A Fatal Frame of Mind

Chapter Eighteen

Now what? Gus thought desperately. There was no way the cop was going to let them in to see the painting. They’d be lucky if he didn’t arrest them just for trying. And if he got any kind of look at Kitteredge’s face, the professor would be in prison awaiting trial for murder, and they’d be sharing a cell for aiding and abetting.

“We’re just trying to get out, Officer,” Shawn said in the same voice he’d been using to feign innocence when caught red-handed since he was spotted dumping a jar of green tempera powder on Suki Stern in kindergarten.

“There’s no exit through that door,” the officer said.

“Well, thank God you came along to let us know that in time,” Shawn said, an extra coating of sugar on his tone. “If we’d gone in there, we might have been broiled alive.”

As opposed to simply getting the lethal injection, Gus thought. Which is what we’ll be facing once that cop recognizes Professor Kitteredge.

“No danger of that,” the officer said. “There’s no fire. But we are evacuating the building. Follow me and I’ll show you the way to the exit.”

“Thank you again, Officer,” Shawn said.

“That is, if your friend feels like getting off the phone,” the officer said.

Gus turned to see that Kitteredge was holding Shawn’s phone to his left ear with his right hand, allowing him to cover most of his face with forearm and elbow.

“That’s Uncle Leroy for you,” Shawn said. “Anything interesting happens, he’s got to tell Aunt Mabel about it right away. Come on, Uncle Leroy.”

Kitteredge seemed to recognize his cue. “Don’t worry about me, Mabel. You’ve got to see to those chickens,” he said into the phone. “And when you’re done, the cows are going to need milking. And the hay needs to be baled. Plus there are those pies to bake.”

Shawn took Kitteredge’s free elbow and started to guide him toward the cop. “That’s plenty of rustic charm, Uncle Leroy,” he said. “I’m sure Aunt Mabel remembers what to do.”

“I’m glad somebody does,” the cop said, turning and headed toward the main lobby. He was expecting them to follow, and if they didn’t he’d come back fast to find out why. And the first place he’d look would be Guenevere ’s gallery. Forget about three minutes with the painting; they’d be lucky to get three seconds.

Shawn was shuffling his feet, moving as slowly as possible while still maintaining a defensible level of forward momentum in case the cop glanced back, when there was a shout from behind them.

“Police! Help!” a man’s voice shouted.

Gus turned to see the long-haul trucker from the cafe rushing past them to reach the officer, trailing his two small children behind him.

“What’s the problem?” the cop said.

“It’s my wife,” the trucker said. “She’s stuck in Chinese porcelain. You’ve got to help her.”

“Is she hurt?” the cop said.

“Her feelings are,” the trucker said. “And believe me, that’s bad enough. She saw you helping that pregnant woman out a couple of minutes ago.”

“So?” the officer said.

“She says she’s entitled to the same level of service as anyone else,” the trucker said. “And if assistance is being offered, she wants some, too.”

The cop stared at him, dumbfounded. “Are you serious?”

“I wish I wasn’t,” the trucker said. “She’s sitting on the floor and won’t get up until she gets everything she deserves. Even if that means burning up in an inferno and leaving our poor children motherless.”

The cop looked down at the children, who stared back up at him seriously. Then he muttered something under his breath and turned back to Shawn. “Exit’s that way,” he said pointing in the direction he’d been heading. “Follow the crowd and you can’t miss it. Don’t be here when I get back.”

The trucker led the officer back in the direction he’d come from. Gus let out a sigh of relief as the three of them crept back to the gallery entrance and pushed the door open. They bolted through and let the door shut behind them.

As Gus looked around the deserted gallery he marveled that less than twenty hours had passed since he’d been here. Since then the entire world had changed. The man he respected most in the world was a wanted fugitive, and Gus was helping him escape the police. He might have expected the gallery to have changed in that time to reflect the new situation, for the lights to be lower or the walls to be closing in or the floor split by a jagged fissure through which they could fall straight into hell.

But nothing looked any different than it had the night before. Sure, there were gray smudges on the walls where crime scene techs had brushed for fingerprints, and there was some dried blood etched in the grout between the marble tiles of the floor. But if you didn’t know what you were looking for, you’d never know this had been the scene of such a terrible crime. You couldn’t even see the tape outline of Filkins’ body on the ground, as the red velvet drape had been closed over the painting again.

“Okay, Professor,” Shawn said. “You’ve got three minutes.”

Gus looked back to see that Kitteredge was frozen by the gallery door. “Professor Kitteredge?” he said.

Kitteredge seemed to shake off the spell. “Sorry,” he said. “This picture has haunted me for so long, it’s hard to believe that it’s actually behind that curtain, even though I saw it last night.”

“And we know how well that turned out,” Shawn said. “We’ve got to move fast. If you start staring moonily at that picture, or start lecturing us about it, we’ll all be caught and you’ll never see it again. Get up close, take the pictures, and get out. Okay?”

“I understand,” Kitteredge said. “I’ll try to hold off my emotional reaction until the proper moment.”

“Here’s a hint,” Shawn said. “You’ll know that the proper moment has arrived when I’m not around.”

Kitteredge nodded absently at him, and Gus went to the draped wall. He tried to move the curtain along its rings, but it wouldn’t budge.

“It’s stuck,” Gus said, feeling a new sense of panic rising in him. “We’re going to have to pull it down.”

“Or we could just do what Lassie did and use the control thingy.” Shawn stepped past Gus, reached into the folds of the curtain, and came up with the device. He pushed the button.

Above their heads, the small motors whirred and whined, and the red curtain began to move across the wall.

“This is exciting,” Shawn said. “I’m so glad we didn’t do what I wanted to do last night. Because we’d never see anything like a red velvet curtain if we went to the Bijoux Theatre. Oh, except for the one in front of the screen.”

“If C. Thomas Howell is in jail because someone framed him for murder, then I’ll consider the possibility that we went to the wrong event,” Gus said.

“I’m sure C. Thomas Howell is perfectly capable of ending up in jail without the help of someone framing him for murder,” Shawn said. “And then he could solve the crime from inside his cell with the help of the beautiful young warden’s daughter, who just happens to stroll around the prison yard topless. In fact, I think that one is playing at the festival.”

“Well, if we clear Professor Kitteredge’s name before eight o’clock tonight, we can still make it in time for night three of the festival,” Gus said. “Meanwhile, maybe we should focus on this case.”

Shawn shrugged. Gus turned to make sure that Professor Kitteredge had started taking pictures instead of staring in awe at the painting.

But Kitteredge wasn’t taking pictures. He was staring straight ahead, a look of despair on his face.

“Professor, we need to get moving,” Gus said.

“We’re too late,” Kitteredge said. He raised a hand and pointed at the wall the curtain had just revealed.

Gus turned to see what he was pointing at, and his heart sank. On the wall, the ornate frame was hanging just as it had the night before. But inside the frame there was nothing but blank wall.

The painting was gone.