by Janice Law
Before I could elaborate on the benefits of putting water between us and the commissioner, David said, “I’ve hired a car and organized a picnic. We’re off down the coast, mountains and the Med. What are we staying in this sewer for? Tell me that!”
“No reason,” I said.
At the gate of the medina we met a driver with an elegant, if elderly, Peugeot and set off. About an hour down the coast, we stopped on a scrubby green slope that overlooked a tiny white beach amid weathered rock formations like abstract sculptures.
David loved the sun, the water, the sand, and at that precise moment, stepping out on the tarmac with the empty sea and empty beach and empty hills, he seemed happier than he had been for a long time. Though I’m an urban man, myself, and always keen to put a good layer of concrete between myself and nature, I scrambled eagerly down to the water after him, while our driver found a shady spot and lit up a pipe filled with kef.
We had a picnic. David swam in the azure water while I splashed in the shallows. When he said with a wicked gleam in his eye, “I think you’ve been a bad boy,” I agreed enthusiastically. Leaving aside the sand, sex al fresco can suit me fine.
We were lying on the blanket, watching the sky begin to turn pink. “I never should have left the country,” he remarked. “Quiet is good for me.”
I was struck by this; David rarely talked about his precarious state of mind and his gaudy troubles. “Well, go back,” I said. “You have your house in Berks. And what about the cottage in Bermuda. That’s near a beach, isn’t it?”
“All gone. I’ve rather run through my resources, Francis. I’m having a hard time making the rent here. Drink and boys will empty one’s pockets.”
That was a shock. David had been independently wealthy when I first met him. “But you have skills.”
He held out his hands. They were trembling, despite two bottles of wine at lunch and surreptitious shots of whiskey on the way. “I can’t fly now.”
“There’s your music. You’re very gifted.”
“Yes, I must become a piano man. Fancy parties a possibility, do you think?”
“I should think so! You’ll charm all the old queens and the dowagers, too.” But even as I spoke, I wondered. There had been too many incidents, quarrels, sudden explosions of irrational wrath.
“We’ll see, but I rather think some seedy cafe. More reliable liquor.” There was a bitter tone to his words. Alcohol made me merry, but it made him sad. Yet without it, he was prey to horrors and regrets and terrors. The commissioner was right. David would not survive in a Moroccan prison, and leaving was no longer an option for him. I knew that he’d need to be careful, but for a time, all the omens were good. We went for rides in the afternoon and explored the rugged terrain to the east of the city and even skirted the desert with its bare ground the very color of the unprimed canvases I favor. No more astute than other mortals, I allowed myself to hope that David’s demons slept and that the commissioner would find someone else knowledgeable to assist his investigation.
Then came a night at the Meridian, when David’s face grew dark as he nursed his whiskey. A young German was next to us at the bar, and maybe it was no more than the echo of certain guttural vowels, but David began muttering to himself and without warning picked up the barman’s cocktail fork and stabbed the boy in the arm. The evening deteriorated from there.
Early the next morning, I collected David at the police station. There was bail to be paid and apologies and not-so-veiled threats. David was shaky and white, his whole demeanor gentle and sad. Even the gendarmes found his earlier rage almost inconceivable.
I put him, nearly weeping with shame, in a cab and walked down to the commissioner’s HQ. When I was shown in, he handed me a business card, and I took it without a word and nodded. I was going to see a man about some pictures.
Chapter Three
The gallery was just off the Avenue Pasteur, in a Spanish Colonial building with small, high windows protected by iron grills and equipped with a wooden door fit to withstand a siege. A shiny brass plate in a handsome script read: GOLDFARBER GALLERY, PAINTINGS AND OBJETS D’ART FOR THE DISCERNING. I pushed the matching brass bell and waited.
When the door opened, I got a surprise. Herr Goldfarber was not at all what I’d expected, being a massive and robust man with blond hair and a boxer’s nose. If I’d seen him on the street in Soho, I’d have taken him for one of Billy Hill’s gangsters.
