west_end_blues | (no subject)

Who: Ronald Sandoval | Irving Braxiatel
What: Sandoval stops to drop some tasty hints of information courtesy of his boss
Where: The museum
When: After Narvin's arrival.

Ronald Sandoval always stood out a bit, which kept him from any of the discrete, covert work that he lusted after. When he became an FBI agent, that had been what he'd wanted most, to be in the field, playing one big name off the other, enjoying the power that came from compromising them.

He was never granted that ability, never allowed into the field, and it ate at him for his entire time working for those snivelling, arrogant jokes of investigators. Those were two reasons Alpha had seemed like a godsend- he maneuvered right under their noses with enviable precision, and he offered Sandoval that chance that everyone else had denied him.

Now they had come full circle- they were back in West End, and he was all to happy to help with Alpha's machinations as he entered the museum with a bright, friendly grin on his face. The right people spoken with, the right names dropped, and minutes later he was being led back to speak with a one Mr. Irving Braxiatel.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Explosion, by George Grosz." Alpha wanted the painting but more in a casual regard- it was a painting he would like and care for, but he wanted all of the things that the man that owned it possessed. And Sandoval made it a point to be, at the very least, thoroughly helpful.

"With the war having passed, I was wondering how the sale of themed art was fairing?" He folded his arms and tapped his lower lip, giving the office-that-wasn't-Braxiatel's another glance around. He'd not thought of Alpha as much of a collector, but he was in his own way. Very much, now that Braxiatel had made the observation, and it was sticking in his mind.

"I'll look into it." Braxiatel might or might not have known the owner off-hand, but that wasn't important. There were a couple things he had to look into first. "Themed art is doing well enough. People tend to like making patterns, even as they hold a world of fragments. Particularly then, in fact." He considered Sandoval himself. "Looking for something for you own collection?"

He doubted it. But Braxiatel knew that even those who spoke on behalf of employers had wills of their own. It was invariably worthwhile to get some measure of them.

"I'm woefully inexperienced in the world of art." He pulls a very old fobwatch from his pocket to check the time, something generational. Wrist watches were the contemporary thing, but Sandoval's was old and well loved. He closed it and returned it to his waistcoat.

"My parents were whalers, so I have a bit of scrimshaw. A piece here and there."

Yes, like all people well under command, much of his free will was taken. Freely offered, at that. But obviously some of it he desperately clung to. Relics from the past, familiar things that someone far from home would want to keep with them

The watch was interesting. So was that detail. And Braxiatel's curiosity was not that of a calculating politician but of a curious collector, one who appreciated all artefacts of human creativity and ingenuity. "It is a medium I've often hoped for a greater acquaintance with. It's a shame the medium is so fragile. If you ever have the desire, it would be my pleasure to see what examples you have."