Jeffrey Nullier's "Man With Fedora" 2/2

[sam_storyteller]

Title: Jeffrey Nullier's "Man With Fedora"
Part: 2/2
Rating: PG (Language)
Warnings: None.
Summary: A routine investigation into an art theft turns up Neal's fingerprints on a stolen painting. Neal swears he's never stolen a Nullier painting, but that's only half the truth...

Part One: Who Framed Neal Caffrey?

***

Neal was twitchy the next morning, which Peter could understand; he didn't want to leave his paintings alone, even in secure storage, and he did after all have a show opening that evening. Peter had watched Elizabeth deal with openings before and knew that the prospect of putting oneself on display, of being judged by one's skills, was enough to put even arrogant, confident artists into fits; it was like having a performance review with Hughes, except it lasted for days. Neal, who never exposed any part of himself if he could help it, was probably suffering from the idea more than most, even if he was better at hiding it.

As soon as they finished the briefing on the Met robbery and the procedure for that evening, Neal took Jones and half a dozen junior field agents and bolted for the Met, where the techs were already installing cameras in the gallery and listening devices in most of the very pretty flower arrangements Elizabeth had ordered for the preview reception. Peter left him alone until early afternoon, when he came in to do the final check and equipment test.

They'd had photos of the stolen paintings hanging in the office for a few days and he'd had time to get used to them, plus they were small. When he walked into the exhibition gallery where Neal's work was hanging, he stopped for a moment to get his bearings.

Neal was straddling the top platform of a stepladder, a digital level pressed to the top of a painting frame. Next to him, one of the museum staff was attaching a small placard to the wall. The painting Neal was struggling with was one of the forged nightscapes, the red sun peeking eerily over his shoulder.

Twelve other pieces hung at even intervals around the room, each with their own little placard giving what provenance could be gathered -- the usual artist-medium-date-catalogue-number, all marked Temporary Loan, some with brief descriptions underneath. In one corner was a larger placard with bigger text, outlining what the Met supposedly knew about Jeffrey Nullier, headed "Power/Mystery". Peter rolled his eyes, but he did a slow circuit of the paintings: Baptism. Field #1. Blue Study and Red Study (another matched set). New Orleans Girl. Darwin's Proof Table, which Peter thought was probably the best and creepiest of them, a bald man with the skull almost visible through his skin, staring at an articulated animal skeleton. Night Blaze, the one he'd given to June.

Peter heard Neal swearing, quietly; he pulled himself away from the paintings and walked over to the nightscape, tapping the lower left corner of the painting gently with one hand.

"Thanks," Neal said distractedly, as the digital level declared the painting even. He took his hands and the level away carefully, swung his leg over the stepladder, and descended. "And we're done. Hey, what do you think?"

"I think I want to know if there are any camera blind spots," Peter said.

"Jones is testing it now."

"You excited?" Peter asked, as Neal folded up the stepladder and passed it off to a museum installation contractor.

"Should I be?" Neal asked.

"Well, you're opening a show."

"It's just a sting, Peter," Neal said. "They haven't got me here because they want me here. I'm here because the FBI wants me here."

"People are still going to look," Peter pointed out. "The show's scheduled to run for weeks. Total strangers are going to walk right in and discover Jeffrey Nullier."

"Great, maybe they can make some postcards, or print my paintings on umbrellas like they do with the Mona Lisa," Neal said drily.

"Fine, you want to play it cool, keep going," Peter said. Neal turned to survey the room -- the paintings, the placards, the new self-portrait at the heart of the show. It was on display for viewing at the preview, but tomorrow it would be enclosed in a little curtained cubicle until the official evening opening. The perfect opportunity, in a room where the only guard was on the door and facing the other way, for their thief to get some alone-time with the painting.

"It's pretty cool," Neal admitted, crossing his arms. "Most of these paintings have never been in the same room together before. I didn't notice Darwin's Proof Table and Kitchen have a mutual palette, that's a little scary."

"Why?" Peter asked.

"Because the first one's about death and the second one's about lunch?" Neal said, glancing at him.

"Darwin's Proof Table is about death?"

"Well, yeah. He's dying," Neal said, pointing to the man in the painting. "That's why you can see his skull. I met him at the California Academy of Sciences museum. We struck up a conversation."

"Did you pick a dying man's pocket?" Peter asked.

"Sometimes I don't know where you get your ideas about me," Neal replied, no real hurt in his voice. "No. I bought him lunch, asked him what was so fascinating about the skeleton. He said the way the bones fit together is Darwin's proof table: you can see a human hand in a whale's flipper, a human spine when you watch a cat stretch. Really interesting guy. He was dying of cancer, decided to spend his last few months going to museums."

"So you painted him."

"He sat as a model for it. He said it felt like immortality," Neal said, looking like he was back in California, in some little studio somewhere, painting a dying man. He shook his head. "Anyway, it has the same palette as Kitchen, which I did just to tease Kate. She hated that kitchen, it was some month-to-month place we rented in Ohio."

"I feel like I'm getting the backstage tour of Neal Caffrey's subconscious, and it frightens me," Peter said, as Jones approached. "Everything in place?"

"In place and functional. We're live and wired," Jones said. "Ready?"

"This should be fun," Neal said, and very few people would have caught the note of hesitation in his voice.

"Come on, Rembrandt," Peter answered, jerking his head at the outer gallery. "I'll take you home so you can get dressed for your big event."

***

By ten o'clock that night, Peter thought the show was going pretty well from a surveillance point of view. The camera over the door caught every patron's face as they entered, and Diana -- posing as an attendant checking registration -- passed the names back to Jones in sync. There were at least ten critics, drifting in and out, and a handful of reporters collecting their press packs. Elizabeth, supervising the caterers, had already given out a couple of business cards.

