Twisted Tea Christmas Read online

  Theodosia’s eyes widened in surprise. “That many?”

  “Renoir was quite a prolific painter. He lived to be almost eighty.”

  “Do you have any idea what prices are like for a Renoir?” Theodosia asked.

  “I’m sure they vary widely, depending on size and subject matter. Though I do know that Renoir’s Dance at le Moulin de la Galette sold for a record seventy-eight million at Sotheby’s.”

  “Holy smokes! Was it sold to a private collector?”

  “Actually it was a telephone bidder.”

  “Wow.”

  “Of course, most Renoirs are hanging in museums. Although the largest collection I know of is held by the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia. I understand they have around one hundred and eighty Renoirs.”

  “That many? How fascinating,” Theodosia said.

  “And there are quite a few—like Miss Drucilla’s stolen painting—that have found their place in private collections,” Ritter said.

  “Is it difficult to get your hands on a Renoir? At auction, I mean.”

  Ritter looked thoughtful. “Today, with all the newly minted billionaires out there infused with collector mania, I think it might be difficult to find one available.”

  “What about a stolen Renoir?”

  Ritter frowned. “You’re talking about the black market? That’s a whole different can of worms.”

  “How so?”

  “The thing is—when a well-known painting is stolen, it rarely sees the light of day again,” Ritter said.

  “Understandable, I guess.”

  “Stolen pieces generally find their way into private collections. And I do mean private.” Ritter’s face grew animated and he took a step forward. “Think about all the artwork that was plundered during World War Two: the paintings, tapestries, sculptures, and rare books. Only forty percent of that has ever been recovered. I mean, it’s been more than seventy-five years and we still don’t know where it is.”

  Theodosia was fascinated. “Where do you think it might be?”

  “If I had to hazard a guess? Maybe hanging in a drawing room in Argentina? Locked in a Swiss vault? Nobody really knows for sure.”

  “That’s very frightening,” Theodosia said.

  “Here’s something else,” Ritter said. “In some cases—thankfully very rare cases—professional art thieves are given a laundry list of what to steal.”

  “You mean like when that fancy museum in Boston was robbed?” Theodosia said.

  “The Gardner Museum,” Ritter said. “Exactly. The museum people, even the police and FBI, are still convinced that the thieves carried a very specific shopping list.”

  “And that happened when? Like thirty years ago?”

  “Something like that. Though two pieces were eventually recovered.”

  “And the rest of the stolen art?” Theodosia asked.

  Ritter looked unhappy. “Even with a ten-million-dollar reward, the Vermeer, Rembrandt, Degas, and Manet just . . . disappeared into thin air. Never to be seen again.”

  10

  With ideas about stolen artwork buzzing in her brain, Theodosia returned to the Indigo Tea Shop, breezed past Drayton at the front counter, and called Pauline at Miss Drucilla’s house.

  Pauline picked up on the fifth ring, sounding a little breathless. “Hello?”

  “Hi, Pauline. It’s Theodosia. I’m thinking about paying a visit to that art dealer Julian Wolf-Knapp. Do you have his address? Or do you by chance remember where his shop is located?”

  “Give me a minute.” The phone was set down, almost two minutes went by, and then Pauline came back on the line. “Wolf-Knapp has an office—he calls it a studio because it’s kind of a second-floor loft—over on Broad Street. It’s above that cute little antiques shop called the Dusty Hen.”

  “Oh, I know that building.” Theodosia had called on a wedding planner who had an office there when she’d investigated another strange case a few months earlier.

  “Okay, then,” Pauline said.

  Theodosia heard a slight hesitation in her voice.

  “How are you doing, Pauline?”

  “Oh, dealing with all the lawyers as best I can. They’re still hounding me to pull all sorts of paperwork together on Miss Drucilla’s estate, the art collection, all her investments. You know, rich-people stuff.”

