Black Cat Weekly #53

By Kathleen Alcalá, Neil S. Plakcy, Garnett Elliott and 7 more

Black Cat Weekly presents a mix of mystery, science fiction, fantasy, and adventure stories every issue. #53 includes:

Mysteries / Suspense / Adventure:

“The Art of the Deal,” by Neil S. Plakcy [Michael Bracken Presents short story]
“Mickey Mantle Is Missing,” Hal Charles [Solve-It-Yourself Mystery]
“The Vaudeville Detective,” by Garnett Elliott [Barb Goffman Presents short story]
Half a Million Ransom, by Nicholas Carter [novel]
Deep Lake Mystery, by Carolyn Wells [novel]

Science Fiction & Fantasy:

“Sweetheart,” by Kathleen Alcalá [Cynthia Ward Presents short story]
“Out of the Sea,” by Leigh Brackett [novelet]
“And We Sailed the Mighty Dark,” by Frank Belknap Long [novelet]
“The Wings of Night,” by Lester del Rey [short story]
“Flight of the Silver Eagle,” by Arthur Leo Zagat [novella]

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wildside Press
• Release date: Sep 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9781667640310

Book preview

Table of Contents

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

THE CAT’S MEOW

TEAM BLACK CAT

THE ART OF THE DEAL, by Neil S. Plakcy

MICKEY MISSING MANTLE IS MISSING, by Hal Charles

THE VAUDEVILLE DETECTIVE, by Garnett Elliott

HALF A MILLION RANSOM, by Nicholas Carter

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

SWEETHEART, by Kathleen Alcalá

DEEP LAKE MYSTERY, by Carolyn Wells

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

OUT OF THE SEA, by Leigh Brackett

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

AND WE SAILED THE MIGHTY DARK, by Frank Belknap Long

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

THE WINGS OF NIGHT, by Lester Del Rey

FLIGHT OF THE SILVER EAGLE, by Arthur Leo Zagat

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

Copyright © 2022 by Wildside Press LLC.

Published by Wildside Press, LLC.

wildsidepress.com | bcmystery.com

*

The Art of the Deal is copyright © 2022 by Neil S. Plakcy. It appears here for the first time.

Mickey Mantle Is Missing is copyright © 2022 by Hal Blythe and Charlie Sweet. Reprinted by permission of the authors.

The Vaudeville Detective is copyright © 2012 by Garnett Elliott. Originally published in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, September 2012. Reprinted by permission of the author.

Half a Million Ransom, by Nicholas Carter, originally appeared in the January 16, 1915 issue of Nick Carter Stories.

Deep Lake Mystery, by Carolyn Wells originally appeared in 1928.

Sweetheart is copyright © 1991 by Kathleen Alcalá. Originally published in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, March 1991. Reprinted by permission of the author.

Out of the Sea, by Leigh Brackett, was originally published in Astonishing Stories, June 1942.

And We Sailed the Mighty Dark is copyright © 1948 by Frank Belknap Long, renewed 1976. Originally published in Startling Stories, March 1948. Reprinted by permission of the author’s estate.

The Wings of Night, by Lester del Rey, is copyright © 1942 Copyright © 1942 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc., renewed 1970. Originally published in Astounding Science Fiction, March 1942. Reprinted by permission of the author’s estate.

Flight of the Silver Eagle, by Arthur Leo Zagat, is copyright © 1937, renewed 1965 by Popular Library, Inc. Originally published in Thrilling Wonder Stories, April, 1937. Reprinted by permission of the author’s estate.

THE CAT’S MEOW

Welcome to Black Cat Weekly.

Our 53rd issue has some interesting artwork—not because of the quality or subject matter, but because it was created by computers using artificial intelligence and machine learning. I have been playing with Midjourney, an AI art program run from Discord, and several of the illustrations (and our cover!) this issue are the result. I don’t think artists are in any danger of being replaced, but the artwork is certainly fascinating, and creating it is quite addictive. Can you guess which illustrations are computer generated as you read this issue?

The next two issues are going to be done early, and back-to-back, due to staff vacations. We have all been working hard for the last few years, mostly from home, and it’s great that things are beginning to return to normal. Here’s to hoping the pandemic is winding down. It’s been ongoing too long.

