Mother of God

By Jack Gunter

in book three, a mission oak chair in the basement of an old state mental hospital leads wally winchester to take a job as a substitute voc ed teacher so he can snoop around for vintage stickley furniture. after a rocky initiation to the world of defiant students and narrow-minded administrators, he invents an ebay class that opens a new world to the wayward youngsters but puts him at odds with the secretary of schools, a rigid ex-marine who has an eye for his wife.
in the endpapers of an old leather-bound atlas he finds in the old estate library, wally finds a cryptic inscription that sends him to eastern russia in search of the kazanskaya, the mother of god of kazan, known as the protectress of russia and believed lost in a turn-of-the-century fire. with the prize of a lifetime in his possession he faces a five-day train ride to moscow that turns into a circus of danger and deception as he rides a rumor wave spreading across the russian homeland that something wonderful is about to occur.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jack Gunter
• Release date: Jun 12, 2012
• ISBN: 9781310490378

Jack Gunter

Jack Gunter, born 1947, is a prominent Pacific Northwest writer, artist, and antique dealer specializing in twentieth century decorative arts. With a degree in biology from Bowdoin College and graduate training in organic chemistry from the University of New Hampshire, he was teaching junior high school science in Massachusetts in 1974 when he wrote and illustrated his first book, "The Gunter Papers", Avon Books, N.Y., which he describes as a futuristic junior high school science curriculum and guide to the fourth dimension. The counter culture science textbook received a glowing review from Stewart Brand, creator of "The Whole Earth Catalog." Searching for a more creative teaching environment, Jack ran the vocational education program in a little alternative school in central Massachusetts, where he started a student-run gas station and discovered that many of the students wanted to learn to paint. Not a painter, he taught art by the seat of his pants and discovered that he had a talent for painting. A self taught artist using the ancient technique of egg tempera painting, he exhibited his large format works in several New England museums and was included in an Andrew Wyeth and Family show in the Sharon, N.H. Art Center in 1979. That year a studio fire claimed all of his existing paintings and landed him in Washington State with a pick up truck, his dog, and the clothes on his back. He settled on an island in Puget Sound when he discovered that he was the only person in a thousand mile radius who wanted mission oak objects and the Northwest was chock full of Mr. Stickley's furniture. Since moving to Camano Island he has created over one thousand additional paintings, three movies as a SAG indie filmmaker, and five books -- an illustrated guide to Northwest history narrated by a flying pig: "A Pictorial History of the Pacific Northwest Including the Future", four novels in the Wally Winchester adventure series: "Original Finish", "The Egg Rocker", "Mother of God", and "Soft Focus", along with the science textbook published by Avon Books, NY, NY in 1974.. He lives in a cliff-side cabin with views of the Olympic Mountains, eagles, and spouting whales out his front window while he works on his first Wally Winchester zombie adventure tentatively titled: Tintoretto's Daughter.

Book preview

Chapter One

Woodshop Building, Colby Academy, Traften, Washington

It wasn’t a loud sound, just an unlikely creaking from somewhere down in the basement of the century-old building. Lazlo heard the noise in the woodshop as he cranked the handles on his clamps. A yellow line of carpenter’s wood glue oozed out between two mahogany boards as he tightened the handle bar.

He shrugged and went back to his work. The old shop always had something to say. Wood shrinks in the winter cold outside, expands with the heat inside, and the wind rattles the windows. Maybe it was those damn mice. Too loud in here,especially in the daytime when the kids are working, to hear anything but their cussing.

He heard it again. Definitely downstairs, and it wasn’t the wind in the willows, more like something dragged across the floor.

Who’s down there? He yelled into the darkness surrounding his lighted workspace. If it’s you kids again, in the tunnel, I’m going to kick your bony little asses, teacher or not!

Lazlo hated the tunnels. They frightened him. All the state hospital buildings, even the groups of grand bungalows at the north end of the former estate, were connected via underground passageways. Steam tunnels. He’d had to use them twice, both times to gain access to his building, and vowed never to set foot in them again.

He listened again, factoring out the whistling of the evening wind through the budding cherry trees outside.

