Bernhardt's Edge (26 page)

“There're other paintings in the room, then.”

She nodded. “Five. There's a Goya, and a Van Gogh, and a Reubens, and a Braque—and a Rembrandt, too. A Rembrandt self-portrait, the one that was stolen from the Hermitage, six years ago.”

“Jesus—” Once more, he shook his head. “It's incredible. It's absolutely unbelievable, that he'd put himself in that position, a man like that, with so much to lose. He's—Christ—he's receiving stolen goods. He's a common crook.”

“No—” Infinitely weary, she smiled. “No, not a common crook. He's Daniel DuBois. And ordinary laws, meant for ordinary men, don't apply to people like him. You must know that.”

“But the risk—”

“He's been taking risks all his life. Laws mean nothing to him. Stock market manipulations, currency violations, it's all part of the game, for him.”

“That's white-collar crime—dummy companies, numbered bank accounts, money laundering. I can understand that. Whole countries do that. Panama and Colombia, for instance. But to actually—physically—take possession of a stolen painting, something worth millions, to put himself at that kind of risk—” Bernhardt spread his hands. “I can't understand it.”

“It's a compulsion, like drugs. An addiction. That's the only way to understand it. He's possessed by the idea that no one—ever—will be able to see the ‘Three Sisters' but him—at least, not during his lifetime. It's like he possesses a part of Renoir, you see. It's power—the ultimate power, the ultimate possession—better than oil wells, or a few castles. They're just steel and stone, after all. And he—”

“But it—it's sick.”

“Sure, it's sick. But also understandable, at least to me. The first time I went into that room—the first time I saw those paintings—I was overwhelmed. Physically overwhelmed. There's a small bench, there, in the center of the room. And I had to sit down. I really did.”

“You said no one will see the paintings as long as he's alive. What happens when he dies?”

“He'd written out instructions for me, and checks. We'd talked about it, too. For a year after his death, I was to have possession of his house, according to the terms of his will. During that time, I was to make arrangements for the paintings to be sold anonymously, back to the companies that insured them. From there, they'd go to museums.”

“Are there other collections—other secret collections?”

“I'm sure there are. There's got to be. I don't know how many major art thefts have been committed over the past ten or twenty years. Let's say fifty. And out of that fifty, I'll bet that less than half were recovered, either by law enforcement or by ransom—insurance settlements, at fifty cents on the dollar. So that leaves twenty-five unaccounted for.”

“It leaves twenty,” Bernhardt said softly. “If we deduct DuBois' five.”

Wearily, she smiled, gestured to the other room. “Do you want to sit in a softer chair?”

Shrugging, he followed her as he said, “There's something I want to do, something you can help me with. But first, tell me about Nick. How'd he fit into all this?”

She had gone into the other room, and was standing beside the queen-size bed. She was looking away from him, her back half turned. Bernhardt saw her shoulders sharply rise and fall as she sighed. Still looking away, she said, “We were together for a year, Nick and I. For whatever reasons, good or bad, we needed each other, depended on each other. I doubt that it would've lasted, though. I don't think we ever would've actually gotten married. Not unless one of us changed, anyhow—or both of us, maybe. But, anyhow—” She sighed again as he stood in the doorway of the kitchen, leaning against the frame, watching her from a distance. “Anyhow, we were together. We ate together, slept together, did things together. And when that happens—when one person lives with another person—they tell each other things. And—” Once more, she broke off. Her arms were folded now; she was standing with her leg touching the bed, as if she needed support. “And so I—I told Nick what I did, what work I did. I didn't tell him right out, not all at once. Because DuBois insisted on secrecy, absolute secrecy. Even before I knew about the ‘Three Sisters,' about the locked room, he swore me to secrecy. But Nick kept asking me, over and over, about DuBois, about what kind of a man he was, how he made all that money. It got to be a fixation, I think, about DuBois, about his money. And the more I put him off, the more insistent he got. Once he even asked me to introduce him to DuBois. And I—” Slowly, she sank down on the edge of the bed. Despite his instinctive urge to reconnoiter, explore the darkness outside the cabin, Bernhardt nevertheless realized that she was saying something—confessing to something—that was important to her, and therefore perhaps important to him.

