The Van Gogh Deception

by Deron R. Hicks

  “My pleasure,” the man in the black coat replied.

  Chapter 3

  4:53 p.m.

  Friday, December 15

  West Building, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

  A tall white-haired man in a dark blue blazer sat down next to the boy.

  “It’s closing time, pal,” the man said. “We need to find your parents.”

  The man had a kind voice.

  The boy looked up. “I know,” he said quietly.

  “My name’s Ken Johnson,” the man said. He held out his hand to the boy, who shook it.

  “I’m a docent at the museum,” the man explained. “I help people. The security guard said you’ve been sitting here for quite a while. I’m sure your parents are worried.”

  The boy turned and looked at the famous sculpture by Edgar Degas—​a young dancer sculpted in wax, her eyes closed and chin lifted, her hands entwined behind her back. The boy didn’t respond. He didn’t have the words to respond.

  “Do you know where your parents are?” Johnson asked. His voice was calm and reassuring.

  “No,” the boy said. His eyes never left the sculpture.

  “Tell you what,” said Johnson. “Give me your name, and we’ll track them down for you, okay?”

  “My name?”

  “Yes,” said Johnson, “your name?”

  The boy turned and looked at him. “I don’t know my name.”

  7:07 p.m.

  Friday, December 15

  First District Station, Metropolitan Police Department, Washington, DC

  The boy sat in a chair and stared at a TV on a beat-up credenza. The office was small and hot. He could hear air whistling through a vent in the ceiling. One of the detectives had brought him to the room ten minutes or so ago and asked him to wait. There was little to do other than sit and stare at the television. SpongeBob SquarePants was dancing around silently on the screen. The boy had muted the TV. He wasn’t in the mood for SpongeBob’s annoying laugh.

  A social worker had picked up the boy at the museum and taken him to the hospital. The doctor in the emergency room had been nice—​he spoke with a soft Jamaican accent and had thick dreadlocks. He had asked a lot of questions, but the boy had few answers. He felt bad about that, but he just didn’t remember anything. He had no idea when he had arrived at the museum, why he was there, who he was, who his parents were, or where he lived. The doctor had checked for any sign of a blow to the head or some other injury that might explain the memory loss. Nothing. Another doctor—​a thin, bald man who seemed in a hurry—​had come in and spoken with the boy briefly. He wasn’t nearly as nice as the doctor with the Jamaican accent and dreadlocks. The new doctor was a neurologist—​a brain doctor, the nice doctor had explained. The new doctor—​the not-so-nice one—​had diagnosed him with a type of amnesia caused by a traumatic event. The nice doctor had told him there was not much they could do for him—​that his memory would return when he was ready for it to return. The nice doctor had given him a pat on the shoulder, told him to hang in there, and then left.

  Patrick Star had now joined SpongeBob on the screen. They danced silently around the bottom of the ocean on the TV.

  Despite the almost oppressive heat in the room, the boy didn’t remove his jacket. It was all he had—​a blue zip-up he had been wearing when he was found. Written on the tag on the inside of the jacket was the name Arthur. The people at the hospital had asked if that was his name, but the boy didn’t know. The name didn’t sound familiar to him. The jacket could have been a hand-me-down or someone else’s jacket that he had borrowed or picked up along the way.

  There was a knock on the door, and a woman with dark, shortly cropped hair stuck her head inside. She had a pair of glasses hanging from a chain around her neck.

  “My name’s Detective Evans,” she said. “May I come in?”

  The boy simply nodded. It wasn’t as if he could say no.

  The detective pulled over a chair from the other side of the small office and sat down directly in front of the boy. She placed a folder in her lap and opened it. He could see his photo stapled on the inside of the file along with the report from the emergency room. And even though the folder was upside down, he could also see the word “runaway” and a question mark written in dark ink across the inside cover. The detective caught him looking at the file and quickly closed it.

