Transgressions

people very much like you and me.' And Publishers Weekly concluded, '(he writes with) a keen knowledge of human nature and a wicked sense of humor.' John Farris

received the 2001 Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime

Achievement from the Horror Writers Association. His

latest novel is Phantom Nights.

THE RANSOME WOMEN

John Farris

ONE

Echo Halloran first became aware of the Woman in Black during a visit to the High-bridge Museum of Art in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Echo and her boss were dealing that day with the chief curator of the Highbridge, a man named Charles Carwood. The High-bridge was in the process of deacquisitioning, as they say in the trade, a number of paintings, mostly by twentieth-century artists whose stock had remained stable in the fickle art world. The Highbridge was in difficulty with the IRS and Carwood was looking for around thirty million for a group of Representationalists.

Echo's boss was Stefan Konine, director of Gilbard's, the New York auction house. Stefan was a big man, florid as a poached salmon, who lied about his age and played the hay burners for recreation. He wore J. Dege & Sons suits with the aplomb of royalty. He wasn't much interested in Representationalists and preferred to let Echo, who had done her thesis at NYU on the Boquillas School, carry the ball while the paintings were reverently brought, one by one, to their attention in the seventh-floor conference room. The weather outside was blue and clear. Through a nice spread of windows the view to the south included the Charles River.

Echo had worked for Konine for a little over a year. They had established an almost familial rapport.

Echo kept busy with her laptop on questions of provenance while Stefan sipped Chablis and regarded each painting with the same dyspeptic expression, as if he were trying to digest a bowling ball he'd had for lunch. His mind was mostly on the trifecta he had working at Belmont, but he was alert to the nuances of each glance Echo sent his way. They were a team. They knew each other's signals.

Carwood said, 'And we have this exquisite David Herrera from the Oppenheim estate, probably the outstanding piece of David's Big Bend Cycle.'

Echo smiled as two museum assistants wheeled in the oversize canvas. She was drinking 7Up, not Chablis.

The painting was in the style of Georgia O'Keeffe during her Santa Fe incarnation. Echo looked down at her laptop screen, hit a few keys, looked up again. It was a long stare, as if she were trying to see all the way to the Big Bend Country of Texas. After a couple of minutes Stefan raised a spikey eyebrow. Carwood fidgeted on his settee. His eyes were on Echo. He had done some staring himself, from the moment Echo was introduced to him.

There are beauties who stop traffic and there are beauties who grow obsessively in the hearts of the susceptible; Echo Halloran was one of those. She had a full mane of wraparound dark hair. Her eyes were large and round and dark as polished buckeyes, deeply flecked with gold. Sprightly as a genie, endowed with a wealth of breeding and self-esteem, she viewed the world with an intensity of favor that piqued the wonder of strangers.

When she cleared her throat Carwood started nervously. Stefan looked lazily at his protegee, with the beginning of a wise smile. He sensed an intrigue.

Carwood said, 'Perhaps you'd care to have a closer look, Miss Halloran? The light from the windows —'

'The light is fine.' Echo settled back in her seat. She closed her eyes and touched the center of her forehead with two fingers. 'I've seen enough. I'm very sorry, Mr. Carwood. But that canvas isn't David Herrera's work.'

'Oh, my dear,' Carwood said, drawing a pained breath as if he were trying to decide whether a tantrum or a seizure was called for, 'you must be extremely careful about making potentially actionable judgments—'

'I am,' Echo said, and opened her eyes wide, 'always careful. It's a fake. And not the first fake Herrera I've seen. Give me a couple of hours and I'll tell you which of his students painted it, and when.'

Carwood attempted to appeal to Stefan, who held up a cautionary finger.

'But that will cost you a thousand dollars for Miss Halloran's time and expertise. A thousand dollars an hour. I would advise you to pay it. She's very good. As for the lot you've shown us today—' Stefan got to his feet with a nod of good cheer. 'Thank you for considering Gilbard's. I'm afraid our schedule is unusually crowded for the fall season. Why don't you try Sotheby's?'

For a man of his bulk, Stefan did a good job of imitating a capering circus bear in the elevator going down to the lobby of the Highbridge.

'Now, Stefan,' Echo said serenely.

'But I loved seeing dear old Carwood go into the crapper.'

'I didn't realize he was another of your old enemies.'

'Enemy? I don't hold Charles in such high regard. He's simply a pompous ass. If he were mugged for his wits, he would only impoverish the thief. So tell me, who perpetrated the fraud?'

'Not sure. Either Fimmel or Arzate. Anyway, you can't get a fake Herrera past me.'

'I'm sure it helps to have a photographic memory.'

Echo grinned.

'Perhaps you should be doing my job.'