Portrait in Crime

  “I’m positive he does,” Nancy declared. “All you have to do is look at him to see he’s got a major crush on you.”

  “Well, then, I’d better not leave him pining on the beach,” she said. “So what’s this outing you have in mind? Not more waterskiing, I hope.”

  “No.” Nancy smiled. “Scuba diving.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ll tell you all together. Okay?” Nancy asked.

  Bess rolled her eyes. “Well, everyone will love it. Except me, of course. I’m not certified.”

  “You can stay with the boat,” Nancy said. “You know you tan best on the water.”

  Still grumbling, Bess headed down to the beach to get the others. They promised to meet at Pete’s Dive Shop.

  Nancy called the dance institute to see if Sasha was done rehearsing. He had just finished, and she arranged to pick him up in ten minutes.

  She explained scuba diving to Sasha on the way to the dive shop. He wasn’t certified to dive, either, so he was going to stay with Bess on the boat. As the others tried on their diving gear and waited for their tanks, Nancy explained what they were doing and what she wanted them to look for.

  “I want you to search the area for any clue as to what Nicholas was doing out on his boat in the middle of the night. Maybe he really was fishing. But maybe he was trying to get rid of something or pick something up.” She turned to Tommy. “I’d like you to take a look at the engine, if it’s still in one piece. Check the steering cable to see if it’s been cut. It’s a long shot, but we may as well try it.”

  “Nancy,” Tommy began. “You should know that these waters are famous for sharks.”

  Everyone turned to Tommy in surprise.

  “It shouldn’t be a problem,” he added quickly. “I just wanted everyone to be aware of it. The biggest great white shark ever recorded was hooked in Montauk Bay.”

  Gary looked at Tommy uneasily. “I don’t mean to sound like a coward, but my specialty is the air, not the water. Is it safe or isn’t it?”

  “It should be. There haven’t been any reports of shark attacks for a while. If you do see one, don’t panic, just stay where you are. It’s very important to keep still and not thrash around. If you do, they think you’re hurt, and they’re more likely to come over and investigate.”

  “We don’t have to go if you don’t want to,” Nancy offered. “Should we vote? Who wants to risk it?”

  Four hands, including Nancy’s, shot up immediately. Bess and Sasha didn’t vote.

  Nancy smiled. “Then here we go,” she declared.

  Soon the group was on its way with Tommy driving their borrowed boat. Bess stood beside him at the wheel as he steered toward the accident site. Their blond hair was almost the exact same color. Tommy whispered into Bess’s ear, and she nodded back at him, her face glowing. Nancy smiled at them from the bow of the boat where she and Sasha were sitting.

  Romance was in the air, all right! Bess and Tommy couldn’t keep their eyes off each other. George and Gary had been together longer, and the electricity between them had turned into familiarity, each knowing what the other was thinking. George was positively radiant.

  As Nancy watched her two best friends, their laughter rising and falling over the drone of the engine, she felt Sasha’s arm slip around her waist. A thrill of emotion ran through her, and without thinking she leaned back against his shoulder.

  The sun was beating down and Sasha’s strong arm was tight around her. Her heart was pounding in her ears. She closed her eyes and let herself relax against him.

  When he turned and her cheek touched his sun-warmed skin, she was startled and her eyes flew open. This was too much, she realized suddenly. Things were moving too fast. Before it went any further, she had to be sure she was doing the right thing. She leaned forward, pretending to study something on the water.

  “We’re here!” Bess said as Tommy cut the engine right then. Everyone sprang into action. Sasha threw the anchor overboard and paddled the boat back until the hook caught on the bottom and pulled tight. After double-checking their equipment, the four divers fell backward into the ocean.

  Treading water, Nancy cleared her mask and put her regulator in her mouth. She gave Tommy the okay sign, and together they dove, a white burst of bubbles trailing behind them after each breath.

  Nancy gazed around, getting used to the feeling of wearing scuba equipment again. Most of the diving she’d done had been in tropical oceans, where the water was clear and swarming with colorful fish. But here the water was cloudy, and she didn’t see any fish. In fact, she didn’t see any living things, other than herself and her friends. It felt creepy.

