Michelangelo's Notebook Part 7

"Yes," said Valentine.

"I'd like to know why you're interested?" Wharton asked. His voice was still pleasant enough but there was a faint edge to the question.

"I'm generally interested in antiquities but I'm more interested in how this one was put to use."

"The murder."

"Yes."

"You're with the police then?"

"I sometimes do consulting work for them."

A nice bit of evasion, thought Finn. Not the truth but not necessarily a lie either. Said without a twitch or hesitation-an expected question, the answer ready. As her mother might say, Michael Valentine certainly was a caution.

"Unfortunate," said Wharton. "There's no connection to Greyfriars, of course. It was simply the weapon used. Nevertheless, it reflects poorly on the school. We can only be glad that it took place during the summer holidays." Not the kind of thing that attracted the rich and famous, certainly, Finn thought.

"Alexander Crawley wasn't an alumnus of Greyfriars?"

"No."

"You're sure."

Wharton's otherwise pleasant and neutral expression suddenly hardened. "Absolutely. In the first place, I checked the records of the New York Police. Given Mr. Crawley's age he would have attended Greyfriars at the same time I did. I was here from 1955 to 1967. If he'd been a student here, boarder or day boy, I would have known him."

"I see."

"There was a robbery. The knife caught the thief's eye. Unfortunately Mr. Crawley became his victim."

"Seems a little far-fetched, don't you think?"

"It seems like an odd conjunction of events, and a tragic one, but I can a.s.sure you that's all it was."

"Why did Greyfriars have the knife in the first place?" Finn asked.

"We have a small museum here. What they used to call a cabinet of curiosities. The knife was a gift from one of the alumni."

Valentine glanced across at Finn. She took her cue instantly.

"May we see it?" she said brightly, giving Wharton her best smile. "The museum, I mean."

"I don't really see the point," the headmaster responded. "The knife is no longer there, after all."

"Please," said Finn. She stood up, putting the bra.s.s b.u.t.ton on the front of her jeans roughly at Wharton's eye level. He barely paused.

"I suppose," the headmaster answered gruffly. He stood up, the fingers of his right hand automatically going to the b.u.t.ton of his jacket and doing it up. He smoothed his tie. "We can get to it through the school but it's easier if we simply go across the quad."

The headmaster led them out into the hallway, informed the goggle-eyed Miss Mimble of their destination and went into the main entrance hall and then outside. He made no effort to talk to either Finn or Valentine, striding quickly down the narrow gravel pathway that cut through the well-tended gra.s.s, almost as though he was daring them to keep up with him.

They reached a small set of stone steps on the far side of the quadrangle, climbed them and went through a small gla.s.s-paned door that led into a small cloakroom s.p.a.ce fitted out with rows of bra.s.s coat hooks on either side. They were at a right angle between two wings of the large building and two narrow hallways led off left and right. Without a word Wharton turned to the right. Immediately on their left an open door led into what was obviously a science lab. Beside it was a door with a neat wooden sign that said DARKROOM. Wharton turned and stopped in front of a door on the left. He reached into his trouser pocket, took out a large ring of keys and fitted one into the lock.

"You lock the door to the museum?" Valentine asked.

"We do now," Wharton answered sourly. He turned the key and the door swung open. He flicked a switch on the wall and several overhead fluorescents crackled to life.

The museum was small, no larger than the average living room. There were maps and paintings on the wall and gla.s.s-topped display cases ranged around the walls. The room had an old-fashioned look about it, like photographs Finn had seen of early displays at the Smithsonian. The display cases held everything from a collection of bird eggs resting on small beds of yellowing cotton b.a.l.l.s to an old stereopticon with several slides to an Olympic gold medal for track and field from 1924 and somebody's Congressional Medal of Honor from WWII.

High on the wall above one case were a pair of Brown Bess caplock muskets from the War of 1812, and in the case itself, a collection of Civil War memorabilia including an old navy Colt revolver. Beside the revolver in gruesome juxtaposition was a pair of bra.s.s-bound binoculars with the right lens smashed and the eyepiece a twisted, exploded mess. Finn grimaced. It gave a whole new meaning to "Don't shoot till you see the whites of their eyes."

Far to the right, almost invisible, was a small, rather amateurish-looking oil painting of a monkey. The painting looked as though it hadn't been dusted in years. Below it was a wood-and-gla.s.s case. A roughly triangular section of gla.s.s had been removed from the case, clearly cut with a diamond gla.s.s cutter and pulled off with a lump of putty. The scored piece of gla.s.s was still sitting to one side of the hole and the whole display case was cloudy with fingerprint dust. Finn looked through the opening, and could see where the curved knife had lain against the green baize cloth that covered the bottom of the case, leaving a darker, unfaded ghost impression of itself. A small printed card said: MOORISH RITUAL DAGGER. GIFT OF COL. GEORGE GATTY.

"Who was George Gatty?" Finn asked.

"He was here in the thirties, according to the records. Went on to West Point."

"One wonders where he came across a Spanish dagger," murmured Valentine.

"Presumably during the war. Spanish Morocco, Casablanca, somewhere like that."

"You know your twentieth-century history," Valentine commented.

"In addition to being headmaster I'm also head of the history department. I teach sixth form."

"Sixth form?" asked Finn.

"He means grade twelve," said Valentine.

"Do you know anything more about Gatty?"

"No. Only that he went here in the thirties and went on to West Point. That's all the information on him I was able to give the police too."

"You don't know where we could find him?"

"Tracing down old students isn't my job, Mr. Valentine. That's what the alumni a.s.sociation is for."

"Dr. Valentine."

"Whatever you call yourself." Wharton turned on his heel and left the museum.

"Short-tempered fellow," Valentine observed.

"I'll say," commented Finn. "You think we'll be able to track down Colonel Gatty?"

