The Genius (45 page)

On the bright side, anyone could
Buy It Now
for $500.

I decided that it would be better not to tell Kevin Hollister about this.

Trueg said, “The first thing I’d like to do is get ahold of the drawings and confirm that they’re for real.”

“And that Kristjana didn’t draw them.”

“Yeah, well, that’s what I mean. It would be pretty dumb of her to keep making copies, though. She sounded pretty scared the last time we talked to her.”

I said that I didn’t think she would stoop to eBay to promote herself.

Trueg laughed. “Bear in mind also that it might be a third party. Can you think of anyone else we should be talking to?”

I almost suggested that he call Jocko Steinberger. But that wasn’t his style. He was more the self-pitying type. There were, of course, plenty of other people angry at me, and plenty of those people could draw—not as well as Kristjana, but at this point I made myself no guarantees. “You really think there might be another forger?”

“Did you think there’d be a first?”

I admitted that he had a point.

“Let’s say we check him out and he seems to be for real, enough that we want to get to know him a little better. We make contact with him, make it sound like we’re interested in buying a lot more, get to him that way. Failing that, we can go after his account information, although that’ll take longer, cause we’ve got to go through the legal channels.” He paused. “I hope you realize how lucky this is. Most of what we go after we don’t find, ever. You really oughta thank the god of your choosing that this guy is such an idiot.”

I offered to Buy It Now.

“Don’t bother,” he said. “That bid is me.”

THE PARTY THAT SHOWED UP at Freddy Gudrais’s door on a late May afternoon included two uniformed Staten Island cops, Sam, detective Richard Soto, and—way in the background—me. I had been allowed to go along for the ride, although it had taken a lot of strenuous lobbying. Nobody wanted an art dealer interfering, it seemed—Sam included.

“It’s not safe,” she’d said.

“What’s unsafe about it?”

“We’re dealing with unknowns.”

“But what, specifically, are you worried about.”

She didn’t answer me. Perhaps I should have known then that something was different, that her silence marked the beginning of a new phase of the investigation. At the time I was too excited by the prospect of an arrest to understand that the professionals had begun to take over and that I was slowly being shut out.

THE LOCK TURNED and the door whined and there he was: a skinny old man in a billowing workshirt, his cheeks sunken and unshaven, one gnarled hand on the edge of the door and the other on the jamb, his left thumbnail nearly gone, replaced by a clump of scar tissue. Close-up, he appeared less well preserved. He looked us up and down. Then he smiled, and the change it brought over him was remarkable. He spoke like we were a group of old friends, fishing buddies or a reunited bowling team.

He said, “Am I gonna need my coat?”

Soto said, “That depends on how easily you get cold.”

The cops followed Gudrais into the apartment, which was dim and overheated. Sam and Soto and I stepped inside, lingering near the door, as though to go any farther would be to poison ourselves with his air. A television sat opposite a folding chair. On the floor was a tray with a chipped mug and dozens of coffee rings. It was a sad room.

As they led him out, Gudrais said, “I’ll prolly die first. Ever think of that?”

Sam said, “Next time I have a drink, Freddy, I’ll drink to your continued health.”

MARILYN AND I DIDN’T SPEAK for several months following her return from Europe. She made herself so busy with work that it was impossible to get her on the phone, or, at least, impossible for me. I’m sure that relevant people had no difficulty getting through. After sending her that first couple of e-mails, I decided that my prodding was worsening things. She was not afraid to make demands. If she wanted to hear an apology, she’d let me know.

Late that summer—about two weeks after the Gudrais trial hit the papers, deep into a heat wave—my cell phone rang. “Please hold for Marilyn Wooten,” said the voice on the other end. That’s what they do when the president calls you.

It was an inopportune moment for her to invite me to lunch: I was standing in the middle of the gallery, my sleeves rolled up, overseeing the installation of a menacing eight-foot sculpture of a bag of organic lettuce. I wanted to request a postponement, but I understood that if I didn’t go now I might never see her again.