  Once on the bottom, she could just make out a boat off to their right. It was about fifteen feet away, and all she could really see through the murk was the shadowy outline of a hull. She touched Tommy’s arm, and the two of them swam toward it. George caught up to Nancy and signaled that Gary had a cramp in his leg. They were going up. Nancy nodded.

  As she and Tommy approached the boat, Tommy began shaking his head at Nancy. He pointed to the hull, then waved his hands vigorously.

  Nancy looked around uneasily. Was he warning her about sharks? she wondered. Then Tommy reached out and wiped his finger across the bow, leaving a mark in the layer of algae that covered the boat.

  Nancy nodded. He was telling her that this wasn’t the wreck they were looking for. This one had been underwater too long.

  Tommy kicked away from the wreck and hung suspended in the water, trying to determine in which direction the current was pulling them.

  They set out with the current. Soon Nancy saw the dim outline of another hull.

  This time they had found it. Nancy and Tommy swam slowly around the heavy metal boat. It was twisted into the rocks, making it impossible to pry free without heavy equipment. No wonder the police had left it, Nancy thought.

  After a half hour Tommy shrugged. Pointing to the engine, he indicated with an okay sign that it was in good condition and the steering cable seemed fine. The gauge on the gas tank, which was lashed into the boat near the engine, showed it was half full.

  As Nancy was probing the gaping hole in the bow where the boat had hit the rocks, Tommy signaled to her that he was swimming away for a minute but that he’d be right back. Nancy watched him disappear into a cave.

  Nancy felt frustrated as she continued searching the bottom for any clue to the accident. Gradually she began to feel short of breath. She checked the gauge on her tank. It said she had plenty of air. What was wrong? Was her regulator failing?

  Nancy scanned the area. Tommy was nowhere in sight. She estimated the distance to the cave. It was too far to get there easily.

  Nancy strained to get a breath, but no air came out of the mouthpiece. She took the regulator out of her mouth and tapped her finger on the valve. She couldn’t push it in to release the air. Something was stuck in it. She hit it a couple of times, but it didn’t budge.

  It was no good. Her regulator was useless, and she was all alone under forty-five feet of water!

  Chapter

  Six

  GET HOLD OF YOURSELF, DREW, Nancy ordered silently. She eyed the surface, wondering if she could make the air in her lungs last. The pressure in her chest was mounting.

  Remembering diving procedure, Nancy kicked slowly toward the silvery surface. She let her breath leak out gradually, fighting the impulse to let it go in one burst and grab another breath. Don’t let it out, she told herself sternly. There’s no more!

  When she’d gone up about thirty feet, Nancy did run out of air. She continued to struggle desperately toward the surface, the blood roaring in her ears, red dots dancing across her eyes. She was ready to pass out!

  Just as the world was closing in on her and turning black, Nancy broke the surface. Her head thrown back, she gulped in air. Weakly she waved at the boat, bobbing fifty yards away. Her chest burned, her arms and legs weighed a ton, but she was alive!

  • • •
r />   “It couldn’t have been sabotage,” Nancy insisted for the third time. She hugged her long legs to her chest, a towel draped around her shoulders. “No one knew we were going diving.”

  “She’s right,” Tommy agreed. “It was just faulty equipment. I should have checked it more carefully.” His usually cheerful face was drawn. Nancy could see he blamed himself for her accident.

  “Stop worrying about it. I’m really fine, just a little shaken,” she repeated.

  “I can’t believe I left you alone!” he insisted miserably. “But I wanted to check out that cave. When I came back and found you gone . . .” His voice trailed off.

  “Bet you thought she was eaten by a shark,” George joked.

  Tommy gave her a stricken look.

  Bess put her arm around him sympathetically. “Nancy’s okay,” she said. “She can hold her breath longer than anyone I know.”

  A quiet and thoughtful group headed back to the dock. Nancy turned the case over in her mind.

