Murder at the Falls (14 page)

“Do you know what triggered it?”

“I would guess it was the painting he was looking at. He was staring at it as if it were going to jump off the wall and bite him. Though it didn’t happen right away. He had been looking at it for a while before he freaked out.”

“Do you remember which painting it was?” Charlotte asked.

“It was a painting of a diner by Ed Verre. It was also a diner painting by Verre that triggered his attack at the Montclair Art Museum, from what I understand.”

Charlotte took a sharp breath.

“What is it?” asked Mary Catherine, clearly unaware that it was also a Verre painting of a diner which had triggered the latest attack.

“Nothing,” said Charlotte. “Listen, do you by any chance have a slide of that painting that I could look at?”

“Better than that, I have a catalog. We don’t usually do catalogs—as you know, they’re very expensive—but we did one for this show. We anticipated some big buyers.” She turned to the receptionist. “Jackie, will you please get Ms. Graham a catalog from the photorealist show?”

The receptionist shuffled off toward the back again.

“Tell me”—Mary Catherine nodded toward the receptionist—“was she pleasant when you came in? Or did she give you the cold shoulder?”

“The latter,” said Charlotte.

“I hate that. She came to me from another gallery, where they think the more attitude a receptionist gives, the better. I’ve instructed her that that’s not the way we do business here, but she doesn’t listen. I may have to get rid of her. But it’s hard to find experienced people.”

Charlotte tried to look sympathetic.

The receptionist returned momentarily with the catalog, which she handed to Mary Catherine. Leafing through the pages, she opened it to the painting in question. “This is the one,” she said.

It was a painting of the Falls View Diner—an exterior view, as opposed to the Verre in the museum show, which depicted the interior. The title was “Falls View Diner on a Rainy Spring Night.”

“Can you tell me anything about the artist?” asked Charlotte.

“Not much. He sent in his slides about a year ago, and I immediately recognized a major talent. He came out of nowhere, had only just started painting. This was his first exhibit. It was as if he had sprung full-blown like Venus from the head of Jupiter.”

“What about his personal life?” she asked.

“He lives in Paterson. I can give you the address.” She turned to the receptionist again, and asked her to write down Verre’s address. “Beyond that, I don’t know much. I’ve never actually met him. He’s kind of reclusive—he didn’t even show up for the opening.”

“What about the painting?” asked Charlotte. “Did anyone buy it?”

“Yes. Morris and Evelyn Finder. They got a bargain, too. In a few years, Verre’s paintings are going to be worth ten times their present value. We get young painters in here all the time who think that because they can paint in the photorealist style their paintings are going to bring the same prices as a Spiegel. Often, they do command good prices—for a while. Randy Goslau was a good example of what I’m talking about. But they don’t last. The only reason Randy had any continuing success was the popularity of his subject matter. And, of course, his connection with Don Spiegel. But if diner art were to have gone out of fashion, he would have had to hang up his paintbrush. These young painters don’t understand that copying isn’t what it’s all about. They have to have the technical skill, yes; but they also have to have a vision. The Finders could spot that right away about Verre: the difference between a copyist and an artist. That’s what makes them such great collectors. Do you know them?”

“A little. My husband knows them very well, of course.”

“They’re very nice people. Maybe they’ll let you take a look at the painting. It’s really quite magnificent.”

Charlotte thanked her for the suggestion. “May I pay for this?” she asked, holding up the catalog.

“Of course not,” Mary Catherine replied.

“Thank you very much,” said Charlotte, adding: “I don’t see my husband much anymore, but I do still see his daughter, Marsha Lundstrom. Next time I do, I’ll ask her to tell him that you’ve been inquiring about him.”

“Thank you,” said Mary Catherine.

Charlotte was on her way to lunch at a neighborhood café where she used to eat with Jack, when she passed the Bellinger Gallery. The downtown branch of the uptown gallery of the same name, the Bellinger was the most prestigious gallery in Soho. Its founder, Winston Bellinger, had made a name for himself as an early supporter of the works of the abstract expressionists, and these now-established artists still comprised the bulk of the works at his uptown gallery. The newer, downtown gallery was devoted to younger, more experimental artists. Jack had bought paintings from both galleries, but more so in recent years from the downtown gallery, the prices for the works of the early abstract expressionists having soared out of reach for all but the wealthiest collectors. In the course of his collecting, Charlotte and Jack had become quite friendly with Bellinger’s daughter, Ellen, who managed the downtown branch.

