Aaron Elkins - Old Scores

"Experts are people too," I said.

Charpentier smiled thinly at me through a blue-tinged haze. "Let's consider the Rembrandt for a moment, and not the Leger. You would like to have it tested? Very good. But what if the technician innocently takes a paint sample from an area restored in the nineteenth century, what happens then to the dating? This has happened, my dear Christopher."

"I know that. You need informed judgment too. That's why I wouldn't have been any happier about it if Vachey had reversed it and said we could submit the paintings to all the tests we wanted, but we weren't allowed to look at them. You need both, not just-"

"And what about errors that are not so innocent? Fakers can add metallic salts to underpainting, and throw off X-ray analysis. This, too, has happened, and not so long ago. They can confound infrared photography by-"

"I just don't like to be made a fool of," Froger muttered again. "There's something wrong. Even dead, I don't trust the son of a bitch."

"No one's going to argue with you there, Edmond," Charpentier said.

"I remember that Turbulent Century fiasco of his," Froger went on. "I reviewed it for the Revue, you know. Now don't climb back on your high horse, Jean-Luc. I know you thought highly of it-"

"I did not think highly of it," Charpentier said irritably. "Get your facts straight. I thought highly of the figurative and Analytical Cubist portion of it. Rene had collected some remarkable works there. As for the rest of the exhibition, I wasn't qualified to make judgments, but I certainly had my doubts about the quality of some of the pieces."

"Yes, well, I can't speak for your Analytical Cubists, but, by God, I know Seurat and the Neoimpressionists; that's my specialty. And I tell you, that show was filled with trash that Vachey was trying to put over on us. It was shameful. I said it at the time-I don't hold my tongue when I have something to say, you know that-and I still say it. Well, naturally, I'm worried now. How could I help it?"

"Edmond, do you mean actual forgeries?" I asked. I'd never read his review of Vachey's notorious exhibition, or Charpen tier's, or anybody else's, but I'd certainly developed an interest.

The word made him skittish. His hand went to his collar again. "Forgeries? No, when did I use the word forgeries? Did you hear me use the word forgeries? We could fill this museum- your museum too, and the Louvre, and the Metropolitan-with disputed attributions without ever touching on forgeries, isn't that so?"

I had to admit it was so.

"No," he said, "I didn't say forgeries, I said only… I meant only… inferior works."

"So what are you worried about?" Charpentier asked brusquely. "Haven't I just finished telling you that this Leger of yours is an inferior work? You already know it. What sinister surprise is to be feared?"

Froger shook his head darkly. He still didn't trust the son of a bitch.

Charpentier ground out his cigarette in the ashtray, and stood up. "I don't see what else there is for me to tell you. I'll give you a report in a few days, but there won't be anything startling in it. Are you going to accept the painting?"

"I-yes, I suppose so. Isn't that what you're advising me? Isn't that what it comes to? If it isn't too much to ask for your advice."

"I'm advising you to put it in one of the dark corners with which the Barillot is so richly supplied. If you're lucky, no one will notice it. Good day, Edmond."

It was only two o'clock, but I was fatigued and still a little tottery from the previous night's episode, so I went back to the hotel to put my feet up, once again taking the chattering old elevator to the fourth floor instead of walking. Inside the room, I took off my shoes, plumped up the pillows, and lay back on the bed. It felt good too.

Charpentier's remarks had started me thinking about this business of the tests again. He'd overdone it, but he was essentially right about laboratory analysis not being as useful on forgeries of modern paintings as on forgeries of old ones. The best thing a test can do for you in pinpointing a fake is to show you that a purported 360-year-old Rembrandt is painted on a 50-year-old canvas, or uses pigments that weren't developed until the late nineteenth century, or is painted over a picture of a 1960 Ford Fairlane. The older a picture is supposed to be, the more a lab has to go on. From that standpoint, it would seem that, of the two-the Leger and the Rembrandt-the likelier candidate for fake was the Rembrandt. That was Charpentier's point.

But we weren't dealing with a modern forgery of a Rembrandt; of that I was sure. As a matter of fact, there weren't many modern forgeries of them around-precisely because there were so many Rembrandt-like paintings still available from Rembrandt's own time. At the worst, that's what An Officer was. And all the scientific wizardry in the world can't help you detect a 360-year-old fake of a 360-year-old painting..

So what was the point of the prohibition? I was right back at what Calvin had aptly enough called square one. Back at it? When had I ever been off it?

I settled in more comfortably to give it some deeper contemplation.

At 6:20 the telephone rang. I got it to my ear without opening my eyes.

"Hey, Chris-"

"Calvin, why are you always waking me up?"

"Why are you always asleep?"

I yawned and swung my feet over the side of the bed. "L'Atelier Saint-Jean," Calvin said, "89 Rue de Rivoli, proprietaire M. Gibeault."

I finished my yawn. "Hm. French, nest-ce pas?"

"It's the junk shop, Chris."

That opened my eyes. "The-you mean where he said he bought the Rembrandt? Pepin actually gave it to you?"

"Are you kidding me? Not that I didn't ask him, but he claims he doesn't know anything about the Rembrandt. Apparently, there were a lot of things that Vachey kept close to his vest, and this was one."

"So then, who told you-"

"I got it from Madame Guyot." He coughed modestly. "She sort of took a shine to me."

"Calvin, that's great," I said. "I can catch a train to Paris tomorrow-"

"I found out some other interesting stuff too. If you think this whole thing is already as weird as it's going to get, think again. You had your dinner yet?"

"I've been asleep. I'm not terrifically hungry."

"There's a brasserie at the foot of the Rue de la Liberte, practically across the street from you. We can get an omelet or something. Meet you there in five minutes."

"Guess," Calvin said, smugly watching me over his glass of white wine, "who Pepin is."

"What do you mean, who he is? Vachey's secretary, his security head, whatever."

"Ho-ho, there's more to it than that, my man."

I poured most of my tiny bottle of Badoit mineral water (I wasn't feeling up to wine yet) into my glass. "Calvin, this is very entertaining, but how about just telling me?"

"Well, you know that heist that Vachey pulled off at the Barillot ten years ago?"

"It wasn't a 'heist,' " I said irritably. "He was making a point. They got their paintings back, and more."

Calvin's eyes widened. I was surprised myself. When had I gone so far over into Vachey's camp that I would defend the theft of art, whatever the reason behind it? I quickly corrected myself. "All right, yes, it was a heist. Sorry. But what about it?"

"And how Froger fired his security chief over the lapse in precautions? Well, you want to guess the name of that fired security chief?"

"You're telling me it was Pepin?"

"You got it. Vachey gave him a job the next week, and Pepin's been there ever since." He grinned. "You don't suppose that might explain why he's a teeny bit paranoid about anybody getting within arm's length of anything in the Galerie Vachey?"