I pulled out my cell and began to tap in Charles’s number.
Someone thumped me on the shoulder.
“Can’t you read, buddy?” a young guy was saying to me. I recognized him, one of the eager beavers who’d elbowed past me at the door. The young guy was pointing his index finger at the sign on the wall warning patrons not to use electronic devices in the museum.
I folded my cell, galloped down four flights and out the front door. I started all over again with the call to Charles.
“Red alert, Charles,” I said when he came on the line. “I’m at the museum, me and the copies of Company of Fools. Not an original left.”
“By jove,” Charles said. “I’ll be there in two shakes of a pig’s leg.”
“Does that mean in a hurry?”
“Faster than Speedy Gonzales, old bean.”
“Ah, that resonates.”
When Charles arrived ten minutes later, we met at the Company of Fools cabinet.
“I have a plan,” I said.
“One’s needed, my lad,” Charles said, examining the fake Company. “These are copies, without a suspicion of a doubt.”
“Can you easily reach your director?”
“Against just such an eventuality as this,” Charles said, “I informed myself of Melissa’s whereabouts last night. She’s at her cottage, old sport.”
“That better not be in Algonquin Park.”
Charles shook his head. “Relatively nearby. On Lake Simcoe. She can be down here in an hour of easy driving on a Sunday midday like this.”
“Your assignment is to get her moving,” I said. “Mine’s the tricky part. I’m going to infiltrate the Janetta residence. From there—get this, Charles—I’m going to digitally shoot live footage of Company of Fools in situ, and beam it back to you and Melissa. That gives you Levin people ongoing evidence of the heist when it reaches its penultimate stage. How’s that strike you for a brainstorm?”
“Brilliant, old boy.”
“There remains one complication,” I said. “I’m hopeless, digitally speaking.”
“No fear,” Charles said. “In my retirement, I’ve made myself a veritable Steve Jobs, may he rest in peace.”
“Do I take it you’ve been more successful with iPhones than with ceramics?”
“By several leagues,” Charles said. “I’ll provide the equipment and a crash course. Amazing how basic it is, my lad.”
Charles had left his car parked on College Street. He whizzed us back to Major where he went to his house to round up the digital stuff and phone Melissa Novak, and I went to my house to ring Isabel MacDougall.
I caught Isabel at her bungalow in North York.
“I’m just deciding what I ought to wear for supervising Elizabeth’s party,” she said on the phone.
“My very reason for calling,” I said. “I need to get into the party, and I know how we’ll manage the sneaky part of the job.”
“One thing at a time, Crang. Why the party and why you?”
“As far as you’re concerned,” I said, “a key result of my infiltration will be the saving of Elizabeth from herself. To a degree anyway. Don’t want to exaggerate the results I’m expecting.”
For a moment, no response came down the line from Isabel’s end.
“You’ve not got anything violent in mind?” she said at last. “Nothing destructive?”
“Shooting film is as rowdy as I intend to get.”
“I’m the person who approached you,” she said, speaking slowly and thoughtfully. “Not the other way around.”
“All true.”
“So it seems only right I should help you,” Isabel said. “And I will. Okay, now tell me the sneaky part.”
“I’m going to pretend I’m part of your catering team.”
Isabel laughed. “You’re old enough to be these kids’ father,” she said. Then she paused. “But you might just pass scrutiny for an hour or so. Your face is wrinkle free. Got all your hair. No gut that I noticed.”
“None’s there to notice.”
“You need an outfit. Black trousers. Practically black everything, shoes, socks, bow tie. White shirt, long sleeves and no French cuffs. No cufflinks, I’m saying. No jewellery of any intrusive kind.”
“Check, check, double check. I have all those in my wardrobe.”
“Then you better get a move on. Be at the Janetta house by two o’clock. Soon as you arrive, I’ll tuck you away in my room. No sense letting you do prep in the kitchen with the others. That’d blow your disguise practically before you got into character.”
