The Resurrection Man (12 page)

Still, Max knew a work of art when he saw one. Bartolo Arbalest was all that and then some. He was ushering his callers past the elegant, now-empty drawing room into a smaller room, lined with books and furnished with a carved, leather-topped desk that held some leather-bound portfolios, a Tiffany lamp, and a French telephone in shiny brass and mother-of-pearl. There were an easy chair and a not-so-easy chair, both covered in dark brown leather. A brass orrery sat on a mahogany pedestal.

Another mahogany pedestal bore a marble carving of a hand in the manner of Rodin, only the hand was making an obscene gesture. On the walls hung a Delacroix of two gazelles fighting over a dead lion, a decidedly overweight Correggio madonna with a glowering child clinging desperately to her knee, and a small Uccello profile of a noble lady with a towering headdress and no chin whatsoever. Max smiled. Arbalest smiled back.

“All my own work, it’s a way of keeping sane. Assuming, of course, that I ever was. Do sit down, I thought we’d be cozier here. What can I offer you? Tea? Chilled wine? I’ve a rather pleasant blanc de blancs.”

“Nothing, thanks,” said Max. “We don’t want to take up too much of your time. Bringers of ill tidings aren’t apt to be welcome visitors.”

“My dear sir, don’t let that trouble you. I’ve become quite adept at receiving bad news, I suppose Brooks has told you something of my history. Though I have to admit I quite lost my aplomb when you told me about George Protheroe’s horrible death. You say he was actually murdered? And with a spear? How can such horrible things happen? And why him, of all people? Robbery, I suppose, but I can’t imagine a more inconvenient house to rob. The mere logistics of trying to sort out what’s worth stealing from what isn’t would daunt even Mercury, god of thieves and pickpockets. What did get taken, by the way? Not the elephant candlesticks, I hope?”

“No,” said Max. “Fortunately Mrs. Protheroe had already sent them along to the bride. As of this morning, she wasn’t able to tell us anything helpful. Neither was her maid.”

“What about Sarah?” asked Brooks. “She has a sharp eye, didn’t she notice any empty spaces on the whatnots?”

“She was pretty well taken up with Anora. The poor woman was in a bad way, as God knows she had reason to be. Sarah’s my wife,” Max explained to Arbalest. “Her family have been friends of the Protheroes more or less forever. I understand you and old George hit it off pretty well. Did he strike you as the sort of man to make enemies?”

“
Au
very much
contraire
. Not to speak with disrespect of the recently defunct, but one thought of him more as a dear old overgrown dormouse looking for a teapot to curl up in. George was quite the most restful person I’ve ever had dealings with. A likeable man, you know, but hardly one to scintillate. He did know a fair amount about Oriental silver; we had a couple of really pleasant discussions, for which I’m grateful. It’s a pity he didn’t stick with his importing business. Or rather his family’s. That’s the problem with being born to wealth, it saps the will to go on. Who holds the money bags, if I’m not being too inquisitive? Is it his wife?”

“It’s both,” said Brooks with some asperity. “Or was. George went into the family business directly from college and was doing quite well, I believe, until he caught some devastating fever that left him permanently impaired. Did you know that, Max?”

“Anora told us just this morning. Sarah hadn’t known, either.”

“That doesn’t surprise me, it happened so long ago. I was only a youngster myself at the time, but I can remember my parents wondering whether George Protheroe would ever leave the hospital. They’d never have believed he’d outlive them both by many years. Entirely thanks to Anora, of course. A good woman really is above rubies.”

Only trained observers such as Max and Brooks would have noticed Arbalest’s wince. What good woman had he lost? Wife? Mother? Girl friend? That artisan in his Houston atelier who’d racked up her car on an abutment? Tough for him, no doubt, but surely not germane to the issue at hand. Max wasn’t much for small talk on the job, he decided it was time they got down to business.

“Mr. Arbalest, you’ve set up quite a security system here. You keep your workers under your own roof, you provide them and yourself with a trained bodyguard, you have grilles on all your windows and enough locks on the doors to start your own jail. This leads me to deduce that the string of calamities that has hit your previous employees, and now seems to be spreading to your clients, adds up to a deliberate terrorist effort aimed at yourself. Do you know why this is so and who’s behind it?”

