Murder at the National Gallery

by Margaret Truman

  “May I help you?” Annabel asked.

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “Just looking.”

  “Make yourself at home,” Annabel said, certain he’d come in only to escape the rain. She returned to her desk and positioned herself so that she could watch him.

  Annabel glanced down at her work. The next time she looked up, she couldn’t believe what was happening: The man had pulled a hammer from his raincoat pocket and swung it with great force at the case, smashing its top and sides and sending the Tlatilco to the floor. The case’s special alarm had come to life, its scream bouncing off the four walls.

  Annabel gasped. She started to shout, but the words wouldn’t come. Springing from her chair, she raced into the showroom. The man had turned and was about to run for the door. “What have you—?” Annabel managed. She grabbed the back of his raincoat collar, spinning him around. Annabel’s hand instinctively went up to protect her face as he brought the ballpeen hammer down in a wide, uncontrolled arc, its peen aimed directly at her forehead. The hard metal nob deflected off the back of Annabel’s hand, causing it to graze her ear and cheek and land with a painful thud on her shoulder. She fell to her knees as the man stumbled to the door, opened it, and disappeared.

  Annabel shook, wrapped her arms about herself, and looked down at the white marble floor. She was surrounded by small pieces of what had been her beloved Tlatilco. She reached tentatively to touch them, then drew back her hand. “Oh my God, why?” she said aloud. She’d knelt on one of the pieces, causing a sharp pain where it cut her knee. Her shoulder ached. She got to her feet and went out to the street, looking left and right. No sign of the man. Across Wisconsin, on the corner of M Street, stood two uniformed Washington MPD officers.

  “Help! Help me, please,” Annabel yelled.

  She and the two officers stood inside the gallery.

  “What is it?” one of the cops asked.

  “A valuable piece of pre-Columbian art,” Annabel replied, her voice trembling in concert with her body.

  “And you say this guy just walked in, hit it with a hammer, and left?”

  “Yes. That’s exactly what happened.”

  “And then he hit you?”

  “Yes.”

  One of the officers checked the side of her head. Her ear and cheek were red, but the skin hadn’t been broken. “Maybe you should sit down,” the officer said. To his partner: “Call for an ambulance.”

  “No,” Annabel said. “I’m all right.” She looked down at her torn stocking and knee, where the small gash oozed blood that ran down the front of her leg. She pressed a paper towel to her knee.

  She pointed to the open door to her office. “I was in there doing some bookkeeping. He came in, stood at the door for a few seconds, then went over and examined the piece. I looked down for a moment. When I looked up, the hammer was in his hand and on its way toward the case. It happened so fast.”

  “Did he say anything to you?”

  “No. I mean, I asked if I could help him, and he shook his head. I think he just said, ‘No.’ Maybe he said he was just browsing. I really don’t remember.”

  “What did the guy look like?”

  “I never saw his face. Not clearly. He had on a green raincoat and a baseball cap. I think it said Baltimore Orioles on it, but I can’t be sure. Yes, that’s what it said.”

  “You didn’t see his face good?”

  “No.”

  “Hair? Any distinguishing features?”

  “If I didn’t see his face, I don’t see how I could—” She caught her anger. Nothing was to be gained by being short with them.

  “And he attacked you?”

  “Yes. No. I mean, I don’t think he intended to attack me. He was heading for the door but I stopped him. I grabbed his coat and … he hit me to get away, I think.”

  “Can I use your phone?” one of the officers asked. “Certainly. In there.”

  From beneath a display case Annabel took a plastic bag in which to place the Tlatilco fragments.

  “Don’t touch them, ma’am,” one of the cops said. “Let’s wait until we get a detective down here.”

  She called George Washington University but was told Professor Smith wasn’t available. She asked to have him call her at her gallery. “Tell him it’s urgent,” she said.

  A couple of browsers attempted to enter the gallery, but one of the officers had positioned himself at the door. “There’s been a crime committed here,” he said. “The gallery is closed.”

