The Perfect Fake

by Barbara Parker

  “Robinson Crusoe,” he said. “Daniel Defoe’s masterpiece. These maps were included in the first edition of his book, I believe. How much are you asking?”

  “Twelve hundred.” Tom added, “It’s firm at that price.”

  “No courtesy discounts for a fellow collector who just overpaid for a mediocre map of Georgia that he didn’t need?”

  Tom smiled. “I’m already subtracting what you paid for Georgia.”

  “Are you?” Barlowe gazed at the map on the wall. “I’d like to buy it, but I don’t have a check on me.”

  “We take credit cards.”

  “I prefer to pay by check. Can you deliver it to my office?”

  “You can take it now if you want and pay later. You’re good for it.”

  “No, I’d rather you deliver it. This evening, if possible. You’d be doing me a great favor.” From the breast pocket of his tweed coat Barlowe withdrew a thin silver case and took out a business card, which he extended to Tom. “It’s just on Brickell, not far. I’ll tell the guard in the lobby to let you in.”

  Chapter 7

  Far over the Atlantic, the tops of the clouds had faded from pink to gray. Tom could see the red taillights on the causeways, the lights in the apartment

  buildings at the tip of South Beach, and the dim glow of a cruise ship on the inky blue horizon. He leaned closer to the window to block his own reflection and watched the ship slowly vanish over the curve of the earth. He wondered where it was headed. He imagined himself at the wheel of his sailboat, turning around to watch the skyline of Miami fade into darkness. One of these days when his sailboat had sails. And the mooring lines to the Department of Corrections had been cut.

  He noticed a movement in the glass. Stuart Barlowe was coming from his desk with the check he’d just written. He had to walk around a table with an architectural model of the area just west of downtown on the river, with three new towers, still at the imaginary stage. A sign announced THE METROPOLIS, and there were some color brochures lying beside it. Tom hadn’t bothered picking one up. He’d heard about the project from his neighbors. A few of them, after too many drinks, wanted to bomb the first bulldozer that showed up.

  “Are you building this?” Barlowe smiled modestly. “No, no. However, my company, Pan-Global, is one of the major investors. You can say we have some input.” He came to stand beside Tom at the window. “Wonderful view, isn’t it? Have you ever been mountain climbing, Tom? The feeling is very much like this.” The check appeared, held vertically between Barlowe’s fingers. “It’s made out to cash. I hope that’s all right.”

  Tom glanced at the figure: $1,200, which failed to include the six percent sales tax. He wavered between not wanting to make a big deal out of it and keeping the transaction on the level. He didn’t know whether Stuart Barlowe was dishonest or just cheap. Avoiding the choice, Tom said, “It’s seventy-two bucks short, but don’t worry about it. The shop can take care of the sales tax.” He put the folded check into his shirt pocket and withdrew the bill of sale he had written earlier, which would establish the provenance of the Crusoe map. “I put your map of Georgia in there, too. You left it on my table.”

  Barlowe returned to his desk and closed the heavy, acid-free folder on the maps.

  Tom asked, “Would you like to have the Crusoe map framed?”

  “Not really. I’ll probably give it to the museum.” Smiling down at the folder, Barlowe pushed it aside. “I have to confess, I’m not the map fancier you are.”

  “That’s more my sister than me.”

  “Rose. She owns the shop, doesn’t she? The Compass Rose. A clever name.” Barlowe gestured toward the wet bar in the cabinet across the room. “Would you like a drink?”

  “No, thanks. I guess I ought to be going.”

  “Stay for a few minutes. There’s something I’d like to talk to you about. Have a seat. Please.” Barlowe took one of the armchairs near the window and adjusted the knee of his trousers as he crossed his long legs. “Do you think The Compass Rose would be interested in selling some of my maps for me? I inherited nearly two hundred of them from my father. He died owning over a thousand, most of which went to the Royal Ontario Museum. There are many I don’t need, and I think the shop could make a nice profit.”

  “Absolutely. Rose would be glad to talk to you about it. Do you want her to call you?”

