White Collar - as an unofficial novel - part 6

Technological virtuoso

Peter sat opposite their young suspect in their interrogation room. Usually, he unlocked the cuffs. This time he had not. The more that reminded their forger about the seriousness in the situation the better. He glanced at Neal, leaning against the wall. Peter had a feeling Neal was not entirely comfortable, but it did not seem to give him enough issues to leave.

After going through the regular stuff, making sure Justin did not want a lawyer, telling him about the recording and the camera, he showed Justin photos of the three forgeries.

"These are three forgeries of Lewis Thayer's 'untitled #2.' Have you painted these?"

"Haven't I already told you?" he asked, confused.

"For the record."

"Yes, I suppose those are the ones I painted."

"Where did you paint them?"

"At the Lamson gallery. In April."

"Are you aware that the original was stolen a few days ago?"

"Stolen?" Justin did seem paler.

"Your forgeries were sold overseas as the original."

"I... I didn't do that! Please, you have to believe me. All I did was the reproductions."

"Forgeries," Neal said. "Your reproductions are forgeries. You didn't sign them with your name."

"Yeah." Justin looked at his cuffed hands. "Forgeries."

Peter leaned back in his chair.

"So, tell us what happened."

"A while ago, I answered an ad on the school's list server for reproductions. I get an e-mail back commissioning seven copies of 'untitled #2.'"

"Seven?" Peter repeated. Where were the other four? "Did you wonder why somebody would want seven copies?"

"You know how hard it is to make money as an art student doing art?"

Easier than get rid of a criminal record, Peter thought.

"Who hired you?"

"I didn't meet them. They dropped the materials off in my mailbox. And once I'd finished, they said to leave the paintings in the rec center and that the money would be left in my box again." The young man must have understood how naive it sounded because he quickly added: "I thought it was weird that they didn't want to meet, so I—"

"So you stayed and watched the pick-up?" Neal ended the sentence.

"Yeah. I wanted to make sure it was legit. And she seemed normal, so I let it go."

Peter sighed. Most people looked normal. And those who did not were rarely crooks. But they needed to find those behind this.

"All right, if you sat down with a sketch artist, do you think you could remember what she looked like?"

"May I?" Justin asked and pointed and the art portfolio.

"Yeah."

With the help of Peter and Neal, it was opened on the table, filling it. Justin moved a few sketches aside and found what he was looking for.

"This is her."

Peter exchanged a look with Neal. It was a young beauty and if he had caught her features right it would be as good as if they had a photo.

Neal had not been in that interrogation room since his own arrest. It was interesting really. He had after all worked with Peter for eight months now. He pushed away the memories from his last stay in prison, breaking the period into two pieces. He hoped Justin would come off easily. He had not, but that was a different thing. He had not given Peter anything usable. In his case, there was no bigger fish to catch. Besides he had not done what he did because he was lured into it or because he was naive. He did it because he was smart enough to pull it off.