An Insignificant Case

Chapter Five

CHAPTER FIVE

At nine in the morning the day after Guido Sabatini burglarized La Bella Roma, Salvatore Borelli was standing in the open door of the restaurant, watching a police car park. A stocky, middle-aged police officer got out of the driver’s side, and a muscular young policewoman got out of the passenger side. Borelli went to the sidewalk to greet them.

“Thanks for coming so fast. I’m Sal Borelli. I manage La Bella Roma.”

“I’m Ken Jackman, and this is Sandy Tanaka,” the male officer said. “What’s the problem?”

“Someone broke in last night,” Borelli said as he led the officers inside the restaurant. “The thief took a painting from my boss’s office, and I know who he is. The security cameras took a beautiful picture of the son of a bitch.”

“A painting?” Officer Jackman asked.

“Yeah. It was hanging over the safe. The bastard broke into that too.”

“Was this an oil painting of a scene from Italy?” Jackman asked.

Borelli stopped in front of the door to Gretchen’s office. “How did you know?”

“The thief isn’t by any chance Guido Sabatini?”

Borelli stared at the officer. “What are you, Sherlock fucking Holmes?”

“I wish.” Jackman sighed. “If I were that smart, I’d be a detective by now.”

“Then how…?”

“This isn’t the first time Sabatini has pulled a stunt like this.” Jackman looked at his partner.

“I make this the third,” Tanaka said. “There was Bellini’s and that steak house on Alder.”

“What did he take this time?” Jackman asked.

“It’s a painting of a gondola on a canal in Venice,” Borelli answered.

“Show us the scene of the crime,” Jackman said.

Borelli ushered the officers into Gretchen’s office. The wall safe was open, but nothing else in the room appeared to have been disturbed.

“Do you know if Sabatini took anything from the safe?” Jackman asked.

“I don’t know everything that was in it, but he left a lot of cash and some papers. You’ll have to ask Miss Hall if there’s anything missing.”

“Miss Hall is…?” Tanaka asked.

“Gretchen Hall. She owns the place.”

“Is she coming in today?” Tanaka asked.

“No,” Borelli said. “Hall’s wealthy, and La Bella Roma is a hobby of hers. She’ll come in a few times a month when she’s in town, but I run the place most of the time. Miss Hall is in LA now with Leon Golden, the movie producer. He’s got a picture nominated for an Oscar, and they’re going to the Academy Awards.”

“Do you know when she’ll be back?”

“No, but I’ll ask when I tell her about the robbery.”

“Do that. She’ll need to tell us if Sabatini took anything besides the painting. Meanwhile,” Jackman said with a sigh, “we’ll visit Guido and see if we can convince him to give back his ill-gotten gains.”

The officers left. Borelli took out his phone to call his boss, but he stopped mid-dial. Gretchen would be having a great time in LA, and the painting was no big deal. Maybe the cops could get it back and he wouldn’t have to upset her. Borelli decided to wait to tell Hall about the theft until she got back to Portland.

Officers Tanaka and Jackman cruised along the two-lane country road that led to Guido Sabatini’s farm. Overhead, white puff clouds floated across a clear blue sky and cast moving shadows over crops divided into earth-brown, sunflower-yellow, and emerald-green squares. The farmland rose up into hills thick with maples, oaks, and evergreens, and the officers were able to enjoy the pastoral scene, knowing that they would be confronting a harmless nutcase and not an armed, meth-crazed maniac.

The other time Jackman and Tanaka had come to the farm, they had recovered a painting that Guido had “liberated” from Bellini’s restaurant. Sabatini had told them that he had purchased the farm a year earlier. When Jackman had asked him what he’d been doing before that, Guido had smiled and changed the subject. One thing was clear—Sabatini hadn’t done much upkeep. The fields had gone to seed, and the exterior of the farmhouse and the red barn that Sabatini had turned into a studio looked the worse for wear.

Jackman parked the patrol car in the yard, and the officers walked into the barn. Painting supplies were spread across neatly stacked bales of hay that were within arm’s reach of the artist’s easel, where Sabatini was placing another arrow in Saint Sebastian’s torso.

“Hey, Guido,” Jackman said.

Sabatini paused his paintbrush halfway to his canvas.

“Officers Jackman and Tanaka! Welcome. To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

“Don’t be coy, Guido. You know why we’re here,” Jackman said.

“Honestly, I have no idea,” Guido answered with a serene smile.

Jackman sighed. “Does the name La Bella Roma Italian Ristorante ring any bells?”

“I’ve never dined in the establishment, but I’ve heard wonderful things about their food.”

“Come on, Guido,” Tanaka said. “Don’t make this like pulling teeth. You’re the star of a movie recorded on the restaurant’s security cameras.”

“Give us the Venice canal painting and anything you took from the safe and we won’t arrest you,” Jackman said.

Sabatini’s features darkened. “Gretchen Hall insulted me and my art. She does not deserve to look at my masterpiece.”

“Yeah, well, she may not deserve to look at your painting, but she owns it,” Jackman said. “We’ve explained this to you before. You’re a bright guy, Guido, so you can’t get away with saying that you don’t understand that a person who pays you money for a painting owns it and can hang it where they want to.”

“And hanging the painting in her office, where Miss Hall can see it all the time, isn’t an insult,” Tanaka said. “She wouldn’t be able to see it as much if it was in the dining room, so that shows you she really likes your artwork.”

“I do not honor an egotist who keeps my work where only she can see it and hides my masterpiece from a public that hungers for great art.”

“Guido, if you’re in jail, you can’t paint,” Tanaka said. “By refusing to give back one piece of art, you’ll be depriving the world of more masterpieces.”

“If you put me in jail, it is you who will be depriving the world of the works of Guido Sabatini.”

Jackman sighed. “Are you gonna give us the painting? If you don’t, we have to take you in, and the charge will be burglary, because you broke into the restaurant. That’s a felony. It carries prison time. I like you, Guido. I think you’re a hell of a painter, and I don’t want to see you rot away in the Oregon State Pen. Please give us the painting.”

Guido put down his paintbrush and held out his hands.

“Put on your handcuffs. I would rather be a martyr like Saint Sebastian than betray my art.”