The Wild Beasts of Wuhan

by Ian Hamilton

  “This is really quite interesting,” Ava said.

  “These are clever men.”

  “That leads me to Mr. Kwong. I know very little about him other than that he was a dealer whom the Wongs trusted.”

  “He was a ceramics dealer, and not half bad at it. He wasn’t big time but he knew his stuff and had a decent enough clientele, nearly all Chinese, of course.”

  “So how did he get into paintings?”

  “The Wongs asked him.”

  “He knew how much about the area?”

  “From what I can gather, hardly anything. The Wongs seem to have been his only clients for paintings.”

  “So how could he locate and buy all those works?”

  “Now that is the question, isn’t it?” Torrence said, emptying the bottle into his wineglass. “How did he indeed?”

  “Have you given it any thought?”

  “A bit, and it seems to me he probably just tapped into associates here who referred him to some people in Europe or the U.S. It isn’t that big a world, our art world. All he had to do was contact some of the major dealers and galleries, tell them he had a client who was interested in buying Fauvist works, and ask them to let him know if something came on the market. There’s always someone interested in selling.”

  “How would he finance those purchases?”

  “He didn’t, I would imagine. He probably had some kind of commission arrangement.”

  “But he did the invoicing.”

  “He wasn’t dumb. The last thing he would want to do is let his client know who he was buying from, and vice versa. You can be sure, though, that no painting arrived in Wuhan until it had been paid for.”

  “How did the real paintings get mixed in?”

  “Kwong was obviously buying from a number of people, some of whom just happened to be honest. There’s no way he was dealing with just one group or gallery.”

  “Could he have somehow orchestrated the fakes himself?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?”

  “There’s the matter of the real paintings, and the questionable ones — I haven’t ruled them out as real too. If he was reasonably certain he could cheat the Wongs without their figuring it out, why would he bother to send them a genuine Matisse and Dufy? It doesn’t make sense to me. No, I think your man Kwong got in over his head. He was only too happy to be a scout for the Wongs and to take a commission from the other end. I’m sure he looked at the provenances supplied with the paintings, but that’s about all he did. I’d also bet that he was doing business with some supposedly reputable companies, and that he was prepared to take their assurance at face value.”

  “Like which companies?”

  “The real paintings were bought from three separate galleries, two in France and one in New York. First-rate firms. The questionable ones are more of a mixed bag. I recognize some of the names attached to them, but not all.”

  “The fakes?”

  “Nearly all of them bought from individual collectors, sometimes through agents and some through galleries. The paperwork was always complete and always bogus.”

  “How would he have been able to contact all those people, or they him?”

  Torrence threw his head back and then shook it as if it needed to be cleared. “My guess — actually, my opinion — is that none of it was random. There’s no way that all those fakes could have found their way to Wuhan without some orchestration. I think you’ll find that Kwong was working with an agent. So rather than hunting down Fauvist works himself, Kwong entrusted that job to the agent. You find that agent and you’ll be on your way to finding your perpetrator.”

  “You make it sound simple.”

  “It isn’t. There’s nothing in the paperwork I saw that hints at one person. All the bills of sale are from a myriad of individuals and galleries and addressed to Kwong.”

  “You do know that all the records from his business have been destroyed?”

  “Yes. It doesn’t leave you much to go on, does it.”

  “I have a few ideas,” she said.

  “Like what?”

  She shook her head. “They’re not important,” she said. “Let me go back to the fakes for a minute. If someone was going to organize this kind of fraud, they would need a painter, or painters, yes?”

  “They would indeed, unless they scoured the world looking for fakes that already existed. But given the consistency in the quality of work I saw, though, I would think most of them could have been done by one person.”

  “One, or more?”

  “Given the time frame over which it took place, it could have been one. It would have been more secure that way. And they were all Fauvist works, and these forgers do tend to specialize.”

  “So this agent, he just contacts an artist and says, ‘Paint me a Monet’?”

  “Something like that.”

  “And in this case you think an agent commissioned an entire range of Fauvist paintings from a forger or forgers and then passed them along to Kwong with dummy paperwork?”

  “I think that’s probably the case.”

  “What would the artist get paid?”

  “I have no idea. It might depend on whether or not he had to sign it. Remember what I told you earlier: if the painting isn’t signed, it isn’t a forgery. So I imagine there would be a premium attached for a signature.”

  “These forgers, how easy are they to locate?”

  “Well, they don’t have a union or anything, but within the art world there are certainly some who are known. Elmyr de Hory was one — he did Monets, by the way. Then there was John Myatt, who did versions of Matisse and Dufy. David Stein did Picasso and Chagall. And then there was Hans van Meegeren, who managed to do more than a passable imitation of Vermeer.”

  “You’re using the past tense.”

  “They’re all dead.”

  “How about current artists?”

  “Not my field.”

  “Who could I talk to?”

