The Gauguin Connection

by Estelle Ryan

  “Hello?”

  “Jenny, it’s me.” The controlled strain in Colin’s voice set my entire system on high alert.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes. No. Shit, I don’t know.”

  “What happened?” I could barely breathe from the fear that he was in danger.

  “I was in Mark Smith’s house. It was really easy to get in there and that made me suspicious. Jenny, we have a big problem.”

  “What?” I heard the near-hysteria in my voice and turned away from Manny’s worried looks. Colin could not have phoned me at a worse time.

  “He’s dead.”

  “Who?”

  “Mark Smith. He’s dead, Jenny. Dead. Someone shot him. I had been watching the house the whole day and knew that no one was there. At least that’s what I thought.” In contrast to his usual composure, he was babbling when he wasn’t taking shaken breaths. “I got in and went to disable the alarm system, but it was already disabled. That made me suspicious. Why would the alarm system be disabled when he wasn’t home? But I knew there was no one there, so I immediately went to his study. He had a very clever hiding place for his safe, but I found it and opened it in less than thirty seconds. I looked through all the stuff in there and saw a few interesting things, but left it all there. Then I decided to go into the next room. And that’s when I found him.”

  I made an encouraging sound, not wanting to respond verbally. Colin was clearly shaken from finding a dead man. It made me feel better about trusting, working with and worrying about this criminal. He took another shaky breath. “He was lying on the floor of the living room and it looked like there had been a struggle. There was so much blood. It looked like someone had emptied out a gun into his chest. Oh god.”

  I waited for him to take a few heaving breaths. “What did you do?”

  “I went back into his study and stole some stuff.”

  “You did what?” I shouted into the phone. Manny’s head swivelled to me and I turned my torso even more towards the door. I wished I could ask Colin all the questions going through my head, beginning with why he didn’t phone the police.

  “I had and still have a bad feeling about this, Jenny. Something is not right about this murder. That was why I decided to make sure we have some stuff to find out exactly who this Mark Smith was. No sooner had I taken the stuff and made my way to his back yard when the police showed up. How did they know to come, Jenny? I had been watching the house the whole day and never saw anyone going in or out. I also never heard any gunshots. It took me a good hour to get safely out of the area. I only started looking through the stuff a few minutes ago and already have found a few very interesting things. Get this. The dead guy’s name is not Mark Smith.”

  “What is it?” I didn’t know why I was whispering, but it felt like the right thing to do. It only caused Manny to lean closer to me. I could feel him entering my personal space at my back.

  “His name is, or should I say was, Brigadier General Nick Crenshaw. He worked for those bastards, Eurocorps.” He must have heard me gasp. “What? Do you know who this guy is, Jenny?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me more.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not? Aren’t you at home?”

  “No, but I’m on my way.”

  “And you’re not with Vinnie? Who’s driving you home?” He was angry. “Are you driving alone?”

  “Agent Manfred Millard is driving me home.” I stole a glance over my shoulder at Manny and saw that he was shamelessly listening to my side of the conversation. Worry had turned into suspicion and his body had gone still with concentration.

  Colin swore crudely and creatively. “You need to get away from him. Something isn’t right, Jenny.”

  “So you keep saying. Why do you think that?”

  “Apart from the obvious murdered Eurocorps man? I’m beginning to think that someone knew that we were going to find him. I don’t know anything about violent crimes, but I know how to set up a scene.”

  “And that is what it looked like to you?”

  “Yes.” He paused. “Shit, wait. Vinnie is also phoning me. Hold the line.”

  I held the phone tightly against my ear. This was not good. Vinnie was at home waiting for me to phone him for a ride. I had forgotten to send him a text message that Manny was going to drop me off.

  “What the hell?” Manny’s irritated question interrupted my musing. I turned in my seat and found him scowling at the rear view mirror. Still holding the phone to my ear, I looked behind us and felt my heart rate accelerate to an alarming speed. Flashing lights of at least four police vehicles were coming up behind us and the sound of the sirens was becoming overwhelming.

