Moving Target

by Elizabeth Lowell

  “Tonight?”

  “Yes. Mr. Warrick is almost one hundred. He never wastes time.”

  “Oh.” Serena looked at the nearly finished wall hanging. Then she thought of the luminous pages lying inside their leather envelope in her locked van, where Picky’s curiosity couldn’t get to them. “Fine. What time and where?”

  Janeen gave her directions and added, “Naturally, Mr. Warrick will want to inspect the originals.”

  It wasn’t exactly an order. Nor was it a question. Serena’s full mouth firmed even as she told herself that she was being ridiculous. If she couldn’t trust the head of the House of Warrick, she couldn’t trust anyone.

  Even so, each time she looked at the pages, her sense of possessiveness toward them increased. In some indefinable way, they were hers. The thought of sharing them with anyone made her uneasy. Or maybe it was just that she couldn’t forget her grandmother’s warning.

  Even at nearly one hundred, Norman Warrick was still a man.

  “Seven o’clock?” Serena asked.

  “Mr. Warrick will be expecting you and the sheets.”

  Click.

  Serena looked at the dead phone, shrugged, and picked up the shuttle again. She didn’t have to leave for half an hour. Forty-five minutes if she pushed it.

  She would push it. She always did.

  Chapter 6

  PALM SPRINGS

  WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON

  Erik looked at his twenty-six-inch flat-screen monitor as intently as he would a manuscript for appraisal. He wouldn’t buy pages over the Internet, but he sure didn’t mind previewing them that way. It saved a lot on airline tickets or special-delivery services.

  For more detailed research and comparison, he preferred using his extensive CD-ROM library of entire manuscripts or collections. Viewing by CD-ROM wasn’t as good as thumbing through a manuscript in person, but it was a hell of a lot more convenient. In any case, most of the manuscripts that interested him were locked away and simply not brought out for viewing by anyone, for any reason. As a way of protecting the precious manuscripts, it was very effective. It was real good at frustrating scholars, too.

  Fortunately, the pages he was looking over right now were being put before the public quite cheerfully. They were for sale to the highest bidder. His favorite auction site to search was the Bodleian Market, named after England’s world-famous Bodleian Library, with its breathtaking collection of illuminated manuscripts. He keyed in his usual request: palimpsests; fourteenth- or fifteenth-century-style illumination; sheets or whole manuscripts; new listings for this month only.

  Because of the short time frame for the listings, and the narrowness of the request, he didn’t expect much. He checked often enough that there were usually only a handful of new entries.

  This time there were six, but the only one that interested him was posted by Reginald Smythe, a small-scale trader who had once been a curator of manuscripts at a minor museum and then an estate chaser with his own agenda. Erik had never met Reggie personally but knew him by reputation.

  The man was perfect for Erik’s purposes. Erik wanted the pages that slipped beneath other people’s radar, the pages that said they were one thing on the surface but really were something else underneath. Palimpsests, in a word, vellum sheets on which the original text had been scraped off and a new one painted or penned on top.

  He clicked on the photo button. Instantly a picture appeared on his screen. One of the side benefits of consulting for Rarities Unlimited was the uplink to Rarities’s satellite-supported computer system. Light speed beat the hell out of even the most recent commercial Internet offerings.

  When he saw the picture, adrenaline kicked in in a tingling rush. Then he frowned. The miniature wasn’t up to the standards he had come to expect of the Spanish Forger, a man whose illicit work had become quite valuable in its own right. Instead of the near lyric style of a late-nineteenth- or early-twentieth-century forger imitating the Romanesque style of the early fifteenth century, the drawing appeared almost clumsy. Almost, but not quite. It was certainly close enough to fool most people. It could possibly be genuine; even the best artists had bad periods.

  Thoughtfully Erik checked the leaf’s availability. No bids yet. The leaf could be inspected at Reggie’s shop in Los Angeles or at the International Antiquarian Book Celebration.