“Guten tag,” I said. It had been a long time since I’d used my German, picked up, like so much of my education, on the fly and on the street.
“Ah, Sie sprechen Deutsch! Welkommen, welkommen.”
I was ushered in. A small foyer opened to a handsome exhibition space with a handful of nicely hung and well-framed paintings. I introduced myself. There was no point in deception because the foreign colony was small enough so that any import was instant news. My name, reputation, and connections would have been all around the Mountain within hours of my arrival at the port.
Herr Goldfarber professed delight in meeting me, especially in exchanging remarks in his native tongue. “And such a good accent. Berlin, I believe?”
I nodded.
“One could wish elsewhere, but still an excellent accent. It takes me back.” He beamed, the very image of the sophisticated dealer, then cracked his knuckles, which rather spoiled the effect. He was like an elephant serving tea, remarkable in itself but somehow unconvincing.
“I saw the Picasso you sold Richard Alleyn,” I said. “I just had to come and admire.”
“Of course! Nothing quite that fine at the moment, I’m afraid, but I have a nice little Matisse drawing and this,” he gestured toward a fine Derain landscape.
It was good, I could see that, and I’d have bet that the Matisse drawing, at least, was authentic. “Unfortunately, my wallet doesn’t stretch quite that far. In fact, although I was here on holiday, I’m afraid I’ll have to get back to the easel. Does anyone in Tangier deal in artist supplies?”
Thanks to my Moroccan student, whom I’d gifted with some used canvases, I knew there was not. Goldfarber shook his head regretfully. “Painting has not flourished here. The Muslim prohibition against images had left us only their splendid tile work.”
I wandered around the room. At least two more works, a Picasso still life and a semiabstract Stuart Davis were clearly bogus. I guessed a Picasso ink drawing and another Matisse charcoal were not. What exactly was Goldfarber’s game? I turned from my examination of a nice little Braque, a copy extraordinaire in my opinion, to find him watching me with a speculative air. Oh, ho, Francis. I could see that things might develop in an interesting way with a little assistance such as I know how to provide. I learned a lot more than German verbs in wicked old Berlin.
“Have you any more drawings?” I asked. “The Matisses and the Picasso are very fine.”
“I see that you’re a connoisseur. Most of my clients like the bright and colorful. Drawings, now, are the real artist’s love. Yes?”
“Without a doubt,” I said.
“I keep some in the back. In my personal quarters.”
Emphasis on personal; he gave my hind quarters a glance, too. We now had a kittenish elephant. Was assisting the toad-like commissioner worth my virtue? Since Mein Herr was just my type, I thought I could make the sacrifice. I said I’d love to see his drawings—and anything else on offer—and followed him into a combined store room, office, and bedroom—where, for the next hour, we combined business and pleasure.
Later, out in the sharp, late afternoon light, I counted my visit a success. I found a phone in the souk and called the commissioner. “I can tell you this,” I said. “Whatever Herr Goldfarber is, he’s not a Jew.”
“Really?”
“On the best possible eye-witness evidence.”
“That calls into question his documents. We’ve made an excellent s
tart.”
I didn’t think he had made anything except difficulties for me. “I feel I’ve earned that arrest warrant.”
“All in good time, Monsieur Francis, all in good time. We need a little more before we can question a respectable member of the Zone.”
I was annoyed rather than disappointed, having anticipated that I would not escape so easily. “More might be possible. I’m to see him tomorrow. He hinted that he might have some work for me.” Indeed, he had done more than hint. I had the promise, at least, of two hundred pounds sterling.
“Very good, Monsieur Francis. I see I was not mistaken in your talents. Report to me every day, but be careful.”
“Top of my agenda,” I said and hung up.
The next afternoon I returned to the blond elephant. We adjourned to the back room where all was quite exciting—a big dash of the sinister is very much in my line. Just the same, I could tell that Goldfarber was nervous. Afterward, he made himself a pipe of kef, toxic stuff in my experience, and lay on his divan, smoking. The drug didn’t seem to produce much effect, but perhaps it enabled him to reach a decision, because he said, “I have a problem, Francis. A delicate problem.”
