Deadly Arts

by Ken Brigham

  “Katya?” a gentle knock on her office door, always ajar, half inviting, half discouraging visitors. “Is this a good time?”

  Katya looked up, “Of course, of course, Harold. Come in.”

  Harold Werth’s body was very short and his head was very large. The ruddy skin of his face was pockmarked with the residua of a long-lost battle with teenage acne. His large head seemed always to be tilted forward as though he was constantly examining details of the floor before him or admiring the brilliance of his always glistening cordovan penny loafers. Any objective observer would have thought him a strange-looking little man, may even have been distracted by his unusual appearance. But Katya Karpov was not any observer. When she looked at Harold Werth, she saw a brilliant geneticist. She had eventually convinced him to join her faculty after a prolonged academic courtship, not to mention a doubling of his, admittedly modest, salary as a stellar investigator in the Human Genome Project at the National Institutes of Health. Werth was in charge of analyzing the genome data from the subjects in the aging study. There was no one on the planet more qualified for the job and he brought to the task the bonus of a special skill in explaining the data to his non-geneticist colleagues.

  Katya motioned Werth to the chair opposite her desk.

  “Thanks for coming down on short notice,” Karpov said. “I just wanted to get your take on the genome analyses from a few of the subjects in the aging study. There is a handful of outliers from the functional data, and I’m dying to know if there’s an explanation; I sent you their study identifiers earlier. Genes are a good place to start looking, don’t you think?”

  Werth smiled, “Of course I think that. Genes are my life. If they aren’t the answer to all of the burning questions in human biology, it’s not their fault. It’s just that we don’t yet understand the whole picture. We’ll get there, Katya. We’ll get there.”

  “You know, Harold,” Karpov replied, “if there is any person in the world who could convince me of that, it would be you. But while you and your guys are figuring out the genetic details, the nature angle, I’ll spend some time and effort pondering the nurture side of the equation.”

  Although Dr. Karpov was a neurologist and thoroughly grounded in hard science, she was fascinated by the persistent mysteries of human biology and had difficulty toeing the hard science line that understanding humanness was ultimately no different than theoretical mathematics or quantum physics; they were all at root just numbers games. She didn’t buy that. There were too many unexplained phenomena. While she was not religious, she was convinced that there was something spiritual about being human that the geneticists would never explain. Even the most brilliant ones.

  “So, what about these outliers?” she continued. “Tell me you’ve discovered the outlier gene, you clever man.”

  “Well, not exactly,” Werth said. “Still need to crunch some more numbers, but so far, I don’t see any clear genetic patterns that they have in common. There are some hints, but nothing solid so far. It’s pretty simplistic to think that outliers in any direction would have the same cause, even if it is genetic. Don’t you think?”

  “Probably,” Katya said, “but I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that whatever the cause for being way outside the norm, it might be a basic tendency. Just a gene for abnormality, greater than normal variability, whether good, bad, or indifferent. Is that imagining a genome that’s too creative?”

  Werth fidgeted in his chair for a few moments, then said, “That seems a strange concept to me, but then I’ve seen some pretty strange concepts turn out to be true.”

  So right, my friend, Katya thought. She trusted Werth’s work specifically because he was rarely absolutely certain about almost anything. In human biology, the important answers are never binary—yes/no, black/white. There are a lot of maybes, gray areas to deal with, and the investigator who knows that has much the better chance of discovering something important. Why not a genetic basis for variability, a kind of uber gene that injects uncertainty into the sequence of events connecting DNA to flesh and blood reality? Katya didn’t see why that possibility should be forbidden territory.

  “When will you be finished with the analyses?” Katya asked.

  “Shouldn’t be long now. We have all the sequencing done, so we just need to get the computer to crunch the numbers.”

  “Can you put these outliers at the head of the queue?”

  “You’re the boss. Say the word, and it’ll be done.”

  “The word,” Katya smiled.

  After Harold Werth left, Katya continued to stare at the table of data. Of course, there were no names and little personal information about the study subjects; participants were promised as much anonymity as possible. That was standard practice as a protection against any use of the health-related information that might hurt the subject. But there was a column on the data sheet with a one-word description of occupation/profession. Katya perused that column for the outliers. There were fifteen outliers, two whose functional data indicated that their brains were aging prematurely and thirteen who were clearly functioning better than the average. The occupation of one of the poor performers was listed as “artist” (that subject had withdrawn from the study a couple of years back) and the other was listed as “artisan.” Ten of the thirteen high performers were listed as “artist” and one as “artisan.”

  Given the low frequency of these occupations in the general population, it seemed more than coincidence that those were the occupations of all of the outliers. So maybe this was a pattern, Katya thought, but not a very distinct one. She wasn’t surprised that the brains of artists might function differently than the brains of most folks, but she would have thought that exercising the creative process would preserve function. How about the two poor souls who had done worse? An artist and an artisan. She needed more personal details about these outliers. But that might require compromising the promise of anonymity. She’d have to discuss that possibility with the ethicists and the Institutional Review Board, the panel of experts that kept a close eye on human research. Okay, she would do that. But, maybe wait for the final word from the genetic studies before getting too excited about chasing down the details of a possible role for nurture.

