by Josh Lanyon
J.J. nodded, only half-listening.
Jason said, “If there was any question as to whether we acted appropriately, we would not be sitting here on the job right now.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Jason continued to survey his partner. “Everything okay?”
J.J. shrugged. “I guess. I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
“I don’t think there are more shoes. I think this was a one-legged bandit.”
J.J. smiled politely, absently.
“Have you spoken to George?” Jason asked.
“Of course.”
Jason hesitated. “You know, if you do need to talk to someone—”
J.J. burst out laughing. “You’re offering to counsel me?”
“Hell no.” Jason was equally staggered at the idea. “I’m just saying there are resources available to you. I had counseling after Miami. There isn’t any shame in it. It helped.”
“You were shot in Miami. That’s a little different.”
“Yes. It was a different traumatic event. The point is—”
“This wasn’t traumatic,” J.J. interrupted. “Brody Stevens stalked and harassed his ex-girlfriend—his teenage ex-girlfriend. He’s no loss to the planet.”
Oh-kay.
Jason put a hand up. “Fine. You got this. I’ll butt out.”
J.J. said curtly, “Appreciated.”
Jason checked his phone. Four thirty. Just enough time to squeeze in one more interview. “I think I’ll try to speak to the Mayhew girl. Do you have an address on her?”
J.J. picked up his phone and texted the address. “I thought you were in a hurry to get to the newspaper archives?”
“The newspaper archives aren’t going anywhere.”
“That’s not how you sounded this morning.”
“I can’t change what’s in the archives.”
“Huh?”
“Never mind. I’ll start on the archives tomorrow.”
“Okay. Whatever, I guess. You want me to come with you to interview Mayhew?”
Jason said casually, “No. I think you’re turning up some very useful stuff. You should keep working this angle.”
“Suit yourself.” J.J. looked down at his laptop.
* * * * *
It wasn’t hard to see how Terry “Baby” Mayhew, Quilletta’s daughter, got her nickname.
Despite being nearly forty, she looked like a baby. Or maybe a toddler, would be more accurate. She was chubby, with a heart-shaped face, close-cut dark curls, wide-brown eyes, and a perfect set of dimples.
Also, given the way she recoiled when Jason showed his ID, a guilty conscience.
“I can’t talk to you without a lawyer present,” she said in alarm, and tried to close the front door.
“Wait a minute.” Jason caught the door and held it in place. “Mrs. Mayhew, you’re not in any trouble. I can’t think of any good reason you would refuse to even speak with me.”
Baby hesitated and then opened the door.
“Thanks. This won’t take long, I promise,” Jason said.
“My husband’s going to be home soon.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Reluctantly, Baby led the way down an almost eerily unblemished hall to a living room that looked like it had been decorated by Mr. Clean. White walls, white carpet, white furniture, white blinds. Jason had seen operating rooms with more color—and warmth.
She waved Jason to take one of the spotless white chairs, positioning herself behind the sofa. As she warily watched him sit, he wondered if he was the chair’s first occupant.
“Did you want something?” she asked grudgingly. “Tea? Coffee?”
“Just information.” Jason smiled. He usually got good results with that smile, but Baby was not having any of it.
“I don’t know why you have to come here,” she burst out. “I don’t know anything. I wasn’t involved.”
“Involved in what?” Jason inquired.
“Involved in anything. I wasn’t even alive when Great-Uncle Roy sent those things home from the war.”
“Which things are we talking about?” Jason asked.
She threw him a frightened look. “The things you were asking Mommy and Uncle Bert about.”
Yeesh. Baby and now Mommy. That was kind of squicky, as his fourteen-year-old niece Nora would say.
He’d have loved to get Sam’s take on this cast of characters.
“Could you describe some of those things for me?”
“No.” She amended, “I don’t know what things Great-Uncle Roy brought back and what was just…his.”
“Sure. Did he bring a lot of things back?”
