The Cézanne Chase (33 page)

“I'm as ready as I'll ever be,” Jones said. “Wish me luck.” He slid film into the back of the camera, set the shutter speed and lens opening, then squeezed the cable release and made the first exposure. Levine had prepared a chart indicating twenty combinations of lens openings and shutter speeds, and if Jones were to duplicate what he had learned from Levine, he was guaranteed to produce six out of the twenty photographs within a balanced exposure range.

“There must be something I can do,” Llewellyn said.

“Indeed there is. I'll need a taxi to the airport in about thirty minutes.”

Llewellyn signaled Willkie on the intercom. “Mr. Jones will be leaving for La Guardia at 2:45, and we'll drive him over.”

Jones rechecked the focus before each exposure. At 2:20 the job was completed. “I'll ring you if I have to reshoot.” Jones said as he put the film into a canvas shoulder bag. “I trust I can leave the lights and all?”

“Of course,” Llewellyn said. “Any chance you'll have to reshoot?”

“A slight one, but I'll know for certain this evening. I'll phone before ten o'clock either way. One last favor: I'd like to ring the laboratory and confirm that I'm on my way.”

“Of course.” Llewellyn motioned toward the phone.

Jones called and talked with a person named Garrity, then said he was all set. The drive to La Guardia might go quickly for a Friday afternoon, Willkie predicting that they were exactly twenty minutes in front of the weekend traffic.

“Who's Garrity?” Llewellyn asked.

“Lee Garrity was with your Treasury Department; he now freelances in counterfeit investigations. Knows every copy process there ever was, and with today's imaging technology, that's a full-time occupation.”

“What happens next?” Llewellyn asked.

“I'll try to explain what I've learned since we talked about it in London. The shots I took this afternoon are like the color slides you take with a 35mm camera, only much larger. The best one of the lot will be placed on a light table and scanned with a laser and divided into twenty thousand color units called pixels. Each pixel is evaluated with reference to the color target I put below the painting, the band of color you noticed. Each pixel is then converted into an electronic signal and stored on a disk, very much like a digital recording. That means, in computer language, that your portrait will be converted into thousands of zeros and ones.

“The computer evaluates this information and adjusts for the color peculiarities of Polacolor film, then a second generation transparency is created. That transparency will be projected onto a sheet of Polacolor film to the precise size of your painting. With all color variations accounted for and adjusted, we should then have a finished photograph that matches exactly with the original.”

Llewellyn digested all that Jones told him, looking thoughtful though a bit confused, and asked, “But a Polaroid photograph has a
smooth surface, no matter how scientifically it's made. How do you give it texture and the swirl of brushstrokes like
The Old Woman with a Rosary
that you showed me at Scotland Yard?”

“It's done by applying a clear, thick gel over the photograph,” Jones went on. “Before it hardens, one of Garrity's artists will use a brush and a palette knife to re-create the texture and brush strokes of the original. That will take place in your home, where the artist can use the actual painting as his guide. Finally they'll put on a coat of UV-absorbent lacquer to add a soft patina and prevent color fading.”

Llewellyn said, “What a hell of a way to make a photograph, or is it a painting?” Then he looked out just as Willkie turned off the Grand Central Parkway and said quietly to himself, “It better be damned good—it's got to fool a lot of people.”

“I beg your pardon, Mr. Llewellyn?”

Llewellyn turned back and smiled. “Nothing, Jonesy. I was just preparing myself to become a lightning rod.”

A
t Oxby's urging and in response to Elliott Heston's persistent petitions, the assistant commissioner, Scotland Yard's number-two officer, authorized Operations Command Group (OCG) to upgrade the search for Vulcan to priority status. With that new emphasis and while Oxby attended the security council meeting, the Arts and Antiques Squad's conference room had been officially transformed into a command center, or Incident Room, in the parlance of the Yard. Oxby had flown into Heathrow Friday evening, gone to his flat where he sorted out his notes from the security council, and settled personal matters that had piled up during his absence. By midnight he was in bed with a book to put his mind in neutral but was asleep in minutes, the unopened book by his side.

