by Susan Daitch
“I’m sorry about my appearance. I came straight from the studio.” I was making it up as I went along “You wanted a condition report on the Koons?”
“So Claiborne’s finally sent you. My assistant called over a month ago. The Koons was one of my father’s last purchases.”
There was a magazine on Jake’s desk that I wanted to grab and wave in front of my face. It was so hot, you could have grown orchids there. Jake Junior wasn’t sweating at all. He seemed to have been the kind of kid whose father provided him with whatever he wanted materially—including going to good schools, better than the ones the dad had been to. If a drunk Junior ran over the gardener with his Beemer, Senior would have known whom to pay off. (Fieldston, in a similar position, wouldn’t know exactly whom to call; it would take several calls, but the result would be the same.) The Valentines weren’t of the Claiborne circle, and wouldn’t be for another generation or two, but, in the meantime, someone was advising them what to buy. A calendar for a restaurant, Curry Flavor, featuring pictures of Bollywood actresses, fluttered next to the painting, as did paperwork pinched on clipboards. If a multimillion-dollar painting was displayed this way, bracketed by ephemera, it might not have been bought from Koons’s gallery or sold at auction; it might have been a copy purchased from Ashby, though he claimed that he didn’t traffic in high-profile artists; or perhaps it came from a similar kind of facilitator. I couldn’t tell from where I stood. Were these the kind of people who would own originals? Hard to say.
If the Koons was original, it was possible that the fluorescent tubes hanging in a parallelogram shape overhead was a real Dan Flavin, and not just cleverly hung lighting. You could drive yourself crazy asking these questions, and I was now questioning everything. There was some controversy, since Flavin’s death, about replacing the tubes when they burned out. Another conservator nightmare but not my province, materials-wise.
In the middle of our conversation, Valentine called out, “Dr. Livingstone! Dr. Livingstone!”
Why hadn’t I seen Dr. Livingstone before? That’s why the office was kept so hot. A huge mangy chimp pulling at a choke-chain collar wandered out from behind a row of filing cabinets, where he had been sleeping. Jake let him eat the remains of the fried chicken, which wasn’t much.
Dr. Livingstone did not look like a contented animal. He had red-rimmed eyes and long yellow incisors that were sharp as knives when he barred them. I hoped he’d had more to eat lately than a few scraps of chicken.
“You keep a monkey here?”
“A chimpanzee, yes. I used to have a cat, too, but now just the primate.”
I didn’t want to ask what happened to the cat.
“Where did you find him?” Somehow I couldn’t imagine Jake Valentine Junior on a safari in Africa, far from take-out food and golf clubs.
“I rescued Dr. Livingstone from a circus in Amsterdam. He’s much happier here, though the poor fellow got loose once while I was watching the Super Bowl. He ran around the neighborhood, getting into people’s garbage, scraped his paws across the face of a man who tried to capture him. You have to be careful of chimpanzees. They’re smart. They can communicate in their own limited language, make tools to access food, and have complicated clan hierarchies, but they are wild animals. And, in fact, they don’t like us, their cousins, very much. And why should they? The man whose face Dr. Livingstone mutilated sued me to have my pet put down.”
“What happened?”
“Well, Dr. Livingstone’s still here, isn’t he? So I would say we settled.”
I looked around the room, hoping to do the “job,” find out a few things, and get the hell out of the office and away from the angry- and unhappy-looking Dr. Livingstone as soon as possible.
“If you have a clean surface, I can lay out the painting and take a look,” I said.
I had no tools with me, and should have been wearing gloves, but for a condition report all I needed to do was convince Valentine that I knew what I was doing. He raised no objections, because he probably didn’t know otherwise. The painting was oil on canvas and appeared to have been done recently but was consistent with the time that Koons executed the series. The balloon-dog sequence had been painted in the mid to late nineties, so this wasn’t unusual. I considered asking Valentine if he had papers declaring ownership, which can be standard practice, but thought better of it. I didn’t care so much if he was offended, but art deals, even legitimate ones, are often conducted with a handshake “between gentlemen.” No paperwork is involved. The absence of paperwork for a private condition report doesn’t prove anything.
Though recent, the painting showed signs of wear and fading from sun exposure. The room faced west and had shades, but they may not always have been drawn. Valentine looked over my shoulder, and I pointed this out.
