Ghost Hero

by S. J. Rozan

  “Okay then. As soon as we’re done with the case.”

  “That’s what Bill said.”

  “That doesn’t make it wrong.”

  “Then let’s get done fast.”

  “All right.” Jack executed a sharp U-turn. “We’ll go to Gruber. And after that, you’ll still owe me a martini. How’s that?”

  Bill said, “Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  * * *

  Jack’s instinct was to step into the street and hail a cab, but I stopped him. We were only twelve blocks from Gruber Arts. It was faster to walk.

  Three people making tracks on a midtown sidewalk is like running a team obstacle course. Especially when the other two have long legs and one of them is on an adrenaline high from being shot at for the first time. There was no way I was being left behind, though. Jack reached our destination first, me second, and Bill, who’d stopped to light a cigarette, last.

  Gruber Arts was one of about a dozen galleries stacked vertically in a limestone-faced building on Fifty-seventh Street, the heart of New York’s uptown gallery district. For an artist, to have any gallery is a great thing, even in the East Village or Williamsburg. If yours is in SoHo or Chelsea, you’ve arrived. If it’s uptown, you’re annointed.

  “Okay.” Jack spoke as the elevator rose. “I’ll provide covering fire and you two go in and take out the enemy.”

  “You know,” I said, “this getting shot at thing may have had more impact on you than we thought.”

  “Either that,” Bill said, “or Jack knows the gallery owner and is offering to distract him while we talk to Shayna.”

  “Her,” said Jack. “Jen Beril. Lots of white wine under that bridge.”

  “Maybe Shayna Dylan’s just a step on the way to her,” I suggested. “Maybe Jen Beril’s the one who’s got the paintings and is going to be unveiling them next week.”

  “Contemporary’s not a period she generally deals in. Her focus is strictly pre-Republic, mostly Tang through Yuan, but she’ll extend as far as the Han in one direction and the Ming in the other.”

  I blinked. “Show-off.”

  “I’m overcompensating for not knowing how to shoot. Anyway, believe it or not, I did think of that. I’ll probe discreetly. Are you guys going to use funny accents?”

  “Lydia always uses one,” said Bill. “She’s a New Yorker.”

  “Oh, I have to put up with that from a guy who sounds like Barney Fife?” That wasn’t really accurate; Bill’s speech still carries a trace of Louisville, but only a trace. But civic pride was at stake here.

  “Vell, don’t vorry. I tink I better make like Vladimir Vladimirivich Oblomov. In case da pretty girl compares notes vit Leetle Neek.”

  Jack snorted. “Oblomov? Russian Lit. 101?” The elevator opened and both men stood aside for me to step out first. At a door labeled GRUBER ARTS I waited with great dignity for these white knights to fight over who got to open it. Luckily for them it was a double door.

  The atmosphere inside the gallery was infused with the same serenity as Jack’s office, and for a similar reason: There wasn’t much there. Plexiglas cases on white pedestals held here a porcelain vase painted in delicate peonies, there a pottery camel piled with Silk Road trade goods. Three scroll paintings hung on the walls, all of misty mountains and rushing streams. Acres of polished wood floor attested to the value of the art on offer: In Manhattan, nothing says wealth like empty space.

  The young woman at the reception desk wasn’t as immediately imperious as Nick Greenbank had been, but we didn’t inspire in her a strong need to be of service, either. She glanced at us through golden hair curtaining the sides of her face. “Yes?” Her copy of ARTnews stayed open in front of her; clearly she intended to get back to it soon.

  “I’m Jack Lee. Is Jen here?”

  She arched an eyebrow. “Can I ask what this is about?” Her glance slid over me as though I’d been oiled, lingered a few moments on Bill, then returned to Jack.

  “Jen knows me,” Jack said in affable nonanswer.

  The young woman raked her fingers through her glistening hair. She gave Jack, and Jack alone, another microsecond look, then pressed a button on the phone. She murmured into it, and a few seconds later a white wall at the far end of the gallery swung open, revealing a room of bookshelves and files. Another golden-haired woman, also dressed in black, walked across the floor with the ease and dignity I’d been trying to muster at the elevator. On her it was natural, and she was twice my age, and in heels. She wore her hair pulled smoothly back. Her skin was silkily smooth, too, though I suspected both the gold and the silk had help. Smiling as she reached us, she took Jack’s hand in both of hers. “Jack! To what do I owe this pleasure?” She and Jack shared a double-cheek kiss.