  “We have a chap in London, Frederick Locke, who’s very good at this kind of thing. He’s the one I referred the Wongs’ questionable paintings to.”

  “Would he speak to me?”

  Torrence said, “I don’t see why not. I’ll make a call for you.”

  “Thank you.”

  He looked at his watch. “We seem to have talked away a lot of the afternoon. Is there any way I can interest you in extending your stay to dinner?”

  “I’d love to, but it will have to be another time,” she said. “I have some other business I need to attend to.” She took out her business card and passed it to him. “My cellphone number is on the back, my email address on the front. Could you call me after you’ve contacted Frederick Locke? It’s just about the start of the workday in London, so you might be able to reach him in the next hour or so.”

  “You move quickly.”

  “I have a definite time frame.”

  “Have the Wongs decided what to do with their paintings? They seemed quite upset when I left, him in particular. You know, we would still be very happy to sell the genuine paintings for them. Would you let them know that?”

  “Sure, but I don’t think they have a clue about what they want to do,” Ava said. “When will you know about the questionable paintings?”

  “It could take a little while. Frederick is meticulous.”

  ( 9 )

  Ava grabbed a cab and asked the driver to take her to the office of the Hong Kong Inland Revenue Service on Gloucester Road, at the far end of Wanchai.

  Hong Kong arguably had the world’s most efficient tax system, imposing a flat corporate rate of 17.5 percent and a flat personal rate of 16 percent. When the Chinese took over and turned Hong Kong into a Special Administrative Re
gion, they were smart enough to leave the tax system in place. The few people Ava knew of who had tried to avoid paying were soon brought to heel and severely punished by a system that was rigorous, incorruptible, and invasive.

  Ava paid the driver and walked into the building. She presented her business card to a woman in uniform at the information desk in the front lobby. “My name is Ava Lee. I’m an accountant representing a Canadian firm that has done business in Hong Kong with a company called Great Wall Antiques and Fine Art. My client has become embroiled in a tax dispute with the Canadian government involving several transactions with Great Wall. We unsuccessfully tried to contact someone at that business, and now I’ve discovered that it’s closed, the owner is deceased, and its records have been destroyed. So I was hoping someone here could help access the company’s tax records so we can clear up this problem.”

  The woman was reading Ava’s card while she spoke. She looked up and said, “You came all the way to Hong Kong to do this?”

  “I was here on other business and decided to kill two birds with one stone.”

  “Wait a minute,” the woman said, picking up the phone.

  “You can go to fourth-floor reception,” she said when she hung up. “Ask for Mr. Po. Sign in here and take a visitor’s badge.”

  Ava rode the elevator to the fourth floor. When she approached the receptionist’s desk, she was told that Mr. Po would be with her shortly. No more than five minutes later, a small, trim man in his sixties came through a door behind the desk with a file folder in his hand. Ava gave him her finest smile. “I’m so sorry to bother you with this, and thank you for being so efficient,” she said.

  “It isn’t a bother,” he said, “but there isn’t much I can do for you.”

  “You don’t have their tax records?”

  “Where was the company located?” Po asked.

  Ava took out her notebook. “Kau U Fong Road, in Lan Kwai Fong.”

  “Yes, that’s the one,” he said, looking at the computer printout in the file folder.

  “So you have their tax records?”

  “Of course, but as I said, there isn’t anything I can do for you. The records are confidential.”

  “My client in Canada is having a terrible time with the tax department there. We believe that Great Wall’s tax records will help to resolve those problems. Even if I could just spend ten minutes with them, in your presence, it might help. I’m not asking to take copies of any documents.” She saw that he was considering her suggestion, and she pressed. “I would sign any confidentiality agreement or any other form you think necessary.”

  “No, it just won’t work,” he said. “Our rules are quite strict and I won’t bend them.”

  “Well, could you at least help us, and the Canadian tax department, by telling me who filed the returns for Great Wall? I’m sure they used an accounting firm here in Hong Kong. If I could get the name of the company I could contact them directly and see if they retained copies. We wouldn’t be doing all this if Mr. Kwong’s heirs hadn’t so stupidly destroyed the company records after the business was closed.”

  Po opened his file again. “They should have kept the records for seven years,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “There’s a name here.”

  “Please.”

  He hesitated, and she knew he was searching his mind for the rules. “I’m not asking you to breach any confidence,” Ava said. “You aren’t telling me anything that would compromise the integrity of Inland Revenue.”

  “Miss, you cannot tell them that we provided you with this information.”

  “Most certainly not,” she said.

  “Great Wall used Landmark Accounting. They have their offices in Landmark Plaza,” he said.

  She called Uncle on her way out of the building. “It’s Ava. Could you please make some calls for me and see if you can get someone at Landmark Accounting in Landmark Plaza to co-operate with us? They were the accounting firm for the dealer who worked with the Wongs. I need access to some of his old tax records.”

  “I think we do have a contact there. How is it going?”