  It looked as though she was on the wrong track, she had to admit to herself. She had been asked to find a missing painter and a missing painting, not to investigate a death. Looking back, Nancy wondered all of a sudden if the note saying that Nicholas was murdered had been written to send her in the wrong direction.

  Sasha came over and sat next to Nancy. “Will you come by later to see our rehearsal? It should end around four-thirty or five. After that I can give you a dance lesson.”

  Nancy nodded absently.

  “Are you thinking about the accident?” he asked sympathetically.

  Nancy shook her head. “I’m thinking about the connection between Christopher and Nicholas,” she said. “And about Bob Tercero. I’m tempted to think that he’s pushing me in the wrong direction.”

  “So you think he is the bad guy? He is trying to keep you from finding Christopher?” Sasha asked.

  “I don’t know,” Nancy said. “He was actually pretty helpful when we were talking about Christopher. After all, it would hurt the gallery enormously if Christopher doesn’t turn up. And a lot of Bob’s job involves working with the Scotts. The thing that is so confusing is the way he talks about Nicholas.”

  “Speaking of strange reactions,” Sasha said, “Megan was very sure that the Vanity does not exist.”

  Nancy nodded. “You’re getting good at this,” she said.

  “A compliment from you about my detective work?” Sasha asked. “That means a lot to me.”

  Nancy blushed, deciding to ignore his remark. “Back to Megan,” she began. “Does her reaction mean she has seen the painting and was just covering it up? Or was she being sincere? Maybe it’s true that Christopher Scott painted nothing but landscapes.

  “But if there is no Vanity, then Bob Tercero made it up. And why would he do that?” Nancy asked, frustrated. As the boat pulled into the dock, she decided to pay another visit to the gallery manager.

  Nancy, Bess, and George headed back to Eloise’s house to shower and change. They made turkey sandwiches for lunch before heading over to the Nisus Gallery to talk with Bob Tercero.

  When they walked into the gallery, Bess took George on a quick tour.

  “Look at this. Isn’t it beautiful?” Bess asked George, gazing at Christopher Scott’s large pink canvas.

  George shrugged. “It’s too pink for me,” she replied.

  Bob Tercero came into the room.

  “I thought I heard familiar voices,” he said. “You’re back sooner than I expected.”

  Nancy introduced George to Bob. He led them down the hall into his office, one door before Cynthia’s.

  “Is Mrs. Gray here?” George asked.

  “No,” Bob replied. “She’s seldom here.”

  “We came back to fill you in on our trip to the Scotts’ place,” Nancy cut in. She watched Tercero carefully, waiting for his reaction to her next comment. “We found out there is no Vanity painting,” she said.

  Tercero looked at her blankly. “What are you talking about? Of course there is.”

  “Not according to Megan Archer,” she said.

  “Who?”

  “Megan Archer, Nicholas’s girlfriend,” Nancy replied. “Haven’t you ever met his girlfriend?”

  The confusion on Tercero’s face cleared. “Oh, right, the new one. She’s been in town only a few months,” he said, dismissing her. “Don’t pay any attention to her. She doesn’t know anything. Of course there’s a Vanity.”

  “Megan seems very sure you’re wrong about that,” Nancy persisted. “There’s no sign of it at his studio. In fact, there’s no sign of a working artist anywhere in the house or the studio.”

  “The Vanity exists,” Bob repeated, a tolerant smile on his face. “I not only bought it, I was there when Chris was painting it.”

  Now it was Nancy’s turn to look taken aback.

  “You still don’t believe me?” Tercero asked. “Wait, I have proof.” He took a binder out of his desk and began paging through it. “This is Scott’s catalog,” he explained. He turned the binder around. “Here. This is a picture of the Vanity.”

  “Look at that!” Bess exclaimed. “It really does exist.”

  On the page was a photo and a description of the Vanity. The picture showed a canvas of a girl in a white nightgown seated in front of a mirror. Long red curls cascaded down her shoulders, obscuring all but the side of her face.

  Nancy looked at Bob. “You were there when he was painting it?” she asked. “So why did you tell me you didn’t know who the model was?”

