Switch

‘A week ago,’ the old man replied. Which meant that Pallesson could make the switch any time.

‘You’ve come to the right people,’ Max said. ‘We’ll trap him. We’ll finish him.’

He was going to nail the bastard, if they weren’t already too late.

‘So how long will it take Sophie to make a second copy of The Peasants in Winter? We’re against the clock,’ Max asked.

The waiter had cleared the table and served them with coffee. Now they were talking specifics, Jacques seemed much happier.

‘Five days. It shouldn’t take her longer than that. She has the work in her head. After all, it was only a few weeks ago that she made the first copy. It’s ironic, really.’

‘Why?’

‘Well, Pieter Brueghel the Younger was a great painter. Certainly better than his brother, Jan, in my opinion. But he did sometimes copy the work of his father. There’s no doubt in my mind that this is the case with The Peasants in Winter. He wasn’t quite as subtle as Pieter the Elder, which makes Sophie’s work a little easier. But it didn’t stop him being a great artist. And it didn’t stop him getting the recognition he deserved.’

Max picked up the undertone and switched the conversation back to Bruegel the Elder, who happened to be one of the few artists Max knew anything about.

‘Was their father one of the greats?’

‘Certainly.’ Jacques nodded, taking another sip of his wine. ‘He painted some great art. The Massacre of the Innocents is my favourite. Such movement, such detail. His style at its best, if you ask me. He could paint timeless landscapes, but at the same time he filled them with real people going about their lives.’ Max could feel Jacques coming alive. Energy was suddenly emanating from the tired old man.

‘What about The Bird Trap?’

Jacques hesitated and pursed his lips.

‘I’m impressed. You know your art?’

Max smiled bashfully and shook his head. ‘Only a little, I’m afraid. And The Bird Trap is pretty much all I know about Bruegel the Elder.’

‘Well, that is a good start. The winter landscape, c’est magnifique. The shades of colour are truly incredible. The figures on the ice are exquisite. The painting is so alive. But …’ Jacques said, pointing his finger at Max, ‘Bruegel’s students made any number of copies of The Bird Trap. They were commercial. And yet history has not condemned him,’ he said indignantly.

Max looked at the old man. He’d got himself into a mess. Just as Max’s father had, and ultimately it had finished him off. Irrespective of what Jacques had been up to, Max was coming to his rescue.

‘The canvas you asked for,’ Max said, pulling his thoughts back to the present while he lifted a painting from the leather holder under the table.

‘Is it the right age?’

‘Apparently. No idea who the artist is, but it’s 1600s. Don’t suppose he’d have been too happy if he’d known when he painted it that you were going to strip his paint off one day.’

Jacques shrugged his shoulders and turned it over to look at the back of the canvas. He seemed satisfied.

‘And the pigments?’

‘Exactly as you requested.’

Max met Gemma in the American Bar at the Hôtel de Paris. Gemma had arrived back first and taken the small table in the corner looking out on to Casino Square.

‘Shall we go to the casino this evening?’ Max asked as he drew up a chair. He was feeling elated. Revenge was going to be sweet.

‘And gamble?’

‘Well, you could. Maybe a little blackjack? Stick on twelve if the dealer has sixteen or less.’

‘You and your risk-assessing brain, Max. Always calculating the odds.’ In fact, she was working out what chance there was of running into Marchant with him.

‘Disappointing, this bar, don’t you think? Very plain. No imagination. No feel to it. How was your meeting? Productive?’

‘Yes. I think so. Drink?’

‘Bit early for me. I’ll have a cup of tea, please.’

Max caught the eye of a waiter who was busily doing nothing.

‘Monsieur, vous avez du Earl Grey? Et je voudrai également un grand whisky s’il vous plaît, Du Grouse, et une petite bouteille d’eau gazeuse.’

‘You’re quite sexy when you speak French,’ Gemma said from behind her newspaper.

‘I’d be even sexier if I could write it properly.’

This was a sore point for Max, Gemma knew, but she didn’t feel like hearing yet again how Pallesson had trashed him going to university. She put her hand on his thigh and rubbed it.

‘Tell me about your meeting.’

‘Well, anything I tell you would have to be erased from your mind. As for my mind, it’s currently contemplating something else,’ he whispered, reciprocating rather more daringly with his own hand.

‘Are you sure you had lunch with an old man? You seem to be—’

‘How was your massage?’ he interrupted.

‘Intimate. Very intimate. Anyway, I thought we were going to explore?’

But Max was having none of it.

‘We could go upstairs and explore,’ he said, downing his Scotch.

Gemma again made the mistake of walking out of the bathroom without tying her dressing gown. She may have got away with it that morning, but not now.

Max pushed aside her long hair and kissed the back of her neck. He felt a familiar response as her body shivered. Though he’d learnt most of his foreplay tips from the sex column in GQ magazine, over the years Gemma had taught him how to turn her on. Today, though, Max was in a rush. He was bursting.

As he pulled her closer to him, she could feel him rubbing against her La Perla-clad bottom.

Max had bought her the underwear a week before, after they’d shared a few glasses of champagne at the Harrods caviar bar. He’d tried not to show his shock when the shop assistant asked him for the best part of three hundred pounds in return for the small swatch of black lace. Now, as he pulled off her dressing gown, he could see it was money well spent.

‘Someone’s come back horny,’ Gemma whispered. ‘Who did you meet, again?’

His response was muffled as he carried on kissing and nibbling at her neck. His left hand reached round and unclipped her bra. She stopped asking questions and knelt on the bed in front of him.

Max just wanted to lose himself in an old-fashioned quickie.