  “Hello, Jen. These are friends of mine. Lydia and Vladimir.” Bill and I shook her hand in turn. “I told them about the Han tomb figures.” Jack nodded toward a glass case in the corner, occupied by clay figures about six inches high. “And I wanted another look at those Luo Pings anyway. So here we are.”

  “It must be kismet, how lovely. I was going to call you. I have a Jin Nong I’ve just gotten, a lotus pond, from the same year as the one at the Met. Shayna, will you take charge of Lydia and Vladimir? If you need me”—she included me and Bill in her smile—“we’ll be in my office. Come.” She took Jack’s arm and drifted off to the back.

  A cloud crossed Shayna Dylan’s face as Jen Beril made off with first prize. But she dutifully stood, though I thought leaving the magazine open was a little pointed. Hair cascading over her shoulders, she led us across the floor to the glass case.

  “It’s a complete set,” she said, sounding a little weary, as though she wished she didn’t have to tell people things this obvious. “From a duke’s tomb. Five musicians and three dancers. All women. In the Eastern Han, as you probably know, the musicians were often women.” She was examining Bill with a newly appraising gaze. “And the dancers, always. The Han understood that beauty and grace could go hand-in-hand with talent and power.”

  I made a note to ask Jack if that was true. About the Han, I mean.

  “The musicians would have had their instruments when they were placed in the tomb. But the instruments were wood and wood rarely survives burial.” She was speaking exclusively to Bill, so I decided I might as well actually look at the figures. Traces of colored paint still clung to them; they must have been riotous when they were new. Even now, their odd, flat faces, squared-off edges, and empty hands didn’t detract from their exuberance. Shayna took a step closer to Bill. “But I’m sure you know that. Are you a collector?”

  “Not of antiquities,” I said, partly to hear my own voice to make sure I was still here.

  Shayna turned slowly to me. “Oh?” She couldn’t have been less interested and still conscious.

  “I wish we were. I love these old pieces. So much history, such subtlety.”

  “Yes.” Shayna gave me a cold, customer-is-always-right smile.

  I sighed. “But Vlad is the real collector.” Bill grinned like the Cheshire cat, to underline my meaning: He was the one with the money. “He gets bored easily. He’s only interested in what’s flashy and new.” I looked Shayna up and down, then gave Bill a smile sweet enough to cause a toothache. “Our focus is contemporary Chinese art. Because that’s what Vlad loves.”

  “Oh?” Shayna said in a totally different tone, swiveling back to Bill.

  “Dat’s right.” Bill winked. “Lydia doesn’t like it, but I can’t get enuff.”

  “Is that so?” Shayna eyed me with pity. “Well, many people are skittish. Unhappy with anything outside their comfort zone.”

  “Absolutely,” Bill agreed. “But dey don’t know vat dey’re missing. Me, personally, I don’t care about comfort.”

  “No?”

  “Not exciting, comfort.”

  “I can hear the passion in your voice.” Shayna swept her glossy hair. “I feel the same way.”

  “Dah. I tink I
could tell dat as soon as ve came in.”

  “The edgy, the transgressive. The very newest. That’s what I love.”

  “Iss dat so?”

  Their eyes met with a spark that made me want to remind them they were talking about art.

  “Vell,” Bill smiled, “iss possible you could help me out vit something.”

  “I’d certainly like to try.” Shayna shifted her weight from one Jimmy Choo to the other, thrusting forward, ever so slightly, the hip that came between me and Bill.

  “Sveetie,” Bill said to me, “dis von’t interest you. Ve came here so you could look at dis stuff.” He waved a vague hand. “Take long time, look at vatever you vant.” His hand came to rest on Shayna’s elbow. He steered her across the prairie of gleaming floor, toward her desk, where he, with no hesitation, slipped behind the counter to sit beside her as though he were working, too.

