Lost Art Assignment (4 page)

“Felicia Lodge Bryant,” Felicity said, offering her hand. “Perhaps your girl told you why I'm here.”

“She told me you needed a special gift,” De Camp said, ignoring Paul. “Why don't you enlighten me as to the details?”

“Well, aren't you just delightful?” Felicity said.
A charmer,
she thought.
A con man with a lot of years and a lot of sales under his belt.
“I just know you can help me. I need a gift for my husband, you see. He collects art and I'm really not very smart about these things.” De Camp's face told her that he didn't believe her professed ignorance.

“Does he favor any particular artist or style?” De Camp asked, hands locked behind his back as they walked along the gallery.

“Well, he goes for what he calls the realists. A lot of it looks like this stuff here.”

“Yes, well these are excellent examples of that school of art, Madame, but probably not sufficiently distinguished to be added to your husband's fine collection.” He brushed something from her fur, aided by a puff of air. Felicity gave him several points for smoothness for that maneuver. It was a nice way to confirm that the chinchilla draped over her shoulders was in fact genuine.

“Well, he only gets originals, you know. I wrote down the ones he has by three of his favorite artists.” Felicity rummaged through her small clutch purse, soon producing a slip of note paper.

“I see. So you would like a sample of one of these men…Joseph Raffael, Frank Stella, William Walker… that your husband does not already possess.”

“Oh, yes.” Felicity stopped to make eye contact. “He especially likes that last guy, Bechtle.”

“Well, Madame, I don't often seek out such works by name.” Felicity could see she had set off a small alarm light in De Camp's mind.

“My girlfriend, Marlene Seagrave, told me you might be able to help. She says she got hold of something very special from you, through a third party. She said you don't display some of your more special things.” Felicity offered him her broadest conspiratorial smile with the slightest
wink. De Camp smiled back. He clearly preferred referrals. This one barely qualified, but it was a New York name he could check.

“Mrs. Bryant, I do have some things not on display, but I fear nothing on your list. However, I will do my very best to find something suitable for your husband's birthday. Which is…?”

“We have two weeks. I'll be in the city during that time. Here.” Felicity handed him a card bearing her cover name and her unlisted telephone number. “That's my New York number. Please call when you have something.”

“Madame, I hate to mention an unpleasant subject, but I must be fair.” De Camp gently ushered her toward the door. “To acquire such an item on short notice, may prove costly beyond the actual present value of the artwork itself.”

“Oh, you're wondering about a limit?” Felicity considered how far she wanted to push this. He nibbled her bait, but she had not quite set her hook yet. “Well, my good man, Newton, the sweetheart, gave me the car for my birthday. I certainly want to make him as happy as he made me.”

Felicity shook De Camp's hand gently, but when Paul opened the door, De Camp followed them up to street level. He waited until Morgan brought her car around before wishing her a final good day, promising once again to do his best to find what she needed.

Carlton De Camp ran the tip of his tongue across his top front teeth. Her fur was real. He knew the BMW was a new issue of the six series, with the base models going for eighty grand. Newton had popped for the convertible, which added twenty thousand to the price, easy. It's the
kind of car that sells only to people who never haggle about prices. A fine, imported sports car, but she had a black chauffeur driving it. And she travelled with a bodyguard when in New York. That meant the woman was new money from New England, a competitive gift giver, and not too knowledgeable about art. He could not have designed a better customer.

He returned to his office, locked the door and picked up the telephone. He needed to check what was in the pipeline he could use. Today would vindicate his expertise and he couldn't wait to share that. He had told Slash's boys to get him realists. He knew he could move them quickly.

Listening to the ringing at the other end, Carlton De Camp reflected on how much better this was than any con he had run before. No running or hiding after the sting. His legal cover was thick enough for this to last for years.

Outside, Morgan rolled the window down long enough to shout at a jaywalker, then pushed the button to raise it, shutting out Fifth Avenue's noise.

“So you figure this guy will call Marlene?”

