Hemlock Bay

your informant has to say. Just be careful. When you get back, I’ll still be awake. Tell me what you find out, okay?”
    He nodded and was at the Plaza Hotel by ten minutes to eleven.
    LouLou was there, pacing back and forth along the park side of the Plaza, beautifully dressed, looking like a Mafia don. The uniformed Plaza doormen paid him little attention.
    He nodded to Simon, motioned to the entrance to the Plaza’s Oak Room Bar. It was dark and rich, filled with people and conversation. They found a small table, ordered two beers. Simon leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest. “How’s it going, LouLou?”
    “Can’t complain. Hey, this beer on you? Drinks aren’t cheap here, you know?”
    “Since we’re in New York, I figured the Oak Room would be our venue. Yeah, I’m paying for the beer. Now, what have you got for me?”
    “I found out that Abe Turkle did the Elliotts. Talk is he had a contract to do eight of them. Do you know anything about which eight?”
    “Yeah, I do, but you don’t need to know any more. I would have visited Abe Turkle second. You sure it’s not Billy Gross?”
    “He’s sick—his lungs—probably cancer. He’s always smoked way too much. Anyway, he took all his money and went off to Italy. He’s down living on the Amalfi Coast, nearly dead. So it’s Abe who’s your guy.”
    “And where can I find him?”
    “In California, of all places.”
    “Eureka, by any chance?”
    “Don’t know. He’s in a little town called Hemlock Bay, on the ocean. Don’t know where it is. Whoever’s paying him wants him close by where he is.”
    “You’re good, LouLou. I don’t suppose you’ll tell me where you heard this?”
    “You know better, Simon.” He drank the rest of his beer in one long pull, wiped his mouth gently on a napkin, then said, “Abe’s a mean sucker, Simon, unlike most artists. When you hook up with him, you take care, okay?”
    “Yeah, I’ll be real careful. Any word at all on who our likely collectors are?”
    LouLou fiddled with a cigarette he couldn’t light, even here in a bar, for God’s sake. “Word is that it just might be Olaf Jorgenson.”
    This was a surprise, a big surprise, to Simon. He wouldn’t have put Olaf in the mix. “The richest Swede alive, huge in shipping. But I heard that he’s nearly blind, nearly dead, that his collecting days are over.”
    LouLou said, “Yeah, that’s the word out. Why buy a painting if you’re blind as a bat and can’t even see it? But, hey, that’s what I heard from my inside gal at the Met. She’s one of the curators, has an ear that soaks up everything. She’s been right before. I trust her information.”
    “Olaf Jorgenson,” Simon said slowly, taking a pull on his Coors. “He’s got to be well past eighty now. Been collecting mainly European art for the past fifty years, medieval up through the nineteenth century. After World War Two, I heard he got his hands on a couple of private collections of stolen art from France and Italy. Far as I know, he’s never bought a piece of art legally in his life. The guy’s certifiable about his art, has all his paintings in climate-controlled vaults, and he’s the only one who’s got the key. I didn’t know he’d begun collecting modern painters, like Sarah Elliott. I never would have put him on my list.”
    LouLou shrugged. “Like you said, Simon, the guy’s a nut. Maybe nuts crack different ways when they get up near the century mark. His son seems to be just as crazy, always out on his yacht, lives there most of the time. His name’s Ian—the old guy married a Scotswoman and that’s how he got his name. Anyway, the son now runs all the shipping business. From the damned yacht.”
    Simon gave a very slight shake of his head to a very pretty woman seated at the bar who’d been staring at him for the past couple of minutes. He moved closer to LouLou to show that he was in very heavy conversation and not interested. “LouLou, how sure are you that it’s Olaf who bought the paintings?”
    “Besides my gal at the Met, I went out of my way to get it verified. You know my little art world birdies that are always singing, Simon. I spread a little seed, and they sing louder and I heard three songs, all with the same words. One hundred percent? Nope, but it’s a start. Cost me a cool thousand bucks to get them to sing to me.”
    “Okay, you done good, LouLou.” Simon handed him an envelope that contained five thousand dollars. LouLou