Judgment of Solomon

A retired senior Air Force officer, Geoffrey Connaught, wants Lovejoy to sell his large and remarkable collection of Jewish antiques. The items were allegedly purchased by his late wife, and they have no provenance to speak of. The pieces are Jewish religious artefacts, which is why the Solomons' suspicions carry the weight they do. Lovejoy's contacts, the father and son dealers the Solomons, are suspicious from the start, and the unease only grows.

Connaught does not wait for the valuation. He makes a quick sale to Charlie Gimbert, and it is only then that the Solomons tell Lovejoy what they suspect: the whole lot was looted by Nazis from Polish synagogues. That explains the haste. When the collection is subsequently stolen, Eric catches the thieves, but the Solomons' judgment cuts deeper. Mr Solomon recognises that dishonesty takes many forms, and Connaught is not all he seems to be. Add to that Eric being arrested for theft while driving Jane's Range Rover, and the episode has more plates spinning than a fairground act.

Ian La Frenais, Jonathan Gash and Tom Kempinski wrote it, Rob Walker directed. Ian McShane is Lovejoy, Phyllis Logan is Lady Jane Felsham, Dudley Sutton is Tinker Dill, and Chris Jury is Eric Catchpole. Malcolm Tierney is Charlie Gimbert, Peter Jeffrey plays Geoffrey Connaught, Alfred Marks is Solomon Senior, Gareth Marks is Solomon Junior, Cyril Shaps, a familiar face in British television for decades, is the Watchmaker, and Eric Deacon is Det. Insp. Hardwick.

It went out in February 1993, one of the season's heavier outings. The episode carries real weight under the usual banter. The value here is not in recovering the goods or catching the crooks, but in the complicated histories that bind people to objects. A collection with no provenance, a quick sale, and a truth that nobody wanted to say out loud: Lovejoy's trade has its dark corners, and this episode walks straight into them.