desperate to leave and flee to the United Kingdom and there was a rush for British passports. Hegarty realized there was a potential goldmine for him and set about exploiting it.

  He began producing, initially in small batches, seemingly very accomplished passport forgeries – and soon had a queue of Chinese customers lined up. Within three months, charging £1,000 a pop, he’d made enough to buy a period terraced property in the centre of Brighton, close to the Clock Tower, where he set up a full-scale mini-factory, employing a printer, a binder and a salesman. He began literally minting money.

  But unfortunately for Hegarty, his printer was lousy at spelling. On the inside front cover of every British passport is the wording, Her Britannic Majesty’s Secretary of State requests and requires in the Name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern to allow the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance, and to afford the bearer such assistance and protection as may be necessary.

  The printer managed to make two spelling errors in his otherwise impeccable forgeries, by having just one ‘N’ in Britannic and replacing the ‘J’ in Majesty with a ‘G’. Despite the crass mistakes, it took over a year for it to come to the attention of the police, during which time Daniel Hegarty had made so much money he’d put down a £300,000 deposit on a small castle in Scotland, intending it as his bolthole should the balloon go up. But he never got the chance to flee. One morning, while the team in his handsome period house were flat-out printing, binding and dispatching passports, the front door was kicked open and five police officers burst into the premises, bringing his dream to an abrupt halt.

  During the ensuing five years he served at Her Majesty’s Pleasure – or Magesty, as spelled on his passports – he learned to paint, and discovered he had a real talent for copying the works of almost any artist.

  Immediately on his release from prison, Hegarty began another lucrative career, forging the works of big-name artists and selling them for big money on eBay, until, following complaints, eBay took him down. Undeterred, he continued making copies of the work of these artists but now signed them with his own distinctive interlinked DH. Rather than his business falling off, it grew even larger, his clientele, as befitted his celebrity status, including rock stars, DJs, actors, authors and even politicians. Galleries in both Brighton and London eagerly offered him permanent space to show his work.

  In addition he was in demand by serious art collectors unable or unwilling to pay the escalating insurance premiums on their works, to make copies which could still be displayed in their homes, while the originals remained secure in bank vaults.

  Which was why Daniel Hegarty was totally unfazed by the photographs of the front and rear of the painting he was now looking at, early on this glorious October Monday morning. Two lovers in a forest of sun-dappled trees, with a lake behind them, and a plinth close to them on which sat a winged figure. He was already familiar with this painting and had some difficulty concealing a smile.

  The man who had brought them to his Saltdean home was Robert Kilgore, for whom he had done a number of previous commissions copying old masters.

  ‘Yeah, Robert,’ Hegarty said. ‘No problem. How long can you give me?’

  ‘How long do you need, Mr Hegarty?’ Kilgore asked him politely.

  They were seated in the large open-plan living room, the walls lined with Hegarty’s paintings ranging from Norman Rockwell to Caravaggio, and there was a smell of oil paint in the air.

  The artist wore his years well; with an elegant head of gelled, spiky silver hair, he exuded the aura of a fit man comfortable in his skin, and had an easy demeanour to go with it, as well as his charming and confident wife, Natalie, who sat in the room with them.

  ‘Well, Robert,’ he said, staring at the highly detailed photographs, ‘that would depend as usual on how far you went and how much you want to pay. If you want a pukka job that would stand up to every forensic test, that will cost you more. I’d use an old French religious canvas – I’ve a mate in France who’s an antiques dealer and sources them for me – that would be several grand extra. Up to you. But I’ll tell you, what you have here, if it is real, is one of the most stunning pieces anyone has ever brought me.’

  ‘Do you think it is real, Mr Hegarty?’

  He shrugged. ‘Hard to tell from photographs. But from what I can see, if it is a Sexton Blake, whoever did it is a better man than me, Gunga Din.’ He shrugged again. ‘What about you? Do you think it’s real, Robert? Do you believe it’s real?’