commissioned portrait awaiting my attention. On the off chance that I wasn’t cut out to be an art detective, I should probably keep my day job.
As I took a twenty-dollar bill out of my wallet, the piece of paper with Harlan Coombs’ address fell out onto the table. Grant Street, near California. Hmmm. Right smack-dab in the middle of Chinatown, just a few blocks from where we were eating. It was an odd address for an art dealer who socialized with the crème de la crème of San Francisco society.
I glanced at Mary, who was watching me patiently.
Mary, who was almost six feet tall, wore scary leather boots, and was game to do anything.
“Listen . . .” I said. “Would you mind if we checked something out before heading back?”
I wasn’t sure what I thought we might find at Harlan’s place. The theft of the Old Master drawings left a number of outraged and politically well-connected art dealers holding the bag. It seemed doubtful that Harlan would be hanging around his apartment, doing a little housework and waiting for the police to show up. Unlikelier still that Anton would be relaxing there with him. And nearly impossible to imagine that upon seeing me they would hand over tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of stolen sketches. But the address was so temptingly near . . .
“Somebody skip out on the bill?” she asked.
Realizing that I hadn’t told Mary about my arrangement with Anthony Brazil and Albert Mason, I gave her a quick rundown on the Harlan Coombs mini-drama. I decided against discussing the murder, or my reason for being at the Brock last night.
“Sweet,” she said. I took that as a yes.
We inched our way out of the jammed dining room and down to street level, where we pushed through the crowded sidewalks on Grant, passing countless bins piled high with cheap imported goods—bamboo backscratchers, plastic pop guns, painted rice paper fans, carved wooden chopsticks—before reaching the address Mason had given me.
A small doorway was sandwiched between a souvenir shop and a Chinese apothecary. Brass mailboxes lined the entrance, each with a tiny label. I peered closely. There, after CHAN, HENRY, and CHANG, MEI, was COOMBS, HARLAN. Apartment 3C.
Mary and I looked at each other. Either Harlan had already absconded or he was the world’s worst fugitive.
“So push the buzzer,” Mary said impatiently.
“I’m not going to push the buzzer,” I said, reconsidering. “He might be dangerous.”
“Push the buzzer, Annie. C’mon—how many art dealers do you know who can really kick ass?”
Albert Mason flashed into my mind. She had a point. “Well . . .”
“He’s not gonna be here, anyway,” Mary persisted, reaching around me and pushing the buzzer. “Not if he did what you said he did, and not if people are looking for him.”
“Yes?” a woman’s voice said after several seconds.
Mary and I gawked at each other.
“Say something,” Mary hissed.
“Like what ?” I was terrible at improvising, my heart was pounding, and I was beginning to sweat.
“Package for, um, Harlan Coombs!” Mary shouted into the speaker.
The door buzzed. Mary smirked and pushed her way inside. Where did she learn to do things like this? I wondered as I followed her up a dark, grubby staircase that smelled of cabbage and unfamiliar spices. Mary was from a small town in Indiana. People from small towns in Indiana were supposed to be cautious.
Then again, Mary had hitchhiked to San Francisco the day she turned eighteen.
We reached the third-floor landing and paused to catch our breath. A long, unremarkable hallway was painted a dingy yellow and illuminated by a single bare bulb in the ceiling. Muffled sounds from televisions and the clanking of pots and pans drifted down the hall.
My enthusiasm for this undertaking was waning. What if Coombs was the exception to the art-dealer-as-wimp rule? What if he was a former-Navy-SEAL-turned-art-dealer-turned-criminal? What was I going to say? “Heya,
As I took a twenty-dollar bill out of my wallet, the piece of paper with Harlan Coombs’ address fell out onto the table. Grant Street, near California. Hmmm. Right smack-dab in the middle of Chinatown, just a few blocks from where we were eating. It was an odd address for an art dealer who socialized with the crème de la crème of San Francisco society.
I glanced at Mary, who was watching me patiently.
Mary, who was almost six feet tall, wore scary leather boots, and was game to do anything.
“Listen . . .” I said. “Would you mind if we checked something out before heading back?”
I wasn’t sure what I thought we might find at Harlan’s place. The theft of the Old Master drawings left a number of outraged and politically well-connected art dealers holding the bag. It seemed doubtful that Harlan would be hanging around his apartment, doing a little housework and waiting for the police to show up. Unlikelier still that Anton would be relaxing there with him. And nearly impossible to imagine that upon seeing me they would hand over tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of stolen sketches. But the address was so temptingly near . . .
“Somebody skip out on the bill?” she asked.
Realizing that I hadn’t told Mary about my arrangement with Anthony Brazil and Albert Mason, I gave her a quick rundown on the Harlan Coombs mini-drama. I decided against discussing the murder, or my reason for being at the Brock last night.
“Sweet,” she said. I took that as a yes.
We inched our way out of the jammed dining room and down to street level, where we pushed through the crowded sidewalks on Grant, passing countless bins piled high with cheap imported goods—bamboo backscratchers, plastic pop guns, painted rice paper fans, carved wooden chopsticks—before reaching the address Mason had given me.
A small doorway was sandwiched between a souvenir shop and a Chinese apothecary. Brass mailboxes lined the entrance, each with a tiny label. I peered closely. There, after CHAN, HENRY, and CHANG, MEI, was COOMBS, HARLAN. Apartment 3C.
Mary and I looked at each other. Either Harlan had already absconded or he was the world’s worst fugitive.
“So push the buzzer,” Mary said impatiently.
“I’m not going to push the buzzer,” I said, reconsidering. “He might be dangerous.”
“Push the buzzer, Annie. C’mon—how many art dealers do you know who can really kick ass?”
Albert Mason flashed into my mind. She had a point. “Well . . .”
“He’s not gonna be here, anyway,” Mary persisted, reaching around me and pushing the buzzer. “Not if he did what you said he did, and not if people are looking for him.”
“Yes?” a woman’s voice said after several seconds.
Mary and I gawked at each other.
“Say something,” Mary hissed.
“Like what ?” I was terrible at improvising, my heart was pounding, and I was beginning to sweat.
“Package for, um, Harlan Coombs!” Mary shouted into the speaker.
The door buzzed. Mary smirked and pushed her way inside. Where did she learn to do things like this? I wondered as I followed her up a dark, grubby staircase that smelled of cabbage and unfamiliar spices. Mary was from a small town in Indiana. People from small towns in Indiana were supposed to be cautious.
Then again, Mary had hitchhiked to San Francisco the day she turned eighteen.
We reached the third-floor landing and paused to catch our breath. A long, unremarkable hallway was painted a dingy yellow and illuminated by a single bare bulb in the ceiling. Muffled sounds from televisions and the clanking of pots and pans drifted down the hall.
My enthusiasm for this undertaking was waning. What if Coombs was the exception to the art-dealer-as-wimp rule? What if he was a former-Navy-SEAL-turned-art-dealer-turned-criminal? What was I going to say? “Heya,
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