suspicious. I think it’s his Scottish blood coming out.’
Justin examined his fingertips.
‘It’s very delicate.’
I’m sure it is, I thought to myself. It would be, if blackmail was involved.
‘Well, I think you should tell me,’ I said.
‘Why should I do that?’ Justin still looked uncomfortable, and he folded his arms across his body defensively. ‘What difference does it make? I just want you to find out who’s doing it, so we can make them stop.’
I sighed. ‘Because I need to know the hold he or she has over you, so I can better neutralise the risk.’
‘OK,’ he said, sulkily, ‘they’ve got evidence of plagiarism.’
‘Tell me more about it.’ I tried on an encouraging smile like Oprah Winfrey when she wants someone famous to explain whatever crime or indiscretion they’ve been up to. Plagiarism? What was he on about?
‘OK,’ he sighed. ‘Here’s what happened then.’ He looked at Aurora.
‘Bravissimo!’ she said, standing up and clapping her hands. ‘Mio caro, Ben needs to know.’
‘Fine, but it’s against my better judgement.’
And Justin began to tell me his life story.
‘I’m thirty-eight,’ Justin said, and pulled a face. ‘Terrible isn’t it! And I started working in a kitchen when I was fourteen – that’s twenty-four years, my God, nearly a quarter of a century.’
He stood up and walked restlessly around the large study. He gazed up at one of the lurid nudes, and continued speaking.
‘My mama was from Le Marche, by way of Scotland, but I was born in England, where I lived, so my Italian was quite poor as a child.’
I nodded. That explained his slightly odd pronunciation, mainly Italian but with certain definitive London vowel sounds.
‘We moved back to Italy where her family were originally from, back in the day. I was twelve. My parents were looking after holiday homes for British owners. I got a part-time job when I was at school as a pot-washer, my first kitchen job – you don’t really need much language. And then I got promoted. You can understand that.’
‘Indeed I can,’ I said. That’s more or less how Francis had ended up being a chef for me. The big difference being that he had no talent and Justin was a genius.
‘Now,’ said Justin, tearing his gaze away from the painting and looking at me, ‘the thing was, the restaurant that I was working in was amazingly good, though I didn’t know it at the time. Who knows anything when they’re a teenager? Besides, I had other things to worry about …’
He rested a hand on Aurora’s shoulder and she patted it then kissed it.
‘And I rose through the ranks. Well, it was a small place, thirty covers max, and great regional cooking. Fifteen years later when I got my place in London, I re-created her menu. She was dead by then and I stole all her recipes.’
He paused and stared into space. ‘I mean all of them,’ he confessed. ‘That first TV series, that was all her stuff, and I passed it off as my own. My signature dishes, the zabaglione, the saltimbocca with a twist, they’re hers. And my first cookery book …’ He shook his head sadly, got up, went to the safe in the corner, (of course, there had to be a safe, here in the lair) and spun the dial this way and that. It clicked open and he reached inside and returned with a paperback book.
I examined it. Mia Cucina by Alessandra Bonini. Its spine was cracked, the pages were yellowed, the typeface looked ridiculously old-fashioned and the cover was faded. It was hard to believe that behind all the glossy footage on TV of Justin making gnocchi, twirling the crank handle of the pasta machine as he turned pasta dough into lasagne, chopping onions with amazing speed (he was incredible with a knife and I should know; I was good but he was awesome), lay this long-forgotten book.
I flipped through the pages, which were heavily annotated in biro and pencil. There was hardly any white margin left.
‘That’s her book. Long since out of print, the publisher no longer exists.’ He pulled a face. ‘If you look at Justin does Italy, it’s pretty much the same book. I just translated it. More or less the same recipes in the same order.’
‘So that’s it? You nicked a load of recipes? It’s hardly the crime of the century.’
It didn’t seem a blackmailable offence. Not in cooking. Everything is based on everything else. Even molecular gastronomy techniques, foams, gels et cetera are not exactly copyright. Nothing is new under the sun.
‘It is when your name is Justin McCleish … and, just for your information, stealing published recipes is a very big deal indeed.’ It was Charlotte, his agent, who had slipped into the room unnoticed by me. ‘For one thing, aside from being sued, no reputable publisher would ever touch him again with a bargepole.’
‘Oh,’ I said, suitably chastened. I felt I had not made a very good impression on her. I made a mental note to work harder on my intellectual side. Next time I would bring a book, show her that I could read. A difficult book. Jacques Derrida, he’d do. He was a dead French intellectual. God knows what theories or philosophy he had propounded. Jess would doubtless fill in the blanks.
‘Justin isn’t just a chef …’ she said.
‘Isn’t he?’ I was confused momentarily.
‘No,’ she said firmly, ‘he’s also a brand. And the brand is integrity.’
I looked across at Justin who seemed a lot more relaxed now he had Charlotte to do his speaking for him.
‘Most of the people who watch Justin are never going to cook what he’s showing them.’
‘They’re not?’ I felt somehow disappointed.
‘No, they like what it represents. These are people who haven’t got the time or the inclination to cook, but they do like Justin – he’s Mr Nice Guy.’ Charlotte warmed to her theme, her eyes flashing behind the thick lenses of her glasses.
‘If they thought he had stolen some old woman’s heritage, it would be terrible for Justin, a real game changer and not in a good way.’
I began to see what she meant, and it complicated things a lot. I frowned.
‘So, discretion is in order?’
‘Absolutely. I, we, do not want the police involved, nor the media.’
It seemed a bit of a tall order.
‘So tell me the mechanics of the blackmail,’ I said.
Charlotte looked at Justin and he handed me a piece of paper. ‘These are the instructions