  “I hear you,” Theodosia said. But she felt like she’d detected a wistful note in Pauline’s voice. Had she been jealous of Miss Drucilla’s wealth? But even if she had been and sought to do her harm, what would she have gained? Well, the painting and the diamond rings for one thing. But Pauline didn’t seem like the murdering kind. Besides, she’d been right there, Johnny-on-the-spot when Miss Drucilla died. Not much time to hide all that loot. No. Pauline didn’t feel quite right.

  “Theodosia?” Pauline said.

  “Yes?”

  “Thank you for caring about all of this. I can’t tell you how much it means to me.”

  “We’ll see what shakes out. Keep your fingers crossed.”

  “I will.”

  Theodosia sat at her desk thinking. Pauline probably wasn’t the killer. But maybe somebody fairly close to Miss Drucilla was. The question remained . . . who could that be?

  “Theodosia?”

  Drayton was standing in the doorway.

  “How did it go with Tom Ritter?”

  “Good.”

  “Did you get the information you needed?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Want to talk about the Grand Illumination?” Drayton asked.

  Theodosia stood up and grabbed her coat. “You know what? I’d love to but I can’t right now.”

  “You’re off again?” Drayton sounded surprised as Theodosia hurried past him. “Where to this time?”

  “I have to see a man about a painting.”

  * * *

  * * *

  Theodosia drove down Queen Street, turned on King Street, went past the King’s Ransom Gift Shop, where Wade Holland worked, and turned down Broad. She parked directly in front of the Dusty Hen Antique Shop, took a minute to look in their window and admire a bentwood rocking chair, then hustled upstairs to the second floor. She walked down a sleek carpeted hallway and stopped outside a white lacquered door with a doorbell and a sign above it that read julian wolf-knapp fine-art consultants (by appointment only).

  Theodosia didn’t have an appointment, but she rang the bell anyway. When nothing happened, she rang it a second time. This time she heard someone rustling around inside and muttering to himself.

  “Yes, yes” came a muffled voice. “Hold on, I’m coming.”

  The door flew open and Julian Wolf-Knapp stared out at her with flat gray eyes. He had a narrow face, a thin nose, somewhat prominent ears, and a carefully groomed goatee. Well-dressed in a navy pin-stripe suit and yellow Hermès tie, he struck her as being European-looking but not in any specific way.

  “Hello. What?” Wolf-Knapp said. He sounded guarded and not all that friendly. Then again, she had interrupted him.

  Didn’t faze Theodosia in the least.

  “Mr. Wolf-Knapp, I’m Theodosia Browning. Would you have a moment to talk?”

  “Possibly,” he said. Then, “Talk about what?”

  “A former client of yours, Miss Drucilla Heyward.”

  Wolf-Knapp seemed to soften. “Such an unfortunate circumstance,” he murmured.

  “Actually more than a circumstance. A murder,” Theodosia said. “A murder that I’ve been tasked to look into.”

  Wolf-Knapp’s curious eyes drilled into her. “You’re here in an official capacity?”

  “Not at all. More like a friend of the family.”

  “Interesting. And you want to talk to me—why?”

  “Well, you obviously know that the Renoir you sold to Miss Drucil
la was stolen at the same time she was murdered.”

  Wolf-Knapp’s head bobbed. “I spoke with the police yesterday. And just as I told them, it was the one and only time I ever worked as a fine-art consultant to Mrs. Heyward. Although I must say, she was a lovely woman. Really quite knowledgeable.”

  “Detective Tidwell mentioned that he’d talked to you.” Theodosia took a step forward. “May I come in?”

  “Of course.”

  Wolf-Knapp led Theodosia through a small gallery that was crammed with paintings and drawings and into an office that was also filled with artwork. Paintings hung on the walls and an entire wall of white vertical shelving held all manner of canvases and framed drawings. More pieces were stacked on the credenza behind his desk.

  “As you can see, I’m up to my eyeballs in inventory.”

  “That’s wonderful,” Theodosia said, still trying to establish some rapport with him. “Business must be good.”

  “I get by,” Wolf-Knapp said. “Please, sit down and make yourself comfortable.”

