The Caravaggio Conspiracy

by Connor, Alex

  Gil thought of Jacob Levens, drunk, blundering, cornered.

  ‘Jacob hid the portrait in the Huber Gallery?’

  ‘He couldn’t keep it in London, so he went to Terrill Huber,’ Naresh continued, touching his head. ‘I feel ill. I’m hurt, really hurt.’

  ‘Get on with it!’

  ‘Terrill said he would hide it and in time would find a collector to sell it on, splitting the proceeds with Jacob. Alma didn’t like the arrangement, she didn’t want anything to do with it. But her brother blackmailed her into hiding the portrait.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Greta wasn’t Terrill’s daughter – she was Harvey Crammer’s child.’

  Shaken, Gil stared at the historian. ‘Does she know?’

  ‘She found out when she overheard an argument between her mother and Jacob.’

  ‘How did she take it?’

  Naresh snorted derisively. ‘It made Greta angry that her mother could be so judgemental about me when she’d acted like such a slut herself.’

  ‘How did you feel about Alma Huber?’ Gil asked, knowing the answer, remembering what he had felt about the murder victim: that her injuries had been inflicted by someone she knew, someone close.

  ‘I despised her. So when Greta said the portrait was hidden in the Huber Gallery I thought it was fate.’ He paused. ‘I wanted the painting. And I wanted my own back on Der Kreis der Acht, the dealers, and Alma and Terrill Huber. They had all disrespected me. I thought of the portrait as recompense. I’d earned it.’ He paused. ‘Greta doesn’t know. She never suspected anything. Her breakdown was genuine. She couldn’t accept that Terrill wasn’t her real father and that her mother had lied to her. After her parents’ deaths, she forgot everything.’

  Gil thought back to his conversation with Greta in the cafe. ‘She’s piecing it together now. She’s remembering the past. She doesn’t understand all of it, but she will in time.’

  ‘She’s innocent!’

  ‘You married her.’

  ‘I loved her.’

  ‘And wives can’t give evidence against their husbands, can they?’ Gil said, gesturing at the historian. ‘Empty your pockets.’

  Naresh sighed, taking out a map, a pair of glasses and a handkerchief, together with an expensive wallet. His focus was blurring. ‘I’m hurt, badly hurt. I could have concussion …’ His head was humming, blood running down his cheek as he looked at Gil. ‘I’m not armed, you know.’

  ‘That was an oversight.’

  ‘I didn’t think I’d need to be,’ he said, smiling wryly. ‘I never thought you’d work it out. I thought I’d walk out of here with the painting. After all, I’d got away with it in Berlin. You didn’t catch me then. Why would you catch me now?’ He paused, touching his temple. ‘I need a doctor.’

  ‘No doctor. Keep talking.’

  ‘You realise that your late wife was involved with Der Kreis der Acht?’

  Gil nodded. ‘I know.’

  ‘Oscar Schultz was her lover.’

  ‘And her killer.’

  ‘You think so?’ Naresh could see Gil frown. ‘You always suspected it, but there was talk of there being two men in Schultz’s car that night. It was obvious that you and Schultz hated each other. I could see it, so could everyone else. I did you a favour getting rid of Schultz. You had to wait seven years, but he died in the end.’

  ‘You killed him when you were looking for the painting in the Huber Gallery?’

  Naresh nodded, returning to his previous theme.

  ‘Years ago, Holly was in love with Oscar Schultz. She told him about Luca Meriss, the patient in the psychiatric hospital—’

  ‘But Luca Meriss had come to you before and told you, in person, about the Caravaggios.’

  ‘I know, I couldn’t believe it! He wanted me to help him, work with him.’ Naresh was breathing rapidly, blood oozing from the wound. ‘I was so excited. But I didn’t want to make him suspicious, so I pretended I had my reservations – and he took it as a rebuttal. Can you imagine? I had him in my hands and he escaped.’

  ‘And you only heard about Luca Meriss again when Holly told the dealers about him.’

  Naresh nodded. ‘She told them one by one, apparently in confidence, never letting them know that they were all in on it. That was a very dangerous game to play, but she liked danger.’

  Gil was struggling to keep his voice steady. ‘How well did you know Holly?’

  ‘Not well. What I knew of her I learnt from Greta. Holly Eckhart was just the trail of gunpowder that finally led to the whole keg blowing up.’