  “I’ll get in touch as soon as I’ve had a chance to go through them. Royce Herron was going to help me with that, but . . . Did you know Royce well?”

  “Not really. He was a friend of my grandfather’s.” Tom sat on the edge of his chair and noticed the antique clock on the bookcase. Nearly six thirty. The clock was under a glass dome, and its four gold balls rotated one way, then the other.

  Barlowe stroked his neatly trimmed beard. “Too bad you missed the reception on Friday. Quite a tribute to the man. Everyone telling funny stories about him, commiserating over what his death will mean to the cartography program at the historical museum. We were all disappointed, of course, that there was only a blank space on the wall where his exhibit would have been. Royce was working on the maps the night he died.”

  Tom nodded. The clock made one soft chime.

  “I had lent him some of mine. The police say that the person who broke in stole several maps from his study, but we won’t have an exact accounting until Royce’s son finishes going through the house.”

  Muffled tones came from Barlowe’s gray tweed jacket. He took out his cell phone and glanced at the screen before returning the phone to his pocket. “My daughter. I’ll call her later. Allison. You and she went to high school together, didn’t you? Or am I mistaken?”

  “No, you’re right,” Tom said. “Wow, that was a long time ago. The last I heard, she went to college in New York.”

  “College at Barnard, law school at Columbia. She’s been in Boston for several years, and she recently returned home.”

  “No kidding. That’s great.” Tom was aware of lying, keeping Allison’s secrets when it didn’t matter anymore, but there wasn’t any reason to spill the truth to her old man. Tom stretched his arms out and glanced at his watch. “Look at the time. I ought to be getting back. I’ll tell Rose about the maps. She’ll be really excited about it.”

  Barlowe remained in his chair. “I asked you here because I need your advice, Tom. I think you might be able to help.”

  “Help with what?”

  “A map. May I show you? It’s in the conference room.”

  Tom followed him into a room with a long row of uncurtained windows. Beyond them, the sky had deepened to indigo. Barlowe flipped a switch, and pinpoint halogen lights illuminated a conference table, in the center of which lay a large black portfolio.

  “You’ve heard of Gaetano Corelli.”

  “Vaguely,” Tom said.

  “Corelli was a Venetian cartographer and publisher of sea charts. His maps were used by Christopher Columbus, among others. In 1511, Corelli planned to publish a folio-sized, hand-colored atlas of the world. Unfortunately for Corelli, his main competitor, Peter Martyr, had been sending his own people to interview explorers as soon as they docked. This meant Martyr had better maps, and he announced that he too would publish an atlas. As a result, Corelli couldn’t sell any of his, and he was stuck with the one proof copy. A few years later he went bankrupt, and his creditors took over his inventory, including the atlas. In the next five centuries, it passed through various hands—a Genovese merchant, a count in Venice, a monastery in Constantinople. I won’t bore you with the entire history, but in the 1950s the Corelli atlas became part of the collection of the state museum in Riga, Latvia. When the Soviet Union fell apart in the early 1990s, the atlas disappeared.”

  During this recitation, Barlowe slid the heavy brass zipper tab around the portfolio. “Among the various regional maps, Corelli included his map of the world. He’d done a fairly good job with the latest discoveries in the Caribbean. Florida wasn’t named until two years later by Ponce de L
eón, but the Corelli map clearly showed that it was part of the mainland, not an island. I wanted the map for my collection, and I finally got a lead on a woman in her eighties residing in Albuquerque, New Mexico, whose husband used to own a map shop. After a good deal of haggling, I flew out to take a look. She let me go through some boxes, and there it was. The provenance was a little shaky, but I knew the history. She let me have it for ten thousand dollars, quite a bargain, really. Allison asked me if I would lend it to Royce Herron for his exhibit at the map fair. I said of course.”

  Reaching inside the portfolio, Barlowe took out a folder about two feet by three. “Royce was holding the map when he died. I persuaded the police to return it to me.”

  When the folder fell open, Tom saw the continents of the world in a configuration that he didn’t recognize. A closer look told him that the reddish-brown shapes were not landmasses. They flowed over the land and extended in blots and spatters across the oceans.

