False colors (9 page)

"Could Nick have copied a Van Gogh so perfectly?" "What it takes to copy any painting is technical skill, and knowing how the painter worked. Nick has the skill. And his other stuff shows he's been influenced by the Impressionists. Nick could do it." "It's still pretty wonderful to do such a fine copy, isn't it?" "You really work at building up Accardi, don't you? No, it isn't wonderful. A thousand guys could make a copy of the 'Mona Lisa.' But not one of them could create a Mona Lisa on his own."

Nancy said, "I'm not trying to build up Nick. I'm only trying to figure out why so many people want this painting."

"I can give you part of the answer. You won't like it, though. This is more than just a copy. A crooked dealer could sell it for a fortune. This thing is a forgery."

8.

The echo of my words slithered around the room and came back as a nasty whisper. Nancy looked white and sick. She said weakly, "I don't believe it. Just because he did a very good copy—"

"It's a deliberate fake. It's intended to sell as a real Van Gogh. That's why the painting is so hot."

"You're not being fairl You don't like Nick and so anything he does has to be bad."

"The guy used tricks that no honest painter would pull. I can prove it. Look." I handed her the magnifying glass. "See

those cracks in the paint? They're faked. This painting was done recently and it couldn't have developed cracks. Look at them under the glass. They're too shallow. They don't go deeply into the paint. Those cracks were cut into the paint with a needle."

She looked for a minute, and said, "But why would there have to be cracks to make people think it's a real Van Gogh?"

"People think a crack proves a painting was done long ago. Actually some Van Goghs are cracked and some aren't. But if you're faking a Van Gogh, cracks would help fool people."

"Are the cracks in this painting your only reason for accusing Nick of forgery?"

I gave her a lecture on some of the other things that pointed to forgery. Under the microscope there were tiny grains of color in the paint. That meant the color had been ground by hand; factory-ground colors are so smooth you can't see the grains. Van Gogh had ground most of his own colors while he was working in Aries. Any smart forger would know that, and would use hand-ground colors too.

The wood of the stretcher looked old and stained, and somebody who didn't know much about carpentry had put it together. In Aries, Van Gogh had made his own stretchers. So Nick had gone to a lot of trouble to imitate him in that way.

Nick had done his painting recently, but the varnish on it seemed old. I told Nancy how you could color varnish to make it give a painting the appearance of age. I got very technical and told her that Van Gogh had used a very hard bright chrome yellow, and explained how chrome yellow takes on a mysterious greenish-brown tint as it ages. I pointed out the greenish-brown tint in the chrome yellow Nick had used, and explained how you could fake that effect. Probably she didn't follow half of what I was saying. But one way or another it got home to her. I was just starting to show her that the back of the canvas had been given an aging treatment when she shoved the thing away and began to cry.

I patted her shoulder awkwardly, and muttered, "Nick means a lot to you, doesn't he?"

She said in an angry broken voice, "He doesn't mean anything to me."

"Sure, sure. Just take it easy and—"

"And you don't mean anything to me either!"

I couldn't understand why I was being dragged into this. "Nobody," I said meekly, "ever claimed I did."

"Oh, it's been such a maddening day!" she said furiously. "First I find you playing around with that Raymond woman and then I find Nick playing around with forgeries. I can't trust anybody!"

"Now wait a minute. The two things you're talking about are entirely different. I wasn't playing around with Kay. It—"

"Oh. You admit you were serious."

"You made me come up with a lot of proof about die forgery. But now you accuse me of something without any proof."

"No proof?" she cried. "It was right in front of my eyes. I didn't need a magnifying glass to see it, either. What I needed were sun glasses. I suppose she's just your type. Cheap, flashy, easy to get. You hadn't known her even a day before you were making passes at her. I'm certainly glad I'm not the type that appeals to you."

I walked across the room and back, to cool off. "Don't be too sure of that," I said.

She jumped up and faced me. "You don't scare me one little bit," she said. "You're the kind of man who runs a mile when he sees a nice girl."

