Andrew Klavan - The Identity Man

"Hey, Conor!"

Shannon was so startled he nearly toppled off the joist. He looked down, his heart pounding. It was only fat little Handsome Harry, standing on the ground right below him, tilting his gorilla face up at him, shielding his eyes from the sun.

"Hey, Conor. Come down here a second."

Shannon glanced back at the shadow of the apartment building. If there had been anyone there before, he was gone now. Paranoid. Shannon edged around the plywood and climbed down the metal ladder to the ground.

He stood with Handsome at the base of the frame. The construction went on, and they had to talk loudly over the banging hammers and the buzzing saws and the spitting nail guns.

"I got a guy who wants to talk to you," Handsome said.

Nervous as he already was, Shannon now tasted a coppery spurt of fear on his tongue. "What guy?"

"Just a guy, looking for someone."

"Looking…"

"To do some work."

"Oh, looking for a carpenter, you mean?"

"Yeah, only he wants, like, a sculptor guy, a carver. A guy who can carve things-like you were doing for the kids. That's what made me think of you. Those trucks you were making for the kids."

"Oh. Oh, yeah." Shannon felt himself relax. Don't be so jumpy all the time, he told himself. Don't be so paranoid. You're a new mang.

"You can pick up some extra money on the weekends," said Handsome Harry.

"Is it legal?"

"What're you, the pope? Yeah, it's fine. It's nothing. I get a hundred off the top, finder's fee. Then you're on your own."

Shannon thought about it. There was no harm in talking to the guy. "Where is he?"

"Right over there."

Shannon looked where Handsome pointed. There was a battered blue station wagon that must have been a hundred years old standing by the curb. Standing by the station wagon was an older guy. He was a dignified college professor sort. Short, kind of tubby. Wearing a brown cardigan over a button-down shirt and khaki slacks. He had clipped salt-and-pepper hair and elegant features except for the squashed Negro nose. His eyes were mild but searching and intelligent.

Shannon walked over to him and offered his hand. "I'm Henry Conor," he said.

"Frederick Applebee," said the professor type. "Are you the sculptor?"

"Yeah, I guess so. Why?"

"I wasn't sure where to look for one. They're a lot harder to find than you'd think, especially around here. Someone suggested I try a carpenter." The man had a gentle, pleasant voice, soothing to the ear. "Take a look at these for me, would you?"

He handed Shannon some snapshots. They were pictures of a carving of some kind. A wooden screen with a lot of background tracery on it, then up in front, two angels with trumpets, one on each side, facing each other. In the middle, between them, there was a third angel, lifting his hand as if he was making an announcement. In one or two of the photos, the sculpture was intact and the angel in the middle was whole. In most of the pictures, though, the thing had been scraped up and damaged and the center angel had been broken. The angel's head and one of his wings were gone.

Shannon looked through the snapshots briefly. Some were close-ups of the figures. Some were taken from far enough back that you could see the whole thing.

"What is it?"

"It's a reredos," said Frederick Applebee. "An altarpiece from a church."

"Oak, it looks like."

"That's right. Made in England about one hundred fifty years ago but in the fifteenth-century style. It was damaged in the flood. The angel's head and wing are gone. I've looked everywhere for the pieces, but they must've been carried off in the water."

"Too bad. You a preacher or something?"

"No. No, not at all. It just came with my house when I bought it. It's not even very valuable, really. I've just always been fond of it."

Shannon handed the pictures back to him. "What do you want me to do?"

"Well, I've asked around. The carving is obviously very fine, and I understand oak is a difficult wood to work with. It'd be more than I can afford to get someone who could actually repair the archangel, the one in the middle. I was wondering if maybe you could just remove him and somehow take out the center of the piece, match the tracery of the two halves together, and make the whole thing smaller with just the two heralds on it, if you see what I mean. That's the only solution I can come up with. I hate to lose the central piece but…" He gave a self-deprecating chuckle. "I find the idea of a headless archangel a bit disturbing."

Shannon smiled at that. He liked this old guy. "Let me see those again." Shannon took the photos back. Studied them more closely. Shrugged. "Y'know, I could probably just fix this middle one for you. Probably be easier. Smooth down the breaks, drill a couple holes, slap some dowels in there. Put a piece on for the wing, a piece on for the head, carve them right into the shape of it. I could hide the breaks in the wing feathers and in that part-the folds there-of his clothes. You wouldn't even be able to see where I fixed it unless you looked really close."

Frederick Applebee narrowed his eyes at him, doubtful. "You'd have to make a new head, a new wing. You'd have to carve them."

"Well, yeah. That's what I'm talking about."

"The original carving was… very fine."

"Yeah, it's good. I can see that." Shannon handed the pictures back to him. "I'm pretty sure I could copy it, though, working from the pictures." He was pretty sure he could, in fact. The wing would be easy and he was already beginning to see the head in his mind's eye. It was just a question of finding the right piece of wood for it. It'd be fun. He could do some sculpting and get paid for it into the bargain. Hell, he would've done it for free.

Still, this Applebee character went on giving him that doubtful look, narrow-eyed. He smiled, embarrassed. Gently, he repeated, "I'm told this sort of wood is quite difficult to work with."

"Yeah. Well… listen," Shannon said. "If it's no good, I can always cut the angel out, right? Do like you said. But why don't you let me try to fix it? Then, you don't like it, I'll just take it out and make the whole thing smaller."

"I haven't got a lot of money…"

"You don't like what you get, you don't have to pay me. I gotta kick a hundred back for the moonlight. Take care of that and, one way or another, you'll get something you can use, and you can pay me what you think it's worth."

Frederick Applebee was shorter than Shannon by a good few inches. He had to look up at Shannon to search his face. That's what he did, standing there for a long moment in silence. It made Shannon kind of uncomfortable: those mild, intelligent eyes going over him, judging the make of him. He had to tell himself again not to be so paranoid. The guy just wanted to make sure he wasn't going to mess up his altarpiece, that's all.

Applebee came to his decision. "All right," he said in his mild voice. "Give it a try. Do you want me to bring it to you somewhere?"

"I haven't got anywhere to bring it. I don't have anyplace to carve."

"Well, we have a small yard out back you can work in. Here, let me give you the address. You can come by on Saturday."

"Saturday," Shannon repeated slowly. That was the day Joe Whaley wanted him to do the job.

When the old man was gone, Shannon stood for a few moments, rubbing his arm, thinking. He was thinking about the job Joe Whaley wanted him to do. He thought he could probably do the sculpting work during the day and do the break-in for Joe Whaley at night. But something else bothered him, something on the edge of his understanding. He couldn't even put it into words at first. Then it came clear to him. His crawly feeling was gone. The minute he found out he'd be doing some sculpting work, the crawly feeling had receded. He knew from experience it would go away completely once the work was underway. He didn't have to do the job for Joe Whaley now. Not if he didn't want to.