  “I’m learning a lot about art forgeries but not much else.”

  She took a taxi back to the Mandarin Oriental. It was late afternoon and jet lag was beginning to get to her. She decided she needed a run, and the day was so pleasant that going outdoors seemed ideal. When she got to her room, she put on her running gear and headed back out, walking to the MTR station at Central. It wasn’t rush hour yet so she managed to get on the first train that arrived. Ava got off at the Causeway Bay station, right across from the park.

  Ava loved urban parks, and Victoria was one of her favourites. Only nineteen hectares — less than one-twentieth the size of New York’s Central Park — it was the sole piece of green space she knew of in Hong Kong. In a city of seven million people, where space was at such a premium and ninety-nine percent of the population lived in apartments, Victoria Park was a sanctuary. She had tried running there some mornings but found it tough. The jogging trail was only six hundred metres long and not that wide, and there were so many people that she couldn’t run fast enough to break a sweat. Weekends were worse. In addition to the weekday morning mix of tai chi practitioners, people with their caged birds, ballroom dancers, walkers, joggers, lawn bowlers, and tennis and badminton players, there were various protest groups, public forums, exhibits, and a large Indonesian nanny population that congregated there every Sunday, leaving Statue Square in Central to the Filipino yayas.

  Ava’s guess was that a weekday late afternoon might work, and when she got to the park there was hardly a soul using the trail. She ripped off six quick laps, the jet lag receding as her adrenalin surged. She found herself gazing at the apartment buildings and office towers that surrounded the park on three sides and the web of highway overpasses on the fourth. She knew that beyond the overpasses was Causeway Bay, where sampans bobbed at the pier. She couldn’t see it but she could smell exhaust fumes from the late-afternoon traffic.

  The MTR was getting busy as she returned to the station. She was sweating profusely when she boarded the train, and the other passengers gave her some space.

  When she got back to the hotel she showered and changed into a clean bra and underwear, a clean black Giordano T-shirt, and a pair of Adidas training pants. She turned on her laptop for the first time that day. Nothing from the Caribbean cruisers — that was good. Not much to do with business — also good. An email from Maria that was almost too full of love. The days are too long. This past week has felt like a month. My bed is cold and too large for me alone. Hurry home, she wrote. While Ava liked the fact that she was being missed, she was troubled that Maria seemed so needy. She clicked on an email from Mimi that was even more unsettling. Thought I’d let you know that things are moving more quickly with Derek than I could have imagined. Love the man. Just love him to death. I’m going to sell my condo, I think. We’re talking about buying a place together. In fact, we’ve started looking. What next? Ava wondered. A wedding? Children? Her thoughts were interrupted by her cellphone. “Ava Lee.”

  “Brian Torrence.”

  “Thanks for calling so promptly.”

  “I spoke with Locke. Write down this number: it’s his direct line. He said you can call anytime.”

  “I appreciate it.”

  “Enough to have dinner with me?”

  “I told you, I can’t make it this evening.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “I’m not sure I’m going to be here.”

  “How about tentatively?”

  “Okay, tell you what, if I’m here I’ll call you,” she said.

  “Brilliant.”

  Ava hung up and checked the time. It was mid-morning in London. She dialled Frederick Locke’s number.

  “This is Fre
derick Locke.”

  “Thank you for taking my call,” she said. “This is Ava Lee. Brian Torrence gave me your number.”

  “Brian tells me you’re poking into this fake painting mess he’s uncovered.”

  “Poking is probably the right word. I don’t know enough to manage it intelligently.”

  “Well, it does get a bit complicated, and I don’t pretend to know everything myself.”

  “Brian explained to me how the forgers work and said that you’re familiar with some of them. I was wondering if you had any idea who might have done these paintings.”

  Locke chuckled. “I don’t have the foggiest.”

  “No idea at all?”

  “They don’t exactly advertise their services. Those that are known usually pack it in after they’re identified.”

  “Brian thought it was probably one person who painted all the fakes.”

  “I would agree with that.”

  “How does that work from a business viewpoint?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The painter obviously wasn’t selling directly to my clients,” she said.

  “Of course not. He or she would have worked through a gallery or an agent.”

  “And produced the works to order?”

  “Probably not specifically, I would think. I mean, I can’t imagine the agent saying, ‘Give me a Monet Water Lilies.’ He might say, ‘Give me a Monet, two Derains, and a Matisse,’ and then let the artist sort it out.”

  “For a fee?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “A large fee?”

  “No, I can’t imagine it would be for a huge sum of money. Most of these people are anxious for work, any kind of work, normally to subsidize their own art. At least, that’s the way it was for men like de Hory and Myatt.”

  “What kind of people were they?”

  “Talented. Amazingly talented, most of them, but for some reason their own art just never took hold, never gripped the public’s imagination. So to make a living and to be able to afford to keep painting their own work, they would knock off a Chagall and have someone flog it for them.”