“You’ll have to be more specific.”
“Newport Beach.”
“Sorry, Tom.”
“Where is he then?”
“San Clemente, actually just a San Clemente post office box at this point, but we’re working on the rest. You were close.”
“San Clemente . . .”
“Yes, and he’s been there for five years. How about at your end, Tom? What have you turned?”
“Nothing much new, except for the fact that whoever stole the horses of Pech-Merle also stole the most important literary manuscript in Britain and the sword of Lancelot. Aside from that things are pretty quiet.”
“The sword of Lancelot?” Dietrich said, his voice filled with wonder and skepticism.
“The question is—what does Mr. Alec have to do with all this?”
“Who is it?” Diana whispered, her voice barely but clearly audible to Chief Dietrich.
“I’ll have to talk to you later, Chief,” Tom said and put down the phone.
Chapter Forty-Five
Brompton Road, Knightsbridge
Sunday, 11:00 a.m.
“Where exactly are we going?” Diana asked. The taxi was driving west, slaloming around parked delivery trucks and early Harrods shoppers, crossing the road to take late breakfasts or early lunches at Richoux and other Knightsbridge tea rooms. At the last jerk she had slid across the seat, her right leg now leaning against Tom’s left.
“Chiswick,” he said. “Back to the safe house where they’re keeping Margaret Harrell. Baker’s already there. They’re questioning her about possible connections between Kepler and Sechrist and asking her if she knows anything about the Aberdeen sword. So far they haven’t learned anything.”
“It shouldn’t take us long to get there.”
“No, driving against the traffic we should be there in about ten minutes.”
“Do you think she could be involved?”
“No, not really, but I think she may be holding things back. She was devoted to Kepler and she wouldn’t want anything made public that could hurt his reputation. At this point that’s all that he has left.”
“Such as the fact that he could be under suspicion of possible collusion with thieves.”
“And murderers.”
The safe house was in Chiswick Mall, a row of upscale eighteenth and nineteenth-century townhouses with bow windows and balconies, overlooking the Thames. On Tom’s instructions the taxi stopped a block away. He checked to make sure that they hadn’t been followed before they walked the remaining distance. The river was steel gray and at low tide, the air chilly and damp. Cyclamen and pansies were in bloom in boxes along the balconies, their pink, yellow, crimson and purple flowers contrasting with the dark sky as they brought life and texture to the brick and stone facades of the townhouses. Diana held her raincoat together at the neck as they walked along the wet, black sidewalk.
Tom checked the number, which he had written on a piece of hotel stationery. He took her arm in his hand, turned slightly, and they walked toward the door of a building with a small plaque carrying the designation Mercer House. The doorbell was a large black knob encircled by a freshly-polished brass plate. Tom pulled it. There was no audible sound but after a few seconds the door opened. They walked into a dark hallway. The door closed and Baker’s assistant, Leonard, stepped out of the shadows. He didn’t speak, but simply nodded. He appeared to be perturbed at the assignment of door duty, perhaps a wrist slap for some earlier bit of dereliction. Tom asked where they should go and Leonard pointed to the stairs.
“There you are,” Baker said, as they stood in the doorway of what was once the house’s library, its shelves now bare of books but filled with folders, pens, notebooks, and pads. In the far corner of the room was a loveseat and three armchairs. The chintz about the windows was lush but faded and the Persian carpet was unravelling at the edges. On the table was a tea and coffee pot, a third pot for hot water, a pitcher of warm milk (slightly curdled around the edges), and an open jar of demarara sugar. “Leonard,” Baker called.
Leonard appeared at the door. “Could you be so kind as to ask cook for some fresh coffee?” Baker asked. “Oh yes, and biscuits all around.”
Leonard turned and disappeared. “Sit down, sit down,” Baker said. “We’ve just been talking about bloody Beowulf and bloody Lancelot.”
