by Louise Penny
He began to sway, and felt a hand on his arm, leading him away.
“Come over here. Sit down.”
A chair was righted, and when he sat, the same large hand was placed on his back and firmly, carefully, bent him over until his head was between his knees.
“Breathe.”
And he did.
When he raised his head, he was a different man. No longer would he look at a scene of violent death as though it was simply a series of brushstrokes.
“Better?” asked Armand.
He nodded and stood, a little shakily. And looked around. He knew he was there to evaluate the paintings.
Professor de la Coutu took a deep breath, almost a gasp.
“Is that a Rothko?” He went right up to it, his nose almost touching the oil paint. “The one that sold at auction twenty years ago? We had no idea who bought it. Look at all this.”
The curator turned full circle, in wonderment.
“They’d been taken off the walls and their backing ripped,” said Reine-Marie.
“They slashed the paintings?”
He ran over to another one. His arms out in front of him, like a parent rushing to save a falling infant.
He picked up the Vermeer and turned it around.
The brown framer’s paper had indeed been slashed, but not the painting itself.
Holding it at arm’s length, he studied the work, his eyes luminous.
It was a classic Vermeer domestic scene of a kitchen table with fruit and meat, and a calloused hand just reaching into the frame.
“You can tell not just by the subject matter, but by Vermeer’s use of light,” said de la Coutu, almost in a whisper. “By the pigments. Oh, my God, what a find.”
“How much would that be worth?” Armand asked.
“Armand!” said Reine-Marie, shocked.
“Priceless,” said the curator under his breath, shaking his head in wonderment.
He rubbed his hand over the engraved dark wood frame, caressing it.
Then he replaced it on the wall and took more paintings off their hooks, turning them around, too.
None of the actual art had been damaged.
Finally, after walking from room to room, examining the works of Old Masters, Impressionists, Modern Masters, he turned to the Gamaches.
His excitement, at first bordering on hysteria, had died down.
“This apartment belongs to Stephen Horowitz, am I right?”
“How do you know?” Reine-Marie asked. They hadn’t told him.
“The collection. He’s a huge financial contributor to the Louvre, and every now and then we’d hear rumors of another of his acquisitions, mostly through auctions. He was never named, but the world of high-end collectors and collections is small, tight-knit. I heard the news, but I thought it was a car accident. Not…” He looked at the outline on the floor.
“That wasn’t Stephen,” said Gamache. “We need you to be discreet about what you’re seeing.”
“Do you know what I’m seeing?” The curator turned from reexamining the Vermeer to examining Gamache.
“I believe I do, but tell us.”
Professor de la Coutu rested his critical gaze on them. “I take it you asked me here for an evaluation. In the event of his death.”
Armand remained silent.
“I’m afraid these are all copies. Excellent ones, certainly. Able to fool most people, though I’m surprised they fooled Monsieur Horowitz. Worth thousands each, even as copies, but not tens of millions. Not priceless as I first thought.”
“All of them?” Reine-Marie looked at Armand and saw that he looked grim, though not surprised. “You knew?”
“I suspected. I knew that most originals from the Renaissance, as many of these would be, don’t have framing paper at the back. And the frames themselves, while clearly good, aren’t old. Even if Stephen had them reframed, he’d make sure they were from the same era.”
“That’s what made me suspicious, too,” said the curator. “The fake Vermeer has a staple in its frame. Monsieur Horowitz would never stand for that, for an original.”
Armand walked over to the smallest painting and, taking it off the wall, handed it to the curator. “Is this original?”
“It’s nice,” said de la Coutu, bending close to it. “Watercolor. Landscape. Probably from the early to mid-twentieth century. Signed VM Whitehead.” The professor turned it around. “Funny that it has a nylon thread at the back and plastic eye hooks.” He handed it back to Gamache. “Probably original, but worthless.”
“Not completely,” said Armand as he replaced it on the screw.
