Murder 101 (4 page)

CHAPTER 4

T
HE CEMETERY SEEMED
quaint, much less foreboding in the daylight with old headstones carved with names like Whitestone, Potter, MacDoogal, and Hawthorne. The Bergman mausoleum seemed like a dowager, too grand for the neighborhood, but since it had been there for years, Decker supposed that it was now just part of the scenery. It was chilly but not cold, brisk but not blustery. The sun was immersed in a sea of deep blue.

The man who emerged from the Mercedes was in his late sixties, white haired but with a lively step. He was around six feet and had a ski-tanned face, milky blue eyes, and a prominent chin. He was dressed in a cable-knit sweater and jeans, loafers but no socks. In tow was a younger, shorter man with brown eyes and curly brown hair. He was wearing a black suit, white shirt, and a red bow tie. On his feet were black Oxfords over black socks.

“Ken Sobel.” He pointed to the younger man. “This is Maxwell Stewart, owner of the famed Stewart and Harrison gallery. If you deal with him, you’d better have your game face on. The man is a shark.”

“Call me Max.” He appeared around forty. “Don’t pay attention to Ken. I never do.”

“Peter Decker. Thanks for coming down.”

Sobel said, “Are you a police officer or a police detective or . . .”

“I’m whatever the department needs. This is my partner, Detective Tyler McAdams.”

More handshakes. Then Sobel turned to Isaiah Pellman who was trying to disappear in nonexistent shadows. “What the hell happened, Isaiah?”

“Just like I told you, sir. The key didn’t work.”

“When was the last time you tried it?” Sobel asked.

“Last Tuesday. It worked fine.”

“So what happened?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

Decker said, “Let me give you a recap of where McAdams and I came in and why I asked you to come down.”

Sobel said, “I know why you asked me down. You told me that over the phone.”

Stewart said, “Let the man finish.”

“Be brief,” Sobel said. “I’ve got a dinner engagement and it’s a three-hour drive.”

“It’s ten in the morning, Ken.”

“You know how brutal traffic can be.”

Decker gave a quick summary of the events of Friday night while McAdams rocked on his feet, no doubt feeling superfluous. At the end, Decker turned to McAdams and said, “Anything you’d like to add?”

“Not a whit.”

Decker turned to Pellman. “We’re going to need that ladder again. Mr. Stewart will need to look at the panels up close.”

Stewart said, “You want me to climb up a ladder?”

Sobel said, “It’s not that hard, Max. One foot over the other.”

“I’m wearing leather-soled shoes.” He turned to his father-in-law. “If I break my leg, you explain it to Natalie.”

“I’ll catch you if you fall.”

“I’d take them down for you,” Decker said, “but I don’t want to screw anything up.”

“It’s fine.” Max was clearly peeved. “If I had known I had to climb up, I would have worn sneakers. I really do think the old man likes to see me sweat.”

“Been there, done that,” McAdams muttered.

“That’s enough out of you, Harvard,” Decker said.

Stewart said, “You went to Harvard?”

“Graduated two years ago.”

“What house?”

“Cabot. And you?”

“Lowell.”

The two men started playing name game despite a decade of life between them. If McAdams was good for anything, it was building rapport with the Ivy League elite with second homes in the smaller towns along the Hudson. But that did nothing to endear him to the regular working stiffs of the town.

Pellman came back with a ladder and his flashlight. He descended the five steps into the crypt and unlocked the door. Everyone crowded inside. Decker turned on Pellman’s flashlight although there was plenty of sunshine coming through the windows along with bursts of iridescence coming from the stained glass.

Stewart looked upward. “Could you shine the light on that one?” Decker illuminated the autumn panel. Max said, “I can already tell that it’s a reproduction. Good glass, lousy work.”

Sobel swore under his breath. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“How can you tell?”

“Ken, how can you tell when it’s time to dump stocks? It’s my business.”

He waved off his son-in-law and then started pacing. “Goddamnit, how did this happen?”

“What about the others?” McAdams asked Stewart. “What do you think?”

Sobel suddenly remembered there were three more panels to evaluate. “Yeah, what about the others, Max?”

“Could I have the light?” Stewart asked.

“Sure.” Decker handed him the battery pack.