Margaret Harrell was dressed in brown corduroy slacks and a light beige sweater, which hung loosely around her neck. Her hair had been cut since they last saw her but she was wearing little makeup and no jewelry. Her complexion was pale and there were lines in the corners of her eyes.
“Miss Harrell has done her best, but unfortunately she remembers very little. There was a call purporting to be from Michael Sechrist’s shop, but it was some time ago and the caller was a woman. It could have come from anywhere, just someone sowing trouble. There were no contacts between Mr. Kepler and the curator at Aberdeen, at least none that Miss Harrell can remember. For that matter, there were no contacts between Mr. Kepler and anyone in Scotland, except for a dealer in Edinburgh who died three years ago and a collector in Ayrshire who moved to London last spring. So there you have it.”
“Miss Harrell . . .” Tom said, nodding in greeting.
“How are you?” Diana asked.
“I’m all right,” she answered. “I wish I could be of more help.”
“Did you ever hear Mr. Kepler mention a man named Wilfred Alec?” Tom asked.
“Wilfred Alec?” Baker repeated.
“The collector in Chile whose collection was nearly burned,” Tom said.
“So you have his name now. Jolly good.”
“We also know that Bachmann was actually investigated for arson.”
“Interesting,” Baker said. Then, turning to Margaret Harrell, he said, “You remember the business in Chile. We spoke of it earlier.”
“Yes,” she said. “You say his name was Alec?”
“Wilfred Alec,” Tom answered.
“That sounds English,” Baker interjected. Before Margaret Harrell could answer, he called out “Leonard.” When he appeared at the door Baker asked him about their coffee and biscuits. Leonard assured him that they would be there presently. “Now, Miss Harrell . . .” he said.
She put her left hand against her cheek. “A collector of paintings, you said.”
“Yes,” Tom interjected. “They found a Rouault and a Modigliani in his collection. Both of them had been hitherto unknown. The Rouault was a self-portrait.”
“Bloody expensive, that,” Baker said.
“It would be expensive,” Margaret added. “Were the paintings authenticated?”
“Yes,” Tom said.
“And you just found that out as well?” Baker asked.
“Yes, just a short time before I called you,” Tom said.
“I don’t know of anyone named Wilfred Alec, but I could check Mr. Kepler’s files. What would you imagine his connection with Mr. Kepler to be?”
“I have no idea,” Tom said. “Alec’s connection is with Bachmann. Bachmann is connected with Kepler. Kepler is dead and Bachmann has disappeared. That’s all that I can tell you, I’m afraid.”
“Yes,” Margaret said. “Of course. Could we go into Dover Street and check the files?”
“Certainly,” Baker said.
Just then Leonard appeared at the door, holding it open as a woman with a gray apron came in, carrying a steaming pot of coffee and a tray of cookies. “Hello again, Mrs. Porter,” Baker said. “I’m terribly sorry, but it seems we must be off. Why don’t you have a cup of that coffee and rest yourself a moment or two. The milk is still hot.” She forced a thin smile as Baker slipped a handful of the cookies into his jacket pocket.
There was a smell of disinfectant in Kepler’s office that Tom had not noticed the last time they were there. When he e
nquired about it he was told that the cleaning staff had been through the building and he was probably smelling something from the other side of the walls and floor. “We wouldn’t let them in here, if that’s what concerns you,” Baker said. Tom just nodded.
“Well, go ahead and have a go,” Baker said to Margaret. “Can we be of any help?”
“No, I can check,” she said. Tom and Diana sat down at the library table. The room was cool; Diana kept on her raincoat and again held it closed at her neck. Tom took out his notepad and checked what he had jotted down during his last conversation with Dietrich, while Baker sat in a tattered armchair, slipping cookies from his pocket and nibbling on them as Margaret worked her way through the files and desk drawers.
“I’m afraid there’s nothing here,” she said, forty-five minutes later. “Perhaps back in Cobham . . .”
“Cobham? Right you are,” Baker said. “We can’t afford not to check, eh?” he said to Tom.
