A Box Full of Trouble

by Carolyn Haines

  He recognized the receptionist from the service’s surveillance photos of Doug when he entered the building. The nameplate on her desk said Sandra Holding. She smiled up at him. “Hello. Can I help you?”

  “I’m looking for Peter Ryder. Is he available?”

  The corners of the receptionist’s mouth turned down and her brow furrowed into a look of concern. “He’s not in at the moment. Can someone else help you?”

  “Know where I can find him?”

  She shook her head. “No.” She hesitated then leaned slightly forward. “I’m worried about him. No one has seen him since Tuesday.”

  “He hasn’t been to work?”

  “No, and he’s not at home either. Debbie went by his house at lunch because he’s missed two appointments.”

  “What about his phone? Pager?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing. I’ve called and called. All I get is his voicemail.”

  Mitch stared at the detailed woodwork of the arch leading from the foyer into the main offices of the company, his mind elsewhere as he sorted known facts. He looked back at Sandra. “What was he working on when you last saw him?”

  She sat back in her chair, a belated look of caution overtaking her concern for her colleague. “And who are you?”

  Mitch opened his jacket to reveal the six star badge clipped to his belt. “U. S. Marshals Service. Mitchell Lawson.”

  “And why do you want Peter?”

  “We have an interest in one of his cases.”

  She hesitated, then stood. “You need to talk to Mr. Weatherby. But he’s out of the office.”

  “How about Douglas Heinz?”

  “Doug? Why do you want Doug?”

  Mitch hesitated. “An old acquaintance. Heard his car was vandalized earlier today.”

  She dropped back into her chair. “Vandalized.” She looked up at Mitch. “What’s happening around here? Peter missing, Doug’s car vandalized.” She glanced around as if there were villains lingering in the corners of the foyer. “This is Savannah. Things like this don’t happen in Savannah.”

  Mitch didn’t disabuse her of the notion of safety. In his experience he knew most people believed their world to be a safe haven. That was until criminal deeds touched them personally. He couldn’t tell her there was a viper in the heart of her quiet, sleepy, little world. He couldn’t tell her that viper had been placed there by his own agency.

  “I wouldn’t worry too much.” It was the most he could offer her by way of reassurance. He took a card from his pocket and laid it on the desk. “Have Ryder contact me when he shows up.”

  * * *

  Ryder, for an insurance investigator, wasn’t very keen on protecting his own worldly goods. Mitch jimmied the lock on the back door of his home in record time. The house had a stale odor to it, not that of ancient dust and neglect, but rather a sense of absence.

  There wasn’t much to see in the three bedroom, bath-and-a-half, house. Though neat and clean, it bore witness to a man living alone. The refrigerator contained a variety of take out packages, a six pack of beer with one missing, and a bowl of what might have been peaches growing an outstanding crown of mold. A much used recliner faced a television screen of mammoth proportions. The home office occupied one of the bedrooms. Nothing seemed to be amiss. An antiquated HP computer tower and screen sat on the desk. He opened drawer after drawer of the file cabinets. The manila folders marched along neatly. Mitch looked for files on the three claims he had seen on Doug’s computer. There were none. A notepad beside the old fashioned black telephone was blank, clean of any messages or doodles.

  He stood in the middle of the living room and let the house speak to him. It spoke of a lonely man, an ordinary man of limited interests and few if any friends.

  * * *

  It wasn’t yet five o’clock when Mitch pulled up to the house on Calhoun Square but the light was already fading toward twilight. The front door of the building stood open and a canvas drop cloth trailed across the foyer. A man in well worn jeans and a polo shirt of faded blue was on his knees beside the French doors leading into a room off the foyer, a putty knife in his hands. He looked up at the sound of footsteps.

