Dead Man's Mistress

by David Housewright

  “Louise didn’t sleep with Montgomery,” I said. “She didn’t sleep with me, either. That’s not what any of this was about.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “It was the paintings, Peg. It was always about the paintings. The Tuesday Montgomery spent half the day here; he wasn’t having sex with Louise. He was honest to God fixing her water heater. Didn’t he tell you when you spent Wednesday evening together?”

  “He did but—but I didn’t believe him.”

  “I believe Tuesday was also the day that Louise convinced him to pretend to steal the paintings. She probably offered Montgomery a lot of money, too. Witnesses claim he was very pleased with himself. He even told his ex that he would make up for his infidelities.”

  “But he went back to her Thursday night.”

  “No, Peg. Louise met Montgomery on Thursday so she could give him some items that he could also pretend to steal and sell to an antiques store. That way I would have a clue that would make it easy for me to find him and reclaim the paintings. All of it in front of a documentary crew filming a movie about the Scenes from an Inland Sea.”

  I saw movement behind Peg’s shoulder and chose to ignore it. Louise began screaming into her gag.

  “Shh,” I said.

  “McKenzie,” Peg said, “you’re making this up.”

  “I’m not. I promise.”

  “Are you saying that David didn’t cheat on me? That I killed him for nothing?”

  “He belonged to you as much as he belonged to any one woman, but never Louise.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “Put the gun down, Peg.”

  “No. No, no, no.” She waved it some more. “You tell me. Tell me why all of this happened?”

  I needed to play for time.

  “Do you watch old movies, Peg?” I said. “TCM? You look to me like a woman who likes to watch old movies.”

  “I like old movies.”

  “Ever see The Flim-Flam Man with George C. Scott?”

  “I think so.”

  “Scott plays a con artist. There’s a scene where he explains how he sold stolen diamonds. His partner says, ‘They’re just glass,’ and Scott says, ‘I never said they wasn’t. Just signified that they were stolen, that’s all. You can sell anything on God’s green earth if the customer believes it was stolen.’”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “The paintings that Montgomery was supposed to have taken from Louise—they’re forgeries.”

  Louise screamed into her gag some more.

  “Forgeries?” Peg said.

  “Louise painted them.”

  “But why pretend they were stolen?”

  “Instant provenance. The paintings must be authentic; why else would anyone steal them? Plus having the theft and recovery take place in front of documentary and news cameras—that was inspired. Louise could have sold those paintings for millions. Only you killed Montgomery before I could recover them. We didn’t know that, of course, the sheriff, BCA, and me. We thought whoever killed Montgomery also stole the paintings. Louise had them, of course. She went over to his place after the documentary crew finished filming, found Montgomery dead and searched his place, leaving the lights on as she went. She found the paintings, hid them, and waited until she could figure a way for us to recover them again. She would have been better off if she had just left them in the house for the cops to find. Her plan would have worked just as well. But she didn’t. Like I once told her, it takes practice to become a good criminal. Meanwhile, we started searching for Montgomery’s killer, which led us to the burglary crew and all the rest.

  “The thing is, no one suspected you, Peg. You timed it perfectly. Leaving the art gallery at twelve thirty, going to Montgomery’s house, shooting him and faking the suicide, driving back here in your white van—you usually walk, remember?—locking yourself in your garage, quickly changing out of your art gallery clothes into shorts and a T-shirt because I’m guessing there were blood splatters, and coming out to talk to me by one thirty. Also, you told me and the BCA that you had often seen Montgomery’s car parked outside Louise’s house; the GPS app on his cell phone confirmed your allegation that he was sleeping with her, like you knew it would. It hadn’t occurred to them or me until this very moment that parking in front of Louise’s house meant Montgomery was also parking in front of your house.”

  “He said he loved me.”

  “I’m sure he did.”

  “How could I have been so wrong?”

  “Put down the gun, Peg.”

