Stealing Mona Lisa

by Carson Morton

  For my parents,

  Connie and Carson

  Based on a true story …

  It has been said that nothing ever happened that couldn’t be improved in the retelling. In this spirit the chronology of certain events has been altered for the purposes of the narrative.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Note

  Prologue

  Part I

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Part II

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Part III

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Part IV

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Part V

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Part VI

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright

  Prologue

  PARIS—1925

  The sight of the horse-drawn hearse and its macabre attendants, rising like a specter out of a vaporous late-morning mist, stopped Roger Hargreaves dead in his tracks.

  Tethered to a black leather carriage, four black horses stood unnaturally still, the polls of their heads adorned with towering red plumes. Three monks—hands clasped and faces obscured by the cowls of their coarse robes—contemplated the cobblestones beneath their feet. An undertaker in a long black coat sat on the carriage bench, his gaunt face emerging from beneath a shiny stovepipe hat. The morbid tableau took up fully half of the first of three small courtyards known collectively as the cour de Rohan, a leafy oasis at the edge of Saint-Germain-des-Prés.

  The ghostly scene filled Hargreaves with the eerie feeling that somehow they had all been waiting there just for him.

  Resisting the urge to turn on his heels and go back to the lively bustle of nearby boulevard Saint-Germain, Hargreaves took a step forward. The lead horse and the undertaker slowly turned their heads, almost in unison. Momentarily transfixed by the driver’s blank expression and penetrating stare, Hargreaves acknowledged him with a slight nod, a gesture that was returned almost imperceptibly. He averted his eyes and rechecked the address written in his small reporter’s notebook: 23 cour de Rohan, presumably one of the narrow, clustered three-story, pink-hued stone residences hiding behind the twisted trees and wild ivy vines snaking around their windows. He thought for a moment of asking the undertaker which house it might be but quickly discarded the notion. He had no desire to communicate with this man. Besides, he was a reporter; he could locate a simple address.

  Hargreaves looked at the name in his notebook. Eduardo de Valfierno, some kind of marquis or something. Of course, half the society of Paris laid claim to one title or another these days. Whoever he was, he claimed to have information regarding the theft of the Mona Lisa—or what was it the French called it? La Joconde—from the Louvre Museum back in 1911. Old news, of course. It had been recovered not too long after the incident, but there might be a story there. The marquis had contacted his newspaper, the London Daily Express, by telephone and arrangements had been made. To save expenses, the paper’s editor had wired Hargreaves—already on assignment in Paris—with instructions. At least it would be a change of pace from covering the Exposition Internationale at the place des Invalides. If he had to write another article about the wonders of Art Deco furniture, he’d drown himself in the Seine.

  Trying to ignore the undertaker and his assistants, Hargreaves stepped past them through a partially opened gate into a tiny courtyard. Luck was with him. Attached to the wall next to a large green door, partially obscured by a sprig of ivy leaves, was a wooden plaque with the number 23 etched into it. He lifted a brass knocker in the shape of a cat’s head and tapped it three times onto a well-worn plate. As he waited for a response, he couldn’t resist one more look back through the wrought-iron gate at the hearse.

  “Can I help you, monsieur?”

  Hargreaves turned, startled. A short, heavyset woman in her late sixties stood in the open doorway, her hands placed defiantly on her hips.

  “Bonjour, madame,” he said, removing his bowler hat. “Robert Hargreaves. I’ve come to interview the marquis de Valfierno.”

  The woman regarded him with the icy stare of a stern schoolmistress. Then, with a dismissive snort, she turned sideways and pressed her back against the door panel, not quite inviting but perhaps challenging him to enter.

  Hargreaves stepped past her into a small, darkly lit foyer. “Those men in the courtyard,” he said in an attempt to make conversation, “they make quite a spectacle.”

  The woman said nothing. She closed the door and led him into a sitting room cluttered with unmatched furniture, its windows adorned with fussy draperies. He tried to place the aroma in the air. Jasmine, perhaps. Something strangely exotic, anyway, mixed with an unpleasant musty odor.

  Lowering herself onto a high-backed wooden chair, the woman indicated a plush sofa. Hargreaves sank into the worn-out springs. Forced to look up at her, he felt like a schoolboy about to receive a scolding for some infraction or other. A silence followed, broken only by the snorting of one of the horses in the courtyard.

  “Madame,” Hargreaves began, “I believe you have the advantage of me.”

  “I am Madame Charneau,” she said sharply. “This is my boardinghouse.”

  Hargreaves nodded. More silence.

  “The marquis,” he asked after a moment, “is he here?”

  “The marquis is one of my lodgers,” Madame Charneau replied.

  “May I … see him?”

  “You are a writer, are you not?” It sounded more like an accusation than a question.

  “A correspondent, yes. For the London Daily Express.”

  “And you’re compensating the marquis for this … interview.” She said the word as if it were something unsavory.

