Heist Society

by Ally Carter

  "I should have seen it sooner. I'm pretty sure Hale saw it right away." She laughed, despite the sirens and the pressure and the blood rushing to her head as she peered down. "I guess I've had a lot on my mind."

  "Kat, throw down the--"

  "Taccone likes to threaten people, did you know that? Typical stuff, really. Innuendos . . . threatening pictures . . . And when I looked at the ones of my dad, I saw you in them-- in the background. Were you following him, Nick? Is that why you followed me?" Kat asked. She didn't wait for him to answer. "I bet you'd been planning to help your mom catch my dad by getting close to me for a long time."

  "Kat!" Gabrielle's voice echoed in the distance. She could hear her cousin struggling with the four priceless paintings as they banged against the thin tin walls of the shaft. But still she didn't move.

  "How long has your mom been leading the investigation of my dad, Nick?"

  He looked down at the ground and admitted, "A while." "And so she drags you with her all over the world, and

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  somewhere along the way you got sucked into the family business?" She looked at the boy who might have helped her, or might have betrayed her, but had certainly lied to her. And yet she couldn't help saying, "I knew there was a reason I liked you." She scooted farther into the shaft. "Maybe you should try boarding school!"

  As she inched deeper into the ductwork, Nick called out, "I thought you were retired!"

  And something in his voice, or maybe just the moment, made Kat smile. She turned and leaned out of the vent one final time. "Why are you doing this, Nick?"

  "Because . . ." He paused, searching for words. "Because I like you," he said, but Kat didn't believe him.

  At that moment a new siren began to wail--a different, deafening sound.

  "Kat," Nick said again, stepping forward, reaching up for help, but in that instant, red laser lights flashed over the grate's opening. The cool blue light of the Romani Room was replaced by a bright red glow. Nick glanced toward the doors as if he could hear the guards coming.

  But Kat stared down at him and said, "Wrong answer."

  Kat tried to ignore the sirens that grew louder and louder with each inch. She squinted and crawled through the blackness. Focusing on a small square of light in the distance, Kat crawled closer and closer. Louder and louder the sirens wailed. And as badly as Kat wanted to stop and think about what had just happened, there was no room for thought at that point--no time.

  When she finally reached the end, she could see Gabrielle beneath her, ripping off the skirt of her docent's uniform,

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  turning it inside out to reveal a burgundy plaid that matched Kat's own. Simon was helping Hamish with his tie, the brothers' blue jumpsuits now shoved deep into a wastebasket somewhere inside the Henley. And then she glanced down at the blazer in her hand. Nick wouldn't be needing it. Not now. So she left it tucked inside the shaft and lowered herself to the floor through the glow of a whirling red light.

  Laser grids were flashing angrily. In the chaotic wash of lights, she could barely make out the paintings on the walls-- Renoir. Degas. Monet. She felt dizzy with the thought of being that close to so many masters. But then again, maybe it was just the thick gas being pumped into the room.

  She thought of the oxygen mask that she'd left behind, but of course it was too late.

  Through blurry eyes she saw the doors swing open, armed guards rushed inside.

  "Henley security!" Kat heard the cry over and over, reverberating up and down the halls.

  Kat's head felt thick. She had already started to fall.

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  CHAPTER 34

  From the backseat of Arturo Taccone's Bentley, the entire world seemed to be falling apart. A small television showed live coverage of a correspondent who stood a mere twenty feet away. Taccone looked between the scene on the screen and the one unfolding in real life, and he wasn't quite certain which showed the real picture.

  "Things have taken a dramatic turn here at the Henley today," the correspondent was saying.

  "What do you want me to do, boss?" the driver turned and asked.

  Arturo Taccone took a last look at the scene, then placed his sunglasses over his eyes. "Drive." His voice was cool and free of emotion; as if another round of his favorite game were finally over. A bystander wouldn't have known if he had won

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  or lost. Arturo Taccone was simply happy to be able to play again another day.

  He leaned farther back into the plush seat. "Just drive."

  The first men through the gallery doors that day were seasoned professionals. They had trained with the American FBI and the UK's Scotland Yard. Most were former military. Their equipment was state of the art. The Henley staff took it as a personal insult whenever a great museum got robbed. Some might have said that their extreme security measures were overkill, a waste, but at this particular moment on this particular day, they seemed like a very good idea.

  Ten men stood at the gallery's entrance, tasers drawn, gas masks over their faces, as they watched doors swing open up and down the Henley's halls.

  Collectively, they represented one of the most highly trained private security forces in the world.

  And yet nothing could have prepared them for what they

  saw.

  "Wait," the news correspondent said, and immediately Arturo Taccone turned back to the screen. "We are receiving the first, unconfirmed accounts that the Henley might be secure."

  "Stop," Arturo Taccone said, and his driver pulled to the curb.

  "Kids!" Kat heard one of the guards yell through the haze that filled her mind. "It's a bunch of kids!"

  She rolled onto her side and looked up through the fog as a man knelt on one knee and leaned toward her. "It's okay," he told her softly.

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  "Gas," she mumbled and coughed. "Fire. The museum was on--" A coughing fit cut her off. Someone handed her a mask, and she breathed in fresh air.