Diana Nelson had named Mary Catherine Koreman as one person who might have had a motive for killing Randy. If there was anyone who could shed further light on the relationship between Randy and the gallery owner, it was Ellen Bellinger.

Charlotte was still thinking about dropping in at the Bellinger when she nearly collided with Ellen, who was just on her way out. She was a young woman, full of energy and enthusiasm for her work.

Within minutes, Ellen had ushered Charlotte into her office, and was treating her to a cup of coffee and the lowdown on the Koreman. Yes, it was true that Randy had been shaking down the Koreman for the Lumkins’ business, Ellen told her. “From what I understand, Mary Catherine paid him a kickback of twenty percent on every painting that the Lumkins bought,” she said.

“How much do you estimate the Lumkins spent there in a year?”

“Oh, I have no idea. But it must have been in the hundreds of thousands, maybe even a million or more, which meant a pretty penny for Randy.” She went on: “At least, however, Randy limited his extortion activities to the Koreman Gallery. If on occasion the Lumkins bought something from our gallery, he didn’t hassle us. Which is not the case with Mary Catherine Koreman.”

“What do you mean?” asked Charlotte.

“Now that Randy’s dead, Mary Catherine isn’t content with getting most of the Lumkins’ business. She wants a cut of the business they do with other galleries too. We had a little visit yesterday from her husband, who informed us that if we wanted to continue doing business with the Lumkins, we had to go through them.”

“Which means that they take a commission.”

Ellen nodded. “Twenty percent. Not only are they saving the twenty percent they used to pay Randy, they’re getting twenty percent on everyone else’s paintings too.”

“Do they need the money?” Charlotte asked.

“I don’t think so. As far as I know, they’re doing very well. But that has nothing to do with what drives people to accumulate more. Did Michael Milken need more money?” she asked, referring to the stockbroker who had recently been indicted for insider trading.

“True,” said Charlotte.

“Then there’s the label scam,” Ellen continued.

“What’s that?”

“A painting generally has a card on the back giving its provenance: who owned it before, and when. The savvy buyer will peek at the back to see if the painting came from another gallery. If it did, he can then call the other gallery and ask, ‘Do you by any chance have a Spiegel?’”

“Thereby sidestepping the consignment markup.”

“Exactly. It’s a little game we all play. But Mary Catherine routinely takes the cards off the back of her consignment pieces and replaces them with phony cards. Which is strictly
verboten
.”

So it was questions about her less-than-kosher business practices that Mary Catherine had been anticipating, thought Charlotte. She was a much sharper businesswoman than Charlotte had believed.

Ellen looked at her watch. “I’m really sorry, but I have to get going. I have an appointment in fifteen minutes.”

“These are just the kinds of things that I wanted to find out about,” said Charlotte. “I really appreciate your help.”

“Good luck,” Ellen replied. “If there’s anything else I can do …”

“As a matter of fact, there is,” said Charlotte. As they headed out to the street, she explained about the disappearance of the twelve paintings that Don Spiegel had given to Randy.

“The same paintings that were claimed by Bernice Spiegel?”

“Yes. If you hear anything about them, will you let me know?”

Ellen agreed, and they parted in front of the building.

Charlotte continued on in the direction of the café, and then changed her mind when she saw a sign on the side of a building that read:
WORLD’S GREATEST DINER RIGHT AROUND THE CORNER
. She was catching Tom’s disease, she thought as she followed the painted arrow to the Moondance, a tiny diner that stood in a lot at the corner of Grand Street and Sixth Avenue, and whose slogan was “It’s a wonderful night for a moondance.”

Though Tom would have sneered at the chef’s diploma from the Culinary Institute of America hanging over the soda dispenser; the signs advertising champagne, cappuccino, and the “mineral water of the week”; and the self-conscious retro chic of the renovation, Charlotte found it charming. After placing her order for the daily breakfast specialty, banana pancakes with Dutch cream, and a cup of coffee—she settled in at the counter with her catalog from the Koreman.

