The Tempest (30 page)

Authors: James Lilliefors

BOOK: The Tempest

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W
alter Kepler was five or six years old when he first became aware of the effects that great art could have on other Âpeople. He would study the expressions of strangers in museums, standing entranced before the world's masterpieces, and wonder: What were they seeing, exactly? What were they thinking, and feeling? What hold did these mysterious old paintings have over them? There was no way of knowing, of course, because those moments were impenetrable, as utterly private as prayer, it had seemed. Even now, there were times when Kepler found himself more interested in the looks on Âpeople's faces than in the paintings they were viewingâÂalthough what really intrigued him weren't their outward appearances so much as what was going on inside, what he couldn't see.

It had been the incongruities in Elena Fiorille's faceâÂserene from one angle, remote from another, and that sly sullen curve of the mouth pulling it all togetherâÂthat had drawn him to her that first day. She'd been admiring Chagall's tumultuous
Half Past Three
, on the first floor at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, a painting Kepler knew well although he had never seen anyone study it at such length, or with such apparent reverence. And so, he'd followed her out of the galleries into the hallway and struck up a conversation.

The terms of the miracle had been born then, in the first weeks of their relationship, when they would talk for hours into the night, telling each other stories about themselves, some probably true, inventing realities and then setting them free, as a painter does a painting. Eventually, Elena had become his loyal partner, with all the strangeness that would entail, and their story had become a love story, more for her than for him; she had even come to accept his pet name for her, “Belasco,” odd as it was. It was Elena who had led him to Champlain, and Champlain to the Rembrandt.

Now, Elena was gone. Kepler had found out about it through Weber the morning after it happened. He had mixed feelings about that, including a heavy burden of guilt, a feeling he'd have to work through for a while. He'd known all along that Elena was a troubled soul, though, and a sociopath; and he'd known that he could not long afford those things in his life.

He was at a different museum today, the Musee Marc Chagall, on Avenue Docteur Menard, several kilometers from his apartment, waiting in the cafÃ© for Jacob Weber again. It was an apt meeting spot, this small but grand museum built around the Biblical paintings of the artist who'd been responsible, in a sense, for their miracle. Now Elena was gone, and it was becoming easier for Kepler to separate the imagined from the remembered. And the real.

On Sunday, Rembrandt's
Storm
was back on display to the public, and Âpeople had lined up around the block to get in, just as he'd imagined. It would be shown for six weeks and then be taken away for a year of conservation and heightened security measures. No one would ever steal it again.

Â“People like this story,” Jacob Weber told him, settling with his coffee.

“So I gather,” Kepler said.

Weber looked especially small today, Kepler observed, dressed in an oversized striped boy's sweater. It was the first time he had seen Weber since Pennsylvania, when they'd stood together in the barn for their private audience with Rembrandt.

He had brought with him the American newspapers and magazines, to show Kepler how the event was being covered, as if he hadn't been following online.

There, on the cover of
Time
:
MIRACLE
IN BOSTON

On
USA Today
:
THE REMBRANDT âMIRACLE'

Even front-Âpage stories in the
New York Times
and the
Washington Post
had picked up the word
miracle
.

“So far, the angels are with us, aren't they?”

Jacob Weber didn't know how to answer, so he didn't.

“But what are the serious Âpeople saying?” Kepler asked.

“The serious Âpeople,” Weber repeated. “Some are calling it a publicity stunt.”

Of course. “And is the museum feeling any pressure to push back on that? To explain?”

“No, none. Per the agreement.” Weber's face showed a rare flicker of amusement. “We're going to be fine, I think.”

Kepler nodded. Yes, the world was awakening to Rembrandt and to
The Storm
, this magnificent painting that otherwise would have been lost to obscurity. Now, it had a mystique to go with its greatness. ÂPeople were seeing it in ways they never would have if it hadn't been stolen. The painting had layers of meaning now that even Rembrandt couldn't have imagined.

“And what will our liability be? Will they try to make a case against me?”

“I don't think so. Scott Randall's been arrested, you know.”

Kepler tried not to smile. “Yes, I saw that. He'll attempt to make a deal, of course.”

“He's going to have a credibility problem, though,” Weber said. “He's taken advantage of the federal government for years. They're not going to trust him now.”

