TRIAL BY FIRE (25 page)

“You’re welcome to your opinion. If you think I did it, fine. Do your worst to try to prove it, but since I was somewhere mid-Atlantic when all this went down, you’ll have a tough time pinning any of it on me. For right now, though, I’m not saying another word to you without an attorney present.”

Serenity had gone pale. “I want to see Mother,” she said. “If she’s dying, I need to see her. It’s not fair for you to lock us out.”

Hal focused his attention on Serenity and Winston. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m not going to deny Mimi the chance to see you, if that’s what she wants. The next time she comes out of the morphine fog, I’ll ask her. It’s entirely up to her. If she’s agreeable, I’ll let you come into the room for a few minutes, but I’m warning you. If either of you hassles her in any way—if you give her any kind of grief—out you’ll go, and you’ll have me to deal with. Understand?”

Winston nodded while his sister stared back at Hal with disdainful defiance. “But we’re her children!” she objected. “You have no right to deny us access to her.”

“I’m not denying you access,” Hal replied, “but I am stating the conditions under which that access will be granted. The decision to see you or not is entirely up to your mother, but once you step inside her room, it’s my call. If you say or do anything to upset her, I’ll send you packing.”

Ali was impressed by Hal’s forbearance and his ability to hold his temper in check in the face of Serenity’s hostility.

Up to now, Winston, apparently the weakest link in this family
squabble, had been content to let his sister do all the talking. Now he voiced his own objection. “I was told Mother is on a ventilator. How can she tell you anything about who she wants to see and who she doesn’t want to see, to say nothing of what she remembers?”

“She can answer yes or no questions,” Hal replied. “That’s it.” With that, he turned to the nurses’ station. “I need to go by the hotel to walk my dog,” he said. “I’ve left word with Sister Anselm that no one is to be allowed in my wife’s room until I get back. I’m telling you that, too. That’s an order.”

“Absolutely, Mr. Cooper,” the charge nurse said.

With that Hal walked over to the elevator and pushed the Down button. While he waited for the elevator to arrive, he turned back to the room. “About that missing painting, Serenity,” he said, addressing his stepdaughter directly. “The Klee that was over the fireplace. Mimi has no intention of selling it at this time. If you have it, you’d by God better return it. If I find out that you’ve sold it without being authorized to do so, I’ll sue you within an inch of your life.”

Serenity looked genuinely stunned. “Mother’s Klee is gone? Are you kidding? That thing is worth a fortune.”

“Yes,” Hal agreed. “It
is
worth a fortune. I know that and you know that. It’s also very interesting to note that one painting is the only thing missing from the house.”

The elevator door opened. Hal Cooper stepped into it and was gone.

“What painting?” Agent Robson asked. “Something’s missing from the house? What is it, and why am I hearing about it now for the first time?”

Ali knew that the missing painting had been mentioned several
times, but since a possible art theft didn’t fit in with Agent Robson’s preconceived notion about the crime, he had most likely disregarded it.

“I’ve been telling Mother for years that painting belonged in a museum somewhere and not in her living room,” Serenity fumed. “Most especially in the living room of a house where they leave the alarm off as often as it’s turned on.”

“What painting?” Robson asked again. “Is it valuable?”

Serenity gave him a scathing look. “It’s a Paul Klee,” she told him disdainfully. “Of course it’s valuable. It’s been in the family for years.”

“What’s a Paul Klee?” Robson asked.

Shaking her head impatiently at his apparent stupidity, Serenity continued. “Klee was a well-known Swiss-born painter—a cubist. He was born in the late nineteenth century and died in the early forties.”

“Never heard of him,” Robson said.

“He taught art at the Bauhaus,” Serenity added, warming to the topic. “Mother’s picture is one of his so-called
Static-Dynamic Gradations
. He did several during his years of teaching. The best known one is dated 1923. It’s in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Mother’s version is somewhat earlier than that. For some reason, he wasn’t thrilled with it. He signed it and then gave it to one of his students, an American girl named Phoebe Pankhurst.”

