Farrell was certain that she could do a fascinating piece on the Paradise collection. She could shoot the most interesting items for sale at the preview over the coming days, and Friday she could cover the auction itself. The piece would air on Evening Headlines on Friday night.
As she tapped out her note to Range on her computer, Farrell was grateful for e-mail. It gave her a chance to compose and express her thoughts without having the uncomfortable pressure of having to pass her idea by Range face-to-face.
Go for it, came the executive producer’s e-mailed reply.
Yes! thought Farrell. The Paradise auction was a cool story, but even more important to her, it was another opportunity to get over to Churchill’s.
Chapter 86
Thursday
The elegant woman, cloaked in a jacket of brown broadtail fur with braid edging, carried a small matching muff as she alighted from the black Mercedes sedan in front of Churchill’s. Though passersby did not immediately identify her, they instinctively sensed that the woman was “somebody.”
“I’ll park the car, Mother, and I’ll meet you inside.”
“Thank you, Victor dear.”
The Churchill’s doorman, a welcoming smile on his face, held the door open wide for Nadine Paradise, who stopped for a moment to talk with him.
“How have you been, Tony?”
“Just fine, Mrs. Paradise.”
“Holding up with all the Russian festivities?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Nadine eyed the cossack costume and an idea struck her. “You know, Tony, I think I’d like to see you inside during my auction tomorrow. Do you think you could come inside and stand in your uniform next to the auction platform? I think that would be a nice touch.”
“Certainly, Mrs. Paradise. Whatever you and Mr. Montgomery want.”
Nadine pressed a crisp bill into the doorman’s hand.
“Good to see you, Tony.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Paradise.”
Clifford Montgomery and Meryl Quan were waiting inside for Nadine, and welcomed her warmly.
“I hope you will be quite pleased with our display of your wonderful things, Mrs. Paradise,” Clifford said solicitously. “We are so happy to have the opportunity to showcase these treasures.”
The threesome entered the busy auction gallery, alive with the energy of the interested public inspecting—and television crews filming—the relics of Nadine’s ballet career. Mural-sized blowups of decades-old pictures of Nadine dancing The Firebird, Scheherazade, and The Rite of Spring hung on the gallery walls, serving as a backdrop for the carefully arranged items that would soon be auctioned. Spotlights illuminated framed water-colored costume sketches and set-design plans that were works of art in themselves. The jeweled and feathered headpieces that had once crowned Nadine’s head as she pirouetted on the stages of the world, now hung on Churchill’s walls, waiting to be taken home by the highest bidder.
“Clifford, you’ve done a beautiful job here.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Paradise.”
Nadine continued her tour, satisfied with the decision to divest herself of all these things. It would be that much less for Victor to do after she was gone.
“Excuse me, Mrs. Paradise?”
“Miss Slater! It’s so nice to see you here.”
“Thank you for remembering me. I’m here covering the auction for KEY News. I was wondering if you’d be willing to be interviewed briefly.”
“Certainly, dear.”
Clifford Montgomery was clearly annoyed. Meryl tried to hide her pleasure at seeing B. J. approach with his camera, while Victor Paradise arrived at his mother’s side.
Farrell started with some questions about Nadine’s dance career, asking her if there were any auction items that were of particular significance. Nadine answered eloquently, her French accent giving her responses an almost melodious quality. Farrell knew that, back in the editing room, she would have good material to work with.
“Why now, Mrs. Paradise? Why did you decide to auction these things off now?” Farrell asked.
Nadine smiled. “As one gets older, one wants to simplify one’s life. This just felt like the right time to let go of a few things and move on.” She failed to mention that the money would be welcome income after living so many years in retirement.
Chapter 87
Friday of the Third Week of Lent
You had to hand it to them. Churchill’s really knew how to do it right.
Farrell observed and B. J. shot as the Paradise auction began. Clifford Montgomery made brief opening remarks from the auctioneer’s platform. The lights dimmed and a movie screen lowered from the ceiling. As the music of Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky played, black-and-white slides of the prima ballerina flickered on the screen.
When the lights came back up and the applause died down, a Russian cossack appeared to stand guard as the first item for sale wheeled into view on the automated platform. The costume that Nadine Paradise wore in the title role of The Firebird. Farrell consulted her auction catalogue to read that the ballet was based on a selection of Russian fairy stories. It was a good selection to start off another auction in Churchill’s Russian series.
Farrell was really beginning to feel comfortable at the auction house—not feeling, as she once had, that it was a hushed, intimidating place that only the very, very wealthy dared enter. As she looked around the gallery, she saw faces she recognized. Nadine Paradise, of course, and her son Victor. Farrell was interested to see that Stacey Spinner was sitting with them.
Where was Pat? Farrell wondered. She had said that she was going to close up the Consignment Depot and come to the auction with Tim Kavanagh.
Farrell felt a tap on her shoulder, and her spine stiffened.
“We have to stop meeting like this.”
It was Jack.
“They really do let just about anyone in here, don’t they?” Farrell whispered. Suddenly the auction had become even more stimulating.
