He smiled again. Twice in the same morning. He must have been ecstatic.
“We traced the tattooed ID numbers,” he said.
“So the hell with the Lexus,” I said.
“Went through the Holocaust Museum,” Quirk said, “in D.C. Epstein was helpful; got an agent to go over from FBI headquarters. They told us about a place in Germany where they keep a huge collection of Nazi stuff. We got hold of the American embassy. Needed a senator and two congressmen to do it, but we got them to send somebody up there, and she said that there were something like five hundred three-ring notebooks filled with names and tattooed ID numbers of everybody that was in Auschwitz. Every prisoner.”
“Imagine keeping track,” I said.
“Imagine,” Quirk said.
“And who had our tattoo?” I said.
“Fella named Judah Herzberg.”
“Hot dog!” I said.
“Listed as deceased,” Quirk said, “and a date: August 1943.”
“The people who’ve been trying to ace me must be part of something to do with him,” I said.
“How ’bout the Herzberg Foundation?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Them. I sent a memo to Healy this morning, copy to Belson. Lemme print it out.”
Quirk must have exhausted himself, smiling twice. He sat silently as I printed out the memo and handed it to him. He read it. And nodded when he finished.
“Amos Prinz,” he said.
“Uh-huh.”
“In Auschwitz with Judah Herzberg,” he said. “And he stole the picture, and sixty years later his son is involved in the theft and attempted retrieval of the same painting.”
“Uh-huh.”
“So where does the Herzberg Foundation fit in?” Quirk said.
“I don’t know. Getting the painting back? Maybe. Revenge? Maybe. Justice or something? Maybe.”
“Think they’re the ones tried to kill you?”
“Yes.”
“You got an address for them?” Quirk said.
“Yep.”
“You thinking about going over there,” Quirk said. “Ask them this?”
“I am.”
“Good,” Quirk said. “We both know if I show up, or Healy, these people will disperse like the morning mist.”
“How poetic.”
“Fuck poetic,” Quirk said. “We need to hang on to them until we can connect enough dots to arrest them.”
“For what, exactly,” I said.
“Somebody killed Prince,” Quirk said. “And your building super.”
“And you’re sure it was the Herzberg Foundation?” I said.
“That’s one of the dots,” Quirk said. “You got something better?”
“No,” I said. “I think you’re right.”
“You got fewer rules to follow,” Quirk said. “Just don’t scare them off.”
“And what if they attempt to kill me?” I said.
“Try to avoid that,” Quirk said. “At least until you’ve found something we can use.”
“Not only poetic,” I said, “but sentimental, too.”
“You gonna do it or not,” Quirk said.
“Sure,” I said.
47
I was back in the Hammond Museum. In the director’s office. Looking at the bare branches through the window, and talking to Richards, the director.
“I am sympathetic, Mr. Spenser, and I appreciate the integrity of returning our check because you felt you hadn’t done the job well enough.”
“I’m hired to protect a guy and he gets killed,” I said. “How much worse could I have done it?”
“Several of the policemen we’ve talked with said there was nothing you could have done, given the setup.”
“I could have prevented him from walking into the setup,” I said.
Richards nodded and smiled.
“What can I do for you?” he said.
“Have you ever had any requests to sell Lady with a Finch?”
“Recently?” he said.
“Ever?” I said.
“Oh, of course. There are private collectors who are quite passionate in their desire for one or another piece of art.”
“Do you have a record of the offers,” I said.
“We probably have a file somewhere,” Richards said. “I can’t really say.”
“Is there someone who could say?”
“We preserve and display art,” Richards said. “We’re not in the business of selling it.”
I nodded.
“Anybody named Herzberg?” I said.
Richards frowned.
“I’m not really comfortable,” he said, “talking to you without our attorney.”
I shook my head.
“Look, Mr. Richards,” I said. “I am not a cop. I am self-employed. You can lie to me with impunity. I’m used to it.”
“I don’t wish to lie to you,” he said.
“Whether you do or don’t,” I said, “talking with me doesn’t require a lawyer.”
Richards nodded. He shifted a little in his chair and stared for a moment out the window. Behind the museum, the snow was still clean and looked relatively fresh.
“Herzberg is the name of a former owner of Lady with a Finch,” he said. “A wealthy Dutch Jew who died in one of the Nazi death camps during the Second World War. Lady with a Finch was confiscated by the Nazis.”
“Where did you get it?” I said.
“It was donated to the museum, in his will, by a long-time patron of the museum named Wendell Forbes,” Richards said.
“Where did he get it?” I said.
“He told us that it was purchased from a dealer in Brussels,” Richards said.
“Is there a way to trace it back?” I said.
“You mean past ownership?”
“Yeah.”
“You’d have to talk with the Forbes estate about that,” Richards said.
“That’s an exciting prospect,” I said. “Is any of the family around?”
“All of this is before my time,” Richards said. “I don’t really know. Apparently, Wendell Forbes was the only one interested in art.”
“Okay,” I said. “Tell me a little about Morton Lloyd.”
“Morton Lloyd?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m interested in everything.”
“He’s our attorney,” Richards said. “I believe you met him earlier.”
“I did,” I said. “How did he come to represent you?”
“He’s a member of our board,” Richards said.
“So he works pro bono?” I said.
Richards smiled faintly.
“We pay him a retainer for general consultation,” Richards said. “And if there’s billable work to be done, he does it at cost.”
“He says.”
Richards smiled but didn’t comment.
“And it was he who suggested you use Ashton Prince in regard to the stolen painting,” I said.
“Yes,” Richards said.
“Did he say how he knew Prince?”
“I don’t recall that he did,” Richards said.
“And no one has consulted you about the painting in any way since Prince’s death?”
Richards looked genuinely startled.
“I am under the impression that the painting no longer exists,” he said.
“And you have no reason to doubt that?” I said.
“I wish I did,” Richards said. “Do you think it is not destroyed?”
“Don’t know,” I said. “But I’d bet it wasn’t.”
“That would be wonderful news,” Richards said. “Art is always one of a kind. If it’s gone, it cannot be replaced.”
“So no one has contacted you in any way about the painting?”
“No.”
“I find out something,” I said, “I’ll let you know.”
“Thank you,” Richards said. “Have I been of any help?”
“Not much,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” Richards said.
“Don’t feel bad,” I said. “Nobody else has been much help, either.”
48
Morton Lloyd did business out of an old gray stone building on Batterymarch. His office itself was aggressively colonial, right down to the receptionist, who looked a bit like Molly Pitcher. There were prints of American militia companies on the paneled walls. And a big painting of Cornwallis’s surrender. The painting looked amateurish to me.