Chapter 4 - The Ghost of Pilsen
Julian’s laughter evaporated instantly, replaced by a cold, calculating stillness that confirmed my deduction.
"You're very sharp," Julian said, his fingers lightly drumming against the walnut desk. "Sharper than is healthy for someone in your position."
"A financier doesn't use a third-rate gallery owner like Victor to move twenty-million-dollar assets unless he has a supply chain problem he can't control," I stated, leaning over the desk. "If you had total control over the artist making these, you wouldn't need Victor’s frantic auction-night theatrics to force my hand. The forger is holding out on you, or they've raised their price."
Julian stood up and walked to the wall behind his desk. He pressed a concealed panel in the white plaster. A section of the wall swung silently inward, revealing a small, climate-controlled alcove.
Inside sat a small, battered wooden box—the kind used by nineteenth-century plein-air painters to carry oil tubes and palette knives. On the lid was a single, stylized monogram burned into the wood: *M.V.*
"Mateo Varga," I whispered, recognizing the mark.
"You know him?" Julian asked, turning back to me.
"Everyone in conservation knows the legend of Mateo Varga," I replied, my voice hushed. "He was the chief restorer for the Prado in Madrid during the late eighties. He disappeared after a scandal involving a Goya restoration that turned out to be an immaculate substitution. He was supposed to have died in South America ten years ago."
"He’s very much alive," Julian said. "And he lives less than four miles from here, in an abandoned brewery warehouse in Pilsen. He has the original Braque. He also has the original Modigliani, three genuine Cézanne watercolors, and the master plates for two early Picassos."
"Why hasn't he delivered the Braque to you?"
"Because three weeks ago, Mateo realized that Victor was cutting corners," Julian explained, his jaw tight. "Victor tried to cheat Mateo out of his fabrication fee by threatening to report him to Interpol. Mateo severed contact. He informed me that unless Victor was removed from the equation entirely, he would destroy the original Braque and mail the ashes to the Department of Justice, accompanied by our entire transaction ledger."
I stared at him, the full scale of the nightmare finally coming into focus. "That’s why Victor was panicking at the gala. That’s why he tried to auction me off. He was trying to prove to you that he still held the cards—that he controlled me."
"Victor thought that if he could force your public compliance, I would protect him from Mateo," Julian said coldly. "He failed to understand that in my world, dead weight is cut loose immediately."
"And what happens to Victor now?"
"That depends entirely on what happens in Pilsen tonight," Julian replied, pulling a heavy silver watch from his waistcoat pocket. "Mateo agreed to meet with one person: an independent conservator who can verify that the original canvas has not suffered irreparable stress during its time in storage. He refused to see me. He refused to see Victor. He requested *you*."
"He knows who I am?"
"Mateo read your monograph on the chemical preservation of early twentieth-century zinc pigments," Julian said with a trace of irony. "He considers you the only person in North America who truly understands his craft. If you come with me tonight, authenticate the original Braque, and secure its transfer to my transport team, I will personally dissolve Victor’s debts, hand over the forged liability agreements, and ensure that your name is entirely scrubbed from the federal records."
"And if I refuse?"
Julian looked at me, his gray eyes piercing and unyielding. "Then by tomorrow noon, the Chicago Police will execute a search warrant on your basement studio. They will find two crates of forged provenance seals bearing your thumbprints—crates that Victor’s logistics coordinator delivered there thirty minutes ago."
My blood ran cold. "You set that up before I even arrived here."
May you like
"I don't play games without setting the board first, Clara," Julian said softly. "You have two hours to prepare your diagnostic kit. We leave at dusk."
***