Nothing.

He returned to his project, the grandmother tall clock, the birthday gift. Evenings were the only time that Lazlo dared to pull the carefully crafted mahogany case out of the double padlocked storage and work at turning it into a piece of fine furniture. In the evenings, it was safe from the prying, destructive hands of wayward youth. The long, empty rectangle rested on its back, awaiting embellishment. Tonight he would add the top, a task he had looked forward to.

The interruption bounced around in his thoughts.

He spat a Magyar curse into the darkness behind him. Tired in his old Hungarian bones, he straightened up and turned toward the stairs.

At the landing above the front doors, he stopped and listened, but heard only the wind and cherry tree symphony outside. Through the two wire mesh-reinforced glass windows in the doors below, he could see the new, late spring snow. He sighed as he walked down the stairs, wishing he’d brought the flashlight. The view from the landing as he looked out the widows was light snow swirling, surreal, through the white budding branches. No footprints marred the dusting on the walkway to the road. He sighed again when the light switches failed to illuminate the space below.

Fucking custodians. He descended into the gloom, fingering the keys on the ring at his belt. Three locked storage rooms and the door to the odious tunnel waited for him in the darkness. Lazlo stopped at the last step, where the light from the landing still ruled, and found the keys he’d need.

If it’s you kids, you’d better come out now! His croak betrayed his distress and he was embarrassed by his nervousness. You know enough not to be here after dark.

Silence again.

Last chance, you little shits.

No response.

Lazlo took another deep breath and added the Colby Academy staff members to his suspect list. His thoughts went first to the headmaster, Ed Bailie. Ed was known to spend evening hours at the school. He was always the last to leave on weekdays. The only key to the steam tunnels that Lazlo had seen belonged to Ed. He kept the key in the office. Lazlo had borrowed it twice.

The state hospital security people had keys, but no one saw those guys down at this end of the sprawling grounds. They made their rounds in the wee hours.

Ed? Laszlo didn’t expect a response. Ed would have let Lazlo know if he’d entered the woodshop building. They were friends, and Ed was no prankster.

Anyone could have grabbed the tunnel key, he thought. It hung on a hook next to Ed’s big hardwood desk. The office was usually unlocked. Even students hung out in there without supervision. Lazlo wondered about other teachers, but couldn’t imagine any of those overeducated hippies venturing into the state hospital grounds on a snowy evening.

That left the superintendent of schools, Colonel Lamontaigne, who kept an office across the quad, in the building where they taught math and reading. Deep in the Cascade Mountain shadows, when winter sunsets brought darkness at four in the afternoon, Lazlo had often noted Lamontaigne’s light still burning after 5:00 PM. He really didn’t know the man. The Colonel rarely interacted with the students or the staff, except to emerge from his lair red-faced, critical of some student’s tantrum. His ramrod posture reminded Lazlo of Russian tank commanders in Budapest during the 1955 invasion, shooting protesters and jerking Hungarian freedom fighters back under the iron curtain.

Lazlo ruled him out. The uptight administrator would have no reason to visit his woodshop on a dark, cold evening, particularly via the tunnels filled with slime and mold and other things to bugger up his shiny shoes.

He opened one of the storerooms, listened, and felt around for the light switch on the wall inside. Utilitarian old hospital furniture, mostly hardwood, was all he saw. He went to the second door, unlocked it, and found more of the same.

Think about the clock, Lazlo. Her birthday is just around the corner.

A flash of light illuminated the small, glass-and-wire widow high up on the tunnel door. Lazlo saw it and cursed his luck. He scanned the shadowy basement, looking for anything he could use in his defense … a shovel, a screwdriver, a baseball bat, a piece of broken glass. He saw clean, dimly lit concrete corners.

The wobble in his legs wasn’t fear, he told himself. He’d faced Russian bayonets and the wide barrels of their tank cannons. Adjusting the tight-brimmed cap that had been part of his life for almost 55 years, he walked toward the door he’d been hoping to avoid. He turned the tarnished doorknob and felt it give, unlocked.

