Woman on Fire

Chapter 1 begins 18 months prior to the events in the Prologue. Jules arrives at the offices of the Chicago Chronicle and walks in as if she has an appointment. She wants a job, and she goes directly the office of Dan Mansfield, a well-known investigative journalist whom Jules idolizes. She notes his scarred hands and the patch he wears over one eye, the results of an explosion at a meth lab facility he was investigating years earlier. She begins selling herself, but her resume does not impress him, so she reveals that she is Anonymous Girl, the teen who helped uncover a sex-trafficking ring at her high school. Just then, his assistant walks in and tells him about a breaking news story: A man has taken people hostage at gunpoint. Most of the reporters have gone home for the day. He needs someone immediately. He gives Jules the chance to cover it.

Margaux has flown her private plane to Munich. Her private hacker has discovered the whereabouts of Carl Geisler, the son of Helmuth Geisler, an infamous Nazi art thief. She has been staking out Carl’s apartment for several days. When he goes to sleep, she enters his apartment and begins searching for the hidden art and finds more than she expected. He has masterpieces that haven’t been seen in years. She also finds the most important piece, a painting called Woman on Fire. Carl awakens to the racket. He is very old and shows signs of senility. She coaxes him back to bed, where she poisons him. She tells her hacker she needs backup and leaves.

Ellis Baum is the founder of Anika Baum Inc., which specializes in fashionable women’s shoes. His secretary informs him about what happened to Carl Geisler in Munich. Ellis once met Helmuth Geisler long ago. Helmuth murdered Ellis’s mother. She had been with a Jewish man and had a Jewish child. Plus, Helmuth wanted her painting, Woman on Fire. It was an image of a woman consumed “with passion, fire, torment, sensuality—part Medusa, part Aphrodite, part Mother Nature” (36). It was painted by the famous Expressionist Ernst Engel. Ellis calls Dan, who owes him a favor.

Jules walks past everyone in the newsroom. She knows that many don’t like her. She did a great job covering the hostage situation and has become “Dan Mansfield’s girl” (39). He tells her about a special assignment, but it’s not for the Chronicle. She will be working personally for him.

Jules meets Dan at a café. He looks tired and overworked. He gives Jules a folder filled with documents. He has her promise not to talk with anyone about the information in the folder. He asks her about what she knows about Nazi-stolen art. Jules knows a decent amount because after her bat mitzvah, she visited a museum about the Nazi period; plus, she watched the film The Monuments Men. Dan needs to go, but he tells Jules to read through the folder, and they will talk later.

Jules has been poring over Dan’s documents when he calls. He tells her he is waiting for further instructions before they can move ahead. He tells her to get ready to be Anonymous Girl again. After he hangs up, Jules thinks back to that time.

She was 17. She never told anyone she was going to a party with the journalists she worked with on the story to celebrate the Pulitzer Prize their story had won. She especially wanted to go because of Rick Janus, the lead journalist. After the party, she found herself alone with him. They both had too much to drink. One thing led to another, and Rick discovered she was a virgin, which shocked him. He apologized profusely and said they both should forget that anything almost happened. After that, Jules swore never to get involved with someone with whom she was working again.

Ellis secretly travels to Montana to speak with his grandson, Adam, who was once a prominent artist. Adam became addicted to heroin and nearly died of an overdose. Since recovering, Adam has lived reclusively in a small cabin outside Missoula. When Ellis arrives, he is shocked by the meager surroundings. Inside the cabin, he notices the walls are covered in colorful murals. He is overcome by Adam’s transformation and apologizes for coming and for not having been more supportive earlier. Adam is warm and loving toward Ellis.

Ellis has a favor to ask of Adam but is ashamed. The history the world knows about him is a cover, so he tells Adam his true history. Anika Baum was Ellis’s mother, and they were from Germany, not Belgium. He is partly Jewish. Anika posed for Ernst Engel as the subject of Woman on Fire. Helmuth Geisler stole the painting and killed his mother. Recently, Helmuth’s son, Carl, was found murdered in Germany, and many precious artworks were stolen. He believes Woman on Fire might be among those stolen. Ellis is dying and wants to see his mother again. He asks Adam to get in touch with Margaux de Laurent, which is difficult, because Adam has a troubled past with her. Nevertheless, Adam agrees to help.

Margaux is in Correns, France. Her family owns a grand château there, and it’s her place of retreat. Moreover, it represents fond memories of her grandfather, who was the most important person to her. Her grandfather founded the family’s art galleries around the world, but her father nearly bankrupted those galleries with his reckless spending. Nevertheless, with the art from Carl, she hopes to change that situation. She goes to see her personal hacker, Wyatt Ross, to discuss how best to proceed with selling the art. She gets a text from Adam, who says he wants to talk to her. She hasn’t heard anything from him in four years.

Jules meets with Dan, who informs her that a story from the Spotlight, a German news agency, about Carl Geisler has been largely censored. Jules wants to know to whom Woman on Fire belongs. Dan won’t tell her until she has shared something personal. To get things started, he tells her that he is recovering from alcoholism. Jules tells him about how her father left her and her mother when she was very young. She tracked her father down later in life, but never spoke to him; she felt he wasn’t worth her time. Dan tells her that his father was abusive. He then tells her the painting belongs to a friend of his, Ellis Baum. Jules knows who he is. Furthermore, Dan elaborates about how Ellis’s mother was the model for the painting, and that Ellis is dying. To see the painting again is his dying wish.