Peter was presenting himself as one of the high-level donors who'd received an invite, keeping mostly to the sidelines as he watched Neal work the room. Neal was glad-handing like it was a religious calling, taking the measure of each person he talked to. He was mostly playing the same conversation over and over: one of the guests at the preview would remark on a painting, Neal would introduce himself as Nullier's agent, they'd discuss how nice it was that he was bringing his work together or finally getting the credit he deserved, and then Neal would imagine he saw someone he needed to speak to, and move on to someone else. At one point Peter caught a surprised look on Neal's face, and drifted over to find him speaking with a young man who was very earnestly telling him about the use of traditional themes in Nullier's work.

"What was that all about?" he asked, when the young man wandered off.

"He's an art student," Neal said. "He told me he lied his way in."

"Diana's probably got him on the watchlist, then."

"I don't think he's our guy," Neal shook his head. "Actually, maybe. He really seemed to have some original thoughts about the work, I think he's here because he genuinely likes it."

"You're surprised?"

"I didn't think people saw it that way, that's all," Neal said. Peter made a mental note to get the full conversation from the wire Neal was wearing, later.

"Jones, keep an eye on the kid Neal was just talking to," Peter said into the wire in his watch, under cover of scratching his cheek.

"On it," Jones replied through his earbud.

"I hope it's not him," Neal said. "Bright kid. Listen, this could be someone trying to draw me out, or I'm thinking it could just be someone who wants to...collect. The motive for everything is pretty oblique, but we might be chasing the wrong fox here."

"We'll talk about it tomorrow. Get a drink, check in with El, make some more friends," Peter told him, eyes tracking the young man as he made his way towards Fury, Neal's self-portrait, and then veered away from it. Peter couldn't blame him; nearly everyone there had some experience with the paintings of Jeffrey Nullier, and there was still a wide empty place around the piece. People passing through the eyeline of the painting tended to shuffle quickly away, most of them without seeming to notice they did it. If Neal had wanted to disturb and frighten, he was succeeding. Elizabeth had been forced to move one of the tables at the last minute so the servers wouldn't feel like the painting was watching them.

Peter did a check for Elizabeth and found her in quiet conference with one of the bartenders, apparently keeping busy. He moved towards the edges of the crowd again, pretending to be fascinated by Baptism -- the realistically painted figure of a young clean-shaven Christ, hand upraised in an attitude of blessing, looking a little surprised and very wet, like he'd just been hit with a bucket of water. Peter wondered if there was a story behind that, too.

"Boss, we have a late visitor," Diana said in his earbud. He glanced at her sidelong. "Woman in the brown jacket. She just bribed her way in, gave her name as Christina Kell."

"Where have I heard that before?" Peter muttered, rubbing his jaw to get the watch near his face.

"She's the one who wrote the thesis on Nullier," Jones supplied.

"I'll keep an eye on her," Peter promised. "Neal, you get that?"

"Loud and clear," Neal murmured into his radio.

Peter followed he as she made her way around the room, on the circuit everyone seemed to take along the walls, but when she reached Fury she stopped and stared at it, minutes ticking past as she studied it carefully. Nobody else had spent so much time looking at it; even the critics had examined it and then moved on quickly, nervously.

She was obviously wearing her best for the occasion, but she still seemed slightly out of place, not quite as formally dressed as the other guests. She had a narrow, freckled face, brown hair cut short, and paint under her fingernails, trapped in the cuticles the way it had been on Neal's hands when he'd finished the painting. The room was warm, but she hadn't taken her coat off.

"Nullier is a compelling painter," he said, approaching her, trying to strike up a conversation. "People don't seem overwhelmingly attracted to the new one."

"The eyes look right into you," she replied, without looking away from the painting. "He looks like he's going to bite."

"Just a painting, fortunately," Peter remarked. "Are you familiar with Nullier's work?"

"I'm getting there," she said.

"Nice to see so many of them assembled. He's finally getting the credit he's due," Peter tried.

She shrugged. "I don't know if I'd say that."

Come on, he thought. Take an opening. "Peter Burke," he offered, holding out his hand. She turned, a false sort of smile on her face, and he gave her his best genuine smile in return. She reached for his hand, caught his face, and then turned pale.

"I don't bite either," he said, but he turned his hand over and let it fall back to his side.

"Man With Fedora," she hissed.

Peter just had time for a brief moment of dismay that he'd been made before she was actively recoiling, which didn't really seem fair. And then she reached inside her coat and, as these things always did when the suspect went for a weapon, time slowed way down.

"Gun," Peter heard himself shout, even as Jones was yelling it in his ear too. "Everybody down -- "

But it wasn't a gun; there was a flash of steel, too bright and sharp for a gun. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Diana drop her clipboard and bolt across the room towards him. The other agent monitoring the room was coming from his other side, and even as the knife appeared in her hand Peter did a safety-check for Elizabeth -- there she was, crouched by the drinks table, Neal with one arm around her and holding her head down protectively.

Peter jerked back, away from the blade, but it was a split-second too late and the knife was very sharp. The tip sunk deep into his shoulder and pulled before he got his arm up and knocked her aside, weakening the force of the drive but not diverting it completely. She cried out and the movement shifted his muscle around the knife, agonizingly, but then Diana was there hauling her off him, while she screamed obscenities and everyone else just screamed and the knife clattered to the floor.

Peter looked down at the gash on his shoulder, blood burbling around it.

"That's not good," he said, as the world began to spin. Agents were pouring into the gallery, and Peter did another vague check for Elizabeth and Neal, only to find Neal right in front of him, mouthing words Peter couldn't hear. Someone caught him as he started to fall, jarring his shoulder, and he got a glimpse of a spray of blood across the face of Fury (or maybe Neal's face; the world was sort of two-dimensional) before he passed out.

