by T. M. Parris
“It’s very easy,” said Rose. “All you have to do is remember this. Noah Tapoko is one of us. Anything that happens to him, it’ll be like you did it to us. And we will turn it right back on you. Only ten times harder. And we will know. If you speak to him, we’ll know. If you go anywhere near him or his home, his college, his club, his family, we’ll know. If you lay a finger on him, we’ll know. And you’ll make sure everyone else keeps away from him as well, because we won’t buy it if you say it wasn’t you. If Noah Tapoko does so much as trip in the street or knock his head on a lamp post, we will come to you.”
“That’s not fair! I don’t control everyone.”
“Don’t you? Certainly looks like you do to us. Fair or not, Noah’s wellbeing has become very important to you, M. Epée. And as long as Noah’s okay, you and I are okay. If he carries on with his life, you can carry on with yours, and your greedy little side scams will remain our secret.”
She backed off two or three steps. “Don’t think we’re going anywhere, Epée. We’ll be right here, watching you.”
She looked at Yvonne, who released him. Epée lurched forward. Rose stood, arms folded, as Ollie stepped in. He dodged Epée’s ill-aimed fist and landed a knee and a punch where it would most hurt. Epée fell to his knees and Ollie kicked him in the ribs to make sure he stayed down. Rose stared at Epée as he gasped for breath.
“I hope you’ve learned something today, Epée. Because if you haven’t, your life here is over. Simple as that. You won’t get a second chance.”
She walked away, out of the far end of the alley, and the others followed. Epée stayed curled up on the ground, quietly groaning.
Chapter 18
Henri was waiting when the two of them pulled up together in a taxi. Gustave was pale, and had said few words on the journey. He was dressed flamboyantly, a purple waistcoat visible under what looked like a dinner jacket. Steel-rimmed glasses and a waxed moustache finished off the look. Pippin didn’t know many art dealers who dressed like that, but no matter. Pippin himself was in a standard suit and tie. Nothing eye-catching. It was how he liked it.
Playing the part, Henri came forward with a polite smile. Pippin shook hands, introducing himself. Gustave was wooden, leaving the other two to exchange pleasantries as if nothing were strange or different. Just a regular visit to the Freeport, that was all.
Inside, Henri leaned on the reception desk and pushed the visitor book over to them.
“If you wouldn’t mind, gentlemen. I can vouch for you both, of course, but just for the records.”
Henri stepped back to make room. Gustave produced an expansive signature, a pre-agreed name. Pippin stepped forward and wrote neatly. The guards sitting behind the desk watched.
“You’re Customs?” asked one of them.
Pippin nodded.
“I’ll need to see your ID.”
Henri was over by the lift.
“Hey, guys? Is this working properly?” He was pointing at the biometric security unit. “Never seen it do that before.”
“Do what?” One of the guards got up and went over.
Pippin reached inside his jacket pocket. He pulled out a wallet, and at the same time a folded handkerchief wrapped in film.
“Just one moment, please,” he said to the other guard, while at the same time pulling the handkerchief away from the film. He didn’t break eye contact as his hand reached out lightning-fast and grabbed the guard’s neck, pushing his face forward into the handkerchief.
“Hey!”
The other guard turned back to the desk, but Henri and Gustave were on either side of him holding him back by the arms. Pippin felt the body under his grip slacken. One second of struggling: two seconds and he was already starting to slump.
“You can’t do that! Let me go!”
The other guard was close to breaking free. He had a gun in his holster. But Pippin was there already and clamped the cloth over his mouth. The guard fought for a few agonizing seconds then went limp. They dragged him behind the desk and laid them both out of sight, on the ground underneath the row of CCTV monitors.
“Very smoothly done,” muttered Henri. He stepped over and bolted shut the reception doors.
Pippin shrugged. “Two more, you think?”
“A warehouse operator.” Henri pointed at one of the monitors. “There should be another guard somewhere. I can’t see him.”