  “Jenny, are you still there?” Colin’s voice sounded loud against my ear.

  “Yes.” My voice sounded foreign from the tension raising its pitch.

  “Vinnie said that the police just showed up at your place.” He was quiet for a heartbeat. “Are those sirens?”

  “Yes. I think we are being followed by the police.”

  “We are being pulled over by the police, Doctor Face-reader.” Manny slowed the car down and rolled slowly to the side of the road. He turned to me with dismay all over his face. “What have you done?”

  “Jenny, listen to me. Jenny!” Colin was shouting in my ear.

  “What?” I spoke into this phone, but looked straight into Manny’s eyes.

  “Jenny, I think this is a set-up. Don’t ask any questions now. Just do exactly what I say. When I hang up, give Millard this phone and tell him to keep it. I will contact him. Also tell him that you were speaking to me, and that I’m helping you.” With that last order, Colin ended the call and I was left with a dead phone in my hand and a staggering amount of questions.

  “I am so close to leaving you to fend for yourself, missy. What is going on here?” Manny still held my gaze. His dismay was quickly turning into anger. It wasn’t difficult for me to make a decision. I handed him the phone, which he glared at for a long second before he took it. Outside the car, mayhem continued to ensue. Four police cars surrounded Manny’s silver Ford and armed law enforcement officers were piling out of their vehicles with their weapons trained on us.

  In need of an extra second to build more courage, I carefully put the programme in my handbag. I swallowed twice and looked at Manny again. “I was speaking to Colin Frey. He is the outside consultant that has been helping me with this case. He said that you were to keep that phone and that he was going to contact you on it soon.”

  Were it not for the aggressive policemen stalking the car, shouting orders at us, Manny’s expression might have been comical. “Colin Frey! You’ve been working with Colin Frey?”

  “Yes. I don’t think we have time for an argument now, Manny.” I nodded meaningfully at the officers still shouting at us to show our hands and exit the vehicle. “As soon as I can, I will explain everything to you.”

  “You will do that and so much more, missy.” Manny lifted his hands above the steering wheel in a universal gesture of surrender and I copied him. Orders were shouted at us and Manny followed them, proving his excellent grasp of French. I also followed all the orders, but completed it with enhanced gestures of surrender and harmlessness. On the inside of a minute I found myself standing on the street, hands in the air and staring at the barrels of two handguns. They must have thought Manny to be the more dangerous, since he had three guns aimed at his chest.

  My parents could never understand why lesser situations would send me into a black space of nothingness, but larger, more intimidating events invigorated me. It was because the larger events provided me with such a wealth of behaviour to observe and analyse that I didn’t want to miss a moment. Having more than half a dozen officers shouting at me, treating me like a dangerous criminal was fascinating beyond anything I had ever observed.

  With the exception of one officer, they all were confident that they had the situation under control. Their bodies were
balanced, all muscles ready to act on any change in the situation. It was, more than anything else, their faces that gave away their confidence. Looking straight ahead, they were constantly assessing Manny and me, their mouths drawn in determined lines. They knew what they were doing and trusted each other to do the same.

  A shorter officer to the left of me did not share that confidence. He was overcompensating with exaggerated gestures and body language aggressive enough to cause concern. Anger pulled his eyebrows together and lifted his top lip in an aggressive sneer. It wouldn’t take much for him to do something that might end with fatal consequences.

  I turned to him with my hands lifted even higher, exposing my torso completely. Humans respond to the body language presented to them and I was giving him innocuous, submissive. I regulated my facial muscles into a submissive smile which almost turned triumphant when I noticed the muscle tension in his body lighten. This was too easy.

  Manny was on the other side of the car, not having as much fun as me. He was shouting back at one of the officers. “Just let me reach into the inside pocket of my jacket. I’ll show you my credentials. I’m an EDA official, you arrogant prick.”

