The Collector's Apprentice

by B. A. Shapiro

  Ronald immediately contacted Dr. Tauber, who, after some hesitation, confirmed your diagnosis and grim prognosis. Ronald was ecstatic until I told him that I was pretty sure I was the only one who knew you were sick, a fact Dr. Tauber again confirmed. Then there was no more ecstasy, for without verification of my knowledge of your impending demise, the diagnosis has no relevance.

  Henri and George could verify my knowledge, but I didn’t bother to mention this to Ronald. Ah, but you didn’t know about George either, did you? So much you didn’t know.

  We were once again left with Ronald’s two prongs: the absurdity of a car crash as a viable murder plan and the likelihood it was an accident. So that’s what we went with, along with some additional padding from character witnesses: your old friend Bill Glackens, two of my students, and our secretary, Sally McDonald.

  This all went well enough at first, with each claiming I was completely devoted to you, but when Pratt brought up Henri, they all admitted that I appeared to have been besotted with him. And, according to Bill and Sally, he with me.

  Oh, Edwin, besotted is one thing, murder is quite another.

  Then it was time for the big climax: the accident argument, our strong suit. Ronald called a “forensic crime-scene expert” and two policemen who had been there that night but hadn’t been prosecution witnesses.

  Yes, all three testified, it did appear to have been an accident.

  Yes, it would be difficult to stage such a thing.

  But once again, our victory was short lived. On cross, Pratt asked each man a series of questions and each gave the same answers.

  Yes, he had seen staged crashes before.

  Yes, the truck driver had a clear view of your car coming down the hill, which was particularly unobstructed because there were no leaves on the trees.

  Yes, if the truck driver turned off his lights, you wouldn’t have been able to see him.

  Yes, it was a cloudy night and there was no moon.

  Yes, given the angle and his time to prepare, the truck driver could have purposely hit the driver’s door.

  Yes, the configuration of the collision would support this explanation.

  Yes, it was possible it wasn’t an accident at all.

  37

  Vivienne, 1928

  The policeman continues to stare at Vivienne, and she at him. “Maybe you should sit down, Miss Gregsby,” he suggests. When she doesn’t respond, he takes her arm, leads her around the couch, and gently urges her into it. Then he reaches down, picks up the blanket from where she dropped it on the floor, and wraps it around her.

  She pulls the soft wool tight across her shoulders and curls herself into a ball until all but her head is shrouded. Then she begins to shake, her hands tremble, and her teeth chatter. Edwin is dead. All that energy gone? To where?

  The policeman glances toward the kitchen. “Is it okay if I get you some water?”

  Vivienne doesn’t remember telling him it was okay, but he suddenly appears before her, offering a glass. She’s afraid she’ll drop it on the floor and doesn’t want to remove her hands from underneath the warm blanket, so she doesn’t move. She’s disoriented, perplexed. Can Edwin really be dead?

  The policeman sits down next to her. “I’m Detective Westford, Miss Gregsby. I can see this has been quite a shock, but you really need to drink the water. We don’t want you fainting away on me, now do we?”

  To please him, she holds up her blanket-cloaked hands and takes the glass. It wobbles as if she’s an elderly woman unable to control her tremor, but she manages to get it to her mouth. She tries to drink but instead spills water down her chin and all over the blanket.

  “Never mind,” the detective says, taking the glass from her. “Why don’t we just sit here for a moment? You take some deep breaths.”

  Vivienne tries to do as he asks, but her breathing is quick and shallow. The Bradley collection is hers. She’ll be able to return Papa’s paintings. Restructure and share the collection with the world. Put George in prison. Reconcile with her family. Go to Henri. But for any of this to be possible, Edwin has to be dead. She knew this was coming but feels as if she didn’t.

  Detective Westford picks up the almost empty wine bottle from the floor, puts it on the coffee table, and surveys the room. “Expecting someone for dinner?” he asks conversationally, nodding to the table.

  She realizes that she hasn’t said a word since he told her about Edwin. She clears her throat, clears it again. “I . . . I guess.”

  He raises an eyebrow. “Looks like more than a guess.”

