The Heist

by Daniel Silva

  The days were still warm and thick with humidity, but in the evening a breeze from the lagoon made the city tolerable. Gabriel would collect Chiara at her office and take her to dinner. By mid-September, she was six months along, past the point where it was possible to keep her pregnancy a secret from the rest of Venice’s small but talkative Jewish community. Gabriel thought she had never looked so beautiful. Her skin glowed, her eyes sparkled like gold dust, and even when she was uncomfortable, she seemed incapable of any expression other than a wide smile. She was a planner by nature, a maker of lists, and at dinner each night she talked incessantly of all the things they needed to do. They had decided to remain in Venice until the last week of October, the first week of November at the latest. Then they would return to Jerusalem to prepare the apartment in Narkiss Street for the birth of the children.

  “They’ll need names, you know,” Gabriel said one evening as they were strolling along the Zattere at dusk.

  “Your mother had a beautiful name.”

  “She did,” replied Gabriel. “But Irene isn’t really a proper name for a boy.”

  “So maybe we should call the girl Irene instead.”

  “Good idea.”

  “And the boy?”

  Gabriel was silent. It was too soon to start choosing a name for the boy.

  “I spoke to Ari this morning,” Chiara said after a moment. “As you might expect, he’s a bit anxious for us to come home.”

  “Did you tell him I have to finish the Veronese first?”

  “I did.”

  “And?”

  “He doesn’t understand why an altarpiece should keep the two of you apart at a time like this.”

  “Because the altarpiece might be the last one I ever get to restore.”

  “Maybe,” said Chiara.

  They walked in silence for a moment. Then Gabriel asked, “How did he sound?”

  “Ari?”

  He nodded.

  “Not good, actually.” She looked at him seriously and asked, “Do you know something I don’t know?”

  “The signadora told me he doesn’t have long.”

  “Did she tell you anything else I should know?”

  “Yes,” he said. “She told me it was close.”

  By then, it was late September, and Gabriel was running hopelessly behind schedule. Tiepolo graciously offered him a brief extension, but Gabriel stubbornly refused it; he did not want the last restoration in his beloved city of water and paintings to be remembered only for the fact that he had failed to complete it in the time allotted. And so he barricaded himself in the church with no distractions and worked with a stamina and speed he would not have thought possible. He retouched the Virgin and the Christ Child in a single day, and on the final afternoon he repaired the face of a curly-haired boy angel who was peering over a heavenly cloud, toward the earthly suffering below. The boy looked too much like Dani, and Gabriel, as he worked, wept softly. When he was finished, he dried his brushes and his face, and stood motionless before the towering canvas, a hand to his chin, his head tilted slightly to one side.

  “Is it finished?” asked Francesco Tiepolo, who was watching him from the base of the scaffolding.

  “Yes,” said Gabriel. “I think it is.”

  59

  VENICE

  IN THE NORTHWEST CORNER OF the Campo di Ghetto Nuovo is a small, stark memorial to the Jews of Venice who, in December 1943, were rounded up, interned in concentration camps, and murdered at Auschwitz. General Cesare Ferrari was standing before it when Gabriel entered the square at half past six that evening. His ruined right hand was stuffed into the pocket of his trousers. His harsh gaze seemed more judgmental than usual.

  “I never knew it happened here in Venice,” he said after Gabriel had joined him. “The Rome roundup was different. Rome was far too big to ever be forgotten. But here . . .” He looked around the tranquil square. “It doesn’t seem possible.”

  Gabriel was silent. The general stepped slowly forward and ran his damaged hand over one of the seven bas-relief plaques. “From where were they taken?” he asked.

  “There,” said Gabriel.

  He pointed toward the three-story building to their right. The sign above the door read CASA ISRAELITICA DI RIPOSO. It was a rest home for aged members of the community.

  “By the time the roundup finally took place,” Gabriel said after a moment, “most of the remaining Jews of Venice had gone into hiding. The only ones left in the city were the old and sick. They were dragged from their beds by the Germans and their Italian helpers.”

  “How many live there now?” the general asked.

  “Ten or so.”

  “Not many.”

  “There aren’t many left.”

  The general looked at the memorial again. “I don’t know why you live in a place like this.”

  “I don’t,” said Gabriel. Then he asked the general why he was back in Venice.

  “I had to do a bit of housekeeping at the Art Squad’s field office here. I also wanted to attend the reopening of the Church of San Sebastiano.” The general paused, then added, “I hear the main altarpiece looks quite amazing. You obviously managed to finish it.”

  “With a few hours to spare.”

  “Mazel tov.”

  “Grazie.”

  “And now?” asked the general. “What are your plans?”

  “I’m going to spend the next month trying to be the best husband I can. And then I’m going to go home again.”

  “The children are coming soon, yes?”

  “Soon,” said Gabriel.

  “As the father of five, I can assure you that your life will never be the same.”

  In the far corner of the square, the door of the community office swung open and Chiara emerged into the shadows. She glanced at Gabriel and then disappeared again into the entrance of the ghetto museum. The general seemed not to have noticed her; he was frowning at the green metal structure next to the memorial where a uniformed Carabinieri man sat behind bulletproof glass.