“Well, come on then!” Gustave was finding his voice again. “Let’s get on with it. We’ll be in trouble if someone else shows up.”
Henri activated the lift with his thumb and retina, and they got in. Pippin caught sight of himself in the mirrored wall of the elevator and rubbed his thumb through his ginger beard. Pippin wasn’t looking like Pippin today.
Henri sniggered. “Fine job with the hair dye there. Nice and subtle. You’ve put on weight as well!”
Pippin was pleased with his padding but looked at Henri anxiously.
“Don’t worry, no microphones in this place. Only cameras.”
There was a camera in the lift, they all knew, and had managed to avoid looking into it. Henri turned to Gustave.
“You think you’re unrecognisable like that, Gustave? You look like you’re appearing on stage. Should have asked your friend here for some help.”
Gustave looked disdainful.
“Unless you’re planning to come to Mexico, like me?” said Henri. “No point me hiding my face, they’ll know I’m involved. That’s why I need that passport.”
“Well you’ve got the passport, and the money,” said Gustave casually. “So if there’s any trouble, you’re the one who won’t be getting out of here.”
Arguing wasn’t going to help matters. Pippin tried to wrap it up. “The van’s already here,” he said. “I saw it on the monitor.”
The lift opened and they walked the length of an underground corridor, Henri leading the way. It was brightly lit and smelled of paint. At the far end another set of Henri’s biometrics let them into a spacious warehouse, aisles separated by wide shelving stacked with packages. Footsteps approached on the polished concrete floor, a man in a sweatshirt with a radio on his belt.
“Good afternoon.” Henri stepped forward with his authorisation note. “Item to be moved out. The van’s here already, I think.”
“Let’s see.” They went over to the far end and the others followed. The guy hit a release button and the shutter started to lift. The van was there, backed up and ready for loading. Clem was standing next to the driver’s door looking suitably vacant.
“Can I see that?” asked the warehouse guy.
Henri handed over the chit and the guy went off into the aisles with it, looking for the reference number. But he never found it, because Clem ducked in under the rising shutter and followed behind him, bringing him to the ground with a couple of hard punches. They all gathered round and stared at his prone body. It didn’t move.
“Just as neat as your cloth up the nose,” said Henri to Pippin. There it was again, that conspiratorial look.
Pippin shrugged. “Same result.”
Gustave was getting impatient again. “Well, let’s move, then! Henri, you and Clem find the other guard, Pippin and I will load up the van.”
“No, I think it’s best if Pippin comes with me,” said Henri.
Everyone stopped.
“That’s not how we planned it,” said Gustave.
“I know, but Pippin looks the part. If the guard catches sight of Clem, he might get suspicious and raise the alarm before we can take him out.”
“You’re saying I look like a criminal?” Clem stood up straight, his muscular form towering.
“Well, no offence, but…” Henri didn’t need to finish. “Besides, Pippin’s trick with the cloth was pretty good. No need for fisticuffs, eh? And you and Gustave can get more loaded between the two of you.”
Gustave was hesitating.
Clem didn’t mind. “What do we take?” he asked.
Henri thrust a piece of paper at him. “T
hose are the highest valued ten items in the main warehouse that I know of. The serial numbers. After that – whatever you like! Let’s move, shall we, before this guard finds us.”
Pippin could feel Gustave’s eyes on them as they walked off. Henri led him down another corridor identical to the first. He stopped by a door, glancing over Pippin’s shoulder to check they were alone.
“You’ll want to see this,” he said.
The door had a code of its own as well as the biometrics. Henri punched it in.
“Aren’t we going after the other guard?” asked Pippin.
“There is no other guard. During the day there’s two on the front desk and the warehouse guy. That’s all. They rely on the technology to do the rest.”
“Two guards and a warehouse guy?”
“These places are all hype. I told you. Come on!”
He pulled Pippin inside. The room was small, a storage vault. A stack of shelves was empty except for one item, a picture in a frame wrapped in padding and brown paper. Henri picked it up carefully by its edges.
