The Netscher Connection

by Estelle Ryan

  I took two deep breaths and exhaled slowly in relief. Then I frowned. “His allergy medication?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, shit.” Francine’s eyes widened. “You think Lila did this?”

  “I don’t know.” I really didn’t. “But it would be in line with her previous methods.”

  “Find a way to get to someone’s medical situation and kill them with it.” Manny got up. “Bloody hell! Palya said Andor swore high and low that he bought his usual safe meds, not the stuff that will make him worse.”

  “At least Andor is in hospital and being taken care of.” Olivia looked at Manny and relaxed when he nodded.

  “Palya posted two officers outside Garas’ room just to make sure no one else gets in there.” Manny smirked. “He said it was hard to find two officers who wanted to protect Garas and not throw him to the wolves.”

  “Hey, you.” Colin walked in and kneeled by my chair. “How’re you feeling?”

  “How long?”

  His smile was gentle, his voice quiet. “An hour and a half. Not too long. We were at Arany for about thirty minutes, waiting for the ambulance and seeing Andor off. Then we came straight here. You haven’t missed much.”

  I nodded, grateful that he understood my need to know how long my shutdowns lasted and what had occurred in that time.

  “Who phoned you, Frey?” Manny asked.

  Colin straightened, then took Olivia’s seat with a smile when she moved to the next chair. “Pál Elo.”

  “You spoke to him?” Olivia’s pitch rose in excitement. A few times she’d mentioned that she was concerned about the owner of the gallery she’d visited the day she arrived in Budapest. “Is he back at the gallery? What did he say?”

  Colin turned to face Olivia. “He had a look at the photos you sent him of Netscher’s A Woman Feeding a Parrot. He said that he recognised it. Not just because it is Netscher’s work, but because decades ago Rubique Art offered it to him to display in his gallery.”

  “I was right.” Olivia looked pleased and worried at the same time.

  “Yes, you were.” He leaned back in his chair to face everyone around the table. “It took some coaxing to get him to talk more. He’s scared of negative publicity, haters and everything that comes with the revelation of Nazi crimes that have been hidden for generations.”

  “There were a few cases of that,” Francine said.

  “The most talked-about and recent example is of course the discovery of almost one thousand five hundred art works in Munich,” Colin said. “The art collector Hildebrand Gurlitt stored these in his apartments. Monet, Matisse, Renoir, Chagall—so many masterpieces. It was a wonderful discovery for the art world and yet...”

  “Don’t care about that, Frey.” Manny slapped his palm on the table. “What did this Pál person say?”

  “When Rubique Art offered him that painting, he started making discreet inquiries. He discovered that Gyula Koltai—the grandfather from the old pictures—bought that Netscher painting from a János Nagy in 1940.”

  “Smack bang in the middle of the Second World War,” Vinnie said.

  “Wait.” I held up one hand while I recalled our previous findings and conversations. I looked at Olivia. “Didn’t you say that your research showed that this painting had been sold by a Jewish family?”

  “I did. But I seldom believe everything I read.” Olivia smiled when Francine held out her hand to give her a high-five. “It would’ve been easy to enter whatever they wanted into the records.”

  “János Nagy?” Manny paused and looked towards the front door. “Hold that thought.”

  Manny got up, his usual posture replaced with alertness, his hand on the weapon holstered at his hip. No sooner had he disappeared into the next room than he returned with Vinnie, Roxy and Captain Palya. Vinnie looked at me and winked before he sat down next to Roxy.

  Captain Palya’s eyes immediately went to me. His scrutiny held an uncharacteristic concern. He opened his mouth twice to say something, but hesitated. Then he grunted and sat down in the only chair still free. “I don’t know what to ask you without sounding insensitive.”

  “Why would you sound insensitive?” I didn’t understand his concern.

  He frowned when there were snorts and laughter around the table. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m well. How is Andor?”

  “That little shit is fine.” He wasn’t able to mask his relief. Then he became uncomfortable again. “Um... can you... um?”

