She didn’t finish the sentence, but I assumed from Rivka’s scowl that Vesta meant when she and Karen had been lovers.
“What about Olympia?” I asked. “How did all that get started, the act at the club and so on?”
“Karen goes to all the clubs,” Vesta said. “She studies other people’s acts. She had this thing she wanted to do with body art; she pitched it to Olympia, who thought it was enough of a novelty to bring in a crowd. Nothing happened for a few months, and then suddenly, around Thanksgiving, the act took off.”
“Why?”
“People realized they had the chance to see an extraordinary artist for free,” Rivka said.
Vesta said, “It was more that people took video footage with their cell phones and put it out on the Net.”
“When did Rodney start taking part?” I asked.
Leander and Kevin looked at each other again as if they could only think in tandem, but it was Leander who spoke. “Rodney’s the big thugly guy, right? We’d been doing the act for about six weeks, maybe two months. At first, it was all about Karen painting on herself and we’d hold mirrors for her, but that was way too hard. Then she started this public art idea. About a week after that, Rodney the Rod Man arrived. Raw sex. Not a nice man.”
The last phrase hung in the air for a moment, allowing us all to wonder if he’d had raw sex with Rodney or if that was just his way of describing a brutish person.
“I’m assuming it was Anton Kystarnik who was at the club last night,” I said. “If he’s not the person blocking her website, who is? And why?”
The four of them looked at one another and then at Petra, obediently quiet in her corner of the couch. None of them had any ideas.
“Rivka,” I asked, “do you have a picture of Karen? Do any of you?”
“She hated being photographed except when she had her full body art on,” Rivka said. “The one time I took her picture, she grabbed my camera and erased it.”
“You’re a good artist,” I said. “Can you draw her from memory? I’m going to need a picture if I’m going to canvas for her.”
“She won’t like it if I do.” Rivka’s face was flushed.
“There’s no point to my asking around about her if I don’t have a picture. This is the last discussion we’ll have on the subject. Either draw a picture of Buckley for me or go home and don’t bother me again.”
Rivka started another protest, but Vesta shook her head at her. “You’re the only one who pulled the detective into this. Do like she says—put Buckley’s face onto a piece of paper or go on home.”
30
Deserted Home—or Whatever
Vesta and the dancers left while Rivka was working on the Body Artist’s portrait. Whatever Rivka’s more tiresome qualities, she was a skillful artist. In less than an hour, she put together a couple of sketches that captured the Artist’s elusive quality. Working only in ink, Rivka showed the transparent, expressionless eyes and the sternness around the mouth that kept people at a distance.
“Where are you going to search?” Rivka asked.
“Maybe I’ll throw a dart at the map.” I pointed to a big map of the city that hangs in my main workroom. “They say if you pick stocks that way, they perform as well or better than a financial adviser’s portfolio. Maybe it will lead me to the Artist as well.”
“I’m staying with you.”
“No, you’re not. Not unless you’ve been lying and know where the woman is. Or what name she might be hiding behind.”
Rivka started to argue the point, but I shut her up without finesse. “You want to find Karen Buckley, but you’re wasting my time. Which I bill at a hundred fifty dollars an hour.”
Her jaw dropped. “I don’t have that kind of money!”
“Then you’d better get out of my way before I decide to start charging you, hadn’t you.”
She scurried out the door so fast that Petra burst out laughing.
“But why aren’t you charging her?” my cousin asked when I’d made sure Rivka had gone out the front door.
“Because I want to find the Body Artist myself. And these pictures may help us.”
“Where are you going to start? At the club?”
“If Vesta and Rivka don’t know where she hangs out, no one at the club will, either. Nope. We’re going up to Irving and the Kennedy, where Karen abandoned that SUV. I’m going to assume she raced home, picked up what she thought she needed to survive on the run, and hopped on the L.”
“Then you won’t find her up there,” Petra objected.