Cool, stale air flowed out when he opened the door. A dim bulb far into the dark tunnel seemed a mile away.

You in there! Come out! Lazlo shouted into the void. At his feet, in the dim light from the open door, a hundred cigarette butts covered the damp, trashy floor. He stood back, chin down and forward, peering into the blackness.

A flashlight beam lit the floor 30 feet into the dark.

Lazlo. It was a voice he knew. Is that you at the door? What are you doing in the woodshop this late?

Relief swept over Lazlo. I can ask you the same thing.

I seem to have twisted my ankle. On this bleeping trash. Can you give me a hand out of here?

Lazlo hesitated.

I’ll shine the flash beam out toward you, Lazlo, so you don’t trip yourself.

A circle of illumination marched over discarded heaps of clothing and a narrow mattress folded like half a soggy sandwich against the filthy wall. Lazlo shrugged and stepped into the glow, picking his way through years of neglect.

The voice was louder now. Lazlo thought he heard a chuckle.

Thanks, Lazlo.I really need a hand.

The pain at the back of Lazlo’s head was throbbing and intense. He watched the walls spin, then stop. He vomited onto a sawdust pile on the floor. A whining electric motor crowded his thoughts. Thirty-six hundred rpms? Sounds like the big Delta table saw.

Lazlo barked orders to his useless arms and legs. He felt someone’s arms encircle his chest.

Come on buddy. Back on your feet, the voice he knew whispered in his ear.

Lazlo was conscious again, cold metal against his cheek. The sound of the blade was deafening. He turned his head and looked sideways toward the saw, six inches from his nose. He was pinned on the saw table by someone very strong. His arms and legs seemed to belong to someone else. One shoulder was tilted toward the whirring blade. Cranked high for thick boards, he thought idly. At the end of his arm he could see a hand. It was too near that blade. Another set of hands held his elbow and wrist like a two-by-four.

Lazlo heard the voice again, behind him. Measure twice, cut once.

Chapter Two

Manaus, Brazil

When the van with the men in it turned around and headed back toward her, the young, red-haired woman knew there would be trouble. She increased her pace a little. The safety of a brightly lit bodega at the distant intersection seemed a million kilometers away. In this forgotten neighborhood of boarded windows and faded paint, the street lamps were dark, their bulbs stolen.

She smiled grimly, thinking of the poles she’d shinnied up when she was younger, risking a frightful fall for a two-peso glass bulb. She looked around again for a lighted window, or an open door, but at this hour, darkness ruled.

The vehicle rumbled by. A scruffy man looked out the passenger window. He asked her for directions to the bus station. He sounded drunk. The accent said Brazilian highlands. A local. She ignored him and walked ahead, clutching a bag of groceries to her chest like body armor. The vehicle slowed and kept pace.

Hey, chucha. He slurred the Portuguese insult. We gonna party, no?

She shook her head silently and looked for an alley or a side street with a business still open. She saw neither.

The sound of the van’s side door rolling open did not make her alter her deliberate stride. A glance showed two men holding bottles. She smelled whiskey.

The van surged forward and angled across the sidewalk and stopped, blocking her path.

Her choices for escape narrowed to none. She halted and peered over the top of her grocery bag at the two men stepping out. One held a dirty tumbler as the other poured amber liquid in its direction, managing to get some in. Come, drink, little whore. It’s good.

She stepped backward. The scruffy man in the passenger window laughed and encouraged his friends. She spotted the driver as he left the vehicle from the opposite side, his feet visible under the van as he tiptoed toward the back in a flanking tactic. Drawing deep, centering breaths, she turned to face the drinkers.

When a cloth smelling of ether was thrust over her nose from behind her, she shut her windpipe. The attacker pulled her to the ground. She concentrated on not breathing.

She opened her eyes, saw three men above her in the dark van interior, their faces illuminated briefly by the lights of a passing car. Fresh air mingled with the odor of motor oil and garbage as the vehicle bounced down a bumpy road. The cold, hard surface of a spare tire pushed at her face. Rough hands pawed at her body. Loud laughter and ugly curses filled her ears as she struggled to free her hands, bound behind her with material that felt like tape.

