Chapter 11
11
The address is on Rue des Rosiers. The area is arty and fashionable, and I pass familiar shoe shops selling short boots with high heels, and stores hawking expensive tailored shirts for men. Along with fashion boutiques, this arrondissement is home to several museums and galleries, so I know my way around. I particularly like the Jewish deli—it’s housed in an old dress store where blue mosaic tiles read “LES JOLIES JUPES” above windows now full of rugelach and challah bread.
I walk past a falafel shop where Simon hangs out in the evenings, holding court at one of the red vinyl booths, but it must be too early, because I don’t spot him now.
The app on my phone tells me I’ve reached my destination, a vintage shop, the kind with a pastiche of goods from black lace skirts to silver tea sets to sky-blue vanities.
I grab the door handle and pull, but it’s locked, and then I notice a sign that says BE BACK IN FIFTEEN MINUTES .
I stare at it, befuddled for a moment, then turn around, scanning for Sophie. Behind me, the shop door opens, and a hand grabs my arm, and yanks me into the dim—and closed —shop.
Remy’s sister lets go of my arm and shuts the door, then motions me back a few steps where we can’t be seen through the front window.
“Did you break into this shop?” I ask.
Sophie waggles her hand in a so-so gesture. “I hid behind a dresser when I saw them put the rugelach out in the deli.” Sophie points across the way to LES JOLIES JUPES. “I’ve been keeping an eye on this place since Remy and I caught wind of a potential forgery scheme. The other day I spotted the guy with the hair”—she mimes Max’s flop of hair on her forehead—“come around. And I’ve been watching the shop since then to figure out when to slip in. The secret lies in the rugelach. As soon as the rugelach goes out over there, the shop owner here closes the store for fifteen minutes, has some with an espresso or sometimes a cigarette, and comes back. We have about ten minutes left before she returns.”
“And who is she?”
Sophie takes her phone out of her jeans, unlocks it, then shows me the picture at the top of a news article from The Guardian about a year ago. A man and a woman are in the photo, but I don’t bother to look closer because the headline rivets my attention.
“ Forging Generations: Father and Daughter Con the Art World. ”
Their names are in the caption: “Oliver and Cass Middleton under investigation in fake Gauguin scandal.”
The article dates from when they were nearly caught in a scheme involving a fake Gauguin. In the end, there wasn’t enough evidence, and the case was dropped and the pair disappeared.
“You’re joking,” I accuse her.
Sophie swings the phone around and enlarges a different picture, showing that to me next. “No joke. That’s who I saw walk right past me. Cass Middleton, in the flesh.”
“So, we broke into the Middletons’ shop. That’s just great,” I say, because running afoul of world-renowned con artists was not on my to-do list today.
“Technically, you didn’t break in, I did. Though, technically , I didn’t either. I was in, and I just stayed in.”
“I don’t know that master criminals are going to appreciate the difference,” I comment, but I’m hardly running out the door. Is it strange that I am more afraid of Clio being stolen away from me than I am of being caught by these fraudsters? “Let’s get on with it.”
She leads me deeper into the store. The place is large, and the path through gilded mirrors and pastel hatboxes meanders like a maze.
At last, Sophie points to a door with peeling paint and a long scratch near the keyhole. “I already tried the door, and it’s locked. But do you smell that?”
As we get closer, something familiar tickles my nose. “India ink?” I ask. I’m not an expert, but I know it makes new documents look old.
“See? That’s where they must have been dummying up the papers so your pal could claim our Renoir was his. And that irks me.”
Irk. Such a funny word for such real vehemence. “You’re not indignant just because it’s a crime, are you? You feel a true connection to the painting, don’t you?”
She rolls her eyes, then counts off on her fingers. “I’m indignant for many reasons. One. Because forgers suck. Two. Because my great-great-great-however-many-greats grandmother asked our family to keep that painting safe because of the curse on it.”
“A curse?” I echo. What the hell? My skin prickles with this new intel. Is Clio trapped because the painting is cursed?
“That’s why we had to keep it away from Renoir’s family all these years. To protect the woman in the painting.”
