The church which had comforted him for decades held only terror now. The shadows were dense, the cold forbidding, and the crucifix on the altar seemed more of a threat than a consolation. Was it just coincidence that Nicholas Laverne had come to see him only days after the stranger’s murder? Laverne, the man of whom he had been so fond and was now so afraid. Laverne, exposing corruption in the Church and then forced out, disgraced and angry.

‘God help me,’ Father Michael prayed. ‘God help us all …’

After his excommunication, Nicholas had raged in his letters. Had cursed God, cursed everything he had loved with a ferocity that was terrifying. After a while, the old priest had stopped opening the letters from Italy. But they kept coming, now postmarked Belgium. Later, France. He seemed to settle there, or so the letters indicated. But what Nicholas was doing, how he lived, what he did for work, the old priest never knew. When the stack of letters filled a drawer in the vestry, Father Michael took them out one night and burnt them in a brazier.

The paper took a while to catch, as though the Devil himself were blowing out the flames, but finally the fire took hold. In seconds every word, every thought that Nicholas Laverne had confided to his mentor, was gone.

Father Michael forgot Nicholas. The letters stopped. Nicholas seemed to be finally laid to rest. But something, someone else, came in his stead. A man looking for sanctuary in St Stephen’s church. A man in a hoodie, sheltering from the rain. A man the priest had turned away, just as he had once turned away Nicholas Laverne.

Chilled, Father Michael closed his eyes, scratching around for a prayer. ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned …’ He clung to his rosary, the beads worn smooth. ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned …’

And as the old priest sat, distressed and afraid, someone opened the vestry door and began, slowly and silently, to make their way towards him.

Book Two

Fourteen

Gerrit der Keyser’s gallery, Chelsea, London

As comfortable as an onion in its skin, Philip Preston strode into the gallery, smiling flirtatiously at the receptionist. She smiled back, recognising him and wondering if he would invite her out again. After all, it was common knowledge that his wife was unstable – surely a man had a right to enjoy himself? Philip Preston might not be young, but he was successful and rich.

‘How’s your boss today?’ he asked, leaning on her desk.

‘Busy.’

‘Too busy for me?’ Philip lifted her chin with his left hand. ‘You are a pretty girl. Now, run along and tell him I need five – no, make it fifteen – minutes with the old man.’

Gerrit der Keyser was spraying water on to a fern as Philip entered, his doleful expression winching itself up into a fleeting, and unconvincing, smile. His recent heart attack had forced him to lose weight and now his jowls sagged, the bags under his eyes pronounced even behind the bifocals.

‘Philip,’ Gerrit said by way of greeting. ‘How are you?’

‘Good,’ he replied, sliding into a brocade sofa under a painting of Brouwer’s Peasants in a Tavern. ‘I was just passing and thought I’d pop in …’

Gerrit kept spraying the plant.

‘… I heard something interesting about a Bosch painting, or rather the chain which held it up.’ He could see Gerrit pause, his finger immobile on the water spray. ‘Mean anything to you? I also had a visit from some man of yours. Honthorst, I think his name was.’

‘I have so many fucking tablets to take,’ Gerrit said, putting down the spray and moving to his desk. Once there, he opened the middle drawer and pulled out four bottles. ‘Fucking tablets for this, tablets for that. To stop me getting breathless. To stop my heart racing like a BMW in a Brixton car chase. To stop my ankles swelling like some fat tart’s.’ He stared at the fourth bottle. ‘I don’t know what these are for. Probably to stop my bleeding arse dropping off.’ He swept the bottles back into the drawer and slammed it shut. ‘What d’you want, you smug fucker?’

‘You always saved your charm for the customers.’

‘Why waste an advantage?’ Gerrit replied. ‘What d’you want?’

‘Do you employ a man called Carel Honthorst?’

‘Yes. He helps me out, talks to people sometimes.’

‘A heavy?’

Gerrit shrugged. ‘A consultant.’

‘You sold a Bosch painting with a chain attached—’

‘I sold a painting with an old bag’s necklace attached,’ Gerrit said sourly.

He was weighing up how much to tell Philip Preston and how much to withhold. Obviously the auctioneer had heard the rumour and it would be pointless to deny it. Besides, Preston might be useful. He certainly had been in the past.

‘Her own necklace?’

‘She swapped them,’ Gerrit snapped. ‘Took off the original chain and put her own on. I’d never have missed it before I was ill. But I did, and I only found out when the previous owner told me about it. By then I’d sold it.’

‘To whom?’

‘“To whom?” You pompous git,’ Gerrit mocked him. ‘Is that how you get into so many tarts’ knickers?’

Philip let the question pass. ‘Who was the client?’

‘You know her,’ Gerrit said, putting his head on one side. ‘But although she’s still a looker, she’s a bit long in the tooth, even for you.’

‘Sabine Monette,’ Philip guessed, remembering his infrequent customer. Then he frowned. ‘She’s loaded. Why would she steal a chain off the back of a painting she was buying?’

‘Couldn’t wait for it to be delivered. Probably thought that if she left it here I might suss it out.’ The dealer waggled his wrist and his watch flopped around. ‘See this – weight loss. More like fucking brain loss. I’m starving and that makes me slow. No dealer can afford to be slow – that’s the way you make mistakes. Slip up, miss things.’

Philip steered the conversation back. Gerrit der Keyser was an East End trader made good. He had married into money, bought some sharp clothes, and hired the best spotters to trawl the world for paintings. And it was an open secret that sometimes his methods could be dubious.

‘So you put the Dutchman on to Sabine Monette?’ Philip asked. ‘That was a bit heavy, wasn’t it?’

‘He didn’t water-board her, he just asked for the chain back.’

The same chain that Philip had seen the previous day. The chain that had shimmered so fetchingly on his desk. He knew it was valuable – that much was obvious to anyone – but he wondered if Gerrit der Keyser knew that there was more to it? Nicholas’s reticence had infuriated Philip and for the remainder of the previous day he had waited for his return – and for the full story. But Nicholas Laverne hadn’t come back.

So he had decided to go it alone.

‘How d’you know that Sabine Monette swapped the chains?’

‘We have photographs,’ Gerrit paused, ‘and some tape.’

‘You tape your customers?’

‘You shocked? After what she did you’re fucking right I tape the customers!’ Gerrit retorted. ‘I could have set the police on her, but that would have been a bit much. I mean, no one wants to lose a good customer. Even ones that help themselves.’

‘And besides, she’s worth a fortune.’

‘The chain wasn’t too shabby either,’ Gerrit replied miserably, picking up the mister and spraying the plant again. ‘Anything connected to Hieronymus Bosch is worth money. Big money. When the old fool who asked me to sell it for him came back with its provenance I nearly had another seizure.’ Gerrit picked at one of the leaves, examining it through the bottom of his bifocals. ‘I pay that thieving florist a fortune for these plants. For that money he should come in and spray them himself. When I complained that I had greenfly, he told me it didn’t come from his shop, and that “the plant must have picked it up in the gallery”. “In the gallery?” I said. “I’m in Chelsea, not fucking Borneo.”’