  Gil paused, thinking over what he had just heard.

  ‘Of course you couldn’t get to Luca seven years ago, could you? He’d been admitted to hospital.’

  ‘He was locked up. Out of reach,’ Naresh said bitterly. ‘And the painting was supposed to be in the Huber Gallery. That’s what Greta told me. If you ask her now, she won’t remember. She forgot everything when she had her breakdown.’

  ‘So all you had to do was to find the picture.’

  ‘Yes,’ Naresh agreed. ‘I confronted Terrill Huber. He blustered, then said he didn’t know where the portrait was. I knew it was in the gallery!’ Naresh was breathing heavily. ‘But he wouldn’t tell me where. I tried, I tried for a while, but he wouldn’t tell me.’ Naresh closed his eyes for a moment, then reopened them, staring fixedly at Gil. ‘I was sick to my stomach, but it had to be done. I’ve no liking for violence – it’s not my nature. I was forced into it.’ He was convincing himself as he spoke. ‘Alma was working at her desk when I went back to the Huber Gallery. She kept saying she didn’t know where the portrait was, but I knew she was lying and I hit her. She fell. She died soon after. Heart attack, I think. It was quick, quicker than her husband—’

  ‘You still tortured her.’

  ‘Her killing had to look the same as her husband’s!’

  ‘But you couldn’t bring yourself to mutilate her genitals, could you?’

  He flushed, glancing away. ‘I hated her, but she was a woman. There was only so much I could bring myself to do.’

  Sighing, Gil shook his head. ‘But you didn’t find the painting?’

  ‘No. It was all for nothing. Two deaths, all for nothing. I’d done it for revenge, but also for recompense. But I didn’t get it. I never found the painting.’ He shrugged. ‘I had to put it all behind me, continue with my life.’

  ‘How did you live with it?’

  ‘I married Greta, I took care of her. I worked, built up my reputation.’ He held Gil’s stare. ‘You had no idea, did you? Neither did the Berlin police. You thought they were just random killings – some lunatic. Which was what I wanted you all to think.’

  Gil refused to be baited.

  ‘And then Luca Meriss announced his claims on the internet,’ he said, ‘for you – and every other dealer in the world – to see.’ He almost smiled. ‘You’d thrown the salmon back in the water and suddenly everyone was on the bank fishing.’

  ‘I’m a patient man.’ Naresh continued, touching his temple lightly and then looking at his hand. ‘You have to help me – I’m bleeding.’

  ‘Good,’ Gil said dismissively. ‘Go on. What about the others? The Weirs? Bernard Lowe?’

  ‘They were all members of the Berlin group. All cosy together, all after paintings which were mine by right.’

  ‘Did the Weir brothers know where they were?’

  ‘No! They had no idea!’

  ‘Terrill Huber was a sick man, and Alma was a woman. You could overpower them easily enough. But the Weirs were young and fit. Was that why you used the drug?’ Gil looked at Naresh with contempt. ‘You’re a coward. You wouldn’t take them on, you had to make them helpless.’

  ‘They deserved it!’

  ‘For slighting you?’

  ‘I had the finest reputation of all of them! I was the most learned, the most accomplished, and they treated me like a waiter!’ He paused, regaining his composure. ‘The Weirs were no good to me.
It became apparent that only Luca Meriss had the information I wanted. Bernard Lowe didn’t know either, but he was dying anyway. I feel no guilt for his death.’

  ‘Jacob Levens was one of the group. Why didn’t you go for him?’

  Naresh took a moment to reply. ‘I was saving him for the last. I wanted him to sweat, to know someone was coming for him. I wanted him to squirm. Jacob Levens is a bad man. He covers it well but he’s guilty of many things.’

  ‘Frieda Meyer was innocent—’

  ‘She was working for Oscar Schultz! She was talking to everyone. I didn’t know how much she knew, only that she was a liability. She was hard to kill … It had been getting easier, but she was difficult. Wouldn’t die. I had trouble with her. Had to keep hitting her …’ Naresh was smoothing the crease in his trousers, working at the material, concentrating. ‘Only Meriss knows where the Berlin portrait is. Jacob Levens was lying – it was never in the Huber Gallery. We’ve all searched that place and there’s no trace of the painting. The bastard was lying—’

  ‘What about the disks?’