Anyway, we have another great issue, and here’s the complete lineup:

Mysteries / Suspense / Adventure:

The Art of the Deal, by Neil S. Plakcy [Michael Bracken Presents short story]

Mickey Mantle Is Missing, Hal Charles [Solve-It-Yourself Mystery]

The Vaudeville Detective, by Garnett Elliott [Barb Goffman Presents short story]

Half a Million Ransom, by Nicholas Carter [novel]

Deep Lake Mystery, by Carolyn Wells [novel]

Science Fiction & Fantasy:

Sweetheart, by Kathleen Alcalá [Cynthia Ward Presents short story]

Out of the Sea, by Leigh Brackett [novelet]

And We Sailed the Mighty Dark, by Frank Belknap Long [novelet]

The Wings of Night, by Lester del Rey [short story]

Flight of the Silver Eagle, by Arthur Leo Zagat [novella]

Until next time, happy reading!

—John Betancourt

Editor, Black Cat Weekly

TEAM BLACK CAT

EDITOR

John Betancourt

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Barb Goffman

Michael Bracken

Paul Di Filippo

Darrell Schweitzer

Cynthia M. Ward

PRODUCTION

Sam Hogan

Karl Wurf

THE ART OF THE DEAL,

by Neil S. Plakcy

Most of my work as a Special Agent in the Miami office of the FBI keeps me at my desk, using my accounting background to analyze spreadsheets and track the flow of funds, but every so often I get the chance to go out in the field for a different kind of case. My involvement with the theft at the Miguel Martinez Museum of Contemporary Art was one of those.

It began with a call from Special Agent Miriam Washington, a member of the Art Crime Team, a group of sixteen agents responsible for addressing art and cultural property crimes. I need your help, Angus, she said. A couple of valuable paintings have disappeared from the warehouse at the Martinez Museum. Can you meet me there?

I had worked with Miriam the year before on another case, where I’d become intrigued by the work she did tracking art theft, fraud, looting, and trafficking across state and international lines. My ability to assemble and analyze data had been useful for Miriam then, and I assumed this one would involve more of the same.

The museum is in Wynwood, in a converted warehouse, Miriam said. I’ll text you the address.

I’d been to Wynwood once or twice before during the year I’d been assigned to Miami. It was a hipster neighborhood on the northern edge of Miami, filled with microbreweries, art galleries, and tattooed folks in their twenties and thirties.

I was twenty-seven and I liked a good fruit-flavored beer, but my skin was ink-free and while the FBI wouldn’t frown on a discreet tattoo or body piercing, I wasn’t interested in the pain.

Miriam hung up, and while I waited for her text to come through, I searched for information on the museum and its founder. Miguel Martinez had come from Cuba as a child and begun selling mangoes from a tree in his family’s back yard. By his teen years, he had recruited an army of other kids to sell fruit, flowers, and bottles of water at street corners and traffic lights. He had skipped college to focus on building a business importing produce and flowers from Central and South America.

My phone buzzed with Miriam’s incoming text, but I wanted to finish Martinez’s biography before I hit the road. He was a millionaire by age thirty-five, and after a chance encounter with a guy painting graffiti on the wall of his warehouse, he began collecting contemporary art.

On his fiftieth birthday, he’d opened the Martinez Museum to show off his collection. He owned works by Damien Hirst, Jeff Koons, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Julian Schnabel, among many others. None of the names meant anything to me, but if Martinez was collecting them, they were probably valuable. I was sure Miriam would fill in anything I needed to know.

It was an easy trip east from our office in the western suburb of Miramar down I-75, then across the county to Wynwood. As I navigated the narrow streets, I was impressed at how lively the area was, with graffiti art on the walls of old buildings, a skateboard company next to a bike rental operation, an art gallery beside an artisanal bakery.

I pulled into a small parking lot in front of the Martinez Museum. It was a three-story concrete box with big, frosted glass windows replacing the loading bays. The front door was locked, so I rang the buzzer. Special Agent Angus Green with the FBI, I said through the speaker. I’m here to meet Special Agent Miriam Washington.

The door buzzed and I pushed it open to a sky-lit lobby with polished concrete floors. A thirty-something hipster guy with a brown man bun approached me. I’m Dashiell Beckett, he said. Special Agent Washington is with Mr. Martinez right now. I can take you there.

