housed a psychiatrist’s office. Two were lawyers’ offices. A brass plaque that read glen hughes, art consultant was screwed into the wall to the right of Hughes’ bright red door.
There was no knocker and no buzzer. Ava rapped on the door and waited. No answer. She rapped again. No answer. She was trying to extract her cellphone from her bag when the door was flung open.
Glen Hughes towered over her. He was at least six foot four, long and lean like his brother, but his blow-dried dark blond hair hung down over his ears. He was wearing blue silk pyjamas, and Ava wondered if she had woken him until she saw the cup in his hand. “Ms. Lee, right on time,” he said, and then stood aside to let her pass. “Go through to the first door on the left,” he directed.
The hallway had dark oak floors, pearl-white walls, and a ceiling that was a facsimile of the Sistine Chapel’s. Ava couldn’t help but stare, her mouth slightly ajar.
“It’s striking, isn’t it? I wish I could say it was my idea, but the previous occupant was a rabid Roman Catholic,” Hughes said.
She turned left into what was obviously his office. It had the same dark oak floor but was covered with a rich, glorious Persian rug. Rows of paintings hung three and four high. There was an antique desk, and behind it was a floor-to-ceiling bookcase, every inch filled. In front of the desk were two delicate wooden chairs, their seats upholstered in white silk.
Ava couldn’t remember ever entering a room that was quite so opulent, so beautifully put together, and the words tumbled from her mouth before she could think. “This is stunning.”
“Why, thank you. We do try to represent our values and tastes in everything we do,” he said.
He was behind her, and when she turned, his face was not more than a foot from hers. She saw the long, pointed nose, the chin that ended sharply, the thin red lips. But it was his eyes that held her attention. Helga had said it looked as if he had one large eye, and at that close proximity Ava had the same sensation. The eyes were blue like his brother’s, but not so open, not in the least curious. Dead — that’s the right word, Ava thought.
She sat without being asked and he moved to the chair behind the desk. “Would you like something to drink?” he asked as he settled in.
“No, I’m fine.”
He smiled at her. “So here we have the vicious little Ms. Lee.”
“That isn’t a word I would choose to describe myself.”
“And what word would you choose?”
“I’m an accountant.”
“I know you are.”
He’s awfully casual, she thought, and remembered Edwin Hughes’ description of his brother as cocky. His reference to her as an accountant, his whole manner, was a bit unsettling. Had she told Edwin she was an accountant? She couldn’t remember.
“You quite panicked my brother, you know, putting ideas about prison — not to mention disgrace and bankruptcy — into his head.”
“This is a serious business.”
“A man selling newspapers on a street corner thinks he’s involved in a serious business. Isn’t it all a matter of perspective?”
Ava sat back in the chair and tried to engage Glen Hughes’ eyes, but they were wandering, almost blissfully, from painting to painting. She said, “Edwin told you about the information I have?”
“About the three paintings Maurice O’Toole did for us? About your threat to write to Harold Holmes and the rest? About the million dollars you intend to extort from us?”
Ava felt her stomach turn. “I beg your pardon?”
“It’s an entire crock,” Hughes boomed.
“Mr. Hughes, I have proof positive that you and your brother commissioned and sold three fake paintings to some of the most prestigious collectors in the United Kingdom.”
“I know that, but that’s not why you’re here, is it, Ms. Lee? You have no interest in a million dollars.”
“What are you trying to say?” she asked.
“You’re here about the Fauvist pieces I sold to that ignorant amateur in Hong Kong. What was his name? Kwan? Wang? Wing?”
So Edwin told him absolutely everything, she thought. “Kwong,” she said.
“Yes, Mr. Kwong. That’s why you’re here.”
He stared triumphantly at her. A man full of himself, a man who loves to hear himself talk, she thought.
“I know all about what you’re up to,” he said, as if he had just scored a debating point.
“And what is that?”
“You want me to repay the money that some fool in China paid Kwong for that art.”
Ava closed her eyes. “Yes, that’s why I’m here,” she said.
“And my understanding is that you intend to use O’Toole’s rather excellent Manet and Modiglianis as your bargaining chips. Pay in China, save our skins in the U.K. and here. That’s the general idea, yes?”
“Yes,” she said, wondering what Edwin hadn’t told him.
He had been holding the cup in his hand, letting it hover in midair, a prop. Now he placed it gently on the saucer. Ava noticed a tiny dribble of saliva at the corner of his mouth. He’s more agitated than he’s letting on, she thought.
“Before we go down that rather complicated path I would like to see the proof you supposedly have. Edwin did go on about it, but he has less experience with this kind of thing and is prone to overreact. You have no objections, I assume?”
Ava removed the rubber band from the files she’d been carrying. She found the file with records of the Modigliani that had been purchased by Harold Holmes, and passed it to Hughes.
“I need to go to the toilet,” he said. “Do you mind if I take this with me?”
“It’s only a copy,” she said.
“I wasn’t going to flush it,” he said with amusement.
He didn’t look at her as he walked past, but when he brushed by she could smell perfume.
Ava opened her bag and took out the letters she had drafted to the Earl of Moncrieff, Holmes, and Reiner. She put them on Hughes’ desk, turned so that he could read them.
He is a presence, she thought, a man who can fill a room. Without him the room took on a different character: more serene, more exquisite. She admired the dark oak bookcase, which soared at least fourteen feet to the ceiling. Her eyes skimmed over the book titles — art tomes, all of them. Then she turned and looked at the walls, which were covered in paintings. Many of them were abstract, though scattered among them was an occasional object, a landscape, a portrait. She remembered Edwin Hughes saying that his brother had an eye for what would be hot. The paintings seemed to fairly represent that notion.
Glen Hughes re-entered the room with a burst of energy that put Ava on immediate guard. He saw her flinch and smiled. He swept past her and sat behind his desk, putting his feet, encased in Calvin Klein slippers, up on it. He held the file aloft before tossing it back to her. “Unfortunately for me, Maurice seems to have been as careful with his record-keeping as he was with his painting,” he said.
She hadn’t expected complete capitulation. “I left those letters on your desk,” she said slowly. “Those will be sent to the gentlemen mentioned if we can’t reach an agreement.”
“If I don’t concede to your extortion, you mean?”
“If you wish to put it like that.”
Hughes had long, slender fingers. His nails were manicured and lacquered. He put his index finger on the letters and slid them back to her. “I don’t need to read these. I am quite sure, as Edwin said, that they would result in our destruction,” he said casually.
“So where does that leave us?” Ava asked.
“Trying to make an arrangement,” Hughes said.
“I believe you have something in mind already,” Ava said.
“First of all, I’d like to know just how much money you think we’re talking about.”
“Seventy-three million.”
Hughes ran his fingers through his hair, only to have it flop immediately back into place. “That seems to be about right,” he said.