  “I’ve been asked to sit down and talk with you a bit,” the detective said. She seemed nice enough, but he could see that she was watching him closely.

  “Any luck remembering your name?” she asked.

  The boy shook his head. “No.”

  “My son has blond hair and green eyes just like you,” she said. “I sure would miss him if he disappeared. Do you know where your parents are?”

  “No,” the boy responded.

  The detective’s eyes never left his face.

  “Do you know their names?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Do you know your address?”

  “No.”

  “Do you live in Washington, DC?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How old are you?”

  The boy paused. That was a good question.

  “Twelve—​I think,” he replied. “But I’m not sure.”

  “Do you know how you got to the museum?”

  The boy mulled over the question.

  “No,” he finally replied. “I was just there.”

  The detective gestured toward the TV. “Whatcha watching?” she asked.

  “SpongeBob SquarePants.”

  “My son loves that show,” she said. “I think it’s kind of silly. Do you like it?”

  “It’s okay,” the boy responded.

  “You remember SpongeBob, but you can’t remember your name?”

  The boy shook his head. “I can’t,” he said apologetically.

  The detective put on her glasses, opened the folder, and scribbled a few notes.

  “Can I ask you a question?” the boy asked.

  “Of course.” The detective looked up from the file.

  “Do you think I’m telling the truth?”

  The detective closed the folder and leaned back in her chair.

  “I’ll be honest with you,” she said. “The chief detective asked me to interview you because . . . well . . . I’m really good at getting to the truth. I read people. I look for the little signs that someone isn’t telling the truth—​lack of eye contact, too much blinking, hand movements, shifting in the seat—​stuff people don’t even realize they’re doing.”

  “Did you read me?” the boy asked.

  “I did,” replied the detective.

  She paused.

  “I think you’re telling the truth,” she finally said. “And I’m going to do everything I can do to help you find out who you are.”

  The boy nodded. He liked Detective Evans.

  Mary Sullivan checked in with the duty officer and then took a seat in the waiting room of the police station. She had learned long ago that patience was an absolute requirement for being a foster parent. Her job—​she was a senior editor for a book publisher in New York—​afforded her a certain level of flexibility. She always had plenty of work to do, but her job gave her the ability to work from home and on a schedule largely of her choosing—​even if that meant poring over a manuscript at two in the morning.

  She was used to the late-night calls and the sudden need for the temporary placement of a child. The children ultimately moved on to relatives or long-term placement in another community. Mary had developed a reputation for handling difficult situations—​children with severe physical disabilities, children who had suffered abuse at the hands of a parent, children who had simply been abandoned under the worst of circumstances. This situation, however, was unlike any she had ever encountered.

  She had been on the way to pick up her daughter when she received the call from social services. Another lesson she had learned
long ago: calls always came when she least expected them. They had asked if she could pick up a child who needed temporary placement. She had initially declined—​she had a pile of manuscripts on her desk at home that were screaming to be reviewed, and Christmas was less than two weeks away. But the social worker had explained the situation and begged her to help. Mary had reluctantly agreed.

  The door leading into the back offices of the police station opened, and out walked Detective Brooke Evans. She was accompanied by a boy, perhaps eleven or twelve years of age, with shaggy blond hair and green eyes.

  “Thank you for coming,” said Detective Evans. “It’s good to see you again.”

  Mary looked the boy directly in his eyes. He was every bit as tall as she was. “Happy to be here,” she replied to the detective. Extending her hand to the boy, she said, “I’m Mary Sullivan.”

  The boy took her hand and shook it. “Am I going home with you, Ms. Sullivan?” he asked.

  Mary smiled. The boy seemed well mannered, which was a good sign. “Yes,” she said. “And please, call me Mary.”

  The boy nodded. “I don’t have any clothes,” he said. “Or a toothbrush. I really should brush my teeth. It’s getting late.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Mary. “I think I can handle a toothbrush and a clean set of clothes.” She turned to Detective Evans. “Any leads?”