Can you give me a quick tour first? I asked. I don’t know much about contemporary art.

Sure. Follow me. He led me into a gallery along the front wall, where the light diffused through those frosted windows. Small spotlights hung on tracks from the ceiling, focused on the paintings and other art works.

It wasn’t the kind of art I was familiar with, that’s for sure. A random pile of bicycles looked like something that you’d see on the deck of a freighter heading for Haiti. A concrete plinth that had been scraped and painted and weathered. Paintings that looked like the graffiti I’d seen on my way in.

Mr. Martinez specializes in art from the past fifty years, Beckett said, as we walked. He has an excellent eye, and he’s been one of the first to collect many of the most well-known contemporary artists.

And all this is valuable?

He smiled. Some more than others. That painting over there? It’s the first sale by a young Dominican artist who’s going to be very popular soon. Right now, it’s only worth a few thousand dollars—but someday, who knows?

I thought it was pretty good to sell your first painting for a few thousand dollars, especially when it looked like something I’d painted in elementary school, lots of brightly colored daubs of paint that appeared to have been randomly applied to the canvas.

We walked through that gallery, and the one beyond it, and Beckett pointed out a long, narrow painting that reminded me of a panoramic photograph. This one is by a painter who goes by the name Jett, with two t’s.

Despite its size, the painting was incredibly detailed. As I leaned in close, I saw that the left side of the painting began at a beach somewhere in the Caribbean, palm trees and a bright-blue sky. The sandy shore was filled with tourists in bathing suits and wraps, an elderly woman in a frilly beach hat, and a couple of kids building sandcastles.

Gradually the painting transitioned from the beach to a market scene, where vendors sold colorful piles of fruits and vegetables. From there the panorama continued to tin shacks nestled beneath towering banana trees. A wizened old woman stirred a pot over a fire, and tiny dark-skinned children played in the dirt.

It’s like the whole spectrum of life on an island, I said in wonderment. How does he do such precise work?

With a magnifying sheet over his easel, Beckett said. Mr. Martinez owns several of Jett’s works. We have another of a similar orientation in the storage area, which is unusual because Jett usually works on square canvases.

We walked into a third gallery, and I saw Miriam Washington speaking with a man in a form-fitting designer suit, with artfully styled black hair and piercing eyes. He oozed success. Miriam was a tall, dark-skinned woman who carried herself with the grace of a model, and in her two-inch heels she towered over Martinez.

Mr. Martinez, this is Agent Green, she said. I’m mentoring him in art theft investigation.

Pleased to meet you, sir, I said as I shook his hand. I was doubly pleased by Miriam’s introduction. I’d hoped for that kind of mentorship, and this was my first chance to take advantage of it.

And I you, he said, with a slight Spanish accent. I hope you will be able to help Agent Washington retrieve my paintings.

Mr. Martinez was about to take me into the warehouse at the back of the museum, Miriam said to me. Shall we all go?

Beckett bowed out, and Martinez led us to a door with a keypad. He punched a series of numbers in and the light on the lock turned green. He opened the door and we followed him into a large open space that had been subdivided into chicken wire compartments.

This area is climate and humidity controlled for optimum storage, he said. You’ll see a list on the door of each unit that indicates what’s stored here. We’re in the process of inventorying everything and attaching RFID tags, and that’s when we discovered that several pieces have gone missing.

Are you actively involved in the operation of the museum? I asked.

No, I leave that to my curator, Dash, and his assistants. When I say we, I really mean he and his staff. I focus on expanding the collection rather than managing what I already own.

He showed us a unit where one of the stolen artworks had been stored. The paintings were hung from clips that attached to long cables along each wall, and it didn’t look like there was anything missing.

I like to have Dash rotate various works in and out of storage, he said. He came back here to choose a painting for display, and that’s when he discovered that one was missing. He immediately began looking through all the other units, in case the works had been misplaced. He noticed other works had disappeared as well.

It doesn’t look like there’s any extra space in here, I said, pointing at the arrangement of paintings on the walls. Was the missing piece stored on the floor or in a crate?

He shook his head. Our thief was very clever. He touched the frame of one painting, and it moved easily along the cable. By rearranging the display, it looks like nothing is missing, so no one noticed a gaping hole.