“Can you restore this section?” He pointed to one of the dog’s legs and the background, which had been painted to resemble silver Mylar. “Brighten it up a little?”
Ordinarily, the answer would be no, but I would never actually work on the painting, so I could say anything. The chimp was making me nervous, and the espresso was doing some fast talking.
“There is a pigment that would do wonders for this painting. Han purple, a hue first recorded in the Zhou Dynasty. It disappeared around AD 220, then, as manufacturing techniques became more refined in the nineteenth century, we found something that approaches the Han purple. Some thought the pigment originated in Egypt as a color known as Egyptian blue and arrived in China via the Silk Road, but this turned out to be erroneous. Chinese pigment-makers used lead to reduce the melting point of the barium in the Han version. That’s one of the interesting properties quantum physicists are now studying in the pigment. Because of its diversely layered barium-copper-silicate structure, under very low temperatures it propagates in only two dimensions, leaving the world of three dimensionality behind. This is very rare. Very few substances can do this. Possibly none.”
“I’m not interested in quantum physics, but if you could bring out the colors in this dog I’d feel better about this painting. Frankly, I don’t know what my father saw in it, but he claimed it was worth a fortune. Certain clients, when they see it, think we’re fools; others think we must keep rooms at the Ritz-Carlton. How can I get you some of this Han stuff? It sounds like molecular Silly Putty.”
“Only one person I knew could get his hands on the really pure stuff, and he’s recently deceased.” Jake Senior must have been the collector, and Jake Junior was more of the my-three-year-old-could-do-this school. It was an odd generational reversal. Usually older collectors went for clearly “what you see is what you get” kinds of painting, the kinds that captured a moment or told a story. Ironic kitsch that twisted your arm around your back, like the balloon dogs, left Jake Junior scratching his head. But, no matter, it was worth millions.
“Be careful with that thing,” he warned. “It looks like a bunch of crap, but that piece of shit is a gold mine on the fucking wall. Talk about transitioning from the second to the third dimension. Flat painting equals big three-dimensional bucks.” He walked to the door. “I’ll be out on the pier. Come on, Dr. Livingstone.” He pushed through the glass doors, the chimpanzee in tow, and disappeared down the elevator.
I turned the painting over and examined the stretcher bars. There was nothing that indicated conclusively whether it was real or fake. The signature looked real, but I’m no expert on signatures, and that wasn’t why I was in Red Hook.
Out the window I saw crates being unloaded from trucks, destined for containers on ships. Occasionally yanking on Dr. Livingstone’s leash, Valentine supervised a group of stevedores. Some wore jumpsuits with the company’s name printed across the back. Some, I could see, even from this distance, had prison tattoos. One had a dark area around his eyes, but I was too far away to tell if he sported eye tatts similar to the Dagbent brothers’. One of the crates was spray-painted wig-something. Hair extension and wig delivery? I couldn’t tell from where I stood.
Valentine was on his cellphone. Some of the men, as tough as they looked, were spooked by Dr. Livingstone and backed away from him, especially when the animal strained at his leash. He had a tendency to swing out when someone tried to speak to Valentine or stood a distance the chimp figured was too close to his master. Dr. L. was a very attentive bodyguard. He tried to pounce on one man as he got out of a truck, but Valentine yanked back on the leash, laughing into his phone.
Livingstone was clever. Though he docilely returned to his master’s side, nibbling something Valentine pulled from his pocket, within a matter of minutes the chimp slipped out of the choke collar and scampered back to where the trucks were parked. He jumped on his quarry, who had his back to the chimp and never saw or heard him coming. The man screamed and tried to fight him off, but the animal was strong, and it was angry. It was as if he and the driver had a history. The dozen or so other men, including Valentine, who was still on the phone, just stood around and watched. The chimp had tackled the driver and was biting his arm as the man tried to fight him off. Blood poured out of him, and no one was helping or attempted to pull the animal off. Did I call 911, either? I have to admit that I didn’t, even though the office phone couldn’t be traced to me personally. As with the man in the Dumpster, I didn’t do the right thing straightaway. Was I like the gawker who stood by taking pictures while others suffered? If put to the Giacometti test, would I save a valuable painting from a fire before I saved a cat? I like to think I would save the cat. I reached for the landline, dialing 9, then 1. But then Valentine, looking annoyed at everyone from primate to human, finally muffled his cellphone against his thigh and whistled for the chimp, who turned his head, just as, paw aloft, he appeared about to scrap his claws across the man’s face. He returned to his master’s side, dragging his knuckles across the pavement.