“Your parents bought it from her?” Robson asked, making notes as he tried to follow the story.

“More or less,” Serenity allowed. “That happened years later. Phoebe’s widowed mother became ill. Phoebe had to drop out of school and return to California to care for her. The mother
eventually died, and Phoebe spent the next fifty years living alone in what had been her parents’ home and teaching art to generations of kids.

“Her house in Santa Barbara had a glassed-in sunporch. That’s where she taught her art lessons. For years and years, no one ventured any farther into her house than that sunporch area. When she died, her only living cousin flew out from New York to attend the funeral. He went to the house and was shocked by what he found there. Every room was piled shoulder-high with old newspapers, books, and garbage. The load was so heavy the floor was in danger of collapsing. The cousin had no idea where to start on cleaning up the mess.

“That’s when my father stepped in. My grandfather was a banker. He and my dad offered to buy the house and all its contents as is, with no contingencies. They also agreed that they would be responsible for all necessary cleaning. The cousin was delighted. He didn’t want to be stuck overseeing the work, much less doing it. He took what they offered, washed his hands of the whole mess, and flew back to New York as soon as the funeral was over. My father told me later that buying Phoebe Pankhurst’s house was the best investment he ever made.”

“Why was that?” Robson asked.

“Cleaning it out was a challenge,” Serenity said. “Daddy had to look through every single book and newspaper. Phoebe’s art students had always paid in cash. She had a fortune in ten- and twenty-dollar bills tucked away everywhere, but the money was the least of it.”

“The painting?” Robson asked.

Serenity nodded. “That one and several others,” she said. “There was a Degas sketch, a Renoir, a Matisse, and a few others
I don’t remember—all of them originals. Dad told me he got enough cash from selling those, and from selling Phoebe’s house, to bankroll his first gallery. He kept the Klee, though. He gave it to my mother and told her it was a little bank account.”

“How much is it worth?” Robson asked.

Serenity shrugged. “I believe it’s insured for seven hundred thousand, but it’s probably worth more than that. As I said before, it belongs in a museum somewhere. If it were to go on sale, however, it might provoke a bidding war, which is why it’s so ridiculous that my mother left it hanging over her damned fireplace for everyone to see. And now it’s gone. I can’t believe it.”

Ali was struck by the fact that Serenity Langley seemed far more concerned about the missing painting than she was about her dying mother. It was easy to see why Hal Cooper regarded his stepdaughter with such contempt.

James’s mother exited her son’s room and came into the waiting room. Walking past the others, she made her way to her still sleeping former husband, sat down next to him, and gently touched his shoulder. He came awake with a start.

“What is it?” he wanted to know. “What’s happened?”

“One of the doctors just called the room,” she said. “They want to talk to us about—”

Breaking off, she leaned against his shoulder and sobbed.

“What?” he said. “They need to talk to us about what?”

“About scheduling surgery.” She choked on the words. “Surgery and skin grafts. He’s going to be scarred for life, Max. Our poor handsome boy.” With that, she began weeping, while he gave her heaving shoulder a series of awkward but comforting pats.

For the better part of two days, the warring couple had waged a very public battle. For now hostilities seemed to have subsided.

“It’s okay, Lisa,” he murmured over and over. “It’s okay. We’ll get through it somehow.”

For a time their family drama took center stage. When Ali looked away, Serenity was back on her phone.

“It’s me again,” she said. “My mother’s Klee seems to have gone missing. See if you can find out if anyone is offering a new
Static-Dynamic Gradations
for sale. Whatever’s become of our Russian friend, Yarnov? He’s a great fan of Klee and he’s not fussy about provenance.”

As in someone willing to buy stolen goods?
Ali thought as she typed the name Yarnov.