***

He woke briefly in the ambulance, disoriented for a moment; his shoulder burned, nerves screaming. He tried to raise his hand to put pressure on it, but someone already was -- one of the EMTs, looking down at him and calling orders to her partner.

"You're cool, you're okay," she told him, smiling reassuringly. "You're losing some blood but you're going to be fine."

"Get her?" he managed. "Bag the knife."

"Cops," she said, rolling her eyes. "They said they had someone in custody. Your wife's right behind us with your partner. I'm sure they bagged the knife. Deep breaths with me, okay, Agent Burke? Nothing to worry about, just inhale, exhale."

Peter closed his eyes and breathed, in and out, until he lost consciousness again.

When he came back to reality for the second time, he found himself sitting up on the edge of a hospital bed, staring at his own arm. There was an IV needle taped down to it, and he followed the line up to a bag hanging nearby.

"Hey, you back with us?" someone said, and he turned his head to find a man in scrubs putting stitches into his shoulder. It didn't hurt; the numbness spreading through his arm and up his throat felt like local anaesthetic.

"Yeah," he tried, and then cleared his throat and tried again. "Yeah. What's the damage?"

"Twelve stitches," the doctor told him, tying one off and clipping it neatly. "You're a lucky man, Agent Burke. The cut's not that deep."

"Where's the knife?" he asked.

"Your Agent Barrigan thought you'd ask that. She said to tell you it's in evidence," the man assured him. "Your wife and brother-in-law are here, if you'd like to see them."

Elizabeth didn't have any brothers; Peter frowned, and then nodded. Neal, of course. Family were the only ones allowed in, aside from LEOs, and Neal was only a consultant. He looked enough like Elizabeth to pull that off.

"I want to see them," he said. The doctor tied the last stitch and taped a bandage over the wound.

"Okay. I'll write up some prescriptions for the pain and get you a care printout," he said. "We'd like to keep you overnight if we can."

Peter nodded and the doctor clapped him on his good shoulder and left. Peter sat and studied his IV some more until Elizabeth pushed past the privacy curtain.

"Hey, hon," he said, as she wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed her face into his chest. "Hey, it's okay," he added, trying to lift a hand to stroke her head and not getting very far with either arm. Neal was standing near the curtain, watching warily, and Peter shot him a hapless look.

"Elizabeth, you're gonna break some ribs," Neal said, and she immediately let Peter go, wiping tears off her face. "Hey, way to go, getting knifed," Neal added.

"It wasn't a goal," Peter retorted, as Elizabeth leaned against him at an angle where he could put his good arm around her waist. He kissed her hair, inhaling, steadying himself on the smell of her shampoo. "I'm okay," he added to El, talking into her hair. "Twelve stitches and a local." Elizabeth liked to know all the details, because then at least she wasn't worrying about the abstract. "They'll keep me overnight, I'll go home in the morning. It's fine."

He rested his chin on her head and glanced at Neal again. There were a few drops of blood on Neal's collar and the edge of his jaw; must have been him that got hit and not the painting, then. A dark streak along the side of his nose said he'd probably half-assedly washed the rest off.

"She's in custody," Neal said quietly, glancing at Elizabeth, checking to make sure it was okay to talk about. "They've got her in detention for tonight. Diana called in a warrant, they're tossing her place now. I told them to text if they found something. Jesus Christ, Peter," he added, which seemed random until Peter saw Neal's hands shaking. He'd held it together just long enough to get out the information Peter would want to know, and now Peter had two people falling apart on him.

"Get over here," Peter ordered. "My arms are messed up, hug Elizabeth for me."

Elizabeth turned, without even looking, and let Neal wrap his arms around her, squeezing him tightly. Neal flinched for a minute, but his hands weren't shaking quite so badly. Slowly, hesitantly, he leaned forward a little and rested his forehead against Peter's temple.

"It's okay," Peter repeated. "I'm fine, I'll be okay."

"Okay," Neal agreed. They stayed like that for a minute, until Peter spoke again.

"Brother-in-law, huh?" he asked, and Neal laughed.

"Hey, they bought it," he said, pulling back. Elizabeth stepped back too, sniffling and digging in her purse for a tissue. Neal passed her his pocket square absently. "I didn't think 'I'm his criminal informant' would go over big with the nurses."

"Do we know what happened?" Peter asked. Neal shook his head.

"She's pretty obviously mentally ill," he said. "It sounded like she recognized you from Man With Fedora. After she cut you she went for Fury with her bare hands."

"What kind of person does that?" Elizabeth asked angrily. Peter took her hand and held it, resting on his leg, thumb rubbing soothingly across her palm. She wiped her nose with Neal's pocket square and leaned against Peter's knee. He made sure he got eye contact and a slightly wavery smile from her before he turned back to Neal.

"You think she's our thief?" he asked.

Neal shrugged. "She's an artist. She probably has the chops to do the forgeries, so it seems reasonable. Plus she's familiar with Man With Fedora, enough that she knew it was you. Diana thinks she was going to try and mutilate one of the paintings. No other reason she'd have a knife, especially one sharp enough to cut varnish and canvas."

"Anyone try to interrogate her yet?" Peter asked.

"Diana's running the case. She said nobody talks to Christina Kell until Diana talks to you."

"Good. You want to let her know what's going on?"

Neal nodded and took his phone out, disappearing through the privacy curtain. Peter turned back to Elizabeth, who gave him another smile.

"I get scared when you get hurt," she said softly.

"Me too," he admitted, kissing her. "I didn't mean to worry you."

"At least it's not a gunshot," she said. "If they had to put you in surgery I was going to freak out." After a while, she added, "I think you freaked Neal out worse. He's not used to you and hospitals."

"So you had to deal with him, too?" Peter asked.

"It wasn't bad. He just kept repeating it wasn't worth the stupid paintings, until Diana told him to shut it and sit quietly." Elizabeth's smile widened. "You've got them both trained."

