PAINTED
Kirsten McKenzie
Copyright © 2017 by Kirsten McKenzie
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are all products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is coincidental.
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Book cover design by: Robert Rajszczak
www.roberto-art.net
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ISBN 978-0-473-39843-9 (Paperback edition)
ISBN 978-0-473-39845-3 (ePub edition)
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Published by Squabbling Sparrows Press
PO Box 26,126, Epsom, Auckland 1023, New Zealand
I sobbed great ugly tears when you left.
You were, and remain, a spectacular friend.
This book is for you Emma Oakey.
Stay away from the sun, the snakes, and the spiders. Everything in Australia is trying to kill you.
(There’s probably a horror novel in that...)
Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?
Leonardo da Vinci
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Kirsten McKenzie
Chapter 1
“He can go whistle himself into his own grave, because I’m not driving there again. I wasted hours last time driving there and back, so he can damn well courier the paperwork. You get hold of him and tell him,” Alan Gates dismissed his secretary with the flick of a wrist, muttering to himself about the self-entitled elderly who refused to embrace technology. As if he had time to drive out to the coast to amend the last will and testament of a rambling idiot. The letter had been splattered with paint and addressed to his father, who’d been dead and buried three months now, hardly a professional approach at all.
Now he was running the family law firm, things would change. No more pandering to the poor and indulging the elderly, this business needed a firm hand and profitable clients. The mess his father had left behind never ceased to amaze him. Fortunately he’d died when he did, while there was something still salvageable in the firm.
Alma Montgomery sniffed her dissatisfaction as she closed Alan’s office door. His father would be turning in his grave if he knew how his clients were being treated by his son.
Clutched in her gnarled hand was the letter Alan found so offensive. A handwritten letter from one of the firm’s oldest clients, Leo Kubin. She’d never met him in the thirty years she’d been answering phones and typing legal documents for Alan’s father, and now for Alan himself, but she’d recognised the letter as soon as it had arrived. The faint scent of mineral turpentine clung to the paper and a kaleidoscope of paint droplets smeared the corners and along the edges of the thick paper.
Despite the assumption that he was an untidy man as she knew bachelors usually were, his thoughts were clearly expressed in the letter — terminally unwell, he wanted to finalise his affairs. He’d included a sheaf of annotated notes, less paint marked than the letter, but unmistakably from the same hand. His writing slender, the product from a school system long since consigned to the scrap heap. Page after page detailed how to dispose of Kubin’s extensive art collection after his death.
It wasn’t unusual for passionate collectors to leave instructions on how their belongings were to be managed, but, as Alma leafed through the papers, Kubin’s instructions seemed bizarre even to her. Each portrait must be crated as soon as it was removed from the wall and not be left leaning against a wall, laying on a table, or boxed with other items. Every portrait must be packaged individually and shipped to the National Portrait Gallery. Of the other pieces in his collection, they were to be sold and the funds distributed to the needy. Given the dubious accounting practices of Alan Gates Junior, she wouldn’t be at all surprised if Alan counted himself among the ‘needy’ referenced in Kubin’s instructions.
Alma removed that final page, the reference to the ‘needy’. Nothing good ever came of shredding legal paperwork, but Alan had been insistent they buy a shredder to better dispose of old paperwork. With a wry smile, she fed that one page through the shredder. All of Mr Kubin’s art could be donated to the gallery. They were best equipped to decide what to do with it. In these times of fiscal cutbacks, every public art institute could be considered a charitable cause. And, after all, how many pieces of art could one man have in his house?
A tiny obituary appeared in the local newspaper recording the death of Leonard Kubin, Artist, aged eighty. No known family.
Alan Gates Junior closed the paper. He only bothered reading the local paper in case it mentioned any of their clients. Divesting the firm of the dead and unworthy was an enjoyable hobby and the menial task of shredding their files a highlight. Thus Mr Kubin’s file could also be disposed of shortly, once the sale of his house and estate was finalised.
Calling Alma to bring him Kubin’s file, he pondered how much of a fee the firm could expect from the sale of the estate. He had some vague recollection of a vast art collection. He’d not paid that much attention at the time, but those reclusive types were more than likely to have squirrelled away a Matisse, or half a dozen long lost Monet oil paintings. His eyes were shining more than the handmade Italian brogues he wore on his feet. It could be a good payday for the firm, yes indeed. Not everything needed to be donated. The man had been old, his mind failing him. Better to sell everything of value and donate the dregs. Potentially slip one or two of the nicer pieces into his own collection.