  “No. I can’t. It’s gone too far.”

  “Peg—Peg, please listen to me. The BCA ruled that Montgomery’s death was a suicide. There’s no one looking for you anymore. You can just walk away.”

  She waved the gun at Louise.

  “What about her?” Peg asked.

  “Louise can’t say anything without admitting to art fraud.”

  Next Peg waved the gun at me.

  “What about you? You’ll tell them about me.”

  I opened my arms wide.

  “Why would I do that?” I said. “I like you. I like how you dress when you want to impress the tourists and how you unbutton your buttons when you want to impress me. I like the way you make tea. I like the color lavender.”

  I moved closer to her.

  “You’re just saying that.” Peg raised her gun like she wanted to shoot me. “I don’t believe you.”

  Deputy Peter Wurzer reached around her and yanked the gun from her hand.

  “I don’t blame you,” he said. “McKenzie is such a liar.”

  * * *

  Wurzer did all the things that a professional law enforcement officer was supposed to do, including reading Peg her rights from a laminated card before leading her to his SUV in cuffs. Meanwhile, I untied Louise, starting with her gag.

  “McKenzie, I was so afraid,” she said.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I think so. She hit me in the face with her gun. After I came back from my run, she knocked on the door and … What you told Peg … My paintings, are they safe?”

  “They’re in my trunk.”

  “What you told Peg—when did you figure it out?”

  “I became suspicious after I read the book Randolph McInnis: Scenes from an Inland Sea. And then you made it so easy for me to find David Montgomery, with a documentary crew standing by to record the event, no less. It was all too easy, Louise. Too convenient. But Montgomery was killed and that didn’t make sense considering what you were trying to accomplish. I let it distract me. After the Cook County burglary ring was busted and you insisted that I search the woods around Montgomery’s place—that rearoused my suspicions. Is that a word, rearoused? But then we got the call about the auction in Quebec City and I was distracted again. The best-laid plans of mice and men, sweetie. They often go awry, don’t they?”

  I finished unbinding her and helped Louise to her feet. I examined her face. So beautiful …

  “Are you okay?” I asked again.

  “I feel faint.”

  “Let’s sit you back down.”

  “I’m sorry people were hurt,” she said.

  “No one was hurt because of you. Tell me, Louise. The paintings—when did you paint them? Not recently.”

  “Years ago, after Mary Ann had sold the Scenes to Flonta and I was trying to make myself into an artist. Only I had nothing to say, no voice, no aesthetic of my own. It all belonged to Randolph. You have no idea how frustrating that was. Even the three paintings were based on ideas that he had rejected. I painted them because I thought—this is true, McKenzie. I thought I could paint Randolph out of my head. Eventually, I did. Only it took years. Decades. I kept the paintings; I never showed them to anyone, not in all these years. That part of my story was true. Then I was asked to participate in the documentary. It wasn’t about the money, McKenzie. I know you don’t believe that. It was about … if people were convinced that the paintings were Randolph’s, it would prove
I was as great an artist as he was.”

  Wurzer had remained outside with his prisoner while he waited for backup. It came with screaming sirens and flashing lights. None of it was necessary. On the other hand, how often did the Cook County Sheriff’s Department get a chance to howl?

  I helped Louise from her chair again and led her to the door.

  “McKenzie,” she said. “McKenzie, please—don’t tell anyone.”

  * * *

  Peg Younghans was transported to the Cook County Law Enforcement Center in Wurzer’s SUV. Louise Wykoff was taken to the Cook County North Shore Hospital and Care Center in another SUV by a deputy I had not met before. After it was determined that the damage to her exquisite beauty was only temporary, she was driven to the Law Enforcement Center to provide her statement. The facilities were only three minutes apart, but I was told the drive damn near killed her she was so frightened.

  Meanwhile, I was ensconced in the Law Enforcement Center’s conference room where I drank bad coffee for a couple of hours—Eileen had resigned unexpectedly her replacement told me, taking her recipe with her.

