The Blood Lance Read Online Free PDF Page B

laughed.
    'Of course there's always a market for Monet... whatever the size.' The gentleman scanned the walls but to no avail. 'Roland had an exquisite Monet as I recall. I remember him showing it to me one time! Surprised he let it go. I know he was very fond of it!'
    'I can understand that,' Marcus smiled. 'I am certainly fond of mine!'
    Having learned something about the value of Wheeler's posthumous gift to Zürich, Marcus happened upon a Frau Goetz, the wife of the president of a small private bank in town where he did some of his business. 'An extraordinary gift on the part of Mr Wheeler, don't you think?' he asked after they were introduced by a mutual acquaintance - the mayor as it happened.
    Roland being gone well over a year, the mayor offered a slight bit of laughter, 'He couldn't very well take it with him, could he?'
    Marcus smiled at the joke and let one shoulder kick up good naturedly. 'I only meant his daughter might have got some pleasure out of it.'
    'As I understand it,' Frau Goetz answered, 'Kate, not Roland, is the one responsible for the gift.'
    'Really?' Marcus asked. He had not heard this rumour and immediately wondered about Kate's accounts - that she could afford such a gift.
    A brittle woman, Frau Goetz sniffed with indifference. ' Really. I guess I should know. My husband handled the estate.'
    'That was. . . quite generous of her. I hope she hasn't left herself destitute.'
    'As I understand the matter, she had some troubles in Zürich last year. I expect she felt obliged to make the gift to get back into the city's good graces.'
    'Two hundred and fifty million Swiss Francs can buy a lot of good will,' the mayor chuckled.
    'Besides,' Frau Goetz continued, 'Kate has her own money - and very proud of it, too, I might add.'
    'I was under the impression she has a trust from her mother's estate,' Marcus remarked.
    'She had one, but it came to her when she turned twenty-one and she invested it in a business venture with her first husband, Lord Kenyon. This was. . . oh, ten years ago. When the company became bankrupt following her husband's death the poor thing lost everything. Imagine it!' Frau Goetz continued with a shake of her head and a strange wobbling of skin under her chin, 'losing her husband on her honeymoon and her entire fortune a couple of months later!'
    The mayor gave a casual shrug of his shoulders. 'If this collection is any indication, Roland surely had a few million lying about to soften the blow.'
    'He did, but Kate wouldn't a take a rappen ! Her trust was hers. She had lost it, and so she set about earning it back - with interest, according to my husband.
    Marcus's eyes twinkled mischievously. 'Any idea just how she managed it?'
    The lady gave him a coy look. 'Dealing in art in the same fashion as her father, as I understand it. You know, money is the least of what children inherit from their parents!'
    Marcus tipped his head and offered an expression of mild curiosity for Kate Brand. 'More than a pretty face then?'
    'Oh, my goodness yes. I believe she is the most extraordinary individual I've ever met! You know of course she is one of the best climbers in Switzerland?'
    'I think I saw something on TV about that a few years ago.'
    'I get vertigo on a stepladder!'
    The object of Frau Goetz's admiration stood radiantly in what had once been Roland Wheeler's library. At the moment she was laughing at something the director of the James Joyce Foundation was telling her. It was curious, Marcus thought, how she won people over so effortlessly. Kate Wheeler, the wealthy heiress, Lady Kenyon, the young widow of an English lord, or just plain Kate Brand, the wife of an American rock climber: whatever scandal they whispered seemed to slip away the moment one looked at that radiant smile.
    It hadn't taken a hundred million pounds to buy her way back into Zürich's fickle embrace. Kate's smile alone was sufficient for that. The gift to Zürich in her father's name was exactly what it seemed: a