The blood in my head was ticking away like coffee coming to a boil. She wasn't the only one who had had a maddening day. "Watch yourself," I said thickly. "Now and then my kind of man starts running the wrong way."

"Any month now you'll work up to holding my hand."

I grabbed her. She had been standing with her arms at her sides and one of my arms locked them so they couldn't move. My free hand came up and got a good grip in her hair. It was lovely soft hair, just the right length if you wanted to drag her around the room. That was a tempting idea but I had a better one. I yanked her head into the right position and kissed her.

My eyes were open and I could see one enormous blue eye, wide with shock, staring at me from an inch away. Then suddenly she closed the eye and her lips parted and her body began to feel like a flame wavering against me.

Inside my head a Fourth of July celebration started, and it didn't seem to be a very safe and sane one. All I had meant to do was teach the girl a lesson. But she seemed to know that one and maybe a couple I hadn't studied yet. I relaxed my grip to let her escape. Her arms linked around my waist, tightened. I couldn't breathe. My hands started out on little whirling trips over her body, like drunken skaters, and I couldn't make them come back. The fireworks in my head were sending out a lot of blinding sparks. With about my last touch of sanity I reached back and grabbed her wrists and pulled her arms away from my waist.

I held her at arm's length, and gasped, "We've got to stop this."

Those blue eyes of hers didn't look like pansies at the moment. More the color of flame from a blowtorch. "Look who got scared first," she said.

"I didn't mean to let it go that far. I—"

"No," she said in a mocking voice, "you didn't. You were merely going to kiss me and give me a horrible fright. It turned out you did run the wrong way, didn't you?"

"But all I-"

"I'm a nice girl, am I?" she said bitterly. "Well let me tell you a nice girl can be just as mean and bad as any Kay Raymond you ever met. So don't try things like that again."

She started walking out of the shop. I followed her, trying to coax her to listen to a few explanations. She reached the street and I told her she couldn't walk home alone this late at night. She paid no attention. A taxi came down Walnut Street and she flagged it.

"Nancy," I said. "Please—"

"We have nothing to discuss. I do not care to talk to you again, ever." She stepped into the cab and slammed the door

and then leaned out and said coldly, "I will expect you to call up tomorrow to apologize."

The cab drove away. I went back into the shop and gave myself a sanity hearing. During the evening I hadn't had a single drink, so obviously I could not be drunk. Nobody had hit me hard enough to give me even a mild concussion. I could repeat the Presidents of the United States in perfect order, not even forgetting Grover Cleveland's two separated terms, so I was not yet losing my mind. But nothing seemed to make sense.

We had been talking in a logical way about Nick and his forgery and then for no reason at all mad things had started to happen. First Nancy had indicated that I was a beast because I liked low women, and then it seemed I was a beast because I didn't like nice girls, and finally I was a beast because I wasn't really very beastly. A little more of this and I could set up business as a zoo. Then there was also the fact that she didn't want to talk to me again but I'd better call up and apologize.

I sighed. There were more ways than one in which a man could lose his head over a girl, and I seemed to be trying out several of them at once.

I turned my attention to the painting on my desk. The thing couldn't be left the way it was, with the top painting peeled back from the forged Van Gogh. The wrong people might get to it, and might not like the idea that Nancy and I shared their secret. I found some light glue and stuck the top painting back into place. Then I slid the canvas under the big blotter on my desk and put heavy books on top so the glue would take hold. I locked the shop carefully and went up to bed.

Nothing went wrong during the rest of the night, and when I checked my desk the next morning the painting was still safe under the blotter. Both the Inquirer and Bulletin had two-column spreads on the front page about what had happened at the one-man show. Several times my phone rang and reporters wanted to know if anything new had developed and if I had any theories about who stole the painting. I told them I had no theories, which was misleading but sort of true, since a theory is a guess and I knew who had stolen it.

I pottered around the shop and made myself wait until mid-afternoon before calling Nancy's house.

A man answered the phone and said, "This is the Vernon residence."

"My name is Peter Meadows," I said. "May I speak to Nancy?"