  Annabel remained in her office until the buzzer said someone else had arrived. She went to the showroom. “Steve,” she said. “Of course. I should have thought to ask for you. I wasn’t thinking straight.” Detective Steve Jordan headed Washington MPD’s art squad.

  “This time, for some reason, they put the call through to the right person,” he said. “What happened here?”

  Annabel explained.

  Jordan knelt and visually examined the broken figure. He looked up from his position on the floor and said, “Doesn’t make any sense. Why would a guy come in and smash this thing?”

  “I wish I knew,” said Annabel.

  Jordan stood. “I can see somebody stealing it. Worth a lot of money, huh?”

  Annabel nodded.

  “Insured, I assume.”

  “Yes, but not for its full value.” Annabel had meant to increase coverage on that piece along with others in the gallery but hadn’t gotten around to it.

  “Report said injuries. You?”

  Annabel shrugged. “Nothing serious. I tried to stop him and he took a swing at me with the hammer.” She grimaced against pain in her shoulder. “Not very bright on my part.”

  “Get yourself checked out,” Jordan said.

  A police technician arrived and took photographs. Jordan asked Annabel whether the man had touched anything on which he might have left fingerprints. She said she didn’t think so, except for the front doorknob, which a criminalist dusted.

  After the uniformed officers and criminalists had left, Jordan sat with Annabel in her office. He took a small tape recorder from his pocket and placed it on the desk in front of her. “Okay, Annabel, give me a complete statement.”

  When she was finished, he turned off the recorder and sat back. Jordan was a short, compact man with salt-and-pepper hair that closely followed the contour of his temples. He wore a gray tweed jacket, white button-down shirt, and maroon knit tie.

  Annabel had known him for three years, ever since he was appointed head of the art squad. Mac Smith’s relationship with him went back further, to when the detective worked Homicide.

  Jordan had earned, at nights and on weekends, a master’s degree in art history at Georgetown University. Other members of his family were involved in the arts—his father edited an art magazine in New York, and an uncle was a painter of minor note in Denver—which helped explain this homicide detective’s interest in matters other than murder.

  Shortly after earning his advanced degree, the head of the Washington MPD art squad retired, and Jordan got the job. Annabel had heard nothing but praise for his having shaped what had been an ineffective appendage of the police department into an important, functioning addition to it. A number of articles had been written about him, including a piece that recounted his role in recovering a stolen Velázquez. The case had involved close cooperation between Jordan, his counterparts in Spain, and other international art sleuths. The painting was discovered and recovered in Washington, turning Jordan into a hero of sorts, at least to the arts community.

  “Strange,” Jordan said.

  “Very,” Annabel agreed. “An insane act. Nothing to be gained. Just wanton destruction of a beautiful object.”

  “I know,” he said. “If the guy wanted to steal it, it would make sense.”

  “I really appreciate you being here, Steve,” Annabel said. “All I hope is that you find the madman who did this. It won’t restore the figure, but it will satisfy my need to find out why.” She
picked up her ringing phone. It was Carole Aprile. “Yes, Carole. Noon? All right. I can be there. What? Oh, nothing. I’ll fill you in when I see you. Noon it is.”

  “Free for lunch?” Jordan asked after she’d hung up.

  “Can’t. I just got summoned to a noon meeting at the National Gallery.”

  Jordan raised his eyebrows. “About what happened last night to the Italian cultural attaché?”

  “I assume.”

  “Strange case, too. Homicide has it, but everybody is fighting over jurisdiction. State. Embassy cops. The National Gallery’s own police force. FBI. But I’m rung in, too. The guy had something to do with art, so the art squad gets involved. How about later in the day? Can I buy you a drink? Dinner?”

  “I don’t know, Steve. I was leaving things open. Mac and I had dinner plans but—is there something else on your mind?”

  He laughed easily. “I wanted to make you a proposition, hopefully one you couldn’t, or wouldn’t, refuse.”

  “A proposition? Sounds intriguing.”

  “Maybe. I’d like you to come down to headquarters sometime today to look at mug shots.”

