Pawn, page 5
“And if you don’t mind my asking, where were you when this all went down sir?”
“Thailand. I have a factory there.” Of course he’d been overseas. It was the perfect alibi and he would absolutely have the best, and the records to prove it. But still Barns would have it checked out, just as he was sure Venner expected him to. It had to be done.
“And lastly sir, could you tell us about the painting that was stolen.” Finally he got a reaction from the man, something genuine. Just a flash, a glimpse of insecurity that he instantly covered up, but still not quite quickly enough, and Barns knew he had something there. Something the man wasn’t completely confident of.
“The last and greatest masterpiece of Rembrandt. Aphrodite in the Roses. Recently found hanging in a abandoned church in the Netherlands.”
“Aphrodite in the Roses?” The name didn’t mean much to the inspector. Fine art just wasn’t his cup of tea. But he knew a little about Rembrandt, mostly just how much his paintings were worth, and no matter how he sliced it, it didn’t sound like one the Dutch master’s works. Portraits and religious scenes for the most part as he recalled from his school days. And as for a Greek Goddess, the church would likely have frowned on that. Four hundred years ago the church frowning on a person could have very serious consequences.
“Yes.”
“Rembrandt?” Despite knowing that it would upset the man, he had to ask.
“It is a Rembrandt.” Mr. Venner seemed very certain of himself as he said it, placing his emphasis very strongly on the ‘is’, but the inspector couldn’t help but notice that a few of his employees looked away just then, slightly less certain at a guess.
“Really?”
“Yes it is inspector.” Mr. Venner drew himself up to his full height and puffed out his chest a little. He didn’t like being questioned, even when he was lying. Maybe especially then. But he had his story ready.
“Yes I know Rembrandt painted religious scenes and figures as well as private portraits and commissions. And I know there isn’t a single painting of his of a Greek god or goddess known. But there is now. Only one, in the entire world. A dozen different art experts have been through and examined the painting thoroughly. X rays have been taken showing the underlying work and the brushstrokes. The paint and the canvas have both been aged several times and using the most sophisticated tests known.”
“Aphrodite among the Roses is a genuine Rembrandt. You can see the reports for yourself.” And he would. He’d go through them with a fine tooth comb. Anyone that determined to prove his case had to be hiding something. But that was a matter for later. For the moment he just had to keep listening to the man’s well-practiced lies.
“It’s from his last years, actually his very last year, after the death of his son and his common law wife. Left hanging in an old church, affixed to the wall and gathering dust for four hundred years. It’s one of his finest works.” Was he telling him about the painting or trying to sell it to him Barns wondered? And he sounded very like a used car dealer just then. But then maybe he was working on his sales pitch, practicing in his spare time. The problem was that if he’d had it stolen then sure he could sell it via the black market. But he could probably get more selling it normally. For a start he could advertise it to the world as being for sale.
“And someone just walked in and stole it?” Of course they hadn’t. Whoever it was, had prepared carefully, and had the backing and resources that surely only the most successful of thieves had, including perhaps most important of all, a buyer.
“Walked in? Walked in inspector?” Mr. Venner didn’t seem too happy with his words, but his fake anger was slipping and he really just looked like a bad actor with a toothache. “These bastards gassed the entire guard house, cut all the alarm systems, blew half the vault to pieces and then drove a tank through what remained. An actual, bloody tank mind you! Then they carried out an eight foot tall masterpiece still bound in its steel and concrete case on a forklift.”
“No they didn’t just bloody walk in!” For the first time Barns almost believed him. The man seemed genuinely upset. And from the red glow in his face, the inspector guessed that he wouldn’t be happy to just get his painting back. Mr. Venner was a very angry man, and not just because of the loss of his painting. The burglary was an affront to him, a slap in the face, and he wanted some payback. He decided to change the subject before unfortunate things were said that couldn’t be taken back. By either of them.
“So how much is it worth?”
“Worth? It’s priceless inspector. There’s not a man on the planet with enough money to buy the painting.” He seemed upset by the very idea that a monetary amount could be put on his precious painting, something that seemed very wrong in a successful businessman. Maybe he actually was an art lover, but somehow Barns doubted it. The man was a money lover and he would let nothing distract him from that. This was just more acting. But what was he hiding?
“Then how much is it insured for?”
“It’s not insured. How can you insure something that’s priceless? How can you insure a painting that’s still to be authenticated? It’s not insured at all.”
“Oh!” That caught Barns by surprise. Insurance fraud was always an excellent motive for theft, but not if it wasn’t insured. Maybe the man did actually have a reason to be upset. If it wasn’t insured and he’d get the best price for it by selling it in a public auction, then what possible motive could he have for being involved in its theft? But Barns still didn’t trust him. The man was a snake. He was hiding something at the least. And if he had to guess, he wasn’t nearly as upset by the lack of insurance as he pretended to be. Why?
