The Art Forger (25 page)

“It’s the reason for the not guilty plea. According to Patel’s lawyers, he never thought the painting was the real thing, never even wanted the real thing. Patel claims that as far as he knew, he was buying a copy through an online company that does high-quality reproductions of nineteenth-century European masterpieces.” Rik grins at me. “Wouldn’t it be a kick if he claimed it was from Repro and that he’d been told that you, the renowned Degas expert, was the one who painted it?”

T
HE NEXT MORNING,
everything Rik told us is confirmed by the media. Which makes me very nervous. A possible trial. A possible deal with prosecutors. A possible betrayal in the levels between Patel and Aiden. A possible connection to Repro. I hastily switch to thinking about the happier parts of the party last night. The acceptance, the congratulations, the promises of support. Only Crystal Mack was less than gracious.

“Is it true?” she demanded.

“Is what true?”

“Don’t be coy, Claire. How’d you do it?”

“Well, first I primed the canvas, did the underpainting, and used charcoal to draw the—”

“Is that all?” Crystal sneered in an obvious reference to Aiden.

“Of course not,” I said, my voice thick with honey. “I mixed my medium with the pigments and applied layer after layer—”

She flipped her hand at me. “Got it.”

“I’ll make sure you get an invitation to the opening,” I called to her retreating back.

“I think I’m busy that night,” she said, before disappearing into the crowd.

Everyone else seemed truly glad to welcome me back from exile. Which means they will come: the critics, the collectors, the curators. If the paintings are as good as Aiden thinks, I could be on my way.

I check on
Charlie’s,
which is baking in the oven, and return to applying the bright oranges of the final layers of
Nighttime T
.
Nighttime T
is going to be one of my favorites, if not my favorite of the series. The faces that stare blankly through the windows of the moving train, lost in the omnipresent nighttime of the tunnel, have a Hopper-esque quality. But because of the luminosity of the paint and the authenticity baking brings to their skin tones, they appear almost three-dimensional, a shade more real than real.

I’m glad when the oven timer goes off. This means not only that
Charlie’s
is ready for the final coat of varnish but also that it’s time to go to Beverly Arms. My leave of absence has been suspended, and I’m allowed back into juvy, no longer a criminal in their eyes. As much as I feel my deadline pressing, I need to be out of the studio, away from my paintings, away from myself. These kids are in far worse shape than I am, and it’ll be nice to think about someone else’s problems. I leave myself plenty of time so that I won’t be late.

The moment I enter the facility and see the rotting-vegetable walls and wire-mesh windows though, my heart begins to pound. I slowly approach the metal detector.

“Name,” the guard barks, looking from my photo to my face, although he knows exactly who I am.

I ball my hands into fists. “Claire.” My nose fills with the odor of cheap cologne and stale sweat. I’m back in that tiny room in the bowels of this building. Locked up and confined. “Uh, uh, Claire, Claire Roth.”

He looks at me closely, warily. “Purpose of visit?”

The room’s overheated, small, and claustrophobic. I’m lightheaded, unsteady. I reach out and clasp the edge of his desk. His face blurs.

“Purpose of visit,” he demands, his voice edged with annoyance.

I try to speak, but nothing comes out. Patel snitched. It’s over. Aiden and I will be locked up forever.

“Is something wrong, Ms. Roth?” he asks suspiciously.

I visualize the boys sitting in their cells, bored, angry, frustrated, swearing at me, at Kimberly, too. Giving her a hard time. She’s already got one of the toughest jobs ever, and all she needs is a wimpy, useless volunteer to make it even more difficult. “Nothing, sir,” I say. “I’m fine.

When I pull open the door of GE 107, Kimberly jumps up. There’s no one else in the room.

“I’ve been calling you for almost an hour,” she says.

I pat the outside pocket of my backpack. It’s flat. I left the damn phone at home again. “Where’s everyone?”

“I’m really sorry, Claire. That’s what I was calling about. It just came down from on high: no more art classes.”

“No art classes?”

“I’m really sorry to have dragged you down here for nothing.”

“You mean like ever?”

“ ‘Until further notice’ is how they put it,” she says.

“But the boys?”

Kimberly shakes her head.

“Is this because of what happened?”

“Could be. Or the budget.” She shrugs. “I just get the orders, not the whys.”

“But I don’t cost anything.” I drop into a chair. “Xavier?”

Kimberly sits down next to me. “Not good.”

I think about how surprised Xavier was when I came through with the silver paint, how clear it was that he wasn’t accustomed to getting what he asked for. The shy nod and the brief skim of eye contact: his only way to say thank you without losing face. “Prison?”

“Last I heard, both Xavier and Reggie were headed for Walpole.”

“But they’re too young.” Walpole is a maximum-security prison.

“Like they say: Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.”

From the pen of

I
SABELLA
S
TEWART
G
ARDNER

June 17, 1895

Paris, France

My dearest Amelia,

Thanksissimo for your cable. It has put me in such good sprits. I only wish all the more I was with you. A baby girl! Is there anything more divine? And I do so love the name you have chosen: Frances Isabella. I am both proud and touched by your kindness. I also agree that “Fanny” is indeed a more fitting name for a baby, and I will refer to her as thus in my thoughts. You must write immediately with all the details of her tiny self. And, of course, of you and your men. What does my Jackie think of his new little sister? Not much, I suppose. I trust your convalescence goes well.