  “To what end? I didn’t see his face.”

  “You never know what you’ve seen, what your mind’s eye might have recorded. At least go through the procedure. We’re big on procedure.”

  “All right. What time?”

  “Whatever’s good for you. Four?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “An early dinner after?”

  “I’ll ask Mac. He still doesn’t know what happened here this morning. Maybe the three of us can have dinner together.”

  “The Collector? At six?” he said.

  “I’ll let you know at four.”

  The phone rang. “Must be Mac,” she said.

  “See you at four, Annabel. And have that shoulder looked at.”

  14

  Mac raced to Annabel’s side after returning her call and hearing what had happened. By the time he arrived, the numbness that had consumed her had been replaced by regular pulses of anger.

  “Forget the meeting and come home with me,” Mac said. “You don’t realize what a traumatic thing you’ve been through.”

  “I’m fine, Mac. Honest I am. I was lucky. No major damage.”

  “Raise your arm.”

  She did, pleased that only a mild ache remained in her shoulder. “See? I’m okay. I don’t want to miss the meeting.”

  “You’ll come directly home after it?” Mac said.

  “I can’t. I told Steve Jordan I’d come down to look at mug shots at four.”

  “To what avail? You said you didn’t see him.”

  “I know. But Steve thinks I might have seen more of him than I remember. Seeing a man in the mug book could trigger recognition. Please, I’m fine. What I want most is to find out who did this, and why.”

  They stood outside as a young reporter from the Georgetowner, who’d learned of the incident from a friend, arrived to interview Annabel. Annabel graciously put him off. He asked if he could call her at home later that evening. “She won’t be available,” Mac responded gruffly. “Sorry.”

  “I’ll be home about six,” Mac said after the dejected reporter had departed. “I’ll have something ready for dinner.”

  “I almost forgot,” said Annabel. “Steve wants to have dinner with us tonight. At The Collector.”

  “Feel up to it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I suppose so. Meet you there? What time?”

  “Six, he said.”

  “I can make it by six-thirty.”

  A lingering embrace was a needed balm for both of them.

  The noon meeting at the National Gallery accomplished little, in Annabel’s view. The topic was, as expected, how Carlo Giliberti’s murder might “impact” the Caravaggio exhibition. Not seeing Luther Mason there triggered a reminder that she was supposed to have continued to try reaching him. “Where’s Luther?” she asked Court Whitney as attendees trickled into the conference room.

  “He won’t be here,” the gallery director said abruptly. “Went home sick. Last night’s tragic event upset him. Understandable. He and Giliberti were pretty close.”

  “I understand that he wants to—”

  One of two trustees who would attend the meeting motioned Whitney from the room. They’d no sooner left than three Secret Service agents entered, followed by Carole Aprile. She came directly to Annabel. “Thanks for showing up,” she said. “Anything wrong? You sounded …”

  Annabel gave her a thirty-second sound bite of what had happened at her gallery.

  “What are you even doing here?” Carole asked.

  “Trying to be helpful. I didn’t reach Luther. Time got away from me.”

  “I don’t wonder. I spoke with him just before coming here. He’s calmed down, although he’s talking about canceling the exhibition.”

  Whitney and the trustee returned and called the meeting to order. It lasted only a half hour. “I understand Luther Mason thinks we should call off the show,” Carole said.

  “That’s correct,” Whitney affirmed. “Luther is upset—and he’s wrong. The show must go on, as they say.”

  “Any word on Mr. Giliberti’s murderer?” Annabel asked.

  There wasn’t. Whitney said, “The faster they find who killed him, the better off we’ll be. The press is already trying to link up his murder with the exhibition and the Grottesca. I got a call from a tabloid reporter this morning. He’s doing a piece he’s calling ‘The Caravaggio Curse Threatens Washington.’ Unbelievable. The sooner they pick up the druggie who killed Giliberti, the sooner this kind of stupid speculation will stop.”

  “It could heighten interest in the exhibition,” a representative from the public information office offered. She was ignored.