Saturday morning at eight o'clock, he had no sooner stepped from the lift on the fifteenth floor when Ann Browley took his arm and ushered him hurriedly to room 1518 where Jimmy Murratore stood waiting.

Three desks were clustered at the far end of the room, two side by side facing a third. Oxby's desk, complete to the last paper clip, had been brought in from his office. There were five phones, two on direct outside lines, one on a dedicated fax line. The computer was linked to the Forensic Science Laboratory, Criminal Intelligence Unit. It also interfaced with the Crime Support Unit, which had a round-the-clock secure satellite-connection to Interpol. The Incident Room was open for business.

Along the wall to the right on entering was a row of cork panels, each one four feet wide and nearly twice as high. There were five in all, and at the top of each panel was a subject heading in bold letters.

Taped or pinned to the cork were notes, phone numbers, assignment notices, photographs, news clippings, reports from other police authorities, and, in the center of each panel, a daily summary and commentary on progress or lack of it, with reasons stated.

Oxby said, “What's ‘dead people' about? One dead person's enough.”

“There's been a murder in Reigate,” Ann said. “The body was found in the road that runs behind Shelbourne's studio. Here's the police report.” She pushed the two-page report across the table.

Oxby read it quickly and looked up.

“We learned about it Friday,” Ann said, “while you were still in France. David Blaney called to say that when Shelbourne returned he discovered that his darkroom had been broken into and that negatives and prints had been ruined. That same day we learned the body had been found.”

Oxby said, “The report is vague about the victim. What do we know about him?”

“Not much. He was a local drifter—a homeless type the shop-owners called Sailor. We don't have hard evidence to link his death with the break-in, but I know they go together.”

“You have an accounting of all this?” Oxby asked.

“It's on your desk,” Ann said, having anticipated the question.

“Negatives destroyed, so there are no photographs,” Oxby said quietly and with obvious irritation. “They were important, all right—important enough for murder.”

Oxby went to the panel marked Dead Paintings. “I don't have anything to add to this, and I hope neither of you does, either. My rational brain says Vulcan has stopped at four, but my irrational brain tells me Vulcan doesn't behave rationally. The Museum of Modern Art in New York put their new portrait twenty feet from the down escalator, and I worry about that kind of carelessness. I'm also concerned about the DeVilleurs portrait.” He stopped roving and leaned against the table. “That leaves the Llewellyn painting. Mr. Llewellyn has accepted the pied piper role with understandable reluctance, but I also think he's excited by it. Unfortunately, he likes to travel with companions we need to know more about. On this trip he's agreed to take only his man Fraser, his dog, and a reporter friend who might put out television stories each day.”

Oxby stepped to the panel headed Chemicals & Poisons. “Anything new in this area?”

Ann said, “I wanted Jonesy with us, but he's not back from
Massachusetts. I requested that he inspect the negatives at Shelbourne's because apparently they were destroyed by an acid. I'm disappointed that I have no more to report on the person who bought so much DFP in Marseille.”

“Metzger?” Oxby said.

Ann nodded. “Dr. J-something-or-other Metzger. We don't know any more about him than we did two weeks ago, and I'm not optimistic we ever will.”

“But worth keeping after,” Oxby said. “Find Dr. Metzger, and you've probably found Vulcan.”

He turned back to the panel headed Speculations & Curiosities. “What have we got here?”

Ann said, “I'm still curious to know why Clarence Boggs was murdered and equally curious to know why the killer used such a rare poison and went to such lengths to place it the car in that strange homemade affair. It's curious that Metzger bought so much of the poison in Marseille.” She paused and put on her own quizzical expression, “And isn't it terribly curious that Mr. Pinkster removed his self-portrait from his insurance policy this past June? Then the photographs, the photographs we'll never see, because, curiously and coincidentally, the negatives were destroyed. Who knew about the negatives? Conceivably Mr. Pinkster knew, and David Blaney. Perhaps even Clarence Boggs. But he was killed. Vulcan knew a photographer was in the gallery that day, but did he know who the photographer was?” She nodded. “I think so. And poor Sailor. What did he know?” The furrows deepened, “Like Alice said, it grows curiouser and curiouser.”

