His wife started after him and then turned back, pausing beside a window. Her face was hard with thought.

“My husband is a terribly jealous man.”

“Is that why he sent for me?”

“He sent for you because I asked him to. I want my picture back. It’s the only thing I have of Richard Chantry’s.”

I sat on the arm of a deep chair and reopened my notebook. “Describe it for me, will you?”

“It’s a portrait of a youngish woman, rather conventionalized. The colors are simple and bright, Indian colors. She has yellow hair, a red and black serape. Richard was very much influenced by Indian art in his early period.”

“Was this an early painting?”

“I don’t really know. The man I bought it from couldn’t date it.”

“How do you know it’s genuine?”

“I think I can tell by looking at it. And the dealer vouched for its authenticity. He was close to Richard back in the Arizona days. He only recently came here to Santa Teresa. His name is Paul Grimes.”

“Do you have a photograph of the painting?”

“I haven’t, but Mr. Grimes has. I’m sure he’d let you have a look at it. He has a small gallery in the lower town.”

“I better talk to him first. May I use your phone?”

She led me into a room where her husband was sitting at an old rolltop desk. The scarred oak sides of the desk contrasted with the fine teakwood paneling that lined the walls. Biemeyer didn’t look around. He was studying an aerial photograph that hung above the desk. It was a picture of the biggest hole in the ground I’d ever seen.

He said with nostalgic pride, “That was my copper mine.”

“I’ve always hated that picture,” his wife said. “I wish you’d take it down.”

“It bought you this house, Ruth.”

“Lucky me. Do you mind if Mr. Archer uses the phone?”

“Yes. I do mind. There ought to be some place in a four-hundred-thousand-dollar building where a man can sit down in peace.”

He got up abruptly and left the room.

^chapter

2

Ruth Biemeyer leaned on the doorframe, exhibiting the profile of her body. It wasn’t young any longer, but tennis and possibly anger had kept it thin and taut.

“Is your husband always like this?”

“Not always. He’s worried these days.”

“About the missing picture?”

“That’s part of it.”

“What’s the rest?”

“It may be connected with the picture, as a matter of fact.” She hesitated. “Our daughter, Doris, is an undergraduate at the university and it’s brought her into contact with some people we wouldn’t normally choose for her. You know how it is.”

“How old is Doris?”

“Twenty. She’s a sophomore.”

“Living at home?”

“Unfortunately not. Doris moved out last month at the start of the fall semester. We got her an apartment in Academia Village on the edge of the campus. I wanted her to stay here, of course, but she said she had a right to her own life-style, just as Jack and I have a right to ours. She’s always been very critical of Jack’s drinking. Mine, too, if you want the exact truth.”

“Is Doris into drugs?”

“I wouldn’t say that. Not deeply, anyway.” She was silent for a while, imagining her daughter’s life, which seemed to frighten her. “I’m not too crazy about some of the people she goes around with.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“There’s a boy named Fred Johnson, whom she’s brought to the house. Actually he’s a pretty ancient boy; he must be at least thirty. He’s one of those perpetual students who hang around the university because they like the atmosphere, or the pickings.”

“Do you suspect he could have stolen your picture?”

“I wouldn’t put it that strongly. But he is interested in art. He’s a docent at the art museum, and taking college courses in that field. He was familiar with Richard Chantry’s name, in fact he seemed quite knowledgeable about him.”

“Wouldn’t that be true of local art students in general?”

“I suppose so. But Fred Johnson showed unusual interest in the picture.”

“Can you give me a description of Fred Johnson?”

“I can try.”

I opened my notebook again and leaned on the rolltop desk. She sat in the swivel chair facing me.

“Color of hair?”

“Reddish blond. He wears his hair quite long. It’s already thinning a bit on top. But he compensates for that with his mustache. He has one of those big bristly shoebrush mustaches. His teeth aren’t very good. His nose is too long.”

“What color are his eyes? Blue?”

“More greenish. It’s his eyes that really bother me. He never looks straight at you, at least he didn’t at me.”

“Tall or short?”

“Medium size. Five foot nine, perhaps. Quite slender. On the whole he isn’t bad-looking, if you like the type.”

“And Doris does?”

“I’m afraid so. She likes Fred Johnson much too well to suit me.”

“And Fred liked the missing picture?”

“He more than liked it. He was fascinated by it. He gave it a lot more attention than he gave my daughter. I sort of got the impression that he came here to visit the picture instead of her.”

“Did he say anything about it?”

She hesitated. “He said something to the effect that it looked like one of Chantry’s memory pictures. I asked him just what he meant. He said it was probably one of several Chantrys that hadn’t been painted directly from a model, but from memory. He seemed to think that added to its rarity and its value.”

“Did he mention its value?”

“He asked me how much I paid for it. I wouldn’t tell him—that’s my own little secret.”

“I can keep a secret.”

“So can I.” She opened the top drawer of the rolltop desk and brought out a local telephone directory. “You wanted to call Paul Grimes, didn’t you? Just don’t try to get the price out of him, either. I’ve sworn him to secrecy.”

I made a note of the dealer’s number and his address in the lower town. Then I called the number. A woman’s voice answered, faintly exotic, faintly guttural. She said that Grimes was busy with a client but would be free shortly. I gave her my name and said I would drop in later.

Ruth Biemeyer whispered urgently in my free ear, “Don’t mention me to her.”

I hung up. “Who is she?”

“I believe her name is Paola. She calls herself his secretary. I think their relationship may be more intimate than that.”

“Where’s her accent from?”

“Arizona. I believe she’s part Indian.”

I glanced up at the picture of the hole that Jack Biemeyer had made in the Arizona landscape. “This seems to be turning out to be an Arizona case. Didn’t you say Richard Chantry came from there?”

“Yes, he did. We all did. But we all ended up here in California.”

Her voice was flat, betraying no regret for the state she had left nor any particular pleasure with the state she lived in now. She sounded like a disappointed woman.

“Why did you come to California, Mrs. Biemeyer?”

“I suppose you’re thinking about something my husband said. That this is Dick Chantry’s town, or was, and that was why I wanted to settle here.”

“Is that true?”

“I suppose there’s some truth in it. Dick was the only good painter I ever knew really well. He taught me to see things. And I liked the idea of living in the place where he did his best work. He did it all in seven years, you know, and then he disappeared.”

“When?”

“If you want the exact date of his departure, it was July 4, 1950.”

“Are you sure he went of his own accord? He wasn’t murdered, or kidnapped?”

“He couldn’t have been. He left a letter to his wife, remember.”

“Is she still in town?”

“Very much so. As a matter of fact you can see her house from our house. It’s just across the barranca.”

“Do you know her?”

“I used to know Francine quite well, when we were young. She and I were never close, though. I’ve hardly seen her at all since we moved here. Why?”