  “An arrangement has been agreed upon, yes.” Hargreaves shifted uncomfortably on the sofa.

  “The marquis is a great man, I’m sure,” she said, as if she did not believe it for a moment. “He is also three months arrears in his rent. And he is very ill. You noticed the hearse outside.”

  “Well, yes. Of course.”

  “My brother is an undertaker. As a favor to me he has diverted his men from a local job.”

  “The marquis is that bad?”

  “I’ll be blunt, monsieur. If you wish to see him, you will give me the money now. I will apply it to his rent and to the doctor’s fees.”

  Hargreaves’s throat tighte
ned. “Madame, I’m … not sure I can do that…”

  She began to rise to her feet. “Then I bid you good day.”

  He was beaten. Not wanting to go back to London empty-handed, he held up his hand in a gesture of surrender. Madame Charneau stopped in midrise and lowered herself back down, a smug half smile on her face. Hargreaves removed the wad of franc notes he had prepared and, after giving it a brief, regretful appraisal, offered it to her. The moment she took it from him, her disposition underwent a complete sea change.

  She sprang to her feet and chirped, “You see, monsieur, the mist has lifted. It will be a lovely day after all.”

  With a lighter step than Hargreaves had noticed earlier, she led him out into the foyer and up a staircase to the first floor. On the way up, he surreptitiously checked his pocket watch. A French colleague had tickets to see the American sensation Josephine Baker and her Revue Nègre tonight at the Moulin Rouge. He was not sure he entirely approved of such spectacles, but this was, after all, Paris. At any rate, he hoped that this interview would not take up too much time.

  On the first-floor landing, five doors and another narrow staircase leading upward lined the hallway. Madame Charneau opened the first door to her right and led Hargreaves into a dark, airless room. In the gloom, he could just about make out a figure lying beneath a thick blanket on a brass bed. Madame Charneau went to the window and snapped back a heavy drape, bathing the room in harsh light. The man in the bed shielded his eyes and turned his face to the wall.

  Madame Charneau was all bright, cheery efficiency as she smoothed out his bedsheet and straightened his blanket.

  “You have a visitor, Marquis,” she said eagerly.

  The man in the bed made no movement as Madame Charneau pulled up a wooden chair and motioned for Hargreaves to sit.

  “This is Monsieur Hargreaves. He’s come to hear your stories.”

  With some reluctance, Hargreaves slowly lowered himself onto the chair.

  “Well, I’ll leave you two alone, then, shall I?” Madame Charneau moved to the doorway.

  “I’ll be close by if you need me,” she added before leaving the room and closing the door behind her.

  Hargreaves stared at the back of the man’s head. His thick hair was an almost luminescent white, matted from lying on the pillow.

  “Marquis,” Hargreaves began, but Valfierno, his face still turned to the wall, raised his hand to stop him. Then he slowly turned his head back toward the light, his eyes squinting against the glare. Without looking at Hargreaves, he pointed to a side table littered with various pitchers and bottles.

  “Of course,” Hargreaves said. “You’re thirsty.”

  Grateful to have something to occupy himself with, Hargreaves lifted a pitcher of water and filled a tumbler. He handed it to Valfierno, who impatiently brushed it aside, spilling some of its contents onto the bedcover. He pointed to the table again. Next to the water pitcher sat a half-full bottle of what appeared to be gin or vodka.

  “The bottle?” asked Hargreaves.

  Valfierno nodded.

  Hargreaves picked up the bottle and found a sticky shot glass in the clutter of the tabletop. He filled it and held it out to the man. Valfierno propped himself up on an elbow, took the glass, and thirstily poured the clear liquid down his throat. Savoring the experience, he handed the empty shot glass to Hargreaves and lay back with an expression that approached contentment, or perhaps it was simply temporary relief from pain.

  Then he began to cough explosively.

  “Are you all right?” Hargreaves asked, thinking that he had just hastened the older man’s demise.

  The coughing slowly subsided, like a rumble of thunder fading into the distance.

  “I have felt better,” he allowed. His voice was hollow, as dry as parchment. Then, for the first time, he looked directly at the Englishman through rheumy, bloodshot eyes. His lips curled into a faintly sardonic smile and he added, “but thank you for asking.”

  Though Hargreaves estimated that the man was perhaps not yet sixty years old, he was aged beyond his years, his unshaven face sallow and drawn.

  “You brought the money?” Valfierno asked, his voice clearing and gaining resonance.

  Hargreaves hesitated. “Ah, yes … the money. Truth be told, I gave it for safekeeping to Madame Charneau.”

  “That witch!” Valfierno spat out, bringing on another series of racking coughs. “I only wish to live in order to torment that putain longer.” He coughed again and shook his head in resignation. “Never mind. There’s not much time left. Are you ready?”

  Hargreaves nodded and dug his small notebook and pencil from his jacket pocket.

