“What are you doing here?”
I turned to see Roger in the row behind me.
“I’m watching the film. Why are you here?”
“It’s my museum, Helen.”
“I’m a big Billy Rapp fan.”
“Since when?”
“Oh, shut up, Roger, and let me watch this in peace.”
He came around and sat next to me. “I didn’t know you were a Billy Rapp fan. Since when?”
“Shhh.”
“Helen, there is no one in the theater but you and me. We can talk at a normal volume.”
I looked around. We were alone. “He wasn’t appreciated like he should have been, and he died too young. This film is one of my favorites. That actress, Nora Wheeler.” I pointed to me on the screen. “She is one of my favorites. You know she only appeared in about four films, but she was magnificent. I hear Billy never cast her with Ford Tremaine because he and Ford were lovers. You know Billy was married to Nora.”
“Yes,” said Roger. “I did know all of that. I brought these films to the Hanover because I loved Billy Rapp’s work. I never knew you felt that way about him.”
“It was a symptom of our marriage,” I said, transfixed by the screen. “We never talked enough.”
“Helen, are you okay?”
“And Richard Nash,” I added. “His exhibit downstairs. Wow! Another lost talent. You know, there are outtakes of that famous photo—the one of the girl bowing to an empty Hollywood Bowl.”
“Sandra Keane.”
“Yes,” I said, touched that he’d done so much research. “There is another great photo series that he took of a band called No Exit. Sandra Keane from the West photo was in that band. Do you have any of those?”
“No.” He rubbed his chin, like was pondering something. “But Kim Nash Clarke will be here tonight for the opening of the exhibit. I’ll ask her about those. See if she has any.”
“Clarke?” I caught what he said. “Kim remarried?”
“How should I know?” Roger was looking at me like I was crazy. “You had no interest in anything related to this museum. Why now?”
“Because it’s all connected.”
“I don’t understand.” Roger shifted in his seat and rubbed the armrests nervously. “Let me guess, you’re a fan of Auguste Marchant as well now. If you tell me that, I’ll pass out, right here.”
“Girl on Step was actually painted in 1895, not 1896.” I looked at him. In the dark, I could see the familiar composite profile of all of them—Marchant, Billy, Rick, and now Roger with their big green eyes—all so perfectly blended.
Those green eyes widened. “And how do you know that?”
“Because I was there.”
He laughed and shook his head. “Stop kidding. I have a secret. Do you know that I have a new painting in the Marchant collection? I haven’t shown it to anyone else. It came this week.”
“What is it?” I was busy watching myself get murdered on the train. It occurred to me that I had no idea how the film ended because Nora had never actually watched the ending.
“It’s called Juliet.”
The name was like a punch to my gut. Quickly, I turned in my seat. “What?” Roger didn’t understand the significance of the painting. Its role in all of this. It was the spark, the genesis, the reason for our marriage and this museum. “Can I see it?”
Roger looked thrilled. “Yes, it’s in the vault. The appraisers need to look at it before I can hang it.”
I followed him down the hallway, taking one last look over my shoulder as Nora acted dead on the floor. Roger was moving quickly to the door marked EMPLOYEES ONLY, which led to the main vault corridor. He scanned his access card, and we entered the basement vault. Roger didn’t seem to remember that I’d had been here two days ago stealing Auguste Marchant’s paintbrush.
Roger walked over to a crate and carefully pulled out a large canvas. Placing it on the table, he pulled the cover off to reveal Juliet. The drapes, the shadows, Juliet’s skin, the look she gave the artist—one of desire and carnal knowledge, which for a girl of her age made up a pairing of doom. I touched the canvas. This was the painting that had been taken by Juliet’s mother the night she stormed into Marchant’s studio, not one of the sketch versions that Marielle Fournier had mentioned from the attic, the one with the burned edges that Michel Busson had taken. This was the real thing.
I’d thought the painting had been destroyed, but then Juliet’s mother had gotten sick; perhaps she’d never gotten around to burning it. “Where did you get this?”
“It’s the crown jewel of my collection,” said Roger. “I am drawn to this painting more than any other. There is something about her.” He waved his hand toward the canvas.
“Yes,” I agreed. “There is.”
“I can’t imagine anyone looking at me like that.” Roger cocked his head. “You know, she kind of resembles you.”
I think I might have snorted out loud. “Really?”
He blinked. “Really.”
While Roger didn’t have the memories of his lives like I did, he was oddly drawn to different versions of himself.
“Anyway, most of my Marchant paintings have come to me through a Parisian broker.”
I closed my eyes.
“Paul de Passe.”
I smiled. “I see.”
“Anyway, I’ve been begging him for this one for years, but the seller wouldn’t budge until now. Remarkable, isn’t it? You know, it’s rumored that Juliet was the love of Marchant’s life.”
“She wasn’t,” I said. “She was only the muse. Only ever the muse.”
“Marchant was lucky. Look at her.”
“But she was very unlucky.”
“I’m not sure,” said Roger. “Nothing is really known about her.” He lifted the painting and placed the cover over it. “But the muse is the creative genesis. Much more powerful than the lover or the wife. To the artists, it’s the muse who is more important.”
“Not at that time,” I whispered to myself, studying Juliet one final time as the painting descended back into the crate. “It was a man’s world then. Being a muse didn’t get you very far.”
“Well, can you imagine being the painter when the relationship ends?”
I didn’t know where he was going with this. “I’m not sure I follow you.”
“You’re creating art where the muse is the centerpiece. Then, for whatever reason, the relationship ends. At that point, your art turns against you. Think about it. You can’t look at your work anymore. Your own work becomes something distant, almost alien to you.” Roger laughed. “I can’t imagine.”
But I knew that somewhere Roger could feel that emotion exactly… the betrayal of his own art.
As we were exiting the vault, I turned. “Any idea who the real owner was?”
“I think I know,” said Roger. “There is a French art collector who contributed most of the money to fund the Hanover Collection.”
“Let me guess. Varnier,” I said. “Lucian Varnier.”