The Cézanne Chase (41 page)

He mumbled some kind of farewell, turned, and was gone.

 

A hazy sun shone the next morning and throughout the day, but
le mistral
continued to blow its cold northerly winds over Avignon, relentlessly churning the air with dust and debris. Mercifully it ended the next day. Llewellyn and Fraser had previously experienced the phenomenon and were happy to remain in the comfort of the hotel. Astrid had experienced the winter storms of Norway, but
le mistral
, she discovered, could be more than an incessant cold wind: It could be deeply depressing. The day passed slowly and uneventfully.

The Palace of the Popes carried a three-star endorsement in the Michelin Guide, and whether or not it was worth a special trip, it was arguably Avignon's most famous monument. The fourteenth-century structure had long ago been plundered of its furnishings and tapestries, but the great stone corridors and huge empty halls still reverberated with the kind of historical significance matched by only
a handful of buildings in France. Signs directed traffic to the Great Audience Hall, a room nearly two hundred feet long and as wide as the length of a tennis court. It was an apt setting for the presentation of a rare painting by a French Impressionist, and somehow it lent even more importance to the portrait of an artist who had lived most of his life a short distance away.

A temporary speaker-system sent out scratchy sounds that echoed and ricocheted off the stone walls and ceiling. It was hoped that there would be a large audience to provide an absorbent buffer, a hope fulfilled as crowds began arriving early from as far off as Valence and Saint-Rémy. There was again a platform and the high-standing backdrop on which Llewellyn had mounted his painting.

Peder Aukrust took his position along the inside wall, choosing a spot beside two men nearly as tall as he. He leaned down to become less obvious than those near him then searched the audience. He was impressed by the fact that everyone was eagerly watching and listening to the six people on the raised platform at the end of the hall. He was certain that among the several hundred persons there were security agents or police in plainclothes, or if there weren't police in the old hall, then Llewellyn had arrranged for his own security force. If he had, they were perfectly disguised.

In the third row sat Jack Oxby, dressed in a double-breasted blazer, a paisley-print ascot fluffed out at the neck, and a beret that was cocked at an angle over his forehead. It nearly touched the top of his thick, black-rimmed glasses. He seemed to be listening with rapt attention, even when he twisted around in his seat to look surrep-titiously behind him then nonchalantly added another note in his notepad.

 

Shortly after eleven o'clock Llewellyn and Fraser returned to the hotel. Astrid lay in Llewellyn's bed, half-asleep, a blanket pulled over her shoulders. Llewellyn looked down at her bruised face, then lightly stroked her cheeks.

“Awake?” he whispered.

“Yes,” she answered, “I think I am. Is it late?”

“A little after eleven.”

She turned onto her back and looked up at him. “Was there a big crowd?”

He nodded. “I'm afraid half of them couldn't see much. An awfully
big place to show such a little painting.” He smiled. “But they applauded.”

She fluffed the pillow then patted it. “Come to bed and tell me about it.”

 

Following the presentation in the palace, Aukrust walked to his hotel, the Danieli, and prepared for an early start the next morning. He was keenly aware of the day and the date: Saturday, January 10. Hopes that he would have found a clear opportunity to take Llewellyn's painting in Avignon had not materialized. It would have been better to see who was guarding Llewellyn rather than to be confronted by an invisible ring, never knowing if there were gaps or where they might be.

Wind gusts continued, but by noon, when Peder reached Aix-en-Provence,
le mistral
had finally spent itself out. Aukrust parked near the railroad station. His anxiety built as he approached a row of storage lockers. At number 104 he slid in the key and turned it. He opened the door. A thick mailing-tube twenty inches long was right where he had left it.

B
efore the plane stopped at the gangway, Alexander Tobias stepped into the aisle and opened the overhead compartment to retrieve his wife's carry-on luggage and his sport coat, all the while managing to maintain a firm hold on his one-suiter. His wife watched, amused but resigned to wait patiently to be told what incredibly important cargo was inside the old suitcase, though it didn't stop her from saying with familial forebearance, “You're more attached to that damned piece of luggage than you are to me and all your grandchildren put together.”

