The Death Artist Page 10

  Jesus, was this from him? How had he gotten to her newspaper? The thought was almost too chilling to consider.

  In the guest room, Kate held the Polaroid beside Ethan Stein’s minimal painting. She couldn’t be sure, but yes, a definite similarity—the whiteness, the hint of gray.

  In her office, she rubbed sleep from her eyes, trained the magnifying glass on the photo. Brush strokes. It was a painting.

  The graduation photo. That was first.

  Then the Madonna and Child collage.

  Now this.

  True, there was no way actually to connect the Polaroid to Ethan Stein, but the similarity and coincidence—after two other missives—had her hands shaking.

  Why were these things being sent to her? Was there a connection, or was her mind, so distressed by Elena’s death, creating mysteries where there were none?

  No. Kate was sure it was something. It was the kind of feeling the young Detective McKinnon used to get.

  Time to see Tapell, but first some validation.

  Kate threw on a pair of slacks, a silk blouse, ran a brush through her hair, and didn’t bother with makeup.

  Kate slid into the coffee-shop booth. “Thanks for meeting me, Liz.”

  “That’s okay. Anything to get away from the twelve-year-old computer instructor who’s been shouting at me for days like I’m some kind of idiot.” Liz peered at her friend over the rim of her coffee cup. “So what’s up, Kate? You didn’t ask me to scoot out of FBI headquarters just to share a cup of joe and tell me how great I am.”

  “Well, I might have, but . . .” She pushed her hair behind her ears, got serious. “Remember the graduation photo—me and Elena?”

  “Attached to your nicotine patch?”

  “Exactly. Well, there’ve been others.” Kate laid them on the table: a copy of the Madonna and Child collage, the Polaroid, which she thought was somehow related to Ethan Stein’s paintings and possibly his murder. “These were sent to me. I think meant for me, Liz.” Kate tried to control the slight tremor in her fingertips.

  “What do you mean?” asked Liz.

  “Well, the graduation photo is clearly Elena, and . . . she’s dead. The collage is an altarpiece that may have belonged to Bill Pruitt, also dead. And the Polaroid looks suspiciously like an Ethan Stein painting, and he . . .” Kate took a breath.

  “The artist who was killed. I just read about that.” Liz looked from one image to the other, concern spreading across her face.

  “It’s all starting to scare the shit out of me.” Kate massaged the tight muscles at the base of her skull.

  “Well, it should scare you. I mean, if someone’s trying to contact you . . .” Liz’s eyes narrowed. “This is serious, Kate. You’ve got to tell someone about it—and I mean now.”

  “I’m going to see Clare Tapell.” Kate stopped rubbing her neck, started playing with the fine gold chain at her throat.

  “Chief of police. Good idea.”

  “But what if I’m totally overreacting—that it’s just some crank?” Kate released the chain, started tapping her finger-nails along the table’s edge.

  “Hey, do me a favor.” Liz pointed a finger at Kate. “Just go. It could be a crank, but it could also be someone who wants to do you damage.”

  “Me?” Kate forced a laugh, but her fingers did not stop tapping. “I’m way too tough for anyone to mess with.”

  “Kate.” Liz laid a hand over Kate’s nervously tapping fingers. Her blue eyes had no humor in them at all. “I’ve been dealing with this kind of stuff for the past ten years. If there’s a psycho out there, and he’s targeted you—” She shook her head. “These guys are tenacious little bastards, real hunters—”

  “Hunters?” Kate tried hard to maintain her cool, but there was a riot brewing in her gut.

  “Most killers—the serial variety—come to hunting humans gradually, but hunt they do.” Liz looked up, her blue eyes gone dark. “As young boys they have rather undirected anger, violence against small animals, occasionally other kids. But as their fantasy worlds grow and take shape, they start to focus on what really gets them off. That’s when they start hunting—for worthy victims.”

  “Oh, I swear, Liz, I’m not worthy.”

  “I know you, Kate McKinnon. Trying to act all brave and sassy.” Liz frowned again. “All I’m saying is that these guys look for someone to work out their violent fantasies on—they’re sick fucks who love getting off on the game, and—”

  “I can take care of myself.” Kate laced her fingers together to keep them from tapping.

