Feint of Art: (10 page)

The smarmy smile returned, and he rocked back on his heels before speaking. “I think we may be looking for the same man. Why don’t we—”

He stopped suddenly, glanced toward the door, and put his fingers to his lips in the international shushing sign. In the silence I heard footsteps clacking on the stairs outside. Johnson nodded toward a large unfinished canvas leaning against the wall in a dark corner, which we crawled behind and hunkered down.

“Annn-tooon,” a woman’s voice cooed. “Anton? Are you here, darling?”

Johnson and I looked at each other in our shadowy hidey-hole, then peeked cautiously around one side of the painting. The new arrival’s willowy frame was wrapped in a gauzy flowered dress more appropriate to summer picnics than to February in San Francisco. Her ash blond hair was pulled back tightly from a lovely, delicate face and coiled upon her head in a sleek modern style. I held my breath as she crossed straight to the portfolio and tucked it confidently under one arm, then paused to write a note that she left on top of the clutter on the desk. Her heels clattered as she went down the stairs.

Johnson looked at me and raised his eyebrows. “Well, well. The old dog Anton still has a few tricks up his sleeve, eh?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I snapped. I hated mixed metaphors.

“Well, you have to admit, she’s pretty attractive. And Anton’s what, mid-sixties?”

I rolled my eyes. I was lurking behind a painting with a pig. A good-looking pig, but still a pig. On top of that, my knees were starting to ache. I did not squat well.

“Let me up.”

“First tell me what you were looking for,” he said.

“I will not,” I said. “You’re the one who’s trespassing.”

“And you’re not?” Johnson scoffed.

“I told you. Anton’s a courtesy uncle.” I was lying through my teeth. Anton was more a marked-lack-of-courtesy uncle.

“Is that why you’re hiding here with me, rather than greeting Anton’s guests in his absence?”

The good-looking pig was displaying quite a flair for the snide comment, and a part of me rather admired him for it. I tried to keep focused, but those eyes were even greener up close, and in such tight quarters I noticed how nice he smelled. I caught myself sniffing. How embarrassing. My nonexistent love life was obscuring my logic.

“If you will kindly move aside, I’ll do just that,” I said, adding, “Xerxes” for good measure.

He leaned against the wall, but otherwise did not budge. “Tell me what you know about Harlan Coombs.”

“First let me up.”

“First tell me what you know.”

“Are you saying you won’t let me up?”

Before he could answer, a cell phone trilled and Johnson and I patted ourselves down. It was mine, and the number on the caller ID was extremely long, indicating an international call. Grandfather. Despite the circumstances, I had to answer.

“
Allô oui?
” I spoke in French, hoping to throw ol’ Xerxes off the track.

“Annie my darling! How wonderful to hear from you!” My grandfather’s voice echoed and the line was full of static, but his charmingly accented English was unmistakable. Georges François LeFleur had been born and raised in Brooklyn but insisted he was to the Eiffel Tower born.

“Georges—I need to speak with you, but this isn’t a good time,” I said, continuing in French.

“Annie? What is wrong? Why do you speak such horrible French?” Grandfather exclaimed.

So it had been a few years. I was struggling to dredge up the French equivalent for “Work with me, please, will you?” when Johnson interjected.

“
Ça m’est égal,
” he said with a shrug, in perfect Parisian-accented French.

In my experience American men who spoke French were of a certain type. This man was not that type. It didn’t seem fair, somehow. I glared at Monsieur Big Ears, who smiled sweetly. I had no idea who Michael X. Johnson really was or what he really wanted, but I was pretty sure he was not who he said he was and that what he wanted was probably not on the up-and-up. In short, I didn’t trust him. I didn’t trust my grandfather to call me back, either, but I was going to have to take that chance.

“
Quel dommage!
I don’t know when I’ll have ze chance to call again,
ma cherie,
you know how it is,” Grandfather said blithely.

I knew how
he
was. I glanced at Johnson, who was examining his fingernails and humming Edith Piaf’s “Je Ne Regrette Rien” slightly off-key. With
le chat
out of the bag, I switched back to English and tucked my head into my jacket, trying for a semblance of privacy. “Grandfather, please, just tell me if you know where Anton is.”

“Anton? Anton Woznikowicz?” Grandfather shouted in reply. “Why do you want to speak with him?”

