“It’s called the Heart of the World,” Varte said. “That’s the Muslim name for it. You can call it what you like.”
Heart of the World. Yes, it fit.
“Before I saw this one,” Varte said, “I didn’t know red diamonds existed. I thought they were all clear.”
“Diamonds come in many colors—yellow, pink, green, blue.” He didn’t add that he had never heard of a true ruby-red, although there were shades lighter and darker. And a ruby itself would not compare to the fiery diamond Varte was selling, because rubies don’t have a diamond’s glittering fire. He pulled his loupe out of his breast pocket and held out his hand for the stone. “I can’t really judge it in this light.”
Varte indicated a flashlight. “Use that.” Before handing him the stone, the Romanian nodded at his guard dog, Heinrich. “Watch his friend across the parking lot, I’ve heard bad things about that Portuguese.”
“He comes toward us, I kill him.”
“If this one touches the car door while he’s holding the diamond, kill him, too.”
“Jawol.” He smiled.
Victoir believed the German would do it. A deceptive concept like bluffing would be too complex for Heinrich to handle. “Hold the light for me,” he asked Varte. Examining the stone under magnification against a white sheet of paper, Victoir could detect no visible flaws. But he equivocated because the conditions were so poor. “The light is not good enough for a professional examination. I need to—”
“You have had all the examination that you will get. Even if there were small flaws, the gem is worth a fortune. Give it to me.”
He grabbed it from Victoir.
“Get out.”
With Victoir on the pavement, Varte locked the door before rolling down the window. “You said you need two days to get the American dollars. The exchange will take place inside the casino lounge at exactly eight o’clock on Wednesday. If I see you or your friend before that time, Heinrich will kill you.”
11
João was laying sideways on his car hood, smoking one of his Havana cigars, as Victoir trudged across the parking lot. He laughed as Victoir reached the car.
“Amigo, you have the look of a man who just lost his favorite woman.”
“You should have seen it, João, it was extraordinary. Varte wasn’t lying, it had to belong to kings.”
“All the more reason to make sure the swine doesn’t get away with it.” João made a cutting motion across his throat.
Victoir wasn’t usually particular about the source of the gems he bought and sold. Six years of war had turned Europe upside down, killed millions, and emptied the pockets of millions more. But he drew the line at letting someone profit whom he suspected of being a Nazi. After Victoir completed a deal with such people, Joáo followed the seller and relieved the man of the purchase price, splitting the money later with Victoir. Victoir thought of it as a private war. But robbery was one thing—killing was another. Helping refugees by buying their jewelry made him feel good. Making sure a Nazi didn’t profit from stolen goods made him feel good. Murder wasn’t in his blood. João always claimed he only robbed the goose-stepper, but Victoir was never entirely sure. Nor did he press the point.
Victoir shook his head. “You can’t just walk up to him and grab it. He has that big kraut, Heinrich, protecting him. And he’s chosen the casino lounge for the transfer. There’s no way we’ll get the diamond and keep the money. And I don’t want to stifle the deal trying. The stone’s worth much more than what he’s asking.”
“So it’s really unique,” João said dreamily, more to himself than to Victoir.
“Like nothing I’ve seen before.” Victoir’s hands were sweaty and he wiped them on his coat. “Like nothing I’ve even imagined. A gem that belongs in a royal crown. It’s got a name and even a history, like the Great Mogul, only more provocative. Three monarchs who possessed it lost their thrones. Varte seems to want to get rid of it not only for the money but because he’s superstitious. He told me death stalks every man who’s possessed it—and he said it like a man who knows.”
João grinned and shrugged. “Maybe our friend has the gift of prophecy—about his own destiny.”
“João, I want this stone. I’d give anything for it. Everything for it. There’s nothing like it on earth. When I go to America, it would be a calling card into the citadels of the diamond trade. I don’t want anything to screw it up.”