  “Designer heels are not made for chasing felons, Ex-Detective McKinnon.” Liz pinched the bridge of her nose. “Sorry, that was below the belt.”

  “Way below,” said Kate. “I do not like any references to my size twelves—designer or otherwise.”

  “Personally, I’d prefer if you stuck to figuring out art.”

  “I never said I was giving up art—or the foundation—or anything else, for that matter. But I can’t walk away from this, Liz. I won’t. This all has something to do with me, and maybe even the art world. I don’t know what yet, but something.” Kate effected an unconvincing smile, patted her friend’s hand. “Relax. I’ll go see Tapell. Right now.”

  The red brick, slightly Mayan cube of a building brought back some memories: a couple of meetings after she had made detective, seminars with that criminal psychologist on the pathology of the runaway. Kate McKinnon, Astoria cop, did not spend all that much time at One Police Plaza, but she knew the place—the surrounding maze of walkways and plazas, the startling views of the Criminal Court buildings, City Hall, all framed through archways, cop cars, and vans ringing the complex like an irregular chrome necklace.

  The lobby was something out of a poor man’s Leni Riefenstahl propaganda film: flags, statues, banners, slogans—COURTESY, PROFESSIONALISM, RESPECT—and guards every-where you looked.

  Kate signed in, went through the metal detector, twice—her keys and a Zippo lighter setting it off—finally into the elevator, the whole time anxious to keep moving, explain to Tapell what she thought was going on.

  Kate spread everything out on Tapell’s desk: the graduation photo of Elena with her painted eyelids, the collage and enlargements made at Mert’s gallery of the Madonna and Child, the Polaroid that she thought looked suspiciously like an Ethan Stein painting.

  She tapped the graduation photo. “I got this just before Elena Solana was killed—no, after. I mean, I hadn’t yet realized that Elena was dead when I got it.”

  “You got it—how?”

  “I’m not sure. I think it was planted on me. It was in my bag, my purse.”

  Tapell arched an eyebrow.

  “The collage was delivered to my apartment. The enlargements are made from it. It’s a religious altarpiece, possibly stolen, and it may have belonged to Bill Pruitt.”

  The line between Tapell’s eyebrows deepened. “William Pruitt? Stolen from him?”

  “Yes. But he may have stolen it, too. Well, not exactly. I mean, he may have bought it knowing it was stolen.”

  “What are you talking about, Kate?”

  Okay, slow down. “Was I a good cop, Clare?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Okay. Then bear with me a minute.” Kate took a breath. “What I was trying to say is that Pruitt may have had the altarpiece in his possession, and now whoever killed him might have it.” She shook a cigarette out of her bag.

  “Smoke-free building,” said Tapell.

  Kate crumbled the cigarette into Tapell’s trash can. “The Polaroid I just got, the morning after Ethan Stein was murdered—and it looks suspiciously like one of his paintings.”

  “How did you get it—the Polaroid, I mean?”

  “It was inside my morning paper.”

  “Jesus.” Tapell shook her head. “So what you’re telling me, Kate, is that a killer—or possibly three different killers—are communicating with you?” Tapell’s eyes widened with disbelief.

>   “No. That wouldn’t make sense.”

  “Well, thank God. I was afraid you’d lost it.”

  “It would have to be one killer.”

  Tapell’s mouth opened, then shut, her lips disappearing into a tight line. “Do you have any idea of what you’re implying, Kate? I don’t know every detail of these cases. But I can tell you the MO for each is totally different. So you’re way off base here.”

  “Look, there’s a possible connection between the victims—Elena Solana and Ethan Stein were both artists, and Bill Pruitt was chairman of a museum board. It could be one killer. That’s all I’m saying—and it’s a connection some reporter might make, too.”

  “Jesus, Kate.” Tapell tugged at the flesh of her neck. “You’re suggesting a serial killer. You realize that?”

  Kate leveled a hard stare at Tapell. “I realize that there were three deaths and someone might be contacting me about them.”