  “Jesus. Is that... blood?”

  “Yes. Notice the bullet holes. Three of them. Here. Here. And here. Royce fell on top of the map and creased it.” He pointed to North Africa, where the bloodstains made a mirror image, like a Rorschach test.

  Tom exhaled. “If you’re asking me whether it can it be restored—”

  “It can’t. I know that. It’s a complete loss.”

  “Did you get it insured?”

  “I don’t care about the money. Call me eccentric, but I was particularly fond of this map. When I saw it like this, I wanted to weep.” Barlowe sat on the edge of the table, one foot swinging. His shoes would have paid Tom’s rent for a month. “Then I had a thought. Why not make a duplicate? A twin. A map exactly like this one. Tell me, Tom. Is there a way—any way at all—that it can be done?”

  “How exact do you want it?”

  “I want to be able to examine it with a magnifying glass and be convinced it’s the original.”

  “Good luck. You’re talking about something that’s five hundred years old.”

  “Go ahead, take a closer look. Pick it up.”

  Avoiding the bloodstains, Tom tilted the map so that the light fell at an angle. The fold down the middle indicated it had come from an atlas. The paper was excellent, probably a mix of cotton and linen. He could clearly see the impressions made by the wires on which the pulped rags had been left to dry. Corelli or someone in his workshop had first engraved the map in reverse on a copperplate, inked the plate, then pressed it into the paper. The plate had left pressure marks around the edge.

  Tom brought the map closer and squinted at the fine black lines, the minuscule letters in the place names, the details of the cartouche. The map’s title, Universalis Cosmographia, was visible through the smears of blood. Aside from the blood, there were age spots, one missing corner, and a four-inch tear in the fold line.

  “I’ve never done anything like this,” Tom said.

  “But it could be done, wouldn’t you agree?”

  “Theoretically, I guess.”

  “You’re an artist, Tom. You have an extraordinary talent. I saw it in the Ortelius map you made for The Compass Rose. This project would be more difficult, I grant you, but surely not impossible.”

  Tom held the map over his head so the light passed through it, then turned it over. “If I were you, I’d go to a commercial printer for a high-resolution scan, take out the bloodstains with Photoshop, and print it on laid paper with a good rag content. You frame it under nonglare glass, and I guarantee you won’t be able to tell the difference.”

  “Of course I could,” Barlowe said. “It would be a digital image! The pixels would show under magnification. No?”

  Tom shrugged.

  “I want a handmade duplicate,” Barlowe said.

  “Where are you going to find paper like this? Office Depot?”

  “Paper can be found. I’ve seen blank end pages bound into old manuscripts and atlases. The ink has to be of the period, too. You find an old recipe and make your own.” Barlowe was watching Tom avidly for any signs of doubt. “It can be done.”

  Tom wondered if Barlowe had all his marbles. He put the tip of his finger into one of the bullet holes. Only an expert engraver would have a chance of making a map like this. It wasn’t a drawing; it had been printed on a copperplate press. Even with the right paper and ink, it would be next to impossible. But hell, if Barlowe wanted it that badly—

  Tom lowered the map to the table. “How much were you thinking to pay?”

  “You tell me.”

  “Assuming I had the right materials? There’s a lot of detail work in this map. I’m going to say... six thousand dollars, plus expenses.”

  Barlowe said, “Half to begin and half on delivery.”

  “That’s fine.” Tom had to clear his throat to keep from laughing in amazement. “I need to talk to some people. Advice on technique, that sort of thing.”

  A telephone rang on the narrow table under the window. Barlowe ignored it. “All right. If you have to, go ahead, but tell no one why you need the information or for whom you are working. No one. If I hear so much as a whisper, there is no deal. One other requirement. I need the map as quickly as you can do it. I’d like it within three weeks.”

  “That’s not much time. I have other commitments.” “Can’t you put them off?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Get sure and let me know tomorrow.”

