False Impression Read Online Free PDF Page A

Anna’s
progress to the University of Pennsylvania, where she continued her studies for
a PhD, her chosen thesis subject the Fauve Movement. Jack had to look up the
word in Webster’s. It referred to a group of artists led by Matisse, Derain and
Vlaminck who wished to break away from the influence of Impressionism and move
towards the use of bright and dissonant colour. He also learned how the young
Picasso had left Spain to join the group in Paris, where he shocked the public
with paintings that Paris Match described as ‘of no lasting importance’;
‘sanity will return,’ they assured their readers.
    It only made
Jack want to read more about Vuillard, Luce and Camois – artists he’d never
heard of. But that would have to wait for an off-duty moment, unless it became
evidence that would nail Fenston.
    After Penn, Dr
Petrescu joined Sotheby’s as a graduate trainee.
    Here Jack’s
information became somewhat sketchy as he could allow his agents only limited
contact with her former colleagues.
    However, he did
learn of her photographic memory, her rigorous scholarship and the fact that
she was liked by everyone from the porters to the chairman. But no one would
discuss in detail what ‘under a cloud’ meant, although he did discover that she
would not be welcome back at Sotheby’s under the present management.
    And Jack
couldn’t fathom out why, despite her dismissal, she considered joining Fenston
Finance. For that part of his enquiry he had to rely on speculation, because he
couldn’t risk approaching anyone she worked with at the bank, although it was
clear that Tina Forster, the chairman’s secretary, had become a close friend.
    In the short
time Anna had worked at Fenston Finance, she had visited several new clients
who had recently taken out large loans, all of whom were in possession of major
art collections. Jack feared that it could only be a matter of time before one
of them suffered the same fate as Fenston’s three previous victims.
    Jack ran onto West
86th Street. Three questions still needed answering. One, how long had Fenston
known Petrescu before she joined the bank? Two, had they, or their families,
known each other in Romania? And three, was she the hired assassin?
    Fenston scrawled
his signature across the breakfast bill, rose from his place and, without
waiting for Leapman to finish his coffee, marched out of the restaurant. He
stepped into an open elevator, but waited for Leapman to press the button for
the eighty-third floor. A group of Japanese men in dark blue suits and plain
silk ties joined them, having also had breakfast at Windows on the World.
    Fenston never
discussed business matters while in an elevator, well aware that several of his
rivals occupied the floors above and below him.
    When the
elevator opened on the eighty-third floor, Leapman followed his master out, but
then turned the other way and headed straight for Petrescu’s office. He opened
her door without knocking to find Anna’s assistant, Rebecca, preparing the
files Anna would need for her meeting with the chairman. Leapman barked out a
set of instructions that didn’t invite questions. Rebecca immediately placed
the files on Anna’s desk and went in search of a large cardboard box.
    Leapman walked back
down the corridor and joined the chairman in his office. They began to go over
tactics for their showdown with Petrescu. Although they had been through the
same procedure three times in the past eight years, Leapman warned the chairman
that it could be different this time.
    What do you
mean?’ demanded Fenston.
    1 don’t think Petrescu will leave without putting up a fight,’
he said. ‘After all, she isn’t going to find it easy to get another job.’
    ‘She certainly
won’t if I have anything to do with it,’ said Fenston, rubbing his hands.
    ‘But perhaps in
the circumstances, chairman, it might be wise if I...’
    A knock on the
door interrupted their exchange. Fenston looked up to see Barry Steadman,