Nat had grown into autonomy nicely; lately, in fact, he had begun to chafe under my authority. I put him in charge, hopped in the shower, and taxied to an uptown brasserie, one of the old haunts, far from Chelsea and the possibility of running into anyone.

I got out of the cab feeling drugged, my shower having done little except prime me to sweat again. Marilyn of course was coiffed and polished and dry and svelte and smooth. She kissed me on the cheek and I bathed momentarily in sandalwood and jasmine. I told her I was happy to see her looking good. I was. I could feel happy for her because I no longer desired her—missed her—loved her—you choose. The point is: it was so far gone as to evoke a sense of nostalgia.

For the better part of an hour, we talked about who was up, who was down, the latest
scandale
. As always, she provided most of the fodder. I served as her foil, stippling the narrative with nods and commentary. I hadn’t been making the rounds, and so I had a hard time keeping up with her. Between stories she downed a steak and
pommes frites;
over dessert she lit a cigarette that the waiter imperiously commanded her to extinguish. She snorted and ground the butt out on her breadplate.

“Congratulations,” she said.

I looked at her.

“On solving your mystery.”

I shrugged. “Thanks.”

“Why didn’t he just plead guilty?”

“I think he thought they would take pity on him because of his age.”

She snickered. “Clearly his lawyer forgot that we live in a youth-worshipping culture. Did you go to the trial?”

“All ten days.”

“Really? Then why didn’t I read about you?”

“I was in the audience.”

“They didn’t call you to the stand?”

“They didn’t need to,” I said. “Actually, my name never came up.”

“Not once?”

“Not once.”

“Well,” she said. “That’s a shame.”

I shrugged. “It is what it is.”

“You don’t get some sort of municipal commendation.”

“Apparently not.”

“Then I guess you’ll have to settle for the satisfaction of a job well done.”

I nodded.

“Personally, I never found that worth very much. Was it interesting, at least?”

“It was mostly very technical.”

“Oh
gawd
. That’s not interesting at all.”

“Not especially,” I said. Here I lied to her, not out of malice but because I knew that what I considered interesting would likely set her eyes spinning. But I’d learned some very interesting things, to me anyway. I learned that Freddy Gudrais wore a size-eleven shoe, the same size as the cast taken from the scene of Alex Jendrzejewski’s abduction. I learned that shortly after the final murder, the murder of Abie Kahn, Freddy Gudrais had been arrested on an unrelated charge; I learned that he had served four years, and that he’d earned his release about eighteen months before the assault on James Jarvis. I learned that our partial fingerprint was intact enough to yield a match, and that your average juror finds DNA evidence remarkably convincing.

I learned that following a brief second prison stint in the mid-70s, Freddy Gudrais had fathered a child. Right around the time I was born, in fact. I found it interesting to note the appearance in court of a tight-lipped, lank-haired woman clutching a Naugahyde purse. She looked considerably like Freddy Gudrais, same pointed chin and wide mouth; aside from the press and me, she was the only person to come every day. Several times Gudrais looked back at her, but her expression never changed, and when they announced his conviction on four counts of homicide, one count not guilty, she stood up and walked out.

One thing that did not emerge at trial—or at any point, for that matter—was the true nature of Victor and Freddy’s acquaintance. Soto questioned Freddy about it. He had to consider the possibility, for instance, that Victor had aided and abetted. All Freddy would say is, “I ain’t seen him in years.” Another time he mentioned offhand that he had bought a car with money Victor had given him. Soto asked why Victor had given him money. And Freddy, who never seemed to get upset, not even when the gavel came down, laughed and said, “Cause I asked for it.”

These were things that interested me, but they would not interest Marilyn. We all have our private causes, and it’s the job of the person who loves you to pretend to care. Marilyn wasn’t that person anymore.

I said, “It wasn’t like you see on TV.”

“Mm. And the lawyer? She’s well?”

“Yes.”

“I’m glad to hear it.”

“I’m glad you’re glad.”

She smiled. “I’m not going to get into a bowing match with you, darlin.”

“We’re going to Ireland sometime in the fall.”

She recommended a hotel in Dublin and told me to use her name. “Thank you.”

“I hope you have a wonderful time.”

