Shooting Gallery (21 page)

I glared at the phone and thought some uncharitable thoughts about the evident uselessness of having a friend in the SFPD.

My pique subsided. It was unfair to expect Annette, who had actual dead bodies to investigate, to drop everything because someone whom I had met once had disappeared. Still . . .

As I gazed out the windows and watched the clouds roll across the bay, I heard my grandfather's voice whispering to me: “
Chérie
, a true artist must have a sixth sense, to see what others cannot, to see what is not there to be seen until
you
see it. Trust your sixth sense.” True, my grandfather had been speaking of artistic vision, not of missing persons, but I figured it applied here, too. Either way, it gave me courage.

The door swung open, and I jumped three feet in the air, squealing.

So much for courage.

“You okay, love?” Samantha Jagger asked in her lilting Jamaican accent. Sam crafted gorgeous handmade jewelry in her studio down the hall. A decade my senior, she was hip yet sophisticated in an indigo and magenta batik-print oversized blouse, black silk pants, and a deep blue turban. The same outfit would have made me look like a clown.

“I'm fine,” I replied as we hugged. Her elaborate breast-plate clanked softly and I caught a whiff of patchouli and sandalwood oils. “Just a little preoccupied. What's up?”

“I wanted to congratulate you on getting that sculpture returned.”

“What sculpture?”

“Head and Torso.”
She held out the
Chronicle
's Arts and Leisure section and pointed to a black-and-white photograph. “Mary told me all about what she's calling
The Party Hearty in the Hallway.
There's something in there about the Stendhal Syndrome, too. It's been sweeping the City.”

I took the paper and read:

I made a mental note to read the article about the Stendhal Syndrome later. I could only deal with one cause for fainting at a time.

“That's strange,” I said. “I just spoke with Pascal and he didn't mention returning it.”

“Perhaps he didn't want to admit it. Old folks can be funny that way. I seem to have missed out on quite the stakeout. Mary said something about singing the score of
My Fair Lady
? And to think all I ever do is sit in my quiet studio and make jewelry.”

“Don't knock it,” I sighed.

Quietly making art was sounding pretty good to me about now.

—Georges LeFleur, “Art Dealers and the Art Market,”
Newsweek

 

Samantha and I chatted for a few minutes, and before leaving she agreed to accompany me on a shopping expedition in the morning to buy a dress for the cocktail party in Hillsborough. I puttered around the studio, straightening things up and thinking. I was beginning to dread tomorrow's date with Michael. Mingling with rich snobs quaffing martinis was sufficient to give me an attack of the willies under the best of circumstances, and my suspicion that Michael was up to something nefarious made my apprehension worse. But I feared that until the museum had its painting back, ransom notes and Nazis notwithstanding, Bryan would not be safe from the long reach of Agnes Brock's skeletal arm. Unless I could think of a way to get through to Carlos Jimenez, Michael was my ticket to the missing Chagall.

The dusty Elvis clock by the faux fireplace revealed I had thirty minutes before I was supposed to pick up Bryan for our tea date with Francine Maggio. I flipped through my mental Rolodex searching for someone who might be able to help me figure out what was going on with Carlos. I knew a lot of artists, who were fun to hang out with. I knew a few art thieves and forgers, who were also fun to hang out with provided one didn't mind occasionally running from the cops. But for what I had in mind I needed a computer geek, preferably one who worked at home and was bored with his day job.

I dialed Pedro Schumacher.

“Annie!
Qué pasa
?”

“Not much,” I said. “You?”

“Same old same old.”

“Well, then, maybe I could talk you into doing me a favor. I need information on a guy named Carlos Jimenez.”

“Sure, Annie. I'll just stick my head out the window and yell. There ought to be three or four on this block alone,” Pedro quipped. Pedro and his girlfriend lived in Oakland's Fruitvale section, which was home to a large Spanish-speaking community, many of whom must have been named Carlos.

“I
know
who he is,” I explained. “I was hoping you could use your unique talents to see if he's been up to anything unusual.”

“Like what?”

“I don't know, maybe making large bank deposits or something? He's a security guard at the Brock Museum. He's worked there for almost twenty years.”

“He an illegal?” Pedro asked, using the aggressively politically incorrect term. Although he was a second-generation American himself, Pedro didn't hold with illegal immigration and had never even visited Mexico, his mother's homeland. I imagined that his pugnacious attitude added spice to his relationship with his long-term girlfriend Elena Briones, a fiercely progressive Chicana lawyer who worked for the Oakland Public Defender's office.

“You got somethin' on this guy, Annie?” Pedro asked, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper.

“I'm just trying to figure out how he fits into something I'm looking into. Sorry to be so vague, but I don't know much myself yet.”

I heard the furious clicking of a computer keyboard in the background.

“Okay,
chica
, looks like Jimenez lives not far from here, off International Boulevard. You want me to go talk to him?” Five feet, six inches tall, Pedro weighed maybe 145 pounds, dripping wet. He looked more like a medieval scholar than a badass, but much preferred to think of himself as a hard-boiled private investigator than a soft-handed computer programmer.

“You found that out already? What are you, Pedro Super Sleuth?” I teased.

“Aw, you'd be surprised to find out how easy it is,” he said modestly. “But then you'd never call me anymore. You want me to go over and shake him down?”

First Tom and Pete, now Pedro. I was starting to feel like a purveyor of macho adventures for my otherwise civilized friends. Maybe I should start a sideline business running men's retreats, I thought. I seemed to have a knack for encouraging mild-mannered suburban males to dream up crazy schemes of intimidation against alleged miscreants. It could be the new millennium's answer to the drumming circles of the 1980s.

“Thanks, but it's not really a shakedown situation. I just want some information on him. Anything out of the ordinary.”

