3 The Braque Connection (21 page)

“I would never do that, you silly man.” Victoria leaned down to kiss the top of his head. She straightened, looked at me, then at Colin with her head tilted. “We’ve been nagging you for like forever to settle down. I always knew the perfect woman would cross your path. Is she the one?”

“Victoria Gaudette Brinius.” Michael sat up straighter in his chair. “That is none of our business. Sorry, Isaac. Now hit the lights, woman.”

When the room lost the brightness of the artificial light, I felt relieved. The tension that had moved into Colin’s body language had been confusing. I resisted the urge to try and make sense of it and focussed on the purpose of our visit. Light coming from the front room left everything dimmed, including the clutter.

“Genevieve, do you know what an underpainting is?”

“No, but from the term I conclude that it is a painting under the main painting?”

Colin stepped closer to me, narrowing his eyes at the three paintings on the easels. All three were turned around, the clear canvasses facing the front. That had been something I had noticed. Instead of the usual heavy brown paper covering the back of my bedroom painting, it was a thin, blank canvas.

“Underpaintings are more than that,” Colin said. “Painters as early as High Renaissance artists used this technique. It is said that Titian pioneered it, but there are many other theories. It is an initial layer of paint that serves as a base. Some say that it is done in monochrome, other masterpieces done by the greats have complete paintings hiding under the one exhibited in museums or galleries. Another theory is that if the underpainting is done correctly, it establishes the tonal values for the overpainting to be done perfectly.”

“And loads of other theories which Isaac and I have had many arguments about. Most times the underpainting is the foundation for the overpainting. In other words, it is the same image. But there are examples in masterpieces where the underpainting is a completely different image.” Michael nodded at the canvasses. “When you brought me those first two paintings, all I saw was forgeries. One good forgery and one great one—yours. But I didn’t look for more until you brought me the original. I got curious what Braque might have hidden behind this famous work of his and brought in my infrared equipment.”

“He was so excited to have this original in his hands. You should have seen him, Isaac. Like a kid with a new toy.” Victoria was once again standing next to Michael, her hand resting on his shoulder. He covered her hand with his, a pose unconscious and I suspected second nature to this couple.

“When I took the first image, I was heartbroken when I didn’t see anything spectacular under the original. A few images later, I was deeply disappointed. But, like now, the room was dark-ish, and I had turned your forgeries around to not distract me. I have no idea why I did it, but I took an image of one of the forgeries––the back of the forgery. And boy, did I get an eyeful.”

Victoria handed Colin what looked like a very sophisticated digital camera.

“Take a shot so you will believe me.” Michael’s voice held a dramatic tone. “I still can’t believe what I saw.”

Colin stepped closer to the first forgery, brought the viewfinder to his eye and took a photo. He lowered the camera to look at the little display screen. He gasped. “Jesus.”

“What?” I moved next to Colin and looked at the camera in his hands. On the display screen was a cubist painting. There were no colours, only stunning geometric shapes. He looked at me, looked back at the camera and shook his head. He inhaled deeply, moved to the other forgery and took a photo of it. This time a different cubist painting appeared on the display screen.

“Do you recognise any of these?” I asked Colin softly.

“No. These are very small images, but they are not from any known cubist artist I know. But it is without a doubt typical cubist style. My God, what does this mean?”

He toggled between the two images, tilting the camera for me to see. These were exquisite works of art I wouldn’t mind owning. One was a cityscape and one a landscape.

The wheelchair made a soft squeaking sound as Michael rolled it closer. “Do you see how the underpaintings are almost to the edge of the frames?”

Colin made an affirmative sound. Indeed, the material used to cover the back of the paintings stretched two thirds onto the back of the frames.

“What did they paint on?” I asked.

“Looks like a thin canvas.” Colin leaned in to look at the back of one of the forgeries. “Not entirely uncommon to use as a back cover, but definitely uncommon to paint on the back. And then to cover the painting with a layer of paint.”

