Silhouette in Scarlet vbm-3

by Elizabeth Peters

  It was something of a coincidence that we should run into one another twice in the space of a few hours. However, Stortorget and the Old Town are tops on the lists of most tourists. Even if he had followed me, even if the accident had been premeditated – well, I have my share of vanity. I could think of reasons why a man might force an acquaintance with me, reasons that had nothing to do with John Smythe. When Leif Eriksson bowed me into the doorway of a restaurant that had once been a wealthy merchant’s house, I stepped right in.

  I had schnapps. I had been meaning to try it anyway.

  The alcohol loosened him up a little. He even ventured to ask a personal question.

  ‘Are you, by chance, American?’

  I nodded. ‘And you,’ I said, with equal gravity, ‘are, by chance, Swedish?’

  ‘Why do you think so?’

  ‘Because only a Swede would hedge about a simple question like that.’

  He laughed. It wasn’t one of your hearty Norse guffaws, but a prolonged chuckle, as rich and mellow as his speaking voice was light. The moustache added a fascinating dimension to his smile. The ends actually appeared to curl up parallel to his lips. His teeth were big and white, just the dentures to rip into a haunch of raw meat.

  ‘You are unkind to us,’ he protested. ‘Why do you have a prejudice against this country?’

  ‘I’m not – I mean, I don’t. I’m half Swedish myself. The other half is a mixture – Norwegian, Swiss-German, American Indian, you name it. Like all Americans, I’m a mongrel, and proud of it.’

  He frowned a little, as if puzzled. Abandoning the problem with a shrug, he announced, ‘My name is Leif Andersen. And yours?’

  I hadn’t quite decided whether to give him an alias. The abruptness of the question, and the surprise at hearing a name so close to the one I had imagined for him, took me off my guard.

  ‘Vicky Bliss,’ I said, mumbling. We shook hands over the schnapps glasses. I felt my bones crunch.

  He ordered another round, and asked me what I was doing in Stockholm. I said I was on holiday. I asked him what he was doing in Stockholm. He said he was on holiday. I have had livelier discussions with retired schoolteachers. Unperturbed, I sipped my schnapps and bided my time. Swedish men once had a reputation for reticence and reserve. Presumably customs had changed since the sexual revolution, although most of the enthusiastic comments I had heard about modern mores concerned Swedish women and were, I might add, based more on wishful thinking than on actual experience. It was all irrelevant. If Leif wanted to move in on me with the ponderous deliberation of a brontosaurus plodding toward its mate, I could wait. So long as he moved in. He was the tallest man I had ever met.

  Then he said, ‘You are here alone?’

  A slimy little tendril of caution poked out from under the erotic fantasies that had buried my suspicions. He didn’t look like a Swedish Jack the Ripper – but then, who does? And he had been at the airport . . . I lowered my lashes bashfully and remained silent.

  ‘I ask,’ he explained, ‘because when I saw you at the airport you were greeting a friend.’

  ‘He’s no friend of mine.’ I spoke without hesitation, as I would have denied being intimately acquainted with Hitler. ‘I thought I recognized someone I knew slightly . . . once . . . a long time ago.’

  Leif leaned forward and put his elbows on the table. I caught one of the schnapps glasses as it slid towards the edge.

  ‘I think I can trust you,’ he muttered.

  Oh, damn, damn, damn, I thought. Here we go.

  The waiter trotted up just then to ask if we wanted anything else. Leif ordered another schnapps. I ordered coffee. I had the feeling I had better keep my wits about me, and I was grateful for the delay, as the waiter hovered, nudging Leif’s elbows off the table and lighting the candle enclosed in a stubby ruby glass holder. It wasn’t dark outside yet, and wouldn’t be for hours, but evidently evening had officially begun. The cafe was getting lively. In the background a small combo broke out in a disco beat.

  As soon as the waiter had left, Leif leaned at me again. Little red flames reflected by his pupils shone diabolically.

  Before he could speak, we were interrupted a second time. A man sidled up to us, cleared his throat deprecatingly, and in a soft, barely audible voice made a suggestion. It wasn’t a vulgar suggestion, though his manner would have suited a drug peddler or seller of dirty postcards. What he actually said was, ‘May I make a silhouette of the lady?’