How carefully do you vet your staff? Miriam asked.

Probably not as carefully as I should, Martinez said, and he pursed his lips. For full-time hires, like Dash, I commission a background check. Part-time and short-term hires go through a much less intense screening. We also offer internships to art history students from local universities, who simply have to be recommended by a faculty member.

We’ll need a list of all staff who had access to this room, Miriam said.

The keypad on the door, I said. Does it keep track of who comes and goes?

Martinez shook his head. It’s a common code. Anyone who works here is given it.

How about after-hours access? Miriam asked. Who can get in when the museum is closed?

Only Dash and I have the codes for the exterior doors, he said. Of course my administrative assistant knows them as well.

We’ll conduct a thorough check on the staff and review your security measures, Miriam said. And once I have a list of the missing works, I’ll put out feelers to see if any of them have surfaced on the market.

Martinez led us back into the gallery, where we met Dash Beckett again. Martinez asked him to assemble a list of the employees.

I assumed the FBI would want that, Beckett said, and handed a manila folder to Miriam. Copies of all our personnel applications ever since the museum was founded five years ago. Including mine.

That’s great, thanks. Miriam handed the folder to me. When do you think you’ll have a full inventory of what’s missing?

It’s going to take some time, Beckett said. And because we’re in the middle of interviewing two new assistant curators, we’re short-handed at present. He turned to Martinez. We have school groups scheduled nearly every day for the next two weeks, and I was planning to spend most of my time with them. Should we close the museum and go full tilt on the investigation?

Martinez shook his head. I don’t want to let this problem interfere with our mission.

Assembling a database was the kind of thing I’d done for Miriam in the past, and I assumed it was why she wanted my help now. I can give you a hand with the inventory, I said to Dash. If you’ll teach me as we go.

Excellent, Martinez said.

We spent a few more minutes at the museum, and I made arrangements with Beckett to meet him there the next morning at nine. It could get dirty, moving pictures around, Beckett said. Just saying. You might not want to get dressed up.

As Miriam and I walked out, she said, You have a few minutes, Angus?

I agreed, and we walked outside. She shucked the jacket of her navy suit, leaving her in a short-sleeved, open-necked white blouse, and I did the same thing, though my shirt was starchier than hers and accompanied by a navy tie with the logo of my alma mater, the Penn State Nittany Lion.

She led me to a coffee shop a block away. The early evening humidity was high, and even though we stuck to the shady side of the street I was sweating by the time we reached the air-conditioned comfort of the coffee shop.

We can’t ignore the possibility that this is an insurance situation, Miriam said, once we were seated in a corner of the shop. She had her coffee on ice, while I went for a hot mocha—even though it was sweltering outside, to me iced coffee is just cold coffee, and not appealing. And my grandmother had always insisted that hot drinks cooled you off. Maybe it was an old wives’ tale, but I believed her.

Martinez stages the theft and collects on the insurance, I said. I can check out his financials and those of the museum, see if he needs money.

And once we have the list of stolen works, you’ll need to research the value of each one. Don’t count on anything that Martinez or Beckett tell you—do your own independent estimates. Look for recent sales, articles on the artist’s reputation, showings at museums and so on.

Miriam had a PhD in art history and had worked in museums and galleries before joining the Bureau. Art crimes were only a part of her job, but clearly it was the part she liked the best.

I pulled out my phone and made notes. Right now, everyone and everything is on the table, Miriam said. Martinez himself. His gallery staff, including anyone who’s worked there in the past and could still have the codes.

She smiled. You have a good eye for detail. If there’s something to find, I’m sure you’ll find it.

Once again, I was flattered. I’m pleased to be working with you again, I said. And I appreciate your faith in me. With only a year under my belt as a Special Agent, I knew I had a lot to learn, and it was great when someone more senior was willing to teach me.

As I navigated the narrow streets out of Wynwood, I could see its roots in the fashion industry. Clothing importers with faded signs in English and Spanish were still salted into random blocks between bike shops and art galleries.

I was reminded of a cartoon I’d seen, about how hipsters could die—things like being run over by a self-driving car, falling off a cliff while Instagramming, or being strangled by a smart phone charging cable. If I was ever tempted to grow my hair long and pull it up into a man bun like Dashiell Beckett, I hoped someone would put me out of my misery.

