Jose Somoza - Art of Murder

'Paul, he was a work of art; he didn't belong to us. He was not from the Foundation. We cannot search the bag of a work that is not ours.' 'Who raised the alarm?'

'Saltzer. He phoned the suite at twelve as a matter of routine. No one replied, and perhaps that was when he made his only mistake. He chose to stay downstairs and call again later. According to him, sometimes the twins decided not to answer the phone. After ringing three times, he got worried and went up to have a look. That allowed us to have more control over things than in Vienna, because we were the ones who discovered the bodies and informed the police when we were ready to do so. And I can forgive him his mistake, Paul. The guy was already inside.'

'OK, so he was inside,' Kurt Sorensen butted in, 'but how did he manage to get out?'

That was the easy part. He went down the stairs to another floor. From there he took a different lift. And he probably used another disguise so as not to arouse any suspicions. Our men were trained to stop anyone entering, not anyone going out.'

'Do you get it now, Paul?' boomed Gert Warfell. 'This bastard is a real expert.'

There was an uncomfortable silence, after which the Head Honcho spoke with incongruous enthusiasm.

'Excuse me for changing the subject for a moment, but I wanted to say that I had the chance to visit the Haus der Kunst and the 'Monsters' exhibition yesterday. I wanted to congratulate you. It's incredible.' He appeared to be speaking to them all, although he was looking directly at Stein. There were some things I didn't understand, though. What's the point, for example, of putting a terminally ill AIDS patient on show?'

'It's art, fuschus' Stein replied in a level tone. 'The only reason for art is art itself.'

'I've also seen the exhibition,' the Europol representative, Albert Knopffer, said. 'What impressed me most was that eight-or nine-year-old girl carrying that African baby who turned out to be a dwarf male model. That gave me the shivers.'

'We could spend all day talking about the works,' said the Head Honcho as he reached for more sweets. ‘I think they're even more profound than 'Flowers'. But let's be precise. They are different, the two shows can't be compared. However, they do seem more profound to me. Congratulations.' 'They are works by the Maestro,' said Stein.

'Yes, but you work with him. So congratulations are due to both of you.' Stein nodded his acknowledgement. 'Lothar, why don't you tell us about the girl called Brenda?'

Sorensen asked. 'Just to fill in for our friends here’ he added, smiling at the Head Honcho.

Kurt Sorensen was the person who acted as the link between the Foundation and the insurance companies. He had learnt to get on with everyone, but Bosch did not like him. It was not just his pale face and vampire's brows that irritated him, but his character as well. He thought he knew everything, that he had all the latest and most accurate information.

'Fine, Kurt.' Bosch shuffled the papers on his lap. 'According to our information, the other days of the week Weiss was on show as another work, an oil painting by Kate Niemeyer at the Max Ernst gallery on Maximilianstrasse. On Monday after work, a girl was waiting for him outside the gallery. Weiss introduced her to a friend of his, another canvas. He told her she was called Brenda, and that she was an art dealer. Weiss' friend, whom we questioned yesterday, said that Brenda looked like a painting. I should point out that paintings can often recognise others of their kind. Apparently, Brenda looked very much like a young professional canvas: athletic body, smooth skin, striking beauty. Weiss and his friend Brenda, whom we don't know when or how he met, had dinner at a restaurant and then went to his motel. The following afternoon, Weiss left on his own. He said goodbye and handed his key in at reception. The receptionist knew Weiss very well, and says he saw nothing odd apart from the bag he was carrying. He didn't look too closely, but he swears it was not the bag Weiss usually carried – which, by the way, he had left in the restaurant the previous evening. Nobody saw the girl leave at any point that day, and I'm sure that whoever the receptionist was, they would have noticed someone like her. Nor did anyone go into Weiss' room. But, of course, the Weiss who left the motel could not have been the real one, because he was killed more than twelve hours earlier…' 'Therefore…' interjected Sorensen.

'Therefore we are led to believe that the false Weiss and the girl are the same person. In all likelihood what he was carrying under his arm was the disguise for Brenda.'

'Which allows us to link this to the girl who had no papers’

Sorensen said, looking across at the Head Honcho. 'That's right, isn't it, Lothar?'

'Exactly. I think you all know about that already. In Vienna, Oscar Diaz met a girl with no residence papers, whom we can find no trace of. Later, a false Diaz turns up, and the body of the real one is found floating in the Danube, strangled with a wire cable. We must assume our man has repeated the same tactic' 'If there is only one person involved,' Benoit said.

That's true,' Gert Warfell agreed. He was the supervisor of the Foundation's Robbery Prevention and Alarms Section, an impetuous individual with the face of a bulldog.' It could be several people, a complete team of silicone experts working together. It could be a man or a woman, or several men and women. It could be… Dammit, it could be anyone.'

The woman among the group of people Bosch had identified as important shifted in her seat, cleared her throat, and spoke for the first time. Her platinum blonde hair appeared chiselled. She was wearing a steel-grey suit with matching stockings. Her eyes were of exactly the same colour, too; and Bosch suspected her mind might be steely as well. He had been told her name was Roman. Her metallic eyes seemed to give off sparks.

'In short,' she said in a high-pitched voice with an American accent, 'if I have understood correctly, gentlemen, there is someone, or perhaps more than one person, who is dedicated to destroying Mr Bruno van Tysch's paintings. They have already succeeded twice, and apparently there is nothing to stop them from doing so a third time. How, therefore, can I offer my clients any reassurance? How can I persuade them to go on investing in the creation, upkeep and security of works which anyone could destroy at any moment!'

Various voices were raised, but it was Benoit who spoke for all of them.

'Miss Roman, our meeting here is aimed precisely at resolving that problem…' The collar of his splendid maroon shirt was stained with sweat. 'There have been failings in our security system which I am the first to recognise and regret, as you will have heard… but these gentlemen…' he gestured vaguely in the direction of Head Honcho, '. .. these gentlemen are not part of our security team. These gentlemen we have asked to help… do you know who these gentlemen are?…'

"Yes, I know who these gentlemen are’ Roman replied evenly. 'What I'd like to know is how much these gentlemen are going to cost us.'

Another hubbub, which immediately ceased when the Head Honcho began to speak.

'No, no, no. We won't cost the Van Tysch Foundation anything, Miss Roman. Let's be precise. Rip van Winkle is a European Union defence system. More precisely still, Rip van Winkle is a system paid for by the cohesion funds of all the member countries.' He paused to scoop up another handful of sweets from between the Tray's breasts. One of them fell and bounced off the taut naked stomach. 'Let's be precise. Neither Mr Harlbrunner, Mr Knopffer nor I are here because we will be paid more, nor because we have any economic interest in this affair. We are part of Rip van Winkle. Part of it, Miss Roman. Let's be precise. If we are here, it's simply because matters which affect our European cultural and artistic heritage affect all of us, as citizens of countries with long traditions. If a terrorist group threatened the Parthenon, Rip van Winkle would be called in. And if Bruno van Tysch's works are threatened by whatever group it may be, then Rip van Winkle will be involved. It's not about money, Miss Roman, it's about moral obligations.' Flinging his head back, he tipped the handful of sweets into his mouth.