Curse of the Jade Lily (34 page)

Gillard returned his gaze to Fiegen. “I don’t know,” he said.

“What don’t you know?” Fiegen asked.

“Three-point-eight million…”

I idiot-slapped Gillard above his right ear with a lot more force than was necessary.

“Okay, okay,” Gillard said. He massaged the side of his head. “Fine. I’ll take it. Geez.”

The check was passed to him. Gillard kissed it, folded it, and stuffed it in his shirt pocket. “Drinks are on me,” he said.

He started to rise from his chair, but I pushed him back down.

“Stay,” I said. “We’re not finished yet.”

Fiegen closed the folder in front of him. “McKenzie, I believe that concludes my part of the festivities,” he said.

“So it does,” I told him. “Heavenly?”

Heavenly left her chair, picked up the aluminum case, and brought it around the table. She set it in front of Branko Pozderac. Pozderac hugged it to his chest like a Christmas gift he wanted to savor before opening. Hemsted’s eyes flicked from the case to me to Fiegen and back to the case as if he were sure there was something terribly wrong, only he couldn’t figure out what. Pozderac opened the case. The Jade Lily was inside, nestled in the gray foam bed. Even under the indifferent overhead lights it was exquisite. Everyone in the room stood to take a good look at it except for India and Gillard. Pozderac ran his fingers gently over the Lily’s flowers and stems. He spoke several words slowly in the Bosnian language. He looked from the Lily to Hemsted. Hemsted nodded. Pozderac abruptly closed the case.

“It is done,” he said.

He turned to face Fiegen. He did not offer his hand, and Fiegen did not offer his.

“It is done,” the Bosnian repeated.

“Yes,” Fiegen said.

“We go.”

Pozderac picked up the case, and he and Hemsted left the room.

“There goes one happy mass murderer,” Heavenly said.

“I don’t understand,” Perrin said. “Mr. Fiegen, what did you just do?”

“I did what was best for the museum,” he said.

“Actually, he did what was best for Minnesota Disposal and Recycling,” I said. “The museum will come out much further ahead than he will, though.”

“You know nothing of big business,” Fiegen said.

“Very true. I wouldn’t be counting those euros just yet, though. See, I do know a little something about human nature, and there’s no telling what Branko is going to do once he discovers that the Jade Lily is a phony.”

I turned my eyes on India and Gillard when I spoke. They both slumped in their chairs like inflatable dolls that had been pricked with a pin. It occurred to me that up until that exact moment, they thought they had gotten away with it.

“What are you talking about?” Fiegen asked.

“The Jade Lily—it’s a fake, a fraud, a forgery.”

“That’s impossible,” Perrin said. “It was authenticated. We had provenance. Cooper? Cooper?”

Perrin was looking directly at her friend, but her friend wouldn’t look at her.

“Dennis was driving your car,” I said. “I was hoping you didn’t know he was in on the theft. That was just wishful thinking on my part, wasn’t it?”

India refused to answer.

“Start talking, McKenzie,” Fiegen said. “Talk fast.”

“The Lily is a fake,” I said. “A forgery committed by a Frenchman named Dr. Arnaud Fornier, who is now doing time for art fraud. He sold it to Mr. Leo Gillard, Jeremy’s father. Mr. Gillard didn’t know it was a forgery, and neither did Jeremy until India Cooper told him—isn’t that right, India?”

She didn’t say if it was or wasn’t.

“Cooper?” Perrin said. “Is it true?”

She didn’t answer.

“I don’t know why India didn’t tell her friend Perrin,” I said. “She did tell Jeremy. I know because India said she had never met Gillard before, yet the other day when we were in the workroom together it was clear that he had met her. Gillard could have taken the Lily back once he realized it was a fraud, but because of the lending agreement, he’d have to have a good reason, and he didn’t want to give a reason. The Lily represented half of Gillard’s net worth. He told me that he could get by on eight million dollars, but four—I’m guessing not so much. What to do? Intact, the Lily was relatively worthless, but if it was stolen or destroyed … I’m guessing Gillard offered India a share if she helped him steal the Lily from the museum. ’Course, neither of them had experience in this sort of thing, so they needed help. Does anyone want to explain how you involved Patrick Tarpley in your plan?”

