Read Frame-Up Online

Authors: John F. Dobbyn

Frame-Up (24 page)

Markov bowed slightly without answering the question.

“You have the floor, Mr. Knight. Please continue.”

“Either you or John hatched an idea to scam the two Vans, who
probably have enough money to finance the World Court. And who, I might add, are probably nobody's fools. The scam was based on the Vermeer that was stolen from a Boston museum back in the nineties.

“You tell an interesting story, Mr. Knight. Is there more?”

“Oh, yes. Much more. The Vans loaned money, quite a large sum of money, on the security of the stolen painting, which John, again acting for Aiello, claimed to have. It was believable since Aiello's a big shot in the Mafia, and John had the brains to pull it off. But you needed a very serious authenticator for the painting to suck the Vans in. John thought of his old professor at Harvard, Professor Denisovitch, one of probably two or three world authorities on Vermeer. No one could doubt his reputation. How am I doing?”

“Go on, Mr. Knight. I'm still listening.”

“The loan was made. I'm sure you got a share of the loan money. And the painting was hidden away for security in a bank vault with two number codes, one went to John and the other to the Vans.”

He gave another noncommittal shrug.

“Now here's the clincher, Mr. Markov.”

I dropped my voice and leaned closer. I knew I was showing a major hole card.

“The painting is a fake. It was painted by Denisovitch. We don't need to go into the kind of threats you personally made against his family to force an honorable man to betray his life's work.”

Markov just looked at the ceiling and smiled. That gave him a major piece of the puzzle. It was now on the table that I knew that what lay in the vault was worth no more than the price of the canvas and paint. The second shoe hung suspended in midair.

“So there we are. I've anted up. Do you play poker, Mr. Markov?”

He looked back down from the ceiling.

“Perhaps.”

“Good. Then you understand the concept. Now let's see if you'll ante up so we can deal the cards.”

I had full eye contact.

“You knew from the beginning that Professor Denisovitch
painted the so-called Vermeer. You knew his authentication was a complete fraud. That's past history. What matters at this point is that we both concede to each other knowledge of the fact that there is absolutely nothing of value in that vault. Can we agree?”

He continued to look me in the eye, and I could see the wheels turning. We were at a threshold. I needed his admission of complicity to cross it.

“Understand this, Mr. Markov. I have no interest in using the information for any purpose other than making a deal. Let's be honest. If I ever disclose it, you'll have me killed. That's a fact of life I accept. Is that blunt enough?”

His eyes narrowed and he spoke in the slow syllables of a cautious man. “Let's say for the sake of argument, Mr. Knight—”

“Let's not, Mr. Markov. The deal is cards on the table or I'm on the next plane, and you'll never hear what I have to offer.”

It was my turn to look him straight in the eye. I knew he was in discomfort, and probably planning personal future revenge on the one who put him there.

“I believe we might proceed on the assumption—”

“You can take your assumptions, Mr. Markov, I respectfully submit, and stuff them. It's yes or no. Nothing else.”

I checked my watch purely for effect. I then gave what I hoped would appear to be my last look into his squinty eyes. I got nothing back.

I gave it three seconds before I looked back at the great Rembrandt on the wall ahead of us and merely whispered, “I'm sorry, Mr. Markov. My mistake. I thought you were a player. I've wasted the time of both of us.”

I turned and took one reluctant step toward the door when I heard it.

“Mr. Knight, I'll give you the yes you want. And I'll give you two things more. Two pieces of advice. Don't ever try to minimize me again. And secondly, don't for an instant believe that you would live to leave Amsterdam if I choose to have it otherwise.”

I turned to face him and the smile was gone.

“I never thought otherwise.”

“Then what have you to offer me, Mr. Knight?”

The air between us cooled, and we were back to business.

“A second harvest from this same painting in the vault. I meant what I said about having a buyer. Mr. Qian is a very private man. The extent of his wealth is staggering, and his greatest pleasure is indulging his taste in art. He has no scruples about the source of it. How I found him is my business. I'm sure you'll do your research on him. You'll find nothing. He can afford to keep it that way.”

