Stone 588

by Gerald A. Browne

  Wintersgill sat back, glanced again out the window. To the west a small but angry remnant storm cloud appeared to be stuck between the twin towers of the San Remo apartment building.

  "You still subsidize films, don't you?" the senator asked.

  "For public broadcasting, yes."

  "Would you be receptive to a documentary film about the Navajo Indians? My son-in-law ..."

  God, not another documentary on the plight of the Navajos, Wintersgill thought. He assumed an interested expression and put himself on automatic behind it for as long as the senator's lips continued to move.

  Then he said, "Sounds like something we'd be extremely interested in funding. Say no more. My secretary will take your son-in-law's name and address and send him an application for a grant."

  That had the ring of a brush-off, the senator thought.

  Wintersgill had purposely put it that way so he could mind-fuck the senator a bit. "1 personally will see that the grant is processed," he reassured him.

  Ten minutes later the senator, satisfied, was gone.

  Wintersgill was told by his secretary that Gilbert Townsend had called twice.

  "Stiff him once more," Wintersgill told her. "When he calls after that, put him through. Meanwhile, I don't want to be disturbed." He removed his suit jacket, hitched up the legs of his trousers so as not to bag their creases, and sat at his desk. Leaning back with eyes closed he took pleasure in the stir of another windfall, this one to come from Townsend's direction.

  He had learned of the Townsend burglary on the morning television news. The first report was that the thieves had gotten away with a hundred million. The last word Wintersgill had heard, that figure had tripled. Wintersgill tried to find in himself some sympathy for Townsend, and perhaps there was a speck of it way back in one of his long-lost callow corners, but how could he feel sorry when the timing was so perfect? Hell, if he knew who the thieves were he'd send them a note of gratitude.

  He reached down into the black alligator business case beside his chair. Brought out a red kid drawstring pouch. Opened it and shook out onto his desk pad twelve smaller black chamois pouches. Those contained the twelve twenty-five-carat Russian diamonds Springer had acquired for Libby. She had given them to Wintersgill over the past weekend, for him to deliver to Townsend Monday, the day before yesterday. Wintersgill just hadn't gotten around to it. He'd planned on taking care of it today.

  He removed the twelve diamonds from their pouches, lined them up girdle to girdle. Libby had shown them to him, but they were much more beautiful now.

  His interphone blinked.

  Townsend was calling for the second time in ten minutes. Wintersgill picked up. Instead of hello he said, "I've heard."

  "I have to see you," Townsend said, his voice an octave higher than usual.

  "I'm with auditors up from Washington, been with them since early morning, and it appears they'll be here all day."

  "It's imperative that I see you."

  "Can't it wait until tonight, or tomorrow?"

  "No."

  "I understand." Wintersgill sighed to dramatize the pressure he was enduring. "Well, a friend in dire straights takes precedence over all else," he recited. He told Townsend where to be in exactly fifteen minutes, then timed himself so that he arrived there in twenty.

  The southeast corner of Central Park, opposite the Hotel Pierre.

  Townsend was standing there in the middle of the walk. His eyes were fixed with painful introspect. He was somewhere between shock and catatonia. His jaw was slack. Wintersgill took hold of his elbow to get him going up Fifth alongside the park.

  Wintersgill wanted to skip all the details. A robbery was a robbery. But it was looping in the most immediate layer of Townsend's consciousness, detained there because it was still too excruciating for the rest of his mind to accept. He had to unload. In that higher-octave grieving voice, he related how he'd come to his busmess that morning even though he'd known there'd be no electric power, no lights. How he'd discovered first the smashed-in panel and torn wires of the backup alarm and then the mess in the room above the vault. He described how the mountings with stones extracted were thrown like so much junk in the comer and how his most precious larger stones were depreciated to gray, faceted lumps. He had touched one and it crumbled. He called his security service, the Reliance people, and the next thing he knew police were all over the place. They still were. They didn't have a clue. They hadn't offered him any hope.

