CopyCat (6 page)

Andrea Jones had been a good friend to me all during the arrest and the trial, but she had a tendency to mother me a bit. Usually I didn’t mind, but I didn’t want her chasing Connor Todd away.

Before I could answer, though, Connor broke in. “Hello.” Connor said, coming up and putting the bags down so he could shake her hand. “My name’s Connor Todd. I’m an investigator for the Alliance Insurance Group. I’m investigating the disappearance of some of the paintings stolen by Miguel Santiago. I was hoping Mr. Winters can help us clear up a few things.”

She dropped his hand fast and jerked the bags up. “Thanks for your assistance, Mr. Todd, but we can handle it from here. I’m Mr. Winters’s attorney, and he has nothing more to say on that subject.”

Looking past her and finding my eyes, Connor Todd gave me a long look. “Mr. Winters promised to answer some questions for me.”

“Well, any questions you have can be addressed to my office. I feel sure they’ve already been asked and answered anyway. Send me an email and I’ll get back to you.” The two of them glared at each other for another moment before Connor gave a curt nod and turned on his heel to go back to his car. As he pulled out of my driveway, he never even looked back at me.

I turned and led the way inside, with Andrea Jones making little exclamations of concern about my injuries. She made me sit down while she put my groceries away for me, leaving the traps on the counter. She gave them a long look, but didn’t make any comment about them. She did, however, have plenty to say about everything else.

“What on earth have you done to yourself, Gavin? And why was that man here anyway? You don’t have to talk to him.” She perched on the side of the ugly red armchair and looked sternly at me. “From now on if he comes back, you let me know right away. Both you and this house have been cleared, and this comes perilously close to harassment to me.”

“It’s okay, Andrea Jones. I don’t know anything more than what I’ve already told the police. Connor’s wasting his time, really.”

“Oh, I know that, but he shouldn’t be bothering you.” She watched me for a moment and then reached over to take my hand. “Anyway, I came over to talk to you. I have some bad news for you, sweetheart. It’s about Miguel.”

“I know—the insurance investigators told me yesterday.”

She looked incensed and drew herself up angrily. “Those son-of-a…Dear, I’m so sorry. You shouldn’t have had to hear about it that way.”

“No,” I said, pulling my hand gently away. “I’m okay.”

She was quiet for a long moment as she watched me ease my shoe off my bad foot and then take off the other one. Frowning, she said, “My mama would have said you’re going to catch pneumonia going around in the winter time with those bare feet.”

“I’m more concerned about stepping on something else after all this.”

“Is that how this happened? You stepped on something?”

“Some broken glass at the top of the stairs. I lost my balance and fell backward.”

She goggled at me, her eyebrows shooting up her forehead. “From those steep stairs of yours? It’s a wonder you’re not dead!”

“Just bruised pretty good, and my wrist is sprained.” I held up the brace.

“Well, I just came by to check on you and tell you about…about Miguel. I’m glad to see you’re taking it so well. I was worried.”

I shrugged and gave her a little smile.

“Well, if you’re sure you’re okay…is there anything I can do for you while I’m here? Help you with anything?”

“No, I’m fine. I need to get back to my painting, actually.”

“Okay, okay, I can take a hint. But call me if you need anything, all right?”

I gave her assurances and stood up to keep moving her gently toward the door. Andrea Jones had been a fierce advocate for me, but right that minute I really did want to get back to work.

After she’d gone, I put the rat traps out. I put one under the sink, and one in the bathroom downstairs, then the last three upstairs in the closets there. I spent the rest of the afternoon in my studio, and didn’t come up for air until the light began to fail. I was realizing how hungry I was about the time the doorbell rang. It was getting to be a regular occurrence anymore.

It was Connor Todd again and this time, he held out a big pizza box in front of him. “I thought you might like to share this with me,” he said when I opened the door. He held a six pack of Coors up with the other hand. “Can I tempt you?”

“Absolutely,” I said, grinning. He stepped in, bringing with him the smell of pepperoni, cheese and tomato sauce—some of my favorite scents. He followed me back to the living room and I settled happily next to him on the sofa. He cracked open a couple of beers and I snagged a huge, greasy slice of pizza.