  Mitch nodded and stepped into the office doorway. Julia sat at a heavy mahogany desk with carved legs and ball and claw feet. She was turned sideways to the desk and the door. Her focus centered on a folder in her lap. The lighting in the room was warm and subdued, coming from a small chandelier suspended off-center from the ceiling over a table in the corner and an art deco lamp on the desk. It created a glow around Julia. The sight of her sent a small shock of pleasure through him. The light and her pose brought to mind a painting he had once seen in a museum.

  A black cat looked up from where he lounged across the cushion of a small sofa covered in a patterned fabric depicting birds. He stood, placed his front legs before him, his rear end rising into the air, spread his toes, and indulged in a major stretch. Then he hopped down from the sofa and approached Mitch, his walk stiff-legged, slow. His tail twitched as he sniffed the hem of Mitch’s jeans.

  The movement of the cat drew Julia back from her concentration on the file and she looked up to find him standing there. She closed the file and turned to face the desk. “Hello.”

  “Ms. Hampton.”

  “Deputy Lawson.” A hint of a smile played across her features. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

  “Peter Ryder.” He watched for her reaction.

  She frowned. “Yes. I’ve been trying to catch up with him. We had an appointment yesterday morning but he wasn’t in his office. I’ve left him a couple of message but so far no response.” She, in turn, watched Mitch. “Why?”

  “A case I’m working. A painting lost in transit.” He took the notebook from his inner jacket pocket though he didn’t really need to refer to it. He already knew from his research on Ryder’s open claims that this was the most likely one that would include someone like Julia.

  “Portrait by a Nicolai Fechin. Shipped from The Palm Beach Auction House two weeks ago. Only an empty crate arrived.” He flipped the notebook closed and returned it to his pocket. “Sound familiar?”

  “Should it?”

  “Only if you’re good at your job.”

  She sighed. “Okay. Yes, I know about it. Peter thought the file needed a second pair of eyes so he convinced Weatherby to contract me to look into it.” She moved the mouse of her computer across the pad and the screen came to life with an image of an old man reading a newspaper. “It’s one of the many portraits Fechin did of his father.”

  Mitch walked around the desk to stand at her shoulder. “Nice.”

  “I prefer some of his other portraits. He did eyes beautifully, so varied and realistic. They give life to his work. In this one you don’t really see the eyes.”

  “You seem to know a lot about this painter.”

  “About Russian art, Mr. Lawson. My major in college.”

  “And yet you’re a private detective.”

  “You could say I fell into the job.”

  “Uh huh.” He studied the painting. “What would be the value of something like this?”

  “It’s hard to say. The buyers of this particular piece, Joshua and Alice Peltier, paid one point two million.” She retrieved a form from the folder and handed it to him. “But Fechin’s work has gone for much higher prices. In 2011, the MacDougall House in London sold one of his portraits for ten point nine million.”

  Mitch whistled softly through his teeth.

  “That’s not the norm for his work. The new Russian billionaires have a taste for Russian artists and apparently two of them got in a bidding war over that particular piece. Though Fechin did the majority of his work in the U.S. after he came here in 1930, places like MacDougall’s are profiting from a new awareness of his talent and ethnicity. In the past he was always promoted as an American artist.”

  “Why MacDougall?”

  “They specialize in Russian art. The piece I was telling you
about, the one the Russians got in a bidding war over, had sold for just over six hundred thirty thousand a mere seven months earlier.”

  “Someone made a killing.”

  “Yes, well art’s become the new gold. People are buying for the long term value. Mainly it’s lesser known artists that buyers hope will appreciate with time. They hope to find the next Van Gough, an artist who, sadly, never sold a painting during his lifetime.”

  “Hmm.” Mitch handed the report back to her and began a perusal of the room. Over the table in the corner was a painting of a nude woman holding a towel to her chest as she lifted the hair from her neck with her other hand, her head angled enticingly toward the viewer. It was a fetching scene. It was illuminated by a recessed light in the ceiling. He examined it closely. “Is this your own investment in the artists of the future?”

  Julia smiled and came to stand beside him. “No. That’s actually a Fechin. My great-grandmother gave it to me as a graduation present when I finished undergraduate school.”