“What a shame,” said the curator. “Someone must’ve come in while Monsieur Horowitz was away from Paris, and methodically replaced originals with copies. Probably done over time. I’ve never seen anything like it. What a loss. Did the dead man surprise the forger, do you think?”
“And was killed,” said Armand. “Could be. Any idea how much this would all be worth, if they were originals?”
The curator frowned, thinking. “Vermeer did very few paintings. This one? In London or Hong Kong, probably close to a hundred million.” He turned full circle. “All told, there might be half a billion dollars’ worth just here, never mind what he must have in his other homes and offices.” Now he turned shocked eyes on Armand. “You don’t think—”
“That they’re all fake?” Armand nodded. “I’ve asked his assistant to have them evaluated. She’s at his home now with the curator from the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal. When they’re finished there, they’ll look at the art in his office.”
“Mon Dieu,” whispered the curator. Feeling light-headed again, he sat down and gazed around the room.
Then his expression turned quizzical.
“Have you noticed that all the works are either pastoral or domestic? Peaceful. No torture, no death. Not even any hunting scenes. Huh. It can’t be a coincidence. I wonder why.”
Armand was so used to the paintings that he hadn’t actually noticed this. Neither had Reine-Marie.
But now that the curator had pointed it out, they saw it. Stephen, the exorcist, had covered his walls floor to ceiling with scenes of peace.
“I’m sorry to have given you this bad news,” said de la Coutu. “Will you alert the authorities, or should I?”
“I will. Could you keep this to yourself for now?”
“Of course. Clara told me you’re a senior officer with the Sûreté du Québec. I hope you find out who did this. And, more to the point, who did that.”
He looked at the drawing on the floor.
They put Professor de la Coutu into a taxi and watched as it headed back to the Louvre.
“Poor Stephen,” said Reine-Marie as Armand took her hand. “He’s going to be devastated.”
“I doubt it,” he said, quietly.
She looked at him. Armand was coming to terms, she thought, with the reality that Stephen would almost certainly never return home, and never find out that his collection, the work of a lifetime, had been stolen.
They waited for a gap in the traffic on rue des Sèvres, then darted across the street.
* * *
Jacques led them to a secluded table in bar Joséphine. But Armand pointed to a table right beside a rowdy group of visitors speaking Spanish. “Over there, perhaps?”
The maître d’ raised a brow but showed them to the table.
Reine-Marie found herself glancing around the bar, trying to make out where those photographs she’d seen in the archives, from the war, had been taken. She felt a knot in her stomach and understood why Zora had loathed the place.
Was she one of the ones who’d been brought here straight out of the concentration camp? Had she searched for her family through these corridors? In the grand ballroom, in bars and restaurants, in guest rooms? In vain.
Once Jacques had taken their orders, Armand leaned close to Reine-Marie. But just as he opened his mouth to speak, another text came in.
&nbs
p; His phone was on the table, and she could see it, too. It was from Mrs. McGillicuddy. At office now. We were right.
Armand typed. Same here.
“His whole collection is fake?” asked Reine-Marie, eyes wide. “Even the ones in Montréal? All of it stolen? What happened to it?”
“I don’t think those paintings were stolen,” he said, leaning close to her and keeping his voice low. “I think Stephen sold them.”
It took Reine-Marie a moment to take that in. “Why do you say that?”
“Because Stephen knew art. He’d know immediately if there was even one fake, never mind all of them.”
“Why would he sell them?”
“To quietly raise capital. And a lot of it. He couldn’t cash in hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of stocks or holdings without anyone noticing, but he could discreetly sell his collection. Then he had to have each painting replaced so no one would know.”
Reine-Marie’s mind raced. “Why would he need that money? Was he in financial trouble?”
“No, not at all.”
“Was he being blackmailed? That dossier? Was he paying to have it suppressed?”
Armand shook his head. “That file was found weeks ago. To quietly sell his collection must’ve taken years. Whatever he was doing, it was a long time in the planning.”