“No, we can’t,” Tom said, fearing that any evidence at Dover Street might have already disappeared.
The traffic was heavy in both directions. It had started to drizzle at midday and the streets were slick. It was 1:50 by the time they reached Kepler’s house in Surrey. By then the drizzle had become light rain and they hurried to the door from the two police vehicles. Margaret let herself in with her own key, slipped her jacket over the back of a wooden chair in the kitchen, and started to work her way through Walter Kepler’s cabinets, drawers, and files. The rest waited in the drawing room. Tom continued to check his notes and compare them with earlier pages in his book. Diana sat beside him, occasionally brushing her hand against the side of his leg, reassuring herself of his presence. Baker cleaned his fingernails with a miniature penknife. He seemed intent on the task. From time to time he checked his watch.
Twenty-five minutes later Margaret Harrell came down the stairs, stopping halfway. “You did say that his name was Wilfred Alec, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” Tom said. “Have you found something?”
“No, but I may have remembered something.”
Chapter Forty-Six
Cobham, Surrey
Sunday, 2:40 p.m.
“Well, out with it,” Baker said. “You’re keeping us all in suspense.”
“It’s probably not anything,” Margaret said. “I’ll have to check some things. It’s just that . . .”
“Yes?” Tom said.
“Mr. Kepler’s assistant was named Wilhelm. At least I think it was Wilhelm.”
Baker turned his head away in frustration, wrinkling his lips as he put his penknife back in his pocket.
“Back in Berlin,” Tom said.
“Yes, of course. I’ve been his principal assistant here.”
Tom flipped through his notebook. “You said earlier that his assistant was seized and taken in for questioning by the Gestapo.” Tom flipped another page. “He was held for questioning for four days.”
“Yes, that’s right,” Margaret said. “They did that sort of thing as a threat. They did it with Freud’s daughter, Anna, for example.”
“I understand,” Tom said, “but you think the assistant’s name was Wilhelm.”
“Let me check,” she said. “There are some old letters . . .”
The letters were kept in an unlocked steel box in Kepler’s chifforobe. “He kept all of his personal papers in here,” Margaret said. She took out the deed to his house and a copy of his will, setting them aside. Then she took out a packet of letters secured by a faded pink ribbon. The stamps were still intact as was some sealing wax. The smell of dried glue and foxed paper was palpable. “Let’s see . . .” Margaret said, taking the letters to a nearby nightstand. She seemed uncomfortable as she sat down on Kepler’s bed. It took her nearly ten minutes to find what she was looking for. “Mr. Kepler asked me to go through these several years ago. He was looking for an old Berlin address.”
“Well?” Baker said.
“Yes, his name was Wilhelm. Wilhelm Eichen.”
“Is there a middle name?” Tom asked.
She looked over the letter. “There’s not much here really, just an expression of affection. Mr. Kepler’s assistant is wishing him luck in his new life in London. Wait . . .” She checked the envelope again, turning it over. “Yes, here . . .” she said, “the return address—W. A. Eichen. Do you think that Mr. Kepler’s assistant could be Wilfred Alec?”
“I don’t know,” Tom said.
“It’s very doubtful, wouldn’t you say?” Baker asked. “This man was an assistant. He wouldn’t have the means to be a collector.” Then, catching Margaret’s glance, he said, “Sorry, no offense intended.”
“None taken,” she said. “Perhaps he was able to prosper where others had failed. Those were difficult times. Fortunes were lost but fortunes were also made. Isn’t it always like that during wartime and just after?”
“Fortunes are sometimes stolen,” Tom said.
“What are you saying,” Baker asked, “that this assistant of Kepler’s was stealing art?”
