I stopped to do some shopping on the way home, and when I got there one of the people I least wanted to talk to at this moment was sitting on my front doorstep. "I think I spoke too soon," Diana said. "I've brought the whole file for you to look at. I didn't copy everything, only the big ones, or ones I thought were suspicious. As I think I told you, there isn't one here for a million dollars."
I didn't want to invite her in, so I told her I was busy that evening, so she'd have to leave the files with me, and I'd have a look through them later that night.
She didn't want to do it, but I didn't give her a choice. It was an interesting selection of documents to be sure, and while there was a lot of material, it was pretty obvious that what had captured Diana's interest were Karoly's expense claims. She had marked several for special attention, many of them meals in rather fancy restaurants. When he traveled, Karoly showed a definite preference for both hotels and restaurants with lots of stars. Where he had listed guests for lunch or dinner, she had put a little yellow sticky on the invoice with the note "check guests". On the hotel bills, there was a question about the minibar usage.
I suppose this kind of thing is what a good bookkeeper is supposed to do. However, she seemed to me to be overly diligent, if not downright enthusiastic. She had kept a clipping of a newspaper feature on Karoly written while he'd been director of the Bramley, one that referred to his difficult relationships with the Bramley staff, but also his high-rolling tastes. In my opinion, it was none of her business as a freelance bookkeeper, what he chose to spend the Cottingham's money on, as long as the board of directors agreed, and assuming there was no fraud. I doubted there'd be a peep out of the board of the Cottingham now that Karoly had snagged the Venus, no matter how much he'd spent doing it. The lines at the ticket booth would put all thoughts of that right out of their minds.
Still, for my purposes and whatever her reasons, the fact she'd kept these invoices proved useful. Stuck in the invoices for a trip to Budapest, there was one receipt that I found much more interesting than where he ate. This receipt made reference to a head of a woman, believed to be old. Wasn't that an understatement of some proportion!
There were two disturbing things about the invoice. One was that the company was in Budapest. Karoly had dodged my question about where he'd found the Venus, but in saying Europe he had implied it was somewhere other than Hungary. The second, even more glaring, was that the invoice was for $600,000, not a million.
As if on cue the telephone rang. My fancy phone said it was the Cottingham Museum. I decided I didn't want to talk to him. The conversation with Frank earlier, in which he'd told me that he'd had to remind Karoly who I was, and even that we'd been, shall we say close, still rankled. And while I wasn't going to spend my life tracking his expenses the way Diana did, I needed some time to think about the discrepancy between Lillian Larrington's money and what he had paid for the Venus, if indeed that was what the receipt was for. Perhaps there was some logical explanation, a final payment, perhaps, although that was not how I would have done it. Any receipt from me would show the total amount of the purchase. Perhaps it was one of those receipts you get to try not to pay too much duty on something you've purchased, much less than the ticket price, although why he would need to do that for an object so old that was destined for a museum, I couldn't imagine.
Whatever the explanation, I didn't want to see him, so I let the message go to voice mail, and stomped around my house in a snit for about an hour. But then I had a thought. Karoly had never actually said he had paid $1,000,000 for the Venus had he? He said he'd taken Lily's lovely money and made an offer the dealer couldn't refuse. I had thought a million because that's what Lily had told Morgan and me she'd donated to the Cottingham. It was not necessarily all for the purchase of the Venus. Part of it could have gone for the exhibit, which was impressive, and perhaps also something toward the publication of the book, which was essentially the exhibit catalog, or indeed for something else entirely. I picked up my message.
"Hi," he said, once again not introducing himself. "I was wondering if you would let me come over later this evening. Or, if you'd prefer, you could come to my place." He gave me an address in a fancy downtown condo. "Or failing either of these, and this last is my least-favored option I want you to know, would you meet me for a drink in the bar at Canoe around nine? I'm at the office. I'll be here until about eight-thirty or so. I think I gave you the number, but if I didn't here it is." He dictated both his home and office numbers. "Call me back when you get this. If I don't hear from you by the time I leave the office, I'll assume you're out."
"Oh, why not?" I said aloud, and dialed his office. I got his voicemail. "Hi," I said. "It's just after eight. Sorry I missed you. If you're still free, I think I'll go with your least-favored option. The bar at Canoe at nine. See you there." There then followed another wardrobe frenzy—I really needed to get out and shop, or at least get to the dry cleaners—and I was off to the bar. I didn't yet have my car back, something about sanding still needing to be done before paint could be applied, so I grabbed a taxi on Parliament Street.
We spent a pleasant hour or so. He was late, but then so was I. We talked about books, films, wines we liked, just about anything but business, and it was fine with me. When it was time to go, he said, "I have a feeling we're both going home alone, is that right?"
"I think so," I said.
"I was afraid of that. Where is rohypnol when you need it?" he said.
"What?"
"I'm sorry. I should not have said that. It was in poor taste. Forgive me."
"What is whatever that thing you just said?"
He looked at me in some embarrassment. "It's a date rape drug," he said. "You know, you slip it to the woman in question, and she gets all amorous. The trouble is she's barely conscious and can't remember a thing afterwards. Hardly ideal. As I said, my comment was in poor taste."
"How do you spell that?" I said. He looked at me as if I was mad, but he told me.
"Is this stuff easy to get?" I said.
"Apparently. Honestly, I have no idea. Please tell me I am forgiven."
"This is all very edifying," I said. "And yes, you are forgiven."
"Thank you. Is your car out of the shop, yet?"
"No."
"Good. I'll take you home then."
"I think I'll take a cab," I said.
"I would never do anything like that," he said.
"Like what?"
"Slip you a drug," he said.
"I know that," I said.
"So I'll take you home," he said. "I'll behave myself, if that's what you want."
"I'll see you soon," I said, kissing him on the cheek.
"It's not as if we're exactly—how to put this—strangers?"
"It was a long time ago. I'll see you soon," I repeated.
"I hope so," he said. He sounded a little grumpy.
WHEN I GOT home, the message light on my phone was flashing. The kitchen clock said it was 12:15. "Tomorrow," I said to it. Because I had things to do. I went on the Internet and did a search of rohypnol. My symptoms all were there, right down to the retrograde amnesia: blurred vision, dizziness, disinhibition—I cringed to think about propositioning Frank, and chatting up all those young men at the bar—difficulty speaking, the works. Apparently the stuff took only twenty or thirty minutes to kick in, and peaked in a couple of hours.
I looked at the phone. It was still flashing, and I finally gave in and put in my password.
The first message was from Cybil. "I'm feeling a little blue, and could use a chat," she said. "It's about 9:30. Please call me when you get in. It doesn't matter how late it is."