“You had Professor de la Coutu come, but it was just to confirm what you already suspected.”
“Yes. And I think I know where most of the money went. When I spoke with Mrs. McGillicuddy this morning, she told me she’d found papers in one of Stephen’s safety-deposit boxes. He’d been siphoning money to Alexander Plessner. And a lot of it.”
“What for?”
“Investments. Those papers were buy orders. Confirmations. It looks like he’d instructed Plessner to slowly accumulate holdings in several companies. But not all at once. The buys were spread over years, in relatively small amounts at a time so that no alarms would be sounded. When Mrs. McGillicuddy added it up, it came to slightly more than a billion dollars.”
“And no one knew it was Stephen?”
Armand shook his head. “This looks like a hostile takeover, done a millimeter at a time. Have you ever seen the game Jenga?”
“Sure. Our nephews have one. You remember last Christmas, they were playing it? It looks like a solid tower but is actually made up of lots of small pieces, like little logs. You pull out one at a time, trying not to have the whole thing collapse.”
“Right. Stephen and Plessner were playing financial Jenga. Pulling out tiny pieces of companies one at a time. He was a wily one.”
Reine-Marie wondered if Armand realized he’d just, for the first time, referred to Stephen in the past tense.
“Which companies?” she asked.
“Mrs. McGillicuddy’s studying the buy orders, but it’s complex and many are numbered companies.”
“He wanted to control them?”
“Or just one. It’s possible the rest are camouflage, misdirection.”
“Is one of them GHS?”
“Non.”
“No,” she said. “That would be worth far more than even Stephen could raise. And the directors would definitely notice a hostile takeover, no matter how subtle. But he could be buying up one or more of the subsidiaries.”
Armand pointed at her. Got it.
That was his thinking, too.
“But why?” And since there was no answer, she asked another question. “Is that why you stopped at home to get the annual report? To see if any of the companies are listed?”
“Yes. But the report doesn’t name any of its holdings.”
“If there are any,” said Reine-Marie.
“Well, we know of at least one. SecurForte. And I suspect there are many more.”
But there was another piece of information he had found out from Mrs. McGillicuddy. He waited for the shouts from the table next to them to reach a crescendo before leaning close to Reine-Marie.
She leaned in.
“Six weeks ago Stephen wired huge amounts into his bank account here in Paris. The funds were frozen, of course, following the anti-money-laundering laws. But they’d be available to him as of tomorrow morning.”
She knew her husband and could see there was more to come. “Go on.”
Armand paused, wishing he didn’t have to actually say it. He studied her eyes. So familiar, he knew every fleck. Had looked into them at all the high, and low, moments of their lives together. As he stared into them now.
“The money’s in the Banque Privée des Affaires.”
Reine-Marie became absolutely, completely still. They were alone now. Far away from the shouts of laughter, the clink of cutlery, the scraping of chairs on marble floors. The murmurs of discreet waiters. Far away from the familiar.
It was just the two of them, in the wilderness.
“Daniel’s bank?” she whispered.
“Oui.”
“So Daniel knew, knows, what they were doing?”
“I don’t think so. I doubt Stephen would’ve told him. There was no reason for Daniel to know. And the less he knew, the better.”
“Why would Stephen involve Daniel at all? If he thought it was dangerous, why in the world would he drag Daniel into it?”
“He wouldn’t. I think at the time, six weeks or so ago, the only danger Stephen probably saw was that his carefully laid plan would collapse. That he’d fail. But he’d never have thought any of this would happen.”
“Five weeks ago Daniel’s name was put on the archive request for Stephen’s war file. That’s no coincidence. Something happened. Someone noticed.”
Armand exhaled. “I think you’re right. Stephen miscalculated. As soon as they threatened him with that file, he knew he had to be more careful. Which was why when he came to Paris he stayed at the George V. Laid low.”
