Through the Grinder (18 page)

“That’s not where I was going.”

“That’s where Quinn would go. And what about the subway victim? And Inga Berg? Wasn’t Bruce connected to both of those women, too?”

I sat back and took a sip of my coffee.

“He was involved with both of those women, true,” I said. “But
for a short time,
and I think that’s just coincidence. New York is a big city, but the circles in some of these dating services are really quite small. Bruce admitted to me that he’d dated a lot of women since his divorce, including the dead women, but I’ll bet a lot of other men dated them, too. Inga, certainly. Ask Tucker. She used to yammer on about her dates every weekend. And Bruce told me Valerie liked the happy hour scene—and she was the one who told him about SinglesNYC.com, the on-line service where he met Inga.”

Matt folded his arms. He didn’t seem convinced yet, but at least he was still listening.

“So why do you think this Sahara person is the key?”

“Sahara McNeil sent Bruce an e-mail link to a web page. It was a promotional site for the art gallery where she worked. It’s in SoHo, a place called Death Row. Ever heard of it?”

Matt shook his head. “Never.”

“They don’t exactly specialize in our kind of thing,” I told him. “The tagline on the site said something about dealing in ‘violent art’ and ‘art inspired by lust, morbidity, and obsession.’”

Matt scratched his unshaven chin. “That’s creepy, but I still don’t exactly see where you’re going.”

“It seems possible to me that Sahara could have been done in by one of the artists her gallery represented. In fact—wait just a second, I’ll be right back.”

I rose and went to my bedroom, then returned with the Hello Kitty notepad I’d filled out on Cappuccino Connection night. I quickly leafed through the pink pages.

“One of the men I was screening for Joy called himself Mars. He had that intense kind of stalker look and said he was a painter. But the strangest thing was that he spent most of his time ogling Sahara McNeil. He kept repeating that he’d already made his ‘connection’ for the night, and Joy said he’d told her that, too, which was truly odd since she was only the second person he’d sat with. The first one was Sahara.”

“So you think that this Mars may have killed Sahara? And since he’s a painter he may have known her through this Death Row gallery thing?”

“It’s a place to start,” I replied, trying not to sound totally desperate.

Matt sat gazing in silence at the steam rising from his coffee cup.

“Look at the facts,” I said after a pause. “Valerie Lathem hasn’t been ruled a homicide. Inga Berg’s killer could have been any number of men, and Sahara McNeil…I think she’s the real key. If I can find other suspects, I’ll bring them to Quinn’s attention. I just need some ammunition to prove Bruce is being framed.”

Matt nodded.

“Okay,” he said, slapping his palms on the table. “What do you want me to do?”

Just then the downstairs door buzzer went off, a faraway sound from up here in the duplex.

“First, I want you to let the pastry man in while I change clothes,” I said. “And then I want you to clear the sidewalk.” I glanced at his tanned skin, the familiar bronzed coloring of the perpetual equatorial summer. “You remember how to shovel snow, don’t you?”

Matt raised his dark eyebrow and gave me a look that seemed to say
I’d
been the one doing the shoveling for the last few minutes. Lucky for him, I had a coffeehouse to open.

U
NTIL
the 1840s, SoHo—the truncated term for the neighborhood in lower Manhattan south of Houston Street—was a sleepy residential section of Manhattan. Then the building boom of the 1850s transformed it into an area of expensive retail stores and lofts built to house light manufacturing.

During this commercial building spree, the use of then-inexpensive cast-iron materials instead of carved stone became the vogue, making opulent, Italianate architecture like the 1857 Haughwout Building on Broadway near Broome Street the norm. Iron columns, pedestals, pediments, brackets, and entranceways were mass-produced for so many SoHo buildings that the area became known as the Cast Iron District.

By the 1960s, however, the facades of these structures were looking pretty worn from a century or more of neglect, and the once pricey lofts had begun to house cheap sweatshops. At that time, an entire floor of an industrial building could be rented for next to nothing, and impoverished artists did exactly that. Within a decade SoHo became the East Coast mecca for art, and by the 1970s hundreds of art galleries, large and small, mingled with antique dealers along West Broadway, Broome, Greene, and Barrow.

Transformed into a bohemian colony, the exhilarating mix of art, design, and architecture attracted the uptown crowd to the area, and by the late 1970s a new brand of tenant was buying up lofts. It was the era of the art patron rather than the starving artist, the latter forced to search the west side’s warehouse districts and the outer boroughs to find inexpensive industrial space. By 1980, the newly renovated lofts of SoHo were more likely to be written about in
Architectural Digest
than in Andy Warhol’s
Interview
.

Fortunately, the “artsy” character of the neighborhood never truly faded, and within the irregular borders of SoHo—and in some areas around it, too—the largest concentration of galleries and museums in North America could still be found.

A promising artist or designer could work anywhere he or she liked, but a showcase in a SoHo gallery was
the
essential element in a truly successful artist’s or designer’s portfolio, which was why the ambitious still poured into New York City year after year upon art school graduation.