“We had actually planned to remove the paintings from the frames for further analysis,” Victoria said. “When Michael saw the underpaintings, we decided to leave everything as is.”

“Good thinking.” Colin straightened. “Thank you.”

“So, what do you think, my friend?” Michael asked.

“I think we need to do more checking.” Colin looked at me. “There are a few ways to check for underpaintings. Michael has used infrared light, the most common first step. Then there is ultraviolet light and radiography.”

“For this you only need good digital camera,” Michael said. “My equipment is much better than that camera, but didn’t show anything more than what you’ve just seen. A while ago a few artists produced paintings that could only be seen through the cameras of smartphones and cell phones equipped with CCD.”

My mind was consumed with processing this new information. The most important element in this new development was that Kubanov was communicating. He was sending messages he wanted us—me—to interpret and act on. Looking at these underpaintings gave me no insight into what those messages might be.

“We should check this painting too.” Colin helped Victoria set up an easel between the original and the other forgeries, and placed the painting from my bedroom on it, the back towards us. None of us were surprised when Colin took a photo and it revealed another underpainting.

I was still standing very close to Colin. He turned his head to look me. “Does this mean anything to you?”

“No. Should it?” I tilted my head to the side and studied the geometric shapes coming together to form a pastoral scene. This one looked more similar in style to the Klee Colin had given me for my birthday than Braque or Picasso’s cubist works. “I’m not an expert in this. I don’t know what this is pointing us to.”

Colin grunted his acknowledgement and continued to stare at the display screen. I stood in silence, hoping for a connection to click in my mind.

“I’m not going to ask what this is about.” Michael’s statement broke into the quiet. His expression wasn’t clear in the low light, but his tone was for the first time without levity. “Isaac, if you and Genevieve need help in anything, all you have to do is ask. Victoria and I will be here. This is not about owing anyone anything.”

“Thank you, Michael.” Something was off with Colin’s tone. I wished there were more light. I no longer knew what the intention was behind everyone’s words. As if hearing my thoughts, Victoria turned on the lights, bathing the room in bright artificial light.

Colin politely declined their offers of coffee, tea and breakfast. Victoria helped us carry the paintings to the SUV and saw us off. It was quiet in the SUV for the first few minutes. I was thinking about everything I had observed. “Why won’t you accept Michael’s offer of help?”

“You caught that one.” His smile was quickly replaced by concern. “Do you think he got that?”

“I couldn’t see his nonverbal cues clearly, but from what I saw, no.”

“Good. I want to keep it like that.”

“Why?”

“It’s not about Michael and Victoria. They are wonderful people. It’s his brother I don’t trust.”

“Then why did you take the paintings to him?”

“His brother is in Ireland at the moment. I knew it was safe to have the paintings there. Michael would never say anything to his brother, but that man shows up at the most inopportune times.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“He’s a cop.” The disgust with which he said that was so unexpected, I laughed. “It’s not funny, Jenny. He’s a really good cop.”

This made me laugh even harder.

An annoying ringtone dampened my mirth. It sounded like the music played before the wrestling matches Vinnie and Colin watched.

“It’s Millard,” Colin said. “You’d better get that.”

“Stop changing the ringtones on my phone.” I found my smartphone and swiped the screen. “Hello, Manny. You’re on speakerphone.”

“Frey with you?”

“Yes.”

“Come to the office.”

“Not even a pretty please, Millard?” Colin tilted his head towards the phone. “We’re on our way home. Why do you need us at the office?”

“My guys found some paintings in Hawk’s warehouse. Cubist paintings. They brought them here, and supermodel is helping me put them up in the conference room.”

As Manny spoke, the pending insight into the numbers broke through. The clarity in my mind was dazzling. “Is Francine there?”

“Yes, Doc. Wait, I’ll put you on speakerphone too.”

“Hey, girlfriend.”

