The Tempest (11 page)

 

Chapter Eighteen

H
unter fed Winston and began the drive west, across the narrow creeks and farm fields toward the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. Dave Crowe had agreed to meet with her at Fred's Crab House on the water in Anne Arundel County. Not “halfway” to D.C. as he called it, but close enough.

Crowe was a different man after a few drinks in the evening than he was sober behind his desk downtown during the day. Night and day, literally and figuratively. Hunter had benefited from this transformation in the past, when he'd told her more than he should have about the FBI's investigation into what became known as the Psalmist case, for instance. But she also worried about him drinking and driving, and vowed she would end this at a reasonable hour.

She'd just started up the eastern ramp to the Bay Bridge when her cell phone rang. Marc Devlin's name came up. Hunter raised her windows, so she could hear.

“Miss Hunter? I just wanted to apologize.”

“For?”

She thought for a moment that Devlin had been the heavy breather; that he was calling to say he was sorry.

“I couldn't talk openly in the gallery earlier,” he said. “The place is wired, for audio and video. Everything that happens there, she sees it. Mrs. Empress.” A truck whooshed by, and Hunter missed a few words of what he said next. “I wonder if I could meet with you, just for a ­couple minutes. I have a few things . . . Are you busy tonight?”

“Actually, I'm on my way over the Bay Bridge right now on business. What's it about?”

“I just wanted to say—­that I sort of
did
know Susie Champlain. I told you I didn't know her. Well, I sort of did.”

“Okay.”

“I mean, not
intimately
or anything. But—­I'm the one who put her art up in the gallery, to be honest with you,” he said. “And Mrs. Empress took it down. I wasn't authorized to do that. She made that very clear.”

“When was this?”

“Beginning of July.”

“Why'd she take it down?”

“It wasn't a good match with our clientele, she said. She was afraid it might scare ­people off. If it's not duck decoys or sailboat pictures, they tend to become very uncomfortable.”

Devlin sounded much more natural than he'd seemed in person. Hunter liked the slow cadence of his voice, which had some sideways Southern inflections.

“So how'd you come to know Susan?” she said, gazing at the brightening lights of the Western Shore past the bridge.

“Oh, I didn't
know
her. But I ran into her a ­couple of times, and we got to talking. I mean—­a total of maybe four or five times, at most. Just chitchat, mostly, you know.”

“When was the last?”

“The last? Oh—­the last time? Was . . . Tuesday morning, I guess, outside the library.”

The same day she had talked with Pastor Bowers.

“And what time was this?”

“Well, the gallery opened at noon and I open the gallery. So, it must've been eleven thirty. Eleven thirty-­ish.”

“So, the day before she died.”

“Right.”

“What did you talk about? What was her state of mind?”

“Actually, we didn't. She was kind of jammed up that day, like she
couldn'
t talk.”

“Jammed up.”

“Well, yeah, stressed out. She kind of gave me the cold shoulder, if you want to be honest. I was kind of like—­ohhhhhh-­kay.”

“Any idea what caused it?”

“Caused it? No. Not a clue. I'd never have taken her for doing that kind of artwork,” he added incongruously. “I think she must've had a
very
abstract mind. She was a mystery girl, really, that's what I thought. You know that Roy Orbison song?”

“Mmm-­mmm,” Hunter said. She knew
Pretty Woman
.

“The other thing is, if you're interested, I could probably tell you a few things about Mrs. Empress.”

“Oh? What sorts of things?”

“Fraudulent appraisals? Faked provenances? I mean, if you ever wanted to look into it. I'm probably not going to stay there beyond the summer, anyway.”

“Okay. Thanks,” Hunter said, “but I do homicides, I don't investigate art fraud. I'll be in touch about Susan, though. Can I call on you for follow-­up?”

“Oh. Of course. By all means.”

He sounded quite happy about the prospect.

“I
'M A LIT
TLE
worried about Amy Hunter, if you want to know the truth,” Charlotte Bowers said.

“Really?”

Luke turned from the stove, where he was sautéing scallops. Charlotte was sitting at the table, drinking wine, keeping him company. Luke had stopped at Kent's on his way home and was preparing his seared scallops with mango salsa, one of Charlotte's favorites, to celebrate their decision to introduce a new Bowers into the world.