“And exactly how do we convince this sophisticated buyer that our little painting is genuine?”

“Unquestionable authentication. I'll produce the expert. Mr. Qian has already agreed that if my authenticator says it's genuine, we'll have a deal.”

“And who might that be?”

I could understand the question since I had apparently been successful in convincing Markov his assassins had killed Denisovitch in his hotel in London.

“That's my concern. I've said that Qian has agreed to the authenticator. That's all you need to know.”

He hesitated on that one, but stayed in the game.

“And how do we arrange the authentication?”

“That's your part. Mr. Qian insists on being present. I'll have him and the authenticator at the bank where the vault is at two tomorrow. Your job will be to have the two Vans there with their code number. Can you arrange that?”

“Of course. And now, Mr. Knight, to the essentials. What price have you discussed?”

“Eighty million as a base. More depending on the condition of the painting. Of course my authenticator will rave about the fine condition and preservation of the painting. He may get the price over a hundred million. The Vans will be repaid their debt, and you and I will split everything over that.”

“And what of your client in Boston? This Aiello person.”

“He'll be satisfied to have the debt repaid. He left this in my
hands. There's no reason why he should know what the painting actually sells for, is there?”

That brought a quiet smile.

“There is one problem, Mr. Knight. Why should the “Vans” as you call them place any trust in this mysterious Oriental? The painting is supposed to be stolen property. They won't open the vault to just anyone.”

“Of course not. Mr. Qian and I have discussed it. I told him we need some assurance of his seriousness. He's willing to write a check for three million dollars jointly to the Vans and myself. I'll have the check in the hands of the Vans by tomorrow at the vault. They can hold it in escrow. If the painting is authenticated, and it will be, and Mr. Qian fails to go through with the purchase, I'll sign the check and they can cash it. Mr. Qian knows the value of what he thinks he's buying.”

Markov took a breath and turned back to look at the nearly life-size figures in the Night Watch. I did the same.

“Astounding how he used light to breathe life into the figures. You can almost see them move.”

“You're an art connoisseur after all, Mr. Markov.”

“Perhaps.”

He looked back at me and our eyes met.

“But I am most certainly a man who would be very disappointed if my confidence were betrayed. And, Mr. Knight, I would express my disappointment in ways that are by no means subtle. Cards on the table, as you say.”

I gave him my most dejected look.

He smiled and just shook his head.

“Always the joker. But you take my meaning. Again, the time?”

“Mr. Qian wants his authenticator to be able to examine the painting. There are tests he'll pretend to perform. Mr. Qian wants to be there as well. We'll meet at the bank vault tomorrow afternoon at two. You'll have the Vans there with their part of the code. Satisfactory?”

“Quite.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

My wake-up call the next morning pulled me right out of a bass fishing boat on a crystal clear lake in New Hampshire. The cheerful sparkle of the hotel wake-up voice did nothing to relieve the incipient terror of awakening in Amsterdam with the day I had ahead.

After fortification at the world's premier breakfast buffet at the hotel, I launched the plan that finally came together just before sleep the night before.

Mr. Devlin called to say that he had gotten Mr. Santangelo's very tentative approval of my three million dollar idea. I took it the sell was hard, since the only thing Mr. D. had to back it up was his blind faith in me.

The first step was to rent a bicycle — no great feat in Amsterdam. Years ago, the city fathers took a shot at the intolerable automobile traffic by providing hundreds of white bicycles on the streets around the city. The Dutch took to bike riding like the Swedes to pickled herring, and the automobile traffic abated. Only two problems remained — theft of the bicycles, and the menace of hundreds of kamikaze cyclists.

The city next turned the free bicycles into cheaply rentable bicycles. It was on one of these that I started crisscrossing an erratic path along the canals and through the cross streets that make up the area called the Ring — a series of concentric semicircles of canals that fan out from the harbor.

