A Perfect Eye Page 5

  Kitchen counter gleaming, faucets turned all the way off. Hangers in her closet perfectly aligned. The clothes in her laundry basket—she’d been in such a rush to get to work that morning after her night with Nick, she couldn’t possibly have been so neat. The intruder had tidied up after her.

  Concentrate on details that don’t stand out.

  Desk even cleaner than she’d left it, pencil mug two inches farther from her computer than she comfortably reached. Dresser drawers and lingerie meticulously rifled, not pawed. None of it taken. Vials in her medicine chest lined up with labels facing out. A subtle rebuke for her minute sloppiness? Or was the intruder testing her eye?

  Her birth control pills were missing. Not subtle at all. Was there something else he wanted her to find?

  The only item in the waste basket was her toothbrush. Its bristles were splayed and matted, as if the intruder had scrubbed them against a hard surface. Details, please. Some were crossed over each other, like grass flattened by the wind.

  She started to dial 911. Then she heard a sound. Claws scrabbling, an outraged mew? The broom closet in the back hall.

  “Jack!”

  He’d been the scrawniest kitten at the shelter, with a body and legs that were impossibly long and a tail that stopped an inch past where it should have ended. In the year since, he’d put muscle on his shoulders, and his short coat—a pelt, really—had become buttery soft. Now his fur was matted and acrid. He’d peed on himself, the ultimate insult to his dignity, and trembled as she held him to her chest. When his heart slowed, she set him down and reached again for her phone.

  “Lily?” came a voice from the front doorway. “Is that you, dear?”

  Her widowed neighbor, Louise, stood there in slippers and a robe. Louise of the molded salads and Coca Cola-braised pot roast. Louise who took in her mail and fed Jack when she was out of town. It was all she could do not to hug her.

  “I thought I heard you,” Louise said. “Everything all right?”

  “Somebody broke in.”

  The only crime at the building had been years earlier, when a burglar scaled the exterior wall and made it to the sixth floor. Entering through balconies, he’d stolen jewelry and cash. Not birth control pills. And that toothbrush… The condo’s walls were paper thin. When Paul had spent the night, they’d put on music; now she fell asleep to the sound of Louise’s TV.

  “Did you see or hear anything, Louise?”

  “Just that gentleman friend of yours.”

  “Who?” She’d brought Mr. Wonderful home once. Or was it twice?

  “Not the older man with the hair plugs from your law firm, dear. This was the handsome one, with the eyes that never blink.”

  Did Paul keep a key?

  “It was around six,” Louise said. “I was taking out my trash and he was standing at your door.”

  “Did he say anything?”

  hope you don’t chase him away again.”

  Chapter Eight

  Degas’s ballerina limbered up at the barre. Sensuous but innocent, she extended one satin-clad foot behind her. Light was represented by color and tone; it couldn’t be reproduced. Her toe slippers gleamed.

  “Where’s the light coming from?” Lily asked Amy.

  “The left.”

  The dancer’s shadow projected onto the wall to her right, echoed by a softer shadow from her extended foot onto the floor. Degas mixed his paints with turpentine to achieve a matte, velvety effect. He never used varnish; he was opposed to its artifice, and the hard film into which it dried inevitably affected tone. Tone was more than contrast. The interplay of dark and light created structure, guiding the viewer’s eye into the painting.

  How Degas felt, however, was of no significance to the ballerina’s current owner. Did he varnish this sublime creature to protect her from dust? But dust on an unvarnished irregular surface wasn’t nearly as great a problem as dirt on a varnished one. The ballerina now wore a resinous brown coat.

  “Varnish?” Amy asked.

  “And nicotine. Our dancer lived with a chain smoker.”

  Lily touched the canvas gently, mindful of her oath: First do no harm. Surgeons buried their mistakes; conservators hung them on the wall. Early in her career, she’d exorcised any vestige of a cavalier nature. Now she never picked anything up without first assessing how it was constructed and should be handled. The ballerina was especially dear because without being sentimental, Degas had captured a girl on the cusp of womanhood. What female could forget the first time a stranger looked at her with desire, how confused and powerful and alive it made her feel?