  “It’s a shame we have to put a security post in the middle of this beautiful place.”

  “I’m afraid it comes with the territory.”

  “Why this eternal hatred?” the general asked, shaking his head slowly. “Why does it never end?”

  “You tell me.”

  Greeted by silence, Gabriel again asked the general why he had come back to Venice.

  “I’ve been looking for something for a long time,” the Italian said, “and I was hoping you could help me find it.”

  “I tried,” said Gabriel. “But it seems to have slipped through my fingers.”

  “I hear you actually came close.” The general lowered his voice and added, “Closer than you realized.”

  “How did you hear that?”

  “The usual ways.” The general looked at Gabriel seriously and asked, “Is there any chance you would agree to a debriefing before you leave the country?”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything that happened after you stole Sunflowers.”

  “I didn’t steal it. I borrowed it at the suggestion of the commander of the Art Squad. And so the answer is no,” Gabriel added, shaking his head. “I won’t be sitting for any debriefings, now or at any time in the future.”

  “Then perhaps we can quietly compare notes instead.”

  “I’m afraid my notes are classified.”

  “That’s good,” said the general, smiling. “Because mine are, too.”

  They headed across the square to the kosher café next to the community center and shared a bottle of pinot grigio as the darkness gathered around them. Gabriel began by swearing the general to an omertà and threatening him with reprisals if the oath of silence were ever broken. Then he told him everything that had transpired since their last meeting, beginning with the death of Samir Basara in Stuttgart and ending with the discovery, and eventual surrender, of $8 billion in assets belonging to the president of Syria.
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  “I suppose this has something to do with those two Syrian bankers who went missing in Austria,” the general said when Gabriel had finished.

  “What Syrian bankers?”

  “I’ll take that as a yes.” The general drank some of his wine. “So Jack Bradshaw refused to deliver the Caravaggio because the Syrians killed the only woman he ever loved? Is that what you’re telling me?”

  Gabriel nodded slowly and watched a pair of black-coated yeshiva students making their way across the square.

  “Now I know why you made me swear not to mention Bradshaw’s name during my press conference,” the general was saying. “You didn’t want me to posthumously drag his name through the mud.” He paused, then added, “You wanted him to rest in peace.”

  “He deserves it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because they tortured him mercilessly, and he didn’t tell them what he did with the painting.”

  “Do you believe in redemption, Allon?”

  “I’m a restorer,” said Gabriel.

  The general smiled. “And the paintings you discovered in the Geneva Freeport?” he asked. “How did you get them out of Switzerland so quietly?”

  “With the help of a friend.”

  “A Swiss friend?”

  Gabriel nodded.

  “I didn’t know such a thing was possible.”

  This time, it was Gabriel who smiled. The yeshiva students entered a sottoportego and disappeared from sight. The square was now empty except for two young children, a boy and girl, who were bouncing a ball back and forth under the watchful gaze of their parents.

  “The question is,” said the general, peering into his wineglass, “what did Jack Bradshaw do with the Caravaggio?”

  “I suppose he put it somewhere he thought no one would ever find it.”

  “Maybe,” replied the general. “But that’s not the talk on the street.”

  “What are you hearing?”

  “That he gave it to someone for safekeeping.”

  “Someone at the dirty end of the business?”

  “It’s hard to say. But as you might expect,” the general added quickly, “other people are now looking for it. Which means it’s imperative we find it before they do.”

  Gabriel was silent.

  “Not even tempted, Allon?”

  “My involvement in this affair is now officially over.”

  “It sounds as though you actually mean it this time.”

  “I do.”

  The family of four quietly departed, leaving the campo deserted. The heavy silence seemed to disturb the general. He looked at the lights burning in the windows of the Casa Israelitica di Riposo and shook his head slowly.

  “I don’t understand why you choose to live in a ghetto,” he said.

  “It’s a nice neighborhood,” replied Gabriel. “The nicest in Venice, if you ask me.”

  60

  VENICE

  FOR THE NEXT SEVERAL DAYS, Gabriel rarely strayed far from Chiara’s side. He made her breakfast each morning. He spent afternoons with her at the office of the Jewish community. He sat at the kitchen counter in the evening and watched over her as she cooked. At first, she was charmed by the attention, but gradually the sheer weight of his ceaseless affections began to grate upon her. It was, she would say later, a little too much of a good thing. She briefly considered asking Francesco Tiepolo for a painting to restore—something small and not too damaged—but decided that they should take a trip instead. Nothing too extravagant, she said, and nowhere that would require air travel. Two days, three at the most. Gabriel had an idea. That evening, he rang Christoph Bittel and requested permission to enter Switzerland; and Bittel, who knew well the reason why his newfound friend and accomplice wanted to return to the Confederation, readily agreed.

  “It might be better if I meet you,” he said.

  “I was hoping you’d say that.”

  “Do you know the area?”

  “Not at all,” said Gabriel, lying.

  “There’s a hotel just outside of town called the Alpenblick. I’ll be waiting for you there.”

