Free The Play of Light and Shadow & Writing by Barry Ergang Page A

reasonable and who might
agree to the job if he weren’t already engaged by another client.
Gaines had welcomed the notion.
    “ Babysitting a painting,” Darnell said,
then shrugged. “Sounds like paid reading time. Go ahead, set
something up.”
    After coordinating schedules, I arranged a
meeting at Culhane’s over dinner the following Thursday evening—two
days before the party.
    Darnell was already at the bar when Barton
Gaines arrived with Marjorie and his research assistant, a young
woman named Carol Prentice whom I had known as a student the year
before. We exchanged greetings, I introduced them to Darnell, and
took their orders for drinks. Gaines invited me to join them. It
was a relatively quiet evening, and a coworker covered for me so I
could.
    “ With due respect to you,” Marjorie
said to Darnell as I sat down, “I think Barton’s being a trifle
melodramatic about this.” Slender and auburn-haired, she stared at
him with imperial gravity. “I agreed to this meeting to get your
professional judgment.”
    “ As soon as I have the
details.”
    “ History is on my side.” Red-faced
after his wife’s pronouncements, Gaines spoke quietly, looking at
the tablecloth and biting at his graying mustache. “The painting is
at risk. I don’t want Marchand to get it.”
    “ How could he know you have it?”
Marjorie demanded.
    “ He knows. Historically—”
    “ It’s possible, Mrs. Gaines,” Carol
Prentice said softly. “Newspapers, art magazines, and Internet
sites report auction results.”
    “ Even so—”
    “ Hold it,” Darnell interrupted. “We’re
getting nowhere. Start from the beginning.”
    “ How much has Alan told you?” Gaines
asked.
    “ Very little,” I said. “I didn’t know
enough.”
    Gaines crossed his arms over his barrel
chest. “All right. About three years ago, after he died, I became
very interested in the work of a French artist named Charles
Riveau. I began researching his life to write a book about him.
Carol’s been assisting me for the past year.
    “ Riveau grew up in a small town and
later went to Paris to study. Like many young painters, he learned
some of his techniques by copying the works of major artists. He
got so good that many of his copies were virtually
indistinguishable from the originals. But unlike most artists who
eventually get away from imitation, Riveau stayed at it. He wrote
in his journal that it helped him develop a more diversified and
flexible style. During this time he met Paul Marchand.”
    “ The guy who wants the
painting.”
    “ Yes.”
    Darnell nodded. “Go on.”
    “ Marchand involved Riveau in a scheme
to forge masterpieces. But instead of selling the forgeries, as
most thieves would, Marchand stole the originals from private
collections or museums and substituted the fakes. He and Riveau
both profited enormously by selling the genuine masterpieces to
unscrupulous collectors.”
    “ How do you know all this, and why are
you worried about protecting a Riveau painting from
Marchand?”
    “ Riveau detailed the significant events
in his life in a journal he published shortly before he died. He
wrote candidly about his association with Marchand.”
    “ He’s stolen from collectors and
museums all over the world,” Carol said, “even from places
considered impossible to rob.”
    “ You’re saying Riveau named him, but
the cops didn’t tag him?” Darnell asked.
    “ There wasn’t any proof outside of the
journal.” Her face, pretty in a fresh, snub-nosed way and framed by
short, shaggy dark hair, was as earnest as her employer’s.
“Besides, nobody knows what he looks like.”
    Darnell scratched his chin. “This is as clear
as the Schuylkill River.”
    “ It needs further explanation,” Gaines
said. “You see, Riveau was caught. The police found some of the stolen masterpieces in
Riveau’s studio he and Marchand hadn’t yet sold, and he was
arrested, convicted, and imprisoned for fifteen years. Out of
misguided