Read Online The Evil that Men Do by Jeanne M. Dams - Free Book Online

recognize. You keep forgetting, my dear, how long I was a policeman. I have been involved in bank robberies, hostage situations, abductions, the whole gamut, and I would lay any odds you care to propose that no one but the four of us was in that gallery.’
    â€˜Then where was the owner? Because I’m sure that Robinson woman is an employee.’
    â€˜Who knows? Perhaps off fetching that large painting, or escorting it. Escorting it, most likely. And I sincerely hope that their insurers never find out about that open door or the disabled alarm, because the painting would be whisked back to its home before you could say Sarah Robinson.’
    â€˜You don’t think  . . .’
    â€˜Why not? There was a prominent blank wall, right in the middle of the room. Just about the proper size, if I’m any judge, and certainly the proper position for the star of the show. Even a copy can be quite valuable, you know.’
    I stuck my tongue out at him. ‘Nonsense. Nobody would be that careless with a painting of value. Anyway, whatever was going on in that gallery, it didn’t have very much to do with the art; I’m reasonably sure of that. It was  . . . I don’t know what it was, but I can’t get that woman’s face out of my mind. Ms Robinson, I mean. I thought she was going to faint.’
    â€˜When we came in?’ Alan sounded dubious.
    â€˜No, in that odd little moment when everything froze. You were a few steps behind me, so maybe you couldn’t see her face, but it was white. Not pale, not what everyone means when they say that about a face, but white, like  . . . like paper, or a blank canvas. Alan, that’s the second time in twenty-four hours that I’ve seen naked fear on someone’s face.’
    â€˜And Ms Carter was there with her.’ Alan’s voice was very thoughtful.
    â€˜And she was very careful to let Ms Robinson know you were a policeman,’ I added. ‘Why?’
    Alan ran his hand down the back of his neck. ‘Lots of questions. I could do with a few answers.’
    â€˜Ms Carter has most of the answers. I’m sure of that.’
    He shifted on his bench. ‘What did they see, the two women, when they reacted so strongly?’
    I made a frustrated gesture with my hands. ‘That’s just it! I have no idea. When I looked where they were looking, all I saw was a group of people passing by, laughing and talking. They looked like perfectly normal tourists, some of them Japanese, maybe. Anyway there were a bunch of cameras in evidence. Nobody was doing anything in the least threatening, nobody was lurking, nobody was doing anything at all out of the ordinary. And they were gone in seconds.’
    We sat in silence for a while. Two children were playing ball with a black and white dog of uncertain ancestry, probably mostly terrier. A fat man sat solemnly chewing on a sandwich. A coach stopped in front of the Lygon Arms and discharged its load of tourists, Americans by their accents and rather vivid shirts.
    I sighed and stood up. ‘I have no useful ideas at all, and I’m hungry. The Swan?’
    We went off in search of sustenance.
    After lunch, of course, we took a nap. One of the lovely things about ageing is that one need not apologize for afternoon naps. I lay down sure that I wouldn’t sleep a wink for worrying about our problem, and woke two hours later chuckling.
    â€˜What’s funny?’ asked Alan, sitting up with a yawn.
    â€˜Oh, just a silly dream. I dreamt I was a little girl, and staying with Aunt Maude. She was really a great-great aunt or something of the sort. I was too young to get the relationships quite straight. I thought she was ancient, and I didn’t like her very much. She lived in a big, dark, gloomy house in Chicago that smelled of dust and old lady, and once for some reason I had to spend a day or two with her, without my parents. She served me some sort