After instructing the old biddy about what he wanted arranged for Mr Kubin’s estate, he rubbed his hands together. As a golf lover, he’d calculated that soon he’d be able to upgrade to the better club on the other side of town. Membership was at least five figures more than he currently paid, but that wouldn’t be an issue soon. He deserved to be mixing with a higher class of person t
han his father had, that’s where the monied clients came from, fresh from the manicured lawns at the Bolton Hills Golf Club, and he could not wait.
Against her better judgment, Alma Montgomery typed the letter to the Nickleby’s Trusts, Estates and Valuation Service, requesting their services to catalogue and sell Mr Kubin’s estate and left it on Alan’s otherwise empty desk for his signature. Clipped to the back were Kubin’s comprehensive instructions detailing how his portraits were to be treated. She rubbed her chest, unsure which hurt more, her arthritic hands or her chest. It’d been bothering her for days. Time to retire. There was no joy working for Alan Junior. She’d known him since he was a boy, a boy fond of cruel jokes, snide asides and everything money could buy. No, life was too short, he wouldn’t miss her if she left. He’d prefer a malleable young thing in short skirts and heels, flouncing around the office. Not her in her orthotic soles and sensible slacks. She’d tell him tomorrow she’d decided to retire.
Locking the office, Alma paused to catch her breath. Pressing her hand to her chest, she came over all clammy. The feeling passed and she pushed off, shuffling to the bus stop, not realising she’d never step foot into the office again.
Chapter 2
If Alan Gates Junior had any emotion about the sudden death of his secretary, no one could tell. He stood to the side of the burial plot, jiggling from one foot to the other, eager to be away. He didn’t interact with Alma’s adult children, whose own emotional offspring were clinging to their legs. Couldn’t they have been left at home he thought as one of them tugged on his trousers. If anything, it annoyed him that she’d chosen now to die. Here he was, busy trying to grow the practice and clear out the dead wood and Alma, with her encyclopaedic memory of their clients, had left him in the lurch. How was he supposed to remember who they all were, or if they were worth keeping?
It never crossed his mind to attend the wake. He had to employ another secretary and he had a business to run. Let these little people carry on with their little lives. He scurried away from the knot of mourners and slipped into his red sports car without any concerns about proprietary or respect for the deceased, music blaring from the stereo as he peeled away from the cemetery. Alma already struck from his mind.
The office had been in turmoil since she’d died. Unopened mail lay in the doorway and the red message light on the phone system blinked constantly, querying where Alma was and why she wasn’t clearing the messages. He’d unplugged the thing. He had no idea how to clear them anyway, that’d been Alma’s job. If people needed him they could email. Alan scooped up the mail and dumped it on his desk. What a mess she’d left him in. Bloody ungrateful woman. And what a waste of his time, listening to that dullard pastor droning on and on about the charitable work she’d done. If she’d had enough time for all of that, she hadn’t been working hard enough for him. Someone new in the office would be an improvement.
Sitting at his desk, clicking his engraved ball point pen, he came across the paperwork Alma had left for him to sign and send to Nickleby’s. He read the letter, eyes popping out of his head when he saw the itemised instructions Alma had stapled to the back. There was no need for those to be passed on to Nickleby’s. They’d think him stark raving mad if he included them. Who in their right mind would dictate that once each painting had been removed from the wall they were to be boxed immediately. That wasn’t the way any sane art appraiser worked. Each piece would need to be examined, photographed, then packed in the most cost effective manner by the experts. The dregs siphoned off to the National Portrait Gallery, and Nickleby’s would sell everything else, with his firm taking an appropriate cut of the proceeds of course.
Alan had been to Kubin’s house once, when he first took over the business and on that visit he’d formed the irrefutable opinion that the man was crazy. Alan could’ve sworn he’d overheard the man talking to the portraits on the walls as he fumbled about the old house. Anyone who spoke with such familiarity to pieces of art should be consigned to the lunatic asylum. He couldn’t be bothered wasting any more of his time driving out to the crumbling old house on the coast until it was time to review the value of the art. Undoubtedly a developer would buy it and bowl it. That’s what he’d do.