  With a grimace that said he really didn’t want to attend the world’s biggest antiquarian rummage sale, Erik moved on to the category called “Provenance.” The first of the leaf’s three most recent owners—all that were required to be listed—was Christie’s (brokered on behalf of a very private client); it was later sold to a private collector by the name of Sarah Wiggant, who died last year, and was then owned by Reggie himself, the ultimate death chaser. He had purchased it from her estate less than a year ago.

  Erik didn’t have to look at his hand-size portable computer/cell phone to key up the Research department at Rarities Unlimited. He could find the code in the dark—and often had, when he got up in the middle of the night with an inspiration.

  Since his own code automatically registered as he “dialed,” his call was routed directly to the person who was handling his previous research request.

  “Shelby here. Whadya think I am, God? I haven’t had your stuff long enough to—”

  Erik cut in quickly. “Just wanted to add to the search list. I copied my screen to your computer, so all you have to do is—”

  “Yeah yeah, got it. Anything else?”

  “No.”

  The cell phone went dead.

  “Say hello to the wife and kids for me, Shel,” Erik said into the useless phone. “And good-bye to me, too.”

  But Erik was smiling as he dumped the handset back into its charging cradle. Shelby Knudsen was a black former pro football player who had broken his back during scrimmage and discovered while in traction for a long, scary recuperation that he had a gift for tickling facts out of computer files.

  Researchers could be trained. Born researchers had to be found. Next to Factoid, Shel was the most brilliant researcher Rarities had. Erik knew it was a sign of Dana Gaynor’s high regard that he had been given Shel on such short notice.

  Or else she knew something about those pages she wasn’t telling Erik. It wouldn’t be the first time.

  It wouldn’t be the last.

  Chapter 7

  PALM DESERT

  WEDNESDAY EVENING

  By the time Serena followed the directions to Warrick’s Palm Desert estate, it was dark. Even at night, the place was impressive. The Mediterranean-style house was set dramatically against the stark black rise of the mountains, pinned by static swords of security lights, and surrounded by stucco walls, wrought-iron gates, palm trees, ocotillo, and barrel cactus. Exterior security lights set off vast colorful plantings of snapdragons and petunias. Sprawling bougainvillea vines shed bright petals that piled up in windrows at the base of the high walls.

  The twelve-foot-high front gate had cameras as well as the usual number pad. Because she hadn’t been told the gate code, she punched the button marked visitor and spoke her name into the microphone grille.

  “Welcome, Ms. Charters. The Warricks are expecting you.” The voice was clear, pleasant, and male. “Please follow the main drive to the house.”

  The gate retracted just enough to allow her through. The instant her van cleared a hidden detector, the gate closed so quickly that it all but banged into her bumper. Soon she was surrounded by tightly mowed lawns, fountains, and trees that owed more to Italy than to the New World. The drive was at least a quarter mile long. The house itself was big enough to be called baronial: pale stone facade, three stories, with vertical windows set at regular intervals on all levels. Olive trees and cypress pruned into unlikely shapes lined the long walkway to the entrance.

  Though Serena knew this tract of land had been nothing but rocky desert when she was a girl, the house and grounds looked as if they had been in place for five hundred years. />
  Wonder if they need any hangings for their castle walls? Serena thought wryly.

  The Warricks certainly could afford her weaving. One of her continuing sources of bittersweet amusement was that she didn’t have enough money to buy her own work. She could barely afford to keep a favorite piece off the market and in her own home.

  As soon as Serena turned off the engine, the massive front door opened. She half expected to see a leggy young thing in a French maid’s outfit, but the person waiting for her was very tall and masculine in outline. She got out of the van and stood, waiting for him to come to her. As she waited, her fingers strayed to the ancient cloth she wore beneath the neck of her blouse. Soothing, almost silky, yet somehow even softer than silk, the texture calmed her.

  The man walked down the stairs with an ease that suggested youth, fitness, or both. His hair looked dark, except where it was woven through with silver that glistened in the artificial light. Erect and clean-shaven, he didn’t appear particularly casual despite the slacks, golf shirt, loafers, and light wind jacket he wore.

