Crossing the line - 21. Clouds of Unknowing

Dan unwound by telling me the whole tale, over a glass of his new whisky.

I was curious, “Do you think that Francis Heyward goes for big blokes?”

“What, because he’d got his security in jocks. Maybe. Brandon’s sexy enough if you like ‘em big, solid though, no flab. But a couple of the others are real fearsome buggers. One judging by his jock, one guy was really packing it.”

“Giving you ideas, was it?”

“Hardly, but you couldn’t help notice the way it bulged. Extra-large too. I checked.” We laughed. “Then there was Jack, winking at me.”

“Get you all hot and bothered?”

“Did a bit.”

“It might be that he wants to offer variety?”

“Eh?”

“In the blokes. Rugby monsters, twinky dancers and waiters who are probably out of work actors and sit somewhere in between,”

“Won’t work if you can’t follow through though, does it? My guys all seemed dead careful about that, and the waiters had the punters sussed.”

“Well now Francis Heyward is becoming pally you’ll have to ask him.”

“Don’t!”

--oOo—oOo—

Next morning, I looked up Francis Heyward’s Scottish estate, somewhere in the North-East, quite small. The house was modern, something of a showpiece, built on the site of a long-demolished castle. I wondered what he had hanging on the walls there, and whether as his new art advisor, I could wangle a visit. We’d never gotten around to talking about the Winstons he’d bought, that was assuming he had bought them. They were hardly small-scale bedroom pictures, so where were they? Locked away, hanging in another property, sold on because he’d changed his mind? I would need to see if I could find a suitable moment to mention them, casually.

There were a couple of pieces about the distillery, along the lines of reviving a lost traditional craft and providing much needed local employment. It sounded intriguing, even if I didn’t enjoy whisky like that.

Having packed up the new pictures, pro tem, there didn’t seem to be much for me at The Manor, but I’d fired off a sort of final missive to round off the discussions with Francis Heyward. He was going off to America and beyond, and I could hardly imagine him being so obsessively interested in The Manor’s pictures when luxuriating in Beverly Hills or whatever.

I was wrong. I got an email. Not from Archie, but from Francis Heyward’s own email address. He wanted me to take over the pictures, arrange a hang and buy anything to fill in gaps. He would trust me, and I would liaise with his business manager in the UK. Oh, and there was an honorarium.

Wow.

He was flying out soon, and I could contact him on this email address. By the time Dan got up, rather bleary eyed, I’d fired off a few emails, to check dates, how the finance worked, when I could get the old pictures down and more. It was going to be an exciting time.

Except, of course, there were those nagging doubts. Was he really as financially secure as we anticipated, would there be money available for my purchases and if he wanted someone to buy pictures then why a journalist and blogger? I tried to be reassured by Dan, who said that clearly Francis Heyward wanted something different. The question was, what exactly did he want?

--oOo—oOo—

“Well, how was it?” Bart looked eagerly from Dan to me, and Martin sighed.

“How was what?”

“The party, of course. I hear there was one at Francis Heyward’s place.”

“Bart”, Martin’s voice had a warning note in it.

Bart simply shrugged, “Well, Richard says he knows people that went, and I wondered…”

The four of us were meeting for a meal at a new restaurant in Borough. It was quite unprepossessing but came with great recommendations; Italian food cooked by Italians, regional Southern Italian food. Dan had been oblivious to Bart’s question, engrossed in the menu.

I turned to him, but he didn’t notice, I exchanged an amused glance at Martin who half whispered, “La Terra a Dante. Earth to Dan”

He looked up, startled, and gave an abashed smile, “Sorry, I was enjoying the food.”

Bart shook his head, “But we’ve not eaten anything yet.”

“Ah, but this takes me back. Some of Gran’s cooking and that of her friend Elena, and Gran’s stories of visits back home.” He shook his head, “Anyway?”

“Bart was asking about Francis Heyward’s party; friends of a friend were evidently there.”

Dan grinned. “I wonder which they were, no doubt some of those with their dicks on show.”

“You were there!”

“Dan was working. He does work for Francis Heyward, after all, and he took an evening shift for the experience. As it happens, one guy didn’t turn up, so Dan did rank and file duty.”

Dan pulled a face, “Wearing a black leather waistcoat, black jockstrap and boots. Nothing else. Oh, and a walkie-talkie.”

Martin grinned, “Great fashion accessory. What was the theme?”

“There wasn’t strictly a theme, as it focused on the showing of a film.”

“Oh yes”, Bart rolled his eyes suggestively.

Dan shook his head, amused, “Not one of those. Lawrence of Arabia, uncut. You try coming up with a suitably themed sexy uniform for the security. I insisted that no bits be on display, the guys need somewhere for their comms stuff. You know. Work.”

“Not sex. Dan had an illuminating conversation with Francis Heyward.”

“Where he said that he doesn’t fuck the staff.”

Bart guffawed and Martin smiled, “Sensible bloke. So, it’s not on the cards?”

“Doesn’t look like it, thank goodness.”

Bart wrinkled his brow, “So. If he’s not planning a threesome, why’s he got so cosy with you two?”

“Bart!” Martin glared at him.

Bart simply smiled and shrugged, “Well he has.”

“Good question and I’ve no idea.”

“We both keep waiting for the catch, the payback.”

“Perhaps he’s genuine, likes having a tame art historian journalist.”