  The detective shook her head. “Not yet. According to the security tape at the museum, he had been sitting in that room for most of the day. I’ll call you as soon as I know something. Being this close to Christmas, I suspect his parents will show up soon.”

  Detective Evans turned to the boy and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Be good for Mary,” she said.

  “I will,” the boy assured her.

  Detective Evans watched as the boy and Mary left the precinct.

  The whole situation was odd.

  There was, of course, the possibility that the boy was faking. She couldn’t discount it entirely. She had been wrong before—​every detective makes mistakes. But everything about the boy suggested that he was telling the truth.

  It was as if he had just appeared out of thin air in the National Gallery of Art.

  Chapter 4

  7:35 p.m.

  Friday, December 15

  Parking lot, Washington, DC

  “Where do you live?” asked the boy. It seemed a reasonable question. He didn’t know what else to say, and he felt as though he needed to say something.

  “North of here, near Dupont Circle—​not far,” Mary Sullivan said as she opened the rear passenger-side door of her vehicle—​a dark blue Honda CR-V—​and pushed a large pile of clothes, schoolbooks, and papers to the middle of the row.

  The boy took a seat next to the mound of items in the back. “How long will I be staying with you?” he asked as he buckled his seat belt.

  “Let’s start with tonight and go from there,” said Mary.

  “Okay,” the boy replied. That seemed fair.

  Mary started the car and headed toward the exit of the parking lot.

  “Just one quick stop before we get home,” said Mary. “I need to pick up my daughter from my sister’s house.”

  “How old’s your daughter?” asked the boy.

  “Ten,” she replied. “But she thinks she’s thirty.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Camille,” said Mary.

  “Camille,” the boy repeated. “Nice name.”

  “Thanks,” replied Mary. “I’m partial to it myself.”

  The vehicle pulled out of the lot and onto the street. A light snow was starting to fall.

  “Supposed to get cold tonight,” said Mary. “I bet the snow sticks.”

  The boy did not respond. He simply stared out the window at the snow flickering through the glow of the streetlights.

  After driving for about twenty minutes in silence, Mary pulled up in front of a small brick home and beeped once. A tall woman with jet black hair peeked out the front door of the house and waved at the car. Mary rolled down her window and waved back.

  “Sorry for being late,” she called. “How’s she been?”

  “She’s been Camille,” the woman called back.

  “Sorry!” Mary replied.

  The tall woman opened the front door wide, and a short girl carrying a large pink book bag and bundled up in a thick jacket, rubber boots, and a wool cap exploded out of the house and ran toward the car.

  “Thanks, Aunt Judy,” the girl hollered over her shoulder.

  She opened the rear door, tossed her book bag onto the floorboard, and plopped into the row with the boy. The large mound of clothes, schoolbooks and papers separated them.

  “Hello,” said the girl. “Who are you?”

  Mary interrupted before he could respond. “He’s staying with us tonight,” she explained.

  The girl took off her wool cap, and a large mane of red woolly hair exploded out. The boy didn’t think she looked anything like her mom, who had dark brown hair pulled neatly into a bun on the back of her head. The girl extended her hand to the boy over the pile that divided them. “I’m Camille,” she said. Her voice was friendly and welcoming.

  The boy shook her hand. “Hi.”

  “And what’s your name?” prompted Camille.

  “I’m not sure,” said the boy.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Camille. “You gotta have a name.”

  “He has amnesia,” said Mary. “That means he can’t—”

  “I know what amnesia means,” Camille replied sharply.

  “Just give him a break from Hurricane Camille, okay?”

  “But that is so cool!” exclaimed Camille, completely ignoring her mother. “I’ve never met anyone with amnesia. We’ve had lots of kids stay with us, but nobody with amnesia. I forgot my locker combination one time at school, but it was only the second week of class so that’s probably why. I don’t think it was amnesia, but you never know. So what’s it like? Can you remember anything?”