Everyone ignored the man bleeding on the lot. Valentine must have known that Dr. Livingstone was capable of slipping his leash—this wasn’t an isolated, onetime occurrence—but the behavior looked like a trick the animal did from time to time, a performance that everyone, even thugs, knew the script for. The bleeding man was able to rouse himself and stand. He limped back to his truck, opened the door, and lay down in the cab. Was this a random attack or a chapter in a vendetta between either Valentine and the man or the chimp and the man? Or was it a show, a way of keeping the others in line? Since I couldn’t hear them, I had no way of knowing for certain, but either way, Dr. Livingstone was a powerful weapon in the Valentine Shipping and Trucking local arsenal.
A truck pulled out of the lot, so I could now see what was painted on its side: “Over water, over land, Hearty Movers are in demand! Since 1972.” It was difficult to make out all the letters. I was still straining to see out the window when Jake Junior and Dr. Livingstone returned. I hadn’t heard the glass doors open. They walked on cat’s paws. They were holding hands. I made a show of returning to the painting.
“Just checking to try to access how much natural light is left,” I said, excusing my position at the window. “I may have to come back tomorrow to finish. Natural sunlight is much more revealing.”
“Not a problem. Before you go, I’m curious about that color you mentioned. Han purple?”
“Yes, that’s what it’s called.”
“And it’s made with lead?” His voice turned preternaturally calm and quiet. Dr. Livingstone stroked the outer seam of his pants affectionately, running a digit up and down, looking up at him as if he expected a treat as a reward.
I nodded.
“So I was curious about this color, and I called Claiborne’s to talk to someone in the conservation lab—that’s where you said you were from, right?”
He didn’t wait for an answer.
“And you know what? They said they had no knowledge of anyone named Star Hammersmith. They said you didn’t work for them. Never had.”
“Of course I did. Do work for them. Who did you speak to? If you spoke to the reception desk, they often hire graduate-student temps who study all day, and they don’t know anyone. Call back and ask to speak to Jack Ashby. He’s my boss.”
Ashby would have no idea who Star Hammersmith was. I was just buying time to get the hell out of the building.
“Jack Ashby is exactly who I did talk to. Conservation put me through. So I’m very puzzled, but what I’d like you to do now is put your hands over your head.”
I pulled the Glock 18 and aimed it at Valentine. Before I could say a word or move toward the exit, Dr. Livingstone screamed and bolted toward me. In the second that I tried to decide whether or not to shoot at him, the chimp knocked the gun out of my hand and it went off, bullets nicking the sculpture of a boy holding a frog. From the sound, I would guess that what the Valentines owned was a fiberglass-authorized copy. Dr. Livingstone and I dived for the gun, but he got to it first, swatting me to the floor with one powerful swing. He handed the Glock to his master. This was one well-trained monkey.
Valentine had a look on his face that said, “What an amateur,” and I felt like one.
“You don’t look like the kind of girl who would carry a Glock 18, especially one without a serial number. Where did you get it?”
“I found it in a Dumpster.”
“I could be much mistaken, but even without a number this gun looks familiar. You know, I could be wrong, but I think I know the man who owned this. He worked for me. Ms. Hammersmith, I don’t like to lose employees, and I’m assuming the reason I’m holding this is because I did lose one. Even those I lease out to other companies are precious to me. Dr. Livingstone.” He turned to the chimp. “Phone!”
Dr. Livingstone went through my pockets, found my phone, ambled back to Valentine, and handed it to him.
“I’m guessing this will provide me with all kinds of information.” He thanked the chimp. “So, Ms. Hammersmith, as you like to be called, I was looking for you, it turns out, and you came to me. I appreciate that. Really I do, so I think we can come to an arrangement.” Underneath his conversational tone lurked a man who got great pleasure from inflicting pain, I was sure of it.
“What arrangement?”
