1 - Artscape: Ike Schwartz Mystery 1 (20 page)

“What is he up to?” Red muttered.

“Also, there is the matter of the ransom. The thieves demand I turn over to them, at the time and place of their choosing, fifty million dollars in diamonds. The specified sizes and cuts must be untraceable. As I said before, they are professionals.

“I wonder how many of you out there have ever seen fifty million dollars in diamonds, or in any other form, for that matter. Well, here next to me are fifty envelopes. Each contains one million dollars in diamonds. Imagine. One business-sized envelope can hold a million dollars. It can be tucked into your pocket and taken anywhere. It will not be detected at airports or customs. Remarkable.”

Dillon, while he spoke, opened in turn ten of the envelopes and poured their contents on the table in front of him. The pile of diamonds grew. It sparkled and shimmered and burned holes in the picture.

“Ten million dollars, and these other envelopes contain the rest.” He gestured and two uniformed men moved beside him. They proceeded to open all but five of the remaining envelopes. The pile of diamonds grew, spilled over, and scattered on the floor.

“My friends, these diamonds spell pain, violence, and death for a lot of people if they’re put in the wrong hands. Put in the right hands, they could bring hope, joy, and a chance for a new life to thousands of others.

“What should I do? What would you do? Give in to their demands, or give hope to those less fortunate than we? As you can imagine, I wrestled with that for a long time. I consulted my friends and family and I have now come to a decision.

“Even though I may be responsible for the greatest cultural desecration since Caesar’s legions burned the library at Alexandria two thousand years ago, I will not, I repeat, I will not put this money into the hands of irresponsible international criminals. No painting is worth even one human life.

“I will, instead, put forty-five million dollars into a trust fund which will be used to foster the development of the next generation of artists—the Dillon Scholarships in the Fine Arts. Dillon gestured toward the shimmering pile in front of him. He paused, then picked up the five unopened envelopes and continued, “The last five million will be used in another way. Our thieves, as I have said, are professionals. They have so far eluded the best efforts by the police. I have no doubt they will someday be caught, but to make that day sooner rather than later, I am offering this five million dollars to the person who brings our thieves to justice.

“I am speaking to them, now. You are in trouble. Every police officer, private detective, bounty hunter, and amateur sleuth in the world will be looking for you. I know people who would sell their own children into white slavery for one-hundredth of that amount. What chance do you have now? The terrorists are now the terrorized. And as for the paintings, return them or burn them…I will not pay.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

His neighbors said Sergei Bialzac often disappeared for long periods of time. Never missed work, it seemed, but lodged somewhere else. What they did not know, what nobody knew was that Sergei maintained two homes. He shared the second with his lover Samir, a Syrian national. Sergei did not know it, but Samir also held a colonel’s commission in Al Qaida.

They sat in stunned silence. The television flickered as the regular programs returned.

“What does it mean, Sammy? He isn’t paying?”

“That is what he said.”

“What will we do now?”

“You have failed. It is over.” Samir rose, picked up his jacket, and moved toward the door.

“Me? I failed?”

“Yes, you. It was your idea, this ransom. You dealt with the Italian, who must now die, and you set the time and date. It is your failure.”

“But I thought—”

“You did not think. You are finished.”

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Where? To get the paintings, of course. I have buyers on the black market in my part of the world, willing to pay a fortune for them. He thinks he will not support us? He will see how wrong he is.”

“But aren’t you going to burn them?”

“Burn them? Don’t be ridiculous. There is a C-130 Hercules with Egyptian Air Force markings sitting on the freight ramp at Baltimore-Washington International waiting to load and fly. Did you think we were going to burn them? We could ransom them many times.”

“How?”

“You put one in a sale. People say, ‘the Dillon collection, it is not burned.’ You sell them back, a million here, five million there. Museums, governments fall all over themselves to be the one to save western culture. Fools.”

“What about us?” Bialzac pleaded.

“Us? There is no us. There never was, you pathetic faggot. You were useful, now you are not.”

Bialzac let the enormity of his betrayal sink in. He had come to believe with all his heart that the country that had nourished him and sheltered him all his life somehow deserved punishment, humbling, and like so many radicals turned revolutionaries, he had lost sight of the way reform got done. Now he sat and stared in disbelief as his whole credo crumbled like a stale cookie.

Samir strode toward the door. As he reached for the latch, he snapped upward. A second and then a third bullet tore into his back and heart. Bialzac emptied the chamber of the thirty-eight-caliber pistol into the now lifeless body of his lover and betrayer.

***

Ten miles south, Bialzac’s contractors sat in the same stunned silence. Harry Grafton felt sweat trickle down his back. The room filled with the smell of fear, overwhelming the stale smoke and close air. He wondered if M. Armand Dillon realized that in his zeal to prevent the death and injury to innocent victims, he had signed the death warrant for at least two people, maybe more. The girl and boy could identify all four of them. At least the girl could. So here we are, he thought. What now?