  Which he certainly was.

  * * *

  I spent twenty minutes wandering lonely as a cloud, absorbing ten centuries of my heritage. What Bill was absorbing, I didn’t know. Or Jack either, until the rear wall swung open and he emerged with Jen Beril. They were both smiling, though her smile tightened as she glanced around the gallery and took in the situation. Jack’s smile, on the other hand, widened.

  “Shayna?” Jen Beril’s voice rang across the oak-floored miles with the silver sound of tinkling icicles. “Have you shown our guests what they wanted to see?”

  Shayna’s head, and Bill’s, popped up, both with guiltier looks on their faces than the situation seemed to warrant.

  “Absolutely,” Bill answered.

  “Yes,” I agreed from beside a shelf of snuff bottles. “We’ve seen more than enough.”

  I wouldn’t have been surprised if my words had just echoed and faded away; by now I’d concluded I might be invisible. But Jen Beril said, “I’m glad,” and Bill stood, though he didn’t look happy about it. I waited, kind of icily myself, until he walked over to where I was. Just as he reached me I turned and stalked away, to the door. I yanked it open and strode with great majesty down the hall, where I punched the elevator button. Before Bill and Jack had left the gallery I’d stepped through the closing doors and started my descent.

  6

  Bill and Jack came out onto the sidewalk laughing. I was behind them, sitting on a planter near the door. They stopped and looked around; I let them be confused for a minute, then I spoke up.

  “All I want to know is, did you see the photos on her phone? The rest can stay in Vegas.”

  They spun around like a two-man dance routine. “Awesome,” Jack grinned. “I wish I’d seen the whole thing. Do you guys run that gag often?”

  “It changes,” Bill said. “Sometimes she’s the boss, and I’m all crude and Neanderthal.”

  “It’s easier that way,” I said. “Closer to reality.”

  “I was expecting the art-consultant routine that you pulled on Nick Greenbank.”

  “One look at Shayna, I could tell this would get Bill next to her faster. Cutting me out made her day.”

  “Did you know it was coming?” Jack asked Bill.

  “I just go with the flow.”

  “Hey, I wasn’t the one who hauled out the Uncle Vanya accent and the Jersey Shore jewelry when we started this,” I said. “So? The photos?”

  “Not yet. We were interrupted at a delicate moment.” Bill looked at Jack, who shrugged an apology. “But I’m buying her a drink later.”

  “You’re kidding me.”

  “Hey, she’s not the kind of girl who shows her phone to a guy on the first date.”

  “Why not? She shows everything else.”

  “Oh, snap,” said Jack. “Do I smell the sickly sweet scent of jealousy?”

  “Impatience. What good is later going to do us? Why didn’t you just swipe the phone?”

  “I thought about it. But seeing the photos wouldn’t have told us where they were taken. Or would it? Is there some way—could Linus—”

  “You ask that as though, if there were some way and Linus could, you’d actually go back up and steal it.”

  “I would.”

  “Who’s Linus?” Jack asked.

  “Well, there’s not, so don’t bother.”

  “Who’s Linus?”

  “My cousin.”

  “Ah.” Jack nodded sagely, as though that had clarified something. “Who’s Linus?”

  “Linus Wong,” Bill said. “Runs a computer security business. His motto is, ‘Protecting people like you from people like us.’”

  “He’s a hacker?”

  “At heart.”

  “Really. Is he good?”

  “The best,” I said stoutly.

  “In that case,” Jack said, “I think we could use him anyway.”

  “Why?”

  Jack leaned beside me on the planter. “Shayna’s the daughter of one of Jen’s big collectors. Jen’s assistant is out on maternity leave, so she gave Shayna the fill-in job to keep Shayna’s daddy happy. Shayna knows enough about the art to avoid making a fool of herself, and she’s decorative enough that a lot of collectors don’t care what she knows. But she’s also wildly ambitious. According to Jen, who’s counting the days, she’s everything you think she is.”

  “You mean, a man-eating coldhearted calculating—”

  “Yes.”

  “—backstabbing brownnosing—”

  “Exactly.”