  Without being obvious about it, he looked through the van’s windshield to see if she was alone. He scanned her with equal discretion. There was nothing to raise warning alarms in her black jeans, black cotton pullover, and black sandals. The black leather purse she carried was big enough to double as an overnight case, but many women had such purses and carried nothing more lethal inside than makeup, water, and comfortable shoes.

  “Welcome to the Warrick estate, Ms. Charters.”

  “At the moment, I feel more like Alice in Wonderland.”

  White teeth flashed. “I reacted the same way the first time I saw it. I’m Paul Carson. The Warricks are eagerly awaiting you inside. May I help you carry anything?”

  “Like the pages?” she asked.

  He had the grace to look chagrined. “Sorry. We’re all excited. The color copies were intriguing, but not particularly useful.” He shrugged. “You understand, I’m sure.”

  “You want to see if the pages have more to offer than the copies, is that it?”

  “Of course.”

  “That’s why I brought them. I’d like to know, too.”

  Intent, pale eyes that could have been blue or gray or green watched while she pulled a large leather portfolio from the rear of her van. She noticed his scrutiny and raised her left eyebrow in silent question.

  “I’m sorry if I seem rude,” he said quickly. “Some habits are impossible to break. I spent twenty years in the Secret Service and ten more as Mr. Warrick’s chief of security. We have so few strangers to the estate that, frankly, I’m nervous.”

  “I’m getting that way myself,” she said. Then she smiled. It was hard not to. The idea of someone who looked like Carson being nervous around an unarmed woman was amusing.

  “Again, I apologize,” he said. “It’s just that so many young women carry concealed weapons today.”

  “I’m not one of them.”

  “Good, because I would have to ask you to leave any weapon in your van. House rules.” He smiled again. This time he let his approval of her feminine form and elfin face show in his voice. “Have you eaten?”

  Serena blinked. The man was damned handsome, even if he was twenty years older than she was. The twinkle in his eyes hadn’t aged one bit. “Eaten? I think so.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “I was weaving. When I’m weaving . . .” She shrugged. “My stomach isn’t growling, so I must have eaten something somewhere along the way.”

  “As soon as I introduce you to the Warricks, I’ll see what we have in the kitchen.”

  “That’s not necessary, Mr. Carson.”

  “Paul.” He gestured for her to precede him up the wide marble stairs. “And it’s very necessary. I have a niece your age. I’d feel terrible if she fainted at my feet because I hadn’t thought to feed her.”

  “That must be how Picky feels.”

  “Picky?” He opened the massive front door and turned to her.

  “My cat. He’s always leaving, er, delicacies around for me to eat.”

  “Delicacies?” He closed the door behind them. “Such as?”

  “Obviously you don’t have cats.”

  “No.”

  “Picky catches all manner of small things, but he only eats the juicy bits. He leaves the crunchy stuff for me.”

  “Ugh. No wonder you don’t eat. This way, Ms. Charters.”

  “Serena.”

  “Serena. Unusual name. Quite lovely.”

  “I’m told it’s a very old name.” As she spoke, her eyes took in the extraordinary etchings, paintings, armor, and framed pages from illuminated manuscripts that lined the hallway. They were more striking than even the Louis XV rug whose plush length softened the stone floor. “According to family legend, the first girl born in every generation is given Serena as part of her name. It’s been that way since the twelfth century, one Serena per generation.”

  “Dammit, Paul, where is she?” demanded a rusty, irritated voice. “I could die before I—”

  “We’re in the hall,” Carson cut in quickly. Then he said softly to Serena, “I’ll apologize in advance for Mr. Warrick. He is rude, arrogant, and brilliant.”

  “I’ll try to concentrate on the last part.”

  “We all do,” he said ironically. “Some days it’s easier than others. This way.”