On this bright, blustery, and cold Saturday afternoon, the narrow streets of SoHo were crowded. Last night’s snow appeared fluffy and white on rooftops and car hoods, but on the streets and sidewalks, foot and car traffic had turned the early snowfall into slushy black puddles.

Tucker was now baby-sitting the Blend, so Matt and I could be free to take off. By the time we reached the perimeters of SoHo, all clouds had vanished in the blue sky. In the streets, we mingled with tourists, day shoppers, and the lucky few who could afford to live in this trendy, too-swank neighborhood.

It was strange to be here again with Matteo at my side. I had been so busy managing the Blend that I had not been back to SoHo very often since I’d returned to New York City, and much had changed. Long-established art dealerships like the Perry Gallery, the Atlantic Gallery, and The Richard Anderson Gallery still resided side-by-side with edgier art showcases like the Revolution Gallery and Ferri Negtiva. But the area had become so upscale that Prada, Armani, and Chanel had established their presence here, too, rubbing shoulders with Pamela Auchincloss and the First Peoples Gallery.

Salons of designer jewelry and haute couture also seemed to be edging out the smaller galleries and antique shops. But the most noticeable difference was the absence of the World Trade Center, whose twin towers had once loomed over the neighborhood like giant silver sentinels, guarding New York Harbor.

Despite the many changes, my memories of this area were rich. Early in our marriage, Matt and I enjoyed shopping here, often accompanied by Madame, who was always pleased to dispense her wisdom and good taste in judging our selections. These days—post Matt’s cocaine habit, our divorce, and the raising of Joy—there was no way in hell we could afford to shop in most of these pricey outfits.

Though gentrification had spread through much of SoHo, there were still tiny pockets of low rent stores, dive bars, and tarot card parlors. Death Row was located on such a block, an area north of the exclusive Mitchell Algus Gallery on Thompson.

Along a row of three-and four-story buildings as yet untouched by the latest spurt of renovation, Matteo and I found several storefronts for minor galleries, low-end antique dealers, and vintage clothing stores.

“According to the address it should be right around here,” Matteo said, glancing at the handwritten note he’d scribbled down before we left the Blend.

I scanned the dingy storefronts and found the Belleau Gallery, Shaw’s Antiques, Velma’s Vintage Clothing, Waxman’s Antique Stoves and Fireplaces, but no sign of Death Row Gallery.

Matt touched my shoulder. “There it is.”

The exterior of the exclusive art gallery that had employed Sahara McNeil did not look anything like I had expected. Instead of a trendy storefront, Matteo directed my attention to an anonymous three-story building with a dingy antique shop on the first floor. Next to the antique shop entrance there was a flight of concrete steps leading down, below the level of the street to a basement door. Above that door, painted in five-inch stenciled letters were the words
DEATH ROW
.

Negotiating the irregularly constructed stairs, we stood before a barred steel door—not an aluminum security gate so familiar to New Yorkers but a real cast-iron door taken off a nineteenth century prison cell. The door was locked. A black iron doorbell fixture in the shape of a skull hung next to the entrance.

Matteo pressed the bell, and I heard a funereal gong sound deep inside the building. I almost expected Lurch from the Addams Family to appear—instead it was a clone of Uncle Fester who buzzed us in.

The man stood at the end of a long hallway lined with framed art. Inside, the air was warm and close, and the lighting had a subtle scarlet tinge I found unsettling.

“Welcome. The gallery is this way,” the fat man said jovially, waving us toward him.

The walls of the nondescript hallway were insulated brick painted institutional green. The floor was covered with cheap green tile as well. Though dismal and ugly, the hall was hung with expensively framed art prints and original theater posters. I didn’t recognize any of the artists and the plays were mostly unknown to me.

I spied a poster for an Off-Broadway musical called
The Jack the Ripper Revue: A Tale of Saucy Jack
. There was also a marquee for a Broadway version of Mary Shelly’s
Frankenstein
which opened and closed sometime in the 1980s, and another Broadway poster for a musical version of Stephen King’s
Carrie.
It was the King poster that jogged my memory.

“I understand the décor of this hallway,” I whispered to my ex. “It’s from the Stephen King story ‘The Green Mile.’ The long green hall of the prison the condemned walked to the place of execution.”

“Well, this
is
supposed to be Death Row.”

“And so it is,” said the big man, standing in front of us. Though portly, he was clad from head to toe in black Armani—slacks, shirt, and jacket. He held his hands behind his back so his bald, pink, oversized head was the only splash of color in a shadowy silhouette. As was the fashion of late, the bald man’s shirt was buttoned tightly around his neck, and he wore no tie.

When we reached him, the man thrust out a puffy hand for Matteo to shake. I noticed pink flesh bulging over the tight collar under the man’s cherubic face, which was free of all facial hair, including eyebrows. As he motioned us through a narrow door, I noted that his shoes appeared to be Bruno Magli, his watch a Rolex.

“Welcome to Death Row. My name is Torquemada.”

I glanced at Matteo. “Torquemada?” I murmured. For some reason, I associated the name with some heinous historical atrocity.