This was a bit much for Arbalest to handle, he reacted with asperity. “Not to be rude, Mr. Bittersohn, but isn’t that rather a personal question for you to be asking on such short acquaintance?”

“I can be even ruder, Mr. Arbalest. Have the police in New York, Los Angeles, or Houston ever investigated you as a possible murderer?”

“What?” The Resurrection Man’s face had turned an even sicklier green than his smock. “See here, Mr. Bittersohn, when you telephoned me a while ago, you led me to understand that you wanted to discuss certain problems relating to clients we have had in common. Now you come barging into my house and—”

“A simple yes would have been sufficient, Mr. Arbalest. You could hardly have expected not to be an object of interest to the cops, considering your profession and your track record on calamities. I’m sorry if I’ve upset you, but I think we should all know where we’re coming from. Any art restorer, especially one with your abilities and connections, must have had a few offers. You know what goes on in the art underworld, you couldn’t possibly not know. Right, Brooks?”

“Oh yes. I was even approached a few times myself, back when I was odd-job man at the Wilkins Museum.”

“Right, and I’ve been propositioned more times than I can remember, mostly with regard to insurance fraud,” said Max. “Theoretically, it’s possible any of us might have accepted, if the price was right and we were that sort of people. Having refused the offers, we’ve all taken a certain amount of grief from people we’ve disappointed. Neither Brooks nor I has been set up for a murder charge, thank God, but you’ve been far more vulnerable, Arbalest, because you offer a wide scope of opportunities and you’re not accustomed to dealing with crooks. Any cop worth his salt would have had to ask himself whether your employees’ deaths had been in fact legitimate accidents, whether they’d been rubbed out as a result of their own criminal activities, or whether you’d either killed them or had them killed because they’d found out things about your operation you didn’t want them to know. The possibility that your employees were being killed simply to get back at you would have had to be a poor fourth on anybody’s list. Except maybe your own. Right, Mr. Arbalest?”

“I’m afraid so. I’m sorry I was short with you, Mr. Bittersohn, naturally the subject is a tender one with me. It’s unfortunately true that I’ve had illicit propositions made to me from time to time. It’s equally true that I’ve turned them all down. I’ve always tried to be tactful about refusing, so as not to create ill feeling, but I suppose I have to grant the hypothesis that some disappointed client may have chosen to revenge himself—or herself I should add, since not all women are above rubies, sad to say—in this dreadfully circumlocutious way.”

Arbalest picked up a niello-ornamented silver paper knife, scowled at its sharpness, and put it down. “I’ve never felt personally threatened, oddly enough. Not that I’m trying to make myself out a hero, actually I’m a terrible coward. It’s the work that’s under attack, Mr. Bittersohn. That’s why my artisans and now my clients have been subjected to these outrages; there is some malignant agency that wants to prevent me from doing what I was set on this earth to do. I quite realize this sounds fanciful and high-flown, but my work is my life. To rescue from neglect and decay some once-beautiful work of art, to give it back to the world as a joy instead of a sad reminder of loveliness that once had been, that is my mission. Now you know why I call myself the Resurrection Man. You did say you wanted the truth.”

“Yes, I did.”

Max was by no means sure he’d got it. A man who was his own best salesman mightn’t have too hard a time talking himself into being his own malignant force. Arbalest’s admitting them into the guild hall, or whatever he called it, didn’t necessarily constitute a proof of injured innocence. He could just as well have come to the office or offered to meet Max and Brooks somewhere on neutral ground. Having them here could be construed almost as a “see, I have nothing to hide” ploy. He’d no doubt had plenty of chances to practice on the cops.

It was time for a reciprocal gesture, Max shoved out a pawn. “I suppose Goudge told you he called on us at the house night before last to explain why we should quit tailing Lydia Ouspenska.”

A vigorous nod set the velvet beret flopping. “Yes, indeed. Madame Ouspenska is a very gifted lady. Mr. Goudge tells me she’s also an old friend of yours.”

“She got poisoned at my wife’s dinner table once. Those things establish a bond, you know. We were all relieved to find out Lydia’s being so well taken care of here. I’d never seen her looking so healthy.”

“How very kind of you to say so, Mr. Bittersohn. She’ll be sorry to have missed your visit, she’s out on assignment just now. A matter of a flaking halo.”

Max obliged his host with the smile that Arbalest was clearly expecting. “Lydia told me she makes house calls on saints.”

