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A silence fell between them. Willa felt herself softening toward Landry and mentally slapped herself.
“I know which painting you’re talking about,” she said after a moment. “But I don’t know what happened to it.”
“What?”
“I remember the painting. It was supposed to be in the show but I don’t remember seeing it after the paintings went to the gallery.”
He swore again. “Was it possible Simon hid the painting somewhere in your studio? The police searched the place, right?”
She nodded.
“Freddy D.’s not in jail so he knows the disk hasn’t turned up. So where the hell was it?” She could hear his frustration and his fear. “Did anyone else have access to your shop?”
She shook her head. “Another artist who worked next door would sometimes watch the shop if I had to leave for a few minutes…. But she wasn’t in the shop between when Simon Renton came in and I packed the items for the show.”
“Okay, let’s walk through what happened after Simon left your shop, okay?”
She explained how she had finished the last of the framing. “I was too excited to sleep so I packed up the art for the show, then I went to bed.”
“And you’re sure that painting was one of them you packed?”
She nodded.
“You say you went to bed?”
“My apartment was just upstairs.”
“You think you would have heard if anyone had come in during the night?”
“Of course. Anyway, the paintings were packed. It would have been impossible for someone to sneak in, find that particular painting and take it without me hearing them.”
He groaned and raked a hand through his hair. “Okay, the painting was packed, then what?”
“The next morning, Evan came over and helped me load the paintings into a van and take them to the gallery. Evan is the gallery owner. I helped him put the boxes in the back of the shop. Then I left and he set up the show after the gallery closed that afternoon.”
“He does everything himself?”
“It’s a small gallery.”
“What did you do?”
“I went back to my studio and worked. I like to paint when I’m anxious. It calms me. Later, I went over to the gallery to make sure Evan had everything he needed.”
“But you don’t remember seeing the sailboat painting.”
“No, but then I can’t be sure it wasn’t there and disappeared later. Evan might remember.”
Yes, Landry would have to talk to Evan. “Did all the paintings sell?”
“Almost all of them. Evan packed up the rest.”
Landry felt his heart quicken. If the small painting had accidentally been overlooked in a box at the back of the gallery, Evan would have just packed the unsold ones with it. “What happened to those paintings, the unsold ones?”
She frowned. “I asked him to put them away for me until I came for them.”
The painting had to be one of two places if it hadn’t been found yet, which he was counting on. Either it had been misplaced at the gallery. Or Simon had hid it in the studio.
“Okay,” he said, feeling better. “What happened to everything in your studio?”