After Isabel and I finished on the phone, I assembled the afternoon’s outfit and put it on. Not bad, I thought. Studying myself in the mirror, I felt a zing of youth.
The doorbell rang. I went down and let Charles in. He said Melissa would be hitting the road for the city any minute now, and he had brought with him an iPhone and an arrangement of tiny earphones and a little mic attachment.
“Hook these up just so, Crang old fellow,” Charles said, fitting a jack into the iPhone. “Simple as pie. When you’re filming, you aim the iPhone as I’m showing you. But first you plug the earphone-mic arrangement into the iPhone. See what I’m doing here? This is the right way to do it. You’re getting the hang of things, old bean?”
“Getting it, yeah,” I said, though I had misgivings.
“The film is going to appear on my computer,” Charles said. “Simultaneously, you’ll communicate with Melissa and me by way of the mic setup. We’ll be watching my computer screen at her office or whatever secure location she designates. Beauty of a setup, isn’t it just?”
“It is,” I said, trying to keep my doubts at bay. “Concealing the equipment on my person might give me some grief.”
I put the iPhone in one pants pocket and the microphone arrangement in the other.
“Rather breaks the line of your costume, old chap,” Charles said.
“Can’t be helped,” I said, giving my pants a small hitch. “Now I gotta go. Tune in to catch my show on your computer at four-thirty, round about then. After that, it’s up to Melissa to call the shots.”
“Good, good, old lad.”
“By the way,” I said, “I don’t recommend summoning the cops.”
“That’s Melissa’s view. If word of this rot about our losing Company of Fools leaked out, it would make the Levin a laughingstock.”
“Gotta go,” I repeated.
I climbed into the Mercedes and drove north to the Bridle Path. It was a gorgeous Toronto summer day. Shame to be spending it indoors. But I was operating in a worthy cause. Worthy? Really? Yeah, I thought so, though Annie might not agree with that part of the definition. Not all of it anyway.
36
Since I didn’t want to leave my car so close to the Janetta spread that Rocky or somebody else sinister could spot it in the neighbourhood, I parked a long block from the house and walked the rest of the way. Isabel was standing on the porch. When she spotted me, she made hurry-up motions in my direction. I did as I was told.
“The catering kids got here long ago,” Isabel said. “The Janettas are still in their bedroom, and the mister’s heavies are sitting on the back patio swapping tales of murder or whatever those dreadful people do.”
“Heavies at a party?”
“You don’t think Lou opens his door to strangers without his personal muscle standing by, do you?”
“Including crazy Rocky?”
“Inevitably.”
Isabel pulled me into the house and pushed a medium-sized platter into my hands. The platter held a dozen crackers with gravlax on them, topped by a dab of white sauce of some kind and a tiny piece of dill.
“Carry this at all times,” Isabel said. “If a waiter’s holding a platter, guests look mostly at the platter, not the waiter. See what I’m getting at? The platter’ll help with your disguise.”
“I can manage that.”
“One more thing, Crang,” Isabel said. “Why’re your pants bul
ging? Most unbecoming, my friend.”
“That’s essential equipment in my pockets.”
Isabel shook her head. I couldn’t tell whether she was amused or alarmed.
“Follow me,” she said. “Closely.”
We marched in smart order along the wide main hall and into the kitchen. One pert blonde in a similar outfit to mine gave me a smile and a raised eyebrow. I smiled back and stayed on the move in Isabel’s wake.
We went up a flight of back stairs, halted at the top while Isabel looked each way along the corridor, signalled me to proceed, and we concluded the hike with a sharp turn into the first bedroom on the left. It was Isabel’s quarters for sleepovers with the Janettas. The room looked characterless, more like a very expensive hotel room than anything personal.
“You’ll stay here until I come for you,” Isabel said.
“And do what while I wait?”
“Anything you like. Read Vanity Fair. The new issue’s on the bed.”
“Geez, Isabel, I could’ve stayed home and done that.”