  “She’s fine, Palya.” Manny sat down and slumped in his chair. “Can we get back to how the fifth man in the photos and friend of four of our victims’ grandfathers owned that bloody painting?”

  Colin gave Captain Palya a brief explanation of his conversation with Pál Elo. “Here’s the kicker. János Nagy was Lila’s great-grandfather.”

  “Holy bloody hell!”

  “Okay, that’s even better than my theories.” Francine sat back in her chair, her eyes wide.

  “Was he Romani?” I didn’t think it impossible, but it was most improbable for a Romani person to have had a thriving business in those days.

  “No.” Colin’s expression turned hard. “His wife was. She was apparently completely shunned from her Roma community when she married Nagy, but didn’t care. She was living a good life and was happy. I’m sure if we look, we’ll even find photos of those two at the same parties as the grandfathers.”

  “What happened to him?” Roxy asked.

  “He was rounded up by the Nazis because of his wife. Pál said that a few weeks before that Grandpa Koltai warned Nagy about this. Because they were all such good friends, the four grandpas apparently offered to take over Nagy’s leather business and sell it, then keep the proceeds from the sale as well as all of his assets for him until things with the Nazis settled down.”

  “He was betrayed by his friends.” Olivia shook her head in disgust.

  “Not exactly.” Colin raised his hand to push it through his hair, then dropped it back on his lap. “Nagy signed everything over to his friends and they did exactly what they said they would. They put all the money in some kind of trust and all his art and other possessions in storage. Pál didn’t have all the detail, but Nagy and his wife survived the concentration camps and the friends gave everything back to him as soon as they got the paperwork done. Including his two houses, his art, everything.”

  “So where’s the catch?” Francine asked.

  “Nagy died when Lila’s grandmother was eighteen years old. About twenty years after the war. Pál said that his sources told him that those men never liked János’s wife, Lila’s great-grandmother. The moment Nagy was gone, they started legal proceedings to claim everything back. Lila’s great-grandmother was Roma, didn’t have much of an education and simply stood no chance against them. It wasn’t even a lengthy legal battle. They got everything and left her with nothing.”

  “Exactly what King told us,” Manny said.

  “Yes.”

  “What happened to her?” Roxy sounded upset.

  Colin looked at her. “I don’t know how and can only imagine it wasn’t easy, but she was somehow accepted back into her old Roma community. Lila’s great-grandmother was left with nothing. That was why she married Lila’s grandmother off as soon as she could. Lila’s grandmother did exactly the same with Lila’s mom. The rest we know about Lila.”

  It was quiet around the table for a few seconds. Manny rubbed his hands over his face. “Well, this is one hell of a thing.”

  “So, I thought I would ask Pál if there were any other rumours about Rubique Art. He told me that there were many rumours about them selling Nazi-looted art. That’s why he never did any business with them. That was also why he immediately took an interest when Liv contacted him.” Colin glanced at Olivia. “He sends his apologies for not being able to meet you.”

  She smiled. “Thanks.”

  Colin paused. “There’s a cache of paintings stashed somewhere.”

  �
�What do you mean cache?” Manny frowned.

  “Pál said he’d heard that the grandpas never got rid of their entire inventory. They’d kept a lot of the artworks—mostly paintings—in some secret location. We’re talking about Griebel, Rubens, Picasso, Van Gogh and many other works by the masters.”

  “Bloody hell.”

  “Where is this secret location?” Captain Palya got up.

  “Pál didn’t know.” Colin looked at the captain. “You have to remember that these are rumours. We don’t know how much of this is truth, how much legend and how much the art industry’s love for dramatic gossip.”

  I looked at the clock on the opposite wall. “We have six hours until the gaming tournament starts. Do we know yet what changes Lila made to Drestia?”

  Francine held up one finger and grabbed her tablet. She swiped the screen a few times, then set it up on its cover to face the table. Pink answered the video call on the second ring. “My quee... oh. Hi, everyone. Huh. Another newcomer. And who might you be?”