  “—kind of woman who, if she had a date with a new guy, would totally Google him.”

  “Totally.”

  “Ah. And might share valuable information with the new guy, if she thought there was something in it for her?”

  Bill said, “Getting to spend an hour with me at Bemelmans Bar isn’t enough in it for her?”

  “If you’re planning to expense this you’d better choose someplace cheaper than Bemelmans Bar.” I took out my phone. “I’m not sure we have time, though. She’s probably Googling already.”

  “No,” said Bill. “I thought of that. I never quite gave her my last name.”

  I stared. “You thought of that? I had no idea you even knew what Google was.”

  “I don’t know how to play the accordion, either, but I’ve seen it done often enough to know it’s possible.”

  I looked at Jack. “Two Chinese people standing here, and the white guy talks in convoluted metaphors.” I called Linus.

  “Hey, Cuz! What’s going on? Hey, Trell, it’s Lydia!”

  I heard Linus’s friend Trella call a greeting across the room—his parents’ garage, actually, where Wong Security operates from—and I said “hi” back, which Linus passed on. “I’m calling on business, Linus. I have a job for you guys. You busy?”

  “We’re always busy. Big growth industry I’m in here. But never too busy for you. Especially if it’s gonna be fun.”

  “Well, you tell me. Bill needs a new identity.”

  “Awesome! He steal a billion from the Colombian cartel? Or he’s on the run from the FBI?”

  “He wants to date a pretty lady.”

  “Oh. You know, lots of people do that without being in Witness Protection. Besides, I thought … I mean…”

  “It’s business, Linus. We have a case. I have a case. Anyway,” I said, suddenly annoyed at myself and not sure why, “we think she’ll Google him, and we want to be careful about what she finds.”

  “Business. Gotcha. Way cool.” Linus sounded a little unconvinced, but he asked, “What do you need? I can’t do, like, Social Security numbers. I can do a driver’s license, but it’ll take time.”

  “I don’t think we need that. This isn’t a background check. I just want whatever she finds to make him look like what he says he is. Vladimir Oblomov, Russian with cash. Probably in import-export, something where there’d be money sloshing around. If you implied he was connected to the Russian mob that would be okay. He collects contemporary Chinese art, that’s the important detail. He can keep a low profile, she’ll believe that, but we w
ant him to pop up enough that when she searches, she takes him for real, a collector, and rich.”

  “Rich?”

  “Loaded.”

  “Excellent. How long do I have?”

  “A couple of hours.”

  “Piece of cake. Call you when I’m done.”

  I thanked him and pocketed the phone and, his “piece of cake” echoing in my ears, I said to the guys, “I’m hungry.”

  “Well,” said Jack, “we could go have lunch. Or, we could grab a pretzel and go downtown and talk to Dr. Yang.”

  “I thought he was in class.”

  “He was. He called while I was in with Jen. He’s back in his office and available for the next couple of hours.”

  I hopped off the planter. “Why didn’t you say so?”

  Again, Jack started to hail a cab; again, I stopped him. “You have some elitist problem with mass transit? You enjoy breathing car exhaust? The six train will get us to NYU in ten minutes.”

  “Sorry. Occupational hazard. In my business the clients look at you oddly if you come up out of the subway. Like you might be a Martian.”

  “Those come down from spaceships. Listen, did Jen Beril have anything to say about the paintings? You asked her, right?”

  We stopped, not for pretzels, but for gyros from the Rafiqi’s truck. Garlicky lamb, with white sauce and hot sauce, wrapped in pita—fantastic, if you can keep it from dripping on your shirt.

  “I asked her,” Jack confirmed, as we made our many-napkined way down the block. “She said because it was me she’d admit she’d heard the rumors.”

  “Nice to be so important,” Bill said.

  “Wouldn’t it be? What’s really going on is, she’s major in antiquities and classical but she’s not a name in contemporary. If the Chaus do exist, she has zero chance of getting her hands on them—she wouldn’t know where to look and no one’s going to bring them to her. So she’s watching this action from the sidelines. Some day she might need a favor from me, so why not help me out?”

  I asked, “Is it really that calculated? You guys looked like you actually liked each other.”