I wandered back to my car. I drove home slowly. I played a Bach tape and tried to think. I concluded that I was more confused than ever. It wasn’t just women that I didn’t know much about.
It was nearly eleven when I got back to my apartment. I poured myself a slug of Jack Daniel’s and sat at the table by the sliders, sipping it. I had an almost physical urge to call up Gloria and tell her that our divorce more than a decade earlier had been a terrible mistake.
I fought off the urge. I always have succeeded in fighting off that urge. At least, so far.
CHAPTER 10
JULY PASSED, HOT AND muggy as usual. The first half of August was little better. In the middle of the month we got several days of sullen rain. When the front finally left, the promise of autumn slid in behind it. The swamp maples started to turn crimson, the nights were cool, and the days grew perceptibly shorter. Winter was just around the corner. The inevitability of winter always ruined New England autumns for me.
Charlie and I drove out to the Deerfield one Saturday to try the trout and found them uncooperative. Doc Adams and I trekked to the Farmington River in Connecticut on a Sunday. We each landed a couple of small ones and tried to convince each other that we’d had a good day.
I talked with Gloria a few times. Joey had lucked into a job at a resort in Ogunquit. He’d be there through Labour Day. She seemed to miss him. I figured they had either resolved their conflicts or at least achieved a temporary truce. I spoke with Joey once. He called me Pop. Neither of us mentioned his moving in with me.
The stock market dipped. Several clients panicked. I had to make a lot of house calls. On the weekends I even opened my briefcase.
Jeff Newton’s condition hadn’t changed. He remained at the Cape Cod Hospital in Hyannis. Machines did all his living for him.
I hadn’t spoken to Lily since our dinner date in Scituate.
The knife wounds on my neck and collarbone healed and that searing anger I had felt for the first week or so after the theft of Jeff’s jaguars, that thirst for revenge, cooled in me. I called Officer Maroney once in Orleans. He had nothing to report. Jeff’s insurance money arrived. I deposited it for him. I talked with Dan LaBreque a few times. Mostly, we discussed bluefish. He said he was keeping his ears open, but had heard no rumours about seven golden Mayan jaguars for sale.
It seemed like a dead issue. I had plenty of other things on my mind.
It was the last Tuesday in August, mid afternoon. I had swivelled around to gaze out at the cityscape, so clear in the pre-autumnal air that it seemed to glitter. The previous Saturday I had, inexplicably, turned down Dan’s invitation to go bluefishing. Bluefish weren’t what I needed. I didn’t know what it was, but it wasn’t bluefish.
The buzz of the intercom startled me. I rotated back to my desk, poked the proper button, and picked up the phone. ‘Hi, Julie,’ I said.
‘Hi, yourself. Daydreaming?’
‘Contemplating obscure points of law.’
‘Sure. You got a call.’
‘Say I’m not here. I don’t want to disturb my train of thought.’
‘Aquatic insects and whatnot.’
I sighed. ‘Who is it?’
‘A woman. Not a client.’
A woman who is not a client had to be a lover, past or present, or potential, in Julie’s mind. She does not approve of my having lovers of any description. She isn’t jealous, at least not on her own behalf. Julie is ecstatically married to her Edward, a young radiologist, and the mother of four-year-old Megan. Julie simply regards me as married, too. The fact that Gloria and I have been divorced for more than a decade has made no impression on Julie.
‘What’s this woman’s name?’ I said.
‘Conway.’
‘Maria Conway?’
She hesitated just an instant. ‘Yes.’
‘OK. Good. Put her on.’
‘I can tell her you’re busy, you’ll get back to her, if you want.’
‘I’m not busy, Julie. I’ll talk to her.’
I heard her sigh. ‘Fine. OK.’
There was a click in my ear. ‘Maria?’ I said.
‘Hi, Mr Coyne. I promised I’d call you if…’
‘The jaguars. You’ve found them?’
She laughed. ‘Not exactly. This may be nothing, and I really hesitated before calling you. I’m not sure it’s precisely ethical, to tell you the truth.’