  Naresh looked at Gil blankly. ‘What disks?’

  ‘The disks that Luca Meriss made. The proof.’

  ‘I don’t know about any disks.’

  Gil changed tack. ‘Why did you scalp the dealers?’

  ‘Why d’you think? I was literally collecting their scalps, putting them on my belt. My own private collection of trophies.’

  ‘Why swap them around?’

  ‘A joke, nothing more.’ He shrugged. ‘I wanted to make it look like the killer was a madman.’

  ‘He was,’ Gil said curtly. ‘How did you plant the drug in Luca’s holdall?’

  ‘Same way I arranged for his father to be threatened, and for a note to be delivered to Bernard Lowe. I paid someone.’

  ‘But you did the torture yourself?’

  ‘I wanted to do that,’ Naresh replied, chillingly.

  ‘Only because they were paralysed and couldn’t fight back. You’re a fucking coward. You only had the guts to kill when your victims were already half dead.’

  ‘I’m a historian, not a thug,’ Naresh replied, piqued. ‘But I have to say that I thought the rabbit skin glue was an inspiration, a gesture that the dealers would have appreciated – at any other time. One of those little in-jokes they loved so much.’ His bitterness rose. ‘Pompous bastards. Arrogant, pretentious bastards—’

  ‘What did it mean?’

  ‘The German word is Karnickel.’ Naresh smiled, pleased with himself. ‘It means rabbit. And it also means scapegoat.’ He glanced up at Gil. ‘I thought someone would work that out. Someone who speaks several languages, like Harvey Crammer or Jacob Levens. All of the dealers were scapegoats in the end. My scapegoats.’

  ‘Why eight wounds? It was always eight. Why?’

  Naresh shrugged. ‘I was born on the 8th of October. It seemed a lucky number.’ He paused, looking steadily at Gil. ‘You’re a day early.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You said you’d solve the case by Monday. Today’s Sunday.’ He took in a deep breath. ‘How do you intend to get me out of here?’

  ‘I’m going to walk you out, Naresh. You won’t take me on, because you know you’d lose. And you want to live. You really want to live.’ Gil shook his head. ‘You’re already plotting, aren’t you? Working out your defence? I reckon insanity would be your best chance.’

  ‘A mental fugue?’

  ‘That might work for one killing, not six.’

  Smiling, Naresh rested his head back against the wall, breathing slowly. Blood was sliding down his cheek and neck, his collar darkening as he gestured to the cylinder.

  ‘Let me see it.’

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘Why shouldn’t you?’ Naresh countered. ‘I’m finished. Let me see what I did it all for.’

  Gil lifted the cylinder, then took off the seal at the end, carefully sliding out a battered, discoloured canvas. He could sense Naresh Joshi holding his breath as he carefully unrolled the painting and held it up for the historian to see.

  His hands went out towards it, his fingers scrabbling at the air, but before he could touch it the canvas began to crumble, paint flaking off, a long tear travelling from the top right-hand corner and spreading across the body of the work. In seconds The Nativity with St Lawrence and St Francis was destroyed, the faces of Mary and the saints crumbling, the masterpiece returning to dust under the dry, blind gaze of the long-dead monks.

  Ninety-Four

  Harvey Crammer was in the middle of packing when Gil knocked on his hotel door. Smiling, he let him in, moving back to his suitcase. On the bedside table was a selection of books, one opened, his reading glasses resting on top of an illustration of Caravaggio’s Penitent Magdalene.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Oh, you didn’t really need me,’ Harvey replied, smiling his frog’s smile. ‘After I called them you handed Naresh Joshi to the police on a plate. Luca was scared but he’s OK now. Wanted me to thank you. I imagine he’ll do that in person anyway.’

  ‘And then I’ll have to tell him about the painting.’

  Crammer shrugged. ‘Well, it’s a tragedy, but in the end it’s a picture, not a life.’

  ‘A picture that cost six lives.’

  ‘But no more,’ Crammer said crisply. ‘What a waste of effort for nothing. I don’t suppose it could be restored?’

  ‘Not unless you know a magician, no.’

  ‘Dust to dust, like everything else.’ Crammer looked away for a moment, occupied by his own thoughts. Finally he turned back to Gil. ‘Did you know it was Naresh all along?’