"I hope so," Peter grumbled, as Neal came back in.

"Jones is letting everyone know," he said. "They haven't found anything yet. They think she has a cache somewhere."

"We should find out -- " Peter, instinctively, started to get off the bed; he had an interrogation to perform. Elizabeth put a hand on his chest and pushed back gently. "Right. Okay. Not tonight."

"Not tonight," she agreed, as a nurse appeared, brushing past Neal.

"Sir, ma'am," she said. "Agent Burke needs to rest. For you," she added, offering Peter a cup of water and a little plastic tray with two pills in it. "Painkiller and a light sedative, just to get you to sleep."

"Can we stay?" Neal asked, fumbling for his ID wallet. "Look -- I'm law enforcement, I work for the FBI. I can say we have to stay, right?"

Peter caught Elizabeth trying not to smile.

The nurse glanced at the wallet he was holding out and shook her head. "You can stay until he falls asleep. Agent Burke, you okay with that?"

Peter nodded, swallowing the pills, the cold water soothing in his mouth, on his raw throat. He let Elizabeth take the cup from him and give him another soft push back onto the bed. She didn't even let go of his hand as she pulled a chair around to sit with him. He closed his eyes -- inhale, exhale, everything was okay -- and heard the shift and creak as Neal sat down as well.

It abruptly struck Peter as funny, Neal trying to badge his way into staying the night, and he said "I'm law enforcement," and began to laugh. He heard Neal's rueful chuckle and Elizabeth's laughter, too, and slipped down into sleep.

***

Peter slept soundly but woke stiff the next morning, muscles protesting when he tried to sit up. His shoulder ached, but not enough to be distracting, and it helped clear the fuzzy aftereffects of sleep out of his brain.

It was early still, early enough that he wasn't too worried about getting to the office on time, especially since it was a Saturday. They fed him a decent breakfast, changed the dressing on his shoulder, pressed painkillers and antibiotics on him, and ordered him to keep his arm immobilized for a few days.

After that they let Elizabeth in to see him, dragging Neal with her and carrying a pile of clothes for him. He would have preferred a t-shirt to work clothes, but as soon as he tried to get his arm through the sleeve he saw her logic -- he couldn't have raised it high enough for anything that didn't button. Dressing the rest of himself one-handed wasn't exactly fun, but Neal presented him with a tie already knotted (double-windsor, showoff) and then offered him a belt strung with his gun and spare clips in a hip holster. No shoulder holster; well, of course. Not for a while.

"Where'd you get this holster?" Peter asked, perplexed, as he threaded the belt clumsily through the loops.

"Your closet," Neal replied.

"When were you in my closet?"

"Last night," Neal said. He plucked the uneaten apple off Peter's breakfast tray and bit into it. "Also, your guest bedroom. I like the quilt."

"Thanks, my mother made it," Peter replied, distracted. "Why were you in our guest room?"

"I wanted someone around the house," Elizabeth said, with a look that clearly announced Neal wanted someone around the house. It was a little gratifying to know that a stab wound could have such an effect on his partner, but they had a job to do. "Neal stayed in the guest room. Now. Office or home?"

"Office," Peter sighed, pulling the sling over his head and settling his arm in it. "We need to talk to Christina Kell."

Elizabeth left them at the office with instructions for Peter not to strain himself, and instructions for Neal about what to do when Peter inevitably strained himself. When they reached the detention and information retrieval floor (Information Retrieval; such a nice term for interrogation) Diana was already there, waiting for them, and Christina Kell was sitting in an interrogation room. She was rocking back and forth slightly.

Peter watched her through the one-way glass, wondering what was going through her head. "Get anything out of her?"

"Nope," Diana said. "She won't talk. Hasn't requested a lawyer, but hasn't waived her right to one either."

"Next of kin?"

"Trying to find them now."

"Can we get a psych consult lined up?" he asked.

"Hard to do on a Saturday," Diana told him. "I didn't want to get that ball rolling until you were here. How's the shoulder?"

"Fine," he said absently. He glanced at Neal, who was watching her also, his face a smooth and unreadable mask. Peter would give even more to know what was going through Neal's head than to know what was going through Christina's. He turned away again. "I don't think I should be the one to talk to her. She's got some kind of delusion going on about the paintings, and she thinks I'm Man With Fedora. I'm not going to help her mental state."

"Can I do it?" Neal asked. Peter saw Diana giving Neal the same surprised look he probably was. Neal met their gaze. "I'm an artist, I'm a thief, I get it. I want to know why she stole my paintings. Maybe she wants to talk to Jeffrey Nullier. I got a lot of cards to play with her."

"You need an agent in the room," Peter said. "Diana, go with him."

Neal shot him a smile and gathered up the file on the thefts, going for the door; Diana drew close and murmured, "You sure you want to do this?"

"I don't see what other options we have. Once she has her psych evaluation, we won't get another shot."

"And isn't that a murky grey area kind of thing to say," Diana pointed out.

"All I want is her cache," Peter replied. "Go. Grab her if she goes for Neal. That's all you have to do. This isn't optional, Diana."

She nodded, still a little wary, and walked out the door. After a few seconds, she and Neal walked into the interrogation room together, and Peter watched through the glass as Diana took up a position against the wall. Christina didn't seem to recognize Neal from his portrait when he sat down; without the anger in his face, Peter couldn't say if he'd recognize Neal from the portrait either.

"Hi," Neal said, and the mirror in the corner showed him smiling at her. She didn't respond, but he doubted Neal expected a response. This was the start of the patter -- hypnotic, distracting, nothing that would even require thought on the part of the mark. "Do you know why you're here today? You're in for assaulting a federal agent. He's fine, by the way. He's watching through that glass there," Neal said, and pointed over his shoulder. "Twelve stitches, but the guy's a trouper."

"What are you doing?" Peter muttered, knowing Neal couldn't hear him.