No, the man was guilty. In it up to his eyebrows. He knew it. His people probably knew it. But proving it was going to be a problem. As crude as the crime scene looked, it had been very carefully staged. The thieves had known when to strike, they had known what they’d need, and tanks if what the man was telling him was true, weren’t easy to come by. Gas to knock out the staff on site was not just expensive, it was also almost unheard of, and very dangerous to play with. They’d need an expert, unless they didn’t care if people died. They’d have to have schematics and access codes.
It had to be an inside job. Venner was in it up to his neck. It was just figuring out how he’d done it, who he’d hired, and most of all, what was in it for him, that was going to be tricky.
But that was just a matter of gathering the evidence and sifting through it looking for the inconsistencies. No matter how well he thought he’d planned the heist, he would have made mistakes. Finding them was only a matter of time and hard work.
To that end the inspector spent his time interviewing, taking notes, detailed notes, as he spoke with Venner and his entire household, all while waiting for the forensics boys to turn up. An entire team of them instead of the normal one or two that normally showed up with a fingerprint kit.
It was lucky in a way that Venner’s people had gone mad and shot at Mr. Hennassy, because thanks to that little mistake he had an almost unlimited budget when it came to staff and overtime and most importantly lab work. If there was a chance of finding the gang through even a hair or a skin cell, they would find it. And they had the added bonus of making Venner nervous, not that he showed it. But still he made his excuses and vanished from the crime scene faster than he should have. That didn’t exactly upset Barns as he continued his interviews.
It was late by the time he was finished, and he had a lot more to do. But by then he’d taken down as much information as he could, the staff were tired, Venner was nowhere to be found, and the tech boys were setting up floodlights within the newly dug tunnel leading down to the vault as they prepared to work through the night. Even the guards had been sent off to the hospital for blood tests as they tried to find out what they’d been gassed with. There was little more he could do.
But his mind was still racing as he ran through the evidence, to the point where he barely even noticed he was in the car, and normally he was a nervous passenger. Even when his sergeant drove as he normally did.
“Hopkins, I want every detail of Mr. Venner’s story gone through with a fine tooth comb, checked and double checked. I want his receipts. I want his witnesses interviewed in detail. I want his sleeping beauty security guards giving full statements. All of them. And I want every detail of Venner’s background on my desk in the morning.”
“You don’t believe him sir?” Hopkins turned to him, probably something he shouldn’t be doing while he was driving, his face as usual a mask of questions.
“Believe him?” Barns stared at the sergeant wondering if he’d misheard him. “That man is a crooked little snake. A man so bent that he couldn’t sleep straight in bed. If he told me that the sun was going to rise in the morning I’d ask for a second opinion!”
“So you think he’s lying?”
“Oh no, far from it. He’s telling us the absolute truth and I’m certain every single fact he gives us will check out in triplicate.”
“Inspector?” Hopkins sounded confused, but he was young and that was the prerogative of youth. Stupidity wasn’t though.
“Sergeant, that man has just told us a whale of a story. A lie so big that it could never be true. But he’s anchored it with enough facts to make it seem as though it is. So we check those facts. We tick them off. And once we know every single truth in his concoction, we can begin to know where to look for the lies. Do they teach you nothing in university?” Barns knew he shouldn’t be so hard on his sergeant. It was a bad habit, and frowned upon in the modern police force, but he was an old fashioned type of copper, and he was frustrated. They had a lead, and it was a lie of some sort. A massive lie. After two solid days of doing nothing but reading the writings of madmen who wanted to believe the impossible, he wanted something more. He just didn’t have it.
And he despised Venner. The man was a living horror in an expensive business suit. The sort of criminal who should be locked away for life, and yet someone he couldn’t touch. God only knew how many innocents he’d robbed blind as he amassed his fortune, though he was certain the lawyers would call it something else. Something legal. Justified theft of some sort. Lawyers were good at renaming things.
One thing was certain though. Venner hadn’t built his Las Vegas casino house by playing by the rules or being nice. When they started digging, and they would, a few nasty little secrets would crawl out from his perfectly arranged closets.
As they drove away from the mansion, for the first time in days Barns started to experience a small measure of happiness and even peace. Everything thus far had been a complete mess. None of it had made any sense. But now they finally had a crime and a bad guy. Something to investigate. He was actually almost tempted to put on the radio and start singing along to whatever was playing.
He didn’t though. That would have been unprofessional.
Chapter Four.
Several days after the crash Rufus managed to make his way down to the police station and pick up his effects from the car. He probably should have done it a day or two before, except that he was far too sore. Instead of doing anything productive, he’d spent most of the previous couple of days either in bed or lying on the couch watching movies, swallowing painkillers and feeling like a very old man.
It was one of the things that they didn’t tell you about car crashes. That the seatbelts and air bags might save your life, but they weren’t gentle about it. And so he was battered and bruised from head to foot. And that was before he included the endless lacerations from the flying glass and the damage from throwing himself down an embankment. In fact he felt as though he’d been in the ring with a team of heavyweight boxers for the full twelve rounds, and they hadn’t been wearing gloves as they’d pummelled him.