“Because I do, Grandfather,” I replied, grinding my teeth. “He’s not at his studio. Where else would he be?”

“Darling! Don’t tell me you are resuming your true calling?
Mais ça, c’est super!
Forget Anton!
Viens!
Come to Paris! Your old grandpapa will tutor you as before! Come today!”

“I don’t want to go to Paris, I want to talk to Anton about something he’s involved with. Something bad. I’m worried about him.”

“Ask him about Coombs,” Johnson broke in.

I glared at him over my jacket collar.

“Just ask,” he urged.

What the hell. “Georges, what do you know about Harlan Coombs?”

“
Quoi?
Annie, I cannot hear you. It must be a solar flare.”

Solar flare my ass. Grandfather didn’t want to answer the question.

“Harlan Coombs,” I shouted. Johnson winced.

“Bernard Sahagun?”

“No, Grandfather, Harlan
Coombs
.”

“Sahagun? Never heard of him, darling.”

I tried to make sense of that, even though I suspected my dear old grandpapa was fibbing again. “Is Bernard Sahagun a friend of Coombs? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

“Ah, my darling girl, I must go now.
Je t’aime,
bye-bye!” Grandfather disconnected.

“Who the hell is Bernard Sahagun?” I muttered, tucking my phone into my jacket pocket.

“Sixteenth-century Spanish priest. Converted the Aztecs to Catholicism,” Johnson said.

Now I was really confused. What did Aztecs and Spanish priests have to do with a Polish art forger? “Was he an artist?” I asked, hoping for clarity.

“No.”

“Was he an art dealer?”

“Don’t think so.”

“So what does he have to do with Harlan Coombs?”

“Nothing.”

“Then why should I care?”

“I didn’t say you should. Your grandfather did.”

“No he didn’t. He misunderstood what I was saying.”

“Why is this my fault?”

“I didn’t say it was your fault. How do you know about Bernard Sahagun, anyway?”

“The Jesuits. They teach stuff like that.”

“Oh.”

We had yet another staring contest. True to form, I blinked first. “Well, listen, Michael Xerxes Johnson, or whatever your name really is.” I glared at him. He smirked at me. “It’s been a whole heck of a lot of fun, but I have
got
to go.”

Literally. My bladder was infamously small. Plus, my knees had just announced that if I didn’t stop squatting immediately they would not be held responsible for the consequences.

Johnson rose gracefully and sauntered toward the door. I rose stiffly and lurched across the room, trying to work the kinks out. I hadn’t been called Kinky Kincaid in college because of the hair alone. Then I remembered the note the mystery woman had left. Johnson intercepted my gaze and beat me to it.

“Hmmm,” he said portentously.

“What? What’s it say?”

“Oh, not much.” He folded the note and nonchalantly slipped it into his pocket.

“Hold on there, Mr. Private Eye,” I ordered. “You have no right to that note. Hand it over.”

“Oh, I think not,” he replied.

“Oh, I think so,” I mimicked nastily. “Because if you don’t, I’m calling the cops.”

He snorted.

“I’m not kidding.”

He snorted again.

“Okay, how about this?” I said. “You show me the note and then I’ll tell you something about Coombs.”

“You tell me something about Coombs, then I’ll show you the note.”

“We’ll do an exchange on the count of three, okay?” He nodded. “Okay. One, two, three . . .”

I held out my hand for the note. “Coombs has a hide-out in Chinatown, where some scary people are waiting for him,” I said as Johnson gave me the piece of paper.

“We need to talk,” it said. “I’m at Q’s. Important!!! Joanne.”

We spoke at the same time.

“Who is Joanne?” I asked him.

“What scary people?” he wanted to know.

We shrugged in unison. I was beginning to feel as if I were back in middle school.

“You go first,” I said.

“You didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know,” he grumbled. “Harlan’s operated out of that Chinatown place for years. And ‘scary people’ is pretty broad.”

“Yeah, well, ‘I’m at Q’s’ is pretty broad, too, so I’d say we’re even. Who’s Joanne?”

Johnson shrugged again. Frustrated, I dropped the note on the desk and headed for the door. “Don’t you want the drawings?” he called after me.