  “What’s our first step, boss?” Amy said.

  “Look. Then look some more.”

  Amy set up two wheeled lamps, one on each side of the ballerina. On the raised, textured surface of the canvas, the varnish caught the light unevenly. The erratic points of luster destroyed the matte effect and flattened the tone, making it difficult for the viewer to enter the painting.

  “Lily?” Paul stood at her elbow with an overnight bag. After he rifled through her condo, she knew he’d show up. “I left three messages. One last night and two this morning.”

  “What do you want?”

  “To talk.”

  “We’re doing that now.” She ran her loupe over the ballerina’s tutu. When Degas painted it, were the tulle folds gold—or pink?

  “Can we go to your office?” he said.

  “Anything you have to say can be said here.”

  His neck flushed, and his hand crept to the back of it. Amy sidled away, but not too far.

  Lily lowered her voice. “Why were you at my condo last night?”

  “I wanted to take you to dinner.”

  “And when you didn’t find me, you let yourself in.”

  “What?”

  He’s such a bullshitter I almost believe him.

  The lab hummed with colleagues engrossed in their work. Across the floor the white-gloved Objects Conservator gingerly examined a porcelain figurine while her assistant worked on a bronze statuette with a mottled patina. The Degas ballerina waited.

  “Why did you do that to my toothbrush?” she demanded. Stealing her birth control pills was such a cheap shot it wasn’t even worth mentioning.

  “What?” he repeated.

  “And you didn’t have to scare Jack!”

  The flush crept to his face. “Who the hell is Jack?”

  “Don’t pretend.”

  “You were with Nick,” he said.

  Is he spying on me? “You’re jealous of a provisional docent?”

  “Provisional?” he snorted. “Poor guy hasn’t proven himself to you yet?”

  With as much dignity as she could muster, she went to her office. He closed the door behind them and stood across from her desk.

  “I’m going back to D.C.,” he said.

  Ten years ago, all over again.

  “The case is solved,” he continued. “They’re making an arrest.”

  She went to the window. A spring storm was blowing in from the west. The clouds looked like snow. He’d better get to the airport fast.

  “Don’t you want to know who killed Kurtz?” he said.

  She didn’t reply.

  “It was a burglar after all. High on crack and caught red-handed in a house two blocks from Kurtz’s. He has a record—”

  She turned. “You believe that? Or is it an easy way back to D.C.?”

  He stared. “You wanted me to go. Then and now.” She turned away again. But he wasn’t finished. “That’s how you stay safe, isn’t it?”

  “No woman’s safe—”

  “You never let anyone in but your father. That guilty old—”

  “At least he stayed. And he didn’t screw around on his wife!”

  For a long moment Paul was silent. When he spoke, it was with a new coldness. “To set the record straight, Lily, you threw me out. For two years I—”

  “You—”

  “No, you listen to me. You hide in a wo
rld of make-believe. You traded your law firm for this museum, but it’s no sanctuary either. You’re just like Harry, pretending it’s all objectivity and facts. I pity you. Life isn’t black and white. But you’re too perfect to see that.” He straightened his tie and reached for his bag.

  “And you’re too stubborn and blind to see the killer’s an artist!” Until she said it, she hadn’t been sure.

  He froze. Then he stood and faced her. “If he’s an artist, what did he paint?”

  She tried to hide her fluster. “I don’t have to—”

  “No, Lily, this time you don’t get to walk. We’ll settle it once and for all. This is an art museum, right?” He gestured grandly and she yearned to smack the smug look off his face. “If the killer’s an artist, something inspired him. Show me a painting sick enough to inspire a maniac to flay and bisect George Kurtz.”

  She squared off. “The museum’s about to close.”

  “It reopens in the morning.”

  “What about your flight?”

  “There’s another one tomorrow.”

  Chapter Nine

  When the museum opened, they met in the lobby. Paul had evidently slept well; he was in a better mood, even jovial. She still smarted. How dare he pity and mock her!