"He's not going to hold a grudge, but you'll probably do time. The government doesn't like it," Neal said, all sympathy. "Tough break. We have you on camera, though, so we don't need to question you about that. The state-appointed psychiatrist assigned to your case will interview you about it. But you can make things better for yourself, easier on you," he continued, opening the file folder. Peter noticed that Christina had stopped rocking, and was focused on his hands. He pressed one over the top report sheet.

"Say that someone was stealing paintings by a man named Jeffrey Nullier," Neal said, and Christina's shoulders pulled taut, inwards, tense. "I have a theory, a little imaginary story I want to ask you about. It's not hard to steal paintings, is it? Especially if they're not very secure. Minor galleries, isolated houses. But this one," he said, taking out a photograph of the landscape that had been stolen from Trumbull. "This job, theoretically, was a little more difficult. Maybe our thief hired some agents to get some paintings for her. If you want a thing done right, though, you just have to do it yourself, don't you?" he asked, smiling. "They weren't supposed to take the landscape, were they? Did you even know they got a couple of Picassos and a Degas as well?"

He passed the landscape across the table, following it with the other paintings taken from Trumbull, except for the two portraits. Christina looked -- hungry, expectant, as if she was waiting for the portraits. When Neal closed the folder again, her eyebrows drew together.

"These," he said, "Were done for hire, weren't they? What screw-ups, huh? They should go down just for being stupid. Don't you think?"

Peter was not completely surprised, though he was a little impressed, when Christina said, "Yes."

"You know who they were?"

"Yes."

"Did you hire them, Christina?"

"Yes," she said, and Peter felt his shoulder burn as his muscles tightened. Yes. Even if she pled insanity, they had a confession.

But that didn't even seem to be what Neal was looking for. He didn't press for their names or for any particulars. Instead he reached into the folder and set out Robbing Titian, the portrait of the redhead. "Still, they can't have been totally incompetent. They brought you this one, huh?"

"Yes," Christina answered, staring at it. Peter couldn't tell whether the fear on her face was for the painting or for Neal.

"You know what she's called?"

"Robbing Titian."

"Mmhm. You know where she is?" Neal asked, tone not varying at all. Christina looked up at him then, defiant.

"Safe," she said.

"Where's she safe?" Neal asked.

"Somewhere nobody can find," Christina said. Neal opened the file again and laid Man With Fedora in front of her.

"And him?"

"Man With Fedora," she almost sobbed, looking away.

"Where is he, Christina?"

"Safe!" she shouted.

"How do you know?" Neal asked. "You're here. They're there. How do you know they're safe?"

"I made sure of it," she answered. Neal took another photo out of the file.

"Who's this, Christina?" he asked, and Peter could hear, if she couldn't, the dangerous tone growing in his voice.

"Pursuit," she replied.

"Where is he?"

"SAFE."

Neal didn't even flinch when she shouted, just laid down a fourth photo.

"Christina, who is -- "

"Keystone, and she's safe!" Christina insisted.

Neal paused. Finally he laid down the last photo -- the portrait of Kate.

"Who is this?" he asked.

"Field #2," she replied. "She's -- "

"No," Neal said. Christina stopped abruptly. Diana glanced at the glass, at Peter, who consciously uncurled the fist his right hand was making. "Her name is Kate."

"No, that's not right," Christina insisted. "That's Field #2."

"No. That's Kate," Neal replied. "The woman in the painting is named Kate."

Christina looked down at it.

"I know the name of the woman in the painting, because I knew her," Neal continued, voice persuasive. "Her name is Kate. You took her away from the other painting, Christina. That was wrong. You broke a set. I don't think Kate would like that. Look at me, Christina," he said, and then repeated it when she wouldn't. "Look at me!"

Her eyes snapped up. Neal held her gaze for a minute and then touched each photograph in turn.

"This is Magdalen," he said, and Peter made a note to look up the name. "This is Peter. This is Sergeant Petrow. This is Alexandra. This is Kate. You stole them, Christina."

"I made them safe," Christina whispered.

"You stole them. They don't belong to you. They belong to me," Neal said. "I painted them, Christina."

Her face went pale.

"I painted these," Neal repeated. "And Fury, too. Weren't you going to slash Fury when you came to the preview last night? That's why you had the knife, isn't it? You were going to attack my painting?"

"I -- I don't -- "

"You took them and I want them back," Neal said, leaning close. Peter saw Diana, ready to move fast if Christina went after Neal. "You took my faces, Christina. You took my faces and I want my faces back!"

"No!" Christina wailed, and started to cry.

"Give them back, Christina, give me back my faces," Neal insisted, almost shouting now, inches from her. "They're mine, Christina, and I want them back!"

"I buried them!" she cried, and Neal didn't give an inch until she added, "They can't hurt anyone now!"

Neal rocked back, shocked. He eyed her across the table for a minute, while Peter reformulated the entire theory of the case. Possibly Neal was doing the same thing, on the other side of the glass.

"When you said they were safe," Neal said, softer again, persuasive again. Peter wondered if he'd been taking notes on other interrogations, or if he was just a natural, "you meant, we were safe from them."

Christina gave a wretched nod. Peter took out his cellphone and dialed.

"I want them back," Neal continued, voice still quiet. "I'll make sure they don't hurt anyone, Christina, but you have to give them back to me."

"You can't have them," she said.

"Jones," Peter said, when Jones picked up. "Are you at the house?"

"Yeah, we're going through the second floor again, why?"

"Does she have a basement?" Peter asked. In the background he heard Christina weeping, and the slam of a door.

"Yeah, but we looked down there."

"Take measurements," Peter said. "She told Neal she buried the paintings. Make sure there aren't any false walls. Look around for fresh concrete, fresh dirt outside."

"Can do. We'll call if we find anything."