Apparently my hiding place left something to be desired. Pulling the drawings out from beneath the rags, he placed them on the worktable and studied them. He looked up and held my gaze. “They’re fake, aren’t they?”

I had the distinct impression that he was reading me, not the drawings.

“Maybe.”

“Here.” He handed them to me.

“How did you know?” I asked.

“You don’t have much of a poker face, honey.”

“Don’t call me honey.”

He smiled and escorted me to the door.

“How do I get in touch with you?” he asked smoothly.

“Don’t call me. I’ll call you.”

I waved his business card over my shoulder as I descended the outside staircase, slammed the redwood gate behind me, stashed the fake drawings behind the driver’s seat of my truck, and took off.

 

I drove back to the studio, mulling over what had just transpired. I was no closer to finding Anton than I had been this morning, and now I suspected he had decamped. Judging from the stack of fake drawings stashed behind my seat, there were probably a number of disgruntled art dealers and clients looking for Anton, which would have driven him underground even if he had not been worried about the Caravaggio affair. And who was Joanne? She had zeroed in on the portfolio quickly enough, though she hadn’t bothered to check if the drawings were actually inside. Had she commissioned the forged sketches? Was she working with Harlan Coombs? Who was the “Q” she referred to in her note? Most important: where were the original—and extremely valuable—sketches?

Michael X. Johnson was a new puzzle. The name sounded phony—Xerxes fell out of favor shortly after the Persian Wars in the fifth century B.C.—and I did not buy his PI routine for a second. As for the business card, it proved nothing. Once, for a sociology class assignment, I had gone to a crafts fair and handed out cards proclaiming me to be a licensed acupuncturist in order to see how many people were prepared to let me stick them with needles on the basis of nothing more substantial than a business card. The number was frighteningly large.

It was apparent that Johnson was also after the drawings, but why? Had one of Coombs’ victims hired him to find them, or was he somehow connected to the forgery of
The Magi
? Johnson had suggested a link between Ernst Pettigrew and Harlan Coombs, though to be fair I had to remember that for years Coombs was a legitimate art dealer. He and Ernst would likely have met through the Brock’s Acquisitions department.

But first things first. My bladder was informing me that I had five minutes tops before I disgraced myself and ruined my truck’s already sad upholstery. Four minutes later I zipped into my building’s parking lot and thundered up the stairs. I got as far as the first landing when a door downstairs banged open and somebody called my name.

Rats. It was my new landlord.

“Yes, Mr. DeBenton?” After yesterday’s fiasco I thought it behooved me to be polite, but he had better make it quick or we would both regret it.

“May I have a word with you?”

“No problem, but I’m in a bit of a hurry at the moment,” I said, emphasizing my haste by moving up another step. “Can I call you?”

“I wish you would. I’ve left several messages already this morning on your office phone. I don’t expect a lot from my artist tenants. But I do expect common courtesy.”

That stopped me. “I haven’t been in my office yet this morning. And what have you got against artists?” I inquired, my nose so far out of joint I could smell my shampoo.

“Let me see.” He shrugged. “Artists are unpredictable. They don’t pay their rent regularly. They make huge messes and don’t clean them up. They make noise at odd hours. They are dramatic and they cause scenes.”

“I’m afraid I must disagree,” I replied, trying to be civil. “First off, I’m very predictable.” This was not strictly true. “Second off, I always pay my rent, and I pay it on time.” Kind of. So far, anyway. “Third, I always clean up after myself.” This was not even remotely true. “I don’t make much noise at any time, I am
not
dramatic, and
I do not cause scenes.
”

Fender Bender was watching me with what appeared to be a ghost of a smile. I imagined he was trying to decide whether to call 911 to have me arrested or his lawyer to have me evicted.

“Now, if you will excuse me, I have some pressing business to attend to.” I pivoted and charged up the stairs, sprinted down the hallway, and darted into the women’s room.

Back in the studio I found Mary and her good friend Sherri sitting on the red velvet couch talking to three leather-clad young men sporting a variety of piercings and multicolored hair, who lay draped over cushions on the floor. Since I wasn’t able to pay Mary enough for her to rent a decent apartment in San Francisco—heck,
I
couldn’t afford a decent place in the City—I let her use the studio as a de facto living room, and it was not unusual for unnaturally pale musicians to clutter up the place. I nodded at them and went to the desk to check for messages.