The Gilded Seal (22 page)

“Great.”

She waited, but that was it. That was all he had to say. No,

“I’m so glad to see you” or “You should have let me know

you were coming.” Just “great” and a twitched smile.

“You . . . ?” she asked eventually.

“Visiting some friends.”

“Great.”

There was a long pause. However many times Jennifer had

played out their reunion in her mind, it had never gone like

this. Whatever might have happened over the last year, they’d

had a connection once. The sort of spark that wasn’t easily

forgotten. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe he was embar-

rassed. Maybe that was why he was acting as if he’d been

cornered by an unloved aunt at a family funeral. How very

English. She coughed for no reason, wondering if she should

just walk away and pretend she’d never seen him.

“Chagall?” he quizzed.

“What?”

“The case you’re working?”

“How . . . ?”

Tom pointed at the book peeking out of her bag.

“Yeah. Sort of,” she conceded sheepishly.

“I like Chagall.” Tom gave a deliberate nod. “Have you

seen the ceiling in the Opéra Garnier?”

“Should I?”

“Everyone should.” He fixed her with a searching look.

“It’s beautiful, but at the same time . . . demonic. If you stare

at it long enough, it feels like you’ve been lifted into a dream

world. A nightmare. A lurid, spinning, drunken nightmare.”

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t w i n i n g

For a moment she saw a glimpse of Tom as she remem-

bered him—the sharp mind and jealously concealed passion.

He snatched his eyes away, as if suddenly realizing that he

had given her a more personal insight than he wanted to.

“What’s the case?”

“You know I can’t . . .”

“Come on, Jen,” he cajoled. “Who am I going to tell?”

“That’s not the point.”

“The point is I might be able to help.” He sat down again,

the water shearing off the fountain’s surface behind him into

a deep trough, like sheet steel spooling out from under a roll-

ing mill. “Besides, what else are we going to talk about?”

She hesitated, torn between what she knew Green would

say and her selfish instinct not to let this moment pass with-

out making some attempt, however futile, to get Tom to warm

up a little. Besides he was right. He might be able to help. She

sat down next to him, placing her bag between them.

“We’ve had a couple of forgeries show up in New York,”

she began, thinking hard about what she could and couldn’t

tell him.

“A Chagall . . .” Tom eyed the pigeon foraging around his

feet as she spoke, his right arm draped around his briefcase.

She nodded. “And a Gauguin. We got tipped off when

both the original and the copy were put up for auction at the

same time—one in New York, the other here in Paris. Same

story with the Chagall. We figure there are probably more.”

“Hmm . . .” Tom reflected for a few moments. “Good forg-

eries?”

“That’s why I’m here. To try and identify the originals

from the rip-offs.”

“And they’re valuable?”

“Valuable enough.”

“Any certificates of authenticity?”

“One in each case.”

“With the fake, right?”

“Right.” She frowned. “Does that mean something?”

“Sounds like a Scotch and Soda.” He made eye contact

again.

“A drink?”

t h e g i l d e d s e a l

1 5 3

“A coin trick. You ask someone to hold a silver dollar tight

in the palm of their hand, but when they open their fi ngers, it’s

turned into a nickel.” He illustrated this with a coin that he

made vanish under her nose only for a smaller one to reappear

moments later. “Put it another way. You buy an original Gau-

guin with a certificate of authenticity, get a copy made, and

then sell that on with the certificate. The buyer thinks they’re

holding the silver dollar, but they’re squeezing it too tight to

notice you slipped them the forgery. Even when they open

their hand to take a look, the certificate fools them. When

you’re ready, you resell the original and double your money.

More, if the market’s moved the right way. The internet’s

making it harder to pull off, but if you know what you’re do-

ing, there’s no one to stop you. It’s pretty simple really.”

“It’s pretty effective too,” she breathed excitedly. If Tom

was right, it would certainly explain how the two copies had

come into existence and why they were so accurate. It also

placed Razi even more firmly at the center of the case. He

owned the original Gauguin. What if he’d once owned the

Chagall as well? Maybe he’d sold the original to Hammon

and a forgery to the same Japanese company that he’d sold

the forged Gauguin to. If Hammon had found out, it would

be reason enough for a fight. And if Hammon had threat-

ened to speak up and blow the whole scam, reason enough

for a murder too.

“I gotta make some calls,” she said, getting up hurriedly.

“Sure,” he shrugged, getting up with her.

“This has been really useful, thanks.”

“Always happy to help the FBI.” He was joking, but in

his smile she sensed the hint of an apology for his earlier

manner.

“It’s been good, Tom—good to see you again, I mean. If

I’d known you were going to be in Paris, I’d have called.”

“You too,” he agreed with a nod.

She turned to leave and then paused.

“You know, I’m around later if you want to meet up,” she

said in what she hoped was a casual tone.

“Thanks, but . . .” He shifted his weight uneasily on to his

other foot.

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t w i n i n g

“We could meet early if you need to get away?” she sug-

gested.

“It’s not that easy,” he blustered. “I’m seeing this guy and

until he calls me . . .”

“Fine,” she snapped, now regretting having even asked

him. He was clearly wishing that this little encounter had

never happened. So much for reliving some of her Paris

memories.

“Look, I’m sorry.” He gave an apologetic shrug. “It’s not

that I . . . I guess I’m just a bit surprised to see you, that’s

all. But you’re right, it would be great to meet up. That is if

I haven’t scared you off.” He smiled. “You can reach me

here—” He jotted his number down on the inside cover of

her Chagall book. “Call me in an hour and I’ll know when

I’ll be free.”

“It’ll be fun,” she reassured him.

With a smile, she floated off. Tom waited until she had

disappeared through the arches leading on to the Rue de

Rivoli before pulling his phone out of his pocket.