Peter hung up and glanced through the glass; Christina was alone in the room. He expected Neal and Diana to come back into the observation room, but after a long minute he opened the door and peered out.

Neal was sitting with his back against the wall, head in his hands. Diana was standing over him, an indecisive expression on her face.

"This is crap," Neal said, when he heard Peter emerge. "They're just some fucking paintings. I'll do new ones."

"She broke the law," Peter said.

"She's sick, Peter. She thinks she's protecting the world from," Neal snorted, tipping his head back, "from Kate and Alex and you and Magdalen and Scotty Petrow. Five of the least evil people I know. And I just tried to destroy her, and this is not okay."

"Neal -- "

"No. I'm not going back in there to abuse a mentally ill woman, Peter, screw the case. They're just paintings, they're not worth what I did to her." Neal pushed himself up the wall and started to walk away, only to find his path blocked by Diana.

"Oh, do you really want to get into it with me?" she said, when Neal's hands clenched. Peter watched, fascinated and aware he should probably be doing something, but Diana just stood there until Neal backed down and leaned against the wall again.

Peter's phone rang, startling all three of them.

"Yeah," Peter answered, when he saw it was Jones.

"I think you better come see this," Jones told him.

***

"Before you go in there," Jones warned, walking backwards up the sidewalk to Christina Kell's small suburban house, talking to Peter as he went, "do you know what the Wall Of Crazy is?"

"The what?" Peter asked, as Jones opened the front door.

"It's a cliché," Neal supplied. He'd been silent for most of the drive out, not sulking, just the sort of exhausted silence Peter had occasionally encountered from him at the end of a long case. "The detectives find out where the stalker or killer lives and they walk inside and find the wall plastered with cutouts and writing and photographs. Wall of Crazy."

"Yeah, well, we got something like that here," Jones said, leading them through the kitchen (clean, but covered in paint-stained dropcloths; clearly a studio) and down a set of stairs to the basement.

The walls were wood-paneled, like something out of the fifties, wainscotted up to about four feet before dingy, damp wallpaper started. It was full of the usual storage junk -- boxes, broken things, bits of unidentifiable furniture -- all of which had been pushed away from the back wall. Jones went up to the wall and pressed on one panel. It swung inwards.

Peter ducked through carefully and found himself in a narrow room lit primarily by FBI-issue excavation lamps, the battery operated bare-bulb lights they usually brought out for nighttime body hunts. Neal followed before he could stop him.

He heard Diana swear, briefly, and a low shocked noise from Neal, but it was hard to process anything except the wall in front of him.

Seven paintings -- the five they knew about, two others that perhaps had been stolen and replaced with copies -- hung on the wall in a neat row, a strange mockery of the exhibit at the Met. They were surrounded by clippings about Nullier and webpage printouts of his art from auction houses and galleries, but that was hardly what drew his attention.

Every single one of them had been slashed with a sharp blade, over and over again, erratic and furious. Some were hanging in tattered strips, others showing gaps where pieces of canvas had fallen to the floor. Peter saw, with a twist of nausea, Man With Fedora, the smiling mouth shredded and gaping.

He turned to Neal, who had gone completely white.

"You okay?" he asked Neal, quietly.

"Why would -- " Neal started, and then shook his head, because he already knew the answer. Ivan the Terrible and his Son Ivan. Neal had reached into someone's mind and pulled out her nightmares, and that seemed to make him even more upset.

"Get him out of here," Peter said, but Neal struggled out of Jones's grip and started forward, crouching to pick up a strip of canvas that lay in the dust below Field #2. He rubbed it against his palm unsteadily and then wrapped it around his hand. One of Kate's eyes looked up at Peter from Neal's fingers, briefly, before Diana took hold of him and pulled him back. This time he didn't resist, just stumbled backwards into the wall and let her bend him to push him out of the room.

"Let's get the scene processed," Peter said. "Get them wrapped as carefully as you can and send them back to evidence. Call the owners -- take photographs of the two we didn't know about, we'll match them against the list Neal has."

The evidence techs, who had apparently just been waiting for the order, began scurrying around under Jones's watchful eye, bagging pieces of canvas and carefully photographing the paintings. Peter ducked back out into the basement and came up the stairs; through the open front door he saw Neal sitting on the outside step, still winding and unwinding the strip of painting around his fingers, dried paint cracking under the strain and flaking away. Kate's eye winked, disappeared, returned. Peter settled next to him, wincing as he lowered himself down with one hand. He put out his hand and covered Neal's with it, pulling the canvas away from him, tucking it into an evidence bag before putting it in his pocket.

"They were a joke," Neal said, after a while. "They were just something to pass the time. They're not worth the money. I'd be fine giving them away."

"You wondered what it would be like to have the power Repin did," Peter reminded him. "You wanted to know how it would feel."

"Peter -- "

"Consequences, Neal," Peter said, shaking his head, cutting Neal off. "Nobody is above them."

Neal looked down at his hands, flecked with paint dust from the canvas. "This wasn't how this con was supposed to work."

"That's because it's not a con," Peter answered. "Being an artist isn't a con just because other people think your paintings are more valuable than you do. You did these paintings and they said something. You didn't take that seriously."

"So, what, I'm to blame for that?" Neal asked, gesturing over his shoulder. "Thanks, Peter."

"No," Peter said. "This isn't your fault. But if it really were a joke, this wouldn't have happened. Take yourself seriously for once in your damn life, Neal. It's okay for these paintings to mean something to you. It's okay to be hurt that someone did that. Stop fighting it."

Neal let out a long, slow breath. "Is someone telling the owners?"

"Jones has it covered. Look, this is good work. We have a confession from Christina, we got the paintings back, and we can probably go after the rest of the art they took from Trumbull once Christina gives us a name. I'm closing the Nullier case. It's over."

Another slow breath. Peter realized Neal was trying not to cry.

