Murder as a Fine Art Read online

  Without taking her eyes off the paintings, Ingrid placed her portfolio beside some art books lying open on the coffee table and walked over for a closer look at the individual pieces.

  “The colours! Everything is so full of colour!” she exclaimed after working her way along the south wall.

  Laura raised an impressed eyebrow at Karen and said, “Colour is colour, but colour value is something else. Let me show you something.” She led Ingrid over to where a still life stood on an easel. Pointing to the petals of a rose, she said, “For instance, this yellow is too bright. It stands out more than it should. Can you see that?”

  Cocking her head to one side, Ingrid nodded agreement.

  Picking up a brush, Laura lightly daubed the offending flower with orange paint. It was as if the rose had taken a step backward into the painting. “I haven’t changed the colour,” Laura explained. “It’s still yellow. I’ve just changed its value. Colour values range from black at the bottom with a zero, to white with a value of ten.”

  Guiding Ingrid over to another painting, Laura said, “Let me show you something else about colour. What do you see?”

  “Red. Red everywhere. The table, the walls, the carpet. Except for the flowers. They’re white. And some blue accents.”

  “Do you see anything else?”

  Puzzled, the young girl peered closer. “There’s a black line that tells you where the table stops and the wall begins.”

  “Perfect! That shows you how even a little touch of colour can create depth. You have an eye, Ingrid.”

  Ears straining to hear every word, Karen laid out the salad, sandwiches, and fruit she had brought. Before they sat down, she glanced meaningfully at Ingrid’s portfolio. “Maybe you should show Ms. Janeway your drawings now, dear.” Laura smiled to herself. Scratch a policewoman and you find a doting mother.

  Smiling encouragingly at Ingrid, Laura braced herself. Ingrid had a good eye, but so did lots of people. That’s what made collectors. The question was, did she have the talent? Unaware that she had been holding her breath, Laura let out an audible sigh when the drawings began to appear. It was all right. The child could draw. In fact, she could do more than draw. The first drawings were faithful renderings of the object — a box, a sunflower, a bowl of oranges — but in the more recent ones, Ingrid had begun to simplify, to suggest rather than to meticulously record.

  “You’re a colourist, Ingrid,” Laura said at last.

  Karen stared blankly at the drawings. They were all done in thick pencil strokes or charcoal. There wasn’t a hint of colour anywhere. Ingrid looked expectantly at Laura who said, “The great master colourist, Matisse, once wrote, ‘A colourist makes his presence known even in a simple charcoal drawing.’ I see a colourist in these drawings.”

  With Ingrid’s talent so happily authenticated, the lunch turned into a celebratory feast. Karen had brought a bottle of wine, but since she was going to assign herself back on duty that afternoon, declined to have any herself. Laura put the unopened bottle away for future use, and made iced tea. As they munched and talked, Ingrid’s eyes returned again and again to the paintings.

  “You know, Ms. Janeway,” she said with a mischievous smile, “if Mrs. Green, our art teacher, were to mark your paintings, I don’t think you’d pass.”

  “Because of perspective you mean?”

  Ingrid nodded, and Laura laughed. “Perspective is something you learn and then use or not use as you see fit.”

  “I’ve wondered about that,” admitted Karen. “In some of the paintings, it looks as if the dishes will slide off the table. But the colour is so wonderful you forget about it.”

  “That’s just what you’re supposed to do. Perspective is just a matter of making distant objects look smaller, but in these paintings I give equal value to all the objects. The viewer’s imagination can provide the perspective.”

  Laura crossed over to where some books were stacked on a shelf. She took down one titled Art of The Twentieth Century and knelt beside Ingrid’s chair. “This is for you. All the great artists are in there. It tells you something about their lives and shows you what their paintings look like.”

  Eyes shining, Ingrid held the book as if it were the key to the future. Impulsively, she flung her arms around Laura and kissed her on the cheek.