“If he's the pro I think he is, he won't be letting a day go by without talking to her,” Felicity replied, dropping contact lenses from her eyes. “And she knows just what to say. She'll be shy about discussing her art collection, but she'll eventually let him know she buys through a middle man and that De Camp's name came up in connection to some of the rarer pieces. The ones she doesn't display except to her closest friends. That'll hook him.”

“What is our next move?” Paul asked.

“Well, you go back to L.A., Paul. We'll stay here, waiting on De Camp's call. When he lets me know he's got a painting, I'll just slip in there and take it back. It, and
Gerry Cartellone's other painting. And a couple more, I'm thinking, just to teach them a lesson. We ought to be able to wrap this case up inside of a week.”

“You're sure about this?” Morgan asked. “No chance this guy's just a legitimate art dealer?”

“As they say in California, no way, Jose,” Felicity said, chuckling. “I gave him Walker's name fishing for our paintings, along with Raffael and Stella as other realists.”

“So?”

“So, Frank Stella's one of the great minimalists of the sixties. Anybody with even a casual knowledge of modern art would've known that.”

In fact, only six days later Felicity found herself back in De Camp's office. This time she was an uninvited guest. The building was deserted by nine p.m. Felicity stopped in just after midnight.

The De Camp Art Gallery's security was both standard and simple. A magnetic link device defeated the door's burglar alarm. Once inside, Felicity closed and locked the door, putting the alarm back into action. She was dressed entirely in black, except for a wide green ribbon holding her hair back. A carpenter's belt filled with burglar tools hung from her slim waist. She turned slowly, focusing on her next challenge.

Pulse motion sensors hung in corners in plain sight, looking a lot like oversized flashlights attached to ammo boxes. They detect movement based on air current disturbances. It took Felicity fifteen minutes to walk across the room without triggering them. Then she gradually reached up to the devices and switched them off. Now she could relax.

Security was lax, she realized, because the risk was small. None of the paintings hanging in the gallery were particularly valuable. In fact, many were grossly overvalued. A theft from this group would probably result in a large insurance profit for De Camp. He would love it if some ignorant thief hauled these things away. If she understood the man who had called her earlier in the day,
his real valuables would be hidden elsewhere.

Felicity had been having lunch at her New York apartment with Marlene Seagrave when De Camp called. She had pushed her Waldorf salad to one side and put her phone on speaker so her guest could share the conversation.

“Mrs. Bryant, I am so happy to have caught you,” De Camp had said. “I wanted you to know that you have been very lucky. I have come into possession of something very special by a painter in the realist tradition, something I think your husband would be very happy with. Would it be convenient for you to visit the gallery tomorrow evening to discuss details of a transfer of ownership?”

“Oh I think that would be wonderful,” Felicity said. “I prefer to do our business in private anyway.”

“Got him,” Felicity had said when she hung up the telephone. “He's asking me to go to his gallery after hours. That certainly hints at something slightly shady. He knows he's got a live one on the hook. I'm sure he'll offer me Cartellone's stolen paintings at a nicely inflated price.”

“I know that look,” Marlene had said. “You're not going to meet him tomorrow evening, are you?” She was a bit older than Felicity, with the face and figure of a beauty queen just now losing ground but fighting to keep her looks with all the money her real estate holdings and import business could generate.

“Of course not, dear. I plan to find and collect those paintings tonight.”

Marlene had stared into her salad then, fidgeting with her carefully styled blonde hair. “Felicity, are you sure you can handle this?”

“And what's that supposed to mean?”

“I don't know.” Marlene looked up. “All I know is, you seem different since I last saw you.”

“What are you saying? You think I'm losing my nerve? This deal tonight's just not a big deal.”

A silence stood between them for a moment. Felicity, feeling awkward, refilled their wine glasses, and then went up the three steps to her galley kitchen to fetch two bowls of French onion soup. While her back was turned, Marlene spoke.

“I know how close you were to Chuck before he got… before we lost him.” Marlene saw Felicity freeze, but pushed on before she lost her nerve. “You know, it was tough on me when my husband died violently. I finally got professional help. A doctor named Neal Rogers. He was really very helpful.”