  Peg was charged with second-degree murder. Probably, charges of kidnapping and assault would follow.

  I spent a lot of time wondering what crimes Louise could be charged with and came up with—absolutely nothing. She never attempted to sell the paintings so there was no art fraud. Nor did she file a false police report or an insurance claim concerning the paintings and the other items that she claimed had gone missing. Plus, she had nothing whatsoever to do with Montgomery’s murder.

  Once again I could hear my old man’s voice, Life is not fair.

  Eventually, Deputy Wurzer wandered in to take my statement. He was interested in Peg drawing down on me and what she had to say about killing Montgomery and nothing else. Louise and her paintings simply did not interest him. He had also thought it through and decided, like me, that while one might argue that her actions were criminal, they weren’t illegal. She had already been sent home, to her immense relief.

  “What were you doing at the art academy anyway?” I asked.

  “Leah Huddleston over at Northern Lights called and requested a welfare check on Younghans,” Wurzer said. “She hadn’t shown up for work for the first time since Leah owned the gallery and didn’t answer her phone. Leah was afraid she might have fallen down her stairs or something. I went there, knocked on her door, and got no answer. I noticed your Mustang on the street and the open door at Wykoff’s and wandered over. Solid police work, what can I say? Lieutenant Rask would have been proud.”

  “Why the hell did you wait so long before taking Peg after you arrived? She could have shot me.”

  Wurzer tapped his chest where a body camera hung.

  “I wanted to get her confession on tape,” he said.

  “When did you guys start wearing body cams?”

  “Tuesday. It’s a new directive from the acting sheriff.”

  “Acting sheriff?”

  “Bill Bowland retired over the weekend.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said.

  “It was time.”

  “Who replaced him?”

  “The county commissioners appointed me.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Go ’head, McKenzie. Say something snarky.”

  “Why you?”

  “Sheriff Bowland’s recommendation. Plus, they liked my forward-thinking law enforcement proposals. Have you seen our new body cams?”

  “How long will the appointment last?”

  “They’re holding a special election in six months.”

  “Are you going to run?”

  “Yes.”

  “Send me an email and I’ll contribute a few bucks to your campaign.”

  “If you really want to do me a favor, McKenzie, you’ll stay the hell out of my county.”

  * * *

  That Wykoff Woman called my cell every fifteen minutes for the next five hours, probably because I still had her paintings. I refused to answer. Instead, I bought three dozen assorted donuts, bismarks, turnovers, long johns, and something called a swirl at World’s Best Donuts and drove home. When I arrived at the condo, I deposited the baked goods in the refrigerator, grabbed Perrin Stewart’s copy of Randolph McInnis: Scenes from an Inland Sea, and headed over to the City of Lakes Art Museum. It was well past nine P.M. Usually, the museum would have been closed by then except it was hosting its monthly event—Art for Adults, which allowed guests to peruse the exhibits with drinks in their hands—so I had no trouble getting in.

  I met Perrin in her office. She became so excited when she saw the art transport case that I thought she was going to have an orgasm on the spot. She grabbed the case from me and carried it into a conference room as if it weighed as much as a Happy Meal. Her hands were trembling and she was having difficulty opening the case. I nudged her aside and did it for her.

  “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” she chanted while hopping up and down on her heels. She hugged me and kissed me and pushed me away so she could take the paintings one at a time from the case and rest them on the table. “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes…”

  Perrin stopped, took a deep breath, and started hopping up and down again.

  “This is absolutely fabulous,” she said. “McKenzie, have you any idea what this is worth to us? To City of Lakes? To American art in general?”

  “I have a small idea,” I said. “It’s too bad that the paintings are forgeries, though.”

  Perrin ceased her hopping.

  “Why would you say a thing like that?” she asked.

  I took the book—Randolph McInnis: Scenes from an Inland Sea—and dropped it on top of the conference room table with a resounding thud.