Unlike Verre’s painting of the Falls View in the museum show, which gave the impression that the artist had set up his easel right behind the two men at the counter, this painting was a long shot. It might have been painted from across the street. The diner sat squarely in the middle of the canvas surrounded by the parking lot, which was complete with cars: a couple of nondescript sedans, an enormous truck, and an old van with Michigan license plates. There were seven or eight customers: three men sitting at the counter, and several others in the booths. The grill man was busy at the grill, his back turned to the viewer. As the title said, it was a rainy spring night. The leaves on the trees growing on the river bank behind the diner were only just beginning to come out. The magnificence that Mary Catherine had spoken of came from the technical challenge of painting a rainy night scene. The painting seemed to shimmer with reflections: in the wet glass of the diner’s windows, in the puddles in the parking lot, on the chrome bumpers of the cars. There was also the rain itself, which the glowing pink of the diner’s neon sign turned to colored mist.

The painting told her exactly nothing, except that Verre was a far better painter than Randy could ever have been. She could see why Mary Catherine had called him a major talent. The painting reminded her of Edward Hopper’s famous painting, “Nighthawks.” It had a haunting, dreamlike beauty, capturing perfectly the ambivalent mood—a strange combination of the cozy and the alienating—of the wee hours at a diner on a rainy spring night.

Could it be that Randy’s reaction had been a magnified form of
angst
? she wondered: a recognition that despite the substantial prices collectors paid for his paintings, he, as Mary Catherine had said, was a painter of little talent whose work wouldn’t stand the test of time.

Finishing her banana pancakes, which were delicious (as far as she was concerned, a diploma from the Culinary Institute could do nothing but improve the quality of diner food), she headed back to her car for the trip out to Paterson.

Charlotte and Martinez struck pay dirt—in the form of the neighborhood busybody—at the first house they visited, a split level directly opposite the spot where the access road to Randy’s camp joined the main road. The owner was a tall, thin woman in her sixties, with a giraffe-like face to match. Although it was nearly four, her hair was still in curlers, which were covered by a souvenir scarf from the Statue of Liberty, and she was wearing a pink-flowered housecoat. Holding the chained door open a crack, she peered out at them suspiciously over the tops of her reading glasses. But once Martinez had showed her his badge and explained what they were there for, her expression changed to one of rapt interest. And when he followed this with the photo of Arthur Lumkin, she hastily unchained the door and ushered them in.

“What took you so long?” she complained as they entered. “I’ve been expecting you ever since I heard that that Goslau man had been murdered. If I didn’t hear from you soon, I was going to march myself right on down to the police station, and give you the dirt. You can call off your investigation,” she announced. “I can tell you who did it. That man.” She waved a long, bony finger at the photograph. “I even predicted it. I told my neighbor, Mrs. Anderson”—she waved an arm in the direction of the neighboring house—“that no good was going to come from his hanging around here like that. He’s the husband.” She peered at Martinez over the tops of her glasses again. “Am I right?”

“Yes, you’re right,” said Martinez. He pulled a notebook out of his pocket. “Can you tell me your name, please?” he asked.

Charlotte now knew why Voorhees had wanted her help. Martinez had said hardly a word on their hour-long journey out, and he was barely doing much better now. He was as silent as Voorhees was garrulous.

“Marion Blakely,” she replied. “Sit down,” she added, directing them across a plastic runner to easy chairs that were also covered with plastic. “I’ll tell you all about it.”

As Charlotte crossed the room, Mrs. Blakely stared at her curiously. “Do I know you?” she asked.

“I don’t think so,” said Charlotte.

“That’s funny. You look very familiar. Maybe I knew you in another life.” She laughed, a kind of rumbling cackle. “Anyway, you want to know the who, what, when, where, and why.” She looked at Martinez. “Right?”

Martinez nodded.

“Well, I’m the one who can give it to you. He started coming around here last December. Just after Goslau took up with that strumpet. The outfits that woman wore would shock the britches off the devil himself. Shortly after that—February maybe, Goslau brought in that diner just for her: the Short Stop. Felix—he’s the caretaker—told me about it. It’s all done up in ruffles and pink satin.…”