Red removed a fat wallet from his hip pocket and placed it on the table next to his right hand. He drummed his stubby fingers and picked his teeth. Donati held out his hand to Angelo, who looked at him, hesitated a moment, then put his silenced Colt 1911 in it.

“Angelo,” Donati said, his voice expressionless, eyes bleak, unreadable, like slate, “get our hostages.”

Angelo left the room and went next door. A moment later he returned, pushing the boy and girl into the room ahead of him. He sat them on one of the beds. Donati murmured something to him. He left again, returned, went into the bathroom and a moment later came out. He carried all the remaining telephone cords from all the telephones. He disconnected the one on the phone between the beds, pulled out a pocketknife, opened it, cut the cords into pieces, and dumped them onto the empty bed.

“All of them not working?” asked Donati.

Angelo nodded.

“That’s so none of you think you’re going to be instant millionaires. Now, we have some decisions to make.”

Red spoke, his voice very low. Harry was startled by its softness, the redneck accent gone, the inflection almost cultured. Red on the defensive was a very different person than on the attack.

“The kids go.”

Donati nodded his agreement.

“Oh my God, why? What’s happened?” the girl wailed, her voice a full octave higher than normal. She looked at Grafton. “You said that we would be okay. I believed you.”

“I hoped, kid, I hoped, but it’s gone sour.”

“Shut up, Grafton.”

“My God, Donati, they have a right to know why they have to die. The project fell through, Jennifer, and there is a reward hanging over us, a big reward. We are all going to die. Am I right, Donati, the two of them, me, Red, everyone, maybe even Angelo? All of us have to go, don’t we?”

The boy shrieked. Angelo hit him on the temple. He rolled off the bed and onto the floor, his body wedged into the small space between the wall and the mattress.

They stared at each other in silence. Harry fumbled in his pocket for a cigarette, found only an empty package, and reached for his jacket. He remembered the right-hand pocket had a fresh pack. His fingers closed around it and he felt something else—the phone cord he had removed three days ago.

He slipped on the jacket, lit one of the cigarettes, and counted to twenty. He wanted to wait longer but he did not know how much time he had. He clutched at his stomach, and groaned.

“What’s the matter with you, Grafton?”

“Cramps. I guess too much…no drinks. I don’t know. I’ve got to use the john.”

Donati stared at him, and then nodded. Harry, pain still etched onto his face, staggered past Red and into the bathroom. He kicked the door shut and moaned. He turned on the water in the sink and jerked out the telephone cord, connected its modular clips and punched in 9-1-1. Moan. Come on. Come on. Moan. To his surprise he found his diarrhea was real.

“Go ahead,” the 9-1-1 operator said.

“Lee-Jackson Motel, room fourteen, art thieves, hurry,” he rasped, his voice a whisper.

“Sir, where are you calling from?”

“Lee-Jackson Motel. The guys you are looking for are here but you have to hurry. Room fourteen.” He moaned some more, hoping he covered the words. Harry hung up and disconnected the cord as Angelo pushed the door open. He reached for toilet paper, palmed the cord into a wad, used it, and flushed it away. For the first time in over a week, Harry saw Angelo smile.

“You that scared, yeah?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Harry answered, his voice somewhere between a moan and a croak.

“Vito wants you back now.”

Harry nodded, pulled up his pants, and reentered the room. Stall for time, he thought, just stall for time.

The girl’s eyes were as big as saucers. He tried to signal her, will her to hear his unspoken message, hang on, help is on the way, just hang on.

***

Dillon waited until the lights dimmed and turned to Ike.

“Well, what do you think?”

“Nice show, sir, forceful, sincere, believable. You could get elected to office on that speech.”

“Not interested. You think it went well, then?”

“Yes, sir, very well. I just hope the hostages understand why they have to die.”

“Can’t be helped, son. Collateral damage, isn’t that what you guys call it?”

“Not us guys, Mr. Dillon, government wonks, people like Kenny, military types who need to justify a misplaced bomb strike, industrialists like yourself, who close plants and lay off thousands to preserve stockholder profits, but not us, not me. No, sir.”

Dillon bristled at Ike’s tone. “What do you call it, then?”

“An avoidable tragedy.”

“How avoidable? We were right on top of this. We had no way of knowing about those students.”

“Avoidable, Mr. Dillon. Avoidable if my office had been called in as soon as the robbery was discovered, not six hours later. Avoidable if someone had the good sense or even just the common courtesy to inform me of the move in the first place. I would have put a patrol down at the bunker. A move like that is an open invitation for just what occurred. Avoidable if someone had taken the time to check out Loyal Parker before giving him a license to set up his personal peep show. There is no excuse for that Lover’s Lane to exist, and both Parker and the hostages should be alive now. An avoidable tragedy created by academic and class conceit, by arrogance that assumes that out in the sticks, police are all bumbling rubes or Barney Fife. We can’t cut it so we need the government or our betters from the big city to come in and solve our problems for us.”

Dillon blanched under Ike’s verbal onslaught.

“Sorry, Ike, I didn’t know.”

“You didn’t want to know, Mr. Dillon, you assumed.”

