Killer Punch by Amy Korman Page A

was Toby, the Binghams’ free-­roaming mutt, who enjoys a fence-­free existence, but is luckily quite streetwise. Toby pauses at crosswalks and waits at stop signs, so he makes his way around town without incident.
    Toby usually respects sheepdog-­a non grata zones such as the club, the cow pastures at Sanderson, and the cemetery. But Skipper’s flank steak had put this well-­mannered pooch over the edge.
    â€œSkipper, your steak brought in a new customer, and he got four legs and a tail!” Gianni shouted to the small crowd of guests. “Hey, don’t worry, we all gotta start somewhere!”
    â€œOh, Toby, you naughty boy,” said Mr. Bingham, wandering over in a yellow sport coat, glass of white zinfandel in hand. He waved a finger at his wayward dog, who merely wagged up at him and kept drooling.
    Just then, two yellow Labs showed up, joined Toby grill-­side, and commenced whining, while Gianni, earrings gleaming as he leaned on his crutches, kept up a running commentary. “These dogs might hire you for their next party, Skipper! Could be whole new business for you!”
    â€œBootsie, aren’t those your Labs?” I hissed, giving her a nudge.
    â€œHuh—­that is Chewy and Rocky!” she said, seemingly undisturbed by her dogs having galloped a half mile away from home. “I told Will to make sure our fence got repaired this week. I’ll have to call him to come pick them up.”
    While Bootsie shrugged and dialed her husband, Gianni made a last dig at the club’s head chef. “Hey, Skipper, maybe you the one stole that painting of the cow yesterday! You probably need the money.”
    With this, Skipper had had enough of Gianni. He stalked inside the club and disappeared as the rest of the guests arrived.
    â€œ T HE PAINTING THAT was returned yesterday is a fake Heifer in Tomato Patch ,” Mrs. Potts told us five minutes later. She downed a mini-­taco in one bite, and sipped a large vodka.
    â€œIt was almost immediately apparent, though the counterfeit painting was a pretty good one at first glance,” confirmed George Fogle, who’d accompanied Honey to the party. The two had spent the day researching forgers of Henry Huntingdon-­Mews’s works, of which there had been many back in the painter’s own century, but none that were known in present-­day art circles.
    â€œThis version of Heifer wasn’t painted all that long ago,” said George. “Probably earlier this year, since oil paint can take months to fully set onto a canvas. Also, it was layered over an existing canvas. It’s a commonly done technique that’s called pentimento, this kind of reuse for an old painting. In this case, the artist found a gilt frame and canvas that’s almost exactly the size of Honey’s original.”
    A new painting layered atop an old one? Bootsie and I stared at each other.
    Eula was a pentimento painter! At least, according to Annie and Jenny. We needed to call Walt.
    â€œThat’s just like The Thomas Crown Affair !” shrieked Sophie. “I love that movie! I mean, when Pierce Brosnan and Rene Russo get naked on his staircase, it’s awesome. Although I couldn’t stop thinking that cold marble stairs would really hurt your tush.”
    â€œIt’s hard to know if this was supposed to be a joke, or if the artist set out to create a convincing forgery of Heifer ,” continued George. “I made some calls today, and Walt took the fake painting in to try to lift any fingerprints that might have been left. Meanwhile, though, the real painting is still missing.”
    I told George about Eula’s hobby of re-­making old canvases, then wondered if this would be a good time to mention to George and Mrs. Potts that a Vegas restaurateur named Lobster Phil LaMonte was also checking around for her painting. Probably not, I decided. It seemed a little too complicated to explain over