A year and a half ago, the Chagall had come up at a private auction in Singapore. A British art dealer had immediately recognized the painting as the one stolen in the infamous Triple Play. He’d contacted the authorities and the painting was eventually returned to the Pascal’s museum director, Annette Pascal Spencer.
“What about the Renoir? And the Picasso?” Britt asked.
After some searching, Zander found a story detailing the discovery of the Picasso. In 1996, a Colorado antique store owner attended an estate sale following the death of the property’s wealthy owner. Among other things, the antique store owner purchased the painting that had been mounted on the wall above the multimillionaire’s bed.
He’d loaded the items into the back of his truck and transported them to his store. As soon as he put the painting on display, customers began marveling over just how much it resembled an authentic Picasso.
Upon closer examination, the man discovered a few horizontal cracks in the paint, which indicated that the piece may have been rolled. Warbles at the edges of the canvas suggested that it mighthave been cut from its frame at some point in its history. Thus, he began researching Picasso’s works and stumbled upon a mention of the Picasso stolen during the Triple Play.
“I almost fell out of my chair,”the antique store owner was quoted as saying,“when I foundan article about the heist and saw a picture of the missing Picasso. It looked exactly like the one I’d just purchased, so I called the police.”
As with the Chagall, the Pascal Museum brought in experts who’d verified the painting’s provenance.
“When I think about how I piled that painting into the back of my truck, it sends a shiver down my spine,”the antique store owner had stated.
“I’d love to know how the paintings ended up in Singapore and Colorado,” Britt said.
“I’m guessing that the robbers sold them on the black market.”
Britt slid her bowl toward Zander so he could taste her soup. He scooted his salad toward her.
“So if Frank was involved in the Triple Play, and he was the one who sold either the Picasso or the Chagall on the black market, we can assume that he would’ve made a tremendous amount of money on the deal,” Britt said.
“I find it hard to believe that Frank could’ve had that kind of money stashed away.”
“Did he ever show any evidence of a big nest egg? Take you guys on an expensive trip? Buy a boat? Purchase land somewhere?”
“No, never. I’d call him frugal. He was the one who did the grocery shopping for the family, and he always spent time on Sunday nights cutting out coupons. Imagine the kind of discipline it would have taken to spend your life cutting coupons, taking your kids to matinee movies only, and turning out lights to save on electricity if you had hundreds of thousands of dollars in a secret account.”
“Awe-inspiring discipline,” Britt said. “Was Frank a highly disciplined person?”
“About some things. He worked out three times a week. Henever missed a Trail Blazers game on TV. He never drank more than one drink. He paid his bills and his taxes on time.”
Zander’s salad tasted of lime and beets and crunchy roasted nuts.
“He was really undisciplined about donuts, though,” Zander continued. “He never could drive past the Edge of the Woods Bakery without stopping and buying an old-fashioned.”
Below their table’s window, boats crisscrossed the water between the mainland and Bainbridge Island.
“What about the Renoir?” Britt asked. “What happened to it?”
Zander ran Internet search after Internet search. No luck.
“If the Renoir was found a year or two after the heist, before the Internet was a thing,” Zander said, “then information about it might be hard to find online.”
“Do you remember the title of the Renoir?”
“Young Woman at Rest,” he answered without a pause. “Let me try that.”
He typed it in and an article from 2015 appeared. “The Mystery of the Missing Renoir Still Unsolved,” its title proclaimed.
“Oh, fiasco,” Britt whispered. She’d adopted the termfiascobecause she liked saying it. Fiasco. Its dance of syllables and vowels rolled off the tongue like antipasto or Tabasco.
“The Renoir’s still missing,” Zander said.
“Did your uncle ever show any evidence of having a world-famous masterpiece hidden in your attic?”
“No. If Frank stole the Renoir, he would have stolen it for money, right? So what motive could he have had for keeping something like that all this time?”