  Before Townsend could tell it all again, Wintersgill asked, "Actually, how much was taken?"

  "Three hundred million."

  "Your cost, retail value, or what?"

  "Mine."

  "And how much is insured?"

  "Twenty million. More than twenty would have cost a fortune in premiums. As it is I've been carrying two policies. That's how it is in the trade."

  "At least you're going to have a hell of a write-off," Wintersgill said with a light edge.

  "I'm in trouble."

  "A loss is only a loss."

  "Some of the goods that were stolen belonged to clients. Several very important pieces were in on consignment. Others equally important were in for appraisal. One client alone had twenty million worth with me."

  "Altogether how much of that sort was lost?"

  "Close to seventy million. I can't cover it."

  "I gather you're asking for my help."

  "Which by no means would be charity," Townsend reminded him gruffly.

  Wintersgill was surprised that Townsend had even that much contention left in him.

  "You could give me something more on the account," Townsend said.

  "How much?"

  "Twenty million."

  "When would you need it?"

  "Already this morning clients were calling wanting to know what if anything had happened to their pieces. I dodged most of the calls, but I won't be able to put them off for long."

  "Would tomorrow afternoon be soon enough?"

  "Tomorrow afternoon would be most appreciated."

  "It will have to be a transfer from account to account in Zurich."

  "That will do fine."

  "Any particular account you want it put into?"

  "Same as last time."

  They walked on a way farther, then did an about-face and headed downtown. Mothers or nurses wheeling dark-blue, very expensive perambulators claimed the center of the shaded walk. Ruffian boys came leaping over the wall of the park, uncatchable. There was the smell of the zoo.

  Townsend had begun again on the robbery, describing the hole in the top of the vault, theorizing on how the thieves had managed to rifle the drawers, confounded by it.

  Wintersgill interrupted. As though it had just then occurred to him, he said, "There is in this an opportunity for you to do me a favor."

  "Oh?"

  "Actually, not a favor for me but for Libby."

  Townsend was not in a position to refuse.

  "No doubt you recall the twelve rather large diamonds Libby wanted you to make into a necklace?"

  "Libby mentioned last week that she had them. I must say I was surprised that fellow Springer was able to come up with them. Are you certain they're not cubic zirconium?"

  "They were within a day of being included in your robbery."

  "How fortunate," Townsend remarked, wishing that could be said of his own goods. "I'd be glad to take a look at them if that's what Libby wants, make sure they're authentic."

  "Let's assume, Gilbert, that these diamonds were handed over to you the day before yesterday, what record would you have of them?"

  "A receipt. I would have given Libby a receipt. And I would have entered them in my computer as inventory."

  "Can you still do both?"

  Townsend got it. The larcenous side of Libby wanted to write off her diamonds and have them too.

  "It must appear as though it was done Monday," Wintersgill said pointedly.

  "How much did they end up costing?"
/>   "Fifteen million."

  Townsend looked off, frowning as though his thoughts were just barely clearing difficult obstacles. The favor would be a simple matter, but Winters-gill shouldn't know that. "I'll need to be precise about the cut of the diamonds, their quality, how much they weigh."

  "They're identical," Wintersgill said and, casually, as though it were no more than a commonplace amulet, from his vest pocket he brought out one of the precious Russians.

  A glint from it shot across the avenue, momentarily distracting Fred Pugh, the lip-reader.

  By late the following afternoon Townsend had regained considerable composure.

  He wasn't his normal, polished self, but the blanch of shock that had jaundiced his tan was gone and about 80 percent of his legs was back under him and again it was somewhat important that his necktie be knotted small but not tight, just so it caused a precise little pleat.

  Much had been lost but not all, was Townsend's attitude.