  The light was so dim I couldn’t make out his features clearly. The most noticeable thing about him was his hair, which was thick and coarse and lifeless, the same dull grey shade as his shabby pullover. Tinted glasses shielded his eyes. Crimson light glinting off the thick lenses gave him the look of a buggy-eyed monster from Arcturus or Aldebaran.

  Taking my surprised silence for consent, he pulled out a chair and sat down. From his briefcase he removed a handful of papers and fanned them out on the table.

  I know a little bit about a lot of things, most of them utterly useless. I hadn’t learned about silhouette cutting from any of my courses, though it can be considered one of the minor arts; I had read about it in an antiques magazine on my last visit home. My mother is a fanatic collector of junk, known in the trade as ‘collectables.’ Silhouettes are among the few things she doesn’t collect, possibly because good examples have become very expensive, such as the portrait of Ben Franklin, cut by Major André, or George Washington, by his stepdaughter Nellie Custis. The art had flourished during the nineteenth century, before photography provided a cheap, convenient method of portraiture. I had not realized anyone still practised it, and I was impressed by the examples the little grey man spread out. The outlined profiles, black on stark white mounts, captured an astonishing degree of individuality.

  ‘For so beautiful a lady I make a special price,’ the artist murmured. ‘Twenty kronor – if she will permit me to keep a copy for myself.’

  Leif shifted position and made grumbling noises. I disregarded them. I wasn’t especially anxious to hear what he had to say, and besides, my curiosity was aroused.

  ‘It’s a deal,’ I told the artist.

  His tools were the simplest imaginable – a pair of sharp scissors and a sheet of black paper. I gave him a profile, and watched out of the corner of my eye. After one long, measuring survey, he began to cut, the paper turning smoothly in his hands as he clipped, without a pause or a second look at me. It was an astonishing performance, a demonstration of the art in its most difficult and refined form of free-hand cutting. Less-skilled cutters worked from a shadow outline or a mechanically produced tracing of the profile. The little grey man was the latest, perhaps the last, practitioner of a unique and dying art form.

  After an interval of less than three minutes he gave a grunt of satisfaction, laid the black outline against a piece of thick white cardboard, and held it up.

  It was me – I mean, I. I hadn’t realized my chin was quite so prominent, but it was unquestionably my chin. He had even managed to suggest the slightly dishevelled state of my hair and the presence of the scarf that held it back from my face.

  Twenty kronor was dirt cheap for a display like that, but I couldn’t resist showing off. ‘Edouart only charged a shilling,’ I said with a smile.

  The artist had leaned down to open his briefcase. He came up so fast he almost cracked his head on the table.

  ‘You know Edouart?’

  ‘The greatest freehand cutter of all time, right?’

  ‘Yes, yes, he was the master.’ His face came alive. The tight, precisely chiselled lips parted eagerly. ‘I have studied his methods – his manner of holding the scissors, for example. It is necessary to work quickly, very quickly, to capture – ’

  Leif cleared his throat. ‘Have you finished?’ The man’s face lost its animation. ‘Yes, of course. I beg pardon . . .’ Hastily dabbing mucilage on the back of the silhouette, he fixed it to the cardboard and gave it to me.

  ‘You cut two at the sam
e time,’ I said, as he repeated the process with the second portrait.

  ‘By folding the paper one obtains greater stability.’ He would have said more, but another cough from Leif stopped him. Eyes downcast, he began putting his materials away. I groped for my purse, which was on the floor by my chair. My fumbling seemed to annoy Leif; he reached in his wallet and counted out twenty SEK. His manner was that of a surly patron tipping a servant. I found it thoroughly offensive, and as the little man rose, I said warmly, ‘Thank you. It is a wonderful work of art and I’ll always treasure it. Will you do me the favour of signing it?’

  Leif – unforgivably – laughed. The cutter’s face turned a dull red. The signature he produced was an unintelligible scrawl. I thanked him again, profusely. As he walked away, the waiter came with our drinks.

  ‘Has this man annoyed you?’ he asked.

  ‘Quite the contrary.’ I showed him my portrait, and he grinned.

  ‘It is clever. I have not seen such work except in a museum.’

  ‘Then the artist is not an employee of the cafe?’ I asked.

