Scarlet Night

by Dorothy Salisbury Davis

  “Really,” Maude Sloan murmured with a downward smile.

  “He wound up saying we could settle the whole thing amicably: I was to give him the painting—for which he was willing to pay six hundred dollars.”

  “Isn’t it interesting that he called you?”

  “Instead of calling you, you mean?”

  Mrs. Sloan nodded.

  “I said that if Mr. Abel wanted his painting back he could have it. He didn’t like that idea: he said he dealt with galleries, not painters, and advised me to do the same. So here I am.”

  Mrs. Sloan laughed dryly. “Somehow, I don’t think he had me in mind.”

  “Do you suppose he went through the phone book till he found me?”

  “You didn’t sign the gallery book?”

  Julie shook her head. “I’d mentioned to Mr. Abel that I was married to a newspaperman. That’s how he found my number.”

  “Very curious behavior—everyone’s.” Mrs. Sloan gave a weary sigh.

  “Do I have to give Mr. Rubinoff the painting?”

  “Do you still like it? That’s the first question.”

  “I do, I really do,” she said, convincing herself at the same time. “I didn’t like Mr. Rubinoff, but then I wasn’t going to under those circumstances. I guess I ought to tell you too, all I paid Mr. Abel for it was a hundred dollars. He said that was all he wanted and that maybe someday—if he was around—I could give him another hundred.”

  “Then, if I were you, I would keep it. Until you hear from Ralph—if you do. Or until Rubinoff brings the matter to arbitration and involves me. I should be surprised, since he’s gone this route, if he intends to do that.”

  “But if he did, would the painting belong to him?” Julie was immediately sorry she had asked that, remembering that at the time she was pretty sure Maude Sloan had opted for the whole star over the half star on the spur of the moment, something that might not stand up legally when push came to shove.

  But she wasn’t going to admit that. “I’ve never found it useful, Mrs. Hayes, to predict the outcome of arbitration.”

  “I was going to ask if you had an address for Mr. Abel.”

  “I do not. I suspect he’s back in Iowa.”

  “Or Italy?”

  Mrs. Sloan just looked at her. Julie shrugged. She felt that Iowa meant defeat for Ralph Abel the painter and Italy was where he’d had a lot of hope. She had not consciously made the association with Maude Sloan’s daughter.

  “I don’t think he’s in Italy. Did he tell you about my daughter?”

  “He mentioned her as a kind of patron.”

  “A patron,” she repeated. Then: “Ginni proposed to come over for the opening of his show. Now she proposes to come the day before it was scheduled to close.”

  “Oh, boy.”

  Mrs. Sloan was amused. “Exactly. I’ve decided to let her come. I want very much to see her. She has asked for a party Saturday night and I’m going to give it. If you and your husband would like to come, you’d be most welcome.”

  “Thank you,” Julie said. “I’ll have to let you know after I’ve talked with Jeff.” Who probably wouldn’t be back from West Virginia or wouldn’t be high on a SoHo party if he were.

  “No need to call, just come. Drinks and buffet at eight.” Mrs. Sloan took a card from the drawer and wrote the address.

  “How nice,” Julie said. Then: “Will Mr. Rubinoff be there?”

  Mrs. Sloan spaced the words out with emphasis: “I…think…not.”

  NINETEEN

  THE ANSWERING SERVICE WAS hooked up Tuesday morning, freeing Julie to do…what? She was learning what Jeff meant when he said the hardest part of a newsman’s job was the waiting. Her mind swiveled between Romano and Rubinoff and she wound up in the terrible position of racing the service for every phone call.

  In the afternoon she got a number for the Abel Tailor Shop in Keokuk and dialed it.

  “Mr. Abel?”

  “There is no Mr. Abel, ma’am. My name is Amberg. Can I help you?”

  “I’m trying to get in touch with Ralph Abel, Mr. Amberg, and I thought you might be able to help me.”

  “I have not heard from Ralph in over a year, ma’am. The last address I have is Paris, France, and I understand that’s no longer any good. You’re calling from New York, right?”