She swallowed. “I don’t know. Why are you asking me?”
“You’re mentioned in your great-uncle’s will, so it seems like he was fond of you. And we know from talking to other people that he was a generous and thoughtful man.”
“He was!”
“So it seems like he might have let you choose something from his art collection.”
Bull’s-eye.
She had been about to sit, but that had her back on her feet, looking terror-stricken. “He never did!”
“Okay,” Jason said easily. “He never did. What was your great-uncle like?”
“I-I don’t know what you’re getting at.”
Hm. What did she think he was getting at?
Jason smiled. “It’s not a trick question. I didn’t get to meet him, so it’s hard to know what he was really like. I have to rely on other people’s impressions.”
“Oh.” She smiled suddenly and sat down. “He was wonderful. Very artistic. And he always had funny stories to tell. He was very cultured too. He had been to Europe.”
“You mean after the war?”
“Yes. A few times.”
“Did you ever meet any of his friends?”
The defensive look was back on her face. “I don’t care about any of that. He was wonderful to me.”
Okay. Now he got it.
“Your great-uncle was gay. Is that correct?”
“It’s no one’s business!”
“I agree. Did your uncle—sorry, your great-uncle—did he ever mention the name Emerson Harley to you?”
She shook her head, and her curls bounced.
“I’m sure by now you’re aware that your mother and your uncle attempted to sell three works of art from your great-uncle’s collection, and that those paintings turned out to have been part of a trove of art and other objects stolen by the Nazis.”
She nodded. “They didn’t know that,” she whispered.
“Of course not. Are you aware of any other items in your late great-uncle’s art collection that he might have acquired around the same time?”
She quickly shook her head.
“Do you know if your mother and your uncle are intending to sell other items from your great-uncle’s art collection?”
She opened her mouth, hesitated. “There isn’t anything else,” she insisted.
Jason sighed. “Mrs. Mayhew, Terry, I want to caution you about making false statements to a federal investigator.”
Baby gave him a deer-in-the-headlights look—and another of those jerky swallows.
“You’re not in any trouble right now, and presumably you’d like to keep it that way. So, let me give you a piece of advice. Either answer honestly, or decline to answer—which, yes, is going to tell me some of what I need to know—but don’t lie to me. You won’t like how that turns out, and you won’t be doing your mother or uncle any good.”
She licked her lips, started to speak.
He heard the floorboard, tensed, and turned before the loud “What the hell is going on here?” came from the doorway behind them.
Baby jumped. “Gary!”
“What are you doing, Terry?”
“I’m— This is the FBI.”
“I know it’s the goddamned FBI. Don’t say a word to him.”
“Mr. Mayhew?” Jason rose, getting h
is ID out. “I’m Special Agent—”
“That’s right. I’m Terry’s husband, and I don’t give a fuck who you are, Special Agent Suit. I want you out of our house now.”
“Really?” Jason said. “That’s the way you want to play this?”
“You’re goddamned right it’s the way I want to play it. Unless you’ve got a warrant, get out of my house.”
Jason unhurriedly opened his wallet, pulled out his card, handed his card to Baby. “Terry, if you change your mind, you can call me anytime.”
She stared at the card like she thought it was a one-way ticket to the Big House, but then took it with trembling fingers.
“She’s not going to change her mind,” Mayhew said as Jason walked past him. He followed Jason down the sterile test-tube of a hallway to the front door.
Jason stepped onto the tiled Spanish-style porch. “I’m not sure what you’re so afraid of,” he said, “but it sure raises some red flags.”
Mayhew slammed the door in his face.
Chapter Ten
De Haan was not answering his phone.
Jason left a message letting him know he’d spoken to Terry Mayhew, then grabbed his copy of Karl Schütz’s Vermeer. The Complete Works, asked the hotel front desk for some restaurant recs, and headed out to have dinner.