Matt lifted an eyebrow. “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.”

The suffocating hallway suddenly opened into a massive, bright art gallery that dominated the entire basement. Though this interior gallery had no windows, strategically placed mirrors, a high white ceiling packed with ductwork, and a polished hardwood floor increased the illusion of brightness and space. The lighting was subtle but intense enough to highlight the work displayed, and the whole space was well appointed and tastefully done—which was more than I could say about the art.

I noticed several other people in the gallery. A young, trendy-looking couple seemed to be browsing, and two middle-aged Japanese men were locked in conversation with a tall, well-proportioned young woman who looked like Prada’s version of Elvira. Matteo’s eyes were immediately drawn to her.

“An amazing space,” Matteo told Torquemada. “I never would have imagined such a splendid gallery could be found at this address.”

Torquemada lowered his eyes and his lips turned up slightly at the compliment.

“Are you looking for anyone’s work in particular?”

At that moment, my eyes locked on a grisly painting depicting a scene of brutal murder and mayhem. The central figure was a woman, slashed and mutilated, hanging over the edge of a bed. Blood seeped from her wounds and pooled on the floor. The figure was crudely done yet very detailed. The colors were lurid and intense—so intense they almost seemed to glow. A window dominated the upper right corner of the canvas; through it, a bland street scene was depicted, totally lacking in detail, as if the artist had showered all of his obsessive attention on the doomed figure in the foreground.

“This work is called
Lustmord,
a German phrase that roughly translated, means ‘sexual murder,’” said Torquemada as he stared up at the image. “The original was painted by Otto Dix in 1922. Sadly, this is only a print produced in Germany during the Weimar Republic in the 1920s, but quite rare nonetheless. This example is signed and numbered.”

“Interesting,” I said, averting my gaze.

“Is this what I think it is?” Matteo asked, resting his hand on an unfinished wooden chair with crude metal electrodes attached to it.

“That’s the actual electric chair that serial killer Jonathan Fischer Freed died in, but don’t ask me how I got it,” Torquemada said conspiratorially. “I’m sorry to say that item is not for sale.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” said Matteo dejectedly.

Browsing, I came upon a section of the gallery dedicated to clown paintings. That’s right. Clown paintings. Just like the ones you’d find in any flea market in America. Competently but not expertly rendered, each picture featured a different clown. Odd, but innocuous, I thought.

“These are a series of works painted in prison by serial murderer John Wayne Gacy,” Torquemada explained. “He turned out hundreds of oils for avid fans before he was executed on May 10, 1994.”

“Electric chair?” Matteo asked.

“Lethal injection,” Torquemada replied. “I recently acquired these particular works from a collector who passed away…”

I looked at one of the paintings and thought I saw a cruel glint in the eye of the supposedly innocuous clown. The painting was called
Pogo the Clown
and was subtitled
A self-portrait
.

“Gacy tortured and murdered twenty-eight young men in a homoerotic frenzy,” Torquemada continued. “He was struck with a swing as a child and the injury resulted in a blood clot that he insisted clouded his sense of right and wrong. Despite this real or imagined infirmity, Gacy was a talented painter and a prominent businessman who was active in his community. Dressed as Pogo the Clown, Gacy entertained sick children at the local hospital and helped with their fundraising activities. He was so influential in Chicago politics that he once had his photograph taken with First Lady Rosalynn Carter.”

Slowly edging closer to Elvira, Matteo came upon a bookshelf made of old bones—human bones by the look of them. I might have found this shocking, except for the fact that I’d seen shrines in Italy made of human bones and they were often quite lovely in a macabre sort of way. And I have no doubt that Matteo had seen more unsettling things than this simple bookcase in the Third World. Indeed, Matteo’s eyes quickly moved past the bizarre furniture to scan the books themselves.

On a rib-caged shelf, a glass case held a shopworn magazine face out to display the cover, which featured a photograph of a woman’s torso and head completely encased in black leather.

“We have a complete set of John Willie’s
Bizarre
magazine, all twenty-six issues,” Torquemada said. “If you are not acquainted with the title,
Bizarre
was an underground fetish magazine published in the forties and fifties. We don’t deal in much erotica at Death Row, but we have a bit here and there if the items are collectable enough.”

“What type of art
do
you deal in, Mr. Torquemada?” I asked.

“Just Torquemada, Ms.—?”

“Cosi,” I said.

Torquemada folded his hands.

“To answer your question, primarily Death Row Gallery provides an outlet for the violent outcasts of our society to exhibit and market their creative endeavors.”

“You mean you sell art by murderers.”

“You put it crudely, Ms. Cosi, but accurately.”

He shifted his gaze to Matteo, then back to me.

“You’re obviously searching for a particular item. I’m sure I can be of service.”

“Actually, I was looking for the work of a particular artists,” I said. “A young man who calls himself Mars…”

Torquemada stared at me doubtfully. “Mars?”

“Sahara McNeil told me about him. Recommended his work.”

At the mention of Sahara’s name, Elvira turned in our direction.

“Mars?” Torquemada said tersely. “You can’t be serious.”