“I don't want anything to happen to it,” Tobias replied in the apologetic manner of a husband not wishing to have a minor bone of contention grow into a full-fledged argument. They passed customs with VIP treatment that materialized in the form of an official-looking young woman wearing an official-looking badge, who took their baggage claim tickets and led them on a circuitous route to the front of the terminal. A Mercedes 290 was at the curb, a plainclothes policeman standing next to it.

From the time Helen Tobias had settled into her first-class seat on the Iberia jet until they were clear of the airport grounds, she had been given one reason after another to suspect that her husband was on a mission of great importance, and his attachment to his homely piece of luggage bore that out. Helen Tobias had not been blessed with good looks, but the years had treated her kindly: Now her hair was pure white, and her eyes and mouth animated a face that was round and full and pleasantly untroubled. Thirty-five years of marriage to a policeman had taught her patience and had also honed her intuitive skills, which on more than one occasion had proved more accurate than her husband's.

“You haven't told me everything.” She stared at him for a moment, then added, “When will you?”

“I promised not to say anything to anyone. Not until we've crossed the border into France.”

She glanced at the clock on the dashboard and set her own watch to local time. “When will that happen?”

“An hour and half to the border, another hour to Perpignan.” He pointed to the map on the seat between them, “We'll stay there tonight and get a leisurely start in the morning. We've got four days to poke around. I said we'd arrive on the sixteenth—Friday.” He gave her a warm smile. “It's a great part of France, you'll love it.”

“Alexander,” she began, her deliberate pronunciation of his name a clear indication she wanted no-nonsense answers to questions she was about to unleash on him. “You have told me only that we are going to a town named Aix-en-Provence in the south of France, but we flew to Barcelona and are now driving, so you tell me, to France. I've been very patient about flying first class and about the way you've held on to that disgusting suitcase, even when you went to the lavatory so many times I became convinced you had a prostate problem. I have not asked why we were whisked through customs then put into this expensive car, which even I could see was under guard. Now I insist you tell me what you're up to.”

“Obviously I've got something in the suitcase. It belongs to a man named Edwin Llewellyn, who asked if I would deliver it for him. He was adamant that you come with me and that we travel first class.”

“Can't you tell me what it is?”

He turned to her, smiled, and said, “Yes, when we get to Perpignan.”

M
argueritte DeVilleurs made a final sweep through the house, activated the alarm, then went out to the car. Emily was behind the wheel, waiting for Margueritte to settle beside her. At the end of the driveway a car suddenly appeared and came to an abrupt halt, blocking their way. Both recognized the car, stunned to realize it was Peder Aukrust's station wagon. Margueritte clambered out of the car with a teenager's agility.

“Peder,” she cried out, “where have you been?”

He went toward her, arms outstretched, but stopped and waited tentatively, unsure of the reception Margueritte would give him. “I apologize,” he said with a smile broader than he had ever shown. “I had personal matters to deal with . . . I am sorry.”

“And I am disappointed,” Margueritte said resolutely. “I worried about you. You disappeared and never called.”

He looked away from her, head bowed as if being scolded. “It was my family,” he said. “I had to go to Oslo. It was a bad time for me.”

“And for me,” she said sternly. “Freddy Weisbord died.”

He remained silent, head down.

“You've been accused of killing him.”

“You believe such a lie?” he said angrily. “Who said it?”

“That scoundrel LeToque. He said you were with Freddy the night he died. He said you had a reason to kill him.”

“Kill Weisbord?” Aukrust's laugh was humorless. “He was a sick old man who was going to die without any help from me.” He slowly dropped his arms to his side, Margueritte watching. She was aware that his eyes were still turned away from hers.

“Did you kill him, Peder?”

“No.” Then, to reinforce his denial, he stared forcefully into her eyes and held the gaze for many seconds. But he was the first to break eye contact and said, “The portrait. I have it.”