He left the doorway, went to the room's only easy chair, sat so that he could see her face. As he did it, she began speaking again: “I realized then, when he said he wanted to meet DuBois—I realized how far apart we were, really. Our tastes, our interests, everything—they were so different. Because, you see—” Helplessly, she gestured. “Because I couldn't imagine ever introducing them. It—it would've been ludicrous, the two of them, together. But then, of course, as soon as I realized that, I tried to deny it to myself. Maybe that's why I told Nick about the ‘Three Sisters.' Subconsciously, anyhow, maybe that's why I did it. Maybe it was guilt—atonement, for what I was thinking about him. Or maybe it was just a slip of the tongue, that started it all. Or maybe, subconsciously, I wanted to confess to someone, to ease my conscience. Because, you see, I'd broken the law. I could've gone to jail, for what I did. When the ‘Three Sisters' transaction was actually concluded—when I took possession—there were two men with me, to carry the money. And they both carried guns. One of them had one of those small machine guns, in an attaché case. It—it was like one of those dope transactions, from TV. Except that it was happening to me.
Me
.” Hopelessly, helplessly, she shook her head. Sitting forlornly on the edge of the bed, shoulders slumped, hands limp, she was staring down at the floor, her eyes empty.

“So you told Nick the whole story.”

She shrugged: an exhausted, defeated lifting of her slack shoulders. “I think, actually, that it started with a slip of the tongue—about the men with guns, in fact, something about them. Nick picked up on that—and guessed some of it, too. So once he knew part of it, there wasn't any point in not telling him the whole thing. And it was a relief, to tell him—tell somebody, anybody.”

“Did you tell him about the secret room?”

Numbly, she nodded. “Yes. It was all a—a package deal, really. Once I'd told him about the ‘Three Sisters,' the rest came out—spontaneously, it seemed. And, of course, Nick could guess a lot of it. He was very perceptive, really. A lot of people didn't realize that about him.”

“So what happened next? Did he try to blackmail DuBois? Is that what happened?”

“Yes—” She nodded once, then nodded again, in another direction, as if she were including a third party in the conversation. Repeating: “Yes…”

“And then what happened?”

“Then they tried to kill him. It happened in a shopping mall, in Los Angeles—just a mile or two from my apartment. Incredibly, there were undercover policemen there, on a burglary stakeout. That's all that saved Nick. It was one of those terribly confused scenes, with everybody shooting. It was in the papers, in fact—except that Nick's name wasn't mentioned. But he had to stay overnight at the police station, because they thought he might've been a lookout, for the burglars.”

“Did he tell them any different—tell them that he was a target?”

“No. He didn't tell them anything. He played the part of an innocent citizen who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Which, of course, he was. And the man who tried to kill him was killed by the police, so that was the end of it. I was frantic, of course, wondering about him, where he'd gone, what happened. I thought he'd been in a traffic accident. They didn't let him make a phone call for hours—not until three o'clock in the morning.”

“Had you known, then, that Nick was blackmailing DuBois?”

“No. I didn't know until he came home the next morning, from the police station. He woke me up, and told me to start packing. It—it was a terrible shock. I'll never forget it, those first few minutes, with him hanging over me, shaking me, telling me that they'd tried to kill him, that we had to leave, before they tried again—before they came there, to the apartment, after him. And I—I couldn't seem to understand it, understand what he was saying. I'd only been asleep for a few hours, and I—I felt like I'd been drugged, and he was trying to revive me, get me on my feet. It was unreal. Totally unreal, the whole thing. And all the time I was trying to understand it—why anyone would want to kill him. So then—God, I can still see him—he sat on the foot of the bed, and he told me the whole story. Everything. And then he said that I had a choice—that I could either stay, or I could go with him. I had to decide. Right then.”

“Jesus—” Sympathetically, Bernhardt shook his head. “Talk about pressure.”

“Yes.”