Chapter 88
“I’m interested in something that’s going to be auctioned at the Russian Space History Sale, and I won’t be able to make it to the preview. Can you show it to me?”
“Right now?” asked Meryl.
“I know it’s an imposition, but I don’t have much time.”
Meryl glanced around the auction gallery. Everything was going smoothly. It wouldn’t hurt if she slipped away for a few minutes.
Meryl led the way. “I hope you don’t mind, but we have to take the freight elevator.”
“I don’t mind in the least.”
Did the costumed doorman look in their direction? Couldn’t be sure.
It had to be quick. There was no time for any more bungling.
As the freight elevator doors closed behind them, Meryl drew in a sharp breath as she felt something snap around her neck. She struggled urgently but silently as she tried to rip away whatever it was that was choking her. She fought hard, but the strong hands that twisted the tourniquet around her neck were unrelenting.
When it was over, Meryl’s limp body collapsed. Although the deadweight was heavy, the corpse was easily folded and stuffed into the large packing barrel at the side of the freight elevator. Forcefully the barrel was clamped shut, as a Hermès scarf slipped through the narrow opening at the side of the car and wafted down the elevator shaft.
Chapter 89
B. J. looked for Meryl before he and Farrell left Churchill’s. He had wanted to confirm their date for Saturday night but he couldn’t find her. Farrell had been anxious to get back to the Broadcast Center to start putting her auction story together and B. J. had wanted to get back to check the quality of the tape he’d shot.
He thought he’d gotten some good stuff, and his hunch was confirmed as he played the videotapes back for Farrell.
“Nice work,” she said. “I notice you got some good shots of your girlfriend as well.”
B. J. grinned. “You know what they say—all work and no play. . ..”<
br />
“Get out of here, you goofball. I have work to do.” Farrell opened up a new computer page to begin composing her story.
“In another of the growing phenomenon known as celebrity auctions, the collection of the renowned ballerina Nadine Paradise went on sale today at Churchill’s in New York City, attracting an audience eager to pay to have a piece of a legend’s life. . ..”
She typed for the next forty-five minutes, interweaving her writing with sound bites from Nadine Paradise and from three of the enthusiastic auction-goers she had interviewed today. Farrell glanced at her wristwatch. Five o’clock. She punched the computer keys to send the script down to Range in the Fishbowl.
Fifteen minutes later, the executive producer called.
“Drop the third auctiongoer’s soundbite, change the close to read, ‘Nadine Paradise, who has spent so much of her life on center stage earning the applause and hearts of her admirers, won their fealty again this afternoon at Churchill’s.’ Then go ahead and track. Eliza Blake will be ready to record in booth three.”
With just over an hour until airtime, Farrell made the script adjustments and hurried downstairs to the editing area. She felt satisfied that Range had changed so little of her script. In the past, she had thought he had taken great relish in ripping her work apart.
Chapter 90
Fourth Sunday of Lent
All day Saturday B. J. had tried to reach Meryl, unsuccessfully. Was she giving him a none-too-subtle message that she did not want to go out with him anymore?
Saturday night, he had left another message on her answering machine at home: “Meryl, it’s Beej. Please call me, honey. I’m worried sick about you.”
With pages of the Sunday Daily News spread out over his bed, B. J. decided to try her at Churchill’s. Maybe she had work to catch up on after the auction on Friday. His heart leapt as the phone was picked up on the second ring.
“Clifford Montgomery.” The voice sounded anxious.
“Hi, I’m trying to reach Meryl Quan.”
“Who’s calling, please?”
“B. J. D’Elia. I’m a friend of hers. We had plans for last night and I haven’t been able to reach her. I was hoping she would be there at the office.”
“I wish she were, Mr. D’Elia. I haven’t seen Meryl since Friday afternoon at the auction here. I’ve been calling her at home myself. It’s not at all like her to just disappear like this. Not when we have another important auction we’re preparing for. She is really very conscientious.”
B. J.’s heart pounded fearfully. “I’m calling the police.”
Chapter 91
Monday
Farrell walked to work, anxious and tense about B. J.’s frantic call the night before. First Olga; now Meryl. Where was she? She didn’t want to admit it to herself, but she was frightened.
Dean was waiting for her when Farrell arrived in their office.
“I was in the Fishbowl Friday night when your piece on the Paradise auction ran. Range loved it.”
“That must have made you very happy, Dean,” Farrell snapped back sarcastically.
“Whoa. Sorry. I just thought I’d pass on a little good news for a change. I’ll be sure not to do that again.” Dean turned back to his newspaper.
“Cut the crap, Dean. Let’s not pretend that you are rooting for me. You’ll be glad to have a new office-mate. And now that I’m leaving, may I take this opportunity to tell you what a lowlife, sneaky skunk I think you are.”
The color rose in Dean’s cheeks and he attempted to mount a sputtering protest, but Farrell pressed on.
“Don’t play innocent. I know you’ve intercepted phone calls and purposefully neglected to give me the messages. I know you sniff around my computer and eavesdrop on my phone conversations. And though I can’t prove it yet, I know you are the reason why a videotape crucial to a story that could save my career here is missing from my desk.”