He was used to eating on his own. He actually preferred a good book to dinner with Russell, who never stopped talking sports scores, debating the merits of current girlfriends, or bitching about wasting his best years trailing after Jason on ACT investigations—though in fairness, Russell had eased up a bit on the job complaints in the last month.
He settled on a Mexican restaurant within walking distance of the hotel, ordered tacos with rice and beans, and—remembering Sam’s concerns—diet Coke, and spent a surprisingly relaxing couple of hours reading and occasionally eating.
The Schütz book was beautifully produced and meticulously researched. All thirty-four of the artist’s universally accepted paintings were included, along with gorgeous color plates reproducing every brushstroke, hue, detail, angle, and gesture contained in his paintings. There were even several large foldouts, which Jason did not dare expose to the risk of flying salsa.
Vermeer was a mystery in his own right, down to the exact date of his birth. There was no record of his apprenticeship, leading to the theory—however unlikely—that he was self-taught. But maybe the theory wasn’t so unlikely given how extraordinary and unique his work was—not just precise, not just luminous, but almost inhumanly beautiful. In fact, another theory—dismissed by Schütz—was that Vermeer had used a camera obscura to obtain his hypnagogic results.
What Jason found especially amazing about the quality of universality in Vermeer’s work was that Vermeer painted mostly domestic interior scenes of 17th century Dutch life. What was it about these paintings that so resonated with 21st century viewers? The bulk of his work, certainly the work of his peak years, was set in two smallish rooms in his house in Delft. Again and again, the paintings showed the same furniture and decorations in various arrangements, and Vermeer frequently portrayed the same people. Mostly women.
In fact, the only two paintings—the only two surviving paintings—with solitary male figures as their protagonists were a pair of later works titled The Astronomer and The Geographer. Or at least that’s what they were called now. Back in 1713, they had been auctioned as A work depicting a Mathematical Artist and A ditto by the Same Name, demonstrating Vermeer’s gift for really awful titles.
Another interesting point about the two paintings—Jason’s favorites out of Vermeer’s entire body of work—was that although one had been done in 1668 and the second in 1669, the same man had posed for them. One theory was that the man was Vermeer himself. Another theory was that it was his friend and estate executor, the noted microbiologist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek. Maybe. The fact remained, a slender man in his late thirties with long dark hair and a solemn face had posed for Vermeer as the painter worked on the two possibly thematically paired pictures.
So if A Gentleman Washing His Hands in a Perspectival Room with Figures, Artful and Rare did exist, it would be all the more, well, artful and rare.
Schütz had nothing to add on the topic of A Gentleman Washing His Hands. There was no question the painting had existed, but for it to have shown up in the tunnels of Engelshofen Castle, it would have had to survive two world wars and a whole lot of history.
That didn’t mean it was impossible.
After dinner, Jason walked back to his hotel.
It was nearly dark by then, a warm summer’s evening with lights winking on everywhere—some of those twinkles turning out to be fireflies. A cool breeze, flavored with clear summer air and wide-open plains, dusted the sidewalks and stirred leaves and flags and imaginatively painted hanging signs. The sidewalks were crowded, but strangers smiled when you caught their gaze. He could hear distant music playing and the faraway, mournful wail of a train.
Bozwin was a college town. A pretty town too, sheltered in the blue-black shadows of the Bridger Range, and effort had gone into keeping it that way. There was a variety of architecture—Art Deco, Italianate, and Mission Revival—but one thing every style had in common was the effort made to preserve and protect. He liked that. And there was plenty of shopping, plenty of places to eat and drink. It was a nice place to visit, no question.
Though he couldn’t help thinking there was a real lack of ethnic or cultural diversity. And despite that surprisingly well-connected airport, this was a very long way from pretty much everywhere he needed to be.
He had stopped to look in the window of a closed art gallery when he caught the reflection of a police SUV. He glanced around, recognized Chief Sandford’s silvery hair and blunt features beneath a baseball cap.
