Rarities Unlimited 03 - Die in Plain Sight

ever,” Lacey said.
    In silence they followed Jordon into an elevator and down to the basement.He unlocked a room, turned on the lights, and gestured impatiently for them to come inside.
    The two unsigned landscapes were on separate easels next to rows of framing samples. For each landscape a frame sample had been pulled out and rested on the corner of the canvas, giving an idea of the final effect. The drowning pool was on a third easel, its bleakly radiant canvas screaming of the dark side of humanity. Several frame samples were stacked near the painting, as though the framer hadn’t decided which worked best.
    Lacey glanced at the landscapes, checked the frames that had been chosen, and said, “Very nice.”
    She looked at the samples near the drowning pool, held up several in turn against the canvas, and then went completely still. She picked up the canvas, ignoring Jordon’s instinctive protest. Silently she turned it into the light and studied the painting, flipped it over to see the back, and turned it right side up again before she set it back on the easel.
    “Thankyou, Mr. Jordon,” she said. Then she turned to Ian. “Time to go.”
    Ian waited until they had left the Savoy Tower and were walking across the parking lot before he said, “What’s wrong?”
    “The drowning painting.”
    “What about it?”
    “It’s the first one. The one that was stolen from the hotel.”
    Ian stared at her. “Are you sure?”
    “The bracelet isn’t nearly as clear as it was in the second one. And the number on the back is twenty-seven, not thirty-six.”
    “Can you prove they were switched?” he asked.
    “I didn’t think to photograph the back of either painting while it was in my hands. Did you?”
    A low curse was Ian’s only answer.

Newport Beach
    Late Tuesday morning
66
    T he offices of Pickford and Pickford weren’t as fancy as Savoy Tower, but they were big and had a peekaboo view of the marina through sheets of wind-driven rain. The weather clearing promised by the forecasters hadn’t come about. A big storm had. Stephen Pickford was sitting behind a desk the size of an aircraft carrier. If he was happy to see the two people dripping on his thick rug, it didn’t show.
    “I’d like to say that any friend of Savoy Forrest is a friend of mine,” Pickford said, “but I’d be lying.”
    Ian had picked up enough reading David Quinn’s fat envelope of clippings to know what Pickford meant. “We understand that you and your son sued Savoy Enterprises over the funding of the Savoy Museum.”
    “Yes. We lost, but not on the merits of the case. What of it?”
    “We’re looking for some paintings we thought were part of the Savoy Museum collection,” Lacey said, “but can’t be accounted for now.”
    Pickford shrugged. “They shift paintings in and out of that museum all the time. If they’re not there, they’re stored at the ranch house.”
    “Interesting,” Ian said.
    “Legal, too,” Pickford said sarcastically. “We’ve got the legal judgment that says so.”
    “Was part of that suit a complete accounting of all museum acquisitions, past and present, active and inactive, in or out of storage, at the ranch or anywhere else?” Lacey asked.
    Pickford’s gray eyebrows lifted. “Yes.”
    “Could we see it?” Lacey asked.
    “Why?”
    “Not to do the Forrests any favors, that’s for sure,” Ian said calmly.
    Pickford thought about it for five seconds. “On the condition that you tell me anything you find that we overlooked, yes.”
    “Done,” Ian said.
    Pickford smiled rather grimly and gestured to the door that joined his father’s office with his own. “South wall, blue binding, volumes one through nineteen. The paintings are listed in an appendix. The records you’re after should be in volume nineteen.”
    “Thank you,” Lacey said.
    “Have you ever looked through court records, Miss?” Pickford asked.
    “No.”
    “Thought so. If you had, you’d be cursing me rather than thanking me.”
    After fifteen minutes Lacey understood what Pickford meant.
    After an hour she was cross-eyed.
    After two hours she and Ian were baffled. No paintings by Lewis Marten, signed or unsigned, were now or had ever been part of the Savoy Museum collection.
    They caught Pickford just as he was coming back from lunch.
    “We’re confused,” Lacey said.
    “I sometimes believe that’s the whole point of the law,” Pickford said. “That’s why I became an accountant. Numbers are more