“Just for tonight,” Dad promises, walking through a pair of sliding doors into the living room and beckoning us to follow him. “I’m taking it to the gallery first thing tomorrow, when Alessandra is back. I feel much better having it here with me until then. Hey!” His eyes light up and he looks back at me. “Maybe you could write something about the painting during the creative arts program. You and Izzy are starting tomorrow, right?”
Ah, the course—the other reason I didn’t go to Australia. Blackwood University puts on a creative arts program every summer that runs over two weeks, to give prospective students a taste of what the university offers. While most of the morning classes are not my thing—textiles, pottery and,ugh, performance art—they do have a couple of writing classes, specifically one that I’m dying to do with a journalism lecturer I’d love to study under. That isn’t until the second week, but there’s also a “personal project” component, so we’ll be spending the afternoon sessions working on those before presenting them at the end of the program.
“Erm, not my thing, Dad,” I say, feeling bad when his facefalls. “I’m going to see if there are any local unsolved crimes I can write about instead. Hone my research skills, try my hand at an investigative article, that kind of thing.”
Dad doesn’t say anything, but I know what he’s thinking, because we’ve rehashed this discussion many times over. I want to be an investigative journalist, but Dad wants me to take an interest in something safer, like art or literature. It’s the only thing he and my mom agree on, only she’s pushing me toward science because she’s a pharmacist.
I just really want to solve cold cases.
When I was younger and still living at Blackwood, I read about a student who’d been found dead on campus in the seventies, but there wasn’t enough evidence to connect anyone to the crime. It terrified me, even though it was so long ago, because Blackwood was my home, the place I felt safest. I eventually forgot about it, but a couple of years ago a reporter became interested in the case and convinced law enforcement to use new DNA technology to retest the old evidence. The killer was identified—he’d been living just two towns over the whole time. That journalist gave the student her story back and ever since then, I’ve known I wanted to become an investigative journalist,too.
I take a seat on a worn leather armchair by the bookshelves—a corner I have already christened the book nook—and immediately regret it when I realize the open living room doors put the painting directly in my line of sight. I twist away from it and look toward the green velvet sofa instead. Kim has definitely made her mark in here, and even though I’d never tell her, I like it.
The sofa sits beneath the wide front window, and whitewooden slats allow the sunlight to stream in. Lush green houseplants dominate the far corner and dot shelves and tables throughout the room, and there’s a well-used easel folded away in one corner. The shelves are filled with books on art and several volumes with titles likeThe Witch’s Yearbookthat would have made my Irish Catholic granny cross herself. I take a sip of water as I watch Kim light an incense stick and place it on the mantle over the fireplace.
“So, now that we’re back, can you tell us what the big deal is?” Kim says to my dad. “You muttered to yourself all the way home but never explained why you’re so excited.”
“Sorry, I was just working through the logistics of it all. A few years ago, the gallery was given a series of paintings known as The Four. They’re similar in style to this one but not quite so…brutal, I suppose. More delicate, and the subjects are obviously female. Anyway, they have been dated back to 1911 and are thought to come from New York, but the provenance is a little shady—”
“Provenance?” I ask.
“Who painted them, where they came from, who has owned them since, that sort of thing. A lot of art passed through black market channels during the world wars, so it’s not unusual for there to be a gap in the records. We have bits of information here and there, but we know next to nothing about this portrait. It’s almost an urban legend.”
“So whatdoyou know about it?” Kim asks as she twists the wedding and engagement bands on her finger.
Dad moves closer to her, and I try not to roll my eyes. “Justwhat the initial auction house reports said. They state that five paintings were kept in police custody for a couple of years, after they were found at a crime scene,” Dad says, looking at me carefully. My interest spikes immediately. This is much more my area of expertise. Or interest, anyway.
“Crime scene? What sort of crime scene?” I ask, trying not to sound too perky. He hates that I’m a true-crime gal.
“I don’t know, Fliss.”
Dad gives Kim that look all adults use when they don’t want to tell kids the whole story. Unfortunately for him, I’ve had this look figured out since I was ten and he and Mom didn’t want to tell me they were separating. The crime scene must have been a gory one—I know what I’ll be looking up on the internet later.
“Anyway, they were eventually sold off at a public auction by the NYPD in 1913 and were kept in the buyer’s private collection, until four paintings resurfaced with a different collector in the eighties, when they were loaned to the National Portrait Gallery for an exhibition. No one seemed to have heard of a fifth portrait, and The Four weren’t seen again until that collector died a couple of years ago. He founded the Heywood Gallery and left The Four to it in his will, so they’ve been there ever since.”
“Okay.” I take a sip of water, my brain sorting through the facts. “So where does our friend out there come into this?”
“That’s the exciting part.” Dad puts his mug on the coffee table and leans forward, like he’s sharing a secret. “As I said, when the NYPD found the paintings, there were five of them—four of women and one of a man. From what we could make out from the original documentation, it appears the painting of the manwas a self-portrait.” My eyes drift to the soulless face hanging in our hallway as Dad continues. “So we have the initial record of five paintings being sold, but when they reappeared in the eighties, there were only four portraits. Art historians and armchair detectives have been trying to find the self-portrait ever since.”
“Armchair detectives?” Kim asks, yawning even though she’s just downed a vat of black coffee. “You mean like internet sleuths?”
My ears prick up again.
“Precisely.” Dad nods, shooting a look at me and hesitating before he finishes the story. “There’s a whole school of thought that the painter actually killed four women and then immortalized them on canvas. His body was found with all five paintings.”
“So he was dead? That’s the crime scene you mentioned?” I ask, trying to keep the excitement from my voice. It’s not every day a murder mystery lands on your doorstep. I take Dad’s silence as confirmation. “Were the women he painted ever identified?”
“I think there was a fire that destroyed a lot of the old records in New York, so even if they were linked, that information has long been lost. That’s not unusual, though. Not all painters kept details about their models.”
“Especially if you were going to kill them, I imagine. And I bet he used women who no one would miss,” Kim says, oblivious to the side-eye Dad gives her.
She’s right, though. Predators like vulnerable targets. People who need something—or have nothing—are often desperate enough to trust in a stranger’s kindness.
“Do you think it’s true, Dad? That this painter was a serialkiller?”
“No,” Dad says carefully. “I think art collectors latched onto the story to drive up the price. There’s a whole other theory that the fifth painting is cursed.” Kim looks at him in alarm, and I know what she’s thinking: We just found the self-portrait in the house of a man who died alone and wasn’t found for days. Dad laughs. “It’s just a story, love. There’s no proof. Plus, I don’t own it, the gallery does. The rumors certainly worked, though—The Four are worth a small fortune.” Dad waves a dismissive hand in the air.
“Right.” I don’t know what else to say. I look out at the painting and shudder, realizing that if one thing could make it worse, it would be that the self-portrait was of a literal murderer.