  There was more coughing around the room. From the corner of her eye she saw Simon holding a mask to his face. He was lying on the ground beside an empty artist's stand, clutching a blank canvas. The guards were busy helping Angus and Hamish to their unsteady feet, so they never saw the smallest of the boys smile behind his mask. But Kat saw.

  Lying on the floor that day, Kat saw everything.

  "What is this?" Kat knew the voice. She had last seen the man disappearing into the crowd and the smoke, but this time Hale was not beside him. "Who are these children?" Gregory Wainwright demanded of the guards.

  The guard pointed to the seal on Simon's burgundy blazer. "Looks like they're from the Knightsbury Institute."

  "Why weren't they evacuated?" the director asked of the guards, but didn't wait for an answer. He turned and snapped at the teens. "Why didn't yon evacuate?"

  "We--" Everyone in the room turned to the girl with the long legs and the short skirt who was rising unsteadily to her feet. Two of the guards rushed to take her by the arm and help her to stand. "We had a"--coughing overtook her for a moment, but if Gabrielle was playing her part too fervently, Kat was the only one to think it--"had a class."

  She pointed to the bag at her feet. Brushes and paints were strewn across the marble floor where they'd fallen in the chaos. Wooden easels stood in a long line, facing the rows of art. No one stopped to notice that there were five children. Five easels. Four blank canvases. No one was in the mood for counting.

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  "We were supposed to ..." She coughed again. One of the guards placed a hand protectively on her back. "They told us to wait here. They said this exhibit was closed so that we could try to copy those." Gabrielle pointed from the blank canvases on their easels to the Old Masters that lined the walls. "When the sirens sounded, we tried to leave, but the doors were--" She coughed one more time and looked up at the men who surrounded her. Her eyelashes might have batted. Her cheeks might have blushed. A dozen different things might have happened, but the end result was t
hat no one doubted her when she said, "Locked."

  Well, almost no one.

  "What class? Why didn't I know about any such class?" the director growled at the guards.

  The gas was almost completely gone. Kat was breathing more normally. She smoothed the skirt of her uniform, feeling as if her balance had almost completely returned. Two and two were starting to equal four again as she turned and pointed to the sign on the open door, which read: GALLERY CLOSED FOR PRIVATE LECTURE (THIS PROGRAM MADE POSSIBLE BY THE W. W. HALE FOUNDATION FOR ART EXCELLENCE).

  "But. . ." the director started, then turned. He ran a hand across his sweating face. "But the oxygen? The fire security protocols should have killed them!" He turned back to Gabrielle. "Why aren't you dead?"

  "Sir," one of the guards cut in. "The fire was isolated in the next corridor. The oxygen deprivation measures wouldn't have kicked in here unless--"

  "Keep searching the galleries!" the director yelled. "Search them all."

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  "The galleries are all secure, sir," one of the guards assured

  him.

  "We thought this gallery was secure!" Wainwright looked down, mumbling something to himself about oversights and liability. "Search them!"

  "Sir," one of the guards said softly, stepping closer. Kat savored the irony as he whispered, "They're just kids."

  "Sir," Simon said, his voice shaking so violently that Kat believed he was honestly on the verge of tears. "Could I call my mother? I don't feel so good."

  And then one of the most brilliant technical experts in the world passed out cold.

  The sound that came next was unlike anything Katarina Bishop had ever heard. It wasn't the screech of an alarm. It was anything but the roar of sirens. One of the busiest museums in the world was like a ghost town, echoing. Haunting. And as the guards carried Simon into the grand promenade and its cleaner air, Kat half expected to see the shadow of Visily Romani hovering over them, telling her somehow that she'd done well, but she wasn't finished. Not yet.

  Through the Impressionist gallery's open door, Kat watched Gabrielle slowly putting the blank canvases into the large carrying cases. Hamish and Angus hurriedly stuffed paintbrushes into backpacks. Kat moved to comfort Simon, but then she stopped. She listened.

  A thud. An echo. A footstep.

  She turned just as the man appeared at the end of the promenade. His arms pumped. His feet banged against the tile floor. And the whole world seemed to stop turning as he told them, "She's gone."

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  The words weren't a cry, and they were far from a whisper. They held no trace of panic or fear. It was more like disbelief. Yes, that was it, Kat decided, although she couldn't tell if it was his or hers.

  "Leonardo's Angel," the man said again as the party made its way down the center of the grand promenade. The big double doors to the Renaissance room were standing open. A fireproof, bulletproof Plexiglas barrier still stood, sheltering the Angel from harm. Lasers shone red all around. But there was no mistaking that the frame at the center of it all--the heart of the Henley--stood empty.

  "Gone?" Gregory Wainwright stumbled toward the Plexiglas barrier, reaching out for a painting that was no longer there. "She can't be--" the director started, then seemed to finally notice that the frame wasn't empty after all. The Angel was gone, but something remained: a plain white card and the words, "Visily Romani."

  If they had searched Kat, of course, they would have found a card exactly like it. If they had peeled back the top layer of canvas that covered the four frames Kat's crew carried, they would have seen that Angel Returning to Heaven was not the only painting to leave the Henley that day, although somehow Kat imagined that only four walked out the front door.