  She held up three fingers before the boy could answer. “Do you know how many fingers this is?”

  She paused for a second, then leaned over the pile between them and stared intently at the boy.

  “Do you even know what fingers are?” she asked. She wiggled her fingers in front of his face. “Or numbers?”

  “I know what fingers are,” the boy said. “And you held up three of them.”

  There was a slightly defensive tone in his voice.

  “Christmas is almost here,” said Camille. “Do you remember Christmas?”

  “C’mon,” interrupted Mary. “Give him a break—​he’s had a rough day.”

  Camille once again ignored her mother. “Well, what am I supposed to call you?” she asked. “I could call you Theo. I once had a turtle named Theo. He wasn’t very exciting but I liked him. He died. Mom said it was because I didn’t change his water, or feed him, or something like that. He smelled real, real bad. We took him out to a pond and tried to set him free, but when I put him into the water, he just sank. Plop. Straight down. To the bottom. No bubbles or anything. Just plop and down. But I liked him.”

  “You can’t name him after your dead turtle,” said Mary.

  Camille turned to the boy. “But you don’t know what your name is, do you?”

  “No,” he conceded.

  Camille turned then to her mother. “And I can’t just call him nothing, can I?” she said. “And his name might be Theo—​or Bill, Buster, Scooter, or Red. It could be anything. Red would also be kinda cool—​or Hank. I’ve always liked that name. Hank.”

  “There’s a name on my jacket,” the boy said. “Arthur.”

  “Arthur?” exclaimed Camille. “What kind of name is that? Sounds like a butler or some old man.”

  The boy’s face turned red with embarrassment. “I don’t even know if it’s my name,” he said quietly. “I can’t remember.”

  Camille paused and considered the situation.
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br />   “Don’t get me wrong—​Arthur’s not that bad,” she finally said. “And maybe we could call you Artie, or Art. That’s short for Arthur, isn’t it?”

  “I guess so,” he replied.

  “Well?” Camille asked her mother. “Can I call him Art?”

  “It’s up to him.”

  Camille turned to the boy. “How ’bout it?”

  “I guess it’s better than being named after a dead turtle.”

  Camille burst out laughing.

  “Fine,” said Mary. “Art it is. Now let’s get on home and eat supper. I’m famished, and it’s late.”

  Camille looked across the back seat at the boy. “It’s spaghetti night,” she said excitedly. “I love spaghetti night.”

  A slight smile creased the boy’s face. “I like spaghetti. At least I think I do.”

  9:17 p.m.

  Friday, December 15

  Carriage house apartment, Washington, DC

  Dorchek Palmer stood in the dark in the middle of the living room of the small carriage house apartment. He was twenty-eight years old but could have easily passed for sixteen. He had a mop of unruly light brown hair and stood just five feet five inches tall. People tended to look past him, assuming he was just some high school or college kid, which was fine by him. By the time he had turned twenty-five, he had made tens of millions of dollars developing game apps for smartphones and consulting for some of the largest technology firms in the world. But developing game apps and consulting—​as rich as it may have made him—​was not exactly the life he had envisioned for himself. Palmer was a thrill seeker, and he used his millions to finance a life of adventure—​mountain climbing in Nepal, running the Marathon des Sables, swimming with great whites in Australia, BASE jumping from Angel Falls. He tried everything at least once—​the more dangerous, the better. But eventually he grew bored—​risking life and limb simply wasn’t enough. He needed something big—​something beyond anything he or anyone else had ever attempted. And then, one day in Paris as he was walking along the Rue de Rivoli next to the abandoned palace of Louis XIV, the scheme had come to him in a flash. He immediately rejected the idea as crazy—​too risky for even his tastes. But he eventually realized that it was exactly what he needed—​something so risky that it scared even him. And it was this new undertaking—​an experience unlike anything he or anyone else had ever conceived—​that had brought him to this small apartment in the dark of night.