  “That’s Andor’s captain.” Francine waved at the tablet screen and smiled when Pink winked. “Captain Palya. He’s very friendly.”

  Roxy giggled and Captain Palya glowered at the tablet screen. “Who is that?”

  “A trusted colleague,” Colin said. “Pink.”

  “Hiya. What’s up?” Pink smiled.

  “I was about to tell them about Drestia,” Francine said.

  “Oh.” Pink’s shoulders dropped. “Yeah.”

  Francine faced us. “Pink and I looked at the copy of Drestia the people at Arany gave us. They promised us that was the copy Lila tweaked for the tournament tonight. If it is, we have a huge problem.”

  “It’s one trap on top of another trap,” Pink said. “Francine and I tried, but if we touch the programming, we might just set something off that we cannot come back from.”

  “Set something off like what?” Manny asked.

  “That’s just it.” Francine’s bracelets jingled as she flipped her hair over her shoulder. “It could be a national network shutdown, it could be a virus sent to every single computer ever connected to Drestia that could wipe everything off those devices, it could be ransomware that locks every computer.”

  “It could really be anything.” Pink’s frustration was as clear as Francine’s. “We didn’t even get very far before we realised that the risk would be too great.”

  “Even for you?” Manny looked at Francine, his expression serious.

  She pouted. “As much as I hate to admit it, yes. Look, I’m going to try. Pink’s going to help me, but I really don’t think we’ll be able to safely tread through the programming before the tournament begins.”

  “Do you at least know what changes she made to the game?” I asked.

  “Traps,” Francine and Pink said at the same time. She smiled when he gestured for her to continue. She looked at me. “Remember the rope trap next to the carpet in the mediaeval room? Well, multiply that by about twenty and you’ll get a rough idea.”

  “Shit.” Colin frowned. “No one’s going to get to the last level then.”

  “They might, but I can think of only a handful of gamers who might manage that.”

  “There’s something else.” The tone in Pink’s voice sent a spike of adrenaline through my system. “It looks like she set a final trap in the tower room—the last room in the game. From what I can see, it will be triggered when someone lifts the scroll.”

  “Do we know what will happen if that scroll is lifted?” Captain Palya asked.

  “Not yet.” Francine’s jaw tightened. “But we will find out.”

  “Tell them what you found in the boosters, Francine,” Pink said.

  “Oh. Yes. Pink helped me look through all the software from the victims’ computers and devices. We found the same virus in all of them. The same virus Pink found in Nikki’s phone.” Francine inhaled deeply. “But it was what I found in the victims’ hardware that’s more interesting.”

  “A chip.” It looked like Pink couldn’t wait any longer to share the finding.

  Francine smiled. “Yes. It wasn’t in any of the other boosters from Három, only in the ones from the victims that I saw.”

  “What does that chip do?” Olivia asked.

  “It gave Lila complete access to every device connected to the wifi enhanced by the booster—phones, televisions, tablets, e-readers, security systems, computers and by extension anything connected to these devices via Bluetooth. That means any appliances, printers, anything with Bluetooth. And if those devices connected to another network after that, she would’ve been able to access those networks as well and worm her way in there too.”

  Manny glared at his smartphone lying on the table in front of him. “The good old days without all this bloody technology.”

  “Have you received the results from the autopsies?” Roxy was looking at Captain Palya. It didn’t surprise me that she was interested in the medical side of this case.

  “Yes.” The captain cleared his throat. “The medical examiner confirmed that Minister Tibor Bokros died from a heart attack. But it was brought on by some medicine that made his blood pressure go very high, very quickly.” He shook his head at Roxy. “Don’t ask me the name of these medicines. The doctor told me, but I have no memory for those stupid names.”

  Roxy laughed and nodded. “What about the other victims?”

