Page 84 of The Hallmarked Man

‘Yes. Enormous, ugly thing, covered in masonic symbols, over three feet tall. Ay can’t imagine who’d want it, frankly. Ay told Rachel two years ago when they bought the shop, “you’re making a mistake!”’ said Pamela, with a resurgence of anger. ‘Everything, from start to finish, was misgayded, but she wouldn’t listen! “Kenneththinks it’ll do very well”, “Kennethknows the market”, “Kennethknows people who’llqueue upto buy” – and of course, they’ve been making a loss ever since they opened! The location’s dreadful, and there simply isn’t ademandfor that kind of specialist shop… if they’d been content to sell onlayne… but Rachel’salwaysbeen silly about business. Nayther of them had thefirstidea what they were doing.Shewas miffed our father put me in charge here, and Kenneth hates his day job and thought he was going to be able to give it up and talk masonic silver all day. And nayther of them have aclueabout proper security. You’d think, with Rachel being a Bullen’ – Pamela said this rather as someone mighthave done on declaring their sister a Mountbatten-Windsor – ‘she’drealisewhat’s needed.This,’ said Pamela, gesturing around at the Silver Vaults, ‘is the fourth most secure buildingin the world. There’sneverbeen a theft from the London Silver Vaults,ever.Stupid, baying that rundown place, thinking they could do everything on a shoestring. Ay tried to tell them! And thenlookwhat happened!’

‘It was very kind of you to go and help them out,’ said Robin.

‘Well, Ayhadto. After may nephew…’ Tears welled in Pamela’s eyes again, ‘… and then m’sister had her stroke… ofcourseAy trayed to do what Ay could. Nayther of them wanted to let the shop go. “It’s all we’ve got now.”Naturally, Ay said Ay’d help.’

‘John Auclairdidcome in to view the collection at Ramsay Silver, didn’t he?’

‘Yes,’ snorted Pamela, ‘but one doesn’t get to be as rich as John Auclair is bay being afool. Ay know John, Ay’ve sold him a few pieces over the years. He knewperfectlywell Kenneth paidwayover the real value of the silver.Ayknew John was coming in on the Monday to decide what he was going to take once Kenneth got desperate to clawsomethingback. But of course, he never saw any of it, because…’

‘Awful, losing it all like that,’ said Robin, who didn’t want to introduce the subject of the body too early.

‘It was dreadful,’ said Pamela, with a shudder. ‘Ay hadno ideaanybody had been in the shop over the weekend. Wrayght didn’t work Saturdays, Kenneth looks after Rachel at the weekends, and Ay couldn’t be there, because Ay was attendin’ may cousin’s wedding.’

‘Presumably,’ said Robin, ‘you and Mr Ramsay were the only ones who knew the codes and had keys?’

‘Yes – well, I suppose Toddmaythave known where the camera controls were, but he shouldn’t have known the alarm or the vault codes, and hedefinitelydidn’t have keys… Kenneth came rushing in after Ay arrayved, frayghtened he’d missed John Auclair, sneaking out of his office, as usual – he’s hanging by a thread at his day job – so he went down into the basement, and then he yelled out.’

Pamela swallowed.

‘Ay called down, “are you all rayte, Kenneth?” Ay thought he’d maybe slipped over, hurt himself. He didn’t answer. Ay went to the top of the stairs. Ay said, “are you all rayte?” And he still didn’t answer, so Ay went down there… he could have stopped me seeing,’ said Pamela bitterly. ‘He could have warned me… it was dreadful. Ay stillhave nayghtmares.… did Kenneth tell you? About Wrayght’s hands being missing, and… and everything?’

‘A little bit,’ said Robin. ‘It must have been awful.’

‘It wasghastly –and then John turned up. Ay’d just come back upstairs, to call the police. Ay nearly passed out in front of John. Ay’d just said to the operator, “there’s a body, we’ve found a body,” and then Ay had to sit down. John left – Ay can’t blame him, who’d want to be mixed up inthat? Then Kenneth came upstairs, babbling, and Todd came up, too. He’d seen, of course. He’d been cleaning the bathroom when Kenneth went down there. Horrible man,’ said Pamela, with another shudder. ‘Horrible.’

‘Jim Todd, you mean?’ asked Robin.

‘Yes. Ay don’t like him at all. Ay don’t think he’s trustworthy.’

‘Really?’

‘Something very sneaky about him. Kenneth hasappallingjudgement,’ said Pamela, becoming suddenly heated again. ‘Allthe people Kenneth hired… he only cares if they’re cheap!’

‘Was Wright cheap?’ Robin asked.

‘Yes, and that’s aperfectexample of what Ay’m talking about!’ said Pamela, in frustration. ‘They were paying their first security chap next to nothing, so naturally, he took the first job offer he got, and because they were losing money hand over fist, they didn’t replace him. But Ay didn’t want to be there alone when Ay went to help out, Ay couldn’t manage carrying everything up and downstairs, andhowRachel was supposed to do it, if she ever gets well enough – so Kenneth advertised for a sort of jack-of-all-trades, a salesman who could do heavy lifting and security.’

‘He said there weren’t many applicants,’ said Robin.

‘No, of course not, not on the salary he was offering! There weren’t many applicants. Aytoldhim Ay didn’t think much of Wrayght’s CV. Misspellings all over it.’

‘Misspellings,’ repeated Robin.

‘Yes. And then helayed.’

‘Wright did?’ said Robin.

‘No, Kenneth! He agreed we shouldn’t interview Wrayght, then sneaked his email address on to the list and Ay didn’t realise until Wrayght turned up that Kenneth hadhoodwinkedme into offering the man an interview. Andthen,’ said Pamela furiously, ‘he accusedmeof making the mistake,meof adding his email address to the list, bay mistake!’

‘That seems very unfair,’ said Robin, who was most interested in this information. ‘How many people did you end up interviewing?’

‘Just three – well, two. One of them didn’t turn up – the one Ay thoughtmaytbe quite good. Ay suppose he had a better offer. So it was just Wrayght and this boy who was seventeen and looked as though he couldn’t fayt his way out of a paper bag. So, of course, with thephysicalrequirements, Wrayght was the only choice.’

‘He claimed to be from Doncaster, didn’t he?’ said Robin. ‘Did he have a Yorkshire accent?’

‘Ay don’t really know. He didn’t sound very refayned… polite enough,’ said Pamela grudgingly, ‘but Ay knewstraight awayhe knew nothing about silver or antiques, whatever he’d said at interview. Not even abasicunderstanding. He asked me what the lion passant meant!’

‘What does it mean?’ asked Robin.