Consigned to Death

transitory. The big difference was that for the first time, I believed that things would get better. Mrs. Cabot was still in shock; for her, the bitter alone-ness hadn’t yet begun.

“It’s okay,” I said, finally.

“I don’t know what to do,” she said in a whisper.

Just after eleven that night, showered and wrapped in my favorite pink chenille robe, I sat on a window seat in my kitchen with my feet tucked under me, sipping, at last, my first martini of the day. The creamy cold gin soothed and calmed me.

Staring across the silver-lit meadow that backed into a thick forest, it occurred to me that I could picture Andi somehow being involved in sneaking the Renoir into my warehouse, and maybe even in her grandfather’s death. While it seemed absurd to think that Mrs. Cabot would have snuck into my warehouse and hidden behind my crates. I could easily picture Andi skulking about, her face pinched with anger. But why would she have done so? Nothing added up.

Still, her anger seemed beyond reason. Could she really be involved? No, I told myself. Such a thing would be incredible! Yet even as I silently spoke the word, a picture of her blazing eyes and sneering lips came to mind. Maybe. I shook my head, incredulous at the thought. Maybe it was true.

I realized that if I’d been thinking like a detective, I would have looked at her feet. As it was, I hadn’t once noticed either Mrs. Cabot’s or Andi’s shoes, so I had no idea whether their sizes might be nine narrow.

I needed to stop thinking.

“Chicken,” I said aloud, and smiled. “I’ll make Monterey chicken tomorrow night or Sunday.” I liked to cook, and I was good at it. Whenever I want to improve my mood, I cook.

When I was thirteen, just days before my mother’s death from lung cancer, she’d made a ceremonial presentation of her recipe box. Her handwritten index cards contained a treasure trove of family favorites, and I’d made them all, adapting the proportions so I could cook for two, and lately, for one.

I’d make Monterey chicken tomorrow or the next day, but tonight my mind wouldn’t be silenced. I sipped my drink and thought about Mr. Grant’s paintings, the Jules Tavernier garden scenes.

It wasn’t unheard of for a curator or owner intent on protecting a treasured canvas to arrange for an artist to paint a second image over the first, secure that the priceless original would remain safely disguised. Once the danger had passed, the second layer of paint could be removed. But Tavernier had died in the 1800s, so he couldn’t have worked to disguise paintings stolen by the Nazis. Yet there was something about those paintings that seemed out of whack.

I reviewed what I knew about them. They were among the least valuable of Mr. Grant’s possessions. Yet they were the most valuable of all the artwork I’d seen. The other paintings were inexpensive reproductions, and there weren’t many of them. It’s odd, I thought, that the Grants would have reproductions in that houseful of treasures. And not many of those. Mostly the walls were decorated with family photographs. There was something else, but whatever it was escaped me.

I sipped my martini and stared out into the silvery night. Seeing the light shimmer on the fluttering tall grasses reminded me of a toast my father coined, meaningless, but pleasing nonetheless: To silver light in the dark of night, he’d say, and raise his glass. I mouthed the words, lifted my drink, and was relieved that I didn’t cry. Progress, I told myself. If I could repeat my father’s toast and stay dry eyed, I was definitely making progress.

As I watched the gently shifting shadows caused by the pale moonlight and a light breeze, I realized that, as the crow flies, Alverez was probably less than five miles away. Fox Point Road, where he lived, was on the other side of the meadow, past the stand of birch and maple trees that flanked the forest on the edge of the property, on the other side of a small tributary called Knight Branch.

I wondered if he was sleeping, or if perhaps he was wakeful, looking out of his window, thinking of me. Remembering the magnetism we’d shared, I became tearful, grateful that my ability to respond to a man and feel womanly, which for so long had been attenuated, was intact.

It was close to midnight when I took a last sip of my second martini, finally relaxed enough to sleep. Just as I was swinging my feet to the floor, the phone rang, startling me.

“Hello,” I said, braced for trouble.

“How ya doing? It’s Wes. I hope I’m not calling too late.”

“No,” I said. “I’m awake.” Wow, I thought, Wes does quick work. Could he have answers to my questions already?

“About what I said, that I’d like to interview you. I wanted to let you know that if you changed your mind, I’ll be at the paper tomorrow morning after nine.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know,” he said, “the interview.”

“What interview?” I felt as if I’d wandered into a hall of mirrors. Nothing was as it appeared. Had I gone insane-agreeing to an interview with Wes Smith? It wasn’t possible.

“Yesterday. You asked that I call you.”

And with those words, I finally understood that Wes was being discreet. He knew I hadn’t agreed to an interview-he was being careful, which could only mean that he was assuming that my phone was tapped. Whether it was tapped or not, he was smart to presume that it was, and I was stupid not to have thought of it before.

“Ha, ha, Wes. I told you,” I said, playing along, “I won’t talk to you. Besides which, I have the auction tomorrow-and the tag sale.”

“When do they start?”

“I need to be there by nine.”

“Okay. I’ll be at the Portsmouth Diner at seven.”

“Is that the place by the Circle?” I asked, thinking that we weren’t doing a very good job of being circumspect, and that anyone listening to our conversation would know we were arranging to meet.

“Yeah, that’s the joint.”

“Well, I’ve told you that I won’t talk to you,” I repeated, wanting to be on the record, in case the call was, in fact, being taped, and Max ever needed to defend me against a charge of interfering with an official investigation.

“I understand,” he answered. “Just in case, write down my cell number.”

I did, told him good night, and hung up.

Wes sounded confident, even excited, and it was contagious. That must mean that he had answers he knew I’d be glad to hear. I couldn’t imagine what they were, but I allowed myself to feel optimistic.

I smiled as I climbed the stairs, and I was still smiling as I fell asleep.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Wes was leaning against an old dark blue Toyota in the parking lot of the Portsmouth Diner when I pulled in just before seven. It was thickly overcast and cold, and he wore a red-and-black checked woolen jacket buttoned to his chin.

I pulled up near the front in response to Wes’s signal. I lowered my window and he said, “Go ahead and park. I’ll drive.”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“You’ll see.”

“Wait a sec!” I called as he walked away. From the back, he appeared rounder than he had from the front. If he wasn’t careful, he’d be fat before he was thirty. “What about breakfast?”

“Later.”

I pulled into a space and hurried to his car. Looking in, I spotted crumpled-up coffee cups, candy wrappers, and fast-food bags covering the floor in back, stacks of papers haphazardly placed on the backseat, and a portable CD player wedged between a scuffed, old briefcase and a battered CD storage case. It was a pit.

Reaching across from the driver’s side, Wes swept crumbs from the front seat onto the floor. Gingerly, I sat