Masterpiece

Mona thought the house didn’t look too bad at all. The old fella had kept the place in pretty good order before he died. There were no K2 like mountains of clutter filling entire rooms or bags of rubbish left to rot on the floor. Mona had only joined the company six months ago but the mess that some people left behind had been a real eye opener.

“Hey, come take a look at this” called Vincent, clomping his way down the ladder. He held a rolled up canvas under his arm. Unfurling it with a flourish, he added unnecessarily “I found it in the attic”

Mona looked at the scruffy yellow houses bobbing on a sea of rolling green hills. She wrinkled up her nose “Ugly thing isn’t it?” she said “still there’s no accounting for taste I suppose”

“It’s a Paul Cezannes” said Vincent practically hopping from foot to foot “stolen from a gallery in Oxford years ago”

“So you’re saying we call the police?”

“I’m saying that this piece alone is worth about 4 million quid. It’s not the only one, Mona, there’s all sorts up there, and we’re the only ones who know about it”

Mona tapped at the screen of her mobile, this had to be a wind up. “Bloody hell….” she said “Vincent, get the van, let’s go”

Pablo was making tea when his wife got home “A letter came today” he told her “My great uncle Claude died, apparently I’m his only living relative. Don’t look worried, I never met the guy, sounds like quite a character though. Dad told me once that he was an artist, well a forger really, fled the country when the mob found out the masterpiece he sold them was just something he knocked up in his attic.