On my way home, I called my boyfriend Lester to see if he was free to help me out that evening, and he agreed. He was an unlikely art aficionado, a former college athlete and bar bouncer who’d become a sales rep for artisanal whiskeys. He had grown up around art, and he and I had spent a lot of time at local art festivals and street fairs so that he could develop my eye.

Before Lester arrived, I did some research and discovered that until a few years before, Wynwood had been a desolate area of rail yards and warehouses, home to a small but thriving Puerto Rican community. Real estate prices on South Beach had pushed artists and entrepreneurs inland, and the area had become the newest home for galleries, brewpubs and millennials on the make.

Lester and I kissed hello, and then I led him to the kitchen table, where I’d set up my laptop. Can we start with a definition? I asked as I handed him a blueberry wheat beer. What makes something contemporary? Just that it’s being made today?

The idea is that artists today have a much wider range of inspiration than the ones of fifty or a hundred years ago. You don’t have to travel to Paris to see the works in the Louvre—they’re online. You can be inspired by cell phones or space travel or all kinds of things that were never even imagined until recently.

I told him about the incredibly detailed beach painting I’d seen at the gallery that day. That’s technique, he said. Using a magnifier like that. But there’s also social commentary. Comparing the island paradise that tourists see to the way natives live.

Like that pile of bicycles I saw, I said, nodding. The artist could be saying something about the first world versus the third world, right?

Or about the way we’ve abandoned getting around by our own power to rely on machines. It’s all in the way the viewer sees the work.

We pulled up a bunch of online images and talked about them, and by the time we finished, I had a better understanding of what I’d seen at the museum.

The next morning, I parked in the small lot beside the Martinez Museum and Dash Beckett buzzed me in. He wore board shorts and a T-shirt with an artist’s palette and a globe, with the logo Earth without Art is Just Eh.

I felt plebeian, because my T-shirt read Brains are awesome—I wish everybody had one!

Love the shirt, Dash said, as he welcomed me into the building. Let’s go into the back and get started.

We began at the cubicle closest to the door, which was filled with boxes and crates of all sizes. Each was labeled, and we compared them to the list on the outside of the cube.

How do we know that what’s on the label is what’s really in the box? I asked, when everything checked out. If the thief was sharp enough to reorganize the paintings so there was no empty space, he or she might be able to empty a box and reseal it.

I was thinking that myself, Dash said. I guess we’re going to have to open every box and check it.

He got an X-Acto knife and a roll of strapping tape, and we began unpacking each item, checking it, then repacking. It was slow, tedious work, and I could see why he needed the help.

We talked as we worked. You from Miami? I asked him.

Nope. Just moved here last year to take this job. Grew up outside Chicago, bachelor’s in art history from the University of Illinois, MA in Museum Studies from Johns Hopkins, he said. Worked at a couple of different galleries and museums until I got this gig. How about you?

I told him about my education, my brief time in accounting, and my transition to the FBI.

Must be really exciting, he said.

You mean this? I asked, waving my hand to encompass the boxes and cartons. Yeah, I’m in it for the glory.

He laughed. He lived nearby, rode his bike to work, had recently begun dating a Cuban American woman who painted and made collages of found objects. I told him how I’d been learning about art from Lester.

As it drew close to noon, he called the artisan bakery down the block and had sandwiches delivered for us. We’d gotten through four of the dozen cubicles by then, and we had discovered three more missing paintings.

We sat on the floor in the main gallery and ate our sandwiches. Mine was hydroponically grown mache lettuce, Spanish ham, and goat cheese from a farm in the Redlands, a farm neighborhood on the south end of Miami-Dade County. It was on ciabatta bread fresh from the oven, and it was awesome.

Everything that’s been stolen so far has been fairly small, I said, as I alternated bites of my sandwich with an icy cold small-batch root beer. You think someone could be smuggling this stuff out with no one noticing?

I suppose. We ask people to check backpacks and big bags when they come in, but that’s so they don’t damage any art as they walk around. And we have a couple of security cameras in the galleries, but not in the back.

Can you think of any staffers who carry a bag big enough to take something out?

Almost everyone, he said. Backpacks, messenger bags, painting tubes.