  “If that’s true, I want a guard on you twenty-four-seven, but—” Tapell paced the length of her spare office. She did not want to consider what Kate was saying, but history had proved Kate’s feelings were often on target. “It could be a crank. You’re a public person.”

  “Yes. I’ve considered that. What are your homicide people telling you about the murders?”

  Tapell stopped pacing, leaned back against her desk, sagged a bit. “Nothing much. But Pruitt’s death could have been accidental.”

  “Maybe. Look, Clare, I’m not saying I have any answers here, just that . . . well, you wanted more than a feeling—and this psycho is providing one. I should be working with your homicide people, advising or—”

  Tapell sagged into the chair behind her desk. “The idea of a serial killer . . .” She sighed deeply. “God. You’d better have a look at those case files.”

  13

  A hundred bucks’ worth of corkboard from Gracious Home was plastered over one entire wall of Kate’s home office. Another hundred had gone to the delivery guy who had stuck the cork panels up for her. Sure, she could have done it herself, but her rationalization was good—spread the wealth.

  It took only a few minutes for Kate to pin up her collection of images: the creepy graduation picture with the painted-over eyelids, the collage of the Madonna and Child, the enlargements she had made with Mert, one blurry Polaroid.

  She was doing it just the way she used to do it back in Astoria—photographs, scraps of evidence, notes, all tacked up like an exhibition. She always needed to see everything. To look, and look again. She could still see her old wall of missing kids—those sweet young faces.

  She moved from one image to the next. Nothing at all similar about them, and yet . . .

  Kate opened the brown cardboard accordion file, removed three off-white folders stamped NYPD, laid them on her desk. Her fingertips played along the edge of the first folder. If only they’d indicated the cases on the outside. She’d rather not open Elena’s first.

  But she was starting to get that feeling, too, adrenaline pulsing into her bloodstream, nerve ends tingling, a mix of excitement and dread.

  WILLIAM M. PRUITT

  Good. She could handle this.

  She noted the toxicology report, contents of Pruitt’s stomach: a heady mix of drugs and alcohol. Pruitt? She wouldn’t have suspected drugs. Was it enough for him to drown in his tub? Time of death was set between midnight and 4:00 A.M.

  Along with the report, an envelope of startling color photos—the man dead in his tub from every angle. A few close-ups of his face—mouth stretched in agony, a purplish bruise on his chin. Kate pinned them all to the wall, stepped back, then forward, moved from one photo to the next. Something nagged at her—What is it?

  And what was that in Pruitt’s hand?

  Kate laid her magnifying glass above the photo.

  A dry-cleaning bill? Now that was bizarre.

  She hadn’t a clue what to make of it.

  She moved to the next folder.

  ETHAN STEIN

  CAUSE OF DEATH: LOSS OF BLOOD. TRACES OF CHLOROFORM ON THE VICTIM’S NOSTRILS, LIPS.

  FIBERS IN HIS NOSE

  TOXICOLOGY—pending

  A rag dipped in knockout drops held to the victim’s face. Kate could picture it, though she was not quite prepared for the photos. The studio floor a sea of red, the artist naked, on his back, leg propped up, or what was left of it—it looked like a bloody stick—half of Stein’s chest, too, maroon red, exposed muscle like steak in a butcher’s shop. And is that bone?

  Kate steadied herself, a hand on the edge of her desk for support. She scanned the report for the details: “Victim’s right leg and left pectoral, skinned.”

  Skinned?

  She forced herself to look at the pictures again. Ethan Stein’s face was a mask of excruciating pain. Jesus Christ. Skinned . . . alive? The report didn’t say, though the tremendous amount of blood loss—the heart still pumping at full speed—might indicate it.

  Why such brutality?

  Kate pinned Stein’s gruesome crime scene photos beside the ones of Pruitt, noted the dramatic lighting: half of Stein’s destroyed body bleached bright, the other half plunged into inky darkness.

  Again, she stopped: There was definitely something oddly familiar about this scene, too. But how could that be?

  Okay. Elena’s file. Kate could not delay it any longer.