  He still had his credit. He'd be able to obtain goods on memorandum. He also still had his contacts for getting swag. No doubt the fences, downwind of his needs, were going to their banks and into their iceboxes to decide on what to offer him: pieces they had personally liked and thought they would keep for themselves, pieces that were not yet comfortably cooled. To beat down their asking prices he would use the burglary, the suffering of the loss. Also, from now on, he would be even more conscientious about fucking the sort of people who would never feel it. The Libbys, that crowd. Every antique necklace that came along—not just every other—was going to have a signed and dated certificate of provenance attesting that it had originally belonged to the Marquise de Maintenon or the Comtesse de Polignac or anyone like that who was supposed to have had a historically notable libido. Perhaps, Townsend thought, he would even revive the rumor that he'd cut a discreet deal with the Hermitage to help it sell off more of their Romanoff pieces.

  He'd be restocked and back on top in no time.

  As long as he didn't come up short now. It was essential that he act gracious, make good every dollar his clients were owed, and, in certain cases, throw in a few dollars extra. He would be able to do that with the insurance and what money he had and the twenty million from Wintersgill. He'd expected that twenty million to show up in his Zurich account today but it hadn't. Wintersgill swore he'd ordered the transfer. Probably the Swiss were using the money for a day, as they so often did, drawing interest for themselves while they held the money briefly in limbo, Wintersgill had suggested.

  Fuck the grubbing Swiss!

  And the same for Wintersgill, Townsend felt. How transparent was Wintersgill's offhand manner when he inquired about Libby's fishy fifteen-million-dollar loss. Had Townsend seen to it? Townsend already had the receipt made out, with last Monday's date on it, as requested, and a thorough description of the twelve Russian stones. He was only waiting for Wintersgill to ask for it. He had it delivered by hand to Wintersgill. He had also manipulated the inventory in his computer so the dated entry of those stones was correctly included. It was the last thing he did before making a printout of what had been stolen for the insurance people and the police.

  The police.

  It seemed to Townsend that at least half the force had been trampling all over his establishment yesterday and today. Up and down the stairs, in and out of his office, out on the roof. Smears of their greasy white fingerprint powder were everywhere. They had interrogated and given lie detector tests to the staff. They had, at first, made a lot of the fabric and tape they had found on the outside wall, but as it turned out, the fabric was only a few yards of several mill runs totaling three hundred thousand yards that was spread across the country, and the tape was from one roll out of a half-million similar rolls.

  Townsend soon came to realize the reason so many different and high-level police showed up. They came out of curiosity, more than anything, and to add their theory to the many of how the vault had been plundered through a ten-inch hole in its ceiling. There was no concensus of opinion. Precinct captains, lieutenants, and detectives looked the situation over and stood staring incredulously at the hole. Some returned for a second, reverent look, as though visiting a shrine. One commander with a vivid imagination was convinced that the thieves had used some sort of trained animal, a smart little monkey.

  Thus, Townsend was made to feel that his was not just a burglary, but an anomaly in the annals of crime, a case for Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot.

  Well, at least now, at the end of the second day, the police were gone. Townsend went throughout his building to make sure. Then he locked up, crossed over Fifth Avenue at 56th Street, and entered Trump Tower. It was routine for him to be there at this time of day to close his satellite outlet in the atrium. Cartier had a shop at street level, Winston and Asprey had places on level two, Buccellati on level four. The Townsend outlet was on level five. It wasn't grand but, like Winston's, intimate and extremely elegant. A single, expensively appointed room intended for mere presence, impression, rather than meaningful sales.

  Townsend could have taken the elevator up. It would have been faster, but he'd had enough scurry. He went up level by level, riding the grill-like steps of the escalators. He took vague notice of these surroundings: the prevalence of Breccia Perniche marble that was either a pleasing aggregation of various shades of sienna, ochres, and madders or too much the color of dried blood and vomit, the five-story ledgelike waterfall uplighted and tropically accessorized by long trailing vines, the abundance of gleaming brass and gold-tinted mirror. Not many sightseers, hardly any shoppers. No shoppers on level five.

  It was seven o'clock.