Why would someone carry a painting tube to a museum?

Some of our interns and part-time staff are also artists, he said. They’re often on their way somewhere when they stop by to work.

Every idea I had opened more doors, introduced more suspects. We finished our lunch and went back to work, and fortunately the rest of the cubes moved more quickly because most of the art was unpacked, hanging on the chicken wire walls. By four o’clock we had checked everything and had a list of fourteen missing pieces.

I finished tidying up the warehouse while Dash copied all the information he had on each of the works, including bills of sale. Martinez had purchased most of the stolen pieces from the Colee Hammock Gallery of Contemporary Art on Las Olas Boulevard in downtown Fort Lauderdale. That was statistically odd enough for me to ask Dash about it.

Small place, focused on up-and-coming artists, he said. Mr. Martinez is a friend of the owner. Because their mission dovetails with Mr. Martinez’s, it’s not unusual that we buy a lot of work through them.

Have you been to this gallery yourself?

Once, a few months ago.

Want to go back? I asked. I’d like to get a feel for the place, and having a professional like you with me would give me some extra cover.

He thought for a moment. How about if we make it a double date, he said. You, me, Carlotta and Lester. We’ll go out to dinner on Las Olas and wander over to the gallery, very casually. If I walk in as Mr. Martinez’s curator, they’ll treat me very differently.

I said I’d have to check with Lester and that I’d get back to him. Before I left, I asked, Is there anything that connects these other than they’re all contemporary?

Dash and I looked through photos of each work, comparing artists, prices and styles, and in the end, we couldn’t come up with anything. It was frustrating, but at least we knocked out that possibility.

On my way home I called Lester. He had to do a demo at a bar on Himmarshee Avenue, the restaurant row on the other side of US 1 from Las Olas, that Saturday at ten at night, so dinner would work out well. When I got home, I texted the plan to Dash and received a return text.

I’d worked up a sweat moving paintings and boxes around at the museum, so I took a leisurely shower, then sat down at my laptop to record the relevant parts of my day with Dash Beckett, stopping periodically to review everything I’d learned about the way the museum operated. It was like one of the locked-room mysteries I’d devoured as a teenager. How did the thief get the paintings and other artwork out of the museum without detection?

I’d have to put my little gray cells to work on that.

Lester was working that night at a club in Palm Beach, so we traded a couple of texts, and then I went to sleep. Saturday morning, I went for a long, sweaty run around the neighborhood, and after I had a shower and breakfast I sat back down at my laptop. Because Martinez Foods was a public company, I was able to find its most recent annual report online and I reviewed it as if I were an auditor, making sure that the numbers supported a view that the company was strong and profitable. It did appear so.

All the analysts whose projections I read agreed the company was in solid financial shape. Martinez earned a seven-figure salary, owned significant stock and held lots of options, so he had the income to support his art collecting habit.

A glossy magazine filled with ads for galleries had profiled Martinez as one of the art world’s most aggressive collectors, a patron of numerous art-related charities, and a fixture at events like the annual Art Basel exhibition. He and his wife owned a four-million-dollar house in a fancy neighborhood called Tahiti Beach, on the water south of downtown Miami, with no mortgage recorded. His collection was insured, but his policy had a high deductible, so there didn’t seem to be motivation for him to have staged the thefts in order to collect. As well, the individual works that were missing were all of relatively low value—from a low of ten thousand to under a hundred grand.

The fourteen missing pieces totaled a fairly impressive sum, at least to a guy like me, whose salary did not yet extend to purchasing more than a framed poster. Lester came over in the early afternoon, and after a romp in bed we showered and dressed to meet Dash Beckett and his girlfriend. I told Lester what I knew about Dash as we drove into downtown. He seems like a pretty cool guy, if you can ignore the man bun.

Better keep sharp knives away from me at dinner, Lester said. Make sure I don’t get irritated and chop it off.

We met Dash and Carlotta in front of the Cheesecake Factory at six-thirty. He’d taken his hair down, and it flowed around his shoulders. Carlotta looked like she fronted for a punk rock band—her hair was dyed blond, cropped to the skin on one side and long on the other. She wore a low-cut blouse that accentuated her assets and showed off the tattoos she had on her upper arms—what looked like Frida Kahlo and her unibrow on one shoulder, a collection of tools like a paintbrush, an easel, and a palette on the other.

