INTO HIS ART
By Joe Hadsall
Copyright 2012, Joe Hadsall
Cover designed by Joe Hadsall, using a digitally manipulated portion of “Circle Limit IV,” copyright 1960 by M.C. Escher. Use of the artwork is covered under fair use provisions of U.S. copyright law. Read more about the work and its creator at the end of this e-book.
Read more from the author, including more fiction and a blog, at www.joehadsall.com.
Even though Chief Ted Jasper hadn’t seen his old college friend in years, he couldn’t look him in the eyes. As he walked into Patrick Medford’s office, he looked instead at the large piece of art on the wall behind his friend. It looked like a large circular mosaic with oblong, black and white tiles. As he looked longer, he saw that the black tiles were bat-like creatures, and the white spaces in between were angels.
“I appreciate you agreeing to see us this afternoon,” Jasper said, resorting to a stiff, professional introduction instead of something more friendly. He sat down in one of two fiberglass chairs in front of Medford’s desk. A third man entered behind Jasper, breathing heavy, and plopped down in the other chair.
Medford nodded at the two other men, but didn’t say anything. Instead, Medford looked at the large, flat leather case that Jasper brought with him. He looked like he didn’t appreciate this visit, Jasper thought. He seemed agitated and nervous, but that didn’t surprise Jasper – this was all his fault. He was breaking a promise, and his friend knew it.
Maybe we should go, Jasper thought. This isn’t going to end well. Maybe I should just say that this was a mistake, thank him for his time and drive back to Kansas City. But he knew he couldn’t. He was stuck from the moment they drove the three-hour trip to Springfield, and there wasn’t anyone who could help the two officers more than Pat. For the first time, Jasper wished he had his old job back as chief of a small-town police department. The cases that happened in a small town were never big enough to consider breaking promises.
“Pat, this is special agent Edward Sinclair, of the FBI,” Jasper said. “We both really appreciate your help, and taking the time to do this.” Neither man got up to shake hands. Sinclair was still breathing heavily from walking almost a mile across a college campus and up four flights of stairs. Or maybe the breathing heavy was from Sinclair being annoyed, Jasper thought.
Medford looked at Sinclair for only a second, then went back to staring at Jasper’s case. He clicked a pen over and over. His stubbly, red beard made him look haggard and tired. “I’ll be glad to help, but I don’t know if I can,” Medford said. “Besides, this must be pretty important for you to drive all this way.
“That’s OK,” Jasper said. “I know you’ll give it your best shot.” Stalling, he looked around the office and saw that two walls were comprised almost entirely of books.
“I don’t know if I can still do it, actually,” Medford said, looking at the case again. “It’s been so long.”
“How long?”
“Not since the last time. I teach English now.”
“I see that. All these books look like they don’t have any pictures in ‘em. Why the switch?”
“I think you know why.”
Jasper paused for a moment, stung. He deserved that.
“I guess I do,” he said. “But I’m out of options, Pat. I need you.”
Sunlight squeezed through a tiny window on the side, bathing the opposite wall in gold. The books, crammed in shelves along that wall, glowed magically. But despite all of the books, there were some pieces of art crammed into the few open wall spaces. All of the pictures were black and white sketches, in the same style as the big circle behind Medford. One featured a picture of swans changing into fish, and another showed two lines of monks on a never-ending staircase, one line going upstairs, the other downstairs, like an optical illusion from a kids’ magazine.
“I see you haven’t given up on art completely,” Jasper said, pointing to the prints on the wall.
“No, I love Escher too much to get rid of him,” Medford said. Jasper saw his old friend relax a little, and settle into his old job of being an art historian. That was a good thing, he thought. Even though he knew an art lecture was coming, he kept his mouth shut and let Medford fill the silence.
“Escher was years ahead of his time,” Medford said, pointing to the one with the swans and fish. “That one is called ‘Sky and Water.’ It’s one of his first works. The other one is ‘Ascending and Descending.’ Obviously, the staircase is impossible, but the way he places it on top of a realistic castle makes it look even more real, despite its fallacy. And that one,” he said, pointing at the art behind him, “just shows how disciplined he was.”
Medford stood up from his chair and moved to the strange circular drawing behind his desk. From Jasper’s point of view, Medford’s head was at the bottom of the circle, which made it look like a bizarre, black and white halo from a piece of Renaissance art. As Medford talked, he pointed out the big shapes in the center, and how the shapes shrunk as they went out. The edge of the circle looked like it had a fuzzy gray line.
“This is ‘Circle Limit IV,’” Medford said. “Notice how in the middle, the shapes are fairly large, but as you look around the perimeter, the shapes shrink and become distorted. Escher distorted the shapes according to a geometrical, mathematical formula. The end result gives the piece a third dimension. Depending on how you look at it, you could perceive it like a ball sticking out from the wall, or the inside of a tunnel. These days, a creative artist could do something like this with a computer in a matter of minutes. But Escher made that one in 1960. He drew each shape with mathematical precision and perfection.”
So, the man still has a love for art, Jasper thought. “That’s amazing,” he said.
“Amazing is a good word for it,” Medford said. He was starting to sound like an art historian again. “His discipline and attention to detail show that order can be beautiful even when it can’t exist, like that never-ending staircase.”