While Paris is at its most exquisite and the marble buildings glow under the summer sun, this has been a most frustrating trip thus far. I thought the prices were outrageous the last time we were on the continent, but now, oh, my dear, they are beyond, beyond, beyond. It is a very bad time here. Even the dealers, Bernard Berenson among them, are distressed. Although I venture they are not all that distressed with their percentages, only with the limited sales.

Your uncle claims that my father’s money is almost gone and that I must go on a budget or we shall be drowning in a sea of debt. I find it difficult to imagine that the Stewart money is gone or that the Gardner money is not sufficient to cover my little flings.

Remember I told you many years ago that Edgar Degas invited us to sit in his private box on opening day at Longchamps? Your uncle and I have never been available before, but last month we were! Edgar has a villa up there. Clearly a man’s home, no woman’s touch anywhere, and despite all the servants, the food was far from first rate and the decorating left much to be desired. Edgar claims he hates the countryside, but you would never know it from his demeanor, and we had a grand time.

We stayed for three days, and the house was full of “The Talent,” so we talked horse from dawn to dusk. Your Uncle Jack and I were so excited when we finally took off for Longchamps with our belt and jockeys all up.

It was a marvelous day, although quite warm, and I was happy for the wide-brimmed white hat Charles Frederick Worth made for me this season. I think this hat would be fetching on you and shall bring it home for you to try on. Henry and John Sargent joined us in the box, as did a host of others. Such festivities! Such smart people! Such a fine open air horse show! It was indeed a delightful afternoon.

But now to the part that you must keep in utmost confidence. I’m sure you remember our discussion this past winter at Green Hill about Edgar and the reiteration of his proposal in his letter this past March. And, yes, this is more of the same. After we returned to the villa, Edgar invited us to his studio in town to see a new oil he’s working on to be called either
At the Races in the Countryside
or
Afternoon at the Races,
set in Longchamps. Of course, I had to go.

Although Edgar has been nothing but a proper gentleman in all the time we’ve spent together this season, I was still a bit leery when your Uncle Jack could not accompany me. But I thought that if Edgar had once offered to make me a present of a nude oil painting, perhaps I could convince him to do a clothed one instead.

When I arrived, he first showed me his painting in progress, and it was quite a delight. Edgar has a way of capturing a moment, private yet universally shared, like no other artist I know. In this one, a mother and nursemaid sit in a carriage, utterly entranced by the little one in the maid’s lap. A proud papa stands by, his head also tilted toward the babe. It is just enchanting, heartfelt, and the composition is most unusual; more than half the canvas is taken up with sky, and the horses and carriage are trotting right off the lower right side of the painting! There is no doubt this is a great work.

Again, I shall try to be as exact in my rendering of the events as is possible. The maid brought in tea and we sat. Edgar poured and offered me a lemon tart, which was luscious. Clearly, his help in town is far better than his servants in the country.

“So have you thought about my proposition?” he asked, as soon as I took my first sip of tea.

I am not a young woman and not easily embarrassed, but, as the last time, I felt heat rush to my face. “As I told you before, sir, that is impossible.”

“Oh,” he said, with a twinkle in his eye. “I thought perhaps, when you came without Mr. Gardner, that you’d had a change of heart.”

“Indeed not.” I tried to be brisk, emphatic, to show I would brook no argument. But somehow I did not sound that way to Mr. Degas.

He stood. “I have a gift for you.”

I must tell you, Amelia, my heart began to pound so. A gift? A picture? Had he made a painting for me after all? I clasped my hands together as he went over to one of his messy corners, squatted, and began to rummage though his things. He returned with a gaily wrapped box, far too narrow to hold a picture.

I rearranged my face so as not to appear ungrateful, and indeed I was curious. “What is it you have there?”

“See for yourself.”

My hands flew at the ribbons, and soon the top fell away to expose layers and layers of tissue paper. I threw back sheet after sheet, now quite excited, until a long piece of material was revealed. It looked like some kind of elegant drapery. I must have appeared perplexed, for Edgar laughed and lifted it from the box.

“It’s a gown,” he said, holding it up. And indeed it was a gown, pale blue and diaphanous, Grecian in form, of the finest spun silk, so light it almost floated in the air.

I wanted so badly to touch it, to feel it against my skin. But, of course, this, too, was impossible. “I cannot accept—”

He leaned over, put his finger to my lips, and lay the dress across my shoulder. It smelled of lavender and fell to my feet with a whisper. I couldn’t help but run my fingers over the silk, pressing it to my breast. “Oh,” I said. It was one of the most beautiful things I’d ever seen.

Edgar stood watching me, a half smile on his face, but his eyes were focused far away, and I knew he was imagining how it would look on me, how he would paint the flowing folds.

“I, I don’t understand.”

“It’s our compromise,” Edgar said.

I stared at him blankly.

He took the gown from me, and I was sorry to let it go. He held it away from his body so I could see it lit from behind, and suddenly I understood. For although the gown wasn’t transparent, it wasn’t completely opaque either.

“Will you, Belle?”

I didn’t move. The gown shimmered in the light, translucent, all the colors of the rainbow sparkling within its folds.

“For me?” Edgar pressed.

I stood, almost as if I were under a spell, and held out my arms. He placed the gown in my hands and motioned for me to step behind a screen I hadn’t noticed before. Still trancelike, I did as he asked. As I was changing, he put on music, but although it was a thoroughly familiar piece, I cannot tell you what it was. Now, as I attempt to re-create the events for you, the whole thing feels like a lovely dream of which I can only grab onto snippets as the details fly away into the day.