  “Right. I bought a painting of his…”

  “Mazel tov. Now he has sold two paintings I know of. But where he is, I cannot tell you. Why don’t you leave your number and if he shows up here someday, I will tell him you called.”

  “Thank you,” Julie said. “Did a Mr. Rubinoff call you?”

  “Somebody called him twice in the last few days. No name. Just a number.”

  “My name is Julie Hayes.” She gave him both numbers. “You’re his cousin, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, ma’am, on his mother’s side.”

  Julie couldn’t think of anything else to say. “You’ve been very kind, thank you.”

  “Tell me something. Ralph is now an important artist? He can make a living at it?”

  “He can make a living,” Julie said carefully.

  “Then how come you expected to find him back home?”

  Julie cast about wildly for the answer to that one. “Roots,” she said.

  “Roots?” the man repeated. “He was pulling them up the last time I saw him.”

  “Good-bye, Mr. Amberg. Tell him I called—if he comes.”

  TWENTY

  “YOU SHOULDN’T FEED THE squirrels. They’re vermin and you’re contributing to their increase in population.”

  “How can you say they’re vermin, Johnny? They’re almost human.” Rubinoff cracked open another peanut shell and held out the nut in the palm of his hand. The creature came right up to the park bench and took it from his hand.

  What irritated O’Grady was not so much that he was feeding the squirrels as that he could afford to buy a sixty-cent bag of peanuts for that purpose while Johnny O’Grady hadn’t the nails to scratch himself. And a fortune awaiting their grasp.

  “Ch-ch-ch-ch.” Rubinoff puckered his lips to the creature. It gave a flick of its tail, turned its backside to him, and took off. He handed O’Grady the bag with the rest of the peanuts. “It was a mistake for me to have called her. At least until we were sure where Abel was.”

  “You can’t back down on it now with her. Why don’t you threaten to have the law on her? It’s your property she’s got sequestered there.”

  “Don’t say things you don’t mean, Johnny. It isn’t helpful. If I did something that extreme, I can’t be sure Maude would be entirely cooperative.”

  “Ah, now it comes out.”

  “And if I could reach Abel, what would he care, having burned his bridges? He might be more hindrance than help.” Rubinoff looked at him, his eyes moist with melancholy. “If only you hadn’t exposed yourself to the Hayes woman, you could go to her now and say you were Abel’s friend and emissary.”

  “God almighty, man, I didn’t expose myself to her. You make me sound like a pervert.”

  Rubinoff grinned. Very unpleasant: the teeth of a shark.

  “If it wasn’t for me you wouldn’t know where the bloody thing was at all.” O’Grady was shelling himself a handful of peanuts to eat all at once.

  “Save one or two in case the little fellow comes back.”

  “He can eat the shells and improve his digestion. Rubin, I cased the place over the weekend. It mightn’t be all that hard to get in a back window.”

  Rubinoff shook his head.

  “I’m glad you feel that way, but I thought I’d better mention it.”

  After a moment Rubinoff said, “I wish you hadn’t told me about it.”

  O’Grady thought that one over and took it to mean he’d approve if he wasn’t consulted in advance.

  Rubinoff too was considering. “She has a husband who is much in social demand, I’m sure.”

  “Aye, so she told me herself.”

  Rubin
off raised his eyebrows.

  “I was inviting her to one of my readings. She has a certain sympathy with the Irish cause.”

  “My point was that she would be very unlikely to ever stay overnight on Forty-fourth Street.”

  “There’s nothing even resembling a bed in the place.”

  “How observant you are,” Rubinoff said nastily.

  “I’m not all that observant, but when I see something that has to be done, I do it.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  O’GRADY SAT IN THE car staring up Forty-fourth Street. There was hardly a soul to be seen between the avenues. He’d have given odds at that point that Rubinoff was not going to show up. Then, through the rear-view mirror, he saw the man come pattering along from the direction opposite to the one he had expected. O’Grady opened the door to him. He got in and complained of the lack of space in a Volkswagen.