That night Victoir lay in bed thinking about the diamond. It put him into a sweat. He never had the inclination to kill anyone, but when he held the Heart of the World in his hand, it created a heat of passion in him, a desire so hot it could explode as violence. What if he’d had a gun with him? Would he have shot the kraut in the back of the head and blown away Varte’s face to get the diamond? Was this like the heat of passion that caused angry lovers to kill?
He knew people could get aroused by diamonds as much as sex, but that was true of many things—horse racing and money, to name two. But the Heart of the World kicked his own passion meter sky-high. “It’s not just a stone,” he’d told João before they parted, “any more than the Mona Lisa is just a painting or Michelangelo’s David is just a figure in marble.” The Heart of the World was unique and beautiful, rightfully the property of kings and queens. And it wouldn’t be the first time a fabulous gem remained hidden in a king’s vault until thieves got their hands on it.
The Romanian might not be wrong about where the diamond came from, either, he thought. Some of the world’s finest gems originally adorned the Peacock Throne. The priceless throne was made for the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan, the Indian ruler who built the Taj Mahal. In 1739 it was seized along with other plunder by a Persian conqueror who captured Delhi and later lost in warfare with the Kurds who broke it up to sell the pieces. The Koh-i-Nur, the Mountain of Light, acquired by Queen Victoria was suspected to have come from the throne, and the same was true of the Darya-i-Nur, the Sea of Light, a flawless pale pink, and its sister, the Nur ol-Eyn, the Light of the Eye, two gems in the crown jewels of Iran.
It was also possible the fire diamond was once the eye of an idol. It was believed the Hope Diamond, the forty-five-carat indigo blue, had been stolen from a Hindu idol. It was once a larger stone called the French Blue, stolen from the idol, and left a trail of murder and betrayal as it made its way to France where it ended up on the crown of Louis XVI—who lost his head, his throne, and the diamond at about the same time.
The same fatal history was true of the Orlov Diamond, the egg-shaped, 193-carat stone of the crown jewels of the Romanoffs—before they were murdered by the Reds. Both gems had histories of murder and intrigue, and, as human nature would have it, that just made them all the more desirable and valuable. A name and a history, even bad luck, increased a gem’s value. The Moon of Baroda, a twenty-five-carat, pear-shaped canary yellow that once belonged to the Gaekwar rulers of Baroda in India, was said to be unlucky for the owners who wore it crossing water. How much did that reputation for misfortune add to its value? How much did the murderous history of the Great Mogul, the French Blue Hope Diamond, and the Orlov add to their value?
For certain, he had to know more about the diamond, more about its history. After he bought it, he would get it safely to America and into a bank vault. Then he would make a trip to Istanbul, Cairo, and Tehran, places the diamond would have passed through.
In his mind, it wasn’t a gem stolen from an idol in India but a piece of a star which had fallen to earth. Meteorites carried diamonds to earth; in fact there was a much greater concentration of diamonds found in most meteorites than in diamond fields. Diamonds were cold to touch, they appeared warm because they drew heat from your hand. But Victoir would swear that the Heart of the World generated its own heat—like a star.
“A piece of a star,” he said aloud. He trembled thinking about it.
12
Heinrich the German was sitting at the bar when Victoir came into the casino’s lounge to purchase the diamond. Jo
ão was there also, but at the opposite end, talking to two women in dresses and makeup that advertised they were in the bar on business. Victoir knew João had his hands in a number of shady businesses. Finding out that João had a string of girls he pimped wouldn’t have surprised him.
Victoir stood just inside the entryway, letting his eyes adjust to the mellow light. He didn’t see Varte. Heinrich caught his eye and jerked his head toward the back of the room. Sitting at a table in a dark corner, a dim light hanging above the nearby entrance to the casa de banho making his fish’s-belly complexion glow, was Varte.
“Olá,” Victoir said, taking a seat at the table.
“Did you bring the money?” Varte asked.
Victoir raised his eyebrows. “Did you bring the diamond?”
“The money first. Let me see it.”