Some women can just be trouble.
Yes, Clio needs protecting.
And now it’s my job, too, to look out for her. Because of everything I feel for her.
“What is the curse? This is the first I’m hearing of it,” I press.
My head spins. Hell, it swims with facts and suppositions. With magic and mystery.
“I don’t entirely understand all of it. But there’s clearly some sort of curse on it to keep the woman trapped in it. I suspect it’s because Renoir and Valadon didn’t see eye to eye on something. Renoir believed art and inspiration were only for great artists,” she explains. “Valadon didn’t, and the Muses don’t either.”
Just when I think I’ve found the pattern, some random new piece drops in. “So . . . they talk to you too, the Muses?”
“Duh. How else would I know these things? The Muses believe that one day there will be an age of great artistic creation and expression.” Sophie spreads her arms wide like she’s embracing the invisible masses before her as she orates. “An artistic revolution that’s for everyone.” She points at me. “That’s where inspiration comes in. Where you come in.”
“Me?” Pointing must be contagious, because I tap my chest with my finger. “How so?”
She sighs loudly, impatiently. “The Muses have always been eternal, not mortal like we are. But they believe a human muse will come along, and that will mark the start of this new age.” She taps me now, right on the sternum. “That’s you, doofus.”
Human muse? What now? “Sophie, what are you talking about?”
She throws up her hands and looks at the ceiling. “Didn’t my brother tell you all this?”
Frustration gets the better of me, and I snap, “No one has given me a complete answer about anything!”
She cuts her eyes my way. “Then I will. The Muses have been expecting a human muse, and when they saw you hanging out with the Degas dancers one night, they figured out that you were the one. The one they’ve been waiting for. But since you’re the first, you’ll have to figure out for yourself what that means. Now, let’s get into that room.”
She says all of this as if she’s giving me directions to Notre Dame from here. Turn down this road, cross this bridge, and there you are—a human muse.
I look from the locked door to Sophie and back again. I picture Max taking the papers out of the black leather portfolio earlier. The ink must have barely been dry, and he was trying to steal the painting.
Sophie says quietly, “I’m not putting you on, I swear. If you won’t believe you’re a human muse, then at least believe that you’re the only one with the power to keep that painting safe. Perhaps the power to break the curse.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose, wondering if this is any stranger than seeing Degas’ ballerinas performing in the gallery or entertaining the idea that the ghost of Renoir is inhabiting Max.
I picture Clio looking up at me, picture her face as she edges around the subject of being trapped in the painting. She’s as alive as I am, and if buying into this human muse business lets me save her, how can I reject the idea completely?
If I’m the only one who can keep her safe, then dammit, I’ll have to do it.
Break the curse and set her free.
Looking over Sophie’s shoulder to the door, I focus on the immediate and concrete problem. “The door is locked. We’ll have to find another way in.”
Her eyes are intense as she stares at me. “ You’re the other way. You brought the calf, right? With the Muses’ dust in it?”
Just go with it and remember it’s for Clio.
I take the pink polka-dotted calf I won at the party from my messenger bag and hand it over. Sophie takes off the cap from the calf’s fifth leg and taps some of the silvery dust into her palm. “Now, draw a key and touch it with the silver dust.”
“Right, sure. No problem,” I say with an eye roll.
But her expression is dead serious. “Please.”
The sound of her voice does me in.
There is no joking, only earnest gravity. As I take out my sketch pad and a pencil, I remember how I’d rubbed my silver-coated hand across the page where I’d drawn Olympia ’s cat and found a black cat’s hair. I’d dismissed the oddity and forgotten about it, but maybe . . .
The lock on the door is the kind that takes an old-fashioned skeleton key. I put my pencil to the paper and draw a precise, pristine skeleton key.
When I tear out the page and put away my sketch pad, Sophie holds out her cupped hand full of the silvery dust. I dip my finger into the dust as if it’s finger paint and then trace the outline of the key.
There’s a silvery glimmer like sunlight on fish scales as the paper quivers on my flattened palm. A moment later, the weight changes, and instead of a sketch, I’m holding a key.
Exactly what I need for the lock.