  “Quite ready. Our readers, I’m sure, will wish to hear the story of the theft of the world’s greatest painting in great detail. I’ve prepared some questions—”

  Valfierno cut him off with a sharp gesture of his hand.

  “No questions! No answers!”

  Hargreaves drew back at the outburst.

  “Don’t worry,” Valfierno said, his voice softening. “You won’t leave empty-handed. I’ll tell you a story. Do you like stories?”

  “If they are true,” Hargreaves replied tightly.

  Valfierno nodded. “Then I’ll tell you a true story.”

  Valfierno’s head sank back deeply into the pillow and he stared up at the ceiling as if looking for something hidden deep in the cracks of the plaster. “Have you ever been to Buenos Aires, Mister…?”

  “Hargreaves, and no, I haven’t had the pleasure.”

  “Pleasure indeed,” Valfierno said, ignoring the impatient sarcasm in Hargreaves’s voice. “The fragrance of the jacaranda trees fills the air; parilla cafés lure you in with their enticing aromas; and the tangos played by the orquestas típicas torment the soul with their elusive promise of love.”

  Making a fist and holding it to his heart, he turned to look directly into the reporter’s eyes. “Have you ever experienced le coup de foudre, Mr. Hargreaves? Have you ever fallen in love at first sight?”

  Hargreaves bristled. “I shouldn’t think so.”

  “Did you know that a man can fall under the spell of a woman and not even realize it?”

  Hargreaves was getting nowhere. He had to get this man back on track. “You mentioned Buenos Aires.”

  Valfierno turned his face back to the ceiling. His eyes drifted shut and for a moment Hargreaves thought he was falling asleep, or worse. But then they shot open, a sparkling intensity shining through the milky haze.

  “Yes,” he said, “Buenos Aires. That is where my story begins.”

  Part I

  Bait the hook well, this fish will bite

  —Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing

  Chapter 1

  BUENOS AIRES—1910

  The marquis de Valfierno stood tapping the knob handle of his gentleman’s cane into the palm of his hand at the foot of the steps of the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes. His Panama hat shaded his face, and his spotless white suit helped to reflect the sharp South American sun, but he was still uncomfortably warm. He could have chosen to stand at the top of the steps in the shadow of the museum portico, but he always preferred greeting his clients at street level and then walking up with them to the entrance. There was something about ascending the steps together that fostered easy and excited conversation, as if he and his client were embarking on a momentous journey, a journey that would enrich both of them.

  He checked his pocket watch: 4:28. Joshua Hart would be punctual. He had amassed his fortune by making sure his trains ran on time. He became one of the richest men in the world by filling those trains with passengers reading his newspapers, and loading them with mountains of coal and iron bound for his own factories to forge the steel for a new America.

  4:30. Valfierno looked across the plaza. Joshua Hart—titan of industry—came on like the engine of one of his trains, a stout barrel of a man, robust at the age of sixty, clad in a black suit despite the heat. Valfierno could almost s
ee the thick smoke curling upward from the stack of his stovepipe hat.

  “Señor Hart,” Valfierno said as the shorter man planted himself in front of him. “As always, it is an honor, a pleasure, and a privilege to see you.”

  “Save the horseshit, Valfierno,” Hart said with only a slight hint of ironic camaraderie. “If this godforsaken country were any hotter, I would not be surprised to find out it was Hades itself.”

  “I would think,” said Valfierno, “that the devil would find himself at home in any climate.”

  Hart allowed a grudging snicker of appreciation for this remark as he mopped his face with a white silk handkerchief. Only then did Valfierno take notice of the two slender women, both dressed in white, lacy dresses and both taller than Hart, collecting behind him like the cars of a loosely linked train. One was in her fifties, the other in her thirties perhaps. Valfierno had dealt with Hart on a number of occasions through the years, knew he was married, but had never met his wife. He could only assume that the younger woman was his daughter.

  Valfierno doffed his hat in acknowledgment and looked to Hart for an introduction.

  “Ah, yes, of course,” Hart began with a hint of impatience. “May I introduce my wife, Mrs. Hart…”

  Hart indicated the younger woman, who smiled demurely and only briefly made eye contact with Valfierno.

  “… and this,” Hart said, a hint of disapproval in his voice, “is her mother.”

  The older woman did not respond in any way.

  Valfierno bowed. “Eduardo de Valfierno,” he said, introducing himself. “It is a pleasure to meet you both.”

  Mrs. Hart’s face was partly obscured by the wide brim of her hat, and Valfierno’s first impression was of white, smooth skin and a delicately pointed chin.

  Mrs. Hart’s mother was a handsome—if somewhat worn—woman whose placid smile was fixed, as was her gaze, a blank stare concentrated on a point behind Valfierno’s shoulder. He felt the urge to turn to see what she was looking at but thought better of it. Was she blind? No, not blind. Something else.

  “I trust that you ladies are enjoying your visit,” he said.

  “We haven’t as yet been able to see much,” Mrs. Hart began, “but we’re hoping that we—”