“Your attorney was less than pleased to see me here this morning.”

I smiled around a big bite. “Andrea Jones is really nice once you get to know her. She’s helped me out a lot. I’d probably still be in jail if it weren’t for her.”

“Mm…”

“You can ask me your questions now if you want to. I know I promised you this morning, so go ahead.”

Connor finished his slice of pizza and took a sip of his beer. He gave me a speculative gaze. “Are you sure? Do you feel up to it?”

“Sure, I’m fine. I painted all afternoon, as a matter of fact.”

“What are you working on?”

“A piece by Degas—do you know him?”

Connor shook his head. “I’ve heard the name, but that’s about it.”

“He was French—sort of an impressionist, but very early. He painted dancers mostly, though this isn’t one of those pieces. Those would have been easier, in a way, because of all the bright colors. Their patterns are usually easier to pick out. This one is proving to be kind of challenging.”

“You know a lot about art.”

“Not really,” I said with a shrug. “My agent brings me what the clients want and some prints to work from. I usually look the artist up online too, along with the painting.”

“You make any money off these reproductions?”

“A little. They don’t sell for all that much. Of course, what’s a couple of hundred dollars compared to what the painting would actually cost, even if it could be purchased and wasn’t hanging in some museum or collection somewhere? And my copies are just as good. Better sometimes.”

Connor choked on a sip of beer. Once he stopped coughing, he wiped his eyes and smiled at me, shaking his head. “Not modest, are you?”

I didn’t understand, but sensed that I probably should, so I just shrugged. After a few more minutes of companionable silence, while I finished my third slice of pizza, Connor Todd leaned back and pulled out a small notebook, like I saw his partner, Jim Allen, writing in.

“How long have you done these reproductions, Gavin?”

“Since I was in high school—maybe six or seven years now.”

“Is that how you met Miguel Santiago?”

“Not exactly. I was nineteen when I was first introduced to him, but it was only a casual meeting. My grandfather was still alive then, and he was with my grandfather’s friend, Steven Oswald, one day when he came to give me an assignment. I didn’t really talk to him until two years later. I went to a party at his house with Steven Oswald. That’s how…that’s when it started.”

Hard hands pulling me down on top of him, impaling me on his shaft and laughing as I tried to pull away—“you’re not going anywhere until I say you can, beautiful boy. Not until I finish with you…”

“You had an affair with him?”

“We lived together. I kept my house, of course, and used it for my studio, but I spent most nights at his condo, unless he needed me to work late. Then we’d stay here.”

“I understand you copied art from his gallery from the artists who exhibited there. Then he sold the originals and put the copies in their places. Some of them were quite valuable.”

“Yes.”

Connor leaned forward and looked at me intently. “You told the judge you didn’t understand that what you did for Miguel was wrong. Is that really true, Gavin?”

“That’s not precisely what I said to the judge. But after we talked, he said I
misperceived
reality.”

Connor Todd blew out a long breath. “What the hell does that mean, Gavin? Did you or did you not know that what you were doing was against the law?”

“Oh, yes, I knew that.” I wiped my hands on the napkin and held out the box to Connor Todd. “Do you want this last slice of pizza? If you don’t I might save it for my lunch tomorrow—it was really good.”

Connor Todd simply stared at me like I was some alien life form. I really hated that look. I blushed and slumped down in my seat. “What is it? What did I say?”

“Did you just admit your guilt to me?” Connor Todd stood up and started pacing back and forth in my living room. He was glaring at me and running his hand through his hair. “Damn it, Gavin, I told you once before that I can’t be your friend! You can’t share confidences with me and expect me to…You can’t just…I’ll have to talk to the police and tell them what you said—you know that, right?”

“You can, but the judge already knows all about it. I told him the same thing.”

He stopped pacing in mid-stride and stared at me open-mouthed. “What?”

“I told the judge. I don’t lie about things. When he asked me, I told him exactly what I told you.”

“That you knew painting those pictures for Miguel was against the law and yet you did it anyway?”

“Yes.”

“And the judge let you go?”

“Yes.”