Victoir took a pouch out from under his coat and handed it to him. Varte placed the pouch on his lap so others wouldn’t see the contents when he opened it. He took out a pack of hundred-dollar bills.
“The Nazis counterfeited these by the millions, using professional engravers and mint employees,” Varte said. “How do I know they’re real?”
“The problem with the Nazis’ counterfeit bills is the German obsession with perfection—they made them look better than the originals.”
Victoir was sure many of the bills in the pouch were part of the millions in counterfeits that the Germans printed, but he was also sure that Varte either wouldn’t be able to tell the difference—or would be so desperate that he’d take the phony bills, knowing that only an expert could tell the difference anyway.
“These are phony,” Varte said.
Victoir shook his head and reached for the pouch. The man was bluffing. He needed good light and a magnifying glass to tell the difference. “No, they’re all good. Let’s not haggle. You keep your diamond and I’ll—”
“I must check these under light.”
“Take a few and check them, but the rest stay with me.”
The Romanian removed some of the bills and gave the pouch back. He scurried into the hallway leading to the rest room.
Victoir leaned back and rolled his neck on his shoulders to relieve the tension. Negotiations were tough. It wasn’t like talking to a couple about an engagement ring. The exchange of money and merchandise involved levels of fear, distrust, and danger.
He looked back to the bar. Heinrich was still there, hunched over a beer, his elbows on the bar, staring down into his drink. Maybe he’s reading the beer suds, Victoir thought, looking for what the future holds for an ex-Nazi with muscles between his ears. He wondered why Heinrich hadn’t insisted upon being at his employer’s elbow when the exchange took place. There was one good possibility—that the little Romanian didn’t trust the German, either. Not with a stack of money.
Victoir caught João’s eyes and shook his head, indicating the exchange hadn’t happened yet. He had asked João to stand at the bar and be ready to back him up if necessary. The Romanian seemed to have a healthy suspicion and fear of João, so it was better that he stood off a little.
After several minutes had passed, Victoir began to get worried. What was taking the little man so long? He smoked a cigarette, then looked at his watch again, a nervous reaction since he hadn’t checked the time when the Romanian went into the bathroom. It occurred to him that there might be a back way out of the rest room—and that the man might have taken off with the five or six hundred-dollar bills he’d given him.
It wasn’t a likely scenario, not when the man had an incredibly rare and valuable diamond, but stranger things have happened since the Nazis turned the world inside out and upside down.
He got up and shrugged his shoulders at João. And glanced at the bar. Heinrich was gone. What the hell? He hurried into the short hallway and pushed through the door to the men’s banho, stopping short as he stepped in.
Varte was on the floor. He lay on his back, his dead eyes staring up at the ceiling, his face in a mask of shock. Blood from his cut throat made a vivid red puddle next to his head and shoulders.
His hat was gone.
The window was open.
13
The sound of a ship’s foghorn wailed from the Rio Tejo as Victoir walked along Lisbon’s embarcadero. Summer fog had crawled along the bay and went out to sea earlier in the day. The fall of night turned the gloom into a dark shroud that suited Victoir’s purpose of being unseen.
Three days had passed since he found the Romanian lying on the floor of the rest room. He had been questioned by the police, but since the dead man wasn’t Portuguese and was traveling with a false passport, a reasonable bribe to the investigating officers had stilled any questions they might have had.
Heinrich appeared the next day, his body floating in the large pool created by the sea cliffs of the Boca do Inferno. He would have stayed on the bottom—one of his ankles had been attached to chain connected to a heavy steel truck rim—but a shark had fortuitously bitten off the foot and the chain slipped off.
It wasn’t hard to guess the sequence of events. João had bribed Heinrich, arranged the murder of the Romanian and theft of the diamond, and was now erasing the list of witnesses.
Victoir was certain he was on the list—escaping the Nazi beasts in occupied France had instilled in him a finely honed sense of survival.