Untie my hands, she pleaded through her tears. The pain in my shoulder is great.

You won’t feel pain for long, Puta.

Please. I won’t struggle. I’m lying on my hands and it hurts. If you free my hands, you can have me.

We will have you, chucha. Rest assured.

Rough hands pulled her up to a sitting position and ripped the duct tape from her wrists.

Party time, the voice of the man behind her said.

She smiled as she leaped to her feet. Party time, she echoed, and struck the man behind her in his throat with the side of her hand, felt his windpipe collapse, watched his eyes widen, heard the rattle of his ruined attempt to breathe. She turned to the others.

The woman who called herself Chana read the story buried on an interior page in the newspaper with some interest. It reported a gruesome discovery down by the river’s edge—four men found naked and dead in a van. The article suggested a gang slaying. A police quote said they were investigating, but she knew it would end there.

She cut the article from the paper, opened her backpack, and withdrew a tan folder. The file is getting thick. Perhaps it’s time to start a new hobby.

The top clipping in the pile told of the mysterious string of deaths in Manaus after the list of child molesters appeared in the paper the month before.

Chana closed her folder and smiled. Yes. These men would be the last.

A knock on the door brought her to the here and now—a hot, dark, second-floor flat that hadn’t seen electric service since she discovered it empty and moved in a month before. She hid her knapsack in a hollow spot in the wall behind the television set where a white plastic electrical outlet cover held the hidden door in place. Satisfied, she replaced the TV plug in a dead receptacle. Visitors to her squat were rare. Trust in this part of town was rarer still.

Who is it? She asked in Portuguese.

A friend.

I have no friends. What do you want?

I want to hire you.

I’m not for hire. Go away.

Your name is Sandra. Born in the uplands. Orphaned at age 11. Lived as the consort of your village executioner until age 16, when you escaped. Grew up on the streets of Manaus. Named as the director of a terrorist training facility at age 22. Acted as chief of security for insurgent leader, Claus Braun, until he went dark last year.

I’m retired.

You’re 24 years old. How can you be retired?

How do you know so much about me?

My business is finding people who don’t want to be found. I was sent here by Yvgeney Ivanchenko.

Chana opened the door and saw a square-jawed Caucasian. He stood erect, relaxed but attentive, neatly barbered and dressed.

She frowned.

He looked around the tiny apartment at nothing but a silent television set and a mat for sleeping on the floor. Looks like you missed out on the pension plan. Do you know Mr. Ivanchenko?

The last time I saw him, he threw me off a bridge, Pointing at the floor, she said, Make yourself at home.

Chapter Three

Puget Sound, Washington

How, exactly, will I recognize this artwork we’re after, Wally?

Don’t worry. I’ll touch the frame as we wander past it.

Wally Winchester’s ears were uncovered by the seven-knot crossing wind that buffeted his face and pushed his unruly light-brown hair off his bulldog-wrinkled face. He squinted over the finely dressed woman’s shoulder into the low intense sun setting over the Olympic Mountains. Behind her, he saw three-story brick boxes and silhouettes of dry-docked battleships slowly became larger, creating the familiar skyline.

The woman beside him produced a small wool cap from her handbag and tucked some of her soft blonde hair under it to keep it out of her eyes. She’d worked too hard on this coiffure to lose it to the wind. From the rail of the blustery second deck, looking back, the Seattle skyline glistened like a row of quartz crystals.

Describe it to me anyway, Babe, she shouted into the slipstream. In case I get to it before you.

OK, Rae. Just so you know what we’re after. We’ll have one shot at this painting. As I remember it, it’s about two feet wide and 18 inches high. It’s a night scene, colored bright pthalo green.

"What, exactly, is pthalo green?’

It’s an electric blue-green. A painting of a cabin with soft lights glowing in the windows. It’s very luminous. There’s a signature on it, down on the lower right, but it won’t help you, it’s just a squiggle for Charles Rollo Peters. Look for a California frame.

Rae Roberts tilted her perfect chin, looked at him.