And so it was that Alma’s letter, minus Mr Kubin’s detailed instructions arrived at Nickleby’s and landed on the desk of junior appraiser Anita Cassatt.
An arts student at a mid-range university, Anita had graduated with honours, those honours landing her a dream job with the Art Valuation Department at Nickleby’s. Her days were filled with cataloguing art from some of the finest homes. Minor works by moderately well known artists passed through her hands every day. The better art was handled by the senior associates. The job a perfect grounding for a new graduate, but there were only so many watercolours by Edwin Fields and John Varley that she could stomach, and she was tiring of landscapes decorated with horses and watermills.
Like a gift from the gods, a note had been stapled to the letter by her manager, instructing her to appraise and catalogue the collection of portraits detailed in the lawyer’s letter.
Excitement tickled. An on-location job, out of the office, obscure collection of portraits. No mention of landscapes or gauche hunting scenes. Anita entered the address into her computer. A house standing on its own materialised on her screen. Grey stone walls competing with rocky outcrops, fallow fields falling away beyond the house and an angry ocean attacking the cliffs below. The exterior of the house void of the decor common to most luxury coastal estates.
The printer whirred into life as she printed out the directions, her excitement dampening any concerns about the remote location of the estate. According to the lawyer’s letter, the sheer scale of the estate would require her to stay several nights and arrangements had been made for her to be accommodated at the house for the duration. Bliss, a mini vacation.
A one sided telephone conversation with the uppity lawyer finalised her plans. He’d been less than helpful, his snippy anecdotes about the deceased owner inappropriate. The poor man was being done a disservice by his chosen legal representative. She’d felt dirty after the conversation, wiping her hands on her skirt after she’d hung up.
Despite her unsatisfactory conversation with the lawyer, her enthusiasm for the task bubbled to the surface. The artist had been a rising star in the fifties, exhibiting his portraits in New York to some acclaim, but even the Internet couldn’t tell her what had happened to him after that. He wasn’t an artist she was familiar with and he’d disappeared from the art circuit in the late fifties. Whenever one of his dark portraits came on the market, they’d been purchased anonymously, never to reappear. Nickleby’s themselves had only auctioned two in the past fifty years. The images in their old catalogues more haunting given the black and white photographs of the day.
Few images existed online. She printed out what she could find for comparison with what she might find onsite. You never knew what sort of wifi access would be available somewhere that remote, and Mr Kubin wasn’t deemed important enough to be included in any of the reference books she’d stuffed into her briefcase.
“You all set Anita?” asked Warren Taylor, her manager, as he approached her desk. A good man, great at his job, knowledgeable and affable. An unheard of confluence of attributes in a manager. Anita knew she was fortunate.
“All set thanks Warren. It’ll be fun.”
“You’re sure you’re okay being there on your own for a few days? There’s just no one else available to join you till Wednesday at the earliest. I did try the other departments, but…”
“I’m all good,” Anita jumped in. Taking in the concern on his face she added, “I’m a big girl. It’s okay really. I’ll be fine there. It’s just art. What could go wrong?”
Warren laughed, “Yes, yes of course, well I was just thinking of, well you know what… and you being on your own. Wanted to make sure you felt okay about it, about being there all on your own. Anyway, we’ll join you either Wednesday afterno
on, or Thursday morning at the latest to help finish it off. Frankly, I was amazed at the quantity of art in the house, if the notes from the lawyer are accurate. Can’t wait to see the place myself. Make sure you leave something for us to do, don’t try and get it all done on your own. Nothing good ever comes from hurrying a job.” And off he went.
Hopefully this collection would be her lucky one. She tried not to dwell on Warren’s concerns. Nothing good would come from worrying about it. She would be fine on her own.
Chapter 3
Following a three hour car ride with the stereo blaring out the year’s greatest hits, Anita struggled through the last hour on a gravel road, with only plumes of dust to show the road behind and nothing inviting ahead. A far too close an encounter with an antique tractor on a corner had left her shaken and she’d arrived at Leo Kubin’s gothic revival home with her heart still racing, a sheen of sweat on her brow.
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