  Bob seemed startled by the question. Then he shrugged. “Well, I didn’t really know her. She was a model, a professional from New York. I know that much,” he explained. “She was dating Nicholas.”

  “You have no idea where we could find her?” George broke in.

  Bob seemed faintly alarmed. “No, I have no idea where you could find her. Listen, forget it and her, okay? The painting’s not that important. Really,” he said earnestly. “It would have been nice if you found it, but I don’t want you to waste your time. The important thing is to find Christopher. Once you do that, I’ll ask him about the Vanity myself.”

  Bob Tercero was up to some trick, Nancy thought, annoyed. Suddenly he had become adamant that the painting was unimportant and was refusing to help her find the model.

  “Well, if you think it’s not important, then there’s no point in looking for it,” Nancy said, standing up. “After all, you were the one who asked me to find it in the first place. We won’t take up any more of your time with it.”

  “Find Christopher,” Bob repeated. “I promise you, Nicholas told me he was working on a painting the day of the accident. There must be some trace of it somewhere.”

  Nancy and her friends left the gallery in silence. So far, Nancy thought, she knew only two people who had been involved in the Scotts’ personal lives. Now she knew of a third person, the red-haired model. Nancy decided she was going to find the girl. Maybe she’d get some answers from her.

  “What a creep!” Bess exclaimed when the girls were back in Nancy’s car.

  “He’s definitely hiding something,” George agreed. “But what?”

  “I’m not sure,” Nancy said thoughtfully. “He wanted me to look for Chris and the painting, only he doesn’t want me looking too hard. And then there’s the question of Nicholas being murdered. Maybe the girl in the painting could help us. It seems she knew both Bob and the Scotts.”

  “But how do we find her?” Bess asked. “The picture won’t help. You can barely see her face.”

  “Modeling agencies,” George piped up. “Didn’t you hear him say she was a professional model?”

  Bess practically jumped with excitement. “We’re going to modeling agencies!” she exclaimed. “You always hear stories about girls walking into those places and becoming superstars!”

  “Well, let’s try calling first,” Nancy suggested, keeping a straight face. “I don’t know if we have time to go into New York City and
pound the pavement.”

  Seeing Bess’s disappointed face, George patted her cousin’s shoulder consolingly. “Let’s stop by Jetstream,” she suggested to Nancy. “I know they have a Manhattan phone book in their office.”

  “My aunt has one, too,” Nancy said. “Sorry, George, no time to see Gary.”

  “Oh, well, I tried,” George said, and laughed at herself on the way back to Eloise Drew’s.

  “George, you look up the numbers,” Nancy suggested. “I’ll start calling.”

  “What are you going to say?”

  “That I’m looking for a redhead,” Nancy replied. “Someone who has experience modeling for painters. I’d guess that’s pretty unusual for a professional model.”

  “It’s a long shot,” George said. “What if they want details, like what you’re paying?”

  “I read somewhere that models make thousands,” Bess warned.

  “Bess, George, I’m not hiring the girl!” Nancy exclaimed. “I just want to find her.”

  As she made call after call, Nancy realized George’s skepticism made sense. Over and over she was told: no redheads, no portrait sittings.

  Finally she got the booking agent for the Unique Agency on the phone. A red-haired model was no problem, she was told. Then Nancy explained she wanted the model for a painter.

  “No way!” the agent yelled. “We don’t work with painters anymore. The last time we sent a girl out to pose for a painting, we never saw her again!”

  Chapter

  Seven

  NANCY CAUGHT HER BREATH. A missing model? She pressed the woman for details.

  “No,” the woman said, laughing. “She wasn’t a redhead. She was Nigerian. She was posing for some young hotshot painter in Manhattan, and last I heard, they were married. But the real reason we don’t work with painters is that they tie up our models for long periods of time. We can make more money on shorter assignments.”

  Seeing Nancy’s disappointed face as she hung up, Bess suggested, “I could do some calling, Nan.”

  Nancy shook her head. “I think we have to find another way.” She looked at her watch. “Oh, no! Is it really four-thirty? I promised Sasha I’d go and watch his rehearsal, but it’s almost over.”