I waited.
“I promised a painting that I cannot deliver.”
“I’ve had that experience,” I said, thinking most unwillingly of recent exaggerations, if not outright lies, to my gallery about work done and quality produced. “My dealer, however, is a gem and sympathetic.”
“Would I were in your shoes, Francis.” And he sighed.
“Is the painting lost?”
“Unfinished. It needs extensive restoration.”
“Ah.” Here was the opening the commissioner desired for me, where, instead of poverty and indifference, the unlucky painter risked having his throat cut. Then I thought of David. I had posted bail for him, but that could be revoked. I knew it could. “I could possibly help you out,” I said. “I have a certain skill.”
He reached over the pillow and put one massive hand around my throat. And squeezed. “It’s a delicate matter requiring the utmost discretion,” he said.
I nodded and began to gasp. He took his hand away, but it was several minutes before I could breathe normally. “Asthma,” I said.
“So much the better.” At moments, Goldfarber’s eyes strongly reminded me of the commissioner’s; they were quarried from the same stone. Then he patted my shoulder. “Nothing personal,” he said. “Outside of business, I really like you very much.”
Goldfarber locked up his establishment, and we drove south down the avenue. It was a dull, damp day with a light wind off the water that stirred, rather than dispersed, the thick odors of bad drains and raw sewage. Despite the desert at its back, the city had all the usual drawbacks of seaside towns except nosy landladies.
Goldfarber took a variety of small streets, then circled back toward the center. The realization that he was making sure no one was on our tail did nothing to reassure me. Finally, he stopped at an ugly, anonymous building, one of the cheap modern constructions lacking both the solid comforts of the Mountain and the dodgy charms of the medina. There was a cafe on the lower floor where Arab men wearing red fezzes and Western slacks smoked kef and drank mint tea. A wide green awning provided a shady patch for a gaggle of half-naked shoeshine boys. Goldfarber stomped through their midst, muttering under his breath and giving them baleful looks.
“I hate Arabs,” he remarked as we took the stairs. “Filthy beggars. Steal you blind.”
That explained a lot. Here he was in the paradise of pretty boys, and he was reduced to making eyes at Yours Truly. And what about the dead Spaniard? More business and pleasure? Keep alert, Francis!
The upper floor was a sizable studio with a worktable and big padlocked cupboards, wide enough, I guessed, to store good-sized paintings. A professional easel held a canvas with what looked to be an outline drawing of a Picasso, a swooning image of his mistress Marie-Thérèse Walter, looking boneless and gentle. Not my favorite period and not, except for his etchings of her, my favorite subject, either. A rather faded color photo of the same image had been pinned up on the easel frame, and a few colors had been experimentally spotted around the canvas. If this was “restoration,” I was the police commissioner of Tangier.
Goldfarber gave me a look. “Extensive work required, of course.”
This was too ridiculous for comment. We were set to forge a large and valuable painting. “When is it expected?” I asked.
“End of the week.”
I shook my head. “The oil paint will never be dry, not even if the wind shifts.”
“It’s due at the end of the week,” he repeated. “And, of course, since it was painted in the thirties, it will be dry.”
I couldn’t help noticing his fingers twitching. “Right,” I said. “Paint as dry as possible. Tempera underneath maybe? Have you any? It dries fast and takes oil over it. The technique of the old masters.”
He’d already laid out some good quality European-made oil paints, lovely but slow to dry. I rather hoped he didn’t have tempera, because the only water-based paint I’ve used was gouache, the designer’s medium. Luck was not with me; Goldfarber quickly found some jars of dry pigment.
I could foresee a tricky preparation with egg yolks, and besides, glaze on top of tempera was hardly typical of Picasso. I again checked the color photo. “Another thought. Can you buy house paint in the city? Emulsion dries in a day or two. We could certainly use that for the background and in place of the ‘fat,’ slower-drying colors.”