“Hey, Farrell, don’t blame me if you misplaced something.”
“ ‘Misplaced,’ my foot! You took it, and don’t worry, I’m going to prove that you did. I wonder what your buddy Range will say when I tell him that his boy wonder is a common thief. So much for journalistic integrity!”
“Be careful, Farrell,” Dean warned.
“You be careful, Dean.”
Chapter 92
“Can you believe it?” the overalled stagehand asked his coworker. “Now we’re auctioning off Commie spacesuits, for Christ’s sake. Russian Space History Sale, my ass. I’ll be glad when this Russian thing is over. I’m sick and tired of getting here so damned early to set up.”
“You and me both,” agreed his companion. “You gotta feel sorry for those cosmonauts, though. Having to sell off all their space souvenirs just to get some money to live.”
“Ah. . . I don’t feel sorry for those guys. They worked against us all those years. Now they’re getting what they deserve. Their country is a mess.”
The stagehands pushed a large dolly stacked with spacesuits, helmets, thick gloves, and parachutes, and stopped to wait for the freight elevator that would carry the merchandise to the gallery above.
“Hey, lookie here, a doggie spacesuit! Those Russians were big on sending animals into orbit.”
The stagehand held up the miniature suit for his friend to see as the elevator doors opened. Instantly both men winced as they inhaled the putrid stench of what they would soon find out was decomposing flesh.
“Oh man, it smells like something died in here.”
Chapter 93
Another week gone by, and still no check from Churchill’s.
Orchestrating the forgery and the sale of a Fabergé egg was a colossal feat in itself. Now, with the murders of Misha and Meryl, and Olga still to be dealt with, if necessary, that money from the auctioned Moon Egg had been earned many times over. And the work to be done was not finished. Unfortunately, it looked like there were others who were getting in the way and might have to be taken care of as well.
The phone was picked up on the third ring at Churchill’s.
“Clifford Montgomery.”
“You’ve taken to answering your own phone?”
“What do you want?”
“My money.”
“Listen, while you’re sitting safe and sound, I’ve got the FBI on my back.”
“Poor Clifford. If it makes you feel any better, I’ve been busy, too.”
“It doesn’t make me feel better. I’m drowning here. Besides, the buyer is having some trouble coming up with the money. And even if I did have it, should I issue a check now, the feds would be all over me.”
“Well, you better think of something, bucko. Get the money from that secret buyer of yours or I’ll tip off the FBI myself.”
Clifford laughed nervously. “You do that, and you’ll go down with me.”
“You forget, don’t you? All I need to say is that I bought the egg at the Twenty-Sixth Street Flea Market and brought it to you for authentication. Don’t worry, I’ll be just as shocked as your buyer that the egg is a fake. There’s nothing in the world that can connect me to the forgery.”
The auction-house president thought about his career. He was being hung out to dry and he knew it. He wished he had never gotten involved in this. A chance circumstance had led to this nightmare and it was going to take more than mere chance to end it.
“Just get me that money, Clifford. Or you’re the one who’ll be going to jail. I have the feeling you won’t like the accommodations in federal prison. That’s where you’ll go if I’m forced to make that call.”
Chapter 94
Tuesday
“They found Meryl’s body.” B. J. stood, shell-shocked, in the doorway.
Farrell felt pinned to her chair, dumbfounded.
“Oh, B. J. No. Oh no!”
The cameraman slowly walked to the couch positioned against Farrell’s office wall, and sat down heavily. Closing his eyes, he laid his head back against the top of the sofa, and sighed from deep wit
hin his chest.
“They found her this morning, in a packing barrel at Churchill’s. From the condition of things, they think she was lying there all weekend.”
“Oh God, B. J. I’m so sorry.”
Farrell sat quietly for a few moments with her friend.
“What are the police saying?”
“The usual. They’re investigating, so they aren’t saying much. An autopsy will be performed to figure out how she was killed.”
Killed. Farrell rubbed the tops of her crossed arms, suddenly cold.
“Do you know anyone who would want to hurt Meryl, Beej?” she asked softly.
But B. J. wasn’t listening to Farrell’s question. “I just saw her at the auction on Friday. She was so much fun. We were planning to see each other this weekend. If only I had stuck around at Churchill’s until I found her, rather than rushing back here to check if my stupid video was good, maybe, just maybe, Meryl would be alive right now.”
Farrell rose and sat next to B. J. on the couch, taking his hands in hers.
“Beej, you can’t beat yourself up like this. If someone wanted to kill Meryl, he or she would have done it eventually. You couldn’t be with her twenty-four hours a day.”
“That’s for sure,” B. J. sneered. “Not the way she lived at that damn auction house, with that boss of hers always giving her agita.”
“Clifford Montgomery?”
“Yeah. She was worried that Montgomery was into something that she didn’t want anything to do with.”
Chapter 95
Every month, the elevator maintenance man came to Churchill’s to make sure the company’s lifts were running well and safely. Liam O’Shea was actually due on the seventeenth of the month, but today he was twenty-four hours early. He wanted to take tomorrow off to go to the St. Patrick’s Day parade.
Do You Promise Not To Tell? Page 14