Wallflower j-3

by William Bayer

  Not a penny less.

  Why? they asked her. She couldn't explain it. She just knew the picture was valuable and she wasn't going to sell it cheap. But we're cops, they reminded her, civil servants; we don't have that kind of dough. Well, maybe not, she said. But ten thousand was still the price.

  Janek understood even before Aaron that there was no point in further discussion. We'll think about it, he told Mrs. Malkiewicz politely. We'll let you know tomorrow.

  Back in the car Aaron was explosive.

  "You crazy, Frank? You'd even consider paying that? Screw her! And to hell with the picture!"

  "Trouble is I want it," Janek said. He explained to Aaron his conviction that the reason Mrs. Malkiewicz set the price so high was that she didn't really want to sell.

  "Sure she needs the money. And sure she acts like Aretzsky's pictures are shit. But the truth is she loved her brother, and his pictures are the only things of his she's got. to sell one off is to lose a part of him. Even if we agree to pay her price, I'm not sure she won't back out."

  Aaron shrugged. "So what's the point?"

  "The point is I need that goddamn picture. So I'll just have to get hold of the money, then handle her very carefully."

  "Where're you going to get that kind of bread?"

  "I think I know where I can raise it."

  Aaron looked at him skeptically. "You're not thinking of Kit?"

  "No, not KiL" Janek said. "I've got someone else in mind."

  Back in the motel he dialed Stanton's office in New York. Mr.

  Dorance was in a meeting, his secretary said. Could he get back to Janek later on? "No. Tell him it's an emergency." A minute later a breathless Stanton came on the line. "What's the matter, Frank? What's going on?" "I need ten thousand dollars." "Is this a joke? I'm kind of busy." "No joke, Stanton. I'm out in Cleveland. I'm on the trail of the person who put that girl up to all those killings, including Jess's.

  I can't go into the details. It's a complicated case. The bottom line is that there's a painting out here I think I can use to put this person away. It'll cost me ten thousand dollars."

  "'Think' you can use?"

  "Yeah, well, it's a long shot. But it's the only thing I got going.

  You said I should call you if I needed anything. I'm calling. This is what I need to catch Jess's killer."

  A long pause. He knew what Stanton was thinking: Yes, he'd made that commitment, but ten thousand was a lot of money. was there any way he could wriggle out of this? was Janek off his rocker?

  "You're sure the painting's worth it?"

  "No. But that's what it's going to cost."

  "Maybe you should have it professionally appraised?"

  "Screw that. I need it now."

  Another pause. "You're really calling in my marker?"

  "I guess you could say that, Stanton, yeah." "I didn't expect this. Not so soon."

  "Neither did 1. Believe me, if I had the money, I'd buy the damn thing myself."

  "Well, all right. How soon do you need it?"

  "Yesterday."

  "I'll FedEx you a check. You'll get it tomorrow morning."

  "No check," Janek said. "The seller's nervous. The only way I can close the deal is put cash down on the table.

  "I can wire you the money, I suppose. to a local bank out there."

  He could hear the exasperation in Stanton's voice. "Jesus, Frank! I just hope you know what you're doing! "

  "Yeah. Well, I'm just doing the best I can," Janek replied.

  The following morning at eleven they were back at the Malkiewicz residence with ten banded packs of fresh hundred-dollar bills and a rented van big enough to transport the painting.

  Mrs. MaMewicz met them at the door. She looked at Janek nervously. "I didn't expect you back so soon."

  "I've got the money. We're here to take the picture."

  He knew the way to do it was to move as quickly as possible, ignore any hesitancy on her part, count out the cash bill by bill while Aaron wrestled the portrait out the door. That way, if she happened to have second thoughts, it would be too late; the transaction would be complete.

  It worked out. Mrs. Malkiewicz didn't say a word, although Janek couldn't help noticing her despair. He knew she'd get over it. Ten grand was enough to fix up her house. And she still had a thick stack of Aretzsky paintings rotting in her cellar.

  That afternoon they found a carpenter who agreed to crate up the picture in time for the first flight the following morning to New York. Janek and Aaron would escort it back, the fruit of their investigation.