"With a name like that I don't think it'll be too difficult."

Valentine took a last look at the small painting over the display case and then followed Wharton out of the little museum. The man was waiting beside the door. As Finn and Valentine stepped out of the room he closed the door and locked it.

"Is there anything else I can help you with?" asked the headmaster.

"No," said Valentine, shaking his head. "I think I've seen enough."

Wharton gave him a sharp look. "In that case, perhaps I'll say good-bye then."

"Thank you for your help." Valentine nodded.

"No problem," answered Wharton. He turned away and went back toward the cloakroom entrance. By the time Finn and Valentine followed he was nowhere to be seen, his footsteps echoing away as he headed back to his office through the school corridors. They exited through the smaller door out into the quadrangle and the hot sunlight.

"Well, what did you make of all that?" said Valentine as they headed back across the quad.

"Is this a quiz?" said Finn.

"If you want it to be."

"Where do I start?"

"The beginning, of course."

"His office smelled of pipe tobacco but I didn't see any pipe."

"Yes, I caught that too."

"Uh, he wanted to make sure we didn't go through the school on the way to the little museum place, so maybe there was somebody he didn't want us to see . . . the pipe smoker maybe."

"Anything else?"

"I think he was lying about Crawley. I bet if we checked we'd find out that Crawley went to Greyfriars."

"Go on."

"I think he was lying about this Colonel Gatty as well. I'll bet he knows more than he's telling."

"Why do you think he'd be doing something like that?"

"I'm not sure. Protecting him for some reason, I suppose."

"Anything else?"

"Not really, except that you seemed awfully interested in that painting in the museum. Looked like a dingy Pica.s.so knockoff."

"It's by Juan Gris."

"The cubist?" Gris, a Spaniard like Pica.s.so as well as his neighbor in Paris, had been one of the early exponents of the style along with George Braque. She'd studied him briefly in her second year. If Valentine was right, the painting was worth a lot of money.

"If the painting is genuine it's an unt.i.tled canvas from 1927. It shouldn't be there."

"Why not?" said Finn. "Another generous ex-student?"

"Doubtful," answered Valentine. "It was looted by the n.a.z.is in 1941 from the Wildenstein Gallery in Paris and hasn't been seen or heard of since."

"How would it turn up here?"

"Now that's a mystery, isn't it?"

They reached the rental car. The Taurus was still there. The Jaguar was gone. "We can presume the Taurus is Miss Mimble's."

"I thought the Jag belonged to Wharton."

"So did I until I saw the aerial photograph behind his desk. It shows quite a large house tucked in behind the main building. The headmaster's residence."

"So who owns the Jag?"

"The person who was smoking the pipe in Wharton's office just before we came in."

"s.h.i.t," muttered Finn. "We should have got the plate number."

"It was a New York World War Two veterans plate. 1LGS2699."

Somehow she wasn't surprised that he remembered the number. "Colonel Gatty?"

"Probably. Easy enough to find out." He tossed Finn the keys. "You drive." She unlocked the car and got behind the wheel. Valentine climbed in the other side. He reached down, picked his laptop case up from under the seat and plugged it into the empty lighter socket. He booted up the computer, turned on the GPRS wireless modem and tapped his way effortlessly into the New York Department of Motor Vehicles database. Finn ran the car up the long drive and then turned onto the road that led back to the highway. Within a few minutes Valentine had what he wanted.

"It's Gatty. He lives near the Museum of Natural History."

"That didn't take long."

"Anything Afghani terrorists can do, I can do better." He grinned. He punched a key on the laptop and closed it. They drove back to New York.

20.Night was falling and the nighthawks were making their swooping, booming mating calls in the purple sky overhead. Instead of being dark, the farmhouse and the outbuildings were bathed in light from half a dozen security lamps on tall poles, lit by the chugging of a small portable generator somewhere. Who had the gasoline to light up a stupid farmhouse these days, making it an easy target for Allied planes overhead, or pa.s.sing patrols? But Allied flights never got this close to the Swiss border, and there weren't any patrols wandering around in this area except for them. This was a dead zone, where whatever war that existed was a private one.

They had made a cold camp just inside the tree line using the remains of an old dry stone fence covered with bramble for cover. One of the spooks, Taggart, was whispering to Cornwall, who was making notes using a small pad and his pocket flash. Everyone else was having M-3 meat and vegetable stew or M-1 meat and beans, which tasted as bad as it looked cold and not much better heated. Not that the sergeant much cared; after eating that s.h.i.t for three years all over Europe his taste buds were cardboard anyway. s.h.i.t filled you up just like good stuff and it all came out the same-C-3 accessory-pack toilet paper. Like everyone said, it was a s.h.i.tty war.

Wonder of wonders, Cornwall was actually talking to him.

"Sergeant."

"Sir."

"We're going to need to get a little closer to the farm."

"We, sir?"

"You and a patrol. As many men as you think you need." Stupid f.u.c.king question. I need the whole f.u.c.king U.S. Army if you've got it to spare. The light from the German lamps twinkled off the man's gla.s.ses like he had no eyes at all. He had a voice like a history teacher, like he knew everything in the f.u.c.king world. A drone. "What do you want to know, sir?"

"Reconnoiter the situation, Sergeant. How many men, weapons-that kind of thing."

"Fine." They were going to do the hard part and Cornwall and McPhail and Taggart were going to sit back here and talk about art. Jesus!

He chose Teitelbaum and Reid because they could keep their mouths shut. They slipped over the hedge and through the last of the trees just after the moon had set. It took them almost an hour to make their way down to the narrow dirt road that ran in front of the farm. It was just on the edge of the pools of light thrown by the pole lamps and offered enough shadow and cover in the roadside ditch to keep the sentries from seeing them.