“Don’t be smart with me, Crang,” Isabel said, a bit of acid in her voice. “I’m far out on a limb on this little enterprise, you must realize.”
I raised my hand in a forgive-me gesture. “Just tell me this, Isabel, where’s the Company of Fools right this minute?”
“That’s the ceramic thingamabob?”
“Worth a few million.”
“Aptly named it is,” Isabel said, “given its presence in this house.”
“People a little hairy around here?”
“Rocky’s just one mean look from the looney bin. Elizabeth’s bouncing off walls she’s so excited. And the mister’s eating nails in frustration.”
“Okay, I’ve got the principal characters down pat. Now where’s Company of Fools?”
“Set up grandly on a table in the library. Under lock and key.”
“Tell me about the library.”
“Practically the size of a tennis court,” Isabel said. “Room for the guests and acres of space left over.”
“So what’s the delay in me getting in there?”
“The lock and key I mentioned?” Isabel said. “Elizabeth’s holding on tight to the only two keys. She’s not of a mood to give them up, not even to me. Perhaps I should say especially to me. But I’m working on it.”
I put my hands on Isabel’s shoulders and gave her my most soulful look. “We’ve just got one shot at this, kid.”
Isabel patted one of my hands. “Isn’t that a bit melodramatic?’” she said.
“Sorry,” I said, shaking my head a little. “I’ve been known to get that way.”
Isabel and I hugged, and she left. I read some Vanity Fair, an article about the richest woman in Dubai. The description of her jewellery and gowns and furs made me feel itchy. Vaguely, in the background, I heard the sounds of people arriving, doors slamming, laughter in two languages. The Chinese had assembled, and so, I guessed, had Lou’s pals. I felt cool with what lay ahead, but the next piece in Vanity Fair wasn’t any improvement over the first. This one was about Wall Street guys who’d emerged from the recession with more billions than they had when the market crashed. The damn magazine was making me edgy.
The bedroom door opened. Isabel stepped in, giving me a close once-over.
“Getting anxious, are we?” she said.
“Not on account of what you probably think brought on my case of the fidgets.”
Isabel had a big smile on her face. She dangled a key in front of me.
“That’s to the library?” I said.
“Worked some magic to get it.”
“Which kind?”
“The old reliable falsehood. I told Elizabeth I’d been disapproving for months, not knowing what she was doing in such secrecy. But now that I’d actually seen the ceramics, I felt nothing except admiration for her accomplishment. I practically gagged on the words, but they got me the key.”
“So we’re set to roll for the library?”
“Time is more precious than ever, laddie. The Chinese want to be in and out of here ahead of previous scheduling.”
Isabel moved into the corridor. I did too. She looked back at me.
“Where’s your platter?” she said.
I ducked back into the bedroom for the platter, and we set off.
Halfway down the stairs, we met a guy coming up, a tough-looking customer in a black suit and white shirt. He had thug written all over his kisser.
“What’re you doin’ upstairs?” he asked me.
“Care for a gravlax, sir?” I said, holding the platter out to the guy. “Quite delicious.”
“Looks like smoked salmon to me,” he said, staring at the platter.
“A Nordic variation,” I said. “You might enjoy it, sir.”
“I don’t eat nothing foreign,” he said.
This guy and Maury Samuels would get on like gangbusters.
“He’s with me, Spike,” Isabel said to the heavy.
Spike grunted. I couldn’t help noticing the guy seemed to be wearing a worried expression.
“The boss up here, Isabel?” he said. “I needa see him.”
“Could be in the bedroom,” Isabel said. “I’ve been too busy to keep track of him. He could just as likely be on the patio.”
Spike grunted again, and Isabel and I resumed our trek to the library.
“Who assigns the names around here?” I asked. “First Rocky, now Spike. Sounds like a 1940s movie. Warner Brothers.”
“In Spike’s case, consider the alternative,” Isabel said. “His real name is Percy Colombo.”
“Not a good name for the hoodlum image,” I said. “Percy.”