  The particulars of Elena’s death—temperature of the body, a few facial contusions, multiple stab wounds—added nothing to what Kate already knew. She dumped the envelope of photos onto her desk. They scattered like mini-sleds on ice, one skittering off the edge, corkscrewing to the floor. Did it have to be a close-up of Elena’s face? Kate stared at the odd pattern of blood along the girl’s cheek, then at a shot of the full body collapsed at the foot of the half-size refrigerator.

  She arranged them all on the wall without really looking, then stood back, lit a Marlboro, glad for the veil of smoke which snaked in front of her eyes. She was reminded of those Goya prints in Mert’s gallery. Was she too close to see what was going on here, too?

  Kate fanned the smoke away, studied the grim gallery of photos. There was something here. She was sure of it. But what?

  She got her magnifying glass, ran it over all the photos, stopped at a tiny picture of a violin stuck to the surface of one of Ethan Stein’s paintings. Odd. Was the artist branching out into imagery? It didn’t really make sense.

  For twenty minutes Kate went from one photo to the next, peering through the magnifying glass, but nothing clicked. All she was getting was eyestrain and a headache.

  In her Carrara marble bathroom, Kate adjusted the antique brass bath taps, added a few capfuls of an aromatherapy gel to the oversized tub. She peeled off her clothes, tossed them onto her bed, grabbed the latest New Yorker off her night table. The soak would do her good.

  The bathroom was already steamed up, the damp air permeated with the smell of hyacinth. Kate tested the water with a toe, stopped short.

  The tub!

  She threw on her terry robe, charged down the hallway.

  In the library, she yanked books from shelves, tossed them onto the leather couch, a few tumbled to the floor. Finally, the one she was looking for, a venerable old tome. She tucked it under her arm, raced back to her office, started flipping pages so fast they tore.

  Okay. Calm down. The index. Right. Kate could barely turn the pages now, her hands were trembling so. But there it was, the famous historical painting, one that Kate had studied in college, even wrote a goddamn paper about: Jacques-Louis David’s The Death of Marat.

  Bull’s-eye.

  Marat, the man in the painting, dead, his head cradled by a towel, leaning back against the rim of the tub. Kate’s eyes ricocheted between the photos of Bill Pruitt pinned on her wall to the image in the book. Both heads—Pruitt’s, Marat’s—in the identical position; Pruitt’s arm draped over the side of the tub exactly like Marat’s. Kate’s eyes were ping-ponging back and forth. Pruitt even had a piece of pa
per in his hand, just like Marat. Jesus, how could I have missed it? Kate tore the page right out of the book.

  Now she eyed the grotesque photos of Ethan Stein. Yes, this was familiar, too. But what, exactly? She flipped more pages, but nothing registered.

  Down the hall again, in the library, she was momentarily stymied. So many books. Think. Think. Her eyes skimmed over row after row—books, journals, magazines, periodicals—but nothing came to her.

  She dashed back to her office, plucked two of the Ethan Stein crime scene photos from the wall, snatched the report, too, reread it as she hurried back to the library. There was definitely something there. But what? What?

  All those books were beginning to feel more intimidating than helpful.

  Kate took a breath, sagged on the office’s small leather couch. She needed to stop a minute, to think clearly. She stared at the photos in her hand—the artist on his back, naked, the skinned leg and torso. Skinned. That’s it!

  Barefoot, on the step stool, she wrestled the huge volume, Renaissance Painting in Italy, from an upper shelf, lugged it back to her office. Then she got all the Ethan Stein crime photos fanned out on the floor beside the book, riffling pages so fast the images were doing the jitterbug. There it was. Another goddamn bull’s-eye. The great Renaissance painter Titian, The Flaying of Marsyas. A horrifying scene, the man being skinned alive—exactly like Ethan Stein. Kate noted the crime scene picture of Stein, then the painting, both figures naked, strung up, the skin of the leg half removed. And the violin. Of course. That clinched it. In Titian’s painting, Apollo plays the violin while Marsyas is being flayed.

  Jesus, this guy was a stickler for detail.

  Shit. Kate sat back on her heels, took it all in. It was about art.

  Now, if she was right about Pruitt and Stein, the same must be true of Elena. But here she was stumped. Elena’s crime scene photos offered up nothing more than heartache.