He stood looking at the Vermeer, scrunched up in the bulky sweater, his hands in the pockets. "So take this one, for example. One of the things you'd want to find out is whether the paint on it was really available in Delft in the 1650s or 1660s-are my dates right?"
"On the button."
He shrugged modestly. "Well, I figured if I was going to get involved with this show, I better do some reading. Anyway, am I right?"
"You sure are. Most of the paint formulas used by theOld Masters have been chemically analyzed by now, so it's not hard to check and see if a particular painting has the right pigments-mixed in the right proportions."
"Yeah, but if you can get the formulas, why can't the crooks?"
"They can, but we've still got the edge. They have to be sure every single substance they use is right, but if we can find even one that wasn't available till later, it's got to be a fake. And that goes for everything, not just the paints. If you're looking at what's supposed to be a fifteenth-century Flemish painting, and the stretcher bars turn out to be made of wood that's found only in America… well, you'd better look a little closer."
"Sure, I see that. But-" He glanced around and pointed to Venus and the Lute Player. "Titian, right? So when was that painted-1540, 1550?"
I nodded.
"Okay, so tell me: Does the frame look authentic to you?"
We walked up to the painting, and I ran my eyes over the curlicues and rosettes of the heavy gilded Renaissance frame.
"Yes."
"Meaning it's from about the right time?"
"Uh-huh."
"All right, say I wanted to push a fake Titian. Why couldn't I go into some little old out-of-the way church and steal some three- or four-hundred-year-old picture of a saint or something-there are millions of them-and then use the frame? Or even buy some old picture that wasn't worth that much, toss the painting, and put in the phony Titian instead?"
"It's not that easy. It's got to be from the right place, not just the right time. You'd need a frame that was made in Venice. One from Germany or Spain-or even Rome or Florence-wouldn't get you past an expert. And I'm not just talking about style; I'm talking about the right joinery techniques, the right nails-"
"OK, OK, but still…" Harry scowled and chewed his cheek, taking this as a personal challenge. "OK, then, how about this? What's to stop me from finding some old piece of wood-say, a beam from a house built at the right time, or maybe a piece of furniture-and carving the damn frame myself?"
"First of all-"
"I know, I know. I'd have to be some kind of master carpenter, wouldn't I? And I'd need to make the right kind of glue, forge some handmade nails-"
"That'd be the easy part. The hard part would be figuring out how to carve an old piece of wood without making a new skin."
"A new what?"
"When you cut into old wood, you can't help creating a fresh surface-a skin-that's 'young' to someone who knows what to look for."
Harry blew out his lips. "That's interesting." He used "interesting" a lot, drawing it out into four slow, respectful syllables: IN-ter-est-ing. "Look, let me know what you find out. I guess it won't take very long, right?"
When I didn't say anything, he turned his head to look at me. "Not right?"
"I don't know. A modern fake I could certainly spot. But I don't think that's what we have, and the older it gets, the harder it is to be sure."
"Like, the new skin gets to be an old skin?"
"Right. And the scientific techniques get less reliable. And if what we have is one that's so old it's contemporary with the original and done by a first-rate artist to boot-say, a Terborch that's been converted into a 'Vermeer'-we've got problems."
"Huh." Musing, he picked up his coat. "Hey, this has really been IN-ter-est-ing; I learned a lot. Listen, I want to ask you something. How come you didn't mention this forgery stuff before?" "I didn't think of it."
"You didn't think of it?" He chewed over the words slowly.
"No. It didn't seem pertinent. It still doesn't, really. That is, I suppose it could wind up being a police matter, but-"
"It didn't seem pertinent to the break-in?"
"To the break-in?" I looked at him stupidly. "No. How could it-"
"Or van Cortlandt's death?"
'To Peter's death? What could it have to do with his death? Harry, if you're driving at something, you've left me way behind."
"Well, I don't know, but doesn't it seem to you like there are an awful lot of weird things going on?"
"There sure are, but that doesn't mean they're connected, does it?"
"In my line of work, yeah, it usually does. I gotta go." He worked his thin shoulders into the coat and suddenly laughed. "Hey, don't look so worried." He clapped me tightly on the arm and turned to the door. "I'm just thinking like a cop; I can't help it. Forget it."
Chapter 7
I forgot it.
As much as I'd love to say that I didn't, that I mulled over his words, turned them over in my mind, realized at last how dense I'd been not to put things together myself, that isn't what happened. I forgot it. Almost the minute he was gone.
Flittner had finished up the lighting and came over to me as Harry left.
'The exhibition looks great, Earl," I said honestly. "The lighting's magnificent."
He grunted. "Something I can do for you?" The implication was that this was his domain, not mine.
"No thanks."
"Just want to look at the pretty pictures?"
"Yes." I'm not sure why it didn't seem like a good idea to tell him about the forgery. Mainly, I think, I just didn't want to explain again. But perhaps something in me felt it was better if he didn't know. Or maybe I just didn't want to talk to him any longer than I had to.
He grunted again, shrugged, and headed morosely for the door, already reaching for one of the Camels that he deprived himself of while working around the paintings.
Alone, I got on with my reason for coming to the Clipper Room in the first place, not that I had much of an idea of what I was looking for. Peter had told me that the forgery was down my alley, which might mean something as specific as the Vermeer, or possibly anything from the Renaissance through the Baroque; let's say from the fifteenth century to 1750-Piero through Luca Giordano. Seven pictures, all told. Not so bad, really.
But it was also possible that "down your alley" might have meant something else entirely-Peter had been in a whimsical frame of mind-so to be on the safe side I went through the entire collection.
I began by looking for the technical inconsistencies of place and time that I'd mentioned to Harry. You might think that an odd place to start; if, after all, I am the expert on Baroque and Renaissance art that I keep (ever so subtly) hinting I am, why would I not immediately get down to examining each painting from a stylistic perspective? Did the Venus and the Lute Player show Titian's characteristic use of fingers more than brush in the final stages? Did the Hals demonstrate his singular ability to fool the viewer into thinking he is looking at a dazzling bravura display of reckless spontaneity when in fact each stroke had been laid on with the slowest, most meticulous care? Was the Vermeer illuminated with pointilles, those tiny, mysterious dabs of paint that seem to drench the canvas with light?
Intuitively, those are the kinds of judgments I trust the most, but they are matters of degree, subjective and therefore arguable-and, in any case, tricky to make. Easier to begin with a simpler yes/no question: Did any of the materials show outward signs of having come from some time or some place other than they should have?