  The outliers continued to haunt Dr. Karpov as she left the office and headed for the medical center parking tower. She relished the throaty purr of the Boxster as she cranked it up for the drive downtown. The weather was nice, so she retracted the top, and headed out onto Twenty-First Avenue toward town and the Printers Alley flat. As always in the afternoons, she anticipated some private time with Shane at the end of the workday. She still worried about Shane. She also needed him more than she liked to admit.

  Hardy Seltzer and Shane Hadley sat on the deck overlooking Printers Alley, nursing their third glass of Lincoln College sherry. As was his custom, Shane had taken the satin-lined case of crystal Oxford sherry glasses down from the shelf behind the bar and carefully polished two of them before opening a new bottle of the wine, placing the glasses and wine on a bright silver tray and wheeling himself out onto the deck where Hardy waited for him. It had taken some time for Hardy to cultivate a taste for the sherry, but Shane had been a patient teacher and with time, Hardy had become an eager enough student. They now shared in the pleasure afforded by the special wine surreptitiously imported from Shane’s old Oxford college as medical supplies by his lovely and attentive wife.

  The intensity of the two men’s conversation addressing the subject of murder had increased as their blood alcohol levels had crept up into the slightly euphoric range, but the specific question of immediate concern had not been clearly resolved. That question was: “Did the available facts surrounding the death of the moderately famous Nashville artist with the unlikely name, Bechman Fitzwallington, arouse enough suspicion of foul play to warrant a murder investigation?”

  Although it might be expected that the answer to such a question arrived at by two slightly inebriated murder investigators would be a
foregone conclusion, in this case, that was not true. There was much to consider apart from the facts directly related to the artist’s demise. The possibility of some severely unpleasant consequences of such an investigation was real, a fact that had been pounded into Hardy Seltzer’s brain by Assistant Chief Goetz, who had phoned the detective twice already in the short time since the artist was discovered dead. Goetz was getting flak from the new chief, and although Seltzer was a full three tiers south of the chief on the org chart, well, you know, stuff rolls downhill. The new chief was extremely sensitive to the importance of city politics to his security in that position. He didn’t hesitate to imply that the job security of the rest of the department, especially the people he had inherited, might also be jeopardized by political insensitivity regardless of the length of time they had spent in the department’s employ. There was nothing to gain and much to lose by inviting a scandal. Bad idea! A distinctly bad idea!! Shane Hadley understood that. He had been there.

  “So, Hardy, my man,” Shane said, “let me summarize. You have a dead artist of some note. Although you have no cause of death, there is evidence that the deceased artist was not well, had apparently been dwindling for some time. You saw nothing suspicious about the death scene. But, the deceased was not widely loved, and several people of his acquaintance, including a daughter, flesh of his very own flesh, are sufficiently pleased with his demise that any one of them might have welcomed the opportunity to assist his exit from the land of the living. And, we cannot ignore the fact that to raise the possibility that our artist was murdered would displease your superiors and other influential people in the city. Is that an accurate summary of the situation?”

  “That’s about it. Shouldn’t be too hard a problem for you,” Seltzer smiled and sipped his sherry.

  “Well, it is, of course, not technically my problem, but I’ll do what I can, my friend. Easy for me to advise, since you and your colleagues will own the consequences. In my current situation, I am, to my everlasting good fortune, insulated from consequences. I was never very fond of such things, you know, consequences, intended and otherwise, collateral damage, those sorts of things. Preoccupations with such are distracting and serve no useful purpose.”

  “Maybe so,” Hardy replied, “but you also lose the credit on occasions when you have a right to it.”

  He was still bothered by the Bonz Bagley case.

  “Ah, credit!” Shane said. “A greatly overrated concept. I say Caesar’s to Caesar, God’s to God, and the detective’s to the detective, a title to which, alas, I no longer have a legitimate claim.”

  “If you say so.” Hardy’s comment did not sound very convincing.

  “But,” Shane continued, “what we need here is more information and perhaps a touch more sherry as well.” He drained the last few drops from the bottle of wine into their glasses. “When will you have the postmortem results?”

  “May be a problem there,” Seltzer answered. “Harry Jensen’s balking on the autopsy.”

  “What seems to be the problem? Jensen’s job is to do the post. Tell him to do his job.”

  “Yes, well,” Hardy responded, “unless we declare it a possible murder case, Jensen is reluctant to deny the wishes of the person who seems to be the artist’s only living relative.”

  “And that would be?”

  “That would be the daughter. Calls herself SalomeMe. Don’t ask me why. Also, don’t ask me what possessed the woman to pierce and tattoo her not so young body in every available location. In fact, you needn’t ask me to explain almost anything about SalomeMe. Waste of time even thinking about explanations for such as her,” Seltzer said, wagging his head awkwardly from side to side.