  “Exhibit A—McInnis carefully documented every sketch, drawing, and painting he ever worked on,” I said. “He kept meticulous notes. He was famous for it. It’s all in the book. If he had given three canvases to That Wykoff Woman, Mary Ann would have known about it. His sketches and drawings and notes would have told her. And Bruce Flonta. And you—you’re the authority on Randolph McInnis.”

  “I am?”

  “And then there’s Louise’s confession.”

  “Confession?”

  “She told me what happened. It’s kind of a long story.”

  “I have bourbon.”

  “I’d be happy to drink your liquor, Perrin, but it won’t change the facts.”

  “What facts?”

  “Louise is a forger.”

  “Or an art lover’s friend.”

  “Excuse me, what?”

  “If a forgery is good enough to fool the experts, the authenticators, the connoisseurs, then it’s good enough to give the rest of us pleasure, even insight, isn’t it? Is it such a terrible thing if thousands and thousands of museum visitors get to appreciate the work of a great artist even if the work isn’t actually by him?”

  “You tell me. You’re the curator.”

  “McKenzie, great art is about the ideas of the artists, not just their physical contributions. So much of the work attributed to Rembrandt, Rubens, Titian, and even modern artists like Picasso and Andy Warhol, were actually produced by studio assistants. Does that make the work any less expressive, any less essential, and any less authentic than if it was executed solely by the artist who signed it? You could argue, I would argue that a good forger is little more than a faithful assistant who just happened to come along after the artist died.”

  “That might be how an art major sees it. Criminologists have a different point of view.”

  “McKenzie, it’s been estimated that as much as twenty percent of the paintings held by major museums are fake.”

  “The museums didn’t buy them knowing they were fake, did they?”

  “Not all of them were purchased. Many were donated or on loan.”

  “Whatever.” I pointed at the McInnis paintings. “These are fakes. You know that.”

  “I don’t actually. Do
you?”

  “I just told you…”

  “Louise’s confession—did you record it? Is it written down?”

  “No.”

  “Then what you’re telling me aren’t verifiable facts. It’s a conspiracy theory that may or may not be true.”

  “Ah, c’mon, sweetie. We’ve known each other too long for this.”

  “Examine these paintings, study them as minutely as possible, and then study the other work that was produced by Randolph McInnis. Can you honestly say that he painted one but not the other?”

  At that moment I felt so tired that all I wanted to do was drive to Rickie’s, drink free liquor, and listen to jazz.

  “Perrin, do you know the difference between ignorance and apathy?” She seemed confused, so I supplied the answer. “I don’t know and I don’t care. You asked me to recover the paintings that were supposedly taken from That Wykoff Woman. Here they are. Do with them as you please. Just remember—from a criminology major to an art major—fraud is defined as wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain. Okay?”

  “I’m grateful, McKenzie.”

  “Good night, Perrin. Oh, before I forget, do I have your permission to give Jennica Mehren and her old man’s documentary crew an interview in which I will tell them everything I know and think I know?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  JUST SO YOU KNOW

  The documentary was called Nine-tenths of the Law and dealt with the struggle between Mary Ann McInnis, Bruce Flonta, and Louise Wykoff to take possession of three missing paintings that had been discovered, lost, and recovered thirty-five years after Randolph McInnis painted them. Not only that, it spent time examining the uber-warehouses called free ports that were filled with billions of dollars of art, fraud, and scandal. It was the free ports that the talk show hosts most wanted to talk about when father and daughter did the rounds to promote the film.

  Nine-tenths of the Law made just under thirteen million dollars, which put it in the Top Twenty-five highest-grossing documentaries and, as I predicted, it was nominated for an Academy Award. It lost, however, to a film about the Holocaust. The expression on Jennica’s face when she heard the news was identical to how she looked when M. A. had told her, “You are a nice piece of ass.”