  Leonardo da Vinci's painting was gone. The five children trapped in the mayhem were no longer a top concern. And so it was that Simon, Angus, Hamish, Kat, and her cousin walked out into the fading drizzle with four masterpieces secured in their artist's portfolios, covered with blank canvas--a clean slate.

  Kat breathed the fresh air. A clean start.

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  In the days that followed, no reporters would be able to interview any of the young artists who had been in danger that day. The Henley's trustees waited for a call or visit from one or more attorneys, and word about what monetary damages there might be, but no such call or visit ever occurred.

  It seemed to some as if the schoolchildren who had been locked in the Impressionist exhibit that day had simply gathered their bags and blank canvases, and walked out into the autumn air, and faded like smoke.

  One of the docents reported seeing the children board a waiting school bus, an older driver at the wheel.

  Many people tried in vain to gain a statement from officials at the Knightsbury Institute, but no one could uncover where the school was located--there certainly was no record of any such institution in London. Not in all of England. Some of the children had sounded American, the guards had said, but after three weeks of failed attempts, the coughing children with their hazy eyes were forgotten for a bigger story on another day.

  No one saw the man in the Bentley who sat watching them walk from the museum in a single line. No one but he noticed that the portfolios they carried were a tad too thick.

  No one but his driver heard him whisper, "Katarina."

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  CHAPTER 35

  Gregory Wainwright was not a foolish man. He swore this to his wife and to his therapist. His mother assured him of that fact every Sunday when he visited her for tea. No one who truly knew him thought that he was personally responsible for Henley security--he employed specialists for such things, after all. But the Angel . . . the Angel had gone missing. Had disappeared. And so Gregory Wainwright was fairly certain that the powers that be at the Henley would be inclined to disagree.

  Perhaps that is why he did not tell a soul that his security card had somehow gone missing in the chaos of the fire. Perhaps that is why he did not say a lot of things.

  If it had been another painting, perhaps all might have been forgiven. But the Angel? Losing the Angel was too much.

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  The article that appeared in the evening edition of the London Times was not exactly what the public had expected. Of course, the color picture of the lost Leonardo loomed large in the center of the page. It went without saying that a headline about the robbery at the Henley dominated everything above the fold. And it was only a matter of time, Gregory Wainwright knew, before the old stories about the Angel would resurface. His only surprise was that it had taken less than twenty-four hours for the press to turn the story from a recounting of the Henley's--and society's--loss, to a retelling of the Henley's shame.

  It wasn't Wainwright's fault that Veronica Miles Henley had purchased the Angel soon after the end of World War II. Wainwright hadn't taken the painting from its original owner and offered it to a high-ranking banking official who had been of great service to the Nazi party. Gregory Wainwright wasn't the judge who had ruled that, since the Angel had been purchased in good faith from the banking official's estate, and since it would hang in a public exhibit, it should not be forcibly removed from the museum's walls.

  None of this was my fault! the man wanted to scream. But, of course, screaming simply is not done. Or so his mother told him.

  The press was loving all of it. The Henley was being villi-fied, and Romani was being made out as some sort of hero--a Robin Hood who headed a merry band of thieves.

  Still, if there was one thing that Gregory Wainwright could be grateful for, it was that the journalists never heard about the boy.

  Wainwright remembered every detail of that day as if he were reliving it over and over again. . . .

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  "Our guards assure me that the room in which you were found had been completely evacuated prior to the fire-protection procedures taking effect," Gregory Wainwright said as he sat across from the young man with the dark hair and blue eyes, in the small interrogation room of Sc
otland Yard. The detectives had assured him that they were too concerned with tracking down the real thief to take much time with the boy; but the Henley's director had felt otherwise.

  "I'm not going to sue," was the boy's only answer.

  "How exactly did you get into that exhibit?" the man asked again.

  "I told you. I told the guy before you. I told the guys before him, and all the way back to the guys who found me, I was in the exhibit when the sirens sounded. I tripped on my way to the door. By the time I got up, I was locked in."

  "But I was in that room. I personally can attest to the fact that our doors only lock when a room has been evacuated."

  The boy shrugged. "Maybe you've got a security problem." This was, if anything, an understatement, but Mr. Wainwright was not in the mood to say so. "Maybe my mom can help you with that," the boy offered. "She's real good at that stuff. You know she works for Interpol."

  The woman at the boy's side was attractive and well dressed, Gregory Wainwright could see. He had, after all, an eye for framing people; so many of them walked through the Henley's doors every day. He knew tourists and collectors, critics and snobs, but he could not truly grasp the woman in front of him.

  "How did you survive the oxygen deprivation measures?" the director asked, and the boy shrugged.

  "Some old dude left his wheelchair. He must have

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  breathing problems, because there was oxygen on the back."

  Gregory Wainwright winced slightly as one of the richest men in the world was referred to as "some old dude," but he said nothing.

  The woman began to stand. "I understand if there are waivers or documents which you will need us to sign, but I can assure you, you have no grounds to hold my son, and he's been through quite an ordeal."