Neither India nor Gillard replied.

“Perhaps you’ll tell us someday,” I said. “In any case, Tarpley warmed to the idea for reasons involving his wife and a crooked cop. It was an easy decision to make because it happened before, didn’t it? That was why the security system was upgraded six months ago, upgraded a lousy eighteen months after it was originally installed.” I pointed a finger at Mr. Donatucci. “Something was stolen from the museum and you bought it back, didn’t you?”

“I’m not at liberty to say,” Donatucci said.

“Sure. Anyway, Tarpley decided to go after the Lily. He was a smart man. He knew that getting the Lily out of the museum was the hard part. He wore the mask so he could pretend he was conducting a security drill in case someone stopped him. If that didn’t work or if he was caught later, he knew that since the Lily was not the priceless artifact it was advertised to be, he could plead down to a gross misdemeanor. Once he was out of the building, Tarpley was home free. Offering to sell the Lily back was the key. He knew that the museum—and the insurance company—would not only agree to his terms, which weren’t particularly onerous, you would work real hard to keep the theft a secret from both the cops and the public—protecting your reputation, you told me, remember? You claim to be a businessman, Fiegen. How would you rate the risk-reward of Tarpley’s enterprise?”

Fiegen didn’t say.

“The reason I was involved—they picked me to act as a go-between because I was reliable and because I was known to the insurance company as being reliable. See, Tarpley and his crew had no intention of returning the Lily. Instead, they had planned from the very beginning to destroy it—once I had authenticated it, of course—knowing the insurance company would accept my word that it was real. That way Tarpley would get the ransom money from my hand. Gillard would get the insurance settlement. And their accomplices, specifically India, would be protected from charges of fraud. In fact, just about everyone would be happy once the Lily was blown sky-high except the insurance company, and who was going to cry crocodile tears for you?”

“Not many,” Donatucci said.

“It was a good plan,” I said. “The plan would have worked. Tarpley’s only mistake was in picking his crew. His wife. India’s brother. He thought they were trustworthy. They should have been. They were family, for God’s sake. ’Course, the way Von wept over Dennis, well, maybe it was a crime of passion when she shot her husband, after all. By the way, I’m sorry I shot him, India—Dennis, I mean. I wouldn’t have if he hadn’t tried to shoot me first. I hope he’s all right.”

“He’ll never turn against me, you know,” India said.

“A brother’s love. Touching.”

“It’s not true,” Perrin said. “It can’t possibly be true. India? How could you, India?”

She’s using India’s first name instead of her last,
my inner voice said.
I guess they’re not friends anymore.

“I knew how important the exhibit was to you,” India said. “Having the Lily stolen was better than having it revealed that you contracted to exhibit a fake.”

“That sounds nice,” I said. “Still…”

“It’s true,” India insisted.

“You were in for a third of the ransom once Tarpley was killed. You, Dennis, and Von—three bags containing approximately four hundred and thirty thousand dollars each. How much does a curator make in a year working for a small midwestern museum? Listen, Lieutenant Rask of the Minneapolis Police Department is waiting outside. He did me a big favor by letting me pretend to be Philo Vance for a while. Tell him whatever you like.”

“The police are outside?” Fiegen asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Also, Special Agent Brian Wilson of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He should be taking Pozderac and Hemsted into custody even as we speak. No doubt Branko will scream diplomatic immunity. We’ll see how that works out for him. Hemsted, on the other hand, does not enjoy that privilege. His testimony might be more easily coerced. As for you…”

“I will not be arrested.”

“No?”

“I have committed no crime.”

“Bribing a foreign national isn’t a crime?”

“It was not a bribe. The Jade Lily was a gift, a copy of a priceless artifact no more valuable than tickets to the opera.”

“I like it,” I said. “I’d hang on to that defense if I were you.”

The room emptied soon after Fiegen dashed for the door in search of his co-conspirators. I sat down next to Mr. Donatucci. Heavenly sat across the table from us.