  Serena didn’t know if the space she entered was officially called a “great room,” but it should have been. French and Italian antiques lined the walls and made graceful conversational groupings that any museum would have been proud to own. The Warricks seemed to have a special fondness for the ornate. Ormolu decorated or held everything that could support its gilded splendor. She was certain that the porcelain thus displayed was the best of Sèvres, the crystal was hand carved, and the furniture was signed by the master craftsmen of their times.

  Though it wasn’t Serena’s style, she smiled at the luxurious result and admired the painstaking artistry that went into each piece.

  Then she saw the medieval French tapestry hanging on the far wall and all thought of furnishings vanished. The complexity of the hanging could only be fully understood by another weaver: the delicate weft, the intricacy of the pattern, the hachure technique of blending colors so that there appeared to be many more than the medieval palette of two hundred, the gold and silver threads among the fine wool, the thousands of hours of work, and the keen eye that first imagined and then taught others the design. Unicorn and aristocratically dressed maiden, knights arrayed for battle, colorful tents where favored members of the court rested after a picnic of wine and cheese and meats; the tableau was a slice of time that had survived to cross the years into the twenty-first century.

  The tapestry’s humanity cried out to Serena. Aristocrat or peasant, knight or knave, all people hungered for food and rest and beauty. The weaving both described and understood the imperfections of human nature and the fleeting perfection of a certain moment in time.

  Motionless, she simply absorbed the faded yet extraordinary tapestry that had been woven and embroidered by nameless workers so many centuries ago. Silently she saluted the long-dead men and women who had created such beauty from nothing but a handful of threads.

  “—stand there like a sheep caught in headlights. Bring that portfolio to me!”

  Belatedly Serena realized that there were people in the room. They were all but hidden by the magnificent furnishings.

  “Father,” a woman’s voice said wearily, warily, “there’s no need to be that rude. Not everyone is used to living with antiques that once graced the castles of French and Italian kings.”

  “And queens,” Serena said, looking back to the far wall. “That’s a woman’s tapestry. Extraordinary. Except in the Louvre, I’ve never seen anything to touch it.” Reluctantly she turned her attention from the enthralling woven portrait of a time long lost. “I’m Serena Charters.”

  “Of course you are,” the old man ret
orted. He was thin, quick, had wispy white hair and hands that looked delicate despite their enlarged knuckles. He seemed more like a vigorous seventy than nearly one hundred. “Anyone else wouldn’t have been allowed past the front gate.”

  “This is my father, Mr. Warrick.” The woman was like her voice: of medium coloring except for her skillfully bleached hair, of medium height, and educated yet still casual, with a strong flavor of New York. “I’m Cleary Warrick Montclair. The young man with the good manners is my son, Garrison Montclair.”

  Serena nodded at Garrison, who looked perhaps eighteen at first glance. When he moved to greet her, she noticed the Safavid rug beneath his feet for the first time. Only the French tapestry could have kept her from noticing such a glorious example of textile art. The rug’s colors were still vibrant after five centuries, the designs both crisp and flowing.

  “Delighted to meet you,” Garrison said.

  Serena realized that she was staring at the rug rather than paying attention to her hosts. Talk about rude. Guiltily she forced herself to look away from the gorgeous rug to the hand Garrison was holding out to her. As she shook it firmly, she realized that up close he looked at least ten years older than she had thought. He had the assurance that came from wealth and exclusive education. If he also had the arrogance, he hid it well.

  Probably one arrogant man in the house was enough, she decided with faint humor.

  Having been raised essentially without men, Serena found them amusing and impossible by turns. Fascinating, too. Rather like large cats. Really large. But, as G’mom had assured her granddaughter many times, Men aren’t worth the trouble of housebreaking.

  Serena had always taken her grandmother’s words at face value. Only when she grew older did she wonder why—if men were that much trouble—women went to such unlikely extremes of dress and cosmetics to get one of their own.

  Garrison’s friendly hazel eyes smiled at her. Two warm hands surrounded her own. Softly curling chestnut hair caught and held light as he gave her a slight bow.