The work had been placed upon an easel and surrounded by lights, almost like a patient in an operating theater. Upon the shelves around it stood microscopes, lenses, scalpels, magnifying glasses, and jars of assorted chemicals. While I watched, the restorer took a thin wooden stick and scored it with a penknife, then pushed it into cotton and rotated it to create a cotton bud of the required thickness. When he was satisfied with his creation, he dipped it into a jar of liquid and began carefully applying it to the surface of the painting.
“That’s acetone mixed with white spirit,” said Ms. Stern. “It’s used to clean away unwanted layers of varnish, tobacco, and fire smoke, the effects of pollution and oxidization. One has to be careful to find the correct chemical balance for every painting, because the requirements of each one will be quite unique. The intention is to achieve a strength sufficient to remove dirt and varnish, even paint added by later artists or restorers, without burning through to the original layers beneath. This has been, and continues to be, a particularly painstaking restoration, as the anonymous artist used a mixture of techniques.”
She pointed to two or three areas in the work where the paint appeared exceptionally thick.
“Here, he has used oil-free paints, giving his pigment an unusual consistency, as you can see. The impasto — the thicker areas of paint — have accumulated layers of dust in the grooves, which we’ve had to remove with a combination of acetone and scalpel work.”
Again her hands danced across the work, almost but not quite touching the surface.
“There is also a great deal of craquelure, this web effect where the old pigments have dried and degraded over time. Now, let me show you something.”
She found a smaller painting, depicting a solemn-looking man in ermine and a black hat. Across the room, her secretary abandoned her work and moved over to join us. Apparently, Miss Stern’s master classes were worth attending.
“In case you were wondering, this is the alchemist Dr. Dee,” she explained. “We are due to offer this for sale at our auction, alongside the painting upon which James is currently working. Now, let me adjust the lighting.”
She turned off the large lights surrounding the paintings, using a central switch. For a moment we were in semidarkness, until our corner of the room was suddenly illuminated by an ultraviolet glow. Our teeth and eyes now shone purple, but the greatest change was visible upon the two paintings. The smaller work, the depiction of the alchemist Dee, was spattered with specks and dots, as though the entire work had been attacked by a demented student of Jackson Pollock. The larger painting, though, was almost entirely clear of such marks, apart from a thin half-moon in one corner where the restorer was still working.
“The dots on the portrait of Dee are called ‘overpaint,’ and they show the areas where previous restorers have retouched or filled in damaged areas,” said Miss Stern. “If one were to perform the same experiment in almost any great gallery in the world, one would witness the same effect on most of the works present. The preservation of great works of art is a constant process, and it has always been so.”
Miss Stern lit the main lights once again.
“Do you know what a ‘sleeper’ is, Mr. Parker? In our business, it is an object whose value is unrecognized by an auction house, and that subsequently passes into the hands of a buyer who realizes its true nature. This battlefield painting is just such a sleeper: it was discovered in a provincial auction house in Somerset, England, and bought for the equivalent of one thousand dollars. It’s clear that the sleeper has not been restored at any point in its existence, although it appears to have been kept in relatively good condition, apart from the inevitable effects of natural aging. Yet there was one large area of concealment in the bottom right-hand corner, noticeable once the overpaint was revealed by the ultraviolet light. Originally, sections of this work had been crudely worked upon to conceal some of the detail it contained. It was uncovered relatively easily. What you are seeing here is the second stage of the restoration. Take a step back and look at that area with a new eye.”
The bottom right-hand corner showed the bodies of monks, all of them wearing white, hanging from the wall of a monastery. Human bones were stacked in pyramids beneath their feet, and one of the monks had an arrow in the center of his forehead. A grapnel had been painted upon the front of each monk’s robes in what appeared to be blood. A group of mounted soldiers was riding away from them, led by a tall armored figure with a white mote in his right eye. Human heads dangled from their saddles, and their horses wore spikes upon their foreheads.
If the bearded figure was their leader, it was to one of his men that one’s eye was immediately drawn. He was not riding a horse, but instead walked alongside his captain, bearing a bloodied sword in his right hand. He was a fat imp, gross and deformed, with a great goiter or tumor at his neck. He wore a tunic of leather plates that failed to conceal the enormity of his belly, and his legs seemed almost to be collapsing under the great burden of his bulk. There was blood around his mouth, where he had fed upon the dead. In his left hand he held aloft a banner bearing the symbol of the grapnel.
“Why was this hidden?” I asked.
“This is the aftermath of the sacking of the monastery at Sedlec,” said Miss Stern. “The killing of the monks during a period of truce was first blamed upon Jan Ziska and his Hussites, but this painting may be closer to the truth. It seems to suggest that the killings were the work of mercenaries, operating in the confusion of the aftermath and led by these two men. Later documentary evidence, including the testimony of eyewitnesses, supports the artist’s version of events.”