“Archie, it’s me again. You’re not going to like this, but I

think I’ve just found us our way out.”

C H A P T E R T H I R T Y

QUAI DE JEMMAPES, 10TH ARRONDISSEMENT, PARIS

21st April— 6:41 p.m.

Ithought I asked for the Commando variant?” Milo kicked

open a crate and pulled out one of the ten blackened FA-

MAS G2 assault rifles it contained, noting that the barrel was

slightly longer than he’d wanted for the close-quarter combat

situation they were likely to face.

“You did.” Djoulou had stripped down to his trousers, his

slab-chested torso glistening with the effort of unloading the

gear. A rare gene tic condition had caused his ebony skin to

lose its pigment in various places, and pale pink blotches

were spattered across his body like acid thrown on to a can-

vas. He reached into another crate. “But the standard model

doesn’t need a separate under- barrel grenade launcher. It’s

one less thing to go wrong.”

He tossed a grenade to Milo, who snatched it out of the air

with an approving nod and fitted it to the end of the barrel.

“We’re in,” Eva called from the adjacent room.

They marched through and found her sitting next to Axel

in front of a large screen sub-divided into about sixteen

smaller images.

From the little he had revealed about himself, Axel seemed

to live a twilight existence, caught somewhere between the

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t w i n i n g

real world and the online one he spent most of his time im-

mersed in. The adoption of his hacking username in every-

day life was just one further example of how far his realities

appeared to have merged. To Milo he looked faintly ridicu-

lous, dressed entirely in black apart from his peroxide blond

hair, drawn back into cornrows, but then he did what he was

asked, when he was asked and without too many questions.

Putting up with his dress sense and gum habit was a small

price to pay, given how good he was.

“The good news is that the Louvre cameras are all on a

wireless network,” Eva explained, “It avoids them having to

lift the floors to lay the cables.”

“It’s encrypted, just not very well.” Axel pushed his gum

to the corner of his mouth as he spoke.

“There she is—” Eva pointed excitedly at one of the feeds

showing the
Mona Lisa
high on her wall. The room was

empty, the museum having shut at six, apart from two guards

positioned on either side of the painting and another three at

each entrance to the room. “I think she just smiled at me.”

“Can you override the network?” Milo asked.

“The surveillance system is a piece of cake,” Axel con-

firmed. “But the alarm is a no-go. It’s a stand- alone network

hard-wired to the cops, probably housed in armored cables

sunk into about three feet of concrete. We’d need to get inside

and try and hack in through one of their service terminals to

have any chance.”

“We haven’t got time for that,” said Milo impatiently. “Be-

sides, there’s no need. They’ll have to deactivate everything

anyway when they transfer it upstairs to the lab.”

“Which is when?”

“Tomorrow at six fi fteen exactly.”

“There will be five men on each floor to make sure she

gets in and out safely. Maybe more,” Eva noted. “But only

two, maybe three, can fit in the elevator with the painting it-

self. It’ll take them five minutes to get the painting off the

wall and into the car, then fifteen seconds from the moment

the doors shut on the fi rst floor to when they open on the sec-

ond. That’s when we’ll hit them.”

“Eva and I will be waiting here until we lower ourselves

t h e g i l d e d s e a l

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on to the roof,” Milo nodded, touching the image showing

the top of the elevator shaft. “So we’ll need you to make sure

they can’t see us.” Axel took careful notes while keeping his

eyes fixed on where Milo was pointing.

“Do you want to loop it or just lose the picture?” asked

Axel.

“Lose it,” Milo confirmed. “We’ll fold the hatch back, deal

with the guards, grab the painting and then jump back on to

the roof before the doors open. So far, we’ve got it down to

thirteen seconds.” He nodded toward the replica elevator

cabin in one of the other rooms.

“We can do it in eleven.” Eva gave a determined nod.

“As soon as we’re out, we’ll set off the incendiary charges

here and here.” Milo pointed to two locations at either end of

the Grande Gallerie. “That’s your cue to cut the rest of the

feeds.”

“The fire alarms will bring down the security barriers,”

Eva continued. “By the time they put the fire out, get their

system up and running, and work out what’s happened, we’ll

be gone.”

“We need the helicop ter there exactly two minutes after

we drop on to the elevator. That’ll give us enough time to make

it back out on to the roof.”

“Any problems, I’ll have the boys parked nearby,” said

Djoulou. “We’ll come in and get you.”

“Is everyone clear on what they’re doing and when?”

Djoulou nodded.

“I want to run through it again,” Axel suggested, folding a

fresh piece of gum into his mouth. “Just to be sure.”

“Good.” Milo grabbed his hair and yanked his head back.

“Because if you screw this up, I’ll saw your head off with a

blunt pocket knife.”

C H A P T E R T H I R T Y- O N E

LA FONTAINE DE MARS RESTAURANT,

7TH ARRONDISSEMENT, PARIS

21st April— 8:17 p.m.

Let me see that list again.”

Tom motioned toward the printout. Jennifer watched

him as he leafed through the pages, his brow creased in con-

centration. She remembered the last time they had sat to-

gether like this. Also in a restaurant. Also in Paris. So much

had changed since that initial, suspicious encounter, and yet

here they were again, perhaps even more suspicious and wary

than then. Was that the heavy price of their fl eeting intimacy,

she wondered. Unsustained, the barriers had come up twice

as high as before.

If nothing else it explained why he was so keen to focus on

her case—this way he didn’t have to risk talking about any-

thing more personal.

“Look at the buying patterns—” he traced a fi nger over

the page. “Your friend Razi is buying some good stuff

here—Klee, Laurencin, Utrillo, even a Renoir or two. But

he’s buying a lot of rubbish too. Similar period, but rubbish