The dealer studied each panel, and then he said, “Okay. To my eye, summer is also a fake. The other two . . . I’m going to have to climb up and take a closer look.”

Sobel continued to swear and mutter to himself as Decker and McAdams balanced the ladder against the wall, going as close as they could to the window containing winter. Stewart shook his head then scaled the risers. When he was eye level with the panel, Decker stepped up two risers and passed him the battery pack. Stewart studied the work for a long time. “This is real.”

“Thank God for small favors,” Sobel mumbled.

Carefully, Max climbed down and went over to the spring panel. “Legit.” Stewart climbed down again and dusted off his pants. “Two and two, Ken.”

“Goddamnit! What the hell is someone going to do with two panels in a set of four?”

Decker said, “I take it that the panels are valuable on their own.”

“Of course,” Max said. “But as a set, the value goes up exponentially.”

Decker said, “You should take the real panels out of the crypt and put them in a more secure place.”

“My thoughts exactly,” Stewart said.

“How involved is it to remove them?”

“Not too hard normally. The chains just hook into the loops in the frame but it looks like the links were tightened around the loop, which isn’t the original design. It would help to have two people up there. One to detach the panel from the frame and another one to hold the tools.”

Sobel was still swearing. McAdams turned to Pellman. “Do you have another ladder?”

“Let me check.” He came back with a shorter ladder. “This is all I had.”

“That’ll work.” Decker turned to Stewart. “Shall we?”

“Let’s.”

IT TOOK LESS
than an hour to remove all four panels, another hour to remove the chains and the ceiling pieces. At straight-up twelve, the two original panels and chains were bubble wrapped and then blanket wrapped and sat in the backseat of the Mercedes. The two forgeries would be entered as evidence of a crime. Sobel jangled his keys as he turned to Decker. “Now what?”

“I’m going to need the names of everyone who has a key to the crypt or even knows that the panels exist.”

“That’s a long list,” Sobel said. “A long, long list.”

Stewart leaned over to McAdams’s ear and whispered something. When McAdams smiled, Sobel said, “Can you tell me what could be even remotely funny?”

“Just two Harvard guys shooting the shit, Ken.”

“Well, shoot the shit some other time, okay.” Sobel was irritated. “I don’t even know where to begin.”

“Start with your relatives,” Decker said. “Any of them have money problems?”

“That would be my sister-in-law,” Stewart said.

“Cut it out, Max,” Sobel told him. “She doesn’t have money problems.”

“My brother-in-law is a good guy. Why he married Melanie is the family mystery. Well, I know why he married her. She’s beautiful. But she’s also unpleasant and a shopaholic. And don’t look at me that way, Ken. They’re going to ask their questions anyway, right?”

“Right,” McAdams said.

Sobel was angry. “I guarantee you that none of our relatives stole the panels.”

“I’m sure you’re right, Mr. Sobel,” Decker said. “But I have to start somewhere. Anyone innocent won’t mind talking to me.”

“Sure, talk to Melanie, talk to whoever you want, I don’t care.” Sobel turned to his son-in-law. “You don’t really think that Melanie stole the panels.”

Stewart put his arm around his father-in-law. “Honestly, no. That would be a new low even for her.”

“Make us a list and we’ll take it from there,” Decker said. “Also, what about locally? Anyone in town know about the panels?”

“Just Pellman here and the other watchmen.”

“We put all the mausoleum keys in a lockbox, Mr. Sobel.”

“That doesn’t mean one of you didn’t use it.” When the caretaker blanched, Sobel said, “I’m not accusing you, Isaiah. Just saying out loud what the police are thinking.”

McAdams snapped his fingers. “What about anyone at the colleges? Maybe an art professor knew about them from your parents’ time? Littleton has been around for a while and back in my dad’s time, it was noted for bringing in local experts on regional painters and craftsmen from the area. Tiffany’s studio wasn’t all that far from here.”

The boy had a brain. Decker said, “That’s a good thought.”

“I never had any dealing with the colleges,” Sobel said.

“We can find out,” Decker said. “Would you know if the panels had ever been loaned out to a museum exhibition or recorded in a book on Tiffany?”

“Or any other art glass book?” McAdams asked.

“I don’t know,” Sobel grumped. “You don’t know how depressing this is for me.”

