Jane Cleland - Consigned to Death

He nodded. “Makes sense.”

“Here’s the thing. I’ve found them.”

“What?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“Where are they?”

“I’ve got them safe.”

After a pause, Max asked, “So why haven’t you brought them forward?”

I looked away, turning to focus on the ocean as I struggled to get my jumbled thoughts in order. “I’m not sure. Two reasons, I guess. First, I thought I ought to hold on to them in case I needed to use them to clear my name. And don’t ask how they’d help me do that, Max, because I don’t know. I don’t have a plan. I just knew those paintings could somehow be an ace in the hole.” I shrugged. “Or, they might be. It’s the only thing I know that no one else does. Knowing their location is, somehow, an insurance policy.”

“What’s the other reason?”

“I need to tell Mrs. Cabot first. I just found them. And today’s her father’s funeral. It seems too awful to tell her today. I just couldn’t do it.”

Max touched my arm again. “You’re a good egg, Josie.”

“A good egg?”

He smiled. “What else?”

“That’s it.”

“Where are they now?”

For some reason, I didn’t want to reveal their location, but I couldn’t justify not doing so. Max was my lawyer, after all. For reasons I didn’t understand, I stayed vague. “In Mr. Grant’s house. I moved them from one secret spot to another.”

He didn’t prod further. Instead, he asked, “How certain are you that someone else won’t find them wherever it is you’ve hidden them?”

“No one but me has access to the house right now, and I’ve arranged it so none of my staff will go near them.”

“I don’t like it, Josie. I think we ought to tell Alverez the truth, and let him take custody of them. Your exposure, your potential liability, if something happens to them, even, God forbid, a fire, is too great.”

I nodded. I hadn’t considered that aspect of the situation before. He was right. “There’s one more thing,” I said, looking down, not really ashamed, but feeling awkward that money came into my reckoning.

“What’s that?”

“There’ll be a reward. It was posted on a Web site. I found them, so I want it. If I turn them over to the police, I’ll lose my claim.”

“No, you won’t. I’ll make certain you’re covered.”

I couldn’t think of any reason not to do as he recommended. “Okay, then.”

“You ready to go back in?”

“Are you sure I should tell him everything?”

He squeezed my arm again. “Yes. I’ll protect your rights.”

Alverez looked somber. His eyes were dark and intent. His manner was serious, even grave. He’d asked if we were ready to resume, Max said we were, and suddenly, the tape recorder light was red, indicating, that once again a record of our conversation was being created.

“Josie has a statement to make.”

“All right,” Alverez said.

“A couple of things before she begins,” Max said. “She has acquired some knowledge of the missing paintings and is going to tell you what she knows.”

“Good,” Alverez said, his tone neutral.

“The paintings, we believe, were stolen. Josie expects to return them to their rightful owners, and if a reward is forthcoming, she expects to claim it.”

Alverez paused and I heard the soft whirr of the recorder. “And?”

Max shifted in his chair. “And we’d like to turn them over to you. But we want to be on the record that you acknowledge that but for the actions of Josie Prescott, you wouldn’t have been able to take possession of the missing artwork.”

Alverez turned to look at me. “Are you saying you have them in your possession now?”

Max said, “Do we have your acknowledgment?”

“When you turn them over, I’ll write you a receipt. I can make no comment about any other aspect of the situation.”

“That’ll be fine,” Max said, but it didn’t sound fine to me.

I leaned over to Max and whispered, “That sounds bad.”

“Nah, it’s standard operating procedure.”

“Okay,” I said, unconvinced.

“Plus, we’ll have a copy of the tape.”

“Josie,” Max said aloud, “tell Chief Alverez what you know about the paintings.”

Taking a deep breath for courage, I said, “I found out that all three paintings were stolen.”

“How?” Alverez asked.

“A Web site.”

“We checked on-line.”

I shrugged. “You checked law-enforcement sites, right?”

“Right.”

“Me, too. I didn’t find the paintings listed there. I found them on a specialized site tracking Nazi thefts before and during World War Two.”

Alverez leaned back and shook his head. “What are you saying?”

“You asked me before about Mrs. Grant’s ledger. The entry that indicated that Mr. and Mrs. Grant bought all three paintings from ‘A.Z.,’ right?”

“Right. Do you know who or what that is?”

I shook my head. “No. Maybe a person. Maybe a gallery.” I shrugged. “No idea.”

“What do you know?”

“I know Renoir’s Three Girls and a Cat was one of several paintings taken from the Brander family home in Salzburg in 1939. Cezanne’s Apples in a Blue Bowl with Grapes was stolen from a well-respected Viennese collector and businessman, Klaus Weiner and his wife, Eva, also in 1939, except that they called it collecting the ‘Jew tax.’ Matisse’s Notre-Dame in the Morning was owned by the Rosen family. They’d lent it to a small museum in Collioure, France, in 1937. In February of 1941, the curator reported it stolen along with, if I recall right, seventeen other paintings.” I shrugged. “Maybe the Nazis got that one, too. I can’t confirm that. But I do know it was stolen, and it had been owned by a Jew.”

Alverez’s eyes narrowed as he listened, and when I was done, he shook his head.

“We figured they were stolen. Why else keep them under wraps?”

“Well, a legitimate owner might be afraid of theft,” I ventured.

He shook his head. “Then you wouldn’t leave a gimcrack lock on the front door.”

“Good point,” I acknowledged.

“Where did you find them?”

“In a hidden compartment behind other paintings.”

“How did you know to look there?”

“Intuition? Luck? I don’t know. I noticed a three-sided frame on the workbench in the basement. A few hours later, tossing and turning in bed, something clicked.”

“Where are they now?”

I turned to Max. He nodded encouragingly.

“I’ll show you. I won’t tell you.”

“Why not?”

“I want that receipt as I hand them over.”

He nodded. “When we’re done here, we’ll go together.”

“And you’ll give me a receipt?”

“On the spot.” He rat-a-tat-tatted the table with his pen. “We need to get the paintings authenticated.”

“Yeah.”

“I want to alert our expert that they’re coming.” He pushed back his chair and stood up.

“I thought I was your expert.”

He smiled. “You are on appraisals. Not on authenticating art.”

“Who are you going to use for that?”

“Leo Snow from Dartmouth.”

I nodded. “He’s an expert, all right. Good choice.”

“I’ll be right back.” He punched the Off button and left the room.

Max and I sat quietly. When he returned, he started the recorder, and said, “I got Dr. Snow on the phone. He’ll be here in the morning with his chemistry set, and we’ll have confirmation by the end of the day.” He paused. “Josie?”

“Yeah?”

“Congratulations on finding them.”

I smiled. “Thanks. I was pretty pleased.”

He smiled back. After a moment, he asked, “Change of subject. How do you set values?”