“No. Will the media tie him to our miracle?”

“They may,” Weber said.

“Which might just add another level to the mystery.”

“Yes.”

The two men drank their coffees, eyes lowered. Kepler changed the subject: “But they will blame Elena.”

“The local police will, yes. Her DNA came back on the woman, Susan Champlain. I'm afraid that's inevitable now.”

Weber had predicted this would happen. More than just predicted: he'd
wanted
this to happen. In a way, it
was
cleaner. A case against a dead person was no case at all. Still, Kepler felt a yearning whenever he thought of Elena, remembering how they had met at the museum in Philadelphia and talked so easily for hours at a time, at her home and at his. The remembrances conjured up a version of himself that Kepler didn't likeâa man who couldn't return the love Elena had for him, whose own greatest love affairs had always been with paintings.

Weber went over his financial accounts, then, as Kepler had requested. And, in the way that a doctor shares the result of a patient's annual physical, Weber gave him a clean bill of health.

He was in good shapeâlegally, financially, and imaginatively.

But Kepler felt lonely when Weber walked away. It would be a while, he suspected, before he would see him again. Kepler would stay at his apartment in France for several months, until things settled down with Scott Randall. That hadn't been the plan. The plan had been to spend time with Belasco, visiting the great art museums of the world.

But it probably
was
better this way. The plan now was to wait, and then to visit the great museums by himself. Eventually, he would find another Belasco. That would take some time. And some looking. But Walter Kepler didn't mind. He was hopeful. It was something to live for.

Author's Note and Acknowledgments

T
he events and people in this book are fictitious (with the exception of those that aren't). The Stolen Art Division of the FBI does not actually exist, although it may bear some passing resemblance to the Art Crime Team, which does. The FBI's Art Crime Team, founded in 2004, has to date recovered more than 11,500 works of stolen art (but not, yet, the Gardner art).

Much has been written about the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft of 1990. Some of those articles and books served as valuable reference materials during the writing of this book, in particular Stephen Kurkjian's investigative reporting for the
Boston Globe
(his book on the subject,
Master Thieves: The Boston Gangsters Who Pulled Off the World's Biggest Art Heist
, was due out as this novel was going to press). Books on stolen art and the Gardner theft that were particularly helpful included
Stealing Rembrandts: The Untold Stories of Notorious Art Heists
by Anthony M. Amore and Tom Mashberg (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011),
Priceless: How I Went Undercover To Recover the World's Stolen Treasures
by Robert K. Wittman with John Shiffman (Crown, 2010), and
The Gardner Heist: The True Story of the World's Largest Unsolved Art Theft
by Ulrich Boser (Smithsonian, 2009).

Many books and online sources provided information and insights about Rembrandt's remarkable life and career, among them
Rembrandt's Eyes
by Simon Schama (Knopf, 1999),
Rembrandt: The Painter at Work
by Ernst van de Wetering (University of California Press, Revised Edition, 2009),
The Rembrandt Book
by Gary Schwartz (Harry N. Abrams, 2006), and
Rembrandt and the Face of Jesus
(Yale University Press, 2011).

A special thank you to my agent, Laura Gross. And thanks to Emily Krump, for her editorial guidance on
The Tempest
and
The Psalmist
, and the staff at Witness, who, among other things, came up with two great covers. Thanks also to Elizabeth Reluga, collections administrator at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and Joseph Gamble, retired commander of the Homicide Unit of the Maryland State Police. And finally, I thank J, T & C for staying calm through the storms.

About the Author

J
AMES LILLIEFORS is the author of the geopolitical thriller novels
The Leviathan Effect
and
Viral
. A journalist and novelist who grew up near Washington, D.C., Lilliefors is also the author of three nonfiction books.
The Psalmist
and
The Tempest
are the first two books in the Luke Bowers and Amy Hunter series.

www.jameslilliefors.com

www.witnessimpulse.com

Also by James Lilliefors

The Psalmist

The Leviathan Effect

Viral

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

THE TEMPEST
.
Copyright Â© 2015 by James Lilliefors. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

EPub Edition JULY 2015 ISBN: 9780062349712

Print Edition ISBN: 9780062349729

FIRST EDITION

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