  ‘No. He gave himself away, slipped up. To be honest, I suspected everyone at some time.’

  ‘Even me, I recall.’

  Gil smiled wryly. ‘I knew it had to be someone with no family, someone who travelled a lot. Someone no one really got close to, because they wouldn’t have been able to hide what they’d done. I didn’t know you had a daughter then.’

  Crammer folded a jacket into his suitcase and then sat on the side of the bed. ‘Go on, ask me.’

  ‘Did you know you were Greta’s father?’

  ‘Of course I did. That’s why I was always so close to Alma. We kept our affair a secret. She fell out of love with Terrill and these things happen.’ He was resigned. ‘Alma wanted a secure home, a family. I could never give her that. I’m a wanderer – I couldn’t settle. Her getting pregnant was an accident, but a blessing too. She had the child she longed for, and she knew I was always there for her.’ He paused, taking a moment to continue. ‘Only I wasn’t always there for her. Not at the end.’

  ‘Is that why you joined Der Kreis der Acht – to keep an eye on her?’

  ‘I knew Alma wasn’t keen on the idea of the collaboration. She mistrusted the dealers and she knew Terrill could be greedy. But she was forced into it by her brother and now I know why.’ His tone was bitter. ‘Alma never told me that Jacob was blackmailing her about Greta. So in answer to your question – yes, I joined the group to keep close to Alma and to keep an eye on the others.’

  ‘But that’s not really true, is it? You had other reasons to stay close,’ Gil said, catching the surprise in Crammer’s face. ‘You were the first one to know about the Caravaggio portrait. It was a story that had been passed down in your family for generations. You say it was a joke, but it never was, was it?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Where is it?’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘The portrait of Fillide Melandroni. You’re a dealer, and a collector – I know how your mind works. The only way you could be so relaxed about the ruined Nativity is because you have the other Caravaggio,’ Gil continued as Crammer watched him silently. ‘I know it left your family’s hands and came to Jacob Levens. And I know that he had to hide it because he was being threatened with exposure. He gave it to Terrill in Berlin and he hid it in the Huber gallery.’ Gil caught a fleeting expression in Crammer�
�s eyes and backtracked. ‘It wasn’t Terrill who hid it! That’s why he couldn’t tell Naresh Joshi where it was. Because he didn’t know.’

  Crammer’s expression was lethal. ‘Do go on.’

  ‘Alma hid it. Of course – that’s why she was so scared! She was worried for Terrill and her daughter and she knew the bloody painting would open up a can of worms. Which it did when my late wife found out about Luca Meriss and tried to play the dealers off against each other.’ He paused, watching Crammer and remembering something he had been told by Greta. Something he had forgotten until that moment. ‘Did you organise the installation of the safe at the Huber Gallery?’

  ‘Yes, I did. I helped Alma with many things. Terrill wasn’t a practical man,’ Crammer said smoothly. ‘So what?’

  ‘That safe’s a hell of a size.’

  ‘It had to be, so it could hold paintings if necessary, as well as documents.’

  Gil shook his head.

  ‘Of course there’s nothing in it now. And there was nothing hidden under it either. I know that – it was checked out by the police. And there was nothing hidden behind it.’ He was thinking, remembering. ‘But someone had been looking. I saw the dust on the top had been smudged. Was it Meriss? Or was it Oscar Schultz?’

  Crammer shrugged. ‘How would I know?’

  ‘Oh, but you do,’ Gil replied, walking round the room, Crammer’s gaze following him. ‘You called in the police this morning. You helped me. And you saved Luca Meriss. Why? You’ve always been looking out for him, haven’t you? You were in New York when Luca fell out with Catrina Hoyt.’

  ‘It’s true. I’ve tried to help him as far as he’d let me,’ Crammer admitted. ‘I didn’t want anything to happen to him.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because of Alma!’ His heavy features tightened. ‘I’d failed her. I didn’t want another death on my conscience if I could do something to prevent it. Meriss was an innocent, a fool that had got in over his head. You only had to look at him to know he was vulnerable.’

  ‘Like Alma?’

  He nodded curtly. ‘Yes, like her. Luca wasn’t kidnapped from the hospital where he was hiding out. I arranged to have him moved, for his own safety. I never expected him to jump out of the back of the bloody ambulance.’