"I'll get in touch with the owners," Neal said. "I can offer to restore the portraits, at least."

"Let's worry about that once we get them back to the Bureau, get the damage assessed," Peter said. "You don't have to do it today. Besides," he added, grinning, "you have an opening to attend."

"Ungh," Neal moaned, leaning back, closing his eyes. "We caught her. Do I have to? I don't think I could look Field #1 in the face right now."

"Diva," Peter told him.

"Bastard," Neal retorted.

"Hey, I took a knife for you, some respect here," Peter insisted. Neal laughed; Terrible Crying Situation officially averted. "Look, I'll find someone to take you back to June's. I'm staying here to help with the cleanup."

"No, I'll stay," Neal said, as Jones emerged from the house carrying Pursuit. "I should make sure they don't mishandle them."

He made no move to get up, though; he just sat and watched as Jones loaded Pursuit's ruined remains into the evidence van, and then as one of the techs loaded Man With Fedora.

"I'm sorry she wrecked your face," Neal said.

"Still not sorry you stole it, though?" Peter asked.

"All my best work is in the field of theft," Neal said. "Allegedly."

"Mmhm." Peter rubbed his injured shoulder absently, trying to stop the muscles from cramping. "Next time, just ask."

"It's more fun to ask forgiveness than permission," Neal replied, and stood up. "Keystone looked like it got shredded. I'm going to go see how they're doing."

Peter nodded and decided to supervise from the step, while the techs streamed around him and Jones and Diana conferred about something nearby. He watched Neal approach the van and climb inside, crouching in front of the paintings, fingers drifting over the plastic covering them. Now that the shock had worn off, Neal had a look of intense concentration on his face; probably already working on how to restore them.

"Consequences," Peter sighed, and got up to check on how the evidence collection was going.

***

On Monday, they had their report from the psychologist who interviewed Christina; he mentioned undiagnosed schizophrenia, coupled with the stress of recent deaths in the family, and recommended the FBI plead her out as mentally unfit to stand trial. He obviously wasn't used to dealing with the White Collar division, where they didn't go in for revenge as much as some other departments could; he seemed nervous giving his report to Peter.

"I know that you're probably not feeling very forgiving right now," he said, eyes flicking to Peter's sling. "But she genuinely believes she stabbed you in self-defense. It's regrettable, and certainly it seems like she must have some culpability for the thefts and forgeries, but people who have dissociated with reality are still capable of functioning in the real world. She thought she was doing good."

"Did she explain the forgeries?" Peter asked, ignoring the rest.

"It's hard to get a clear picture, but I think she admired Mr. Nullier. The forgeries may have been her way of trying to draw his attention, or perhaps some kind of...ritual shielding. Maybe she thought if she could replace the portraits with less harmful images..." the man shrugged. "Agent Burke, this is going to take a long time to understand, but she needs treatment, not punishment."

"The FBI is required to press charges when an agent is injured," Peter said. "I'll speak on her behalf at the hearing."

"You will?"

"I have bigger problems than being stabbed, frankly," Peter said, eyes drifting out to where Neal was holding court in the bullpen, telling some probably exaggerated story to the probies. There was a slightly manic edge to his movements. After Peter had Jones drop him at home, he hadn't heard from him the rest of the weekend, but June assured Peter when he called on Sunday that Neal was fine.

"That's -- unusually understanding of you," the man said.

"We try not to unbalance the scales," Peter said. "If she can give us the names of her accomplices..."

"I'll speak to her lawyer about it."

"This could have been a lot worse," Peter said, standing to shake the man's hand.

"How so?" he asked, and Peter thought, You know how. It was a game -- a question to get a bead on Peter's mental state.

"She could have been doing that to people," Peter told him. The man nodded and left. Neal watched him go; as soon as he was in the elevator, Neal came up to Peter's office, leaning in the doorway.

"So?" he said.

"She'll probably plead as mentally unfit. She'll get treatment," Peter said, and noticed the fractional relaxation in Neal's shoulders. "You okay?"

"Yeah," Neal said, shrugging.

"You talk to the owners about restoring the paintings?"

Neal nodded. "Once they're out of evidence I'll take them to my place, back them, do some touch-up work. Most of them won't look too bad. I might have to crop Keystone, pretty much the entire bottom half is confetti. Man With Fedora will be okay," he added with a smile. Peter grunted.

"You're fine with working on them?" Peter asked.

"Yeah, it's..." Neal broke eye contact. "Not easy to look at them. I'm not used to stuff like this mattering. It'll be good, though."

"Lesson learned?"

Neal rolled his eyes. "Okay, I get it, there's a moral to the story. Hey, that reminds me, check it out." Neal took a handful of paper slips out of his inside pocket and waved them. "Offers on Fury."

"Already? Who's the lucky buyer?" Peter asked.

"Nobody, yet. I'm selling it in a set with a new work." Neal tipped his head at Peter's computer as he tucked the offer slips away. "I just did it this weekend. Check the Erickson Auction House site."

Peter called up the auction house, the same one that had bought the forgeries, and clicked on the name Jeffrey Nullier. Two images came up: Fury, photographed at the Met, and a second image obviously taken in Neal's home, a painting sitting on an easel. This one was a nude, or at least part of one: a portion of a man's chest and shoulder, part of his throat. There was a white bandage on the shoulder, blood staining the bandage from the inside. Peter put his hand to his own shoulder, thoughtfully.

"It's called Consequences," Neal said. Peter noticed a mark on the body's throat, a mole right in the hollow above the clavicles. He had one just like it.

"You stole my chest," Peter said, glaring at him. Neal laughed and ducked the wad of paper Peter fetched up and threw at his head. "Neal!"

Neal stood behind the glass wall of Peter's office and gave him an impenitent shrug. "It's hard to find compelling subjects," he said through the glass. Peter threw another crumpled up paper ball at the glass. Neal leaned back as it bounced off harmlessly. "Elizabeth said you shouldn't strain yourself!"

