St Kilda Consulting 04 - Blue Smoke and Murder

painting to painting, each breathtaking, each unsigned.
    Why would a “great artist,” according to my mother, not sign paintings?
    Why did Modesty keep the paintings secret so long?
    No matter how long Jill looked at the canvases, they didn’t have answers for her. They simply murmured to her of the lonely grandeur of living in the demanding freedom of the West.
    Modesty’s life.
    Modesty’s death.
    Jill looked at her watch again. She’d see the lawyer and sheriff in Blessing tomorrow. In fifteen minutes the rate on her costly satellite phone connection would go down, a reflection of local business hours.
    She took her digital camera out of her backpack, hesitated over the paintings, and finally chose the three smallest. After taking several pictures, she pulled out her computer and downloaded the best images. Quickly she searched the Net for high-end Western art galleries within a day’s drive. She chose Fine Western Arts in Snowbird, owned by Ramsey Worthington. Worthington had several galleries, all in high-end Western resorts. Plus he was the owner of the Best of the West, an auction house that was setting up to be the new Sotheby’s.
    If the ads could be believed.
    After deliberating about who had the next-snottiest ad, she chose Vision Quest Gallery in Taos, owned by William Shilling. He’d been in business for thirty years at one location, which spoke well of his client list. She chose three more galleries almost at random. All of them were heavy on the Western theme, cowboys and Indians, hardships and manly hunts.
    As for the Art of the Historic West gallery in Park City, forget it. They had already lost one of her grandmother’s paintings. That was why Jill was using the JPEGs instead of the paintings as her calling cards.
    She didn’t want any more of her heritage getting “misplaced.”

5
    TAOS, NEW MEXICO
SEPTEMBER 12
MORNING
    W hen the buzzer rang on the front door of the Vision Quest Gallery, William Shilling glanced up and immediately pressed the door release. Mrs. Caitlin Crawford was the kind of client gallery owners loved to see at the door. She was beautiful in a classy way, discriminating, and the wife of an older man who could afford to drop seven figures on a painting without his pulse raising.
    “Caitlin, what a pleasure,” Shilling said, hurrying toward her. “May I get you some coffee? It’s quite chilly out.”
    The door shut with a sound that suggested complex, durable locks.
    “That would be lovely,” Caitlin said, pulling off her black kid gloves and tucking them into a pocket of her black vicuna coat.
    “No sugar, no cream, correct?” he asked as he helped her out of her cloud-soft black coat and went to the coffeepot.
    “You’re such a sweetheart to remember. And I’m sorry to give you so little notice. Talbert just decided to fly over and check on the new resort. Naturally, I couldn’t pass up a chance to see you.”
    Shilling smiled and handed her a fine china cup. The smell of the specially blended roast made an earthy counterpoint to the gallery’s restrained décor.
    “You picked a good time,” he said. “I have some paintings I was getting ready to e-mail you about. Really quite thrilling pieces.”
    “Dunstans?” she asked quickly.
    His smile faded a bit. “Er, no, not really.” Unsigned Dunstans weren’t worth the canvas they were painted on. “There’s a wonderful Blumenschein, a quite nice Sharp, and a small Russell, a lovely little gem. The owner is considering placing them in the Reno auction next year, as it’s too late for proper publicity at the upcoming one in Las Vegas, but he’s willing to consider—”
    “No, thank you,” Caitlin interrupted. “We’ll be at the Las Vegas auction, of course. It’s so rare that any Dunstans come on the market.”
    “And Talbert always buys them.”
    “But of course. As he tells me, what’s the point of collecting if you can’t have the best? All of it.”
    Shilling bit back a sigh. Talbert Crawford had become a legend along the Western art circuit. Only the crème de la crème for him.
    All of it.
    Thomas Dunstan was the best of the best. Unfortunately, the artist hadn’t been the most stable of people. In fact, he’d been an alcoholic of the worst sort. Binge drinker, blackout drunk, and violent. He’d go years without showing a new painting to anybody. But at least he’d had the good sense to destroy his mediocre—or worse—paintings when he was sober. The paintings that survived