She pointed at his car. “You have it with you?”

“Yes, but the frame is missing.”

“You can make a new one. It's the painting I want to see.”

He took the tube from the car, carefully twisted out the rolled canvas and unfurled it.

“Look, Emily! Monsieur Cézanne has come home.”

U
niversity students gathered in small groups around little round tables set outside the cafes that lined the north side of the principal avenue in what had been the capital of old Provence. Cours Mirabeau was an incomparably beautiful boulevard, particularly so when the four rows of giant plane trees created a summertime canopy of soft green through which thousands of needle-fine shafts of sunlight came down to touch the ground. Simply called Aix, a word pronounced with infinite variety, it was a city of surprising sophistication, where even in mid-winter on a cloudless and wind-free day, a coffee taken al fresco was a delight.

Near one of the three ancient and still flowing thermal fountains a grime-and-dust covered silver Porsche was backed into a parking slot. From the passenger side emerged a long-legged girl with long hair and a tired expression, and from behind the wheel came the driver, who pointed to the empty tables in a cafe near the Grand Hôtel Nègre-Coste.

LeToque pulled a chair away from a table and sat. He looked up at Gaby, who was rubbing the chill from her body. He said irritably, “Are you just going to stand there?”

“I'm cold, and I have to go to the bathroom,” Gaby said.

“Then go, for Christ's sake. In there.” He pointed to the inside of the cafe.

She went off, passing a waiter, who put a menu in front of LeToque.

“Two coffees,” LeToque ordered. “And how do I get to the Musée?”

“Which one?” the waiter asked with a touch of disdain.

“The Granet, the one on all the damned signs. Like that one.” He pointed to a banner announcing the Cézanne Retrospective, suspended across Cours Mirabeau near the Fontaine de la Rotonde at the head of the boulevard.

“Go to the clock tower then right on Rue d'Italie,” the waiter said, indicating the direction opposite from the landmark fountain. “It's in Place St.-Jean-de-Malte, next to the church.”

B
y noon on Thursday, Llewellyn and By noon on Thursday, Llewellyn and his party were settled into a top-floor suite in the Hôtel Pullman Roi René. The first to visit was Scooter Albany, who asked Llewellyn to preview a video segment that he was about to release to French television. When Llewellyn entered Scooter's room, it was Oxby who stepped forward to greet him.

“Gotta go,” Scooter said to Llewellyn and went off down the hall.

“I thought you had been called back to London,” Llewellyn said. “I'm afraid I wasn't a very good lightning rod. Sorry.”

“I suspect Vulcan had a plan cooked up for one of the nights you were in Avignon,” Oxby replied. “But it might have looked too easy. He wanted to see what he was up against, and the ring around you was invisible. At least that's my hunch,” he grinned. “But my average hunch is like three-day-old milk: sometimes sweet, the other times sour.”

“Have you heard from Tobias?”

“Everything is fine,” Oxby assured him. “Alex and his wife arrive in Aix this afternoon.”

“The painting—”

“As safe as when you last held it,” Oxby said. “How's Astrid?”

“Still nursing her bruises. She's genuinely concerned about my safety and doesn't want anything to happen to the painting. In fact she thought a couple of guards outside my room would be a good idea.”

“What did you say to that?”

“That posting sentries at doors is for presidents.”

“Did she ask if anyone was protecting you and your painting?”

“She got on to something like that in Avignon.”

Oxby fanned the pages of his notepad. “I want you to tell Gustave Bilodeau that he can't hang your portrait until the morning the exhibition opens. Not before.”

“He won't like that.”

“Blame it on your lawyer.”

 

Oxby found Jimmy Murratore in his room. The inspector had compiled a list showing where every person worth knowing about was staying. “They're pretty well scattered around, with Sam Turner staying in, of all places, the Hôtel Paul Cézanne. Ann arrives tomorrow morning. I've got her in the Cardinale, where I'm staying.”