There wasn’t a part of him that didn’t ache, not a patch of his skin that wasn’t bruised or torn, and to add insult to injury he had a perfect set of panda eyes. His nose must have taken a blow somewhere in the crash, and it looked as though someone had given him two perfect black eyes.
Of course it was more than just pain that had kept him at home. It was fear. Gut wrenching, sickening, paralysing fear.
The nightmares had returned with full force. Footsteps on the stairs. The evil voice in the middle of the night, calling his name, chilling his blood as he knew something terrible was coming. The hands in the darkness, holding him down, forcing him, strangling him. And the pain. The terrible pain as things he couldn’t even imagine were done to him again and again.
It had been a long time since he’d had those nightmares. Since he’d woken every night drenched in ice cold sweat, terrified of what lay out there in the darkness. A long time since that terrible fear had left him completely powerless, and it was like a kick in the teeth. He’d thought he’d moved on. He’d thought they’d died for good. But suddenly they were back as if they’d never gone away. And with them came the fear. The terror of not knowing what lay around every corner. Of who was behind him. Of when he’d feel those powerful hands smashing down on his shoulders, holding him. His fear was back in all its gut churning glory. And the thought of leaving the safety of his home was a horror all its own.
Though he’d been making progress these past couple of decades since escaping his home, learning to go out more and take risks, at least a few, to find safety in places like schools and libraries and hospitals, after the events of that shocking day, he was almost all the way back to where he had been as a young child. Afraid of the dark. Afraid of anywhere that wasn’t safe, anywhere he didn’t know. Afraid of anyone he didn’t know. He found it very difficult to face going outside. His home was safe, it was his fortress. He’d worked hard to make it that way, and that was where he belonged.
Deadlocks on the doors and windows, a decent burglar alarm in place for when he slept, bolts he could slam home when he was in, a panic alarm he could reach for in every room in the house, and of course, a panic room. His home was safe, just as it was meant to be. Everything else, everywhere else, wasn’t.
So he’d called the office and told them he wouldn’t be in for a couple of weeks, told them he was still hurting from the crash, and given himself an unscheduled holiday. The sort of holiday he most wanted. A safe one. At least for a few days.
Still eventually he had to go outside. He knew that. He’d always known that, which was how he’d made it through his childhood. Forcing himself to do what had to be done. And after a couple of days of scarcely even looking out the window, he finally found the courage to force himself to go down to the station in a taxi, and pick up his envelope of personal effects. Years of living his nightmares had taught him that he had to face his fears, or else live in a closet. In the end you always had to go on. It was that or death.
He had to wonder though, as he was driven back to his house, why he’d even bothered. It was a very small envelope. A few discs for the cd player, a couple of paper files from work, a box of tissues, his camera and some coins from the tray. Not much to show for his morning’s effort. Not much to show for having abandoned the safety of his home, for having somehow pushed all the terror he felt out in the open back down in to the dark recesses of his subconscious. Hell they could have chucked a stamp on it and mailed it to him. Actually they could have kept it. He wouldn’t have cared.
At least though, he hadn’t had to face the inspector again. That would have been too much. The man had looked at him as though he was some sort of criminal, and his questions once he’d started, didn’t seem to stop. Instead he’d just asked and asked and asked them, often repeating the same question three or four times in a row, hoping perhaps he’d change his story or get caught in a lie. And all the time he was chewing absently on a pen while his eyes had narrowed to slits as he stared straight at him, searching for the lie.
Being interviewed by the inspector Rufus had felt as though he was the one on trial, as though he was the suspect, and that had seemed frightfully unfair to him at the time. Battered and bruised, still shaking from the shock of what had happened, and being fussed over by the nurses in the hospital who kept trying to remove the last of his blood, the last thing he needed was to be accused of a crime. Especially the crime that had been committed on him. But he hadn’t found the words to say that to the inspector. None that he would have accepted anyway. The man didn’t seem a particularly understanding sort.
Inspector Barns didn’t like being interrupted either. When one of his subordinates had come to see him he’d snapped at him like an angry pitbull terrier, and sent the man scurrying away while he continued his interrogation of the victim. Rufus would have hated to work in his office.
It was clear that the inspector didn’t believe him, though what there was to doubt he wasn’t sure. On the other hand he kept wondering if it had really happened, himself. It was simply so bizarre. Cars self-destructing, people in speeding trucks shooting at him with machine guns. It was madness. It was the sort of thing that happened in the movies, not real life. Not his life anyway. His life was boring, just the way he liked it.
Still even if it had gone mad, even if all his nightmares had returned, he had faced his fears once more. He had left his home and claimed his stuff. And in time he knew, or he hoped, the fear would go away again. He should be proud of himself. Rufus told himself that as he paid the driver and headed back to his haven. He had told himself the same many times before. But it never really helped.