  The telephone was still ringing. Barlowe strode over, picked it up, and snapped out, “Yes, what is it?” He listened, and surprise showed on his face. Then he slowly replaced the handset. “That was security in the lobby. My daughter is on her way up.”

  Sunday night, and they were still playing that insipid music in the elevator. Allison wanted to throw her shoe at the speaker. She had been feeling pretty good today, until her watch had ticked past six o’clock and she still hadn’t heard from her father, who had told her—promised her—that they would go out to dinner tonight. Just the two of them. Not Rhonda, and for God’s sake not Larry.

  Allison had dressed up for the occasion: lipstick, high heels, her trusty Fendi handbag, and a green cashmere jacket with a fox-fur collar that she’d snagged for half price on eBay. She couldn’t help liking fur—her Canadian blood, no doubt. She would stop wearing fur when the animal rights activists stopped eating fried chicken.

  The polished steel doors threw back an image of a woman frowning, face framed by long brown hair, eyebrows drawn together over the black rectangles of her glasses. Allison took a deep breath to relax. There were things she wanted to discuss with Stuart. A frown would only put him off. She tilted her head, smiled at herself, then said, “How phony is that?”

  The elevator deposited her into the silence of the thirty-fifth floor. Absolutely no one about. The door to her father’s office opened just as she got there. He was talking to someone, a man wearing a white shirt with the cuffs rolled. Nice shoulders. Spiky, dark blond hair. Baby-doll mouth and light green eyes. He turned toward her, and she froze.

  Her father said, “There she is. Allison, do you remember Tom Fairchild? He just dropped off a map for me.”

  “Tom. Right.” She kept her right hand curled around the strap of her shoulder bag. “Well. This is a surprise.”

  “I’ll say. Haven’t seen you since...high school. You’re all grown up.”

  She made a polite smile. “So. You’re a map seller now?”

  “That and other things.” They stared at each other for a few empty seconds before he said, “And you’re practicing law in Miami.”

  “As soon as I take the bar exam.” It occurred to Allison just then that he had to know where Jenny Gray had gone to, but engaging Tom Fairchild in conversation was too high a price to pay for finding out.

  He shook Stuart’s hand. “Mr. Barlowe, I’ll be in touch. Allison, it was...just great to see you again.”

  Allison watched him until he went out of sight around the bend in the hall. There was something going on. “He’ll be in to
uch about what?”

  “Come in while I turn off the lights. You look very nice.”

  “Thanks.” She wandered after him into his private office. “What map did he drop off?”

  “That Hermann Moll on my desk. I bought it at the map fair.”

  She went over to see. “It’s Robinson Crusoe. Why did you buy that?”

  “You don’t like it?”

  “Oh. Oh, my God! You bought it for me?”

  Her father looked at her, then smiled. “Not if you don’t want it.”

  “I do. It’s the first thing you’ve bought for me in a long time. I mean, something personal.” She hugged him. “This almost matches my favorite gift of all time. Remember when I was three years old, what you brought me back from Dublin?”

  He tilted his head. “Dublin?”

  “Here’s a hint. It was in a little velvet box.”

  “A ring?”

  “I was only three! You said that this object would always tell me where you were.”

  “A map? No, maps don’t come in boxes. A ...compass?”

  “Wrong again. Come on, you remember.”

  “I’m sorry, Allison.” He smoothed his side-parted hair off his forehead. “My mind is a blank.”

  “Well, I’m not going to tell you. This is a test. We’ll see if you’re getting senile.”

  She held up the map of Crusoe’s make-believe voyages and followed the dotted lines from England to the islands in the South Seas. “I really like this. I’ll have it framed for my office.” She laughed. “It’s probably too juvenile, but I don’t care.”

  As her father waited by the door with his finger on the light switch, Allison closed the map into the folder. She hesitated, then turned around.

  “Dad? Before we go, I have to get something off my mind. Larry says he’s going to have all the restaurant facilities in The Metropolis. That’s huge. The only way he could get so lucky is if you backed him. I think it’s a mistake.”

  Stuart looked into the empty corridor and sighed. “Allison.”