  Theodosia sat down in a gray club chair while Wolf-Knapp took a seat behind his white desk. She couldn’t decide if he was a fusty artiste type or what she and her girlfriends (after a couple glasses of chardonnay) would good-naturedly call a play-uh.

  “You mentioned inventory,” Theodosia said. “So naturally I’m curious. How on earth does one go about locating an available Renoir? I would think it’d be almost impossible. That museums and private collectors would be reluctant to part with one.”

  “It’s a little-known fact, but museums deacquisition works of art all the time,” Wolf-Knapp said. “Public interest flags. A new area of interest opens up. Circumstances are constantly changing for private art collectors as well. They get bored with a certain piece or decide to move their collection in a new direction. Perhaps something more contemporary. Or their paintings have appreciated so much in value that they jump on an opportunity to cash out.”

  “That’s interesting. So the Renoir that you sold to . . .”

  Wolf-Knapp held up an index finger. “Technically, I was not the seller. I acted as an intermediary between buyer and seller.”

  “Okay, the Renoir that you intermediated for Miss Drucilla . . . I believe it was a still life. Where did it come from?”

  Wolf-Knapp favored Theodosia with a thin crocodile smile. “If I told you that, I’d have to kill you.”

  Theodosia smiled back at him to let him know she understood his little joke. But inside she cringed a little because Wolf-Knapp almost looked as if he meant it.

  “Seriously,” Theodosia said.

  Wolf-Knapp shook his head. “I’m afraid that’s a trade secret.”

  Wolf-Knapp was being a jerk and enjoying it, Theodosia decided. She felt an urge to reach across his desk and pinch one of his ears but managed to restrain herself.

  “So let me get this straight,” Theodosia said. “A seller might contact you to see if you have a willing buyer?”

  “That’s one set of circumstances, yes.”

  “Does that happen often?”

  “Not nearly as often as I’d like.”

  Theodosia knew they were dancing and jousting, and she didn’t care for it one bit.

  Can’t this guy give me a solid answer?

  Turned out, he couldn’t. As Theodosia asked more questions and Wolf-Knapp skillfully deflected them, her suspicions grew. Could this hotshot art consultant, or dealer or whatever he called himself, have sold Miss Drucilla the Renoir, then stolen it back from her? And murdered her as a by-product of that theft?

  She supposed it could have happened that way.

  By the end of their conversation, Wolf-Knapp had revealed next to nothing, and Theodosia decided she had yet another name to add to her perplexing list of suspects.

  * * *

  * * *

  Theodosia walked into the Indigo Tea Shop just as Drayton and Haley were turning off the lights and locking up. The aromas from scones and tea still hung in the air.

  “We didn’t think you’d be back,” Drayton said.

  “Hey,” Haley said as she pulled on a black bomber jacket. “Somebody called for you.”

  “Who was it?” Theodosia asked.

  “Don’t know. He wouldn’t say. But whoever it was, he was curious about where you’d run off to.”

  A hint of wariness flickered in Theodosia’s brain. “You didn’t tell him, did you?”

  Haley shook her head. “Nope. Because, truth be told, the call felt kind of creepy to me. Like somebody was checking up on you. You know, fishing around for information.”

  Smokey, was that you? Theodosia wondered. Or someone else?

  “Aren’t you off to the ballet tonight?” Drayton asked as he grabbed his tweed jacket and put it on. “With Delightful Delaine?”

  “Yes, but I’ve got to make a quick call first.”

  “Well, have fun,” Drayton said. “Don’t stay out too late.”

  Theodosia walked into her office, remembering what Tom Ritter had told her earlier about the Barnes Foundation.

  Might they know something about a disappearing Renoir? Or about other Renoirs that have been stolen? Maybe Miss Drucilla’s painting is just one in a number of thefts.

  Maybe. But the only way to know for sure was to do a little fishing. She looked up the Barnes Foundation on the Internet, found their phone number, and called.

  She got one of the administrative assistants in their main office and asked to be put in touch with one of the curators, but was told that none of them was around.

  “I’m sorry,” the admin assistant said. “Most of our people are on vacation because of the holidays. But if one of our curators should happen to call in or drop by for some reason, I’ll have them give you a ring.”