“Well, sir, is this what you had in mind when you came to my house last week?” I asked.

“Almost exactly.”

“Sure.”

Donatucci removed a check from his inside pocket and set it on the table in front of me.

“One hundred and twenty-seven thousand dollars made out to cash as requested,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“Thank you, Batman.”

“I wish you wouldn’t call me that.”

Donatucci patted my shoulder and left the room. I glanced at the check, set my hand on top of it, and slid it across the table to Heavenly.

“It’s not quite the payout you were hoping for,” I said.

She took the check and put it in her bag.

“Just as long as we come out ahead, that’s the main thing,” she said.

“Thank you for saving my life.”

“My pleasure. McKenzie?”

“Hmm?”

“How did you know the Jade Lily was a fake?”

“They told me I had ten seconds to live. If they had wanted to kill me, they wouldn’t have called. So why did they call? They wanted me out of the room so they could blow up the Lily and I would be around to tell the tale. Why would they want to do that, blow up the Lily? Because they hated it so much? Because they didn’t want anyone else to own it? It’s kind of obvious once you think about it. After that, everything fell into place.”

“But when did you figure it out?”

“While I was holding the telephone in the motel room just before the bomb went off.”

“You’re the master of intuitive thinking.”

“It’s a curse.”

JUST SO YOU KNOW

In hindsight, it probably would have been better all around if I had allowed them to blow up the Jade Lily in that damn motel room instead of risking my life to save it.

First of all, Von Tarpley and Dennis Cooper both pled guilty to killing Patrick Tarpley and Lieutenant Scott Noehring. Normally, you shoot a cop they drop you in a hole and you never get to see the sun again, but they cut a deal, Von and Dennis did. They gave up their right to a jury trial—during which they would have presented irrefutable evidence of Noehring’s many dastardly deeds—in exchange for the possibility of parole hearings after seventeen years. They also managed to swap the bomb charges for the names and whereabouts of the people who sold them the explosives (I guess making a bomb is worse than exploding a bomb).

That was it as far as the courts were concerned. No one—including India Cooper—was ever charged with the theft of the Jade Lily, largely because both the museum and Jeremy Gillard refused to press charges and the insurance company claimed it had not been defrauded. I got a kick out of that—Gillard refusing to press charges against himself. There was plenty of talk about conspiracy to do this and conspiracy to do that, only nothing came of it.

The original Lily, by the way, has yet to resurface despite Tatjana Durakovic’s tireless efforts to locate it.

Branko Pozderac was granted diplomatic immunity and sent home, although his government removed him from the Foreign Investment Promotion Agency. Jonathan Hemsted was fired by the State Department in the morning and hired by Minnesota Disposal and Recycling in the afternoon to work as a liaison between the company and the governments of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, and Montenegro—yes, Fiegen got his garbage and wastewater cleaning contracts. Big surprise. Plus, any plans to charge Fiegen under the antibribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act were discarded when India, testifying on Fiegen’s behalf, argued that while it was an inspired facsimile of the original, the Jade Lily held little monetary value and therefore could hardly constitute a bribe.

Hell, even El Cid skated. All charges against him were dropped at just about the same time various joint task forces conducted a half-dozen large-scale gun and drug raids across the Twin Cities. Apparently Cid was correct when he said he could always make a deal with the police.

As for Jeremy Gillard—Fiegen never did cancel the check as I thought he would. When the feds were trying to jam him up on the bribery beef, they suggested that paying Gillard $3.8 million for a “worthless knickknack, isn’t that what you called it, sir?” was awfully excessive. Fiegen told them that how he spent his own money was none of their damn business.

Months later, long after everything had settled down, I checked out a few exhibits at the City of Lakes Art Museum. Perrin Stewart told me that she’d had no choice but to fire India and had not seen her since, but that a mutual friend told her that Gillard had given India some of Fiegen’s money—she didn’t know how much—and took her to Las Vegas. Personally, I hope they had a wonderful time.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to acknowledge my debt to Tom Combs, M.D., India Cooper, Tammi Fredrickson, Keith Kahla, Alison J. Picard, Lisa Vecoli of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, and Renée Valois.

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