“Want to guess what this is?”
Pippin shrugged.
“Well, let’s take a look.” Henri started to unwrap the paper.
“What are you doing?” said Pippin. “We don’t have time for this. We have to get back.”
“Just enough to check.” Henri was fumbling like a child unwrapping a birthday present. “A little corner, that’s all. Ah! Here!”
He tore along the top of the packaging enough to pull the top of the frame out by a couple of inches. It was an oil, yellows and browns. The brushwork. The brushwork! Pippin would know it anywhere. His heart started to pound.
“Come here! Take a look.” Henri was beckoning him closer. Pippin peered inside the packaging. There was enough light to see that it was a portrait. A portrait of a man with a thin face, a moustache, and a cravat. Even in semi-darkness, he recognised it.
“Holy shit.”
“Exactly. And I’ll tell you what, Gustave isn’t getting his self-righteous hands on this little beauty. You and me, Pippin. We keep this to ourselves. I know you appreciate these things. Clem’s just a street fighter. You and I together, we form a plan for this particular piece.”
Pippin couldn’t stop staring at it. Henri carried on burbling again.
“You think I’d pull a stunt like this, put everything on the line, for a hundred thousand Euros? Make a fugitive of myself? Five hundred million dollars you’re looking at there, Pippin. Half a billion! Even if we only got a tenth of that, we’d have twenty-five million each. Imagine!”
Pippin felt hot and cold at the same time.
“But what do we do with it?”
“Load it into the van with everything else! You’re driving straight to Paris, right? Once you drop me off. As soon as you stop, get it out of there somehow.”
“How?”
“I don’t know! You’ll think of something. You’re smart. I’ve been watching you. There’s more to you than you’re showing. I think you’ll know what to do with this. I want half, though. I’m not greedy, you can keep the rest, but I want my share.”
Pippin closed his eyes and opened them again.
“How do you know I won’t just keep it all?”
“I think I know enough about you to make your life uncomfortable. You’re not like Gustave. You’re not making a statement. You don’t want to be in hiding after this, but I could make that happen. We could both ruin it for each other, couldn’t we? But why do that? Just get me my share. Okay? Come on!”
He didn’t wait for an answer. “Bring it!” He was opening the door.
“How will we get it past the others?”
“I’ll distract them, you load it on. Come on!”
Pippin picked it up, barely breathing.
“We should take something else as well,” he said. “Then we can say that we picked these two up on the way, from another storage room. If we only have one painting, they’ll get curious.”
Henri thought, and nodded. “This way.”
In the corridor they carried on down to another door which he opened with biometrics, but no code. This was a small viewing room with a Japanese print on the wall. Henri took it down without ceremony.
“Out for a client viewing,” he said.
“It’s not wrapped.”
“Doesn’t matter. It’s not worth a lot. Put it on top. Let’s go!”
In the warehouse, Gustave and Clem were carrying some enormous frame. Henri went over to them spouting some story about overpowering the other guard. Pippin slipped the two extra items in. No one was anywhere near the van. The space was filling up, mainly with large frames – Gustave’s choices, no doubt. Pippin stood by the shutters while the others approached, one on each end of the frame while Henri talked at them. And it was at that moment that the alarm went off.
They stared at each other. The ringing was loud, almost unbearable. Clem moved first, dropping the frame unceremoniously.
“Let’s go. Go!” he shouted, running for the driver’s door. “Get in the back! All of you!”
Gustave didn’t shift. “What did you do? You two! What did you do?”
“Nothing! I don’t know what this is!” Henri threw up his hands. “One of the guards must have come round in reception.”
Clem started the engine. Henri stepped towards Gustave.
“Get in, for God’s sake!” he shouted.
Gustave stood like a rock. “No. No. You’re not coming with us. You did this, I know it.”
“Gustave, come on, you can’t leave me here, you know that! Stop messing around and let’s just go.”
It was too fast to see. Gustave, somehow, was pointing a gun at Henri’s head.