  “Let me think. Was it Kolta... no, it was Udvaros who died two days ago. He was given some drug that overstressed his heart or something like that. There were traces of it in the tumbler Garas insisted the crime scene guys test. And Szell, who died before you people joined the investigation, well, he had high levels of...” Captain Palya said something in Hungarian that was most likely expletives. “He also died from being given a drug that would make it look like he died of natural causes.”

  “Only someone with knowledge of their medical histories would know the effect the drugs would have on them.” There was no more humour in Roxy’s expression. “What an awful person.”

  “She definitely would’ve had access,” Francine said. “Even just being able to get into someone’s email would already give someone a lot of information about that person. Nowadays, people receive their medical results via email.”

  “Email.” Colin straightened. “Andor said something about emails just before the paramedics came.”

  “What are you talking about, Frey?”

  Colin dropped his head back and faced the ceiling for a few seconds. Then he looked at me. “It was before I knew you were in a shutdown. When Andor had just fallen to the floor.”

  “The guilt on your face is misplaced. I don’t understand it.”

  He huffed a soft laugh and kissed me on the cheek. “When I got to Andor’s side, he was still conscious. I thought he was talking nonsense, but he said ‘friend’s dad,’ ‘boost,’ ‘gift,’ ‘email’. He repeated ‘email’ a few times before he passed out.”

  “Huh.” Captain Palya took his smartphone from his trouser pocket. “If Garas told you that, it means it’s important.”

  “What are you doing?” Manny glared at the captain’s fingers tapping his smartphone screen.

  “Reading Garas’ emails.”

  “Oh, my God. That’s a total invasion of privacy.”

  Captain Palya looked up and stared at Francine. “Really? You hack everything and everyone and you have an opinion about me reading the emails of my subordinate, who is also a public servant?”

  “He’s kinda right, Franny.” Vinnie’s expression was mischievous.

  Francine scratched her temple with her middle finger and raised an eyebrow at Captain Palya. “So? What is in Andor’s emails?”

  Captain Palya looked at Manny who only shrugged. “Let me see. Hmm. Yes. Wait. There’s a... Okay. The CEO of Három sent Garas an email with a list. Let me... Huh. Apparently, the CEO is very unhappy that his brand is associated with a serial killer. He’s spent the last twenty-four hours going over all c
lient accounts. He’s had his whole team search for irregularities and found that all the boosters that were in our victims’ homes were gifted to them.”

  “Gifted.” Manny scowled. “We already know that.”

  “Looks like they got it as some prize at a function or a cold call or something. None of them bought their boosters.” Captain Palya pulled the phone closer then moved it back, his expression showing surprise. “I might just have to employ this CEO. He’d make a good detective. He went a step further and looked at the postage information for all the gifted boosters. Seems like they keep track of everything. And all the boosters were sent from the same address. And it’s not any of Három’s distribution centres.”

  “That doesn’t make sense.” Francine’s corrugator supercilii muscles pulled her brows in and down. “Only a really stupid criminal would do that. She could’ve given any address.”

  “This is consistent with her behaviour throughout.” I wondered if anyone would ever have discovered her crimes if it hadn’t been for Andor. “She’s never tried to hide any of her crimes. With the exception of the actual murders, she made little effort to mask her online presence, her name, her connection to these people.”

  “Oh, my God!” Francine’s loud exclamation made me jerk back. She turned wide eyes from her laptop screen to Captain Palya. “What’s the address?”

  “It’s here in Szentendre.”

  “Berek Street?”

  He frowned. “Yes. What do you have?”

  “János Nagy owned a summer house here in Szentendre until it was registered in a trust belonging to Rubique Art.”

  “Holy hell.” Manny got up and looked at Captain Palya. “You better have an extremely good SWAT team.”

  “I do. And we call ours TEK.” Captain Palya also got up, already swiping his phone screen. “You think Lila’s at that house?”

  “My gut tells me she’s there.”

  This time I didn’t disagree with Manny’s use of that expression. All evidence led me to believe the same. I glanced at the clock again and wondered if we would have enough time to find her, detain her and get enough information to know what she was planning and possibly prevent it.