Consigned to Death

“Is that all right? I think they’re worth it, but I don’t want to offer so much if you don’t think I should.”

“No, do it. It’s all right.”

I wished I could give Sasha the gift of confidence, but I couldn’t. She was, it seemed, inherently insecure.

There were fifty-seven volumes in three boxes, all in excellent condition. At a glance, I spotted no incomplete sets, no volumes with missing pages, and no broken bindings. Roy, after fifty years picking, knew the value of what he had and held fast for twelve dollars a volume, an unbelievably high price to pay a picker for miscellaneous leather volumes.

I nodded over his head to Sasha, and swallowing, she made the deal. Gretchen slipped out to go to the safe we kept in a back corner of the warehouse, and returned with the cash. Roy counted it carefully, thanked Sasha, and left, his gait awkward and his steps slow. I figured he had to be approaching seventy-five, and maybe he was even older.

I wasn’t concerned with the high price we’d just paid, since, at the least, we’d triple our expenditure. Gretchen and Sasha repacked the books in the ratty cardboard boxes Roy had hauled into our office, and set them aside to be researched and cleaned.

I told everyone good-bye, and, having forgotten my umbrella again, darted through the rain to my car. As I waited for the defroster to clear the foggy window, the windshield wipers clacking a steady beat, I decided to go to the Blue Dolphin. I still wanted a martini, and given the piercing homesickness I’d just endured, I decided that tonight was definitely not a night to drink alone.

Having wedged my car into a tiny spot on Market Street, I rushed through the drenching rain. I stood for a moment to catch my breath under the copper roof that shielded the restaurant’s entrance, and listened to the echoing, staccato beat as the rain pounded the metal overhang. I was soaked.

Two hours later, it was still raining, and I was still at the bar, finishing my second martini. I was trying to prepare a cover story for the London dealer. I could tell Shelly that my interest in Matisse was general and vague, and, because we’re friends, she’d accept that story with only a little push-back. No way would a big-time art dealer answer hypothetical questions from a stranger on a lark. I needed to have a credible reason for calling.

Home again, the unrelenting rain feeding my feelings of remoteness, I cooked the chicken I’d prepared earlier, and ate one of my favorite meals in lonely isolation.

I reached the dealer, Ian Cummings, in London as Sasha and Fred sat down to watch the video, a copy of Mrs. Grant’s ledger in hand. When I had Cummings on the line, I introduced myself, referring to Shelly, and thanked him for taking the time to talk to me.

“Right,” he said. “So which Matisse are we talking about?”

“I can’t tell you that, I’m afraid. My seller is still on the fence about whether to let it go. Of course, if she decides to do so, I’ll call you first.”

“And you want price information?”

“Yes.” I detailed the range of prices I’d discovered, and explained that I was looking for guidance.

“Well, it’s a little tricky without knowing which painting, but let’s see. Is it an oil?”

“Yes.”

“On canvas?”

“Yes.”

“Quite. What subject matter?”

“A cityscape.”

“Paris?”

“Yes.”

“Size?”

I glanced at my notes. “It’s twenty-eight by twenty-one inches.”

“Provenance?”

“Various owners, all private, no one notable.”

“When was it last on the market?”

“I don’t know. Not for at least a generation.”

“Well, I can’t tell you anything for certain. But if I had to set a price right now, I’d probably aim to goose it just a little. I’d set a range of from one-point-three to one-point-six million pounds, and hope that I could persuade my seller to be satisfied with one-point-one million.”

I did a rough conversion. “In U.S. dollars, then, you’d expect it to go for around two million.”

“Yes, with any luck, more. As much as three million dollars.”

“You’ve been very helpful,” I said. “Thank you.”

Hanging up the phone, I sat for a moment, then put in a call to Alverez. I left a message on his voice mail.

I was about to head downstairs, ready to go over the protocol with Fred, when Sasha poked her head into my office and asked if they could come in.

“Sure. What’s up?” I asked.

“I wanted to show Fred the catalogues.”

I gestured to the wall of shelves. “Go to it.”

I listened as she explained how we organized them. “We have a lot of catalogues of local dealers. It makes sense, since we all tend to carry similar merchandise.”

“Can you rely on them?” Fred asked. A good question, I thought.

“Well, it depends,” Sasha answered. “Like anything else.”

As they started to leave, I asked if they were done with the video, and Sasha said, “Part of it. Fred wants to study it, so I thought I’d show him how we typically research things while we wait for you. Then he can take his time reviewing the tape.”

“Good,” I said. “I’m ready if you guys are.”

They moved chairs near my desk and I went through the steps I’d delineated as I took him through the binder. He nodded and scanned the pages.

“Is this one of the local dealers?” he asked, pointing to the Troudeaux title page.

“Yes,” I said.

“But we don’t think very highly of their research,” Sasha added, twirling her hair. “I mean we use them, but I’d want additional verification.”

“That’s true,” I acknowledged. “Martha Troudeaux does most of their research, and it’s often sketchy and sometimes just dead wrong.”

“Who’s this?” Fred asked, pointing to the editor’s name: M. Turner.

I was about to say that I didn’t know, when Sasha jumped in. “That’s Martha, too. Sometimes she uses her maiden name-Turner. I think it’s to make the company look larger, you know, not a mom-and-pop outfit with everybody in the firm sharing the same name.”

Staring at the page, my mouth fell open. In a flash of clarity, the pieces of the puzzle fell into place. Barney, whose wife, Martha, did most of his research. And who sometimes used her maiden name-Turner. I pictured him at the tag sale, deep in conversation with Paula. Paula Turner. I was willing to bet that Paula was Barney’s niece by marriage. That would explain the call that Wes had told me about, the one made from the Taffy Pull to Mr. Grant. No one in the family would think it was odd for Barney to stop by his wife’s family’s store and borrow the phone.

Roy, the picker, had said that Barney didn’t have the cash to buy the books. And a relatively small amount of cash it was. Less than a thousand dollars. Which must mean that Barney was broke. If Barney was broke, how could he afford the Renoir he’d intended to buy from Mr. Grant?

Maybe he hadn’t had any such intention. Perhaps he hadn’t wanted the Renoir for pride of ownership or even for the commission a sale would bring. The Renoir might have represented a second chance, a way of raising enough cash quickly to save his business, to protect all that he had built up.

I realized that Sasha and Fred were engaged in a lively discussion about verifying research, and I’d missed it all.

“I think we’re all set here,” I said. “Any questions?”