might be dead, I would believe them asleep, for their skin fairly hums with light.
But I do know.
The man who painted these images sat or stood before petrified human beings, absorbing the hard metallic odor unique to sweat produced by terror. Unless the women were already dead when he painted them. How long could he have stood that? Staying in the room with dead women while they decomposed? I’ve photographed a lot of corpses, and close proximity with them isn’t something easily endured. But perhaps for some people it’s no hardship. Perhaps for some it’s actually pleasurable, though after a while, even a necrophiliac would have to be driven off by the smell alone. Or is even that a naive assumption?
“How long would it take to paint these?” I ask Kaiser, sotto voce.
“Experts say two to six days. I don’t know what they’re basing that on. I read in a book last night that the Impressionists believed you should start and finish a painting at one sitting.”
“If the women are dead, do you think he could be preserving them somehow before painting them? Embalming them?”
“It’s possible.”
I fire off two more shots of the last painting. “Look at this picture. What do you see? Is this woman dead or alive?”
He walks closer to the canvas and studies the woman.
“I can’t tell,” he says at length. “There’s nothing obvious that says death to me. Her eyes are closed, but that’s not conclusive.” He turns back to me, his face thoughtful. “I mean, where’s the line between sleep and death? How far apart are they, really?”
“Ask the dead.”
“I can’t.”
“There’s your answer.” I cap the Mamiya’s lens and remove the last exposed film. “I’m done. Let’s go see de Becque.”
Li appears silently in the archway to my left, like an escort to some other world.
The old Frenchman is waiting in the glass-walled room. He stands with his back to us, a wineglass in his hand, and watches a yacht sail out of the bay into the Caribbean.
“Hello?” I call.
He turns slowly, then gestures toward a matched pair of sofas that face each other before the great window. Li pours wine for us, then vanishes without even a sound of slippers on the granite floor.
“You wish your ‘assistant’ to join us?” de Becque asks, one eyebrow arched.
I turn to Kaiser, who sighs and says, “I’m Special Agent John Kaiser, FBI.”
De Becque walks forward and gives Kaiser’s hand a light shake. “Isn’t that a relief? Deception is a wearying art, and foolish deception the most wearying of all. Please, sit.”
Kaiser and I take one sofa, de Becque the one facing us.
“Why have I brought you here?” the Frenchman says to me. “That is question number one?”
“That’s a good place to start.”
“You’re here because I wanted to see you in the flesh, as they say. It’s that simple. I knew your father in Vietnam. When I learned you were involved in this case, I took steps to meet you.”
“How did you learn Ms. Glass was involved?” asks Kaiser.
De Becque makes a very French gesture with his opened hands, which I translate as
“How did you meet my father?”
“I collect art, and I consider photography an art. At least when performed by certain people. I owned a tea plantation in a strategic part of Vietnam. It provided a good base for those journalists whom I allowed to use it. My table was famed throughout the country, and I enjoy good conversation.”
“And access to information?” Kaiser asks bluntly.
De Becque shrugs. “Information is a commodity, Agent Kaiser, like any other. And I am a businessman.”
“What do you know about my father’s death?”
“I’m not at all sure he died when and where the world believes he did.”
There it is. Spoken by a man in a position to know.
“How could he have survived?”
“First, he disappeared in a very embarrassing place. Embarrassing for the American government, I mean. Second, while the Khmer Rouge generally killed journalists out of hand, not all Cambodians did. I believe Jonathan was shot, yes. But he could well have been nursed back to health. And like you, I’ve heard reports over the years that he has been sighted.”
“If he survived,” says Kaiser, “and he considered you a friend, why wouldn’t he seek you out?”
“He may have. But I had sold my plantation by the time he went missing. If he went there in search of me, he would not have found me. But there’s a simpler answer. By late 1972, Vietnam was not a place anyone would want to return to.”
“Neither was Cambodia,” I point out. “If he didn’t get out before Pol Pot started his genocide, he couldn’t possibly have survived.”
Another shrug. “It is a mystery. But I’ve heard Jonathan was twice sighted in Thailand, and by reliable sources.”
“Do you think he could still be alive?”
A smile of condolence. “That would be too much to hope for, I think.”
“How recent were the sightings you mentioned?”
“The first around 1976. The last in 1980.”
More than twenty years ago. “We’re here for another reason, of course. But would it be all right for me to telephone you later for specifics?”
“I’ll make sure you have my numbers before you go.”
Kaiser leans forward, his wineglass between his knees. “I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“Of course. But I may be selective about my answers.”
“Do you know the identity of the artist who paints the Sleeping Women?”
“I do not.”
“How did his paintings first come to your attention?”
“I was acquainted with Christopher Wingate, the art dealer. I’m in the habit of buying new artists whose work catches my eye. It’s a risk, but all life entails risk, no?”
“Is this purely a business endeavor?”
De Becque’s eyes shine with humor. “It has no connection whatever to business. If I wanted to make money, there are much surer ways.”
“So Wingate introduced you to the Sleeping Women, and-”
“I told him I would buy all he could get me.”
“And he got you five?”
“Yes. I made the mistake of letting certain Asian acquaintances see my paintings. The price skyrocketed overnight. After the fifth, Wingate betrayed me and began selling to the Japanese. But” – de Becque turns up his hands – “who expects honor from a Serb?”
“What initially attracted you to the paintings?”
The Frenchman purses his lips. “Hard to say.”
“Did you have any idea that the subjects might be real women?”
“I assumed they were. Models, of course.”
“Did you have any idea that they might be dead?”
“Not at first. I assumed the poses were of sleep, as everyone else did. But after I saw the fourth, I began to get a feeling. Then I saw the genius of these paintings. They were paintings of death, but not in any way that had been done before.”