We all said hello and decided to stroll around before dinner, making our visit to Colee Hammock Contemporary Art along the way.

We found the gallery a couple of blocks down the street. Plate glass windows looked into a white-walled room with art hung on the walls and a couple of dividers. We had to ring a buzzer in order to be admitted, and a Latin security guard opened the door for us. I noticed that he had an arrow shaved into the hair on the left side of his head, pointing up. Interesting, and a lot less permanent than tattoos like Carlotta’s.

She strode ahead of us, walking past several pieces, then stopped at a painting of a black man on his knees before a cloudy sky, one hand raised to the heavens with a broken shackle hanging from his wrist.

I hate this kind of shit, she said. So didactic. I don’t need you to tell me how to feel about your work. Oh, look, he’s been a slave, but now he’s free, thanking God for his release. Give me a fucking break.

Don’t hold back, Lester said. Tell us what you really feel.

She burst out laughing, then leaned against him. I like you, she said.

A slim young woman in a clingy black dress came up to us. Do you like Duval Calixte’s work? she asked. We have several examples.

Do you have any pieces by Jett? Dash asked. I love his stuff.

She shook her head. The last one we had was sold to a museum in Miami, she said. But I can take down your information and let you know if anything comes on the market.

Lester turned to Dash. With you traveling so much, bro, probably hard to reach you. Why don’t I give her my info instead?

That was my Lester, I thought, as Dash agreed. He’d realized that the gallery owner might recognize Dash’s name from the Martinez Museum.

The girl took down the information, and Dash added the names of a couple of the other artists whose work had been stolen. We do have a Billy Eustis, she said. It’s in the back right now but I can bring it out for you.

That would be great, Dash said. When she was gone, he turned to Lester. Thanks for pulling my fat out of the fire.

No problem. Those other artists you mentioned, they were all stolen, too?

A couple of them. I threw in some others so I wouldn’t set off any alarms. I doubt she’s going to bring out one of the stolen works, but I’m interested to see what she’s got and what it’s going for.

Billy Eustis, I discovered, was a sculptor, and the piece she wheeled out on a cart was a stone plinth inscribed with what looked like Mayan symbols. This is part of his newest collection, she says. He’s making a statement about the ubiquity of representational language. See how he mixes these ancient pictographs with modern emoticons?

She pointed out symbols for a throne, a house and a flower scattered among hearts, smiling faces and slices of pizza. Behind her back, Carlotta was making gagging motions and I had to struggle not to laugh.

We left the gallery a few minutes later. You watch, one day she’ll be talking like that about your work, Dash said to Carlotta. See if you throw up then.

I hope no one ever uses such pompous language about me.

What kind of art do you make? Lester asked.

You ever see one of those ransom notes made out of cut out letters from the newspaper? Dash asked.

Lester and I agreed as Carlotta elbowed him. That’s what she does. She won’t tell you but she’s making statements about the commercial nature of the art world as she does it.

I hate you, she said, and she stuck her tongue out at him.

But it’s true, isn’t it? he asked.

She sighed. Okay, I’m as much of a pompous ass at any of the artists in that gallery. And the truth is I’d love to have someone talk about my work like that. And sell it for those prices.

We discussed the art market as we walked, and then as we waited for a table. We went on to talk about Lester’s job, and Dash’s work at the museum. It was fun to have a night out with new people who might become friends. Even though I cautioned myself that Dash was still a suspect in the thefts, I’d warmed up to him and I thought Carlotta was a hoot, and after we left them, Lester said he felt the same way.

I’d like to see what she does before I make a final judgment, though, he said. If her art is crap then I’ll think less of her.

And you can make that kind of judgment?

So can you. If you like it, if you understand it, even if you don’t but it moves you somehow. If it doesn’t do any of that, then you’re entitled to call it crap. I just wouldn’t say it to her face. Any girl who can tolerate so many needles in her skin is scary tough.

Lester supplied me with a cocktail when we arrived at the bar where he was doing his demo, and I stayed in the background doing more research on the Martinez Museum during the hour it took him to get the bartender set up and trained on the specialty drinks.