  The manager of the Townsend outlet had already removed the merchandise from the display cases and put it in the floor safe. He reported a bit proudly that sales for the day amounted to fourteen thousand three hundred and twenty-two dollars. Several gold and pave diamond pieces had been purchased.

  Townsend acknowledged the accomplishment with a proportionate quickly on-and-off smile and told the manager he could leave. Townsend put the day's proceeds to pocket and closed the floor safe. As usual, to accommodate anyone who wanted to look in and admire his excellent taste, he left the lights on.

  As he was locking the door he noticed off to his right a large red plastic bucket. Overturned. The sudsy water from it was spilled slick across the marble floor in front of his shop. A fat red-handled mop lay nearby. Evidently one of the Trump maintenance people had just had an accident and, for some reason, left it there. It was unsightly and dangerous. Townsend would complain.

  His mind was on that when the hand came around from behind. He never actually saw that it was a hand because it was so quick. The edge of the stiffened fingers flicked at Townsend's throat, struck his voice box.

  The next thing he knew, he was being lifted from behind by arms around his thighs. Arms so thick and a grasp so strong it was as though he'd been caught up by some brutal mechanism that would have to be switched off before it would let go.

  Ten feet to the railing.

  Townsend kicked and flailed and wriggled. He was screaming but no sounds were coming out. Then he was where he shouldn't be, above the fat polished-brass railing, passing over it, and, perhaps because of the glimpse he got of the waterfall across the way, his mind told him he was merely diving and he expected the air to be a substance with a surface that he would plunge into and be able to swim.

  He was dog-paddling, working his legs furiously, when at 105 miles per hour he belly flopped on the marble lower level seventy-five feet below.

  The tabloids, the Post and the Daily News, gave Townsend's death their entire front pages. It was a godsent follow-up to the boldly headlined play they had given the burglary of his vault earlier in the week. The New York Times also positioned Townsend's death on its front page, but below the fold in a single column with most of the story continued on the obituary page, section D.

  The question posed for journalistic mileage was whether or not Townsen
d had died by accident or suicide. Both the Post and the Daily News made a lot of the spilled bucket of sudsy water and the mop, especially when no one came forward and owned up to having left them there. However, photographs of the mop and the bucket intended to illustrate the story were killed before press time by the editors, who knew such things were far below the body-bag and string-bikini interest level.

  The New York Times account made no mention of controversy. The factual tone of the Times was in agreement with the conclusions of the police and the medical examiner. Townsend, with good reason, had been despondent. His death was an apparent suicide. Most of the content of the Times article concerned itself with Townsend's business background and prominence, information drawn from the obituary that had been already written and kept on file with the obituaries of other notables, ready to go.

  Chapter 35

  Eight days since the burglary.

  Audrey hadn't yet come down, thought she never might.

  The first morning after, when she'd stood on tiptoe and pressed her face to a window of her apartment to watch the commotion that was almost too directly below — all those police going in and out of Townsend's, scrambling and nosing around the rooftops—she'd had the adolescent notion to jot off a cryptic note, fold it into an airplane, and send it gliding down to baffle them all the more.

  What self-delight! Possibly the largest burglary of all time and she'd taken part in it. Not just a wait-in-the-car or help-by-loading-the-guns part, either. She'd been right in the thick of it, putting it all on the line, making criminal history. How about that, fellow women?

  Even when the police were gone from Townsend's and the brick wall repaired and everything down there appeared back to normal, Audrey found herself drawn to that window—to visually trace and therefore to some extent reexperience the exact steps of the adventure: the rooftop fences they had overcome, the perilous ledge they had defied, the walls they had scaled. Each reliving caused a physical sensation in her that was not at all unpleasant, a clenching in the left and right sockets of her groin that could only be described as erotic. Perhaps, she thought, what she was striking was an instinctual nerve connection between sexuality and survival. That would explain her desire for risk. And might it be a two-way circuit, that nerve, so that each orgasm one had was a sort of close call? Didn't the French, who were legendarily wise about such things, call coming la petite mort, the little death?