  After the plane took off, Janek stared out his window at the sprawling city below. The sky was gray, broken by a few plumes of industrial smoke. Cleveland looked huge and flat, blocks of bleak gray buildings, a grid of ironcolored streets. The Cuyahoga River, famous for once having caught on fire, was crusted with snow, and Lake Erie seemed a vast white frozen waste. It was a strange and fascinating place, he thought, this city Aaron had described as a Rust Belt town of broken dreams. Here for many years iron and coal had been forged into steel, and here, too, the pathology of Wallflower had been forged.

  The

  Portrait The crucial move, Janek knew, would be the delivery of the portrait.

  Bungle that and he could botch his entire case.

  He and Aaron war-gamed the problem. Since they couldn't break into her house and switch the new painting with the old (their preferred solution), they'd have to take their chances on a straight delivery. The trick, they agreed, would be to get Beverly to accept it.

  "How about two guys in deliveryman uniforms. 'Parcel, Ms. Archer.

  Just sign here, please, ma'am."' "Yeah," said Aaron, "then they bring in this enormous box. 'Hey,' she yells, 'I never ordered this. Get this stinking thing out of here.' See, Frank, it's not like you want to send her a valentine that all we got to do is slip it under her door. That picture's fucking humongous."

  "So there's only one solution," Janek said. "Deliver it ourselves."

  "What if she won't take it?"

  "We'll leave it on the stoop."

  "So she ignores it. Or has it hauled away. There's no guarantee she'll look at it, even if she does take it inside."

  "You're right," Janek said. "There's no guarantees about any of it.

  But if we deliver it to her in the proper context, our odds will improve. By a lot."

  He called Monika, filled her in on his trip to Cleveland, outlined his plan, then asked her what she thought. "Strange, a bit morbid, certainly daring," she said. She sounded less excited than he'd expected. "You say you want to shock this woman into a confession. But there's also a chance you'll shock her into a psychotic state. Have you considered that?" "It's occurred to me," he said. "Frankly, the idea doesn't break me up. She goes to prison or she goes to the funny farm. I win either way. A third possibility is that she laughs the whole thing off. That's the one I'd just as soon not think about."

  "Sounds to me like you're out for blood, Frank."

  Why was she reproaching him? "Wasn't blood what she was out for?"

  He imagined Monika shaking her head. "This is difficult for me. My profession is to heal, not to wound."

  Suddenly he was irritated. "You say I sound like I'm out for blood-I'm not sure what that means. I'm certainly not about to pick up an ice pick and stick it in her ear. But if you mean tearing the mask off her face, then I guess you're right."

  "Oh, Frank… I'm just not sure I can help you with this anymore." But it wasn't her help he wanted now; it was her approval. And that, it seemed, she was not about to give. He didn't understand. She had told him to look to the past, that he would find the secret there. What secret, he wondered, did she expect he would find-the cure to Beverly Archer's disease?

  "Look," he said, "she's a vicious, manipulative, dangerous murderess. My job is to put her away."

  "Of course," she said sadly. "Of course…"

  He felt awful when he put down the phone. Would Monika now hold this aga
inst him? She said she understood, but did she? He was a detective, not a therapist. Now he had to do his job.

  After much discussion and many rehearsals, he and Aaron agreed that since there was no way of knowing how Beverly would react, their best approach would be the simplest and most direct. No big dramatic production at the door. Just walk up the front steps picture in hand, ring the bell, offer to place it in the hall for her, then let the chips fall where they may.

  Figuring she'd be tired and thus more vulnerable at the end of the day, they parked their van across from her house a little after 6:00 P.m.

  There they waited until 6:45, when her last patient left. they had uncrated the picture earlier; it was now covered only with a sheet. they pulled it out of the van, picked it up, and together carried it across the street.

  Aaron pushed the buzzer. It was a while before Beverly answered on the intercom.

  "Who's there?" "Janek."

  A short pause. "Go away. I'm not in the mood today. "

  "I brought you something." He spoke cheerfully. "Something from Cleveland." He tried to entice her with his tone.