She paused. She wanted me to reassure her.
‘I don’t want you to violate your ethics, Maria,’ I said. ‘But if you’ve got a line on those jaguars…’
‘I’m not sure I do. But I was talking with a patron of our museum the other day. It’s probably nothing at all, but…’
She paused. Finally I said, ‘Maria?’
‘I’m sorry.’ I heard her laugh quickly. ‘I guess I’m beating around the bush here because now that I’m trying to tell you, it sounds irrelevant and silly. OK. This actually happened back in the spring—maybe June, which, as I remember it, was before those jaguars were stolen. Anyway, according to Victor—’
‘Victor?’
‘Victor Masters. He’s a collector who lives in Tempe. Specializes in Latin American stuff. We exhibit his things now and then. He’s got some lovely pieces. Very valuable. He’s quite well known among people in this field. Anyhow, as I started to say, I happened to mention your phone call to Victor—actually, I didn’t mention you, just that I’d heard some pre-Columbian objects had been stolen—and he told me that he’d been approached a couple of months earlier by somebody who claimed to have some Mayan pieces, fourteenth century, that could be purchased.’
‘This was in June?’ I said.
‘Late May, early June, something like that.’
‘These pieces…?’
‘They were supposed to be gold jaguars. Victor said he didn’t think too much of it at the time. Wealthy collectors get crank calls all the time.’
‘But it could be the cats.’
‘Right. So I thought I should call you.’
‘This Victor Masters. Do you mind if I call him?’
‘If I minded, Mr Coyne, I wouldn’t have told you this.’
‘Does he expect me to call?’
‘No. I didn’t decide to call you until I actually dialled your number. It still feels like a violation of his privacy. But he’s a good man, a gentleman, and I think he’ll understand.’
‘You don’t happen to have his number, do you?’
‘Sure I do. It’s right here on my desk.’
She read it off to me. I jotted it down on my yellow legal pad. I thanked Maria Conway, hung up the phone, and swivelled around to resume gazing out my office window. But now I didn’t really notice the city out there. Now I was picturing Jeff Newton’s dented and bloody skull, and his missing jaguars, and two dead Dobermans, and I once again remembered the feel of the knife blade against my skin.
I waited until nine that night to call Victor Masters. A woman answered the phone and I asked to speak to Mr Masters.
‘We were just sitting down to dinner,’ she said. It came out as an apology. ‘Is it important?’
‘I’m calling from Boston. But I—’
‘It must be important, then. Just a minute, please.’
A moment later a man’s voice, soft and cultivated and elderly, said, ‘Victor Masters. What can I do for you?’
‘I don’t want to disturb your dinner, sir,’ I said. ‘I forgot about the time difference. It’s nine o’clock here. We can talk later.’
‘No problem. My wife said it was long distance. What can I do for you?’
‘My name is Coyne, Mr Masters. Brady Coyne. I’m a lawyer here in Boston.’ I paused. ‘Look, it’s kind of complicated. Perhaps—’
‘Go ahead, Mr Coyne.’
‘I understand you collect art.’
He hesitated. ‘Yes, that’s right.’
‘Well, I—’
‘Mr Coyne.’
‘Sir?’
‘What exactly is
your business?’
‘I’m a lawyer.’
‘I mean, will you state your business with me, please?’
I cleared my throat. ‘I started off badly. Maria Conway is a mutual acquaintance of ours, I believe.’
‘You know Maria?’
‘Not well. I haven’t see her for a long time. Several years ago she worked with a friend of mine in the Museum of Fine Arts here in Boston.’
‘Yes.’ said Masters thoughtfully. ‘I knew she once worked in Boston. She is extremely competent. Very knowledgeable. I consult with her frequently. You have dropped a good name, Mr Coyne.’
‘I spoke with her today,’ I said. ‘She mentioned you, said you were an art collector.’
‘Not just any art. I collect very old stuff. Central American Indian, mostly. Not to be immodest, but I have quite a valuable collection. Are you selling, Mr Coyne? Is that why you are calling?’