Connor Todd threw himself down in the chair and shook his head. “You’re going to have to explain, Gavin, because I’m lost here.”

I sat back and considered how I might explain this to Connor Todd. It seemed so obvious to me, but for some reason the neurotypicals found it difficult to conceive. “Have you ever seen my paintings? I mean, really looked at them?”

He shook his head slowly. “One of them. It was…remarkable. I’ve seen photographs of the other frauds, too.”

I got up and nodded toward my studio in the back. “Come with me and I’ll show you what I’m working on now.”

He followed me back to my studio and I turned on the light. The Degas was turned toward the window from earlier in the afternoon when I was trying to capture the remaining light, so I turned the easel toward Connor Todd and stepped back. The warm shades of brown and gray glowed in the harsh glare of the overhead light. The painting was a depiction of a woman and man at the center and right of the painting. The man, wearing a hat, looks to the right, off the canvas, while the woman, dressed formally and also wearing a hat, stares downward. They both looked a bit shabby and both seem vacant as they stared off into space. A glass filled with the pale green absinthe sits in front of the woman.

“This painting was universally panned when it was first exhibited—literally booed off the easel by critics, who disliked its subject matter and thought it was uncouth and depicted two drunkards. It was only later that it was recognized as a great work of art.” I turned toward Connor Todd. “But none of that matters to me—I don’t get context, you see, and I don’t care what the paintings represent. I only see the patterns of the colors, and I find them beautiful.”

He shifted his gaze from the painting back toward me. “Okay. So…?”

“So instead of concentrating on getting the vacant stare just right or depicting ‘an air of desolation’ like the descriptions say online, I’m not constrained by any of those concerns. I concentrate only on the patterns and shading of the colors. It makes my copies come out as perfect replicas of the originals.
Perfect copies
—exactly the same as the original artist’s.”

He stared at me intently, really seeming to be trying to understand my point. “You have to help me here, Gavin. I’m still not getting it.”

I huffed out an impatient breath. “It’s the same painting in every regard. Put them side by side and even Degas himself couldn’t tell the difference—so why is one of them worth so much money and the other worth very little? It’s completely illogical. They’re the same thing.”

He raised his eyebrows at me. “Gavin, it may seem that way, but what Santiago was doing by substituting the paintings was fraud. If this painting you’re working on were offered for sale as artwork by Degas, and sold for a lot of money, as you say, then that’s dishonest. It’s misrepresentation.”

I made a little sound of impatience. “Is that what determines the worth of a work of art? The name of the artist? No! It’s the work itself—the shapes, textures and colors. That’s where its beauty and value should come from. Someone should fall in love with it and want it for their home so they can look at it every day and appreciate it.”

“That’s just naïve. People buy paintings for all kinds of reasons besides appreciation of the art—as investments, for example.”

“If they buy this painting of mine, they have exactly what they bargained for—a beautiful painting of two people sitting in a café in Paris. Miguel understood that! He agreed with me, and we gave people what they wanted. That’s all.”

“Miguel agreed, huh? And what did Miguel do with the originals?”

“I suppose he sold them like you said—but does it matter? No one would be able to tell the difference between them unless you tested the age of the canvas. With a newer painting, you couldn’t even do that. You see, no one was cheated—not really. The buyer got what he wanted.”

“No, he didn’t—It’s not real, Gavin!”

“But it
is
real! If I can reproduce a thing so perfectly that no one can tell the difference, then it creates its own reality. Is one identical twin any less real than the other?” I pulled the beer bottle from his hand and held it up next to mine. “Which is the real and which is the fake? They’re identical, Connor! Because one was made a little earlier in time than the other one doesn’t make it less real. There is no
real
one!”

He shook his head in exasperation. “You’re looking at this all wrong, Gavin. Look, suppose you had a chance to buy—I don’t know—the
Mona Lisa
. You have the money, you pick up the painting and then you discover the painting is a fraud—It’s a copy by one of his apprentices or something. How would you feel?”

“How do you know for sure the
Mona Lisa wasn’t
painted by one of da Vinci’s apprentices? Would it make any difference? Would it suddenly be worthless, after being revered as a great work of art over the centuries?”