“What, a shrink?” Felicity asked, finally returning to the table. “You think I need a head doctor because my boyfriend was murdered? Sorry, Marlene, you're my best female friend, but you're off base now. All that's preying on my mind now is facing my first B and E in a long while.”

“B and E?”

“Breaking and entering.” Felicity smiled.

Now, standing in the darkness of the gallery, Felicity pushed all thought of her earlier conversation with Marlene from her mind. Her search would start in De Camp's private office. He would not want any really valuable work too far from his control.

De Camp had a small office, Spartan but professional. Its walls were bare and the carpet thin. A large oak desk stood at the back of the room. Disposable rubber gloves in place, Felicity started her search here. In various drawers she found business papers, a few porno magazines and a thirty-eight caliber revolver.

A steel file cabinet stood on the right of the desk. Its lock yielded to a steel pick within thirty seconds. While
carefully going through the cabinet, Felicity thought more about its owner. She wondered if De Camp even considered himself a fence, which he most surely was. Official gallery records showed sales of minor art works, yielding a marginal profit.

Aside from the desk and file cabinet, the room held a chair facing the desk, one behind it, and an ornate coat rack against the left wall. Wall to wall carpet made a floor safe unlikely. Some people put trap doors in ceilings, but she saw no ladder and De Camp didn't seem very athletic. Still, if he dealt in stolen goods he dealt in cash. There must be a safe.

Felicity's attention eventually centered on the antique coat rack. Like the desk it was oak, with a three foot wide shelf at waist level and a large round mirror in its center. Clothing could be hung on pegs placed around the mirror. Similar pegs along the shelf would have held hats in the old days. It had a wide, solid base.

It looked heavy, but Felicity needed to see behind it. She grasped one side and pulled. Nothing. She yanked harder. Still no movement. She then realized it wasn't merely heavy. The coat rack was attached to the wall.

She stopped trying to move the rack and started probing it with the sure practiced fingers of an expert safe cracker. For ten minutes, she pressed, pulled and jiggled every square inch of the coat rack. Nothing happened until she pushed the second lower peg to the left while pushing up on the top peg above the mirror.

She heard gears grind, and almost lost her balance as the pegs in her hands moved forward. Actually, it was the entire wall, backing away from her. With a squeak of masonry grating on cement, the wall moved backward four feet. A light came on behind the wall and Felicity stepped
around it into the concealed space.

The cool, crisp atmosphere stung her nose as only dehumidified air can. The walls were a subdued color to resist the glaring track lights on either side of the ceiling. Paintings hung in even rows on the side walls, without frames. Padded spring clamps at their corners held them in place. A traditional steel combination safe stood at the end of the long narrow room. Despite her past, the safe held no interest for Felicity. She was looking for two paintings.

Seconds later, Felicity's elation turned to disappointment. Cartellone's missing paintings were not there. In fact, there wasn't a single Bechtle on display. She squatted on her haunches, absently scratching at her scalp. She had been so sure. If De Camp wasn't offering her Cartellone's missing paintings, then what had he found?

Felicity's eyes wandered the room aimlessly for a few seconds and stopped on a particular prize. When she spotted it, her eyes bulged. Her mouth hung open and she said “Holy mother of God” out loud to the otherwise empty room. She reached out to touch her find.

He had said in the realist tradition, but she could not have expected him to present her with an original Andrew Wyeth. Fifty years ago, Wyeth was the most popular American painter working. At a time when abstract ruled as the accepted style, he presented scenes of rural America in precise, astounding detail.

This painting was undoubtedly genuine. She didn't know this particular piece, but she knew the artist's work. A young girl stood alone, outdoors, on a farm in Pennsylvania, she would bet, or perhaps somewhere in New England. The girl's loneliness reached out to you, created by a perfect use of light and shadow, and astounding realistic detail. Her hair. Her simple dress.
Thank goodness it was on canvas. Wyeth usually worked in egg tempera like this, but sometimes painted on Masonite for its texture.