  And so it was that, early the following morning, Gabriel and Chiara left their beloved city of water and paintings and set out for the landlocked little country of wealth and secrets that had played such a prominent role in their lives. It was midmorning when they crossed the border at Lugano and started northward into the Alps. Snow flurries blew through the high passes, but by the time they reached the shores of the Interlaken the sun was shining brightly from a cloudless sky. Gabriel refilled his tank with gas and then set out up the valley to Grindelwald. The Alpenblick Hotel was a rustic building standing alone at the edge of town. Gabriel left the car in the hotel’s small parking lot and, with Chiara at his side, climbed the stairs to the terrace. Bittel was drinking coffee and gazing upward at the looming peaks of the Monch and the Eiger. Rising, he shook Gabriel’s hand. Then he looked at Chiara and smiled.

  “You surely have a very beautiful name, but I won’t make the mistake of asking it.” He glanced at Gabriel and said, “You never told me you were about to be a father again, Allon.”

  “Actually,” said Gabriel, “she’s just my food taster.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  Bittel sat down and waved away an approaching waiter. Then he pointed across a green meadow, toward the base of the mountains.

  “The chalet is right over there,” he said to Gabriel. “It’s a nice place, good views, very clean and comfortable.”

  “You have a future as an estate agent, Bittel.”

  “I like protecting my country better.”

  “I assume you have a static watch post somewhere?”

  “We’re renting the chalet next door,” said Bittel. “We keep two officers here full-time, and others cycle in and out as needed. She never goes anywhere without an escort.”

  “Any suspicious visitors?”

  “Of the Syrian variety?”

  Gabriel nodded.

  “You get all kinds here in Grindelwald,” Bittel responded, “so it’s a little hard to tell. But so far, no one’s gone anywhere near her.”

  “How’s her mood?”

  “She seems lonely,” said Bittel seriously. “The guards spend as much time with her as possible, but . . .”

  “But what, Bittel?”

  The Swiss policeman smiled sadly. “I could be wrong,” he said, “but I think she could use a friend.”

  Gabriel rose to his feet. “I can’t thank you enough for agreeing to take her, Bittel.”

  “It was the least we could do to repay you for cleaning up the mess at the Geneva Freeport. But you should have requested our permission before running that operation at the Hotel Métropole.”

  “Would you have given it?”

  “Of course not,” replied Bittel. “Which means you’d still have eight billion dollars in Syrian money in your bank account.”

  Eight-point-two, thought Gabriel as he headed toward his car. But who was counting?

  Gabriel left Chiara and Bittel behind at the hotel and drove into the meadow alone. The house was at the end of a lane, a small, tidy structure of dark timber with a steeply pitched roof and flowerpots lining the balcony. Jihan Nawaz appeared there as Gabriel eased into the grassy drive and switched off the engine. She was wearing blue jeans and a thick woolen sweater. Her hair was longer and lighter; a plastic surgeon had altered the shape of her nose, her cheekbones, and her chin. She was not quite pretty, but she was no longer ordinary looking, either. A moment later, when she came spilling out of the front door, she brought with her the faint scent of roses. She flung her arms around his neck, embraced him tightly, and kissed him on each cheek.

  “Am I allowed to call you by your real name?” she whispered in his ear.

  “No,” he replied. “Not here.”

  “How long can you stay?”

  “As long as you like.”

  “Come,” she said, taking him by the hand. “I’ve ma
de us something to eat.”

  The interior of the chalet was warm and comfortable, but it contained not a trace of evidence the person who lived there had a family or a past of any kind. Gabriel felt a stab of regret. He should have left her alone. Waleed al-Siddiqi would still be managing the money of the worst man in the world, and Jihan would be living quietly in Linz. And yet she had known the name of al-Siddiqi’s special client, he thought. And she had stayed at the bank for a reason.

  “I’ve seen that look on your face before,” she said, watching him intently. “It was in Annecy, as I was coming out of the back of the car. I saw you sitting in the café on the other side of the square. You looked . . .” She left the thought unfinished.

  “How?” he asked.

  “Guilty,” she said without an instant of hesitation.

  “I was guilty.”

  “Why?”

  “I never should have let you walk into that hotel.”

  “My hand healed nicely,” she said, holding it up as though to prove the point. “And my bruises have healed, too. Besides, it was nothing compared to what most Syrians have suffered since the war began. I’m only sorry I couldn’t do more.”

  “Your war is over, Jihan.”

  “You were the one who urged me to join the Syrian rebellion.”

  “And our rebellion failed.”

  “You paid too much to get me back.”

  “I wasn’t in the mood for a prolonged negotiation,” said Gabriel. “It was a take-away offer.”

  “I only wish I could have seen Mr. al-Siddiqi’s face when he found out you’d taken the money.”

  “I must admit I enjoyed his suffering a little too much,” said Gabriel, “but yours was the only face I wanted to see at that moment.”

  With that, she turned and led him into the garden. A small table had been laid with coffee and Swiss chocolates. Jihan sat facing her chalet; Gabriel, the towering gray massif. When they were settled, he asked her about her stay in Israel.

  “I spent the first two weeks locked away in an apartment in Tel Aviv,” she said. “It was dreadful.”

  “We do our utmost to make visitors feel welcome.”