‘You didn’t see this woman,’ said Jan. ‘She seemed a little bit unhinged. The first I knew of any of this was when I turned up at lunchtime to take over from Ciara. There was no sign of Mary’s picture; by that point it had been hidden, and I had no idea it had ever been at the fair. As far as I knew it was in my workroom, waiting to be picked up by Mary.’

‘The woman came back?’ Charlie tried to sound as if she didn’t already know.

‘Yes, with a man in tow, but again, that was weird. It was as if he was pretending not to be with her, standing with his back to us, listening to our conversation. I didn’t realise he was with her, didn’t even notice him until he started walking away and she ran after him. She’d been shouting at me about how a picture by Mary Trelease had been on our stand that morning, and saying Ciara had lied to her about it. Course, I didn’t know what she was talking about. I told her she was mistaken. It didn’t take me long to work it out—I found Abberton hidden under a pile of prints under the table a few seconds later, but by that point the strange woman had gone.’

‘How did Mary find out?’ Charlie asked, guessing she must have.

Jan’s face crumpled in distress at the memory. ‘I told her. I had to. I didn’t believe the woman at the art fair was a spy, or anything so absurd, but it wasn’t beyond the bounds of possibility that she knew Mary and would tell her. I thought I ought to do the decent thing and ’fess up.’

‘I assume it didn’t go down well.’

‘Mary slammed the phone down on me. The next day she came like a deaf-mute to collect the painting—wouldn’t look at me, wouldn’t speak to me. I haven’t heard from her since. She wouldn’t take my calls and didn’t answer my letters. Eventually I gave up.’

‘And Ciara?’ Charlie was curious.

‘She left the week after the art fair,’ said Jan tersely.

Charlie read a sacking between the lines. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got any photos of any of the pictures you framed for Mary?’ Charlie was growing more curious about Abberton the more she heard about it. She wanted to see what the fuss was about.