  “Sir, keep your hands where we can see them. We know who you are. Our orders are only to apprehend Miss Lenard.”

  “It is Doctor Lenard to you, sonny.” Manny lowered his arms a fraction. “If you only have to apprehend her, why are you aiming your guns at me?”

  “Manny.” I addressed him quietly, hoping he would hear me above all the commotion. “You’re not helping the situation.”

  “Not helping...” he sputtered and then inhaled deeply. “She’s right. I’m not helping. Could we all just stop shouting at each other?”

  I didn’t want to point out to him that after we exited his car, he had been the only one shouting. Instead I kept my eyes on the insecure officer. “What do you need me to do?”

  “Please turn around, face the vehicle and place your hands on the roof.” It was the officer next to him who spoke, which brought most of the tension back to the first officer’s stance. He was not respected by his peers and he resented it. Team dynamics was a study in itself, but now was not the time for it. I did as asked and lost my focus when cold handcuffs embraced my wrists.

  I lifted my eyes, looking for something to analyse so that the panic starting in me wouldn’t grow. I didn’t have to look far. On the other side of the car, Manny was now in deep debate with the officer who looked to be the team leader.

  “What do you mean, you have fingerprints?”

  “Miss,” the officer swallowed at Manny’s growl and corrected himself, “Doctor Lenard’s fingerprints were found at a crime scene and we need her to come in to the police station for questioning.”

  “So you arrested her?”

  “The crime scene is quite incriminating, sir.”

  “What crime scene?”

  “I’m sorry, sir. I can’t tell you that. It is an ongoing investigation.” I could see the officer was genuinely sorry, but I didn’t think it was because of his concern for me. His face told me that he would’ve taken great joy in telling Manny about my alleged crime.

  “It’s okay, Manny. I’ll go with them. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  The expression on his face told me that he didn’t think that to be the truth and I smiled at him. He was furious with me for not telling him about my co-operation with Colin. I was sure that that was the only wrongdoing he could accuse me of. And accuse me he was going to. I could see the promise of it in his eyes. He looked at me for a few more moments and I watched anger make way for concern. “Are you okay?”

  I knew what he was referring to. “I’m okay. This is not as bad as that photo.”

  He gave me a tight smile. “Don’t speak to anyone, Genevieve. Do you hear me?”

  “Why not? I haven’t done anything wrong.” I had nothing to hide.

  Manny bit down hard on his teeth and turned to the leading officer. “May I please have a minute with Doctor Lenard? Your courtesy will be noted and will be remembered by the EDA and Eurocorps in the future.”

  The officer’s eyes flashed in respect for those two agencies and nodded his agreement. “One minute, then we go.”

  Manny walked around the car and stopped inside my personal space. Now didn’t seem to be the time to remind him of the fifty centimetre rule. Not while I was handcuffed and surrounded by police. He pushed his face close to mine and I wondered if it was because he wanted me to read how serious he was. “Listen very carefully to me, Doctor Face-reader. This case that we are working on is the most important thing that you should remember right now. As you know, we are working with people who have enough power to ruin you, me, Leon, Phillip and whoever the hell they choose. I do not want you to say anything to anyone. Not even to ask for water or the lavvy.”

  “The lavvy?”

  He rolled his eyes. “The toilet, missy. I will follow you to the police station and sort this out. Then you and I are going to have a very hard conversation.”

  The officers were becoming restless, glancing uneasily at us. My mind was working overtime and I had reached some hypothesis. We didn’t have much time, so I was going to be honest and direct without polite filters. I lowered my voice and leaned very close to Manny’s ear. “They’re going to say that I killed Crenshaw. I didn’t. Colin didn’t. Colin thinks it’s a conspiracy and that this is a set-up.”