Serenity was clearly upset to learn that her mother’s painting had disappeared, but Ali couldn’t help wondering if the woman didn’t know far more about it than she was letting on. The painting had come into the family under less than honest circumstances. Serenity had no qualms about what her father and grandfather had done in cheating Phoebe Pankhurst’s relatives—to say nothing of the IRS—out of what was rightfully theirs. Ali suspected that Serenity Langley had firsthand knowledge about Mr. Yarnov’s lack of concern about provenance.

James’s mother had finally quit crying. Once she dried her tears, she and her husband went to confer with their son’s physician. For a time after they left the only sound in the room was the clatter of Ali’s keyboard. Suddenly, Winston turned around and glared at Ali over his shoulder.

“What the hell are you doing?” he demanded. “It sounds like you’re writing down everything we say. Are you?”

Caught red-handed, Ali was groping for an appropriate response when Sister Anselm arrived at the waiting room entrance and came to Ali’s rescue.

“She’s working for me,” the nun explained. “I’m tired of having other people write whatever they want about me. I asked the diocese for permission for an authorized biography, and I’ve asked Miss McCann to write it. I find it convenient to have her come to the various hospitals when I’m in the city. That way she can interview me during my off-hours, and we save a fortune in long-distance telephone charges.”

Having thus quashed the Ali discussion, Sister Anselm looked around the waiting room. “Has anyone seen Mr. Cooper? I expected him back by now.”

As if on cue, the elevator door opened and Hal stepped off. “There you are,” Sister Anselm said. “Your wife is starting to wake up again. If she’s going to see her son and daughter, now would probably be a good time.”

Hal nodded. “I’ll see what she wants me to do. And thanks for your suggestion. The concierge says not to worry. He’ll send a bellman up to the room every couple of hours to take Maggie for a walk, and they’ll feed her later this afternoon. I’d hate to be gone when . . .”

He left the rest of the sentence unsaid. Setting his jaw, he marched past Agent Robson and his stepchildren and made straight for Mimi’s room, followed by Sister Anselm.

His arrival had been enough to take the focus off Ali and her computer.

“Can you think of anything else?” Agent Robson asked Serenity.

She shook her head.

“What about you, Mr. Langley?”

“Nothing to add,” Winston Junior responded. “I think that just about covers it.”

“All right, then,” Robson said, pocketing his notebook. “I
need to make a few calls, but if your mother is able to give you any information . . .”

Serenity patted the pocket where she had stowed the business card Agent Robson had given her. “Yes,” she said. “We’ll call you immediately.”

Ducking her head, Ali resumed typing.

Before, she had fought desperately to wake up. Early on, opening her eyes was the only thing that had allowed her to escape the nightmare of flames. Now, though, she would have preferred to stay dreaming and asleep instead of having to return to this stark hospital room with its humming machinery and this strange bed.

This time Mimi had found herself walking along a sandy beach with her mother. Moments later her mother disappeared from the beach, but Mimi was still there, playing ball with her dog, her first dog, Rover. That had to be more than sixty years ago now, but in her dream, her bluetick hound had been alive once more, bringing the grubby sand-covered tennis ball back to her time and again so she could throw it. When he looked up at her with his soulful brown eyes, Mimi stretched out her hand to pet him. His long black ears were soft and silky to the touch, just the way she remembered them.

“Mimi,” Hal said from somewhere close at hand. “Are you awake?”

She was awake and yet she wasn’t. She didn’t want to leave Rover behind. Would she ever see him again?

But Hal was speaking to her insistently, and she needed to listen. She needed to pay attention. Struggling, she finally managed to open her eyes. Hal stood above her, smiling. He looked a little better. His hair was combed. He had shaved.

“I just got back from feeding Maggie,” he was saying. “If I’m gone for very long, the concierge says he’ll make sure someone walks her and feeds her.”

The concierge. What concierge? Our house doesn’t have a concierge. What is he thinking? But Maggie? If someone is walking her and feeding her, that must mean she’s all right. That means she didn’t die. They didn’t hurt her. Thank you, God. Thank you.