  It was not hostility that Hardy Seltzer felt toward the woman. It was just that he was genuinely baffled by behaviors like hers. Hardy liked clear reasons for what people did. Irrationality distracted him.

  “Hmmm,” Shane rubbed his chin and wheeled himself over to the edge of the balcony, looking down at the people passing below. “While I agree that there doesn’t seem to be anything very substantive about this situation that suggests murder, I still detect a faint odor of something amiss. An autopsy might clarify things. Since there is no explanation for the man’s death and we have no witnesses to the event, you could probably demand an autopsy if you chose to without committing to the murder thing in advance.”

  “Yeah,” Seltzer replied, “that’s probably true. It’s just that neither I nor Harry Jensen is anxious to take on Ms. SalomeMe without being fully armed for what would be, I am certain, an unusual and not very pleasant encounter.”

  “A charm offensive, my good man. You should marshal your considerable interpersonal skills to convince Ms. SalomeMe that her father’s autopsy is in her best interest. It could be, you know.”

  “I suppose I could give it a try,” Hardy answered. “But what if the post is negative? Do we declare it death from natural causes and move on? That would please a lot of people. A different decision would please almost nobody, including me.”

  “A negative autopsy would certainly diminish the faint odor of something amiss,” Shane said. “Would the odor disappear altogether? Hard to say, my man, hard to say.”

  Katya Karpov was still thinking about her table of data from the outliers, so that she forgot to turn into Printers Alley. She drove right past the big arched sign that marked the alley’s entrance. She drove on down Church Street then, realizing what she had done, turned right on Second Avenue to Broadway, around the block, and back up the hill for another try at going home. As she approached their building, she saw that Shane and another man were sitting on their balcony apparently engaged in a serious conversation. Probably Hardy Seltzer, she thought.

  Katya thought that Shane’s relationship with detective Seltzer was good for him, for the most part. She didn’t understand Shane’s fascination with crime, but she respected it. It had been a while since Seltzer had come by, and Katya wasn’t sure why. Shane hadn’t mentioned anything about the detective lately. So, a part of Katya Karpov was pleased to see the two men together again. Another part of her was disappointed that she might have less private time with Shane this evening than she had hoped for.

  Chapter 5

  The near-skeletal visage of Blythe Fortune confronted an email that appeared unsolicited on her computer screen.

  To: bfortune@galleriasalinas.com

  From: athenagolden@avantart.com

  Subject: Bechman Fitzwallington inventory

  Blythe,

  You may have heard that BF was discovered dead this morning in his Nashville home. We are making an effort to locate his unsold paintings and determine who has them. His death may obviously affect the value of his works. Is your gallery interested in handling whatever BF works we can locate that are for sale? We at AvantArt have had a few of his later works consigned to us in the past, and we understand that there are other works in possession of either BF’s estate or his daughter (those may be the same) and should be available for sale. The circumstances of his death remain unclear, but as you know, this is not an unexpected event. I am contacting you because of your success with selling BF’s works in the New York market.

  Let me know asap re: your interest.

  Best

  Athena

  Blythe pondered the message. Evening was just starting its stealthy trek up from the dark East River. The FDR traffic was starting to build. Blythe had come home to her Sutton Place penthouse earlier than usual, but as was her habit, she had kept a close eye on her emails. Although this message was not unexpected, it came sooner than she had anticipated. Her communication with the Nashville folks had been pretty infrequent lately. Fitzwallington was the only Nashville artist her Upper East Side gallery had handled, and in the past couple of years, interest in his art had waned as had the quality of the paintings. BF was old and it had certainly crossed Blythe’s mind that his health might be deteriorating. She thought that might even prove to be a boon to sales of his art. She ha
d observed that once the quality of their work began to decline, artists were generally more valuable dead than alive.

  Blythe needed to discuss this with her partner, Bruce Therault. She was the art expert, but Bruce was the business guy, and she depended on him in situations like this. They had discussed the Fitzwallington issue over the past year or so, and he would have some valuable thoughts about how the gallery should respond to these changing circumstances. She seemed to recall that Bruce had mentioned something about that in the past.

  She fired off an email.

  To: btherault@galleriasalinas.com

  From: bfortune@galleriasalinas.com

  Subject: Bechman Fitzwallington

  Bruce

  I just learned from the AvantArt people in Nashville that BF was found dead in his home there today. They were inquiring whether we would be interested in handling whatever works of his that are available for sale. They haven’t done so well for us lately, but his death could change that. What do you think? Can we discuss soon?

  Let me know.

  Blythe

  Blythe stood up from her computer, walked across the large room to the east windows, and looked out. The expanse of windows on that side of the apartment afforded a broad view of the river and across to Roosevelt Island with a penumbra of Queen’s skyline peeking over from behind. A sliver of afternoon sunshine had somehow managed to wend its way from the west side through the darkening maze of the Manhattan glass and concrete forest to dab a gentle smudge of contra luce near the far riverbank. The early fall sky was just inviting in the coming night.