For a moment Bernhardt made no response. Then, taking a calculated risk, he decided to say, “You shouldn't've gone. When you ran, you looked like an accomplice.”

“I knew I'd lose him, though. If he left, I knew I'd never see him again. And I couldn't face that. Besides, I thought that, after a few days, I could talk sense into him. Because he was never sure, never absolutely sure, that DuBois sent the killer after him. It could actually have had something to do with the burglary gang—a coincidence, in other words.”

“Did he believe that—believe it could've been a coincidence?”

“He—” She bit her lip. “He was starting to believe it, I think. In Santa Rosa, he was starting to believe it. And then they killed him. He got careless—got cabin fever, had to go out, have a few drinks. And they killed him.”

“And then you ran.”

“Yes…” She said it stoically, as if all guilt had been drained, leaving her empty of emotion.

“If you'd been in danger, though—if they'd wanted to kill you—they could've done it. Both times, in Los Angeles and Santa Rosa, they could've done it.”

“Logically, you're right. But I wasn't thinking logically. I'm still not.”

“What would happen,” he asked, “if you were to call up DuBois, tell him that you want to make it up with him?”

Answering, she spoke in a dull, dogged monotone: “He had Nick killed. I can't forget that. I
won't
forget that.” Her eyes were lusterless, cast down. The angle of her head, the set of her shoulders, both revealed a malaise that must surely numb the depths of her soul.

“Nick was threatening DuBois,” Bernhardt said. “It figures that DuBois would react, do something. He couldn't very well call the police. And he's not the kind of man who's going to roll over and play dead. Besides, paying blackmail is usually a losing proposition. The blackmailer runs out of money, he makes another phone call. Nothing changes.”

She made no response, either by word or gesture.

“So what now?” he asked. “What'll you do?”

She tried to smile—unsuccessfully. “Do you mean tomorrow? Or for the rest of my life?”

“Take your pick.”

“No need. The answer's the same to both questions. I don't know. I haven't got the faintest idea.”

“You've threatened DuBois. Is that right?”

“I said I'd make him pay, for having Nick murdered.”

“How do you plan to do that? Are you going to tell the police? The papers?”

“I'm not really sure.” She said it thoughtfully, speculatively. “I guess, originally, I wanted him to suffer. I wanted him to think about what he'd done—and worry, too, worry about what I'm going to do. He's someone that can't stand uncertainty. He's got to hear the other shoe drop. If it doesn't, he suffers.”

“So, in fact, you might never actually tell the law what you're telling me.”

“I—I don't know. I just don't know.”

“If you
did
tell the police, you'd be taking a chance. Technically, you're an accessory to receiving stolen goods.”

She made no reply, gave no sign that she'd heard.

Bernhardt glanced at his watch. The time was eight-thirty. He'd done what he'd come to do—what he'd come six hundred miles to do, what he'd probably spent four hundred dollars to do. He'd found Betty Giles. He'd made sure she knew she could be in danger. He'd consulted with her, advised her. And he'd offered her his protection.

No. Not really. He hadn't really offered her protection, or help. He'd been playing the part of the grand inquisitor, comfortably above the fray, the amiable moralist.

But he hadn't offered to help…

…and he hadn't told her about the black man in the black Camaro, proceeding so sedately down Palm Canyon Road.

At the thought, he rose to his feet. “Listen, I want to take a look around. And then—” Speculatively, he eyed her as she sat so forlornly on the bed. Earlier in the day, before he'd spoken to her, he'd thought of a strategy, a diversion that might determine whether, in fact, she was really in danger.

“You have a suitcase, don't you?” he asked.

“Yes. Certainly.” As if the question surprised her, she raised questioning eyes. “Why?”

“I think there's a way that we can tell whether you're in any danger—any immediate danger.”

As if she were indifferent to the possibility, she let a few seconds pass before she said, “How's that?”

“Before I answer the question,” he said, “let me give you a little background.” He paused, to organize his thoughts. “Now, there're two possibilities. Either there's someone here, watching you—or there's not. Right?”