Isabel and I reached the library without further socializing. She unlocked the door, and we stepped into the biggest damn library I’d ever seen outside of the British Museum. Except there wasn’t a single book in sight. The room was more for the display of visual stuff. Porcelain doodads and knick-knacks of all sorts. All the room’s curtains, which were black, had been closed. The lamps and other lights were switched on. Company of Fools, arrayed on a black tablecloth that draped to the floor, dominated the room. The table it sat on was situated at what would be centre stage, maybe a little to the right. Farther back, closer to the near wall and facing in the direction of the display, were two tables holding rows of champagne glasses. Behind the tables stood silver buckets of ice, a bottle of Dom Perignon in each.
“I’ll lock you in, Crang,” Isabel said. “About a half hour from now, everybody’s going to shift from the patio to here for the formal festivities. I’ll be back five minutes before that.”
Isabel left.
I got the communication equipment out of my pants pockets. The mic fixed easily into the iPhone, and I was set to start filming in jig time.
Somebody in the hall outside stuck a key in the library door. It was way too soon for Isabel’s return. Had to be Elizabeth out there, the only other person with a key. I made a swift cataloguing of the room. There was a door in the right wall. Maybe a bathroom behind the door. But it was too far away for me to reach in time. I got down on my hands and knees and scrambled under the black tablecloth on the table holding Company of Fools. I could hear the library door opening and closing.
Two voices began to speak above me. I detected pretty quickly that the voices belonged to Elizabeth and Lou.
“I want you to see Company, just you and me alone together,” Elizabeth said. Her voice sounded more breathless than it did the one time I’d talked to her.
“I appreciate it, sweetheart,” Lou said. He sounded calm and measured, his usual restrained but dangerous self. “These pieces of pottery are what you been messing around with all this time? Me wondering what the hell was up?”
“Company of Fools, they’re called, and they’re priceless, Lou. I’ve made the deal of a lifetime, honestly. You’re gonna be so proud of me.”
“I already am proud of you, baby.”
This was embarrassing,
me eavesdropping on a private husband-and-wife conversation. But it couldn’t be helped. My situation on the floor was painful in the physical sense as well as the psychological. In the haste to duck under the table, I’d landed on my left side with the leg at an angle a leg wasn’t supposed to be capable of. It was developing a cramp, not a gradual process but a swift seizing up.
“You’re selling these ceramic pieces to the Chinese guy out there on the patio?” Lou was saying.
“Elvis’s a billionaire, Lou.” Elizabeth was very excited. Bouncing off walls indeed.
“What’s he paying, you don’t mind me asking?”
“Fourteen million, Lou.”
Lou made whistling sounds. “Kee-rist, I’m impressed. I mean really impressed, sweetheart. What’re your expenses?”
“About four million.”
“You’re clearing ten million? I never had a one-off deal like that in my life.”
“Plus, I come out of it with a house in the Kingsway I can sell for a couple million.”
The pain was morphing up my left leg, calf to thigh. I didn’t know how much more of this I could stand.
“Let me ask about the possible downsides,” Lou was saying, not sounding critical, just curious, talking like one businessperson to another. “That idiot Rocky let it drop you got a dead girl in all this.”
“Oh, Louis,” Elizabeth said. She sounded a little false to my ears, but who could tell? “Grace’s death is shocking,” Elizabeth said, “but I’m sure the police’ll find it was random. A drug addict went off his head or something unforeseeable like that.”
“Yeah, it happens,” Lou said. “What about the Nosy Parker lawyer?”
“What Nosy Parker lawyer?”
“Guy by the name of Crang.”
This was too much. They were talking about me, and I was listening? I read a scene like that in a novel once. A Brian Moore book, I think it was. The character in the book was an Irish schoolteacher, he was in a cubicle in the teachers’ can, and he overheard two other teachers at the wash basins slamming him. The two other guys didn’t know the main character was even in the room. The whole deal didn’t turn out well for the cubicle guy.
“Rocky says he’s got Crang under control,” Elizabeth said.
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