  Manny jerked away from me, looking at me as if I was completely insane. He opened his mouth only to close it again while shaking his head. The officers decided they had waited long enough and walked purposefully towards us. Manny gave me another searing look which I supposed was to reiterate his warning. I nodded at him and then turned to the officers. They had holstered their weapons, but I had no doubt that they would reach for them if I posed any threat. I made sure that my body language and facial expressions communicated harmlessness.

  The drive to the police station was happening too fast for me. I wanted more time to observe the dynamics between the officers. The short officer was driving so aggressively that his partner commented on it. That only put the insecure man more on edge. I was willing to stake my reputation on the prediction that this officer’s behaviour was going to spiral into something that would become problematic within the next three months. Too soon we were at the police station and I was escorted to a small room with a wooden table and three steel chairs. Nothing else.

  Since I wasn’t an expert on police procedure I didn’t know what to expect. What I didn’t expect was the handcuffs to be taken off, to be told to sit down and then to be left on my own. The sudden solitude was a welcome change. Being in constant close proximity to people these last few days was wearing me down. At least I knew that I had nothing to worry about. Between Phillip and Manny, I had respectable and solid alibis. It would have been impossible for me to have killed anyone. Not when I had been with either one or both men for the larger part of the day.

  After fifteen minutes, I got up and tried the door. It was locked. I placed my ear against the door and imagined that I could hear Manny’s annoying voice. Only now it didn’t sound annoying to me. It calmed me. I went back to my seat at the table. A few minutes later an officer came in, rudely dropped my handbag on the table and left without saying a word. Maybe Manny had convinced them to give this to me. I didn’t know. I grabbed my bag to make sure nothing had been taken. It was all there. Including the programme of the Foundation’s annual gala event. I stared unseeingly at the cover.

  I glanced at my watch and saw that only another fifteen minutes had passed. If I were going to be detained like this, I might as well make use of the time. I studied the programme from cover to cover, absorbing everything. The niggling in my subconscious started up again and wouldn’t relent. There was a connection to be made. I sat back in the steel chair and called up the Mozart Gavotte that I had started earlier.

  When next I looked at my watch, it was ten minutes to six. I had mentally written
the Gavotte and two Minuets and it had only taken me five hours. My mind felt energised and my soul centred. And I was jittery with excitement. The connection I had made was so obvious, I almost felt embarrassed for not seeing it earlier. It was only a theory, yet it was the overwhelming evidence that had my heart racing. I needed one or all of the annoying men in my life as sounding boards.

  As if on cue, Manny burst through the door, followed by the leading officer that had stopped us. The other man looked exhausted yet furious. He leaned against the wall close to the door and pulled his lips into a thin line. His eyes kept resting on the back of Manny’s head, narrowing with what laypeople would call a murderous look. Manny had not made any friends during the early morning hours.

  “Are you okay, Doctor Face-reader?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  Manny studied me intently for a few seconds. Apparently he decided that I looked fine and he sat down in a chair next to me. “Do you need anything?”

  “The lavvy.”

  He laughed at my use of the word I had not earlier understood, but quickly sobered. “This is a mess, Genevieve. A big mess.”

  I could count on my one hand the number of times Manny had called me by my name. This was obviously as bad as I had expected. “Is this about–”

  “Not now.” Manny interrupted me before I could finish my question. He looked at the policeman hovering by the table. “They didn’t arrest you?”

  “I don’t know.” How did one know if one was arrested? Surely being handcuffed equalled being arrested.

  “Did they explain your rights to you?”

  “What rights?” My eyes widened with the memory of a few Hollywood movies I had watched in my student years. “Oh, those rights. No. Nobody told me anything. And I didn’t speak to anyone.”

  Manny smiled at my admission. Then he turned to the police officer and glared at him, before giving me his full attention again. “They should never have handcuffed you. You were never under arrest. They just wanted to bring you in for questioning.”

  “Why? No one has questioned me all night, so why have I been here at all?”