Goldfarber thought for a moment then put his heavy hand on my shoulder. “Make a list,” he said.
When I’d written down the most useful colors, he told me to start work and went out, locking the door behind him. That was how I began my stint as an art forger. Not so physically demanding as the interior decoration I’ve been forced to do in my career, nor so awkward as a little spell as a seaside portraitist, but in some ways less congenial than either. I don’t lie in painting, though I lie easily in life. “It’s for a good cause, Francis,” I told myself, but I wasn’t sure I believed that. Everything about the business was murky except for David’s troubles and the dead Spanish boy.
A dead painter was close to home, anyway, and I sat down to study the drawing and think about appropriate colors. When Goldfarber returned with a carton holding assorted cans of house paint and some mixing buckets, I set to work approximating the master’s soft candy colors and rich, deep purples.
Bit of a challenge, really, but the paint was quite good quality, and it went on fast and smooth. When I was first learning to paint—on the fly again from a lover who is now old and terribly respectable—I worked just like this. Lay out a drawing of mostly geometric shapes with black paint, then fill in the shapes with colors.
I worked until I began to lose the light. “I can’t do any more today,” I said.
Goldfarber roused himself from where he’d been smoking and came over to check my work.
“It’s complete!” he exclaimed. “This is good.”
“Not quite.” I pointed out some little missing details. “I don’t dare attempt the features in this light. It would be way too easy to make mistakes. And it’s best to let everything dry overnight.”
His hostile and speculative look gave me a new and clear understanding of the old story of Scheherazade.
“It’s almost done,” he said impatiently. “Put in her face and fingernails, and get finished.”
“If you want it ruined, I’ll go ahead. But the paint is still wet underneath and wet into wet won’t have the right effect. Besides, I’ll never match the colors now.” The foggy gray light that filled the narrow windows was sinking into thick shadows all around the room. The studio had a gasoline lamp to supplement the unreliable electricity, but neither it nor the two lonely ceiling bulbs was adequate. “Impossible.”
/> “First thing tomorrow,” he said. “First thing!”
“I paint in the mornings,” I said, momentarily forgetting I’d claimed to be out of supplies. “I’ll see you in the afternoon. When we have a chance that this will be dry.”
I thought he was going to go for my throat again, but instead he laid a heavy hand on my shoulder. “Touch up then,” he said.
“And off to your client at the weekend.” I smiled to encourage him, and perhaps the kef had taken effect, for he seemed to relax. Just the same, I was uneasy having him at my back down the steep stairs, and I was relieved when he drove away. I hoofed it back toward the medina with thoughts of a cafe, of meeting David, of passing an amusing evening. I had not gone very far when the dull day gave way to the quick nightfall of the Mediterranean, and the fog turned to a gusty rain.
Perhaps that is why I did not notice the man until I was slipping on the greasy, garbage-strewn stones of a narrow alley, and trying to use the awnings of the little shops to avoid the downpour. I was beginning to see the attractions of hooded Moroccan garments when I noticed a man examining a display of pots despite the streaming rain. He was tall and thin, and when he gave me a quick, surreptitious glance, I saw that he was blond—one of the international community.
That was a bad sign. Despite rivalry and dislike amounting to hatred among the various ethnic and religious rivals in the city, serious violence from the locals was quite rare. I doubted now that a Moroccan had killed the Spanish boy—or, indeed, that the commissioner would have press-ganged me if he had not suspected a foreigner.
I left the shelter of the awning and hurried to the next corner. I wanted to get to one of the larger streets, where I hoped that, despite the rain, there would be enough shoppers and vendors for me to elude my pursuer. When a woman with a huge umbrella and a large basket momentarily blocked the alley behind me, I squeezed between a tiny storefront and a still warm brazier to a covered passage with steps down to a wider lane below. The steep descent stank of urine and drains and the salty dampness of the coast had coated the walls with greenish slime.