“You’re right!” he shouted above the noise. “We can’t leave you here. But you’re not coming with us, either.”
He pulled the trigger. The sound was barely audible over the alarm. Henri fell to the ground, his head a mess of blood and bone. Gustave turned to Pippin and fired. Pippin ducked and turned. The bullet passed him. He darted out towards the van. Gustave was walking towards him. He fired again. Pippin got round the front of the van and threw himself to the ground. Under the van he could see Gustave’s feet coming towards him. He needed to make a run for it, back into the warehouse. He rose to a crouch. The feet came closer. But then they stopped.
“Drop the gun, Gustave!” Clem’s voice boomed out over the alarm. “Drop it or I’ll shoot you in the head.”
Pippin circled the van and peered round the back. Clem was aiming his gun straight at Gustave. A siren started going off in the street, not far away.
“Now!” Clem shouted. Gustave dropped the gun.
“Kick it over here. Do it, now!”
Gustave did. Clem picked it up.
“Get in the back. Both of you. Now. Or I go without you.”
He stepped forward and got into the driver’s seat. Pippin scrambled into the back. The engine revved. The sirens got louder. Gustave climbed in. The van lurched forward before the doors were fully shut. They swung open and everything slid backwards. One of the packages bounced off and hit the ramp as the van sped up through the gates. Pippin and Gustave clung on and reached out for the doors. Pippin could only just touch the door with the tips of his fingers. He strained further. It took several seconds to get a good enough grip to pull it towards him and slam it shut. Gustave pulled the other door shut just as they reached the main street and Clem accelerated. The force threw them both back against the doors. Pippin’s face hit the metal catch, hard.
The van screeched round corners, tossing them from side to side. The sirens faded. Pippin’s cheek throbbed. Wherever they were going, they were in Clem’s hands now. The package containing the portrait slid and rested against Pippin’s foot. It didn’t look any different from the others, but he couldn’t stop staring at it. He sat silent, holding on, not looking at Gustave, who had his head back and his eyes shut.
Gustave, the man who’d just tried to ki
ll him.
Chapter 19
“Well, I was right,” said Rose. “I didn’t think we’d be the only people interested in that Freeport.”
She took a swig of gin. All four of them had long pink gins in front of them, but their focus was elsewhere. They were sitting round the table at the Nice apartment, coming together for a rushed brainstorm as soon as the news broke. A dramatic Mediterranean sunset was in progress outside the window, but all heads were down looking at screens, following the coverage of the theft on laptops and tablets. The TV was showing CNN, which had picked it up as well.
“Yeah, interested,” said Ollie. “We weren’t going to rob it, though.”
“True. We just wanted to poke about. That’ll be all but impossible now. They’ll tighten up their security to ridiculous lengths.”
“They may even close the place down,” said Fairchild. “Ship everything elsewhere. Though moving stuff out of Monaco would be pretty difficult because of all the tax complications.”
“How can we find out what they’ve taken?” asked Rose. “If they have the Van Gogh, the Freeport’s no longer of interest to us anyway.”
“With a lot of difficulty,” said Fairchild. “Nobody really knows what’s in there. This is why it’s such an insurance nightmare. One firm could have millions of dollars’ worth of liability within a single building and not even know it. This, or a fire, could wipe out an entire company.”
Fairchild was looking irritatingly relaxed, in a designer shirt, branded chinos and a navy jacket that looked custom made. Understated yet expensive. Very Monaco. Rose turned to Ollie and Yvonne.
“Are they saying anything at all?” Each was monitoring media reporting of the theft, Yvonne on French media, Ollie internationally.
“A lot of speculation,” said Ollie. “Basically, no one has a clue what was in there, so they’re padding things out with lists of anything that’s changed hands recently, or anything they know is owned by someone who lives in Monaco. They’ve had Christie’s on, Sotheby’s, lots of commentators taking guesses.”
“Are they talking about the Van Gogh?”
“Oh yes.” Both of them nodded.