By mutual consent, Dan and I had agreed not to mention Francis Heyward’s offer for me to take over the new hang at The Manor. Until the project developed more, I was keeping it under wraps. I didn’t want to look a fool by boasting about something that never actually happened.

Martin gave a scornful snort, “Come on. I know you have a name Vaughan, but if it comes to collecting notches on your stick…”

“I don’t rate very high in the pecking order.”

“Precisely. Do you trust him?”

I shrugged, “He certainly manipulates. And no. I don’t think we do trust him.”

Food took over, ordering, discussing, appreciating. But eventually, Dan returned to Bart’s first question.

“And to answer your original question, Bart, the party was a bit like a gay club, but with a different dress code. Plenty of people willing to show off, some in ordinary gear, some twinks in tight shorts and little else, one guy who did the Full Monty almost immediately, another who wanted to tip me to give him a private show, and plenty of cute guys playing hard to get.”

“And did you? Give a show.”

Dan rolled his eyes, “Please. I was on duty. I’m afraid to disappoint you but what sex there was, was pretty discreet, going into dark corners or into the garden. It was basically a bunch of rather unpleasantly entitled people pretending. If I wanted a bit of fun, then it wouldn’t be there and if you stripped away the tacky glamour, there wasn’t much that was original.

“It’s fun being on the fringe, getting to watch, and no I don’t mind showing off my bum a bit. But I don’t want to be part of that world”, he leaned over and took my hand, “We don’t want to be part. Thank you.”

We had discussed it often enough, for Dan’s diatribe to be no surprise to me, but he had rarely let rip so volubly. I knew that Bart and Martin annoyed him somewhat, Bart’s rather Daily Mail eagerness to dig dirt, particularly. Bart stared whilst Martin grinned and said well put.

We moved on to other topics.

--oOo—oOo—

By serendipity, the chance came up to find out more about Francis Heyward’s financial background by going to the horse’s mouth, so to speak. I had been invited to an event which promised a mix of financial and arts colleagues, there was bound to be plenty of gossip. I should surely be able to turn the conversations toward Francis Heyward without much difficulty.

It was to be one of those launches where a dodgy financial institution tried to whitewash its reputation by supporting the arts. In this case, a series of large-scale commissions from young artists. Unusually, all the artists chosen were painters, an interesting mix of figurative and abstract; all young talent worth supporting. We’d get the usual - waffle from the CEO, a chat with each of the artists, a freebie pack and plenty to drink.

I didn’t really think about the location, just followed directions on Google Maps. It was in a former industrial building, now an events space that didn’t mean anything to me until I got close. From the station you walked through a mix of old and new buildings, an area in the process of regeneration. Then I realised, how appropriate, it was the old warehouse where the Daily Mail, and Evening Standard used to be printed.

It was an unlovely, cavernous space, presumably you could make of it what you wanted. Now it was gussied up with a light show along with large-scale projections of work by the commissioned artists. Not bad really. I grabbed a drink and wandered round, chatting to old faces and new. I paid enough attention during the speeches for an article, but I was keeping my eye out for the right old faces and my luck was in.

First off, there were two mates from way back who both still covered financial affairs and were always up for a good gossip. Then as a bonus, an arts colleague who was an assiduous collector of news and trivia from the arts world; he was bound to have something for me if I could come up with a juicy story in recompense. I have to admit, I rather enjoyed myself as well. The chance for a chinwag with colleagues, to see people who you’d not bumped into for ages, as well as being able to sample some top-notch catering; both wine and food were liberal.

I came out full of uncredited stories, rumours, and suppositions, useful only as background to the putative story I was writing about Francis Heyward (my cover for being interested in him), but grist to our mill when we considered what may or may not be going on at The Manor. As with everything about him, Francis Heyward hid his affairs behind a series of smoke screens. On the arts side, he had certainly parted company with those advising on his old master collection, reputedly thanks to what Heyward regarded as dodgy advice or perhaps financial irregularities, though it was common for such arrangements to be arcane. A couple of recent court cases involving high-profile collectors and auction houses had only served to shed light on a murky world.

There were tantalising rumours of two high profile drawings, one by a follower of Leonardo. They had disappeared, which might only mean they were in his private domain (after all, I had not seen the whole collection at The Manor, and he had other residences). But rumours swirled about the two drawings, perhaps because the Leonardo school one had once, many decades ago, been attributed to the master though this attribution was now generally agreed to be false. So, they’d been smuggled out of the country to be sold discreetly (easy enough to do when you had access to a private jet), or they were in a bank vault as collateral for a huge loan, or, well, you take your pick. No one knew for certain.

There was agreement that Francis Heyward was financially over extended thanks to recent political events across the globe. Quite how important this was, I could not tell, the detailed financial implications were beyond me. But what I took away from my chats with mates was how much we didn’t really know. As my mate Jack said, it could be all smoke and mirrors and Francis Heyward wasn’t anything like the wizard financial billionaire that it was claimed he was. What it meant of course, was that quite who owned the pictures was a moot point, they too might suddenly disappear to further prop up Heyward’s financial dealings.

Dan and I had a late supper afterwards (yes, the food had been good, and plentiful, but frankly rather insubstantial and unsatisfying), and I brought him up to date. As he commented, we had to take it as it came. He could always get another job, and move in with me pro tem, and certainly working for Heyward wasn’t central to my career, though the extra string to my bow was exciting. The vague worry, a distant possibility only, was if Francis Heyward fell, he’d fall in a way that tarnished our reputations too. We had to make sure we didn’t cross that red line, wherever that was.