That’s a small inside frame next to the painting, then a flat board a couple inches wide, then a bigger frame on the outside, Wally said. See the frame, find the picture. And don’t mention the name when you see it. Lester doesn’t know who painted it. You’re supposed to be rich, bored and totally without art knowledge.

I think I can fake the rich part, Wally. Rae batted her eyelashes.

Baby, you’re gonna make us a ton of money. And by the way, I love what you did to yourself, you look like a million dollars.

How much do you want me to spend to make you this ton of money, Bucko? How big a pile of purchases are we going to make? She felt complete in her costume: silk-lined black velvet cape over a Donna Karan cashmere sweater, black. Black wool trousers and indigo Christian LaCroix pumps. Until she’d stepped out onto the windy second-level promenade deck near the ship’s bridge, the smart French bob that cost her 135 dollars that morning at Che Donald had framed her high cheekbones, giving her face the European aloofness the scam required.

I’m under-dressed, you know. That Christian La Croix pantsuit we saw last week in The Pinto Pony’s front window. The one with the blue-red contrast. That would have knocked this guy out.

Nice try, cowgirl. Wally laughed. If I spend 950 dollars for an outfit, I’m going to hang the fucker on the wall like a Cherokee robe. You’re going to clog up Lester’s radar with what you’re wearing now. Trust me, Rae. It’s working on me, and it’s my scheme.

I have another suggestion.

Shoot.

A French accent on English words is hard for me to fake. Let me speak to you in French and you can pretend to translate it to your pal, Lester, as anything you want.

Lester is not my pal, he’s a guy we’re running a game on, Rae. Don’t worry about the accent. The closest Lester’s been to France is probably Paris, Texas.

I see you went out of your way to dress up for this game, as you call it.

Lester sees me 10 times a year. I only have to look like a local dealer hired to entertain a cultured lady from Europe, show her the trendy places to buy antiques. It happens all the time.

Rae rolled her eyes. No collectors, to her knowledge, had ever hired Wally to show them where the hot antiques were, though he’d bragged that it had been a frequent occurrence back in New England where he had learned the trade. Rich Texans, he’d recounted, frequently contracted the Wally Winchester guide service to escort them on antique-hunting safaris all through New Hampshire and Maine, in exchange for a percentage of the day’s purchases.

I always dress this way. This is my costume, sweetie.

Rae looked at three layers of plaid wool garments and a white T-shirt, all of the clothing visible under an L. L. Bean safari jacket with tattered sleeves. To her, Wally looked like a panhandler, but a classy one who had once been respectable. He could be mistaken, she thought, for the former mayor of a small western town who’d fallen on lean times, or perhaps a dot.com software writer who hadn’t worked for a couple of years. He had a twinkle in those blue eyes, an intelligence that set him apart from the street people who dressed in similar fashion. Wally, she knew, believed that natural charm and his boyish, optimistic spirit trumped high fashion, and she truly believed he might have a point.

His role today was wake up and find a clean shirt and put his pants on. Her job was the hard one, she figured. Act like a rich trophy wife, alone in the Pacific Northwest and bored.

She’d given up the hope of teaching her partner of six years how to dress. He’d always come back with the Bill Gates defense.

Bill Gates, when he was young, Wally would say, dressed like shit, and he drove around in a hundred thousand dollar Mercedes with the back seat filled with empty chocolate milk cartons and Dick’s Hamburger wrappers. And he seems to be doing OK these days.

Wally returned to the briefing. When we walk through Lester’s shop, I’ll nod at things I want you to put in a purchase pile, or I’ll stroke them with a finger as if I’m wiping dust off. Anything you want to buy is also OK. Long as it’s not too expensive. The key is to look like you’re buying stuff on a whim.

I wish Yvgeney were here, she said. A Euro husband and wife would make more sense than a woman alone.

Not necessarily. Lester will be wary of anyone who wants this painting. He can’t figure out the signature but he knows it’s good. I know three people, art dealers, who have tried to get him to quote a price and failed. The trophy wife angle is best. Even better is a pissed-off trophy wife stuck in Seattle on a shitty spring overcast day with nothing to do but punish her old man by spending a lot of money.