  While they were engrossed in the book, Ingrid turning the pages with little exclamations of delight, a scratching sound made her look up and glance toward the balcony.

  “That’s my pet squirrel,” said Laura. “A substitute for my dog while I’m here. Would you like to feed him?”

  Ingrid nodded eagerly and Laura handed her a biscuit and opened the sliding glass door onto the balcony. She closed it behind Ingrid to keep the squirrel from coming into the studio.

  “Knowing you as I think I do,” said Karen, as she began to gather up the plastic bags in which she had brought the food, “you would never have been so encouraging towards Ingrid unless you genuinely felt she has talent. Am I right?”

  “In my view, she has the capability to become a visual artist. How that talent develops remains to be seen, of course.”

  “That’s what I wanted to ask you about. What should I be doing to help her?”

  “For the moment, very little. She should continue with her art lessons, of course. At this stage Mrs. Green can’t do her any harm. You might suggest to Mrs. Green that she tape a charcoal to the end of a three-foot stick and have her students draw with that. That will teach them to draw freely and not worry about tiny little strokes of the pencil. However, Ingrid will soon outgrow Mrs. Green. Then we’ll have to find her a teacher who can take her to the next plateau. As long as you’re stationed in Banff, that won’t be a problem; there are some outstanding instructors right here in the Centre. If you like, I’ll make some enquiries.”

  “That would be wonderful. I should be here for another couple of years at least. Of course, you never know. I could be posted to Moose Jaw or Tuktoyaktuk tomorrow.” It was obvious that Karen was worried about how the demands of her own career might clash with what was best for her daughter.

  “You should be able to work around that. What they can do today with computers and correspondence courses is incredible,” Laura assured her. Laura could still feel the spot on her cheek where Ingrid had kissed her. She was aware that her own biological clock was fast winding down and that if she were ever going to have a child it would have to be soon. As she always did when this mood struck her, she looked around at her paintings. They were her children.

  “With Larry gone, Ingrid and I are completely on our own.” Karen’s thoughts were still on her daughter’s future. “If anything happened to me, I don’t know what would become of her.”

  Laura realized it would be useless to say that nothing could happen to her. They both knew better.

  “When you’re out on patrol and spot some guy driving a stolen vehicle and pull him over late at night, you haven’t a clue what you’re going to be faced with when you walk up to that car. You could be met with a blast from a sawed-off shotgun, or cut in two with an automatic rifle. It’s crazy out there.”

  That kind of thinking could affect a person’s ability to respond in an emergency. As if reading Laura’s mind, Karen sat up straighter and said, “We’re trained to block everything out except how we’re going to handle the situation without people getting hurt. After Larry was killed, they made me take a refresher course. It works.”

  The balcony door slid open and Ingrid came back into the studio. She slid the latch home before turning to look at her mother. She seemed composed, but her pale cheeks were slightly flushed.

  “There’s a strange man out there, Mummy. A clown.”

  “Did he say anything to you?”

  “No. He was juggling some balls in the air. I came right in.”

  “You did the right thing, dear.” Her mother gave her a hug.

  Laura stormed out the front door, intending to tell John Smith where to get off, but as she expec
ted, there was no sign of him. She would get to him later.

  “The squirrel ate all the biscuit,” Ingrid volunteered, as if to ease the situation.

  Laura smiled at her. “He loves biscuits. They’re better for him than nuts.”

  After the remains of the lunch had been packed in Karen’s cooler, Laura announced she was “painted out” and would leave with them. Locking the studio behind her, she joined them as they went up the path. “Oh, oh,” she muttered when they rounded a bend and came in sight of the parking lot. John Smith, clad in a rather sinister-looking clown outfit — rakish black fedora, black jacket and pants, his face made up with white greasepaint and green eye shadow — was being interviewed by a television reporter and cameraman. The media coverage which had reached a fever pitch in the days immediately following Erika’s death had dwindled down to the occasional follow-up item. It would flare up again if there were any more sensational developments, such as another death, or an arrest. Lavoie had pleaded with the colonists not to talk to the media, but that of course wouldn’t deter John Smith.

