Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Reluctant Model

“There won’t be any,” Drake said. “I’m a chastened guy. I had the job of investigating an automobile accident about two weeks ago, and in case you don’t know, I’ve completely and utterly reformed. After you see people strewn around the road the way I saw them — well, it gives you something to think about, and I mean think.”

“Good,” Mason said. “I got cured a while ago. The Traffic Safety Editor of the Desert News and Telegram in Salt Lake City took me to task for my fast driving. Now I’m glad to see you’ve reformed. You can chauffeur me from now on — until you start getting reckless again. Come on, Della.”

They left Mason’s office, went to the parking lot, and Drake drove them to a so-called apartment building, a combination of studios and living quarters. The building had evidently been used at one time as a warehouse. The elevator was a huge, slow-moving affair which inched its way upward carrying Mason, Della Street and Paul Drake to the third floor.

Drake located the apartment of Goring Gilbert and knocked on the door. When there was no answer he pounded with full knuckles, then turned to Mason, shrugged his shoulders and said, “Nobody home.”

“Is the door locked?” Della Street asked.

Drake hesitated, said in a low voice, “I have an operative around here somewhere, Perry. He’ll know where the guy is. All we need to do is to—”

A door across the corridor opened. A woman somewhere in her late thirties or early forties, heavily fleshed, wearing nothing except a light robe stood in the doorway, a cigarette dangling pendulously from a flabby lower lip.

“Something?” she asked, her eyes impudently curious as she surveyed the group.

“Goring Gilbert.”

“Try thirty-four,” the woman said. “There’s a party down there.”

“Which direction?” Mason asked.

The woman jerked with her thumb.

As the trio moved off down the corridor, the woman stood in the doorway watching.

Hi-fi music seeped its way through the door of Studio 34.

Drake’s knuckles gave a loud knock.

The door was opened by a slender, trim-figured young woman in a bikini bathing suit, who said, “Well, come on—”

She stopped mid-sentence as she surveyed the group, then said over her shoulder, “Okay, Goring, I guess it’s for you. Outsiders.”

A man attired in a sport shirt which was unbuttoned, a pair of slacks and apparently nothing else, came in barefooted silence to the door, surveyed the party.

“Goring Gilbert?” Mason asked.

“That’s right.”

“We’d like to talk with you.”

“What about?”

“A matter of business.”

“What kind of business?”

“A painting.”

“A duplicate painting,” Drake said.

Gilbert called over his shoulder, “See you later, folks.”

A man’s voice said, “Play it cool, man.”

Gilbert stepped out into the hall. “My pad’s down the hall,” he said.

“I know,” Mason told him.

Gilbert surveyed him. “That’s right, you would. Okay, let’s go.”

He led the way down the corridor, walking with long, easy strides. His uninhibited hip motion indicated that walking barefoot was no novelty to him.

He took a key from his pocket, fitted it to the lock, twisted the knob, said, “Come on in.”

The place was a litter of canvases, brushes, two or three easels, and smelled of paint.

“This is a workingman’s shop,” Gilbert said.

“I see,” Mason said.

“All right, what’s worrying you cats?”

“You know Collin Durant?” Drake asked.

“Did know him,” Gilbert said. “The guy’s dead and I hope you’re not trying some of this crude stuff of trying to say ‘How did you know he was dead unless you killed him?’ — I didn’t kill him, I heard it on the radio; that is, I didn’t hear it but my chick did, and made me wise. Now what do you want?”

“You did work for Durant,” Drake said.

“What if I did?”

“Some of those paintings were forgeries that he palmed off as originals.”

“Now, wait a minute,” Gilbert said. “What do you mean forgeries? I don’t give a damn what a guy does with a painting after I sell it to him, but that guy never palmed off anything of mine that way. He always told the customer, ‘I have a painting which almost any expert will pronounce a genuine so-and-so. I don’t think it is, but it’s a swell conversation piece and I can get it for you for peanuts.’

“Now, what’s wrong with that?

“Soon as I heard of the murder I figured guys like you would be down here prying. Now I’ve told you what I know, and that’s all I know.”

Mason, who had been carefully watching Gilbert, said, “You did a certain painting that we’re interested in. It was a copy job. I’m not saying it was a forgery. I simply say that it was a clever copy.”

“That’s better,” Gilbert said.

“The copy,” Mason said, “was of a Phellipe Feteet. It was a copy of a picture of women under a tree with a strongly lighted background—”

“Sure,” Gilbert said. “All Feteet’s pictures were like that.”

“Now,” Mason said, “we want to know when you made this copy, what happened to it, and how much you were paid for it.”

Drake’s face showed some surprise as he followed the lawyer’s questioning.

“You got a right to ask?” Gilbert inquired.

“I’ve got a right to ask,” Mason said.

“Credentials?”

Mason said. “Drake’s a private detective, I’m an attorney.”

“A private detective doesn’t rank and I don’t have to talk to an attorney.”

“Yes, you do,” Mason said smiling. “You don’t have to do it now but you would have to do it under oath and on the witness stand.”

“So you want me to talk now?”

“I want you to talk now.”

Gilbert thought for a moment, then padded his way across the floor to a place where several canvases were piled up, selected the bottom canvas, pulled it out.

“This answer your question?” he inquired.

Mason and Della Street stood speechless, impressed by the sheer brilliance and artistry of the canvas; a canvas which seemed an exact duplicate of the one they had seen on Otto Olney’s yacht; a canvas that had power and vivid coloring. The smooth texture of the skin on the women’s necks and shoulders was such that one could see the sheen of light caressing the velvety softness.

“That’s the one,” Mason said. “Where did you copy it?”

“Right here in the studio.”

“You had the original to copy from?”

“My methods are none of your damned business. I did it, that’s all. It’s a hell of a good job and I’m proud of it. It’s got everything that Phellipe Feteet ever had. Those were my instructions, to make a copy so accurate you couldn’t tell it from the original.”

“How in the world did you do it?” Della Street asked.

“That’s my secret,” Gilbert said. He turned back to Mason. “Now, what about it?”

“How long ago did you do it?”

“Couple of weeks ago, and it took me a while — the way I work.”

“Slow?” Mason asked.

“Spasmodic,” Gilbert said.

“How much were you paid for it?”

“I’ll answer that on the witness stand, if I have to.”

“You’re going to have to,” Mason said, “and if you answer it now, it might save a lot of trouble. I’d particularly want to know whether Durant paid you by check.”

“No checks,” Gilbert said. “Durant, you say? That guy! Look, you’ve got all the information now you’re going to get, so I’m going back to my party and you’re going back to yours.”

Della Street said, “Would you answer one question for me, Mr. Gilbert?”