“But still they got him. Monsieur Plessner’s dead and Stephen’s in a coma. Oh, God, Armand, is Daniel in danger?”
“No. If they were going to hurt him, it would’ve been that same night they attacked Plessner and Stephen.” He took her hand. It was freezing cold. “They’re setting him up, but they need him alive for that. They won’t hurt him.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. He’s safe. Especially if he can be convinced to go to Commander Fontaine and tell her about Alexander Plessner and the venture capital. That will prove to them he has no idea what’s really happening.”
Reine-Marie snatched up her phone. “I’m going to call and make him do it.”
But he stopped her. “Let’s get in a taxi. Call from there.”
Reine-Marie strode down the long corridor, almost breaking into a run.
“Hôpital Hôtel-Dieu, s’il vous plaît,” said Armand.
Reine-Marie had the phone to her ear and was listening to the ringing. Ringing.
Paris slid by, unseen.
She looked at Armand, who was watching her. “No answer.”
“Try again.”
She did. Still no answer. The hospital was up ahead. She called Roslyn, who confirmed that Daniel had left a couple of hours earlier, but she hadn’t heard from him. And no, she didn’t know where he’d gone.
“Armand?” said Reine-Marie.
“We’ll find him.”
His mind was racing. Where could Daniel be? He’d been so sure, genuinely certain, that SecurForte, or whoever was behind all this, needed Daniel alive.
Didn’t they?
Dear God, didn’t they?
The taxi pulled up to the entrance to the hospital. Armand was on the phone. He no longer cared if he was giving himself away.
“Claude? Armand. Can you tell me if there’re any reports of violent crimes in the last couple of hours?” He was pale as he asked, holding on to Reine-Marie’s eyes. “Accidents? Where?” He held up his hand to reassure Reine-Marie. “Merci. No, just checking. Merci.”
He hung up. “A woman fell off her bicycle and was hit by a car, but will recover. Nothing else.�
��
“But that doesn’t mean—”
“I know.”
“We have to find him. There must be a way.”
“There is.” Armand stared at his phone. About to do something he loathed. Something he knew Daniel would find hard to forgive.
But there was so much unforgiven already—what was one more violation?
He pressed the app. And waited, staring at the screen, as it changed to GPS. To a map of Paris. To the île de la Cité.
“But it’s not working,” said Reine-Marie. “It’s showing our location.”
“Oui.” Armand stared up. At the façade of the old hospital. “Daniel’s here.”
The cop at Stephen’s door let them in. Daniel was sitting beside Stephen’s bed. With one hand, he held Stephen’s hand. In the other, he held his phone.
And Armand saw the outrage in his son’s eyes.
CHAPTER 32
“We need to talk,” Armand said to Daniel as soon as they’d returned to Stephen’s suite at the George V.
Jean-Guy was there and introduced his colleague Séverine Arbour.
They greeted her, but before Beauvoir could explain, Armand said, “Excusez-moi,” and turned to Daniel. “Come with me, please.”
Armand walked up the stairs, but Daniel stayed behind until his mother said, “Go. Please.”
His father had asked him, in the taxi over, if he’d gone to see Commander Fontaine, but Daniel had refused to answer. As he’d done since he was a child, when angry, Daniel clamped shut. Refusing to talk. To make eye contact. To acknowledge anything and anyone.
Now he slowly followed his father up the stairs while the others exchanged glances.
Honoré was having a nap in the second bedroom, and Roslyn had taken the girls into the courtyard garden of the hotel for afternoon tea.
Those in the living room tried not to listen, but still, they heard enough.
* * *
“What?” demanded Daniel when they got into Stephen’s bedroom and his father had closed the door.
“What?” said Armand, turning to face him. “One man is dead, another probably dying. We’re in the middle of God knows what scale of crime, and you’re sulking?”
“Sulking? You spied on me. You tracked my movements. My own father suspects me of having something to do with all this shit. I’m not sulking, I’m in a rage, you … asshole.”