  “Where shall we start?” she said.

  “With the gore.”

  “This is a museum, Paul, not an abattoir.”

  “You’re the one who thinks he’s an artist.” His grin was strained. Was he bristling at being accused of breaking into her condo, or still furious over what happened ten years ago? “Does your museum have a version of St. Sebastian with the Arrows?”

  “No, but we have more than one crucifixion.”

  “Let’s start there,” he said. “You can play your dad’s game.”

  The sooner this charade was over, the better. “You’re the one who thinks perfection’s bullshit.”

  “Now’s your chance to convince me.”

  At the Spanish Colonial gallery they wasted no time on the silver or decorative arts. He stopped in front of a twelfth century altarpiece and waited with his arms folded.

  “Does it remind you of Kurtz?” he said.

  “Not in the least.” She turned to leave.

  “Not so fast.” He was like a kid with a front-row seat to the circus, only to discover there were no clowns. “Think about the body.”

  Humor him. She looked at Christ on the cross again.

  “Kurtz wasn’t spread-eagled. When’s your flight?”

  “Come on, Lily,” he chided, “you were trained better than that.”

  “The display’s all wrong. He’s nailed to a cross and Kurtz was propped in a chair.”

  He shook his head. “Another blind alley. What about the ankles?”

  “Christ’s are crossed and pinned. Kurtz’s were broken.”

  “And?”

  “Breaking Kurtz’s ankles cut his feet from view. It made the tableau compact.” She was getting testy. “That’s why I said it’s a painting, Paul, not because of the gore.”

  He held up his hands in mock defense. “Let’s look some more.”

  They took the elevator to the European & American gallery. He stopped at a sixteenth century portrait of a man whose head was a composite of vegetables and fruit. “What about him?” His nose was a zucchini, his lips were grapes, and a glossy eggplant hung from his ear. The artist was Italian, of course.

  “Was Kurtz a vegetarian?” she mused. “There is something about turning a man into a bowl of fruit.”

  “The ultimate still life?”

  They moved to a Dutch Golden Age painting commemorating a dead soldier. The breastplate was propped up like an armless and legless Kurtz, and the shiny helmet reminded her of his brilliantined hair. A sword’s hilt protruded from a swathe of brocade, its blade poised to plow up the breastplate and cut its wearer in two. Medals spilled from a box next to a silver pocket watch.

  “Tempus fugit,” Paul said, “the transience of life?”

  She shook her head. “The killer wasn’t honoring Kurtz. He was punishing him.”

  “But the sword—”

  “Too obvious.” This was such a waste of time. “He isn’t hung up on the seventeenth century, Paul, his inspiration’s more modern—almost impressionistic. And it’s not about theme. It’s about structure.”

  “Structure?” Maybe it was being around art, but last night’s anger and this morning’s condescension were gone. Did he want to believe her despite himself? A tour group filed in, led by Dave. He waved but she ignored him.

  “Kurtz’s arms were splayed on the armrests of his chair, Paul. They converged with the furrow through his sternum and met in a vanishing point at his head.”

  “Lily—”

  They were at the gallery entrance. As usual, visitors flocked to Seven.

  She stopped.

  “What?” he said.

  She waited for a break in the crowd, then moved to Seven. It was a classic landscape. Grass and wildflowers in the foreground, the deep plow mark leading to the brooding stand of poplars midground to the right. Rooftops in the distance, opposite the trees. Looming clouds. And the little man with the brimmed hat.

  “See him?” she said.

  “The man? He’s heading right into that storm.”

  “No,” she insisted. “He’ll make it home.”

  “But the clouds—”

  She stared at the painting. Something had always seemed a tiny bit off. The clouds were moving across the field from the right. The wind came from the same direction, sweeping the poppies and grass towards the viewer and not away. Caillebotte’s man was walking directly into the storm. She leaned in closer. And he wasn’t heading for the houses. The bend of his knee propelled him ever so slightly toward the trees.

  “That’s what you wanted me to see?” Paul said.