  “Okay, thanks much.”

  So much for chasing that lead.

  11

  It certainly hadn’t been Theodosia’s idea, but Delaine had two tickets to Giselle that were burning a hole in her handbag and had insisted that Theodosia go with her.

  “Why me?” Theodosia had asked.

  Delaine had pursed her lips, made a lemon face, and said, “Because my regular date Tod hates the ballet and I didn’t feel like inviting that drip Allan Barnaby. What a bore he turned out to be, always yapping about books and publishing, as if that’s the only thing in the world a girl’s interested in.”

  “Okay,” Theodosia had told her. “I can see the logic in your thinking.” Not.

  So here they were, strolling across the lobby of the Belvedere Theatre, mingling with a glittering, black-tie-wearing, ballet-loving crowd.

  “Are you sure I’m dressed appropriately?” Theodosia asked Delaine. She was wearing a short black cocktail dress with a chubby faux-fur jacket that Delaine had brought along and insisted she wear. It made Theodosia feel like a fuzzy walking burrito.

  “Nonsense!” Delaine cried. “You’re extremely au courant. Alta moda if you will. As if you’ve leaped from the pages of a chic fashion magazine.”

  Delaine herself was wearing a black see-through blouse with a lacy black camisole underneath. The blouse had an enormous froth of feathers at the neckline that made her look like a snooty ostrich, and it was tucked into a short black leather skirt. The look was completed by studded high-heeled booties and a mink coat draped casually over her shoulders. Theodosia hoped the antifur contingent wasn’t lurking somewhere. If so, they’d be in big trouble.

  “Look!” Delaine exclaimed. “There’s a bar set up over there. Fancy having a glass of prosecco before the ballet starts?”

  “I never turn down a glass of bubbly.”

  They sidled up to the bar, ordered their prosecco, then wandered off to sip and people-watch. Sixty seconds later, Delaine’s arm shot into the air, she let out a bloodcurdling shriek, and cried, “Sawyer Daniels! Imagine running in
to you tonight!”

  Theodosia remembered Sawyer Daniels from the party. He was the one with the high voice who’d speculated that Miss Drucilla had probably “passed out” from “too much excitement.” Pauline had also mentioned Daniels as the numbers guy who worked with Miss Drucilla to help her select charities, which was why Theodosia was suddenly interested in Daniels as he walked toward them, his eyes on Delaine and a smile on his face.

  Though easily in his mid-fifties, Daniels had a military bearing, ice chip blue eyes, a smug Gordon Gekko smile, and white brush-cut hair. In other words, he looked disciplined. Like he was the kind of guy who jogged five miles every day, came home and chugged a protein smoothie, and never let you forget it.

  “So lovely to see you again,” Delaine purred, practically rubbing up against Daniels like an affectionate cat. Then she turned to Theodosia and said, “Have you two met?” Without waiting for an answer, she quickly introduced them.

  “Nice to meet you,” Theodosia said.

  Daniels nodded back at her, but his eyes remained on Delaine.

  Delaine burbled along and said, “Sawyer and I were talking the other night at the party. Right before the unfortunate, uh . . . incident.”

  “The murder,” Theodosia said. No reason to sugarcoat it.

  Delaine’s eyes glazed over slightly. “Yes, uh, anyway, Sawyer was telling me about this really superb red wine . . .”

  “The Benziger,” Sawyer said. “From Sonoma.”

  “That’s it. With a bouquet like ripe strawberries.” Delaine’s eyelashes fluttered. Probably her heart did, too.

  “You remembered.” Sawyer seemed beyond pleased. In fact, he seemed rather captivated by Delaine’s charms.

  Delaine dimpled prettily. “I never forget a good wine or an interesting man.”

  Sawyer Daniels gave Delaine a knowing wink. Then he excused himself, went to the bar to grab a drink, and returned.

  “You worked closely with Miss Drucilla, didn’t you?” Theodosia asked him.

  Delaine gazed daggers at her but Theodosia kept her focus strictly on Daniels.