  John Smith’s painted lips broadened in a smile as Laura and her two companions hurried past. Karen frowned when she heard the reporter ask about the possibility of there being a serial killer on the campus. A rumour like that would bring reporters swarming like a plague of locusts. She quickened her pace so that they were practically running by the time they reached her minivan. She barely allowed Ingrid time to say goodbye before hustling her into the passenger seat and closing the door. Leaning against it, she said to Laura, “I hate him knowing I have a daughter.”

  “I don’t think I’d worry too much about that,” Laura tried to reassure her. “John Smith likes to touch the world, but he doesn’t like to be touched back.”

  “I just don’t like him knowing about Ingrid. It makes me feel kind of vulnerable somehow.”

  Laura almost came out with the quote from Francis Bacon—”He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune”—but checked herself in time. The word “hostages” was bound to have painful associations for Karen. Still, if you brought the cynical old essayist into this century by making him gender neutral, he was expressing precisely the same thought as Karen had when she talked about being vulnerable. Everything that happens has happened before and someone had a word for it.

  Ingrid blew Laura a kiss as the minivan drove away.

  chapter twelve

  It was finished! Laura’s excitement mounted as she painted an ear hole on the evilly grinning skull. Stepping back from the canvas, she knew it was good. It was better than good. It was great. She had a feeling it was destined to be an icon. But not yet. She would keep it to herself for a while. It would not travel to New York with her show, although there probably was a market for it there. Later maybe. A sudden shiver ran through her body. She lifted the painting down from the easel and placed it face-first against the wall. With the eerily powerful painting hidden from view, the others in the studio seemed to come back to life. Laura looked at the still lifes and abstracts, vibrant with colour, and smiled. That’s what she would paint for the remainder of her stay.

  Picking up her flashlight, she switched off the studio lights and went outside into the darkness. She would celebrate with a glass of wine. It was more than a celebration; she needed the wine to calm herself down.

  “It’s finished,” she whispered to Richard as he held a chair for her. He, Norrington, and Jeremy were sitting around a table, sharing a bottle of wine.

  A delighted smile spread over his face. “When?” he asked.

  “Maybe you could buy a girl dinner tomorrow night?”

  “Done.”

  “What are you two whispering about?” asked Jeremy.

  “I was just telling him I’ve finished a painting,” Laura replied blandly.

  Jeremy sniffed, but didn’t probe further.

  He knows there’s something between me and Richard, thought Laura. But who cares? We’re both adults.

  The conversation, like every conversation in the Centre, returned to the subject of the unsolved deaths. “I’m beginning to wonder,” intoned Norrington, “if we don’t have a thrill killer in our midst. There seems to be a complete absence of motive in the killings. Except of course, for you and Montrose,” he added with a sideways glance at Jeremy.

  “The police are completely satisfied with my alibi.”

  “So it would seem. I wonder what it is?”

  When Jeremy showed no sign of enlightening them, Laura said, “The police have ruled out a serial killer.”

  “I was speaking of a killer who kills for the thrill of it, not a serial killer. As if it were a game.”

  “If you’re looking for a thrill killer,” Jeremy said, “John Smith’s your man. It could be one of his performances.”

  “Even he wouldn’t go that far,” protested Laura. Jeremy shrugged. “The guy’s a sociopath. That’s all I know.”

  That seemed to bring the conversation about the deaths to a dead end. Norrington turned to Richard. “How is your new masterpiece progressing?”

  “Very well, as a matter of fact. As I said on the television program,” Norrington winced, but Richard didn’t seem to notice as he went on, “I think my new hero has a number of layers ...”

  “So does cardboard,” Norrington interjected.

  “I think he has the staying power to sustain a series.”

  “A series!” Norrington almost squeaked. “May the good Lord have mercy on us!”