I was surprised at how many aficionados in Miami, and other cities as well, had begun opening their private collections to the public in their own museums. In Wynwood alone there was the de la Cruz Collection, the Rubell Family Collection, the Margulies Collection, and the Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation. Martinez was part of an elite group.

I made notes to contact each one on Monday to see if they’d experienced any thefts. If they had, the case could be getting much larger.

When Lester began serving up custom cocktails made with the brands he represented, I took pictures of each one and posted them to both of our social media accounts along with links to recipes and the brand websites. As long as I was hanging around drinking for free, I figured I’d make myself useful.

Sunday morning Lester and I slept in, then went to an art fair in the parking lot of a strip mall in a western suburb called Parkland, which appeared to be more gated communities and shopping centers than actual parks.

I saw a lot of pieces that reminded me of what I’d seen at the Martinez Museum. What makes this stuff different from what’s there? I asked, as we stopped in front of a very pretty painting of a beach scene somewhere in the Caribbean. I mean, other than the size, how is this different from that one by Jett?

What does this painting say to you? Lester asked.

It makes me want to go there and lie on the sand.

And?

I shrugged.

Think about that painting you saw at the museum. You had a whole bunch of things to say about that, didn’t you?

But there was so much to think about with that. The technique, the social message… I stopped. Oh. I get it.

This stuff is beautiful, Lester said, waving his hand to encompass the paintings on the walls of the booth, all of them lovely, often impressionistic views of beaches and palm trees. And it can give you a visceral longing to be in the place. But that’s it.

It’s like the whiskies you’re selling, I said, and Lester cocked his head. You’re always telling me to pay attention to the different notes in what I’m drinking, the vanilla or the oak or whatever. To appreciate the depth. Just like the stuff in the museum.

Lester smiled and linked his arm in mine. We’re going to make an art expert out of you, he said. Miriam Washington is going to be gobsmacked by how much you know.

I doubted that, but I basked in Lester’s praise anyway.

Monday morning, I opened a new FD302, the form the Bureau used to record information. I entered everything I had learned at the museum, and at my visit to the gallery, in as much detail as I could provide. It always gave me a bit of a thrill to sign my name, Special Agent Angus Green, at the bottom.

I emailed a copy to Miriam Washington, along with the complete list of stolen work. With that out of the way, I contacted the director of each of the other private collections in Miami. None had experienced any thefts, but in each case, I left my name and contact information and asked to be notified if anything happened.

I was speaking with the last of the directors when Miriam appeared in the doorway of my office in a stylish gray suit with a tucked waist. I motioned her to a seat across from me, and after I hung up, she said, Great job on the FD302.

She wasn’t exactly gobsmacked, but I was happy with the praise. What’s your take on these thefts? she asked.

The implication is that this is an inside job. The thief is someone who has access to the gallery’s back room and knows how it’s organized. And he or she must be able to recognize the right painting quickly, then manipulate the other works so it doesn’t look like there’s something missing.

We knew that before we left the museum, Angus. What else?

So far the only thing that connects all fourteen works is that they’re contemporary, I said. Nine different artists represented, in a variety of sizes, media and styles. Could they be stolen to order?

That’s what I was thinking, too. I emailed you instructions on how to enter the works into the National Stolen Art File. In case someone has been offered one of these works and wants to check on the provenance, I want an online search to show that it’s been reported as stolen. I’m going to nose around among my contacts, too.

She left, and I read through the email she’d sent. Before I began entering data, I opened a browser at the public address for the database and began searching for each of the missing pieces. None of the fourteen were already listed there.

Then I went into the back end from the address Miriam had given me. I entered my login credentials and was offered the opportunity to add a work to the database. I began with one by Jean-Michel Basquiat. It was called Skeleton Plant, and fortunately I was able to find a picture of it online.

To me, it looked like a kid’s scribble of a plant growing out of a pot and branching into a skeletal head. But what did I know? I filled in the appropriate blanks: it was an abstract painting, with the title, the date and the signature on the back. Approximately three feet square, made of acrylic and oil stick on canvas. The incident type was stolen, the crime category painting, the maker Jean-Michel Basquiat, and the period 1986.

It took most of the day to enter all fourteen pieces into the database, because I often needed more information than Dash Beckett had provided. In a couple of cases I had to scan the photos Dash had given me