Stewart put his arm around his father-in-law’s shoulders. “The good news is we know the panels weren’t destroyed, Ken. They were taken by someone who wanted them because he knew what they were. And the panels can’t be sold in a reputable auction house, because there’s no provenance of ownership. So if the thief is going to sell them, he’d have to use the black market. We’ll find them. If not, you’ve got insurance.”

“I don’t want insurance. I want the works.” The man teared up. “They were my grandparents’ legacy. My grandmother commissioned them from Tiffany Studios.”

“I know.” Max kissed his cheek. “At least, we salvaged two of them. And if we need to do a facsimile of the others, I’ve got artisans who are just as talented as those at Tiffany Studios although almost anyone could do much better than those pieces of dreck.”

Sobel nodded. “Thanks for coming down, Max.”

“Oh please, Ken. You know I’d be insulted if you asked anyone else.” Stewart looked at Decker and McAdams. “We’ll get that list for you. I’m sure we won’t think of everyone, but as names pop up, we’ll send them off to you.”

“Thanks,” Decker said. “And I don’t care how long it is. A long list isn’t as big a problem as no list at all.”

Sobel nodded and slid into the driver’s seat. Stewart sat in the backseat, with an arm placed skillfully over his glass charges. They drove off in a wisp of exhaust, tooled up for the long ride back to civilization.

Pellman said, “I’m gonna put the ladders away.”

“That’s fine,” Decker said. “Thanks for all your help.”

“Do you think that Mr. Sobel suspects me?”

“No, he’s just upset.” Decker patted his shoulder. “We’ll talk to you later.”

The men walked back to the car. McAdams put the key into the ignition, turned on the motor, and headed back to the station house less than five minutes away. “What now? I’m sure you have many ideas bouncing around in that predementia brain of yours.”

“A few. I’d love to hear what you’re thinking.”

“Age before beauty.”

Decker said, “This is the drill. We bounce ideas off each other. I say something, you say something. There is no right or wrong. So it’s okay to say stupid things.”

“That’s never been my problem, Old Man.”

Decker smiled. “No thief would go through all that rigmarole to keep the panels for himself. He had a fence or he was hired for a buyer. If it was a buyer, he probably wants all four panels before he shells out money. I’m sure our thief is going to return and try to steal the other panels. So that means surveillance.”

“You mean like monitor cameras on the crypt’s door?”

“No, I mean like a guy sitting in a hidden place waiting from the thief to return and arresting him.”

“It’s an open area. Where could we park a car so it wouldn’t be noticed?”

“He’s going to come at night so that gives us some cover,” Decker said.

“We’re going to sit here all night, every night until we catch a thief that may or may not show up, take one look at the lone car, and hightail it out of here?”

The kid had a point. “Maybe we could do it with cameras linked up to a surveillance van parked elsewhere. Or I’m only a mile away. I could actually just do this from home.”

“And where do you propose we’d find the technology in rural little Greenbury?”

“You’re the techno guy. You tell me.”

McAdams frowned. “I suppose we can stick a camera in a strategic place and link it up to a tablet or smartphone, Eagle Eye or some system like that.”

“That would work for me. We could rotate the watches of the laptop at night between the five of us detectives.”

McAdams said, “Do you really think the thief would return to the crypt knowing that the cops are onto him?”

“Why would he think we’re onto him?”

“What if the thief saw all the commotion that went on this afternoon?”

“Did you spot anyone nosing around?”

“Not really, but I wasn’t looking. What about you?”

“I checked around several times. I didn’t notice anyone watching.”

“Maybe no one was watching us on the streets. But I’m betting that a few of the neighbors pulled back their curtains to see what was going on.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right about that. And that leads me to another thought. If we start asking questions locally, eventually the local paper will find out. So will everyone else, including the thief—if he’s local. This is a very small town.”

“So I repeat. What’s next?”

“Not doing surveillance would be negligent. Let’s do something before the case blows wide open. Could you help me hook up a camera?”

“Who’s gonna pay for this?”

“I’ll ask Mike. It’s something that’s handy to have.”

“And if Mike says no?”

“I’ll pay. These things aren’t that expensive even for an old retiree like myself. Of course, if some rich kid with gold watches wants to pitch in, I won’t object.”