  “It’s not a Porsche, sure. I thought you weren’t coming.”

  “It’s not much after twelve.”

  “There’s things to be said. I’d like you inside with me, Rubin, if I can open the door to you.”

  “Under no circumstances.”

  “You’ve a woman’s hands on you and that’s what’s needed!”

  “I’ve given the matter some thought, Johnny. If you can open the door, I see no reason why we shouldn’t leave it unlocked, take the picture out with us, and then bring it back when we’ve finished.”

  “Now you’re talking, man,” O’Grady said, enormously relieved. “I’m almost certain she had but the one lock, a bolt that opens from the inside and then one of them chain arrangements.”

  “You’d better go in prepared in case you can’t open it.”

  “I have my knife. It has all the tools we’ll need, save a wee hammer, and I have that in my inside pocket.”

  “And the tube, Johnny?”

  “I have the tube. It cost me eighty-five cents, the robbers.”

  “Then go and good luck and try to hurry.”

  “Don’t be rushing me. I don’t want my nerves unraveled. This isn’t common practice with me, you know.”

  “The night has a thousand eyes,” Rubinoff said mournfully.

  “Thanks.” O’Grady got out and gave Rubinoff his wallet to put in the glove compartment. He took the eighteen-inch mailing tube from the back seat, checked his knife and the hammer. He started down the street toward the parking lot and had to turn back. He’d forgotten the crowbar. He took it from the trunk—Rubinoff’s nose against the glass to see what he was after—and tucked it inside his jacket, the crook of it cold against his arm where he hooked it into the sleeve. He slammed the trunk door, an explosion in the stillness of the street. It was a damn shame, nobody felt safe on the streets at this hour, and it almost as bright as day with the high-intensity streetlights.

  He had reconnoitered earlier, when the parking lot closed after theater hours. The fence was no problem, already broken through at one corner; but it was a trip for a cat from there to his destination. The back of every building was a hazard of a different sort—broken pottery, smashed bricks, crumbling cement partitions, and broken bottles by the carload.

  The sky was a murky pink, sending down a faint glow, and there were lights peeping through the windows here and there, but no faces that he could observe. The rumble of traffic could be heard a long way off, and human screeches now and then that he calculated to be carrying all the way from Forty-second Street. The only consistent sound nearby was people coughing. It put him in mind of church on a cold, windy Sunday in Derry when you could hardly hear the priest for the hacking—the noise and the smell of disease. Even T.B. in this day and age, damn the oppressor.

  He looked up at the clutter of flowerpots on Rose’s fire escape. The kitchen was dark and he knew the bedroom to be at the front of the house. It gave him an uneasy feeling, thinking of the man sleeping innocent beside her. He made firm the wooden crate he had picked up on his first trip.

  The crate creaked under his weight, but he was able to get the wedge end of the crowbar between the cement and the iron grill outside the small window. The cement started to crumble at once, seeping down like coarse sand into his sleeve. He hung onto the grill with one hand while he worked, his fingers twined through the interstices. Once started he never looked around. He could neither hide nor run. The best he could do was pray. The crate gave a shriek and went out from under him. He hung onto the grill but it also gave, and as he went down came on top of him bringing along an avalanche of dust and particles. It was out, well.

  He crouched and waited, listening. Nothing. He set the crate up again; the window itself was child’s play, the rotten wood yielding at once to his knife; the window swung open on hinges inside. He had no chance at all of hoisting himself up from below, the window no more than eighteen inches square and some ten feet from the ground, but he had taken that into his calculations. He threw the mailing tube in before it was crushed altogether, went down and moved the box to beneath the fire escape. Climbing up again, he was able to hook the crowbar into the ladder and bring it down. But it came down on the wrong side, far away from the gaping window, and that had not been in his calculation. He had to go up to Rose’s garden and sidle along outside the railing. When he was over the window, he lowered himself till his feet touched the sill. By hooking the crowbar through the rail, he was able to support himself until his behind was secure on the windowsill.