The chief was looking straight ahead and didn’t seem to see him, which was fine with Jason. Local law enforcement didn’t always welcome the Bureau with open arms, but he’d rarely had such a hostile reception.
And he was still curious as to why Bert Thompson’s first instinct had been to call the Bozwin police chief after the shootout at his ranch. Maybe the chief was a personal friend of the family, though he hadn’t seemed particularly chummy with Bert.
When he reached his hotel, Jason got out his laptop and settled down to work. That was usually how he spent his evenings on the road.
If Sam had had the evening off, it might have been nice to walk around town and catch some of the summer activities he had seen advertised on posters and flyers: a local theater was running classic Westerns, the Montana State University was doing Shakespeare in the Park, and on Main Street the summer music festival was in full swing.
But they weren’t on vacation, and he had reports to write up.
He was doing his best to keep a careful and accurate account of his investigation, making particular effort to be scrupulous in any and all matters related to Emerson Harley’s potential involvement.
When the time came to turn in his final case report—and regardless of his findings—he intended to make full disclosure about his personal connection to Emerson Harley. He knew his chief at the ACT, Karan Kapszukiewicz, was not going to be happy. At all. And George Potts, his supervisor at the LA Field Office, would be even less pleased. There was a good chance he was going to receive a letter of censure for his file. That would be hard to take.
Not least because a letter of censure put him in danger of losing a much coveted spot on the highly competitive Art Crime Team.
He hoped not. He didn’t think that would happen, but he couldn’t be sure. Even knowing the risk, he felt he had to pursue the path he had started down on.
There was another possibility too: that he would be fired outright. But that he refused to even think about.
Accordingly, he noted Quilletta’s allegations that her uncle had been ordered to take the artwork by a commanding officer, and de Haan’s conviction that MFAA Deputy Chief Emerson Harley was the best and most likely candidate f
or Captain Roy Thompson’s accomplice.
He also noted that neither Terry Mayhew nor Edgar Roberts had recognized Harley’s name or remembered hearing Thompson mention him, but so far, the scales were not tilting in his favor. Still, it was early in the investigation.
He was hoping spending some quality time in the Bozwin Daily Chronicle’s archives might turn up the names of some other potential suspects, although if de Haan hadn’t identified them by now, they probably did not exist.
By the time he finished writing up his notes and checking and answering emails, following up current cases as best he could long-distance, it was after ten. Still no word from Sam.
Not looking too promising, then.
He tried to do a bit more research on A Gentleman Washing His Hands, but there really did not seem to be any more to discover.
He did come across a fanciful reconstruction of the legendary lost work painted by Delft artist Arthur Stam in 2013 and displayed at the Delft art gallery Ruimte Remmelink in spring of that year. The painting was…well, it was not Vermeer, of course.
It was an interesting experiment, though. Jason studied the recreated room and small, pudgy central figure intently. Putting aside technique, palette, composition, and Vermeer’s apparent sorcery, it seemed to him that Stam entirely missed the point, for lack of a better word, of Vermeer’s work.
Stam had tackled the lost painting again, this time in a three-dimensional installation. And, in Jason’s opinion, he’d got it even more wrong. Vermeer had not simply painted scenes of comfortable domesticity; he had tried to convey a quality of life, even perhaps the very essence of civilization. There was something profound in Vermeer’s work. Somehow the simplicity of the scenes he chose to portray only underlined their importance, their sublimity. Vermeer seemed to be illustrating what it meant to be human.
But then in Stam’s efforts to recreate Vermeer’s lost work, he too was illustrating what it meant to be human.
At eleven, his cell phone rang. Jason picked up, assuming it was Sam, but the screen showed de Haan’s number.
“Hi, this is West.”
It was kind of late for phone calls, but he didn’t think much of it until he heard a garbled static background noise followed by a high-pitched…Jason didn’t even know how to describe it. Something between the sound of accidentally dialing a fax machine and falling over a metal trash barrel.