"Jones!" Peter yelled. "Come strangle Neal for me."

"We get to do that?" Jones asked, appearing from the conference room.

"I'll buy you coffee," Neal offered, obviously trying to salvage the situation. "Lunch? You want lunch?"

"Scram," Peter told him. "Out of my sight. Thief!" he yelled after him, as Neal walked down the steps.

"You're a philistine, Diderot!" Neal called back. Hughes leaned in the doorway to Peter's office.

"You two done with the Cop And Robber Show?" he asked.

"He started it," Peter said.

"I should ground them both," Hughes muttered, and went back to his office.

***

Grief And Restoration: The Mutilated Masterpieces Of Jeffrey Nullier

Release for General Press - The Metropolitan Museum Of Art is pleased to extend its showing of the work of Jeffrey Nullier, contemporary impressionist, formerly titled "Power/Mystery". The new exhibit, "Grief And Restoration: The Mutilated Masterpieces" features seven restored canvases on loan from private owners. These seven paintings, damaged while in the hands of an art thief, were restored by the artist himself, documented at every step in a series of compelling photographs also on display.

Nullier's work recently drew attention when several of his paintings were reported stolen from private collections. Investigation of the thefts led to the home of a mentally ill artist who had hidden the paintings in her basement before slashing each portrait with a knife for reasons not yet clear. Once the works were recovered, Nullier contacted the owners through intermediaries, restoring each painting with painstaking care.

In a letter to the museum, Nullier says of his work that it is intended "to capture moments in time that strike the eye, both real and symbolic" and "to challenge perceptions, mine included, of what is valuable in art". In an unusual move for the reclusive artist, he has identified some of the models in his earlier work, requesting that Field #1 and Field #2, a two-piece set of paintings, be renamed Kate #1 and Kate #2. He has also identified the man in Darwin's Proof Table as Jacob Ehlert, a history professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who died of lung cancer in May of 2002. Critics have pointed out the presence of distinguishing marks on Man With Fedora and Consequences, both recent works, which have led to the supposition that they may be the same model. Fury, which is presented as a set with Consequences, has been tentatively identified as Nullier's agent, who helped to recover the paintings.

The models and origins for seminal works such as New Orleans Girl and Baptism remain a mystery.

The question of Jeffrey Nullier's identity also remains unsolved. Working without representation for his entire career before entering a five-year seclusion, Nullier has now begun to take a more active role in the management of his work. His catalogue, including partial provenances, is available via the Metropolitan Museum of Art's website. Images of Nullier's work have also been archived for research purposes. Scholars and collectors interested in contacting Jeffrey Nullier may inquire through the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Curatorial Staff, or via his agent, Nick Halden, at the contact address listed on the following page. Mr. Halden advises that Mr. Nullier does not accept commissions or grant interviews.

***

Excerpted from the entry on "Jeffrey Nullier" at Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Nullier#Caffrey-Burke

The Caffrey-Burke Connection

While it has never been confirmed by artist or model, Consequences has been identified by Nullier scholars as FBI Special Agent Peter Burke, who received a similar injury in the course of investigating the thefts of Nullier's portraits in 2011[7]. This links Burke also to Man With Fedora[8], one of the mutilated portraits, likely painted in early 2010, prior to the thefts. If Nullier and Burke were acquaintances by early 2010 they may have met through Neal Caffrey, an amateur artist and colleague of Burke's who for many years went by the pseudonym Nick Halden while representing Nullier after his return to painting. Caffrey has said that he thinks highly of Nullier's work and that he and Burke both found it a great pleasure to work with the artist during the investigation.[citation needed]

Burke has declined many times to comment on the investigation or his association with Nullier, refusing to reveal whether he has ever sat as a model for the artist[citation needed]. There is still some debate as to whether two works by Nullier, Triumph (painted in 2014) and Late Lunch (Nullier's only work to be painted in 2015), also use Burke as a model. If true, this would make Peter Burke one of Nullier's most frequent portrait subjects. Caffrey has confirmed that one of the two men in Late Lunch is modeled on himself[9]; it has been pointed out that the woman in the image bears some resemblance to Burke's wife, Elizabeth Burke. Nullier scholar Jerome Thompson has suggested that the painting is a statement on duality and the woman is, in fact, a feminized version of Caffrey, with the unidentified man representing Nullier himself, contemplating the masculine and feminine in his work[10]. If this is the case, it remains the only known self-portrait of Jeffrey Nullier.

Thompson has also theorized, regarding the portraits of Burke (and Caffrey, to a lesser extent, who appears again as the semi-nude sculptor in Midnight, painted in 2012), that the mildly homoerotic nature of the images indicates a fascination bordering on obsession on the part of Nullier[11]. In a rare public statement, addressed to the journal which published the article, Nullier rebutted this idea: "To focus on the homoerotic in my paintings creates an imbalance in any critical view of the work. To some extent, all of my subjects contain erotic overtones; part of the frequently uneasy reaction the images cause is the juxtaposition of morbid or grotesque with that of desire. Consequences contains the erotic, but not more so than Robbing Titian or Blue Study."[12] It is rumored that a handwritten note addressed directly to Thompson was included with the letter, reading "You're overthinking things, Jerry." [13]

Although Jeffrey Nullier has never been positively identified, Caffrey's occasional coyness on the subject of Nullier's identity suggests that it may be a pseudonym. Neal Caffrey is a convicted felon and is known to have ties to the world of art theft and forgery[citation needed] and it is possible that the painter behind Nullier's work is either a fugitive criminal or wishes to remain out of the public eye for legal reasons.

Caffrey himself has said that Mr. Nullier "is just a private kind of guy. He likes to paint. I don't think he gets what all the fuss is about."[14]

END