  “Yes,” she manages. “Yes, I am. I was.”

  “Dr. Bradley?”

  “Dr. Bradley?” she repeats, not following him.

  “Was Dr. Bradley to be your guest?” His words are clipped, formal.

  “Why . . . why do you say that?”

  He shrugs, but his eyes sear into hers. “Mrs. Bradley told me that he sometimes comes here. She’s the one who asked me to tell you what happened.”

  Ada asked him to come tell her. The grieving widow asked the policeman to tell the woman she believes is her husband’s girlfriend that her lover is dead.

  “You’re surprised she sent me?” he asks.

  “Yes,” she says. “Yes, I am.”

  In all her imagining about Edwin’s death, she never thought about how it would affect Ada—she thought only about how it would affect herself—and she’s ashamed. But Ada will still have her arboretum and her school and Ker-Feal. Vivienne doubts Ada will mourn much for a man with whom she had no meaningful relationship. In fact, Ada will probably like it better this way: no Edwin to worry about, no Vivienne to worry about, no pretenses.

  “Was Dr. Bradley here often?” The detective’s voice has a slightly different ring to it, harsher, more demanding.

  Vivienne wraps herself even more tightly inside the blanket. She doesn’t like his tone. This isn’t an interrogation. No need to interrogate suspects when there’s been a car accident. No need to interrogate her when it’s clear that she’s been here all night fast asleep and is now hung over from disappointment and too much wine.

  “Miss Gregsby?”

  “Yes,” she says from somewhere inside the groggy fog surrounding her. “Yes, I was expecting Dr. Bradley. We’re colleagues, close friends. We sometimes have dinner together. Or used to. Not so much lately. That’s why . . . that’s why I’m so upset.”

  Detective Westford stands and walks around the small table, taking in the fine china, the linen napkins and silver cutlery. The unlit candles waiting to add ambience to a romantic dinner. “I can see that you must have been close friends.”

  Vivienne wants to tell him to shut up, to mind his own business, but he’s a policeman, and she supposes that in some ways it is his business. It’s time to cry, time to get him to leave. So she does, and he does.

  The sky spits sleet on the day of Edwin’s funeral. The church is so packed that one might have thought they were burying a much-loved man instead of the person who had been vilified in the Philadelphia press as “The Bad Tempered Dr. Bradley.” The priest’s eulogy is full of accolades for Edwin’s brilliance and generosity, for the contribution Bradley and Hagerty, Chemists, has made to both the community and the world. All of which is true.

  Vivienne rides with Sally and two Bradley teachers to the cemetery. Sally holds her hand in the backseat, but no one says much, although the teachers keep casting curious glances over their shoulders. Vivienne stares out the window, her face impassive. When they reach the cemetery, she looks into the stark rectangular hole in the ground, at the heap of dirt at its head, pulls her coat close. It’s taken almost a week for her to grasp the fact that Edwin is gone. That everything is going to change.

  Yesterday when she came home from work, George was standing in front of the glowing fireplace. He apologized for letting himself in but claimed it was too damn cold to sit on the porch.

  Vivienne shrugged off her coat and went to stand next to him. He didn’
t have a key and she didn’t ask him how he’d gotten in. She held her hands toward the flames. “Thanks for the fire.”

  They were silent for a long time.

  “So,” he finally said.

  “So,” she replied, transfixed by the flickering logs.

  “I didn’t have anything to do with it,” he told her.

  She watched the flames darting and shifting. “Neither did I.”

  George took her shoulders and turned her toward him. “Then something very fortuitous and wonderful has happened to us.” He pulled her to him.

  Vivienne twisted away. She longed to be held, to be consoled, but his callousness made her feel dirty, guilty. “It’s too soon to think about it that way.”

  “Why, you little hypocrite!” His laughter boomed through the room. “After all this finagling, you’re pretending to be sorry Bradley is dead? When you’re finally going to get your father’s paintings? I don’t believe you haven’t been thinking this very same thing since the moment you found out.” Which, of course, she had.

