The Burglar Who Painted Like Mondrian - By Lawrence Block Page 0,82

“because we need the fake in order to substantiate our suit against Barlow. Barlow’s got money, and he got some of it from my client’s deceased uncle, and I intend to bring suit to recover the price paid for the spurious Mondrian. And I’m also representing Detective Kirschmann, so don’t think you can weasel out of paying him his reward.”

“We’re a reputable company. I resent your use of the word ‘weasel.’”

“Oh, please,” Wally said. “You people invented the word.”

Barnett Reeves cleared his throat. “I have a question,” he said. “What about the real painting?”

“Huh?” somebody said. Probably several people, actually.

“The real painting,” Reeves said, pointing to the canvas that Lloyd Lewes had authenticated several revelations ago. “If there’s no objection, I should like to take that back to the Hewlett Gallery, where it belongs.”

“Now wait a minute,” Widener said. “If my people are coming up with $35,000—”

“That’s for that thing,” Reeves said. “I want my painting.”

“And you’ll get yours,” I said, gesturing toward the acrylic hanging over the fireplace. “That’s the painting that was on display in your gallery, Mr. Reeves, and that’s the painting you’ll take back with you.”

“We never should have had it in the first place. Mr. Barlow donated a genuine Mondrian—”

“Nope,” I said. “He donated a fake, and he didn’t even cheat you by doing it. Because it never cost you people a penny. He defrauded the Internal Revenue Service, and they’ll probably have words with him on the subject, but he didn’t defraud you beyond making a horse’s ass out of you, and what’s the big deal about that? A bunch of school kids made a horse’s ass out of you just yesterday afternoon. You’ve got no claim on the painting.”

“Then who does?”

“I do,” Mrs. Barlow said. “The police officers took it from my apartment, but that doesn’t mean my husband and I relinquish title to it.”

“You don’t have title,” Reeves said. “You gave title to the museum.”

“Not true,” Wally said. “My client in Calgary should get the painting. It should have passed to Onderdonk, and so it now passes in fact to Onderdonk’s heirs.”

“That’s all nonsense,” Elspeth Petrosian cried. “That thief Barlow never had clear title to it in the first place. The painting belongs to me. It was promised to me by my grandfather, Haig Petrosian, and someone stole it before his wishes could be carried out. I don’t care what Barlow paid for it or who he did or didn’t sell it to. He never dealt with a rightful owner in the first place. That’s my painting.”

“I’d love to include it in the retrospective,” Mordecai Danforth said, “while all of this is being sorted out, but I suppose that’s out of the question.”

Ray Kirschmann went over and put a hand on the painting. “Right now this paintin’s evidence,” he said, “and I’m impoundin’ it. The rest of you got your claims and notions and you can fight it out, but the paintin’ goes downtown while you drag each other through the courts, and once the lawyers get started it could go on for a good long while.” To Reeves he said, “If I was you, I’d take that other one downtown and hang it back where it was. By the time the papers write this up, half the city’s gonna want to look at it, fake or no. You can waste time worryin’ about lookin’ like a horse’s ass, but that’d just make you more of a horse’s ass, because whatever you look like they’re gonna be lined up around the block to look at this thing, and what’s so bad about that?”

Chapter Twenty-Five

“This is a nice place,” Carolyn said, “and they make a hell of a drink, even if they do charge twice as much as they should for it. Big Charlie’s, huh? I like it.”

“I thought you would.”

“I like the girl playing piano, too. I wonder if she’s gay.”

“Oh, God.”

“What’s wrong with wondering?” She took a sip, set down her glass. “You left some things out,” she said. “Explaining everything and making all the bits and pieces fit together, you left a few things out.”

“Well, it was confusing enough as it was. I didn’t want to make it impossible for people to follow.”

“Uh-huh. You’re a considerate guy. You left out the bit about the cat.”

“Oh, come on,” I said. “Two men had been murdered and a couple of paintings had been stolen. I couldn’t waste people’s time talking about a kidnapped cat. Anyway, he’d been ransomed and returned, so what