I nodded.

She said, “I’m going on vacation, too, you know.”

“I thought you’d already taken a vacation.”

“A vacation that long demands another vacation. A brief one, anyhow. Kevin and I are going to Vail for a week.”

Now it was my turn to smile. “Just the two of you?”

“Well, he does have a fairly large
posse
. But yes, I suppose that at certain key moments we will be alone together.”

I couldn’t help myself: I started to laugh.

“Be nice,” she said. Then she began to laugh as well. We laughed and laughed and I handed her the remainder of my strawberry zabaglione, which she polished off in three bites. Then she lit another cigarette. “I’ve decided to take on Kristjana.”

I looked at her.

She shrugged. “It was at Kevin’s request.”

“I didn’t realize they were acquainted.”

“Oh yes. She’s been working for him for a while now.”

“Working how.”

“You know, his Great Paintings thing?” She spoke through smoke: “After Jaime Acosta-Blanca skipped town Kevin had to find someone else and I suggested her. He asked her to make some copies of the Cracke drawings and what she did impressed him, so he hired her. Apparently they’ve grown quite close. I think he might have fucked her, actually… But. That’s neither here nor there.”

I said, “Kristjana’s a lesbian.”

“Says you. Anyhow it’s all very cordial.”

“
Madam
.” The waiter was strangling on rage, leaning over the table and goggling at her half-finished cigarette. “
Please
.”

“We’ll take the check,” she said, handing him her credit card and waving him away. As he stormed off, she took a last drag and dropped the smoldering remains into her water glass. She sighed. “They’re ruining my city, Ethan.”

“I didn’t realize they’d given you the keys.”

“Honey,” she said. “I make the keys.”

DETECTIVE TRUEG spent more than three months establishing a rapport with pps2764 in New York, New York, and by that November they had him in custody.

“Sometimes we get our man,” he said. “You know a Mr. Patrick Shaughnessy?”

It took me a moment to place the name. “From Muller Courts?”

“The very same.”

“But he’s the superintendent,” I said, as though that made a difference.

“You should of seen the look on his face when I badged him. Whoo, he looked like he swallowed a sack of rats. At first he claimed he got the drawings from somebody else. Pretty soon, though, he’s saying, all right, it was him, but—hey—after all, he was taking back what rightfully belonged to him. He says you ripped him off cause he had the drawings first. I wouldn’t be surprised if he tries to come at you with a lawsuit.”

Sure enough, a few weeks later a process server showed up at the gallery. I called Sam, who offered to recommend a real lawyer.

TRAVEL AND ITS ATTENDANT STRESSES provide a good litmus test for the viability of a relationship, and so I suppose it’s no surprise that shortly after we got back from Dublin, Samantha and I split up. Apparently my narcissism finally wore her down. Among other things, she told me that I was lost and that I needed to get ahold of who I was.

When my anger subsided I saw that she was on to something. My life had grown somewhat diffuse, aside from our relationship and the case. When both of those had gone I was left with work and little else.

I struggled to get back in the game. For a long time I’d been inventing excuses to stay away, with the result that all my artists were now furious with me. After Jocko’s defection several more had followed suit. I couldn’t recruit new ones, because the best steered clear of me, having been warned that I could and would desert them at a moment’s notice. I spent hours on the phone and over expensive meals trying to restore my hobbled reputation, but by New Year’s 2006 I was down to a roster of seven, and quite honestly not my best.

If I learned one thing in my years selling art—if Marilyn taught me nothing else—it’s that there’s no time like the present. Real estate having caught fire, the price I could get for my space bordered on obscene. I helped Ruby and Nat find new jobs; then I paid them each a year’s salary plus bonus and put out the word that I was leaving the business.

“To do what?” people asked. I didn’t have an answer for them. I tried to be philosophical. I said that I had run a gallery for nearly five years; my time was up; without knowing what I meant, I told people that I was moving on. I didn’t want to reflect. Other than money in the bank, I had a hard time saying what I had to show for myself. I suppose that’s something. Marilyn might say that it’s everything. You can’t argue with her. Anyone can see how happy she is.