The familiar shudder signaled that the ferry dock was near. Wally looked toward the stern, downstairs. Below, on the passenger deck, his neighbor Ralph sat wearing the red livery that the service threw in with the limo rental. Boat’s about to dock, Babe. Let’s wake up Ralph and get into character.

Eagles Nest Antiques and Collectables, Bremerton’s only high-end downtown store, hadn’t seen a customer for three hours. Lester Moody, thin, dark bearded, wearing a jeweler’s loup on his eyeglasses frame, watched the stretched Caddy pull up in front. He smiled for the first time today. He watched as a liveried driver opened the rear door for a tall, elegant woman wearing fancy clothes. He straightened his bow tie and tucked in his shirt.

A man emerged from the limo. Lester Moody frowned. It was Winchester.

What the hell’s he doing? The shopkeeper said aloud as the massive front door opened, allowing waterfront seaport sounds into his quiet domain.

Hey, Lester. Wally’s voice was too loud in the elegant shop. I brought you a real customer. All the way from France. Act nice.

Moody walked stiffly toward the couple, acknowledging Wally with a wary nod and bowing to the elegant woman. He extended his hand, Lester P. Moody at your service, Madame. Welcome to my humble store.

Rae looked disdainfully at Lester’s liver-spotted claw and nodded. Ramada DuPont. Her expression suggested she’d sniffed something rotten.

To Wally, the shop was anything but humble. Lester was a pro. Examples of high-end style and extraordinary craftsmanship filled every wall and table. A montage of Edward Curtis photographs, sepia-toned masterpieces that captured the last shreds of traditional freedoms the Western Native population could maintain, occupied a wall to itself. Wally looked at images of the gold-toned turn-of-the-century Puget Sound shoreline and guessed that land there was now worth 5,000 dollars a running foot. And these days there wasn’t a resident Indian in sight. Ironic. The original inhabitants of the Pacific Northwest now had benches in Pioneer Square or reservations tucked out of sight from their European inheritors, but posed snapshots of their ancestors were worth thousands.

Another wall offered a colorful collection of country store advertising graphics touting the benefits of patent medicines and liver cures. Bright Victorian fonts with chromolithographs of healthy children or buxom matrons left no question as to the guaranteed benefits of the elixirs.

Great lamps graced polished mahogany claw-foot tables. Pottery that originally sold for pennies now filled fancy china closets. Greenish aged-bronze statues and paintings in ornate gold-leafed frames screamed, A Rockefeller owned me once, now it’s your turn.

Wally looked vainly for the Charles Rollo Peters night scene. It wasn’t in sight. He panicked. That limo with Ralph and the uniform cost me 200 bucks, not to mention Rae’s fancy New York shoes.

Mzzz DuPont has hired me to escort her around Seattle, Lester. I’m supposed to show her some fine works of art. I brought her here anyway.

Thank you, Win … chester. Remind me to reinstate you on my Christmas list. His sneer belied his words.

Ziss une, ziss lamp, Monsieur Lestaire, how much? She fondled an Emeralite glass banker’s desk lamp that had just received the Wally Winchester fingerprint of approval.

Ah, two-fifty, Madame. US funds, not Euros.

"Muy bien." The shopkeeper didn’t catch the Spanish phrase.

Wally did, suppressed a chuckle. He looked about the room as Rae wandered, picking up objects and handing them to the flustered shopkeeper. The painting was nowhere in sight, and the pile of a Frenchwoman’s whimsy, a tightly woven Native American blanket that Lester described as Germantown, the Emeralite lamp, a Curtis gold-tone photo depicting a lone Indian on a horse, a windup tin Popeye toy with the original colorful box, a hammered copper vase with the symbol of a windmill that Wally had pointed to three times, and a tall, matte-green pottery vase with architectural handles jutting out like a Frank Lloyd Wright do-dad, was growing. He knew if they didn’t find the painting soon they would have to abandon the charade and beat a hasty, empty-handed retreat.