  ‘No, no. We allow such people if they do not bother our customers. Most often they are singers or tellers of fortunes. This is original, at least . . . Do you wish to dine here? We have an excellent smorgasbord.’

  ‘Fine,’ I said. It was a nice little cafe, very atmospheric, with dark beams and rough stone walls, and I figured I might as well get dinner out of Leif. If he intended to spend the evening pumping me about Sir John Bloody Smythe, the least he could do was pay for my time.

  I studied my menu with intense interest, but Leif would not be put off any longer.

  ‘This is not the place for a private conversation,’ he grumbled.

  ‘I don’t go to isolated places with strange men,’ I said.

  Instead of objecting, he nodded approvingly. ‘Very wise. What I would expect of a lady of your reputation.’

  ‘What do you know about my reputation?’ I demanded.

  ‘All those who work in my field are acquainted with Dr Victoria Bliss. You are employed by the National Museum of Munich, and you are an authority on medieval art.’

  ‘Well, well,’ I said. ‘Do you by any chance know Inspector Feder, of the Munich police? Short, paunchy man with a bald head?’ Leif grinned, baring all his rapacious teeth, and conjuring up a pair of elongated but attractive dimples. ‘Feder is tall, not short; lean, not paunchy. But he is, I confess, losing his hair.’ This accurate description did not cheer me as it should have. I sighed. ‘What are you, Leif – Interpol, or the Swedish equivalent of the FBI?’

  ‘It is what you would call the Special Branch of Art and Antiquities. You are familiar with our work?’

  ‘I know that many countries have such special departments. The number of crimes involving art objects has necessitated a corps of men with specialized training. But I wasn’t aware that Sweden had suffered to that extent. Besides,’ I added heatedly, ‘I’m an art historian, not a private eye. And I’m supposed to be on vacation.’

  ‘Dr Bliss. Will you swear to me that you are not presently involved with Al Monkshood?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The man you greeted at the terminal.’

  ‘You heard me call him John – John Smythe. Maybe,’ I said hopefully, ‘we aren’t talking about the same person.’

  ‘He has as many aliases as hairs on his head,’ Leif said, grinding his big white teeth. ‘Smythe is one of them. Yes, we are talking about the same person. Do you expect me to believe that it was by coincidence that you hailed the best art thief in Europe?’

  ‘He isn’t all that good,’ I mused. ‘Al Monkshood . . . What won’t he think of next? Look here, Leif, let’s order dinner and get the waiter out of our hair; then I’ll tell you what I know. It isn’t much.’

  I am not uninterested in food. A woman of my size needs her nourishment. But I can’t remember what we ordered or how it tasted. If I could have gotten my hands on John Smythe, AKA Al Monkshood, I would have squeezed his neck till his face turned puce.

  We sat in silence until the waiter had brought our dinner. The silhouette cutter was still circulating, head bent over his work, he was reproducing the far from symmetrical features of a chubby Italian paterfamilias several tables away.

  Our own table wasn’t very big. By the time the waiter finished fussing over the arrangement of the dishes, Leif was simmering with frustration. He kept dropping things – napkins, forks, menus – and diving under the table to retrieve them. His face was flushed with exertion by the time the waiter had finished.

  ‘Well, then, speak,’ he demanded.

  ‘Okay, okay. I met Sir John Smythe, as he called himself, in Rome several years ago. I know the title is a fake, and I presume the name is, too, though he told me John was his real first name. He was mixed up in a scheme to copy famous antique jewels and steal the originals. But,’ I said, ‘if you’re familiar with his career, you probably know the details.’

  ‘Natürlich,’ Leif said impatiently.

  ‘Then you know the scam didn’t succeed – thanks in large part to me.’ Leif gave me a raised eyebrow, but modesty is not a virtue I cultivate. I went on, ‘Smythe and I were allies at one point because certain developments threatened him as well as me. I can assure you, I have no fond memories of the man and no reason to seek him out. I’d just as soon cohabit with a rattlesnake.’

  I applied myself to my meal whatever it was. ‘That is all?’ Leif demanded.

  ‘That is all.’ It was all he was going to get. What I had told him was public knowledge – at least it was information available to any police officer. My private dealings with John were none of Leif’s business.

  ‘Why did you choose Sweden for your holiday?’ he asked.