  But now as she stands next to the grave, tiny pieces of ice sticking to her hair, she wonders. She has the right to feel more than one way about Edwin’s death, doesn’t she? She may have been looking forward to becoming his heir, but that doesn’t mean she can’t be sorry he’s no longer alive. They were friends, worked together for years, and he taught her much, gave her opportunities few men would offer a woman. She’ll miss him in many ways.

  But she’s also glad, as George so crassly put it, to get her father’s paintings, the collection. To be with Henri, free and clear. Even when the dirt begins to rain down on Edwin’s coffin, she has a hard time dredging up the grief she professes to feel. That damn George has always been able to read her.

  “You have a lot of nerve to smile at a moment like this,” Ada hisses. The crowd is beginning to disperse, and Ada is standing in front of Vivienne, arms crossed, her chin quivering. Thomas Quinton is standing next to her. “You’re a little harlot—and a murdering one to boot!”

  Vivienne wasn’t aware she was smiling, but given her thoughts, it’s not impossible. “You think I drove a truck into his car? How could I have done that?”

  “A conniving woman like you could devise a way,” Ada says with a sneer. “I wouldn’t—”

  “It was an accident. Nothing more and nothing less. It was nobody’s fault—except the truck driver’s.” Vivienne doesn’t mention that it was Edwin who drove through that stop sign because he disagreed with its location. Even harlots and murderers have a sense of propriety.

  “An accident?” Ada repeats. “An accident that just happened to hand you everything you ever wanted? It was no accident—and you know that as well as I do! Mark my words, I’m going to prove you killed my Edwin. Just sit back and watch me!”

  “Ada, please.” Quinton places a protective arm around her shoulder. “There’s no reason to start this now. It’s not the—”

  “Don’t you shush me!” Ada shouts at Quinton. “You agreed. You promised to help me prove it.”

  “Come on,” he says forcefully. “Let’s get you home.” Then he deftly turns Ada around and leads her to the line of waiting limousines.

  Vivienne is taken aback by the loathing in Ada’s eyes, by the disgust on Ada’s face as she looked at her. Did Ada actually believe she, Vivienne, murdered Edwin? Did Quinton? Could they persuade other people to believe it? You agreed. You promised to help me prove it. What the hell did that mean?

  There is no doubt that both Ada and Quinton have reason to stop her from becoming Edwin’s heir. Ada out of spite, and Quinton because if Ada controls the Bradley, he’ll be able to persuade her to turn it over to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Edwin’s ultimate horror, Quinton’s ultimate payback.

  Vivienne doesn’t know much about criminal law, but she does know that if you’re convicted of killing a man, you can’t inherit his property.

  The reading of Edwin’s will is postponed twice, probably the work of Quinton and Ada’s lawyers, buying time to contest it. Before the episode with Henri in the garden, Edwin had always been adamant that Ada would never get the collection, convinced that she, as she’d threatened, would sell it off piecemeal. He’d assured Vivienne that the language was written in such a way that it would be impossible for Ada to break the will. Except now Ada has powerful friends. Powerful friends with a vested interest in her stake.

  Vivienne is also worried that Jacob Gusdorff might have had time to incorporate Edwin’s adjustments, although it’s unlikely Edwin had time to sign the new will. Still, there were three days between Edwin’s death and his threat to disinherit her. It wouldn’t have been enough time. It couldn’t have been enough time.

  She doesn’t worry as much about Ada’s contention that she murdered Edwin. A car accident is a car accident, and there’s no way to prove otherwise. George isn’t as certain of this as she is. For a man who never appears to be bothered about anything, this strikes her as odd. She’s eager to have him arrested, but given Ada’s threats, now isn’t the time to get involved with the police. So she agrees when George suggests that they not see each other until things are settled.

  Finally the will is certified, and despite Ada’s attempts at interference and Edwin’s late change of heart, Vivienne becomes the sole owner of the Bradley and all its contents. A tremendous, yet bittersweet, victory. Her first order of business will be to send the colonnade seven to her father. Her second will be to let Henri know she’ll be coming soon—even though France won’t be her permanent home for a while.