“Francine, can you please locate Rousseau & Rousseau client files for me?”

“Sure, which ones?”

“Each client has a number allocated when they sign with Rousseau & Rousseau. I think the numbers on the website frames are client numbers.”

“Shit. Have you told Phillip?”

“Not yet. Just get those files, please. We’ll be there in another—”

“—ten minutes,” Colin finished.

“Make it five, Frey.” Manny disconnected the call and I put the phone back in its pocket in my handbag. Colin sped up, but stayed within the speed limit. Was my suspicion about the client files correct? If so, how was it going to connect to the rest of the case?

Chapter SEVENTEEN

Manny’s voice met us as Colin and I stepped out of the elevator into Rousseau & Rousseau. I was carrying two of the paintings, Colin the other two, including the original. Around his neck, he had an expensive looking camera that he had taken from his SUV’s trunk. He only smiled when I asked him why he would leave such expensive equipment in his vehicle. We followed the sound of Manny’s serious tone to the large conference room at the opposite end of our floor. I seldom came here.

“About bloody time you two show up.” Manny stood at the far end of the spacious room, his hands on his hips. His thumbs were pointing back, indicating an argumentative mood.

“Are these all the paintings?” Colin didn’t pay attention to Manny’s rudeness, immediately attracted by the new additions to the room’s decor.

“There was a room behind Hawk’s room in the warehouse where he kept all these.” Manny waved a hand at the paintings hanging against the wall. Six months ago, when Phillip had the team room built, he had also renovated this conference room. It was now larger and set up to serve as a mini-gallery if ever the need arose. Along the wall were adjustable hooks to hang as many or as few paintings as were needed. Paintings of different sizes by different artists covered two walls.

“How many did you find?” I asked, walking to the closest painting. I recognised the work as Juan Gris’ Violin and Checkerboard.

“Thirteen.”

“These look like originals.” Colin leaned in to a painting. “There’s always a margin of error, but I’m ninety-nine percent sure this painting is an original Cézanne.”

“I was afraid of that.” Phillip stood in the door, his demeanour so unlike his normal professionalism that I took a step closer.

“What’s wrong?”

He took a deep breath. “All these paintings are insured by Rousseau & Rousseau. I have no idea how it is possible that someone had access to this data. I pride myself in protecting my clients’ confidentiality. It is what this business has been built on.”

“Kubanov,” Manny and Colin said at the same time. Colin turned back to inspect the paintings.

“This is a disaster.” Phillip pulled out a chair and sat at the table. In the seven years I had known him, I had never seen him dejected. “Even the slightest hint of our clients’ data being vulnerable and our reputation is destroyed.”

“He’s hitting you where it hurts.” Manny sat down opposite Phillip. “He’s getting to Frey on a personal level, and to you professionally. Last time he had one of the best hackers working for him, giving him access to your computers. Maybe he found somebody like that again to get into your files.”

“No one has been in the system.” Francine walked into the room, carrying a stack of folders. It wasn’t going to get easier for Phillip. Francine put the files on the table and looked at me, the
frontalis
and
orbicularis oris
muscles in her face tight with anger. “Thirteen files for thirteen numbers.”

“What’s this, Genevieve?” Phillip’s body tensed. He had recognised the folders.

“The numbers hidden in the frames around my photos on the website looked familiar to me. On the way here I realised why and asked Francine to see if there were client files for each of those numbers.”

“Dear God.” Phillip reached for the folders, but pulled his hand back.

“Manny’s guys have found thirteen paintings in the warehouse. There are thirteen files here.” I picked up the top file. “I think we should look for connections.”

Francine and Colin also took files, the atmosphere in the conference room turning heavy with tension. It didn’t take long to confirm each of the paintings on the wall belonged to one of the thirteen clients insured by Rousseau & Rousseau.

“How the hell did someone get access to these files?” Manny walked along the table where we had laid out the files, open on the page with the painting information.