She spread the index and middle fingers of her right hand to indicate the bearded rider and the grotesque figure cavorting beside him. “This one” — she indicated the fat man — “has no name. Their leader was known simply as ‘the Captain,’ but if one is to believe the myths surrounding Sedlec, he was really Ashmael, the original Black Angel. According to the old stories, after the banishment from heaven, Ashmael was shunned by the company of the fallen because his eyes were marked by their last glimpse of God. In his loneliness, Ashmael tore himself in two so that he would have company in his wanderings, and he gave the name Immael to his twin. Eventually, they grew weary and descended into the depths of the earth near Sedlec, where they slept until the mines were dug. Then they awoke, and found the world above at war, so they began fomenting conflict, playing one side off against the other, until at last Immael was confronted and cast down into molten silver. Ashmael immediately commenced searching for him, but when he reached the monastery the statue had already been spirited away, so he avenged himself on the monks and continued his quest, a quest which, according to the tenets of the Believers, goes on to this day. So now you know, Mr. Parker. The Believers exist to reunite two halves of a fallen angel. It is a wonderful story, and now I plan to sell it in return for twenty percent of the purchase price. In the end, I am the only person who will profit from the story of the Black Angels.”
I was home before midnight. The house was silent. I went upstairs and found Rachel asleep. I didn’t wake her. Instead, I was about to check up on Sam when Rachel’s mother appeared at the door and, putting a finger to her lips to hush me, indicated that I should follow her downstairs.
“Would you like coffee?” she asked.
“Coffee would be good.”
She heated some water and retrieved the ground beans from the freezer. I didn’t speak as she went about preparing the coffee. I sensed that it wasn’t my place to begin whatever conversation we were about to have.
Joan placed a cup of coffee in front of me and cradled her own in her hands.
“We had a problem,” she said. She didn’t look at me as she spoke.
“What kind of problem?”
“Someone tried to get into the house through Sam’s window.”
“A burglar?”
“We don’t know. The police seem to think so, but Rachel and I, we’re not so sure.”
“Why?”
“They didn’t set the motion sensors off. The sensors weren’t disabled either, so we can’t figure out how they got to the house. And this is going to sound crazy, I know, but it seemed as if they were crawling up the exterior. We heard one of them moving on the outside wall behind Rachel’s bed. There was another on the roof, and when Rachel went into Sam’s room, she says she saw a woman’s face at the window, but it was upside down. She shot at it and —”
“She what?”
“I’d taken Sam out of the room, and Rachel had set off the panic button. She had a gun, and she shot the window out. We had it replaced today.”
I hid my face in my hands for a few moments, saying nothing. I felt something touch my fingers, and then Joan took my hand in hers.
“Listen to me,” she said. “I know that sometimes it might seem like Frank and I are hard on you, and I know you and Frank don’t get along too well, but you have to understand that we love Rachel, and we love Sam. We know that you love them too, and that Rachel cares about you, and loves you more deeply than she’s ever loved any other man in her life. But the feelings she has for you are costing her a great deal. They’ve put her life at risk in the past, and they’re bringing her pain now.”
Something caught in my throat when I tried to speak. I took a sip of coffee to try to dislodge it, but it would not be moved.
“I know Rachel has told you about Curtis,” said Joan.
“Yes,” I said. “He sounded like he was a good man.”
Joan smiled at the description.
“Curtis was pretty wild when he was a teenager,” said Joan, “and wilder still when he was in his twenties. He had a girlfriend, Justine, and, boy, he drove her crazy. She was much gentler than he was, and though he always looked out for her, I think he kind of frightened her some, and she left him for a time. He couldn’t understand why, and I had to sit him down and explain to him that it was okay to cut loose a little, that young men did those kinds of things, but at some point you had to start behaving like an adult, and rein in the young part. It didn’t mean that you had to spend the rest of your life in a suit and tie, never raising your voice or stepping out of line, but you had to recognize that the rewards a relationship brought came at a price. The cost was a whole lot less than what you got in return, but it was a sacrifice nonetheless. If he wasn’t prepared to make that sacrifice by growing up, then he had to just let her go and accept that she wasn’t for him. He decided that he wanted to be with her. It took some time, but he changed. He was still the same boy at heart, of course, and that wild streak never left him, but he kept it in check, the way you might train a horse so you could harness its power and channel its energy. Eventually, he became a policeman, and he was good at what he did. Those people who killed him made the world a poorer place by taking him from it, and they broke so many hearts, just so many.
“I never thought I’d be having that conversation again with a man, and I understand that the circumstances are not the same. I know all that you’ve gone through, and I can imagine some of your pain. But you have to choose between the life you’re being offered here, with a woman and a child, maybe a second marriage and more children to come, and this other life that you lead. If something happens to you because of it, then Rachel will have lost two men that she loved to violence; but if something happens to her or to Sam as a consequence of what you do, then everyone who loves Rachel and Sam will be torn apart, and you worst of all, because I don’t believe that you could survive that loss a second time. Nobody could.