“If you insist.” He sighed good-naturedly. “I'll call you with the results, okay?”

“Great. One more thing. Speaking of unusual names, I'm looking for a woman named Evangeline . . .”

“
Now
we're talking.”

“But I don't know her last name.”

“Oh boy.”

“She's the niece of Robert Pascal, a sculptor with a studio on Tennessee Street. They're related through his sister, so she probably has a different last name.” I filled him in on the little I knew about Evangeline. He promised to check it out, and I promised to treat him to dinner.

Teatime. I scrubbed the marble dust from my hands and face, and pulled on a pair of clean jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt from the old oak armoire. I tried to keep clean clothes on hand for the times when I was too messy—even by my loose standards—to meet with clients. Standing before the wardrobe mirror, I calmed my curly brown hair with a spritz of tap water and a wide-toothed comb, and applied a little lipstick. I'd read somewhere that lips pale as one ages, and for some reason the thought bothered me. God forbid I have pale lips.

I was now officially late, but hesitated. I should call Pascal's studio in case Evangeline answered.

“Yeah?” the old sculptor said brusquely after the second ring.

“Um . . .”

“Jose?”

I was tempted to pretend to be Jose but didn't think Pascal would fall for it. I've been told that on the telephone I sound like a fifteen-year-old girl.

“It's Annie.”

He hung up. I hit redial.

Pascal picked up but didn't speak, so I dropped my voice as low as I could and said, “Jose here.”

“Fuck off,” he swore, and hung up.

This was kind of fun. I hit redial once more.

He picked up. Whoever Jose was, Pascal did not want to miss his call.

“May I speak with Evangeline, please?” I asked sweetly.

Slam.

I rushed across town and found Bryan tapping his foot on the sidewalk outside his Mission District apartment building. Dressed in buff-colored wool pants tucked into glossy knee-high black boots, and a stark white shirt topped by a brocade vest, he carried a tweed jacket folded casually over one arm.

“What, no jodhpurs?” I teased as he opened the passenger door.

“Very funny. Take the scones.” Bryan handed me a basket of still warm baked goods that smelled scrumptious. His smile faded when he got a gander at my outfit. “Oh, baby doll, I wish we had time! You don't look
at all
the thing!”

I heard that a lot.

“Hey, these jeans are clean! Just because we're invited to tea doesn't mean we're being transported to Jane Austen's England.”

He snorted in a most un-Mr. Darcy-like fashion.

I knew of no easy way to get from the Mission to the Avenues, so I skirted Laguna Honda Hospital, passed through the Forest Hill neighborhood, and went up Noriega to Thirty-first. This section of town was known as the Sunset, which was something of a misnomer considering how often the thick banks of fog hunkered down along its streets, obscuring the sunset along with everything else.

The Maggio house was typical of the neighborhood: a two-story, stucco-covered bungalow, with the garage and entrance at street level and the living quarters on the second story. Francine Maggio met us at the gate, a plump woman in her mid to late fifties with a round, attractive face, warm brown eyes, and blond hair liberally shot through with gray. She wore a floral dress topped by an immaculate lace apron, ecru stockings, and sturdy lace-up black shoes. Smiling graciously, she waved us through a flower-filled courtyard and up the stairs.

I paused in the foyer, taking in the scene. Every inch of wall space was papered in a riot of pink cottage roses and pale green stripes, the mahogany-trimmed furniture was upholstered in rose-colored brocade, and an oil painting of a big-eyed cocker spaniel hung with pride of place above the living room mantel. My eyes searched the shadows for a shrine to at least one member of the British royal family.

Francine urged us to have a seat on a hideously uncomfortable Victorian settee, bustled into the kitchen, and returned moments later with Bryan's scones arranged on a silver tray alongside what she referred to as “finger sandwiches.” She sat in a Queen Anne armchair and commenced an elaborate tea-pouring ceremony. Bryan seemed at ease, but I felt like an anthropologist observing an alien culture.

“One lump or two?” she asked me, a pair of delicate silver tongs hovering over the painted china sugar bowl.

“Just plain, please,” I replied.

“Surely some milk, then?”

Bryan caught my eye and inclined his head.

“Yes, please,” I said. “Thank you.”

Francine diluted the tea with milk and handed me the eggshell-thin china teacup, a teaspoon perched precariously on the matching saucer.

The brew was an unappetizing shade of beige. I took a sip. Tasted beige, too.

“Thank you for meeting with us, Mrs. Maggio,” I said, relinquishing my tea to the coaster on the low table in front of us. “I know this must be difficult for you, but we were hoping you could shed some light on what happened between Robert Pascal and his assistant Eugene Forrester.”

Francine took a fortifying sip of tea and dabbed her lips with an embroidered linen napkin. “Eugene and I had been seeing each other for about two years,” she began. “We were both students at Berkeley. He was an art major with an emphasis in sculpture, and I was English lit. The fiction of Jane Austen was my specialty!”

Bryan and I nodded encouragement while Francine took a hearty bite of scone.

“Why, these are delicious!” she exclaimed. “Currants?” Bryan nodded, pleased. “Anyway, Eugene landed an apprenticeship with Robert Pascal, which was considered quite a coup at the time. Pascal was only a few years older than we, but already had a reputation as an up-and-comer. Eugene was very good, you know, immensely talented. Everyone said so. And we were so happy. . . .”

Her voice trailed off as she stared into space for a moment. She caught herself, picked up a silk-covered album from a side table, and handed us a photograph of a young man with light brown hair and long sideburns. Handsome and rather dashing despite the dated fashions, his eyes were bright and alert, brimming with life as if he were poised to race off someplace exotic and do something exciting.