He thought about the utterly murderous insanity that had gripped Europe for six years. And about everything he had lost. He had lived through the Nazi era in Europe, which they were calling the Holocaust, though the Gypsy expression for the genocide—the Devouring—was more accurate. Nothing surprised him. He had no faith in the inherent goodness of mankind. Or friendship.
He was sure the murders and theft were João’s work. He felt no anger over what João had done. He suspected that if he confronted João, the Portuguese would only smile and shrug his shoulders and suggest they have a glass of wine and a good woman, rather than answering.
But there were some questions you didn’t ask another man. Not when it involved double-cross, murder, and robbery. A man like João could hand you a glass of wine as he slit your throat.
His only regret was the loss of the diamond. He would have given anything for it. Except his life. That poor bastard Varte didn’t know how right he was when he said the gem carried a curse. He only hoped that someday the curse would find João. But he didn’t think it would—men like João make their own luck. It was the only explanation for people who bet incredible odds to rise from the gutter.
Lisbon no longer was a haven for him.
He found the dock he was looking for and walked along it to a fishing boat waiting for him. He had escaped the Nazis in France in a fishing boat. He would leave Lisbon the same way, taking the boat to England. He had been practicing his English for a year. His papers said he was American. Being American was a good choice, he thought. He wanted to go to America, where he had relatives who could help him get established in the diamond business.
Besides, it was the one country in the world where a foreign accent did not mean you were a foreigner.
14
Win Liberte, New York, 1991
I went alone to JFK, taking a taxi to the terminal that TAP Air Portugal flew out of. Nobody had volunteered to see me off and I asked no one. The only way to start a new life is to leave the old one behind. “Alice doesn’t live here anymore,” I told Tony, the duty lobbyman, as I passed by. He gave me a puzzled look back. I didn’t remember who Alice was, either.
“Gonna miss you, Mr. Liberte.”
I gave him an envelope with some cash in it. Tony had been a good guy, helping me up to my apartment more than once when I was too drunk to make it alone.
I felt funny in the taxi and leaned back, trying to figure out what was wrong. Surprisingly, for a guy who never worked a day in his life and only knew how to clip the proverbial coupons, being broke didn’t scare me. It was numbing, but I wasn’t shaking in my boots. Maybe I was too stupid to be running scared.
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br /> Something else was bothering me and I started going down the list. It wasn’t the loss of the boat or the cars—those were things that could be replaced. I was never really caught up in possessing things. I bought toys and beat the hell out of them and bought more, to use, not to horde. I found it easy to give up things. Maybe because I lost my mother and father when I was a kid. Nothing was permanent.
That’s how I felt about the apartment in the Dakota. I had a place before that one and I’d have another. The fact it was a world-class address didn’t mean much to me. I got it because I had money to burn and the opportunity came up when a rock star fell and needed a quick fix to his finances after too many fixes of another type.
As the cab driver sped down Manhattan streets, playing chicken with jaywalking pedestrians, threatening to leave tire tracks on their backs and teeth marks on his bumper, I realized what was bothering me. I wasn’t leaving anything behind that I cared about. Not my glamorous pad, my fast cars, my trophy boat. Not even my trophy girlfriend. I shipped Katarina off to L.A. with a first-class plane ticket and her bank account fat from the sale of the Bugatti. I liked Katarina, but I didn’t miss her. I only felt a void about her when I was horny, a good sign that my attraction was more lust than love. Not that she wasn’t special to me. The rest of my friends stampeded away when they heard I was broke. Katarina got the word from other people and ran to give me support, but I assured her that it was all a tax-dodge thing with my accountant. It was a good line to feed her. She didn’t understand finances any more complex than balancing her checkbook, if that, but she came from an area of the world where governments had corrupt bureaucracies and tax dodging was a way of life.
I tried to think of someone or something I cared about, really cared about, and came up with a blank. I had no family. Bernie was dead and we weren’t that close emotionally. My stepmother only invited me for the holidays and I always found an excuse not to accept. My stepbrother was a turd. My “friends” were all really just acquaintances—I had no blood brothers, no frat brothers.
Heat of Passion Page 7