‘No, it’s nothing like that. Look. I understand a couple months ago a man approached you, offering to sell a set of Mayan jaguars.’
He hesitated. He struck me as a cautious man. ‘Maria told you that?’
‘Yes. She specifically called me to tell me.’
‘I told that man I wanted nothing to do with his jaguars.’
‘Did he tell you his name?’
‘No. And I didn’t ask. I wanted nothing to do with him.’ I detected a trace of understated anger in his tone. ‘I suspected he did not own those pieces legally.’
‘I’m not accusing you of anything, Mr Masters.’
‘Well, I hope not.’
‘No, the thing is, about a month after this man approached you, a set of Mayan jaguars was stolen from one of my clients here in Massachusetts.’
‘Well, sir, I do not have those pieces.’
‘That’s not—’
‘I’ve heard nothing from that man except for that one conversation,’ he said quickly. ‘I want nothing to do with stolen property. It tends to be a bad investment. Quite aside from the legalities. Not even to mention the ethics.’
‘I believe you,’ I said.
‘This theft you are talking about,’ he said. ‘It happened after that man called me?’
‘Yes. Mid July.’
‘As if he was trying to arrange the sale of the jaguars before he stole them, is what you’re thinking.’
‘Right.’
‘Assuming they’re the same pieces.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It does seem possible. How many Mayan jaguars can there be, available for sale?’
‘None, as far as I know,’ he said. ‘And I would be likely to know.’
‘So—’
‘Well, I didn’t want anything to do with them. I told him that. That was it. I haven’t heard from him again.’
‘Did he describe the pieces to you?’
‘Sure. They were gold jaguars. Mayan, fourteenth century. With emerald eyes.’
‘Bingo,’ I said. ‘It has to be Jeff Newton’s jaguars.’
Masters paused. ‘He wanted five hundred thousand for the lot,’ he said, finally.
‘Is that a good price?’
I heard Victor Masters chuckle. ‘Based on his description, assuming, of course, that the pieces are genuine, that is an unbelievable price. That is about one-third the value of the lot. That, Mr Coyne, is why I turned him down cold.’
‘Because the price was too good?’
‘If he had been legitimate, he would have been asking a legitimate price. I simply told the man I was not interested. He was polite. He thanked me. As I said, I haven’t heard from him since, and I had more or less forgotten the whole thing. The other day Maria mentioned a theft, and that reminded me of that call.’
‘This man,’ I said. ‘Did you meet with him?’
‘No. He called me on the phone.’
‘Can you recall the conversation?’
‘Just generally. It was brief, businesslike, as if he had a list of names he was calling and I was on his list. He said he had these jaguars, described them, assured me they were genuine, mentioned his price, said it was not negotiable, and asked if I was interested. I thanked him and said no. That was it.’
‘Do you know where he was calling from?’
‘No.’
‘His voice. Was there anything distinctive about his voice?’
‘I didn’t notice any particular accent, if that’s what you mean.’
I thought for a minute. ‘Talking to me, Mr Masters, do you find anything distinctive about my voice?’
He laughed quickly. ‘Of course I do. You’re a Bostonian, aren’t you?’
‘I think I told you that.’
‘I would have known. You do a peculiar thing with your R’s.’
‘So this man you spoke with on the phone, the man trying to sell the jaguars—’
‘He’s probably a westerner, Mr Coyne. Like I said. Nothing distinctive about his voice.’
I tried to remember the voices of the two men who amused themselves by threatening me with a knife. They were wearing ski masks. Their voices were muffled. They could have been westerners. Or Bostonians.
‘One more thing, Mr Masters,’ I said. ‘Did this man on the phone mention how many pieces there were in the collection he wanted to sell you?’
‘Sure. He said there were seven of them. Is that—?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘My client owned seven jaguars. Can you think of anything else?’
‘Actually…’ He was silent for a moment. ‘No, I’m afraid not,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Well, if something should occur to you, will you call me?’
‘Of course. As a collector, I have a stake in seeing that art thieves are brought to justice. Of course I’ll call you.’