  Carole Aprile had the last word. “I’m relieved that this dreadful wanton act won’t derail the exhibition. The administration remains fully committed to it. If problems arise with the Italian government over this, let me know.” She whispered to Annabel, “A minute?”

  They stood in a corner of the reception area, watched by the Secret Service agents. “I’m so sorry about what happened to you this morning, Annabel.”

  “Lucky, actually. Guess he could have killed me.”

  “Bad time to ask more of you, maybe, but I will. Court is very concerned about Luther’s mental stability.”

  “Really? It sounds to me like he’s simply distraught over his friend’s death.”

  “I agree. But Court seems sincerely troubled by Luther’s behavior. His reputation as a curator might be more secure than his psyche. I wondered if you’d make it a point to get, and stay, close to him until the exhibition opens. You know, keep in touch with him, read his moods, and let me know if in your judgment there’s anything to worry about—including his judgment.”

  “I’ll do my best. We’re not close friends but—”

  “Your best is more than sufficient, Annabel. You weren’t hurt at all?”

  “Bruised a little. Nothing a little liniment and a good night’s sleep won’t cure.”

  Carole kissed Annabel on the cheek. “You’re a trouper. Keep in touch.”

  At five-thirty that afternoon, Annabel turned the last page of the mug-shot book placed before her by Steve Jordan. “Sorry,” she said, “but I see nothing that even resembles the man who came into my gallery this morning. As I said, all I really remember were his hat and coat.”

  “A long shot, Annabel, but worth taking. We put out a bulletin on what the guy was wearing. Every cop in town will be looking for him. Not that that’s much consolation. Maybe he was a nut case, smashing it as an act of protest.”

  “Against what?”

  “Against art, or pre-Columbians, or beautiful gallery owners. Hungry?”

  “Surprisingly, yes. Mac said he’d join us at six-thirty.”

  “I might have to bail out before he arrives. One of the kids is sick, and I promised Ruth I’d get
home early to spell her. It’s her class night. She’s studying calligraphy. But we can at least have a drink and appetizer together.”

  “Time enough to proposition me?”

  “I wouldn’t put it that way.” His grin was pleasingly boyish. “To make you a proposition you can’t refuse. Besides, I try never to hit on women taller than me.”

  Bill Wooby’s Collector Gallery and Restaurant, located on the ground floor of the Dupont Plaza Hotel, had become the gathering spot of choice for Washington’s artists, a place where the gossip was as juicy as the steaks, backs were bitten, and useful information was occasionally exchanged. Washington’s artist population was America’s fourth largest, according to Washington artists.

  Wooby, whose grandmother had been a bareback rider, knife thrower, and tattooed lady in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, was a prime influence on what went on artistically in the city, his restaurant a rallying point for social, charitable, and artistic causes dear to his heart. The art featured on The Collector’s walls was rotated on a monthly basis. This month it featured the black-and-white works of photographer Kathleen Bober.

  As Steve Jordan and Annabel entered, Wooby was winding down a cocktail party honoring students of the Corcoran Gallery’s art school. He spotted them and led them to a table, saying to Jordan as they passed through the bar area, “I still intend to get your name on my ceiling one of these days.”

  They stopped and looked up. The ceiling was covered with signatures and salutations from artists, politicians, and other regulars.

  “Not until I retire from the force,” Jordan said. “It wouldn’t do the career any good to end up next to an art forger or thief on your ceiling.”

  Wooby sat with them. “What’s new on the murder?”

  Jordan shrugged. “Nothing you haven’t heard on television. Did you know Carlo Giliberti?”

  “As a customer. I wouldn’t call him a regular, but he did come in now and then. He had a thing going with a local artist and used to bring her here.”

  “We’re still trying to figure out what he was doing in Rock Creek Park at that hour,” said Jordan. “As far as we can piece together, he wasn’t the kind of guy to be prowling a park after midnight. He’s married, got a couple of young adult children. No sign of drug use. Hard to figure.”