“I’m the best there is, Manny.” There was no arrogance in Francine’s tone or body language. She was making a statement of fact. “If an unauthorised person got into this company’s computer system, I would have found it. I’ve looked since the day Colin and Genevieve disappeared and haven’t found any breach. It is no fault of Rousseau & Rousseau’s.”

Some of the tension left Phillip’s shoulders. He upheld a high work ethic and set high standards for everyone, including himself. His integrity was paramount to his business and he saw Rousseau & Rousseau as an extension of him. It was. And that was why I could comprehend his distress.

I stood in front of a painting, thinking. Colin was on the other side of the room, taking his time with each painting. Francine was positing an unlikely theory about government espionage and Manny was becoming increasingly agitated. Something was trying to connect in my consciousness. A keyword someone had said, a clue I had observed, or a sequence of events. It could be one or all of them, but I knew when that connection clicked, I would know where and how Kubanov had gained access to Rousseau & Rousseau’s database.

“These are all originals,” Colin said. “Except for one.”

Curious about an anomaly, I walked to stand next to him. He was looking at a familiar painting, but it was the one next to it that caught my attention.

“Oh my.” My voice was a shocked whisper. “This is Braque’s Man with a Guitar, the
L’homme à la guitare
. I must have seen this somewhere and that is why I included this in my email.”

“It makes sense, but were we at the warehouse or did we see it somewhere else?”

“I guess we’ll never know.” It was most perturbing to have a gaping hole in my memory. I looked at the other Braque painting from Hawk’s warehouse, the one that used to be my favourite. This brought the number of Harbour of Normandy paintings up to five, one of which was the original.

“Is this one also a forgery by the same person?” I asked.

“No.” Colin pointed at the signature in the left-hand corner. “This is the artist who painted your reproduction. This is the painting that was in your bedroom, Jenny.”

I took a step away from the painting. There was no doubt in my mind that this piece of art would never hang in my house again. No matter the lack of rationality, the association attached to this specific work would remind me of Kubanov every time I looked at it. The Klee Colin had given me for my birthday would be much better above my bed.

“How sure are you all the others are originals, Frey? If that one is a fake, maybe the others are also fakes.” Manny was glaring at my painting.

“As I said earlier, there is always a margin of error, but this is the only non-original in this room. I would’ve recognised a forgery. It would take an above exceptional forger to duplicate all these paintings and not be found out.”

“Someone like you?”

“You might not be as sarcastic if you see what we found out about the forgeries.” Colin found a place on the second wall for the original Braque that we had brought with us. “This one should be with his brothers.”

“Did your friend tell you anything about the Harbour of Normandy?” Phillip asked.

“Not about the original, no. Except that it is the original, just as I thought. Francine, can you connect my camera to the screen in here?” Colin handed Francine his camera and she got busy with the multimedia system. He pushed four conference chairs against the third wall and placed the three forged paintings and my reproduction on it, showcasing the backs. “We’ll need to get easels in for these.”

“I hope you plan to add a tell to your show pretty fast, Frey.”

Even Phillip showed signs of impatience. Colin ignored Manny and took his camera from Francine with a nod. “If you can turn off the lights, please.”

Manny and Phillip both swivelled their heads from the paintings to the screen now lowered over a part of the wall with the originals. Francine pressed the button controlling the lights and the room darkened, only the light coming from the corridor casting shadows. Colin spent some time with the digital settings on his camera before he took a photo and waited for the Bluetooth connection to transfer it to the screen. Again I was amazed at the beauty of the painting as it came up on the screen. Colin moved to take photos of the other forgeries.

“Oh my God.” Francine’s gasp was audible.

“What the bloody hell is that?” Manny gaped at the colourless painting on display.

“Underpaintings.” Phillip gave a brief description, similar to what I had been told an hour earlier. I turned on the lights, needing to see their body language. I had hated not seeing Michael and Victoria’s nonverbal cues.