  ‘Why not? It’s the land of my ancestors.’

  ‘You have kin here?’

  ‘Probably . . . Leif, I’ve tried to be cooperative, but I am terribly, terribly sick of Smythe-Monkshood and everything to do with him. There is nothing else I can tell you that could be of use to you.’

  That wasn’t strictly true, but there were several good reasons for neglecting to mention John’s cryptic message about Wayland Smith which was beginning to look more and more like a legitimate clue instead of a cute come-on meant to lure me into a bargain-package rendezvous with John B. Smythe. It was one hell of a vague clue, though. ‘Wayland’s work’ could refer to any one of a hundred objects in a dozen different museums. If John really was planning to steal a historic treasure, and if Leif really was on his trail, Leif presumably knew more about the plot than I did. Besides, that damned message made me sound like a collaborator. I wouldn’t have blamed Leif for interpreting it that way. I couldn’t figure it out myself. Why the devil would John warn me of his illegal intentions? He knew I’d do everything possible to thwart him if I took the warning seriously . . . I hadn’t taken it seriously, though. The message had been perfectly framed – vague enough to preclude action on my part, intriguing enough to whet my curiosity. It had done the job. Here I was, right where John wanted me. I wished to God I knew why he wanted me here.

  While I pursued this depressing train of thought, Leif watched me intently. After a while he said, ‘I believe you.’

  ‘Thanks a heap. I’d like some dessert, please.’

  ‘Certainly.’ He waved at the waiter and watched benevolently as I consumed something consisting primarily of whipped cream and custard. ‘I like to see a woman who enjoys her food,’ he announced.

  I glanced at him, licking custard off my upper lip, but he wasn’t being funny. ‘You are right,’ he went on. ‘I should not spoil your vacation. I apologize. Let me make amends. I will show you some of the night life of Stockholm.’

  Things were looking up. I smiled at him. ‘I’d like that.’

  There was one minor contretemps, when I hauled my purse out from under the table and checked, as I always do, to make sure the contents were intact. I can never get the darned thing closed – I carry too many thi
ngs in it – so I was not surprised to find that several items were missing. ‘My passport,’ I exclaimed.

  Leif eyed the bulging, obscene object critically. ‘You should keep it always in your hands.’

  ‘It’s too big.’ I peered under the table, then shied back as I found myself nose to nose with Leif. His eyeballs gleamed like boiled eggs in the gloom. They looked absolutely disgusting.

  ‘As I thought,’ he said, fumbling around the floor. ‘Passport, lipstick, comb . . . What in God’s name is this?’

  I couldn’t tell. It was too dark under the table. We both came up into the light and Leif handed me my belongings, including the object that had prompted his horrified inquiry. I didn’t blame him; it must have felt like something long-dead and rotten. I am particularly addicted to a variety of pastry made by a certain bakery in Munich. It’s like a jelly doughnut, but squashier. I had forgotten it was in there.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, retrieving the collection and putting it in my bag. Leif started to lick his fingers, then thought better of it and wiped them on his napkin. ‘Is everything there?’ he asked, with the doggedly patient look men get when they deal with women’s purses.

  ‘I think so. No, wait – my notebook.’

  We crawled around under the table for a while without success. The waiter watched our activities with poorly concealed alarm; when I explained, he joined the search. Finally he said breathlessly, ‘Perhaps it has been kicked away, under another table. If you would like me to look . . .’

  ‘There was nothing important in it,’ I said. ‘If it turns up, hang on to it. I’ll look in next time I’m in the neighbourhood.’

  ‘Are you sure you don’t wish to continue searching?’ Leif asked, as we started for the door.

  I reassured him. The notebook was new; it contained nothing except a few addresses and miscellaneous notes.

  The evening turned out to be a success after all. First we went to a jazz pub – ‘with jazz,’ as the advertisement carefully specified. Then we went on to a nightclub and danced. Leif was a marvellous dancer. For so large a man his movements were extraordinarily economical and controlled. After-wards we took a walk along the waterfront The white boats lifted at anchor and the long lights shimmered across the water. We held hands as we walked, and we didn’t talk much. When we finally turned back towards the hotel I had almost forgotten J. Smythe; if I thought of him at all, it was to thank him for inadvertently making it possible for me to meet Leif.