  He hung the crowbar on the swinging window, eased himself down and over on his belly. His jacket caught on the hook and something fell from the pocket making a clatter and a watery plunk below. It was his knife, and as soon as his foot touched the toilet seat he knew where it had fallen. His feet on the floor, he ran his hand over the wall looking for a switch. The light came on like a splash in the face. There was only the commode and a sink, no shower or tub. He rolled up his sleeve and groped. He reached as far as he could into a fixture as ancient as any he had seen in all his travels. Without success. He washed and wiped his hands on a paper towel, and cursing his luck, threw the towel into the bowl.

  He picked up the mailing tube and left the bathroom. The bathroom light shone across the room. There stood the desk with the phone and the table with Yeats and the crystal ball. But the picture was gone from the wall. He turned from wall to empty wall, then ran to the room up front and turned on the lamp. Nowhere.

  He turned out the lights, threw the crowbar down first, and went out the way he had come in, except that he almost knocked himself unconscious when he banged his head on the window frame and fell to the ground with a jolt that rattled every bone in his body.

  When he reached the car he threw the tube and the crowbar into the back seat.

  “Be careful,” Rubinoff cried and reached for the tube.

  “There’s nothing in it to be careful of. The picture was gone from the wall.”

  “She’s decided to keep it and has taken it home,” Rubinoff said after a moment as though he had known all the time it would come out this way. “That’s what comes of being impatient, Johnny. The mere fact of my calling about it has elevated its value in her mind. If her husband is a collector, he will soon disabuse her of the notion. Or else tolerate it to humor her.”

  “Put it in English for me, Rubin. I’ve had a rough night.”

  “Either she’ll call me, pretending to concede that I’m the rightful owner, or we’ll not hear from her at all. In which case, I must think carefully before committing myself further.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  AS SOON AS JULIE opened the shop door in the morning she knew that someone had been there…or might still be there. She propped the door open with a chair. A crosswind caught at the curtain between the front room and the back and she knew what it was that was different: the smell; the air was almost fresh. Juanita hovered in the doorway and for once Julie didn’t send her away.

  She pulled the curtain aside and from where she stood saw the open window in the bathroom, something she had not been able to achieve
working from the inside. Her predecessor had nailed the larger window to the back room closed and Julie had covered it with heavy drapery and had all but forgotten it was there. Nothing was missing. There was nothing of value. The typewriter was so old it wouldn’t bring five dollars at a pawn shop. She felt jittery, and although she had nothing personal in the shop, the violation of the place made the place itself suddenly abhorrent to her.

  She went into the bathroom. A muddle of dirt surrounded the toilet bowl, the dust on the seat brushed off by the intruder. He might have tried to wipe away fingerprints, for there was a wad of paper toweling in the bowl. She flushed the toilet, then closed the window and latched it although she could see daylight through the frame where the burglar’s tool had pried the latch open. She glanced down, then watched with dismay while the water rose to the top of the bowl, threatened to overflow, and then gradually receded. That too was a new development. She went out front, dispatched Juanita, closed the door, and thought about calling the police. The phone rang before she could make the call.

  It was Alberto. “Mr. Romano would like to see you, Mrs. Hayes.”

  “Now?”

  “I will send the car.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  ALBERTO WAS WAITING IN the lobby. Grave, courteous, and utterly detached. Without a word to say. The elevator ride seemed to take forever and Julie had to fight a sudden feeling of panic. When they reached the penthouse Alberto moved ahead to open door after door for her, the foyer, the library, the gallery with American paintings. They came at last to a door where he knocked before opening.

  Romano was at a desk in the center of an office, facing them. His desk was clear. He was simply sitting there waiting. Or in a reverie. He did not speak or get up until she was well inside the room. He rose then and said, but without warmth, “It was good of you to come at once.”

  Alberto brought a chair for her and placed it beside the desk. The room beyond was a skylit studio. Julie could see an easel. Romano sat when she did. The office was full of books and papers, folios, and a lot of expensive-looking electronic equipment. A phone with several buttons was on a bracketed platform on the other side of the desk, but the desk itself was absolutely bare.