Rae peered down into a dome-topped trunk and extracted some vintage underwear. She looked at the proprietor and winked naughtily. He blushed. From under a lacy pile she pulled out a fringed buckskin dress. A Campfire Girl outfit, she figured, or maybe an Indian woman’s costume in an old-time settler’s pageant.

Vat is zis? She giggled. The devil was in her eye.

Just some old costume, I reckon. Lester’s blush deepened.

Vere iz your dressing room, Monsieur? Rae walked toward a work area behind the owner’s desk. She parted the felt curtain and pulled it back to reveal Lester’s not-yet-for-sale merchandise. Her eyes met Wally’s. He nodded.

I’m sorry Ma’am. That area is off limits.

This room vill be fine. Nose in the air, she walked boldly behind his counter into the small storeroom, parting the curtain wider and entering. She left it open, and began to disrobe inside.

Lester looked to Wally, who just smiled and shrugged. His objections, begun as a protest, ended when she removed the Donna Karan cashmere sweater. The fine woolen slacks slid to the floor into a luxurious pile at her feet, revealing French-cut panties.

The proprietor’s eyes darted back and forth between his two customers.

Wally raised his eyebrows and looked away, his attention on a Rookwood pottery vase.

Rae emerged, wearing the soft leather dress like a second skin. She held a green painting in a California frame under her arm. Vat iz zis?

A painting, from my private study collection. I’m afraid it’s not for sale.

Rae pouted. She glanced at the mass of items she had chosen. She turned and looked out at the waiting car.

I am bored, Monsieur Wally. Can we go now?

It’s your nickel, Madame. Wally looked out toward the waiting limo.

Can I write these up for you, Miss DuPont? Moody spoke gently, carefully.

She looked back at three or four thousand dollars worth of fine collectibles in an antique dealer’s dream-pile on Lester Moody’s counter. Eyes on the California painting, she said, No, I think I do not like this place. She held her chin up and scanned the ceiling in the direction of the door. Her back was ramrod straight, shoulders back.

Three hundred for the painting, Madame. The shopkeeper frowned as he placed the painting on the table.

Rae smiled sweetly and bumped her accent. Add it up, Monsieur Lestaire. She kissed his cheek. Would you reduce the price by, say, 20 of your US percentage points if I give you American cash?

Chapter Four

Baghdad, Iraq

Yvgeney Ivanchenko looked at the faces of the seven hard men assigned to him as private contractors in charge of his personal safety. He did not feel safe. Despite all the scars and broken noses and wind-blasted, leathery cheeks, bulging muscles and Special Forces training, they were still outside the Green Zone, on their own. It was a small team—one UN guy, a radar technician with some fancy hardware, and a handful of 700-dollar-a-day muscle. Not a group he would have chosen as companions on a desert treasure hunt. It was the price of UN-sponsored art reclamation research in the very dangerous city of Baghdad, Iraq.

Out of the stifling gloom, a red-haired giant wearing a pirate’s bandana marched up to the Russian investigator. He looked down at Yvgeney, I’m going outside, Doc. To wait for this specialist you sent for. It’s not a good neighborhood for an out-of-towner to wander around in. The little buggers have seen us here for three days now, long enough to round up a lynching party. The quicker we’re out of this museum the better, I say.

Yvgeney looked up into the 40-year-old Irishman’s nose, a souvenir of life in the IRA. The red net of broken capillaries that had already destroyed his cheeks was advancing past his nostrils. Nostrils, Sweeney had bragged, that once sniffed the sweet aroma of cordite before a murderous Belfast blast.

Watch your ass, Sweeney. Do not advertise the fact that we are here. Do not flirt with the local women. The Russian walked to where the technician, a shy and quiet Saudi named Asad, toiled over a juiced-up computer monitor bristling with wires and umbilicals attached to a device that resembled a red vacuum cleaner.

Got the gizmo running yet? Yvgeney was a fan of American slang and used it whenever he could, especially when he spoke English with other non-native English speakers.

One more switch, sir. This high-gain antenna will penetrate a concrete floor better than the low res factory equipment unit. We will be scanning in five minutes.