“Good show, Annie. What about you, Jimmy. Any curiosities?”

“I'll start out sayin' I don't have space in my brain for all the curious things Sergeant Browley's got crammed into hers. I've laid to rest any lingerin' doubts I had about Mr. Boggs's gamblin' activities, so I've got no more curiosity about any of the agents doin'him in. But I do have a first-class curiosity that's been takin'me places I've never seen. Seems when we put Mr. Pinkster's name in for a background check, one of the reports we got was from the Port of London sayin'the guy's a licensed waterman. It's a provisional license because he hasn't taken any tests and keeps askin' for extensions and pays all the fees on time. Some pals in the Thames Division helped me track the boat to Cadogan Pier. Would you believe we found a bloody tugboat? Crew's a Greek couple. Tug's even got a Greek name—
Sepera
—and a Greek flag flying off the stern.”

Oxby wrote
Sepera
on the board and stared at the word for half a minute. “It could be a lark,” he said finally, “or some kind of investment. A boat for hire?” He turned to Jimmy. “Get yourself back on a police launch with your chums and see what Pinkster's doing with a tugboat. If you have a problem I'll work it out with Chief Inspector Wycroft; he was just made number two in the Thames Division. What else have you got?”

Jimmy shook his head.

“Annie,” Oxby said, “Make sure Jonesy gets into Shelbourne's darkroom, then I want you to speed up your investigation of Astrid Haraldsen. She's somewhat of an enigma, beautiful and dull, or pretty and damned smart, I'm not sure which. Be sure that Intelligence checks her record at the design school in Oslo—name of it's in her file.” Oxby was now standing by the panel headed Vulcan. “Regrettably, I can't add to our profile of Vulcan—any thoughts I've got belong under curiosities, and we've got enough of those.”

Oxby reviewed the assignments he'd given his assistants then sent them away with the admonition that there would not be much relaxation until the investigation had moved further along. Before going off, he walked slowy past the five panels, pausing for several minutes in front of each. He secured room 1518 and started for the lift. Before reaching it he was met by a staff officer from Heston's office who handed him an envelope. “I tried your office, but half the furniture was missing. Is everything all right?”

“Quite all right, thank you.” The envelope was marked urgent, and inside was a decoded message from Henri Trama that had been transmitted by the Direction Centrale de la Police Judiciare, Paris:

H
eavy weekend traffic and the remnants of a brief shower slowed the traffic through the London streets and made the drive to Bletchingly a grinding bore. Oxby's decision to pay Alan Pinkster a surprise visit had been initially prompted by a presentation made by Félix Lemieux, which dealt with the escalating cost of insurance and how difficult it had been to obtain coverage for those paintings in the retrospective that were not insured by the loaner. Mixed in with the files he had taken to France was a report on the insurance status of the Pinkster collection, information which had been compiled by the Fraud Squad and which, if accurate, could discredit statements made by Pinkster. News that a drifter named Sailor had been murdered was another reason for Oxby's surprise visit. He would interrogate Pinkster without another officer present, a violation of procedure. But he did it all the time, and he knew that Heston would raise hell.

Alan Pinkster's manor house had originally been named Valley View. It had been built in 1848 and faced out on a once-pristine valley that was now encroached upon by the Godstone Hills golf course and a stretch of the M23 motorway. A Mrs. Padgett, squarely built and mannish, answered the door and gave her name and rank (property manager). She seemed unimpressed by Oxby's credentials and was slow to reveal that Mrs. Pinkster and her daughter were in Maidstone, Kent, for the weekend and that Mr. Pinkster was expected “sometime later in the day.”