The Garden of Unearthly Delights Read Free Page B

think that if you just keep on playing you’ll start winning again.’ He shrugged. ‘Only you never do.’
    ‘You think Basinski rigged it?’
    ‘Probably. He counted on a gambler’s stupidity, and I didn’t disappoint him. I lost a fortune. And even better, I was an art dealer, with access to the world – and the dealer – who had humiliated him. I had access to a business that revels in its secrecy and inclusiveness. With me, Basinski had a way in.’
    ‘And you never saw it coming?’
    The dealer smiled bitterly. ‘Does it look like I saw it coming?’
    There was a long pause. The light on the recorder clicked off, fell into a rickety sleep. In silence, David watched the dealer and then finally spoke again.
    ‘Did you know Leon Joyce?’
    ‘Very well. He and I were friends, so were our wives. I spent time at his gallery, as Leon spent time at mine. We enjoyed each other’s company and collected similar paintings.’ He paused, then added: ‘Leon had no reason not to trust me.’
    ‘Which was why Basinski set you up.’
    The dealer nodded.
    ‘And you never suspected.’
    ‘Never. I couldn’t believe it.’ He slumped in his seat. ‘Remember, I thought it was over, I thought I’d cleared the bloody debt. But Basinski had only just started. When I got over the shock, I finally asked what else he wanted.’
    ‘And?’
    ‘It was simple, he said “Just steal the
St Jerome
and we’ll call it quits”.’

FIVE
    Before the dealer could continue, the door of the room opened and a prison guard walked in, addressing David. ‘Your time’s up.’
    ‘I was given an hour.’
    ‘And you’ve had an hour,’ the officer replied, gesturing for the dealer to rise. Smiling ruefully, but still elegant in his prison garb, he got up, then turned back to David. ‘I was a good art dealer, but a lousy thief. As everyone knows, I was caught during the robbery. Didn’t even make it past the alarms—’
    ‘But Bosch’s
St Jerome
is missing.’
    ‘Really?’ he replied. ‘I don’t know anything about that. I just know that I didn’t get it. Ask Basinski where it is. That bastard’s ruined me.’
    *
    David watched him as he was lead out. He could hear the dealer’s footsteps and those of the prison guard. He tucked the recorder into his coat pocket, ready to leave. Of course, he could never prove it, but what if
the dealer
had
managed to steal the
St Jerome?
Even in the moments before he was caught he could have hidden it, or passed it out of a window to an accomplice.
    If he’d been quick he could have done it and then allowed himself to be caught to give his helper time to escape. In prison, the dealer was tucked away and could do his three year sentence in safety – his family having been conveniently spirited away, out of the country. To an unknown destination; beyond the reach of the thwarted Iwo Basinski.
    Secretly, David suspected that the dealer had organised everything. Had allowed himself to be played, whilst all along planning a double-cross. All he had to do now was wait. When he was released from prison he would go to his family – and the fortune the sale of
St Jerome
would eventually realise. He was a dealer, after all. The sale would be done discreetly, to a buyer who wished to keep it a secret – just like the dealer.
    Getting to his feet, David picked up the photographs of the images and looked at their backs. But there was nothing. No clue, no tidy solution to his suspicions. Instead, on that rainy morning, David Gerrald left the prison wondering just
who
had been the victim, after all.

Read on for an exclusive preview of Alex Connor’s new novel

ONE
    Church of St Stephen, Fulham, London, the present day
    ‘Father?’
    The priest turned, staring at a face he didn’t recognise. At first.
     ‘
Nicholas
?’
    He nodded, moving towards the older man. Nicholas Laverne, forty-one years
     old, a man who had left London ten years earlier and had – to all intents and purposes –