“That would account for his secretiveness. It might also account for the fact that he possessed works that no one else had ever seen. He worked for a broker. Perhaps he had access to things that had not yet surfaced. He knew the names of Kepler’s clients. He knew the location of their collections. If works were hidden or shipped out of the country, Kepler would have known, and so would his assistant. So far we’ve been operating under the assumption that the assistant was detained by the Nazis. Perhaps that was all a ruse. He may have been negotiating with the Nazis, betraying his employer and the other members of Tenedos as well as their clients. Hitler loved art and he loved propaganda. He also used art as a prime example of the degeneracy he was personally called by God to cure. He called it entartete kunst. Just a second . . .”
Tom checked his notebook. “Yes, Bachmann and Erhard were involved with it; there was a story mentioning their names. They may have sold it or helped exhibit it.”
“Hitler would have liked to have seen it disappear, but he would also have wanted to draw some advantage—political or financial—from its disappearance,” Diana said.
“Yes,” Tom added, “and Eichen could have helped him. Confiscated works could have been sold and the proceeds transferred to the coffers of the wehrmacht. Eichen himself might have been permitted to keep some things. Their value after the war would have continued to grow. He could have become immensely rich and still kept a core of what he considered key pieces. He may still have them, since they escaped the fire in Chile.”
“And he anglicized his name to evade the authorities after the war,” Diana added.
“Just a second,” Baker said. “I don’t mean to discourage you, Deaton, but all of this is speculative in the extreme.”
“Agreed,” Tom said, “but it has the virtue of covering a number of the facts. We have been discussing Tenedos as a circle of five individuals: Kepler, Bachmann, Driessen, Erhard, and Berthold. All five have either disappeared or are now dead. However, there were six individuals, counting Kepler’s Berlin assistant, and that man may not only be very much alive, he may also be the same man whose home and collection Karl Bachmann may have attempted to burn. At the very least there is a connection between Bachmann and this man Wilfred Alec. Bachmann has now disappeared and Alec is known to be alive.”
“That’s a large number of may’s,” Baker said.
“True, but what else do we have?” Tom answered. “There’s something else you should know.”
“And what is that?” Baker said.
“Alec is living in southern California, a reasonable distance from Dr. Bennett’s brother’s Orange County gallery. Also no more than thirty or forty minutes from the studio where his body was found.”
“And so are another—what would you say—twenty to twenty-five million other people?” Baker asked.
“I’m going to have to leave,” Tom said.
“You’re going back to Laguna?”
“As soon as I can.”
“There’s something you might do first,” Baker said.
“Yes?”
“Roberts called. He wants to speak with you. I told him I couldn’t give him the name of your hotel, but I agreed to give you his number and ask you to call him.”
“What does he want?” Tom asked.
“He wouldn’t say,” Baker answered, seemingly perturbed by Roberts’ desire to keep his own counsel.
Tom confirmed their flight and called Roberts. There was expectation in his voice when he answered. Tom identified himself and they agreed to meet for drinks in a pub called The Aristocrat in George Street. There were oil paintings on wooden panels outlining the front door, lords and dandies in bright reds and greens. Inside it was heavily Victorian with green and red velour couches, thick, bunched drapes, and etched-glass gaslights, since converted for incandescent bulbs. Tom waited for six minutes before Roberts came through the door.
His ruddy face was lined from sleeplessness and his shock of white hair had lost its body and outline. The moment he sat down he ordered a double whiskey. Tom said, “the same for me but with a little soda.”
“Are you all right?” Tom asked.
“I could be polite and say yes,” Roberts answered, “but the vicar told us never to lie.”
“You look like hell,” Tom said.
“Indeed. Baker would probably be pleased. He thinks I’m immune.”
“What can I do for you?” Tom asked.
“This is not the easiest thing for me, Detective Deaton. I have a request to make of you, the nature of which you can surely anticipate. I’ll be brief, and say that you simply must recover the manuscript. Its value is . . . beyond my ability to express.” He paused and then spoke again. “Tell me, please. What have you learned? Who is this man who’s stolen it?”
“We’re not certain,” Tom said, “and I’m not really at liberty to discuss the details.”
INTO THE DARK : A TOM DEATON NOVEL Page 23