  Mitch filtered that fact through his mental folder on Julia Hampton. The art, the house on Calhoun Square, the understated value of everything in the room. What was she doing with the likes of Doug Heinz, better known as Viktor ‘Avoska’ Letov, the Russian bag man.

  “Your great-grandmother has good taste.”

  “Yes, she did.” Julia folded her arms across her waist, tilted her head slightly and studied the painting. “But in this case she was also lucky. She was a friend of Fechin’s. She sometimes modeled for him.”

  Mitch studied the figure more closely. “Did she now.”

  Julia laughed. “I think she was influenced by her name, Mame.”

  “Maybe the song was influenced by your great-grandmother.”

  Julia turned her full attention to him. “A fan of Rita Hayworth’s?”

  He saw a spark of interest in her eyes. “Who isn’t?”

  “Most people under the age of seventy.” She looked back at the painting and sighed. “You would have loved my Gran. She lived in California during the glory days of Hollywood. She could curl your hair with some of her stories.”

  The sound of a man clearing his throat brought Julia back to the moment. She turned toward the sound. “Oh, Hal. I almost forgot you were here. All done?”

  “I’ll have to come back in a couple of days to paint it. Need for the glazing to dry.” He was in the process of gathering up his tarp. “You need anything else while I’m here?” He cut his eyes in Mitch’s direction then looked back at her.

  “No, no. You go on home. It’s late. And you can come back at the beginning of next week. No need for you to come on the weekend.” She opened the top drawer of her desk. “Shall I pay you now for what you’ve done?”

  He shook his head. “We’ll settle up when everything is finished to your liking.”

  “Thanks, Hal. I know I can rely on you.”

  He nodded and turned from the room.

  Mitch walked over to the door and studied the repair. “What happened here?”

  Julia waved her hand dismissively. “A break-in two nights ago. Just kids looking for office change or out for mischief.”

  “Yeah?” Mitch watched as the cat wound between his legs then batted at the door, barely missing the still damp glazing compound. “What did they take?”

  “To be truthful, nothing. It has taken me two days to restore order but so far I haven’t found anything missing.”

  “Trashed the place, did they?” Mitch turned from the door and stared at the painting.

  Julia looked up from her desktop. “Yes.”

  “And left all this expensive art and electronics.”

  Julia hesitated. “Well, I kind of scared them off.”

  He turned to her. “You were here?”

  She shrugged. “Well, not in the office. I was upstairs. In my apartment. Trouble heard them and woke me.”

  “Trouble?”

  “Yeow.” The cat hopped back onto the sofa and began to clean his face.

  “Yes. Trouble.” Julia smiled. “I’m cat-sitting for my friend Tammy Lynn while she’s touring regional estates sales for used books.” She crossed to the sofa and scratched behind Trouble’s ears. He lifted his head into her caress, angling for just the right spot. “He’s quite a good detective. My very own little Benedict Cumberbatch.”

  Mitch stood with a hand on his hip and watched the woman and cat. “Uh huh.”

  Julia laughed. “I know. It’s hard to believe but it’s true.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  The art theft, the missing insurance adjustor, the vandalism to the Ferrari, the break-in, and the pretty lady. Mitch didn’t like any of it. And right smack in the middle of all of it was Avoska, alias Douglas Heinz.

  “So, how long have you known Doug?”

  Julia returned to her desk, sat, and leaned back in her chair. For a moment she didn’t answer. “Your friend from college?”

  Mitch nodded.

  She straightened the items on her desk, the stapler, aligned with the tape dispenser, the pencils in the holder all slanting in the same direction. “You don’t sound like you’re from Tampa.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Oh.”

  “Military brat. I’m from pretty much all over the states, including Hawaii.”

  “I see.”