  “Colonel Crenshaw was murdered last night.” Manny waited for my response and I realised that I was supposed to look shocked for the benefit of our audience. I was a millisecond late, but quickly manipulated my face into the appropriate expression. He lifted an unbelieving eyebrow at me, but continued. “Your fingerprints were found at the crime scene. They were on a glass of whiskey and also on the coffee table in the room where he was shot.”

  This time I did not have to pretend to be shocked. “My fingerprints? How–”

  The memory of my hand being forcefully held against a device rushed through my mind. Did those thugs take my fingerprints? Was it possible to take my fingerprints from a machine and put it on a glass? I wanted to ask Manny this, but didn’t know if it was a good idea. Not with the police officer showing such intense interest in our conversation.

  “Your fingerprints were taken when you started working at Rousseau & Rousseau and were placed on a few databases. That is how they managed to identify the prints so quickly.” He had misunderstood my shock and hesitation, but had also answered a question that I was going to ask. Manny noticed the police officer moving closer and shook his head. “We’ll talk about this later. You are not under arrest, which means that you can go home.”

  “I can go home?” Relief rushed through me. Not wanting to spend another second in this place, I got up and felt the effects of sitting in an uncomfortable chair for five hours. My legs were a bit shaky and the muscles in my back were stiff. I took my handbag and turned to the door. I couldn’t wait to lie down in a tub of steamy hot water. “Is there any paper work or something that I still need to do here?”

  “I’ve taken care of all of that.” Manny got up and followed me. He gave a dismissive nod towards the police officer and together we walked down a long corridor. I heard some commotion up ahead, but kept my focus on Manny.

  “Thank you.”

  For a second, I thought that he hadn’t heard my quietly spoken recognition of his help. He stopped next to me, reached for my elbow and just as quickly withdrew his hand. Lowering his brow just enough to look me straight in the eye, he spoke just as quietly. “I did what was necessary. I did this because I know that you don’t have it in you to do anything remotely criminal. But I also did this because I want answers.” He straightened. “Honest, complete, full, detailed answers.”

  My comment on his overuse of adjectives died in my mouth when Phillip came barrelling down the corridor. He looked as if he was on his way to a meeting, dressed in one of his bespoke suits, smoothly shaved and looking much fresher than I felt. It was the tightness in his face that belied the image of a man in full control. His steps faltered slightly when he saw us and that was when I noticed the empty music sheets he was clutching in his right hand.

  He stopped in front of us, indecision making him rock back and forth on the balls of his feet. As a rule it was not something that I liked, needed or allowed of anyone, but I knew that Phillip needed more than verbal reassurance. With a slight smile, I opened my arms and immediately found myself in a tight embrace, surrounded by his arms and the scent that was uniquely him. Phillip’s intense concern and now relief meant more to me than I wanted to admit. People were starting to show their care for me and that made me feel uncomfortably vulnerable.

  “Enough of this. Let’s get her home.” Manny’s gravelly voice broke the emotional moment and I stepped out of Phillip’s arms. “And before you ask, she’s okay.”

  “You brought me music sheets.” I looked at the papers now crumpled in his fist.

  “I thought you might need them.”

  “I was okay. Am okay.”

  “I told you that. Now can we please leave this hell-hole?” The agitation in Manny’s voice and on his face was all we needed to follow him to his car. He and Phillip agreed over my head that I was to go with Manny and that Phillip would follow us in his car. The trip to my apartment was done in complete silence. I thought it prudent to wait for Manny to initiate the dreaded conversation. For now I was just content watching the activities of the city waking up. A few people were jogging, but mostly the streets were still deserted.

  Manny found a parking space a block away from my apartment building and we waited for Phillip in the foyer. The two men talked quietly while we rode up to my apartment. With a sigh I accepted that the hot bath I was so looking forward to was going to have to wait. At least I had the new connection. I placed an inordinate amount of hope that it would placate Manny’s unavoidable fury.

 

  Chapter TWENTY