“A nice one. Very simple. I’m going to leave you in the office with Dr. Livingstone. There is a phone here, and computers, but you have to be careful with chimpanzees, especially this one. He’s very temperamental. Helpful hint: you never, ever, want to turn your back on a pissed-off chimp or give him anything less than full attention. Also, I’m not sure he’s had enough to eat today. I fed him a Xanax a little while ago to calm him down, but sometimes the drug has the opposite effect on him. You never can tell.”
“Your man is still alive. I didn’t kill him. He really was in a Dumpster.”
“He’s of no use to me anymore. So listen, Ms. Hammersmith. If you’re still here in the morning, more power to you. I could shoot you right now, put your body on a container ship, dump you in the Strait of Hormuz, and no one would be the wiser. I’m giving you a chance, a night with Dr. Livingstone. There are girls who would kill for that opportunity, and you, apparently, did just that. His stats: he’s five-six and weighs a hundred and fifty pounds. Now, I have Knicks tickets and a hookup that requires my immediate attention. See you in the A.M.”
The blue polo shirt and khaki pants disappeared down the hall and into the elevator. I was left alone with Dr. Livingstone, species name Pan troglodyte.
The chimp climbed up a filing cabinet, banging his fists on the metal, as if he were a mad steel-drum player, never taking his eyes off me, snarling, baring his fangs if I touched the phone or a keyboard. Jumping from the filing cabinet to a desk, he began to circle me, his prey. The lights were on, and I considered a way to get him to jump up to the possible Dan Flavin lights suspended from the ceiling. You see it in old movies, a chimpanzee scaling surfaces like a simian Spider-Man, swinging from a chandeliers. If Dr. Livingstone could be enticed to grab the wiring or the fluorescent lights, he might electrocute himself. A harebrained idea. Not only would wiring o
r fixtures not support his weight; I had no enticements except myself, and I had no way of climbing up to the ceiling.
I was standing in the middle of the room while Dr. Livingstone circled me in ever-smaller circles. He grew angry when I stepped closer to the painting, and hopped on top of the Boy with Frog. Screaming, he snapped off the frog and threw it at me. I made sure to turn as he circled, so that I never took my eyes off him. From time to time he would again snarl, bare his fangs, widen his eyes, then his mood would change on a dime, and he would appear to be a curious monkey, picking up a pen here, a snowball paperweight there, which he pitched at me.
The circling was painfully slow, and went on for maybe an hour. I had no idea. He finally came within a few inches of me. I’d seen him swing his powerful arms like pendulums or use them like hammers, thumping relentlessly up and down. If a two-hundred-pound truck driver couldn’t fend him off, I would be a pulp by the time Valentine, cheerfully humming, “We will we will rock you,” unlocked the front door.
“I get it,” I said to Dr. Livingstone, “you’re the dominant one here.” This would be a bad time to nod off, but I felt an uncharacteristic drowsiness overtaking me, alternating with sheer terror. We were face to face. I struggled to keep my eyes open.
The chimp let out a piercing scream and opened his mouth as if to bite. The business end of his fangs were sharp, and the pounds of pressure behind them were inexorable.
I grabbed the Jeff Koons painting from the table in front of me and shoved it into the chimp’s maw. Stretcher bar slammed into the corners of his mouth and the hinge of his jaw. He was stunned, eyes bulged in fury. I shoved harder. Millions of dollars rammed down Pan troglodyte’s gorge. He grabbed the sides of the painting, but I pushed more. Whether his meal would turn out to have poisonous effects remained to be seen, but I didn’t plan on hanging around to find out. I ran to the door, which wouldn’t lock behind me. Dr. Livingstone threw the painting on the floor. He would have no trouble opening the glass doors. The elevator was right there, but so was he. Its doors advanced quickly, but, just as quickly, Dr. Livingstone’s hand prevented them from meeting. Elevator technology should have caused the doors to spasm open, but this is what happens when you (presumably a Valentine) bribe the elevator inspector: things that should be automatic develop glitches. The chimp’s paw was stuck between the doors, which squeezed like a vise. Dark leathery digits like banana slugs with bones wiggled, then one dropped off, severed, falling to the elevator floor. Dr. L. screamed as he pulled his paw out, and the elevator descended.