  For she’s going to transform the Bradley into the Bradley-Mertens Museum of Post-Impressionism, and it will be housed in Nice. Her museum will be everything she’s imagined, and so much more: the greatest private collection of post-Impressionist works in the world. Her vision will be focused, sharp, and pointed, telling the tale of the sweep of European and American artistic innovation over the past fifty years—and hopefully the next fifty.

  An ambitious project, yes, but one she’s grateful to be able to bring to fruition. She’ll hone and streamline, and then she’ll erect a modern building that reflects the art it encloses and allows her new collection to breathe. She’ll throw the doors open, welcome all, and share the wondrous gift she’s been given. The gift of overseeing grand masterpieces, orchestrating them, and protecting them for the generations to come. What an honor it is to be their custodian, for this to be her life’s work. Just as she’s always hoped.

  Two months after Edwin’s death, Vivienne is still in her own tiny office. She hasn’t felt comfortable moving into his yet, although she could use the space. Her workload is heavy; she has to do both her job and Edwin’s, as well as manage all the issues a transition in leadership brings. She’s so overwhelmed that she hasn’t had the time to do anything about the colonnade seven, although she has written to Henri, who’s anxiously awaiting her arrival in France. This, unfortunately, doesn’t appear to be imminent.

  One afternoon, there’s a knock on her door. “Do you have a few minutes, Miss Gregsby?” Detective Westford asks.

  “Detective.” She stands and smiles as if there’s no one she’d rather see. “Please. Come in and sit down.” She scoops up a number of folders that are resting on the chair next to her desk. “If you can find a free spot.”

  “I’m fine standing.” He scrutinizes the cluttered room, scrutinizes her. “A lot of work?”

  Vivienne runs her hand through her hair and drops back into her chair. “More than you can imagine.”

  “I understand you’re the boss now.”

  She lights a cigarette and inhales the smoke deeply. “Chief cook and bottle washer, too,” she says in an attempt to keep the conversation light.

  “Must be especially hard without your close friend to lend a hand.”

  “I do miss him,” Vivienne admits, pretending not to notice the sarcasm in his tone. “Very much. All the time, actually. As a friend and a colleague—and even as a boss.”

  “And
yet, you’ve accrued many advantages from Dr. Bradley’s death.”

  So much for light. “I’m learning that there are advantages and disadvantages to just about everything in life.”

  “Yes,” he says, nodding his head appreciatively. “That’s true enough.”

  “How can I help you, Detective? I’m guessing you didn’t just drop by for a friendly chat.” Stop it. Do not antagonize. “I’ll be happy to answer any questions you might have.”

  “Did you know that just three days before his accident, Dr. Bradley instructed his lawyer to modify his will?”

  “No,” she says, opening her eyes wide. “I didn’t. What kind of modifications?”

  “He wanted to remove you as the beneficiary.”

  “I don’t believe that,” she says as her stomach plummets. “He trusted me implicitly. He said that aside from himself, I was the only one capable of running the Bradley.”

  The detective scratches his cheek. “Apparently he reconsidered. Tens of millions of dollars is a lot to leave a relative stranger.”

  “And who exactly did he want to appoint?” she asks scornfully. Stay in character, George always cautioned. In this case, that of an innocent person.

  “His wife.”

  Vivienne snorts. “Now I know this can’t be true. Ada knows nothing about the collection—she doesn’t even like art and told Edwin she’d sell it off if it were hers. Something he would never have wanted to happen.”

  The detective looks thoughtful. “Perhaps she reconsidered also.” He nods crisply. “I’m sorry, Miss Gregsby, but I’ve got to run. Just wanted to keep you abreast of the changes in the case.”

  After he leaves, she stares into the empty doorway. So Ada has moved beyond accusations and into action.

  Detective Westford returns three weeks later, accompanied by two uniformed policemen. He knocks politely, but the three of them enter Vivienne’s office without being invited.

  She stands, notes the guns sitting in the policemen’s holsters, the handcuffs the taller one is pulling from his pocket. This can’t be happening. Even Thomas Quinton doesn’t have this kind of power. Or does he? Her throat closes up, and all she can do is stare at the detective.