He thought Arbalest relaxed just a bit. “Oh, Madame Ouspenska—she’s asked us to drop the title—is a lady of many parts. She’s marvelous at church work, of which we get a good deal, heaven be praised. She’s also a positively inspired miniaturist, as you perhaps know.”

“Byzantine icons?”

“Oh yes, definitely. There’s simply nobody to touch Ouspenska on icons, though unfortunately we don’t have many of those coming through the atelier. But we do get an occasional illuminated manuscript, she’s a grand illuminator. In more ways than one, I may say, she positively lights up our lives with her never-failing joie de vivre. Really, it’s a privilege to have Madame Ouspenska in the guild.”

“I’m glad you feel that way.” Arbalest must have been pretty hard up for joie de vivre, Max thought. Much as he himself liked Lydia, he’d have been driven to howling frenzy in a matter of hours if he’d ever been stuck with her at close quarters. “Tell her we’re sorry to have missed her. I suppose she’s got Goudge waiting at the church now? He mentioned last night that he generally goes along when she’s on an outside job.”

“Indeed he does, they have a most agreeable relationship. He’s inclined to be somewhat taciturn, you know, and she’s so charmingly effervescent.
Entre nous
, I suspect our Carnaby’s a trifle smitten.”

Brooks chuckled. “From what I know of your Carnaby, not much will come of it.”

“Oh, I do so hope you’re right. Such attachments never work, you know. Sooner or later the bloom rubs off the rose, then the sniping begins. Eventually there’s a major dustup and one of the pair storms off in a huff. Sometimes they both do. I couldn’t handle that. Not now, when I’ve struggled so hard to organize the guild and get everything working so well. At least I thought I had, until I got Mr. Bittersohn’s phone call.”

Arbalest picked up the silver paper cutter again. For a second it looked as though the man might be going to stab its sharp point into his well-oiled leather desk top, but his nobler nature prevailed. “Well, gentlemen, do you have further questions or would you like to see the atelier? You’ll be our very first outside visitors, you know; I’m not quite sure how to introduce you.”

“You’d better not be too obvious about who we are,” said Max. “How about if he’s Mr. Brooks and I’m Mr. Tickle? Brooks can be an artisan applying for a job and I’ll be the plumber looking for a leak.”

In a sense Max was just that, but Arbalest shook his head. “Couldn’t you both be prospective members of the guild? You could even move in with us if you feel it’s necessary, though where we’d put you I’m sure I don’t know. All the bedrooms are in use and I can hardly ask any of the present occupants to double up. We really could use more space, but I don’t know where we’d get it.”

“Then there’s your answer,” said Max. “Brooks can pose as an architect trying to figure out how to enlarge the house and I’ll be the building inspector telling him he can’t do it.”

“Couldn’t you both be architects?” Arbalest was a little out of his depth with Max, as people often were.

“Sure, why not? Come on, Brooks. Grab yourself a pencil and let’s tear the place apart.”

F
ASHIONS IN CITIES CHANGE.
Boston’s Back Bay, created prosaically enough during the nineteenth century by dumping a great deal of soil on top of a great expanse of mudflats, had had its day of glory. In 1883, King’s
Handbook of Boston
said of “the grand Back Bay section,” that “these broad and handsome streets are lined with imposing and stately edifices, the architectural designs of which, in many cases, are most ambitious and elaborate.”

Alas for stateliness, many of these ambitious and elaborate edifices have been chopped up into apartments and rooming houses or adapted to various other purposes, some of which the illustrious architects of Grover Cleveland’s administration would have held in horror. Somehow or other, Bartolo Arbalest had got hold of a property that had remained pretty much as it had been built. Either he’d bought the house outright, though God only knew what it must have cost him, considering real-estate prices in the area, or else he’d found a landlord desperate enough for a paying tenant to let him do as he pleased.

Perhaps Arbalest saw his atelier through the eyes of love, or maybe he thought smocks and berets made up for the overall air of bleakness and the unavoidable clutter on the long tables at which the artisans were working. Brooks, a man of many parts, all of them in excellent working order, saw at once what was wrong and how to fix it. The basement level, once the cozy domain of the cook and the servant’s hall, had been converted into a brightly lighted space about as cheery and inviting as a sardine cannery.