  "Oh, really Her voice was lethargic. She certainly didn't sound upset.

  "Open the door and I'll show you," he said. He paused again; he was getting into the rhythm of the thing. "You won't be sorry, Bev."

  Aaron gave him a thumbs-up as they heard the lock mechanism being turned. Then the door opened and Beverly stood in the archway, hands planted on her hips. 'She looked a perfect little butterball as she stared at them and then at the sheet-covered picture in between.

  "Is that great big thing for tiny little me?" She spoke with a sarcastic lilt.

  Janek nodded. "Want us to bring it inside?"

  "I don't know that I'm going to accept it. Remember the old saying: 'Beware Greeks bearing gifts."' "What're you afraid of? Think it's a Trojan Horse?" She stared at the picture curiously. "What is it anyway?" "A painting."

  "What kind of painting?"

  "Aretzsky's second portrait of your mother," Janek said.

  She tut-tutted him. "Oh, Janek, you're so tiresome. I know all about that second portrait."

  "Sure, you know about it. But did you ever look at it?, I "No. And I don't intend to."

  As she started to close the door, he felt his case begin to slip away.

  Do something! Razz her! Don't let her close you out!

  "Scared to look, Bev?" he taunted.

  She hesitated. "No, I'm not scared to look."

  "There are things in this picture you won't see in the one upstairs."

  She nodded. "I know the story. A drunk old painter's revenge."

  "Maybe something deeper than revenge, Bev. Maybe something true."

  "All the truth went into the first portrait. The second was painted on the rebound. That's the way I heard it."

  He shook his head. "You heard wrong. The first time Aretzsky was blinded by love. The second time his eyes were wide open." She glared at him. "You're an ass, Janek." Again she tried to shut him out.

  This is it, he thought. Go for broke!

  He blocked the door with his shoe. When he spoke again he used no taunts nor was there any trace of sarcasm in his voice.

  "The MacDonaids were a mistake, Bev. You sent I)iana out to kill the wrong boys. Sure, they gave you a hard time. But it was your mother who put them up to it." He snatched the sheet off the picture, tilted it so she could see Victoria's face. "Look into her eyes. Check out her mouth. See the cruelty, the depravity, the selfishness? This is the lady who set you up. She told Melissa Walters she didn't want you to be a wallflower. But when you look hard at this picture you have to wonder if she meant it. Because that's what you are, Bev. A wallflower. Now and for the rest of your life." He thrust his finger at the painting. "And this is the lady who made you one. Not the MacDonalds. Her!"

  He nodded to Aaron. they turned and walked away. The plan was not to look back, not to give her a chance to answer, or gesture at them, or show her contempt by slamming the door in their faces. By the time they heard it slam they were already at the curb. And still they walked. It was only when they reached the other side of the street and got into their van, that Janek turned and looked and saw with satisfaction that the door to the house was closed and the picture they'd left was no longer on the stoop.

  Give her the night with her new mama, Janek thought. Let them cook together, heat each other up. Then, maybe, butterball will be ready to talk.

  It was out of his hands now. It was between the Archers. Nothing for him to do but wait. He went home, ordered in some Chinese, watched a hockey game on TV, then retired early to bed. He did not sleep well. He tossed and turned, worried that Beverly would not take his bait, worried that if she did Monika would forever think less of him, because, as she'd put it, he'd gone for blood.

  In the morning he spoke briefly with Aaron, who'd spent the night watching Beverly's house. Nothing yet, so Janek set to work methodically cleaning his apartment. He mopped his kitchen, vacuumed his rugs, waxed his furniture, and scrubbed his bathroom floor on his knees. He didn't clean up the place very often, but this day he did so with a vengeance. Perhaps, he thought, it was a way for him not to think about Monika, not to deal with the feelings she'd conveyed, the way she'd distanced herself after he'd revealed his plan.

  A little after ten he received a call from a young lawyer, an associate at Stanton's firm, who was representing him on the Rusty Glickman assault suit.