My purpose was to eliminate a tail, in case Markov decided to play dirty pool. Within twenty minutes, I felt as secure as I would in the Back Bay of Boston.

The second purpose of my cycling odyssey was to accomplish two errands before meeting Harry and the professor back at the hotel. The first was to find a specialty art shop in the museum district in the center of the city.

The second was to find the particular bank that rented the private vault now containing the fake Vermeer painted by Professor Denisovitch. Markov had given me the address, and the concierge found it for me on a map.

I did a bit of business at both the art shop and the bank. I gave the manager at the bank a tip sizable enough to insure that he would accommodate, first by not recognizing me when I returned with the group at two, and equally importantly, by doing a small favor that afternoon that did not compromise him, but was a key element in pulling off a bit of magic.

That done, I cycled back to the hotel and welcomed any tail that Markov wanted to put on me.

At exactly two o'clock, Mr. Qian, aka Harry Wong, and I stepped out of a hired limousine in front of the bank. Harry was in his finest suit — in fact his only suit, but cleaned and pressed for the occasion. The third member of our little trio was Harry's traveling companion from London. Professor Denisovitch was dressed in the style of any number of Harvard intellectuals, a la couture of Horace Rumpole — tweedy and somewhat ill-fitting. But that didn't matter. It was Harry who had to make an impression.

We strode into the bank and asked for the manager. He greeted us without a hint of recognition and led us to the vault room where the two Vans and Markov were waiting.

Even the Vans dispensed with the Dutch custom of preliminary social bantering. We were there for a single purpose, and an unusually large sum of money was at stake.

The Vans were pleasantly surprised to see Professor Denisovitch again. In fact, they seemed somewhat relieved, since the professor had been the original authenticator of the painting in their deal with Tony Aiello. They were obviously confident that he would not change
his mind about the painting in the vault. In fact, based on the professor's previous authentication, the Vans still believed the painting to be the genuine Vermeer.

The true shock told on the face of Markov. He looked at the professor as if he had come back from the dead. I had been saving that little surprise for this meeting at the bank, hopefully to set Markov a bit off balance about his ability to control events.

The bad news for Markov in seeing the professor alive was that his boys had flubbed it in London. The good news was that the professor would be capable of setting up another profitable scam for him. Until he could get his mind around the conflicting possibilities, he stayed in the background, which allowed me to play master of ceremonies.

I introduced Harry — Mr. Qian — and got down to business.

“Gentlemen, we know what we're here for. Mr. Qian has a check for three million dollars made out jointly to Mr. Van Drusen and myself. The check will remain in the hands of the manager of the bank, Mr. Van Houten. If the painting is authenticated and for any reason Mr. Qian does not complete the transaction, Mr. Van Drusen and I will be free to cash the check. The three million dollars will go to Mr. Van Drusen and Mr. Van Arsdale, who made the loan for which the painting is the security. Acceptable?”

I looked to the two Vans, each of whom nodded assent. Markov still looked a bit nonplused, but he nodded to keep the train rolling.

“Then let's get on with it. Mr. Van Drusen, if you'll give your code number to Mr. Van Houten, I'll give him mine.”

Van Drusen wrote something on a slip of paper and handed it to the bank manager. Since that seemed to be the routine, I did the same with the correct code I had memorized.

The manager located the numbered vault and opened it. With almost silent reverence, he took a roll of canvas, a bit over two feet long, out of the vault and gently unfurled it on the table. If I didn't know it was a fake, I'd have been awestruck in the presence of the masterpiece that the entire art world would give untold fortunes to locate.

Even in the form of Professor Denisovitch's copy, the painting
was gripping enough to bring silence and a genuine moment of respect from this group of dealers and hustlers. I broke the spell.

“Gentlemen, shall we do what we came to do. Professor Denisovitch wishes to examine the painting before giving his authentication. He requests that we leave him alone while he performs certain tests that he's developed. I think we should respect his privacy.”

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