Read The Art Whisperer (An Alix London Mystery) for Free Online Page B

In 1998, the Brethwaite came through with a surprise job offer and he’d been there ever since: still in the same job after sixteen years. Still the same person too: still bright, still lazy, still unambitious (this is all Alfie talking), and still a boozer, though a more moderate one than he’d been before.
    Still an amiable person, too, and pleasant to be around, but miles shy of Prentice in experience, ability, presence, and everything else. What kind of game was Clark playing at?
    Alfie had obviously been asking himself the same question. “Does anybody here seriously think Clark would put me over you, Prentice?” He shook his head. “Get real.”
    “It’s hardly as ridiculous as you make it sound, Alfie,” said Prentice. “You have a good many—”
    “Of course it’s ridiculous! It’s his nasty little joke, Prentice. He’s just saying it to demean you, that’s all.”
    “And what makes you think he won’t do it to demean him?” Drew asked.
    Alfie took a swig from his suspect mug. “If he did, I’d never accept the position,” he said with dignity. “Prentice is a legend. The museum is lucky to have him.”
    “I don’t agree with you, Alfie,” Prentice said, “and I sincerely urge you not to do that. But I want you to know how much I appreciate your words.”
    “Oh, I’ll do it, all right,” Alfie said and went back to his newspaper. “It would be a travesty.”
    Well done, Dr. Wellington , Alix thought with a swell of affection, good for you . But, she wondered, what about the other change that was in the works: the one that would make Madge her husband’s superior and, presumably, boss? Drew didn’t strike her as the kind of man who’d be able to handle that. It wasn’t altogether a matter of chauvinism, either. In some ways he could make a pretty good case that, on paper anyway, the curatorship was going to the wrong person. He, too, was a Yale PhD in art history, and had been an adjunct professor at Brown when he applied for the position at the Brethwaite. Madge, by comparison, had no “Dr.” in front of her name and wasn’t really an art historian at all. She had an MS in costume design and technology from the University of Cincinnati and had worked in theater and taught continuing education courses at a community college in Providence when Drew had been at nearby Brown. When Lillian Brethwaite had hired Drew, Madge—then his fiancée—had come along as part of the package, to install and head the new, relatively small Costumes and Furnishings department, which had since grown considerably. Alix had no doubt that Madge herself thought she was fully competent to curate the entire new Costumes and Decorative Arts collection and was the right choice for the job. That Drew saw it that way was doubtful in the extreme.
    Alfie was now reading the newspaper with more attention, and Alix glanced at the front-page story that seemed to have caught him up: “Phantom Strikes Again: This Time the Ocotillo Lodge.”
    “The Phantom,” Alix said, making conversation. “What is that about?”
    “Actually, it’s interesting, there’s this thief, the Phantom Burglar, they call him, he never leaves a clue, the police don’t—uh-oh.” He set down his cup and straightened up. “Gird thy loins,” he whispered, “man the bulwarks, hoist the . . .”
    There had been a perceptible stiffening in the room as those in it sensed the director’s imminent entrance, which she made with long, quick, confident strides and more than a hint of swagger.
    The Iron Lady, they called her, and she looked the part, a keen-eyed, wiry old woman with a face full of crosshatched wrinkles, weather-beaten and parched by nearly six decades of desert sun. She wore the same expression Alix had seen during their single face-to-face interaction, one eyebrow slightly arched in a lemme-see-you-try-and-put-one-over-on-me-pal look. She wore her straight, gray-streaked hair long and bound in a none-too-neat, old-fashioned