Enter Pale Death(72)

“Only nine of us to dinner this evening—a small gathering—but it feels more like the Delhi Durbar!” He looked upwards to the high, vaulted ceiling. “I’ve always thought this place fills up fast because half the guests are already here, waiting and watching before the first cocktail’s poured.” He waited for Joe to raise an eyebrow. “The ancestors!” he confided, waving a languid hand towards the portraits that lined the walls. “Look at them! What would you give to hear their exchanges when the descendants leave for the dining hall!”

Joe smiled at the playful thought and cast a glance at the array of pictures of varied age and size on display. Lace and pearls and white shoulders shone out from layers of dark oils, striking a contrast with lush velvets and even the dull glow of armour. Some of the subjects stared with dreamy pride away from the painter, inviting the viewer to join them in admiring the rolling acres they possessed; some stared challengingly ahead. For an uneasy moment Joe felt himself skewered by many pairs of eyes. Most were haughty and he guessed that the next reaction of the sitters, on catching sight of him, might well have been: “Who is this policeman chappie? Ask what he’s doing here and throw him out!”

One or two of the ladies looked more approachable.

“I haven’t yet had the pleasure,” Joe said. “Though I can identify one who is by no means yet an ancestor. Isn’t that your mother? A Philip de Laszlo, if I’m not mistaken.”

“It is. Painted when the subject and the artist were in their prime.”

Joe never found this particular painter of society portraits much to his taste. Too blatantly flattering. Too sumptuous. Too much bosom and throat displayed by ladies of a certain age who should have known better. The style had fallen out of favour in a less flamboyant post-war era. He searched for an inoffensive remark. “De Laszlo must have been delighted to be offered a subject worthy of his brush. No need for the flattery of a carefully chosen angle or kindly lighting for your mother. She was then—and still is—a stunningly attractive woman.”

“You see where James gets his good looks. Now see where I get mine. The late Sir Sidney Truelove.” He led Joe over to admire more closely an imposing full-length portrait of his father in full Victorian splendour.

Joe was thinking anyone would have been proud to inherit the looks of this man. The best England had to offer, very likely. He stood tall and Saxon blond, ferociously moustached, hand on hip, eyes scouring the horizon to his left. He was wearing the military dress uniform of a cavalry regiment. Joe hoped it was kept for parades and suchlike formal occasions since one could hardly have done any effective fighting in that three-inch-high gold embroidered collar and the heavy epaulettes. The dark blue jacket with a white plastron were an invitation to enemy target practice, the blue trousers with an elegant white stripe emphasising the length of the leg would have been impressive circling the ballroom. The gold emblazoned czapka bearing at its crest a flourish of white egret feathers was, sensibly, carried in his hand. Worn on the head, the hat would have turned the wearer into a seven-foot-tall musical comedy hero.

“A Lancer?” Joe guessed. “I hadn’t realised your father was a cavalryman.”

“We mostly manage to provide them when they’re needed, though the warrior strain seems to be getting a bit anaemic these days. He was in the Seventeenth Lancers. The Duke of Cambridge’s Own.” Alexander stared at Joe, waiting.

Joe wondered whether he was searching for recognition in his stare. Recognition of the tall, bluff, older half-brother. The similarity was uncanny. Joe had to look harder to see the connection with the impish young man at his side. “Lucky chap! You have your father’s eyes and hair,” he said. “But these two portraits are not a pair. This one is a Sargent, yes?”

“It is.”

“A fine-looking fellow.”

“Indeed. Sargent had a seeing and sympathetic eye for the elegant male form. Papa admired his work. Sargent clearly admired Papa. There’s something humorous, don’t you think, in that exaggerated stance? I never saw the old man stand with his hand on his hip like that in real life.”

“They’re sending each other up,” was Joe’s judgement. “Or us. It’s a conspiracy. The artist and the subject are having a laugh at our expense. I always enjoy a Sargent.”

“So do I. You’ll find one or two of his Venetian scenes along the corridors and a couple of lake-side views with swooning ladies in white draperies carefully arranged in the foreground.”

“Your father was a collector of some taste?” Joe said.