“I can see where you’d appreciate that,” Jasper said, raising an eyebrow. He turned his attention back to the one with the never-ending staircase. “When you look at that staircase, what do you see?”
Jasper saw Sinclair shift in response to the word “look,” and he regretted his choice of words. Jasper wasn’t ready to explain Medford’s gift. He looked back at Medford, who seemed to understand the code word.
“Nothing unusual, believe it or not,” Medford said. “That one is meant to be viewed from a single point in space, like a camera positioned exactly to make an impossible illusion. So when I look at the staircase from another point, I see nothing. It just disappears. But, when I look at the circle, it’s…perfection.”
“Excuse me,” Sinclair butted in. “What do you mean, ‘viewed from a single point in space?’”
Medford looked at Sinclair, puzzled, then back at Jasper, who picked up the unspoken message: “You didn’t tell him what I do?”
“Dr. Medford used to be an art historian,” Jasper said, turning to Sinclair. “One of the best I’ve ever seen, but that’s not saying much, since I haven’t seen much art in my life. He has a knack for getting into the mind of an artist. He used to teach art history at UMKC. Made quite a name for himself … he wrote several books about the impressionists, and a good one about Thomas Hart Benson.” Jasper pointed out a shelf of books to Sinclair. All of them had Medford’s name on them.
Medford didn’t take Jasper’s flattery to Jasper’s attempt at flattery. “I was fortunate to be blessed with a unique insight, but that was a long time ago, Ted.”
“I’m sure Dr. Medford’s skills are top notch,” Sinclair said. “That’s why we’re here, isn’t it, Chief Jasper?”
“Of course,” Jasper sighed, turnin
g to Medford. No stalling anymore. Jasper opened the case, but kept its contents inside. “We’re working on a case that has hit a wall. The only lead we have left is a painting.”
“Figures,” Medford said, rubbing his eyes. “What kind of painting?”
“I’m not gonna lie to you, Pat. It’s disturbing. But we think you can pull something out of it that will give us a lead.”
“Who painted it?”
“A man who we believe is responsible for killing five girls and kidnapping a dozen more.”
“You have a suspect already?”
Sinclair cleared his throat, suggesting Jasper was about to say too much, but Jasper waved him off. “We have a person of interest, but we’re not getting any more out of him. He was shot in an altercation with police. We believe he had several more girls in captivity somewhere. But we didn’t get the chance to ask him.”
“Young girls?”
“We don’t think a one of ‘em is more than 14 years old.”
Medford’s shoulders drooped and his head lowered. He clearly wasn’t ready to do this again. Jasper felt awful. His stomach burned; it felt like he had chugged several cans of high-caffeine drinks. He wondered if guilt could cause ulcers.
Medford and Jasper had always been good friends, the kind of friends that could go for months without talking, yet pick up exactly where they had left off when they did talk. Only the last few times they had talked, it had been about work. Medford had gotten into his art, and Jasper’s art became solving crimes. The demands of being a police chief didn’t leave Jasper much time to catch up with friends.
And now, Jasper was about to show his friend a piece of art that could drive him to dark, dark places. He knew what was inside the case would do tremendous amount of damage to his friend. Yet he had no choice. He would do anything to his friends in order to find missing children. Years ago, he knew that Medford would gladly go to the darkest of places if it would save innocent lives. Jasper hoped his old friend still felt that way.
“OK,” Medford said, taking a deep breath and pointing to the case Jasper brought in. “Let’s see it. There’s an easel in the corner.”
Jasper took the painting out of the case, but tilted it away from Medford, as he positioned the easel in the sunlight. “This one isn’t as bad as the last one,” Jasper said as he placed the painting on the easel, giving Medford his first look.
“Oh, God,” Medford said.
The painting featured a blonde girl, about 10 years old, with a large head. She was kneeling and wearing a red, frilly dress. Her hands were between her knees, bound by handcuffs that were attached to the floor by a chain. Her knees pointed to the lower left of the painting. Her enormous head was turned toward the front of the picture. Her eyes were full of fear and desperation. Her head was unnaturally huge and rounded; her lap looked small and diminutive. It almost looked like she was getting sucked and stretched by an invisible drain.
It didn’t show anything grisly or bloody, but Jasper knew the picture was unnerving. He had seen enough horrible pictures to know that the face of someone who had seen terrible things could look just as terrible. Medford sat in his chair, covering his mouth and nose, like the picture was infused with an awful stench. His breaths grew heavier and labored. His face looked almost like the face of the girl in the picture, and Jasper understood why. They had both seen horrible things.
Sinclair walked over to Jasper and whispered in his ear: “What is he doing?”
Jasper shushed Sinclair, keeping his eyes on Medford, who was starting to sweat. Much more than last time, he thought. The last painting he brought to Medford had blood, entrails, demons with razors for hands and all sorts of gory imagery. The painting of the girl was tame by comparison, but Medford looked even more bothered than before. Violence against little girls was bad, Jasper thought. But was it worse than being surrounded by razor-handed demons and severed body parts?
Medford began to shiver, like he was cold.
“Let’s leave him be for a minute,” Jasper said to Sinclair. He opened the door, let Sinclair out and took a last glance at Medford, who now was keeling over, clutching his stomach.
“We’ll be right out here, Pat,” Jasper said, knowing full well that there was no way Medford could hear him.