I gave him both my home and office numbers, thanked him, and hung up.
I pondered what I had learned for the rest of the evening. It was interesting, but it didn’t seem to lead anywhere. So the thieves planned their burglary at Jeff’s ahead of time. So they knew what they were after. So they knew the names of some people who collected Central American Indian art. I had already surmised as much.
And maybe they were westerners, which very conceivably related to the phone calls from Montana, though I couldn’t figure out how.
Martin Lodi’s motorcycle was registered in Montana. But Lodi was in prison.
I kept coming back to Lily. Except in my gut I didn’t believe she’d had anything to do with it, which no doubt qualified me as naïve to the extreme. She told me it wasn’t she, and no woman who slept with me could ever lie to me. That’s how my reasoning, such as it was, went. In sex veritas.
Dumb, masculine ego.
I went to sleep wondering about it.
The telephone beside my bed jerked me awake. I fumbled for the light switch and glanced at the clock. It was ten of one. I picked up the phone.
‘Coyne,’ I mumbled.
I heard a chuckle. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Coyne. I forgot about the time difference. You were sleeping.’
‘Oh. Mr Masters.’ I yawned and hitched myself into a semi-sitting position in my bed. ‘What’s up?’
‘I can call you tomorrow.’
‘I’m awake.’
‘I wasn’t going to tell you this.’
‘Tell me what?’
‘I mean, normally I don’t give any credence to rumours. And this is a rumour. But I got to thinking. And I decided I would tell you, and you could decide for yourself.’
I extracted a Winston from the pack on my bedside table and managed to light it one-handed with a match. ‘Go ahead. Please.’
‘A lot or rumours circulate among collectors. Who’s buying, who’s selling, who got a good deal, who got a bad deal. Each of us, we like to think we’re the shrewdest. Most of these rumours you learn to discount. And, to tell you the truth, this one I’m calling you about I discounted when I heard it, and pretty much forgot about it. I just didn’t make the connection.’
‘Does this have something to do wit
h the jaguars, Mr Masters?’
‘Well, I don’t know. If I knew, I certainly would’ve made the connection before now. Talking with you earlier this evening got me to thinking, and it reminded me of this rumour.’
The cigarette tasted awful. I stubbed it out, mildly annoyed at the habit that had caused me to light it in the first place. ‘What is this rumour?’ I said.
He cleared his throat. ‘The rumour is that a collector got himself an awfully good deal on some Mayan artifacts recently. The rumour is that the deal might not have been entirely aboveboard.’
‘Jaguars? Were they gold jaguars with emerald eyes?’
‘I don’t know what they were, Mr Coyne. Just that they were Mayan artifacts, and very valuable. Pre-Columbian.’
‘You don’t know the name of this man, do you?’
‘Yes, I do. It’s one of the reasons I hesitated to call you. Because I knew you’d want his name. And, as I said, I don’t like to spread rumours.’
‘But you did call me.’
‘Yes. I decided I’d tell you his name. It’s a man I have met. A real estate developer. Very wealthy. Builds condominiums. Rather tasteless condominiums, in my opinion. Sells time-sharing on them. He’s only started collecting recently. He collects for the same reason he builds condominiums. Investment. Profit. He doesn’t love art. He buys it and sells it. From what I hear, he has considerably better taste in what he collects than in what he builds. And his scruples in both pursuits are dubious. His name is Timothy McBride.’
‘Hang on a minute, Mr Masters,’ I said. I fumbled on my bedside table and found a scrap of paper and a pencil. When I’m awakened by a phone call in the middle of the night, I don’t trust myself to remember anything I’m told. I wrote down Timothy McBride’s name. ‘What else can you tell me about him?’
‘That’s all I know,’ said Masters. ‘Just this rumour. I connected that phone call I got with the rumour about McBride acquiring some Mayan pieces. Anyone who’d know enough to call me would also probably call McBride. The timing of it all seemed to fit, so I decided I’d pass it on to you.’
‘He’s into real estate, you said.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Real estate in the West, I understand, is not very lucrative these days.’
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