  "Glickman's got no case and Streep amp; Holster know it," the attorney said. "I told them: All you've got is a bunch of phony charges brought by a man Janek put away years ago. Unfortunately there wasn't any give, so my strategy now is to go into court and move for summary judgment. It may take a while but I'm pretty sure we'll get it. Then the whole @srable business will be done with."

  Janek thanked him. The moment he set down his phone it rang again.

  He snatched it up. It was Aaron. "Something's going on here, Frank.

  Beverly's not seeing her patients."

  "What do you mean?" "they show up on time, go to the door, ring, and stand there a while. When nobody answers the intercom, they sort of droop and slouch away."

  "You're sure she's there?"

  "Positive. I would have seen her come out. I tried to call her a minute ago. All I got was her answering machine."

  He thought of what Monika had said, about the possibility Beverly could be shocked into psychosis. Maybe, just maybe, the portrait was having its effect.

  "I'll be right over," he told Aaron. "Better get a police locksmith there, too."

  He would never forget the scene that confronted them when they finally got inside the house. The painting he and Aaron had delivered, at least what was left of it, stood in tatters in the front hall just inside the door. The image had been desecrated. The eyes, the cruel scheming eyes, had been stabbed straight through the pupils. The selfish mouth had been slashed across so that the lips hung in loose folds. The breasts, too, had been assaulted with a scissors or perhaps a knife. But by far the worst and most fiendish violations had been committed against the area between Victoria Archer's legs. That portion of the picture bore numerous stab wounds, a "pattern of fury," as medical examiners refer to a configuration of knife thrusts so rapid and vigorous that all vestiges of the reproductive organs are obliterated. Janek and Aaron rushed up the stairs. At the bedroom door they stopped. The spectacle before them was so stunning and bizarre they could only stand before it and gape The room was bathed in reddish light. The original portrait, removed from its niche, lay flat across the great four-poster. Beverly, in the same scarlet dress her mother had worn in both paintings, lay upon the picture very still. There was blood on the canvas and the bed.

  "I think she's dead, Frank," Aaron said. "It looks like she slit her wrists."

  Janek walked forward and touched Beverly's forehead. The skin was cold as ice. He tried to lift her arm to check for wounds, but found he could not move her. Then he understood. She was stuck
to the painting. She had glued herself to it.

  "Jesus!" Aaron said. "Maybe she was trying to screw the picture. Do you think?"

  Janek shook his head. He was sure that that was not what Beverly had been trying to do when she opened her veins, then glued herself to her mother-pelvis to pelvis, hands to hands, breasts to breasts. What she had attempted, he felt certain, was a terminal act of bonding. But then, perhaps in her last moments, she had writhed against the image, engaging in a final failed life-anddeath struggle for release.

  He circled the bed, and, when Bev's face came into view, Janek felt his rage subside. Her frozen expression, a mixture of panic and yearning, filled him with pity and terror.

  He turned to Aaron. "Call the morgue," he said.

  After Aaron went downstairs, Janek spotted an ivoryhandled knife, blade open, on the floor. He picked it up, clasped the blade shut, then pushed a chrome button on the side. The blade sprang forward in his hand. It was the knife Bev had used to kill herself-Jess's knife, the knife that had haunted his dreams.

  He looked back at Beverly, met her dead eyes headon.

  "What can I do for you?" he whispered.

  The moment he heard his own voice, he knew the answer. He would use Jess's knife to cut the dead woman loose.

  He imagined her screaming: "Cut, Mama! No!" But to cut them apart, he knew, was the only way. He straddled Bev, then sliced into the picture. How appropfiate, he thought, that he was now separating her from the phony image she had worshiped. The painting was thick but the knife was sharp. The canvas parted before the blade like silk.

  Beverly had been mad, of course, functional but mad, perhaps as far back as her girlhood. Confronted finally by the true nature of her mother, her madness had engulfed and destroyed her.

  He waited until the medical examiner arrived, waited until the assistants carried Bev's body out. He sat alone for a while in the strange dark bedroom. And then it was time to leave.

  Downstairs Aaron was standing before the damaged second portrait in the hall.