"How do you do, Mr. Meadows," the man said gravely. "I am William, the Vernon butler. I'm glad you called. I have some messages for you."

"Good. What are they?"

"Ah, let me see. It is now a little past three o'clock. I am instructed to tell you that you certainly took your time about calling."

"Can't you put her on the phone instead of relaying what she says?"

"But Mr. Meadows, she isn't at home."

"How do you know what she wanted you to tell me, then?"

The man cleared his throat. "I have very full written instructions on the subject. Miss Nancy spent quite a while this morning writing them out."

"Where is she?"

"Just a moment, sir. Here we are. Quote. Obviously you have lost all interest in helping Nick so I have gone out to do it myself. Unquote."

I said angrily, "She'll get herself hurt."

"One moment, Mr. Meadows. Quote. I don't suppose that will matter in the least to you. Unquote."

"Now wait a minute. This is fantastic. Do you mean to say she actually wrote out that answer?"

"Yes indeed, Mr. Meadows. She wrote out a number of things you might say, and the answers to them."

"What if I had called at ten o'clock this morning? What would the first comment have been?"

"I'm sorry, sir. You didn't call at ten so I can't tell you."

"Will she have dinner with me tonight?"

"Quote. No. Unquote."

"Can I come around and see her tonight?"

"May I drop the quotes, Mr. Meadows? No."

"When may I see her again?"

"The answer seems to be: That depends."

"Oh, nuts," I said disgustedly.

"Perhaps I had better replace the quotes, Mr. Meadows. Quote. Nuts to you, too. Unquote."

"You're making that up. She couldn't possibly have figured out that I was going to say 'oh nuts.'"

"Really I'm not," he said in a worried tone. "Let me read you her instructions. Quote. If Mr. Meadows makes any remark indicating anger or irritation, please repeat it back to him. For example, if he says tell her she's crazy, tell him he's crazy. Unquote."

"William," I said, breathing hard, "you may tell me I'm crazy."

"Yes sir. Miss Nancy often has that effect on young men."

"All right, William. Thanks for all the messages. Please tell her that I called."

"One moment, sir. Quote. I am not interested in whether or not you called. Unquote. Good-by, sir."

"Good-by," I said dizzily, and hung up.

When I put the phone in its cradle and sat up, I found Miss Krim leaning over my shoulder. She smiled sweetly and said, "I couldn't help overhearing your talk."

"Couldn't help it? You're so close it's a wonder you didn't join in."

"It was too fascinating to miss. Do I understand that you and Miss Vernon have had a disagreement?"

"There isn't any disagreement. She has a poor opinion of me and so do I."

"I think she has a very high opinion of you," Miss Krim said. "The only trouble is, you don't live up to it."

"You've been taking lessons from her in double-talk. Well, I feel a touch of sanity coming on. So I'll go out to look for her and see if I can get rid of it."

I left the office and headed for Nick Accardi's rooming house on South Twenty-second Street. That might be the most logical place to start looking for Nancy. Besides, I wouldn't mind catch-

ing up with Accardi, if I could coax him to exchange a few words instead of punches. The guy might be in this mess deeper than he wanted to be, and might be willing to trade information for some help. When I reached the door of his room this time tire door was locked. I knocked and didn't get an answer. I returned to the first floor and located the landlady's door and knocked on it.

She opened it a few inches and peered out and said, "We don't want none."

I pulled out a ten-dollar bill and waved it at her. "A lot of people do, though," I said.

She examined the bill to see if it had been issued by the Confederacy. "What's this for?" she asked.

"I want to ask a couple of questions. Don't you remember me? I was with the girl who bought those paintings from you in Rittenhouse Square."

"Oh, I remember. Had your face in the papers lately. Not what I would call a good likeness."

"I'm looking for Nick."

"Third floor, back."

"He isn't in. Or anyway he doesn't answer."

"I don't keep track of people's comings and goings. I'll tell that to the police or anybody."

"What makes you think the police are involved in this?"

"The stoiy in the paper today makes it look like Nick 'stole one of them paintings."

"I'm not accusing him of it," I said. "I only want to talk to him. You can help if you will."