  Laura put down her empty glass, and stood up. “I’m off. It’s been a long day.”

  “I’ll go with you.” Richard drank the last of his wine and put the empty glass down on the table. Seeing there was some wine left in the bottle Richard had paid for, Norrington and Jeremy elected to stay.

  “I honestly don’t know how you can stand it.” Laura’s face was flushed as she and Richard left the Sally Borden Building.

  Richard laughed. “If you think that was bad, you should have heard him earlier. He announced to at least ten people that it would be a boon to the world of literature if my word processor were to self-destruct.”

  “What an appalling thing to say!”

  “It was pretty extreme, I agree,” Richard shook his head thoughtfully. “There are times when he sounds really bitter. Almost venomous. Tonight was one of them. I can’t think why. Lord knows I’ve never done anything to him. Except buy him drinks. Anyway, it’s his problem, not mine.”

  Laura slipped her arm through his. “You really don’t care what Henry thinks, do you?” When Richard shook his head, she said, “Then I shouldn’t let myself get so worked up.”

  “Except that it becomes you so.” He held her close and kissed her. “Tomorrow night seems an awfully long time away.”

  “Twenty-four little hours, that’s all.”

  Richard walked her to her door and kissed her goodnight. Before Laura fell asleep, she decided that first thing tomorrow she would check out one of Norrington’s books from the library. She might come across some weaknesses and absurdities that Richard could use as ammunition to defend himself with. If Norrington wrote the way he talked, he would be highly susceptible to parody.

  The librarian showed Laura where Norrington’s books were shelved, and lifted a heavy tome down from the shelf. “This is probably the best one to start with.”

  Laura read the title aloud, “Demystifying Deconstructionism— not exactly escapist literature, is it?”

  The librarian smiled. “It’s easier to read than you might think. He’s got quite a way with words. When you finish with that one, you can move on to Decoding Paradise,” he said as she signed for the book. “It’s pretty metaphysical, but it’s worth the effort.”

  “While I’m here, I’d like to have another look at the tape of Chagall. Could I borrow it?”

  “Sure, I’ll get it for you.” He went over to a rack of videotapes and brought one back to her. The library was in the basement of Lloyd Hall and had an extensive coll
ection of audiovisual materials and equipment.

  Laura switched on a VCR and began to watch the video. The tape was an interview with Marc Chagall shortly before his death and took place in his garden. So many of the great European painters took inspiration from their gardens, Laura thought. It undoubtedly had to do with colour.

  The revered artist’s lined face was luminous with pleasure as he talked about Daphnis & Chloe, his series of jewel-like lithographs. Laura was so absorbed in his comments it took her a moment to realize something liquid was dribbling down the screen. Ripping off her earphones, she jumped to her feet. Now she heard the soft splat as another drop landed on the TV set and began its downward journey. Slowly, almost reluctantly, her gaze travelled up to the ceiling. A dark crimson stain was spreading across its surface. Another drop fell, then another. A male dancer who had been watching a ballet video on the set next to hers, leapt to one side to get out of range. “Jesus Christ, is that blood?” It was as if he had been confronted with a cobra, its evil hood outspread.

  “Come over here!” Laura called out to the librarian and the urgency in her voice brought him running from his office. The hushed quiet of the library gave way to an excited babble of voices as staff and visitors dropped whatever they were doing and gathered round the television set. Warning them not to do or touch anything, Laura used the librarian’s telephone to call Corporal Lindstrom’s extension. To her intense relief, the Mountie answered on the first ring.

  “There’s something weird going on down here at the library. Can you come over right away?”

  “What’s happening?”

  “It looks like there’s blood dripping down from the ceiling.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  “What’s upstairs?” Corporal Lindstrom asked only a few brief moments later. She was gazing up at the dark stain, now considerably larger than when Laura had first seen it. Laura frowned, trying to recall the layout. A security guard, his walkie-talkie squawking excitedly, answered for her. “A small conference room. It isn’t used very much.”