  She stepped back, jostling a visitor. “Sorry,” she murmured, and Paul took her arm to steady her. She refocused. “The geometry, Paul. See how the field, furrow and trees converge?”

  His grip on her elbow tightened.

  “Look at Caillebotte’s palette and technique,” she continued softly. “The cross-hatched greens and golds, the wet-on-wet poppies, the deep plow mark. Kurtz’s killer scored and flayed him and dabbed his intestines on a green silk wall patterned with gold leaves.”

  “Lily.”

  “The furrow up Kurtz’s sternum is the plow mark here, the gobs of intestines are those poppies. The green and yellow wall is the field, and that stand of poplars where the field and sky converge is his head.”

  ―

  She tied her running shoes. It had been a hell of a day. For a moment in the gallery, he’d seen it too—she’d felt it in his touch, heard his sharp intake of breath. But back in the lab he laughed it off. Had me going for a minute, Lily. If our burglar paints, I’ll let you know. He really had changed.

  She’d spent the rest of the day trying to lose herself in the Degas and waited for rush hour to end to drive home. It had begun snowing again, a spring blizzard on which the drought-stricken Front Range depended. Now three inches of slush blanketed Cheesman Park’s running trail. She locked the balcony door. Jack hated to be wet, and it was too late for him to be out. As she stretched at the wall he came up beside her and arched in a perfect imitation of her pose. She scratched his head.

  “Back soon.”

  She set off down the path, gradually adjusting to the snow. She didn’t usually run at night but was too keyed up to sleep. Instead of Kurtz and Seven, she kept thinking about what Paul said. Not today, the night before. And not just about her but about her dad.

  That guilty old…

  She passed tall bushes, scattering a flock of sparrows.

  Perfection’s bullshit. You live in a world of make-believe.

  The packed dirt under the slush gave spring to her step. She got into the rhythm of her feet on the trail. The astringent scent of pine needles sharpened by snow carried her past the colonnaded
pavilion into what she did best.

  On predawn runs back when she was a lawyer, the problems she’d wrestled with were legal ones. Who, what, why. What was different from what she’d thought? Details, please. Surrendering to nature on those runs, she’d practiced looking with all her senses: earth versus pavement as she exited the park, a porch light winking on as a man in a bathrobe looked for his newspaper, the purr of an engine turning over and the smell of exhaust from an early commuter heading downtown to work. Then the Zen of running would kick in, freeing her from having to think. By the time she arrived at her office, the answer to her problem always popped into her head. Tonight she didn’t want answers. She wanted to escape.

  The harder she tried not to think, the more distracted she was. Crossing Sixth, she slipped on a patch of black ice. Did Paul make his flight? She’d kept meaning to return his hanky but couldn’t bring herself to launder it. His clove, Jack’s perfumed fur… She focused on the streetlights, watching flakes swirl like birds taking flight. He was lying about the case being over, was too smart to believe it was a burglar on crack. Using the distance between lights to get into a rhythm, she timed her steps to her puffs of breath in the cold night air. Was Kurtz really Seven?

  Details, please.

  Why was the little man heading into the storm? Something about the crime scene…

  What’s hiding in plain sight?

  She was getting cold.

  Beep!

  She flipped off the pickup truck tailing her. The driver sped past, drenching her sweats in sleet. The asphalt was freezing over and it was time to go home to Jack. Twenty minutes later she was in her hallway, unzipping her hoodie and slipping out of her sneakers. A blast of cold hit her. Her sliding door was wide open.

  In wet socks, she padded across the rug to close it. Her south-facing balcony had been warmed all week by the sun. Her pots were mounded with snow, but the cement pavers retained enough heat to turn their accumulation to slush. Not enough, however, to erase the footprints leading from the door to the railing. She followed them and looked down.

  A black ribbon lay in the snow.

  Shoeless, she dashed out her front door and stabbed the elevator button. The elevator was too slow. She ran down the stairs. Wrenching open the emergency door on the south side of the building, she hurtled to the figure in the snow.