Dillon glared at Ike with a look that had melted more than one chief operating officer. Ike glared back. Dillon opened his mouth to say something just as Ike’s cell phone twittered.

“Yeah?”

“Ike, 9-1-1 just called in an emergency. Listen.” Ike listened to the recording.

“I’m on my way. Get Billy and Whaite on the road and call Scarlett’s people—and no sirens.”

“Sheriff?” Dillon asked.

“Got to go.”

Ike raced out to the parking lot and within thirty seconds his car spun out of the parking lot, kicking gravel on several expensive corporate cars. It had happened fast, too fast. Real professionals would fence around for hours, days even, before one would break and run. It could be a crank call, or did someone get through? Why? Who? What’s-his-name, the ex-Bureau guy, the locksmith, the one who bought the clothes; it had to be him. No matter what else happens to people, they never change, and according to Charlie, the man was a good, honest technician. He hoped that the message meant the hostages were still alive, that Grafton, that was the name, called in not only to save his own skin, but the kids as well. He hoped.

***

Harry talked, stalled, and tried to kill time. Donati stared at him, revealing nothing. Angelo maintained his state of apparent transcendence. Finally, Red interrupted.

“Stuff it, Grafton. You are not going to talk your way out of here. Fact—some of us have to go. First, we take those two out.” He nodded at the girl and in the direction of the still unconscious boy. “Then, Rummy, it’s you. Donati and the Italian sphinx over there, well, we go back a ways. I figure we’ll just fade, fold this hand, and play another some other day, right, Donati?”

Donati continued to stare at a point midway between Harry and Red. He handed Angelo the Colt and in a barely audible voice said, “Angelo, do it.”

Red picked up his wallet and had the Hi-Standard derringer out, cocked and aimed at Angelo in less than a second. He was not fast enough. The silenced Colt gave a gentle burp and sent a copper-jacketed slug between Red’s eyes. Harry launched himself out of his chair toward Angelo, who stepped aside. Harry’s momentum carried him past Angelo and to the girl. He collapsed on her, half protecting her. He braced himself for the shock of the bullet. Nothing happened. He turned to see what had happened, grateful for the respite, even if brief. Jennifer fainted.

Angelo faced Donati. “I am sorry,
Patrone
.” He looked woebegone. “You see it is this way, the Giacamo family? Their youngest…you were contracted to eliminate. They put out a contract on you. You understand how it goes, yes?”

“Wait a minute. My contract also said Martelli would cover me. Angelo, there are always these contracts, but they go away when they need me again. This will be no different, you will see. Now take care of—”

“No, Vito, it is different this time. Martelli, he found out who contracted us. He wants no part of this new thing. He said he did not want anything to do with you now.”

“There is no new thing. We are paid to do a certain job, that’s all. What is so different about this one?”

“These people are with the ones who killed all the people in the World Trade Center. He says we don’t do business with them.”

“Since when has the Family made such a distinction? We run cocaine for South American dictators and heroin for the people he now says we cannot do business with. It’s crazy.”

“Even so, he told Giacamo to proceed. Giacamo has my mother and father in Sicily, you know, my sister, too, and they say if I do not do this, they will do terrible things and then kill them. They will. In Sicily, they are very true about those things, you know. Giacamo will see to that.”

“
Si
, Angelo, I know. So now you must shoot me, and you would have to, no matter what, yes?”

“Yes, Vito, I must. I have no choice in this.”

Donati looked at Angelo for a long time, saw the gun steady in his hand and sighed, “So shoot.”

“Not me. This Red person, he will be the one who does it. First, he kills these three, then he tries to kill you and you shoot each other.”

Angelo picked up the derringer and leveled it at Donati.

The door crashed open at the same instant the gun fired. Donati pitched backward into the dresser, the snub-nosed Smith and Wesson from his ankle holster halfway out. Angelo spun toward the door. Ike crouched, gun held two-handed and ready. For a split second, Angelo hesitated, unsure which gun to use. He lowered the derringer just as Ike’s three fifty-seven magnum barked. Angelo, chest crushed, slammed into the wall and onto the floor.

Ike straightened up and looked at Harry.

“You called?”

Harry swallowed and nodded.

“You must be Grafton. Where’s the other kid—is he okay?”

Harry motioned toward the wall. “I think so, knocked silly, and in shock. Doesn’t know what happened to him. She,” he pointed to Jennifer, “on the other hand, can give it all to you.”

“But you called, right?”

“Right.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t want anyone hurt, because they were going to kill Jennifer, the girl, both of them. Me, I didn’t care about. Hell, this just isn’t my line of country.”

“So I hear.”

“What now?”

Ike studied Grafton, saw the pain, old pain, in his eyes, and recognized it. He looked at the girl, fainted. Just as well.

“Grafton, according to my information, you went camping up in the Adirondacks last week. And you have twenty seconds to get out of here, into that rental and away. If you are smart, you will lose that car in Richmond, go north for a day or two, camp out, and then go home. You are the one that got away.