Strand paused on the sidewalk across the street from the Connaught Hotel. The clean gray and black cars that seemed always to be waiting at the curb in front of the hotel and along the Mount Street side glinted in the dull glow of the street lamps, adding a luster of the modern to a famous old landmark that still maintained the staid and subdued manner of British propriety.
In front of the hotel was a triangular traffic island where Carlos Place forked and went in opposite directions onto Mount Street. The near side of the island was usually lined with black cabs quietly biding their time until a Connaught guest emerged from the old residence. There was a cluster of plane trees on the island as well as a few stone benches and, in its very center, a dark bronze statue of a nude woman in a shrugging, crouching posture.
On the other side of the island was a five-storied Victorian building of terraced row houses made of bright red orange brick and having bay window facades with white stone and wood trim. The front of the building swept in a gentle arc from Carlos Place to Mount Street.
“He lives there,” Strand said, lifting his chin toward the row houses. “Number Four.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No. A discreet brass plate beside the front door says ‘Carrington, Hartwell and Knight. Private Dealers in Fine Art.’”
“There’s a light,” Mara said. “Second floor.”
Strand took a few steps to get a better line of sight through the trees.
“That’s where he does most of his work,” he said. “There’s a large room with an ornately carved library table near the windows. Opposite that, there’s a walk-in vault with narrow vertical bays for storing canvases. The drawings are kept in stacked rows of shallow drawers. There are bookcases along the walls below which are cabinets with countertops about waist high. He uses the countertops to display his canvases and drawings. Where there are no bookcases, the walls are covered in crimson silk. There’s a sitting area furnished with rosewood and ebony antiques.”
They crossed Mount Street to the island and stood under the plane trees, looking up at Carlos Place, Number Four.
“The first floor,” Strand continued, leaning against one of the trees, “is a reception area. There’s a gallery to the right to exhibit drawings. Here the walls are done in indigo silk. Usually some small, first-rate sculpture scattered about. All the woodwork is mahogany. Down a short hall there’s a generous bathroom for clients. Marble. Linen washcloths. Complimentary flacons of cologne and perfume. There are little silver boxes with handmade tortoiseshell combs with a tissue band around them. Complimentary.”
“Good Lord,” Mara said.
“It’s intended to convey a sense of elegant wealth. A client understands that the very best art is traded here. They can expect to be treated like royalty-and to pay royal prices.” He went on with the description. “The stairs leading from this first floor to the second are wide and turn slowly back upon themselves. Mahogany banister and railing. A truly stunning Persian carpet covers the treads all the way up.”
“Why are you telling me all this?”
“Carrington is going to play a very big role in our plans,” Strand said. “You need to know what he’s like, and what to expect from him. A young man usually stays at a desk in the foyer. He’s a sort of security person, doorman, factotum. He takes care of the electric lock on the door and monitors people who come in to browse around the downstairs gallery.”
“What does Knight look like?”
“He’s just shy of six feet. Stocky, a little puffy. His hair is prematurely gray, white really. He wears it longish, like an artiste. Very stylish. He likes to wear black clothes to offset his hair. Sometimes he wears thin black wire-rimmed eyeglasses.”
“Sounds foppish.”
“Yeah, it sounds that way, but he’s thoroughly masculine. Somehow it all balances out.”
“What about his education?”
“Oxbridge.”
“Really? What else about him?” She drew closer to him, putting her arm through his, lacing their fingers together.
“He understands Wolfram Schrade.”
“Understands him?”
“The only thing that fascinates Carrington more than the art that he buys and sells are the people from whom he buys it and the people to whom he sells it. He’s a collector of psychological minutiae.”
“What do you mean?”
“Carrington believes that people who buy art, who care enough about it to want to own it, are an anomaly in the general scheme of modern life. In today’s world, which so values speed and the quick result, the immediate feedback, the quick payback, the person who turns to art-something that requires a meditative discipline to create and to appreciate-is a rower against the tide. Everything modern militates against it.” Strand paused. “Nothing fascinates Carrington more than a rower against the tide.”
“Even if he’s Wolf Schrade.”
“It doesn’t have anything to do with morality. Besides, Carrington doesn’t know anything about Schrade’s criminal side. The connection is purely an artistic one. Carrington simply recognizes a fellow rower.”
CHAPTER 40
Claude Corsier sat at a small square table with a starched linen cloth. It was set with Victorian china and sterling silver and Dutch crystal. Carrington Hartwell Knight sat across from him, each man enthroned in an elaborately carved, high-backed Spanish chair several hundred years old. Knight’s elbow rested on the damask-upholstered arm of his chair, his wan face resting in his hand, an index finger lying close to one pale eye. His longish wavy white hair was carefully coifed, a full dandy’s wave sweeping back in undulations from his temples.
The two men were eating a late brunch in Knight’s second-floor library. The food was prepared upstairs in Knight’s well-appointed kitchen by a French cook whom he retained three days a week. It was brought down in a small elevator by the chef’s niece, who also served the two men. They had begun with a modest mixed-leaf salad with small medallions of grilled goat’s cheese and then had gone on to noisettes d’agneau garnished with potato galettes. They had followed that with little plates of fresh fruit and slices of brie de meaux. Dessert and coffee were declined in favor of finishing off a very good bottle of Pouilly-Fume.
Knight laughed richly at Corsier’s third or fourth anecdote of the meal and poured himself a full glass of the vaguely smoky white wine, adding some to Corsier’s glass. He sat back in his chair, smiling. Corsier recognized his moment.
“Carrington, the food was wonderful, as always,” he said, lifting his glass. “My compliments.”
Knight smirked pleasantly, accepting the praise.
“I told you I had something special,” Corsier went on, “and I do, something that I am sure will delight you.” He reached down beside his chair, where he had leaned a wafer-thin, royal blue leather portfolio. “I have photographs of two drawings in my possession.”
He opened the portfolio and took out two eight-by-ten color photographs and handed them across the table to Knight, who put down his glass and sat up in his baroque chair, hand outstretched.
He looked at the first photograph. Frowned. Looked quickly at the second. Frowned. His attention still glued to the images, he moved aside the few things in front of him and laid the pictures side by side on the linen cloth. He leaned over them. Without removing his eyes from them, he reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and took from behind his gray linen handkerchief a pair of eyeglasses with perfectly round, black wire frames. He put them on, continuing to stare at the photographs. The frown disappeared. He began to shake his head slowly.
“ Good God… extraordinary.” He closed his mouth and swallowed, his eyes squinting, his head thrust forward.
He looked up at Corsier. “Where did you get these?”
“Long story.”
“I’ve never seen them.”
“Nor have I.”