Yvgeney looked at the ruins of the looted interior of the National Science Library. Jagged electrical wires sprang like lightning from mosaic-tiled ceilings where grand light fixtures once hung. Lighter spaces on the empty walls suggested the absence of large paintings or tapestries. Bookshelves tumbled into dark disarray. Empty. Empty cases. Empty bookshelves. Empty storage rooms. Looters and art thieves at a blue-light special-frenzy. Open 24 hours, no cashiers. Not much damage, oddly, from the shock and awe. The damage came later, he knew. In the crazy weeks, years before, when there was no law, no retribution, no boss man. As if there were one now.

May you have everything you wish for, the meanest Chinese curse, ran through Yvgeney’s mind for the third time that day. His friend back in Seattle, Wally Winchester, had blessed him with that curse as a gift upon his reenlistment with UNESCO as an art theft investigator. Wally had offered it as a parting gesture, a little ball-busting thrown in. He had also whispered a second reminder to the Russian as they said goodbye at the SeaTac concourse 12 months before. And don’t forget, Yvgeney, no good deed goes unpunished.

The massive wooden door groaned open. Midday sun spilled into the dark ruin of the library entrance hall, illuminating the remains of a receptionist’s desk. The Irishman, Sweeney, silhouetted against the glare, shouted. Truck coming. Looks like a friendly, to the Russian. Sweeney barked orders into the headset he always seemed to wear.

Yvgeney looked at his watch. Twelve noon plus or minus. Baghdad Time. She is right on schedule.

A lone figure entered the library as the sound of the personnel carrier faded. Backlighted by the sunshine, her body looked small, elf-like, non-threatening. Chana. Yvgeney felt secure from harm for the first time since coming to Baghdad.

Hello, Yvgeney. Her English was precise, barely accented.

Hello, Chana, sorry to see you under such circumstances.

I am your sword, I am told, for 50 dollars an hour.

Yvgeney wanted to hug her. He wanted to sit her down and ask her how her life had been since they had parted company on a bridge over Deception Pass in Washington State. He wanted to say,I am so glad I did not kill you when we plunged into the water under the bridge. He wanted to say, I searched almost every day for news about you on all my intelligence channels and I am happy to find a way to link us up again.

Instead, he said, Let me introduce you to our security team.

She passed by him, close to his face. He looked for a sign, any tell. He got nothing. She was a blank read. Nice to have you at my back. It is good to feel safe.

Chapter Five

Woodshop Building, Colby Academy, Traften, Washington

Curled up in a deep oak inglenook, leafing through a photo magazine, Rae Roberts said, Hey, Wally, last Friday I went into the basement under the woodshop building out at the state hospital to look for some copier paper. I saw one of those chairs you like. The ones with the adjustable backs.

Wally sat up.There’s a Morris chair out at your school? Is it Mission-style like the one in the corner?

It’s square-ish. If that’s what you mean. I don’t know if it’s a Stickley or one of those other companies that you like.

A 40-watt bulb in a cased green-glass cone suspended from a wall-mounted O. C. White Company articulated lamp, patented 1897, cast a warm yellow glow on the new addition to the wall: the Charles Rollo Peters night scene of a farm house.

Describe that chair again, will you? Can you draw a picture? He liked the way the sunset caught Rae’s cheekbones. Nordic goddess came to mind. Shafts of setting sunlight fell on warm brown wood furnishings and multicolored Oriental rugs. Glimpsed through the trunks of three fat cedar trees in the front yard, the rugged backbone of the Olympic Mountains stood out in hazy relief.

Rae climbed out of the inglenook, walked to the bookcase, and returned with a brown-covered pamphlet. It’s like one in this catalogue, the Craftsman Furniture reprint. Opening the book, she said, This one, Wally, with no slats under the arms. She opened it toward Wally, pointing. She returned to the corner of the massive, flat-slatted inglenooksettee and sat among soft leather cushions, looking small despite her tall frame. A leaded-glass shaded floor lamp behind her glowed softly over her shoulders, onto the publication in her lap.

Wally bent over her