“You’re a good man, and I understand that you’re driven to try to make things right for people who can’t help themselves, for those who’ve been hurt, or even killed. There’s something noble in that, but I don’t think you’re concerned with nobility. It’s sacrifice, but not the right kind. You’re trying to make up for things that can never be undone, and you blame yourself for allowing them to occur even though it wasn’t in your power to stop them. But at some point you’re going to have to stop blaming yourself. You’re going to have to stop trying to change the past. All of that is gone, hard as it may be to accept. What you have now is new hope. Don’t let it slip away, and don’t let it be taken from you.”
Joan rose and emptied the remains of her coffee into the sink, then placed the mug in the dishwasher.
“I think Rachel and Sam are going to come stay with us for a little while,” she said. “You need time to finish whatever it is you’re doing, and to think. I’m not trying to come between you. None of us are. I wouldn’t be having this conversation with you if that was the case. But she’s frightened and unhappy, and that’s not even taking into account the aftermath of the birth and all the confused feelings that brings with it. She needs to be around other people for a little while, people who’ll be there for her round the clock.”
“I understand,” I said.
Joan placed her hand on my shoulder, then kissed me gently on the forehead.
“My daughter loves you, and I respect her judgment more than that of anyone else that I know. She sees something in you. I can see it too. You need to remember that. If you forget it, then it’s all lost.”
The Black Angel walked in the moonlight, through tourists and residents, past stores and galleries, scenting coffee and gasoline on the air, distant bells tolling the coming of the hour. It examined the faces of the crowds, always seeking those that it might recognize, watching for eyes that lingered a second too long upon its face and form. It had left Brightwell in the office, lost among shadows and old things, and now replayed their conversation in its head. It smiled faintly as it did so, and lovers smiled too, believing that they saw in the expression of the passing stranger the remembrance of a recent kiss, and a parting embrace. That was the angel’s secret: it could cloak the vilest of feelings in the most beautiful of colors, for otherwise no one would choose to follow its path.
Brightwell had not been smiling when earlier they had met.
“It is him,” said Brightwell.
“You are jumping at shadows,” the Black Angel replied.
Brightwell withdrew a sheaf of copied papers from the folds of his coat and placed them before the angel. He watched as its hand flicked through them, taking in snatches of headlines and stories, and with each page that it read its interest grew, until at last it was crouched over the desk, its shadow falling upon words and pictures, its fingers lingering upon names and places from cases now solved or buried: Charon, Pudd, Charleston, Faulkner, Eagle Lake, Kittim.
Kittim.
“It could be coincidence,” said the angel softly, but it was said without conviction, less a statement than a step in an ongoing process of reasoning.
“So many?” said Brightwell. “I don’t believe that. He has been haunting our footsteps.”
“It’s not possible. There is no way that he can know his own nature.”
“We know our nature,” said Brightwell.
The angel stared intently into Brightwell’s eyes and saw anger, and curiosity, and the desire for revenge.
And fear? Yes, perhaps just a little.
“It was a mistake to go to the house,” said the angel.
“I thought we could use the child to draw him to us.”
The Black Angel stared at Brightwell. No, it thought, you wanted the child for more than that. Your urge to inflict pain has always been your undoing.
“You don’t listen,” it said to him. “I’ve warned you about drawing attention to us, especially at so delicate a juncture.”
Brightwell appeared about to protest, but the angel stood and removed its coat from the antique coat stand by its desk.
“I need to go out for a while. Stay here. Rest. I’ll return soon.”
And so the angel now walked the streets, like a slick of oil trailing through the tide of humanity, that smile darting occasionally across its face, never lingering for more than a second or two, and never quite reaching its eyes. Once an hour had gone by, it returned to its o
ffice, where Brightwell sat patiently in a corner, far from the light.
“Confront him if you wish, if it will confirm or disprove what you believe.”
“Hurt him?” said Brightwell.
“If you have to.”
There was no need to ask the last question, the one that remained unspoken. There would be no killing, for to kill him would be to release him, and he might never be found again.
Sam lay awake in her crib. She didn’t look at me as I approached. Instead, her gaze was fixed raptly on something above and beyond the bars. Her tiny hands made grabbing motions, and she seemed to be smiling. I had seen her like that before, when Rachel or I stood over her, either talking to her or offering her some bauble or toy. I moved closer, and felt a coldness in the air around her. Still Sam didn’t look at me. Instead, she gave what sounded like a little giggle of amusement.
I reached across the crib, my fingers outstretched. For the briefest of moments, I thought that I felt a substance brush against my fingers, like gossamer or silk. Then it was gone, and the coldness with it. Immediately, Sam began to cry. I took her in my arms and held her, but she wouldn’t stop. There was movement behind me, and Rachel appeared at my side.
“I’ll take her,” she said, her arms reaching for Sam, and irritation in her voice.
“It’s okay. I can hold her.”
“I said I’ll take her,” she snapped, and it was more than annoyance now. I had been called to scenes of domestic arguments as a cop and had seen mothers latch on to their children in the same way, anxious to protect them from any threat of violence, even as their husbands or partners attempted to make up for whatever they had done or had threatened to do, once the police were present. I had seen the look in those women’s eyes. It was the same as the one that I now saw in Rachel’s. I handed the baby to her without a word.