“I want a life-size print of each of those paintings here.” Manny pointed at the paintings resting on the chairs. “I need to see it, not look at a blank canvas or look at a slideshow on a screen.”

“I’ll get it done,” Francine said.

“We need the other forgeries.” The confusion on everyone’s faces told me I had to explain. “According to Colin the forgery replacing his in the safe house and the one replacing the reproduction in my apartment were painted by the same artist. Someone had to break in to replace all the paintings. Has anyone reported a burglary?” I asked Phillip. “Have any of our clients indicated in any way that these paintings had been taken from their homes?”

“No. Ms McCarthy wouldn’t have known hers had been replaced, had she not wanted to sell it.”

“Looking at this, I posit that these owners all have paintings in their homes they think are originals. We should get those forgeries and check all of them for underpaintings.” As I said this, more pieces clicked into place. “Once we have those paintings, I think we will have the message Kubanov is trying to send me.”

“A message, Doc?”

“We are working on the theory that Kubanov wants revenge for whatever crime he perceives we have committed against him. It’s not a strongly substantiated theory, but I feel comfortable using it. It fits with Kubanov’s psychological profile.” I had their full attention. “Through some means Kubanov knows personal information about Colin and confidential details about Rousseau & Rousseau. He has been acting on this information, killing Colin’s associates and setting him up for murders. He’s also using this information to discredit Phillip’s business. Why Colin and Phillip? What do they have in common?’

“You,” Francine said softly. “Which means that Kubanov would want to get to you too. Apart from replacing your Braque painting, what else has he done that included you?”

“He sent her those fucking daffodils.” Manny sat down and looked at me through narrowed eyes. “So you’re thinking that Kubanov is sending you some message with the backpaintings?”

“Underpaintings,” I said. “Kubanov likes to play games. He’s a strategist. Nothing he does is without purpose. I’m wondering how long he has been planning this. He would’ve needed to commission the artist quite some time ago to paint not only forgeries, but also underpaintings on the back of the forgeries. Then he would’ve needed a burglar to break into these people’s homes and replace the paintings.”

“But first he would’ve needed to know who owns which paintings, where they live and how to enter their homes.” Phillip turned to Francine. “Six months ago, Kubanov got someone to get into Genevieve’s computers. Could he have downloaded those client files then?”

“No. I’ve checked and double-checked. And I will check again, but those files had not been accessed by anyone but those with authorisation.”

“I need a list of when those files were accessed and by whom.” That looming connection was gaining ground, but still out of reach. “We need those forgeries. I need to see what is behind them.”

“Damn it.” Phillip so seldom swore that we all looked at him in surprise. “I’ll call everyone in to the office. I refuse to think that it is one of my team who betrayed me. We’ll have those paintings here as soon as possible.”

I needed to be in my viewing room, in my precisely arranged environment where I could allow the different components to fall into place. Any further discussion paused when Manny’s smartphone rang. With an annoyed look at the device, he answered the call and left the conference room. Phillip and Colin started talking about the equipment needed to best see the underpaintings. Francine nodded towards the door in a gesture I had come to interpret as a request to follow her. We walked to the team room.

“I know you have a suspicion of someone in the company,” she said. “Someone who gave Kubanov that information.”

“How do you think you know this?”

“Because I have a gut feeling that you have a gut feeling.” Her wide and teasing smile warned me not to fall into her trap.

I inhaled deeply. Pointing accusing fingers at someone without evidence did not feel right. I chose my words carefully. “People commit crimes for different reasons. One of those, maybe the most powerful motivator, is money. You said you were going to look deeper into the employees’ finances. Did you?”

“I started a search, but there’s been so much happening at the same time that I dropped it. I’ve been looking into Dukwicz, but now I will make this a priority.”

I took a few steps to my viewing room. I didn’t want to taint her search, but also didn’t want her to waste time looking at the wrong people. “Start with those closest to Phillip.”

“Including you?”