  She still hadn’t answered his question. He knew better than to press, to place too much emphasis on the connection. He could feel her clamming up. He would learn nothing more today. He took a business card from his pocket and placed it on the desk then turned toward the open doorway. “If you hear from Ryder, give me a call.” He wanted to say more, to warn her of the danger, but he couldn’t afford to show his hand. So, he simply walked out of the building and into the descending night.

  * * *

  Julia picked up the card and read it. Then she moved to the window and watched as Mitch Lawson stood on the sidewalk outside her house, unmoving, staring into the darkness.

  She hated to think she was so fickle but from the moment he had stepped into her office she had forgotten all about Doug Heinz. That is, until Lawson brought him up. What was it between those two? She had sensed the tension in Doug on the street earlier in the day when Mitch arrived in response to her 911 call. At the time she brushed it aside as anger over the vandalism. Now she wasn’t so sure. It now seemed more than a little suspicious that Mitch would have shown up at the scene, and so quickly at that. And now he was asking questions about her relationship with Doug.

  He had come to her in search of information on the theft, or so he said. Why did she feel there was more to it than that? She sighed. Her father’s concern over her safety was beginning to take its toll. All these unanswered questions didn’t help matters. She had brushed off the break-in to everyone but now she could admit to herself a little niggle of fear. After the break-in, Peter Ryder had disappeared, a U. S. Deputy Marshal had arrived on the scene, tight lipped and watchful. What was really going on?

  She placed the card on her desk and started to tidy up the files on the table in the corner of her office. Trouble dropped to the floor from the sofa and padded across to her desk. He jumped to the chair then the desktop.

  “What have I told you about my desk, Trouble?” Julia stopped what she was doing, a stack of files in her hand.

  “Yeow.” Trouble batted at the card with his paw, moving it around on the desktop. Then he sat on his haunches and blinked slowly three times. “Yeow.”

  Julia placed the files on the table and crossed the room to stand looking down at Trouble. She picked up the card. “Okay. So, what’s the message? Friend or foe?”

  Trouble began to purr, his eyelids drooping to half mast.

  Julia started scratching him under his chin. His eyes closed and the purring grew to the sound of a small cement mixer. “I think you like him.”

  Trouble’s eyes opened to green slits, then closed again. A final judgment, Julia thought, on the merits of one Mitc
hell Lawson, U. S. Deputy Marshal.

  Chapter Three

  Julia tapped Mitch’s card against her chin. The key, she thought, was Peter Ryder. As soon as the claim was assigned to her, he disappeared. True, it had been only a little over forty-eight hours since anyone had last seen him, but the timing was suspicious.

  She picked up the desk phone and dialed his home. The burring ring of the phone went on for a long time and she sighed. Peter was old fashioned in that he refused to have an answering machine. The only people who needed to reach him, he had once told her, were calling him on business and they could darn well contact him on the company issued cell phone or his pager. It was a sad comment on Peter’s life, but there it was.

  The problem was he wasn’t answering either of those devices. How did you go about tracking someone down who had no life outside the job?

  What was it Sandra had said? He had missed his last appointment on Tuesday. Julia reached for the phone again but this time she called the receptionist.

  Peter’s last appointment, according to Sandra, concerned a claim about stolen assets from an estate just prior to the auction date. There hadn’t been any art involved but a Bentley was on the auction block as well as quite a bit of jewelry. The deceased was from Savannah and his home in the historic district would be part of the auction.

  Julia picked up the file she had found with the two art cases. When she first discovered it earlier in the day she had assumed Ryder had given it to her by mistake. She knew the family and was aware of the upcoming auction but the stolen jewelry wasn’t part of her contract with the Weatherby Insurance Agency. It had to be a mistake. Her field of expertise was art, more particularly, Russian art. She read the form and scanned the list of stolen items and put the file aside.

  The second case assigned to her could possibly have a tie in to the Fechin theft, she thought. Apparel once worn in 1868 by King Christian IX of Denmark to the christening of Nicholas II, future Czar of Russia, had gone missing in transit from a private owner in New York. It disappeared enroute to the Telfair Museums as part of a display on Russian art.