“I just worry that she's too independent and it's going to catch up with her before long.”

“Well,” Luke said. “I think Hunter's pretty good at handling herself, actually.”

“Oh, I know you do,” she said, giving him a saucy look.

Luke turned back to his scallops. “So,” he said. “Is that one of the things?”

“Things?”

“You said you had two things to tell me tonight.”

“Oh. No.” Charlotte laughed. “It's just that I wonder about this Scott Randall and what his intentions are. I had a funny vibe about him.”

“We all did, didn't we?”

Perhaps coincidentally, Sneakers raised his head then and looked up at Charlotte. Then he returned his chin to the floor.

“I wonder what Amy Hunter thinks about him.”

“I guess we both do,” Luke said, stirring the scallops.

“So how about we invite her to dinner? She's never even been to the house. At least as far as I know.”

“Really?”

Charlotte eyed him mischievously. “To which part?”

“Inviting her.”

“Yes. Really. That was one of the things.”

“Okay. Good.” He liked that Charlotte was suggesting this.

“Let's see if she's free over the weekend.”

“I'll ask her,” he said. “Good idea.”

Charlotte smiled at him, ambiguously. They ate Luke's dinner on the back deck, drinking wine, talking about the future. The sun deepened to a warm orange-­copper shade that seemed to settle into the wetlands before dimming into darkness.
A year from now, we might be living somewhere else, raising a child
: it was an exciting feeling.

“You said two things,” Luke reminded her.

“Oh, yeah,” Charlotte said. “The second was just that I thought we could work on our project later. After dinner.”

Luke smiled, looking at the long, brightening stretch of the Bay Bridge. “Another good idea,” he said.

D
AVE
C
ROWE WAS
seated on the large screened porch by the docks. Behind him a cabin cruiser was coming in, blasting a familiar country music song. The restaurant was something of a cliché, with a captain's wheel, dark wood tables covered with butcher paper, fishnets hanging from the ceilings, lots of neon beer signs behind the bar. It wasn't the place Hunter would've picked for a quiet conversation.

“Why doesn't it surprise me that you've gotten yourself involved in this?” Crowe said, giving her his self-­assured smile as she sat.

“A question only you can answer, I suspect,” Hunter said.

Crowe watched her unfazed. He was a small, good-­looking man, with nice hair, nice bone structure, dark eyes. He was also married, although, like a number of cops and Bureau agents Hunter had known, he seemed comfortable blurring the lines between what was allowed and what wasn't.

“I received a letter from our old pal, by the way,” he told her, once they'd ordered drinks. “About a week ago.”

“Who's our old pal?”

“August Trumble.”

“Oh.” Hunter went cold. This was the way Crowe did things, his dark eyes nailing her across the table, his cheeks creasing as he smiled. Trumble was the serial killer Hunter had helped put away for life, a man the media had christened the “Psalmist.” It should have been a sore subject between them because Crowe had waged a tug of war with Hunter throughout the case. But he was reinventing the past as he talked, which was one of his specialties.

“He asked how I was. And he asked how
you
were. Fortunately, we don't have to deal with him anymore.”

“Tell me about Scott Randall,” Hunter said.

His eyes did a dance for a moment. “You first. Tell me
your
impression.”

“My impression is that he cares very much about making a case against Walter Kepler. Too much, maybe.”

Crowe was smiling. “There you go. That's it, in a nutshell.”

“Why?”

“Because he can,” Crowe said, touching his drink glass with his fingertips. “Randall's headstrong, and he's finally carved out his own little domain, chief dog of the Stolen Art Division. But keep in mind, this is his third case involving Walter Kepler. Did he tell you that?”

“He did.”

“And Kepler won the other two. My impression? I think this is Randall's last big shot. And he knows it. And frankly? I think he's worried that Kepler's the better chess player. I think the boy's running scared.”

Drink often added a tone of condescension to Crowe's speech, so that he used terms like “the boy” and “the kid,” words he'd never use when sober. It also made him sloppy with his metaphors. Clearly this wasn't his first drink of the day.

“I know a little about that,” Crowe added, “because I worked the last case. Down in Florida. Randall and Selwyn actually were talking about starting a task force to go after Kepler at the time.”

“David Selwyn was the head of art crimes before Randall.”

“That's right. Then Selwyn got kicked upstairs, mostly because there wasn't room for the both of them. Selwyn got to the point that he didn't want to look at Randall's face anymore, that's what he told me.” His cheeks creased as he grinned.

“Randall made Kepler out as a bad guy,” Hunter said. “He told me he thinks he has ties to terrorism. True?”

Crowe tilted his drink glass. He seemed briefly fascinated with how the light changed in the whiskey. “It's a big point of contention within the Bureau,” he said. “I don't think so. I think Kepler is smart. Randall thinks he's just bad. Bad draws more resources. He wants to Escobar-­size the man to gin up interest. Did he try to recruit you?”

Hunter shrug-­nodded.

“The reason I warned you yesterday,” Crowe said, “is because someone else did what you're doing and it didn't end up so well. You ought to know that.”

“What am I doing?” Hunter said. “I'm investigating a homicide in Tidewater County.”

“No. I mean, someone else got involved with Randall, on a deal having to do with Kepler. Up in Philadelphia last year. Someone Randall thought could get him things he couldn't get on his own.”

“Okay. Tell me about that.”

“I wish I could.” Crowe's hands circled his drink glass. He gave her a flinty look. “Actually I'm going to put you in touch with a woman who'll tell you all about it, all right? Ex-­Bureau. She lives out on the Shore, so you won't have to go far. It'd be worth your while. I just need to clear it with her first.”

This, too, was typical Crowe, drawing out the drama.

“Why is Randall so fixated on Kepler?” she said. “I don't get that.”

“Obsession.” Crowe shrugged, gripping his drink. “He's got it in his head that the man's a killer. And I'm sure it pisses him off that Kepler sees himself as some kind of Robin Hood of the art world.”

“Is
he a killer?”

“No.” His eyes took in the deck, then returned to her. “
I
don't think he is. But . . . There
is
another theory. Which Randall, I'm sure, didn't mention to you.” Hunter nodded. “It's the theory that Kepler has a partner. And it's the partner who does the dirty work. That's the real point of contention. Helen Bradbury, this woman I'm going to put you in touch with, tried to push that agenda. I did, too, insomuch as I could. But Randall fought her every step of the way. Every
step.

“Now, I'm not saying Kepler
isn't
a bad guy,” he went on. “But he's also a smart guy, like I say. I'd be more concerned about the smart than the bad. He's a very hard man to pin down, you'll find.” Crowe took a long drink of his bourbon. “Let me ask you slomething,” he said. “You know how many objects were stolen in that Gardner deal?”

“Thirteen? I think.” Did he just say
slomething
?

“That's right.” He smiled up at her for an instant. “The works were split up. The Vermeer went overseas, it was sold off in the South of France, we think, in the late nineties. Two of the others were sold to a Corsican group. And one of those two, the Manet, was down in the Miami area for a while. Kepler tried to broker its sale there last year.” This was the sort of information Crowe wasn't supposed to talk about and never would have if he hadn't been drinking. “That's the deal I was involved in.”

“So this isn't Randall's first connection with Gardner art.”

“No, second. Kepler was the broker. He represented a buyer who was willing to pay two or three million for the Manet, if Kepler could locate it. The day Kepler's seller was supposed to show the work, he disappeared. It ended right there. I think Kepler saw red flags, took the money and ran.”

“Who was the buyer?”

“Supposedly some sultan type in Dubai.” He gave her a quick, sly smile. “That was the cover story, anyway. The real buyer was Uncle Sam—­although you didn't hear that from me.
That
was the real problem. It was supposed to be run as a sting. But Randall got overconfident, and sloppy. He thought he could get the painting and Kepler in one swoop. They got nothing, and Kepler walked away with some of the government's money—­an upfront broker's fee, basically. We don't know for sure that Kepler really even had the painting; my guess is that he didn't. That's when Selwyn parachuted out, right after that; he thought Randall was too much of a loose cannon. Randall blamed others, of course, as he always does. And he was promoted, as a result.”