Jeffrey Archer - False Impression

Krantz nodded toward the linen closet. He pulled open the door and they both slipped inside. Krantz immediately opened the palm of her hand to reveal the two twenty-dollar bills. She passed them over to the guard. Just as he went to grab them, she dropped one on the floor. He bent down to pick it up — only a matter of a second — but long enough for him to feel the full force of her knee as it came crashing up into his groin. As he fell forward, grasping his crotch, Krantz grabbed him by the hair and in one swift movement sliced open his throat with the doctor’s scissors. Not the most efficient of instruments, but the only thing she could lay her hands on. She let go of his hair, grabbed him by the collar, and, with all the strength she could muster, bundled him into the laundry chute. With a heave she helped him on his way, then dived in behind him.

They both bounced down the spacious metal tube, and a few seconds later landed with a thud on a pile of sheets, pillowcases, and towels in the laundry room. Krantz leapt up, grabbed the smallest overall from a peg on the wall, pulled it on, and ran across to the door. She opened it slowly and peered out through the crack into the corridor. The only person in sight was a cleaner, on her knees polishing the floor. Krantz walked quickly past her and pushed open the fire-exit door to be greeted by the word Subsol on the wall in front of her. She ran up one flight of steps, pulled up a window on the ground floor, and climbed out onto a flower bed. It was pouring with rain.

She looked around, expecting at any moment to hear the raucous sound of a siren followed by floodlights illuminating every inch of the hospital grounds.

Krantz had covered nearly two miles by the time the philanderer required the privacy of the linen closet for a second time that night. The nurse screamed when she saw the blood all over the white walls. The guard ran back into the corridor and charged toward the prisoner’s room. The chair-bound guard at the end of the passage leaped up from his seat as the smoker came rushing in from the fire escape. The philanderer reached her room first. He pulled open the door, switched on the light, and let out a tirade of expletives, while the smoker smashed the glass covering the alarm and pressed the red button.

One of Anna’s golden rules when she woke in the morning was not to check the messages on her cell phone until she had showered, dressed, had breakfast, and read The New York Times . But as she had broken every one of her golden rules over the last two weeks, she checked her messages even before she got out of bed. One from Stalker asking her to call, which made her smile, one from Tina — no message, and one from Mr. Nakamura, which made her frown — only four words: “Urgent, please call. Nakamura.”

Anna decided to take a cold shower before she returned his call. As the jets of water cascaded down on her, she thought about Mr. Nakamura’s message. The word urgent always made her assume the worst — Anna fell into the half-empty-glass category rather than the half-full.

She was wide awake by the time she stepped out of the shower. Her heart was pounding at about the same pace as when she’d just finished her morning run. She sat on the end of the bed and tried to compose herself.

Once Anna felt her heartbeat had returned to as near normal as it was likely to, she dialed Nakamura’s number in Tokyo.

“Hai, Shacho-Shitso desu,” announced the receptionist.

“Mr. Nakamura, please.”

“Who shall I say is calling?”

“Anna Petrescu.”

“Ah yes, he is expecting your call.” Anna’s heartbeat quickened.

“Good morning, Dr. Petrescu.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Nakamura,” said Anna, wishing she could see his face and more quickly learn her fate.

“I’ve recently had a most unpleasant conversation with your former boss, Bryce Fenston,” continued Nakamura. “Which I’m afraid” — Anna could hardly breathe — “has made me reassess” — was she about to be sick? — “my opinion of that man. However, that’s not the purpose of this call. I just wanted to let you know that you are currently costing me around five hundred dollars a day as I have, as you requested, deposited five million dollars with my lawyers in London. So I would like to view the Van Gogh as soon as possible.”

“I could fly to Tokyo in the next few days,” Anna assured him, “but I would first have to go to England and pick up the painting.”

“That may not prove necessary,” said Nakamura. “I have a meeting with Corus Steel in London scheduled for Wednesday, and would be happy to fly over a day earlier, if that was convenient for Lady Arabella.”

“I’m sure that will be just fine,” said Anna. “I’ll need to contact Arabella and then call your secretary to confirm the details. Wentworth Hall is only about thirty minutes from Heathrow.”

“Excellent,” said Nakamura. “Then I’ll look forward to seeing you both tomorrow evening.” He paused. “By the way, Anna, have you given any more thought to becoming the director of my foundation? Because Mr. Fenston did convince me of one thing: you are certainly worth five hundred dollars a day.”

Although it was the third time Fenston had read the article, a smile never left his face. He couldn’t wait to share the news with Leapman, though he suspected he’d already seen the piece. He glanced at the clock on his desk, just before ten. Leapman was never late. Where was he?

Tina had already warned him that Mr. Jackson, an insurance assessor from Lloyd’s of London, was in the waiting room, and the front desk had just called to say that Chris Savage of Christie’s was on his way up.

“As soon as Savage appears,” said Fenston, “send them both in and then tell Leapman to join us.”

“I haven’t seen Mr. Leapman this morning,” said Tina.

“Well, tell him I want him in here the moment he arrives,” said Fenston. The smile returned to his face when he reread the headline, KITCHEN KNIFE KILLER ESCAPES.

There was a knock on the door, and Tina ushered both men into the office.

“Mr. Jackson and Mr. Savage,” she said. From their dress, it would not have been difficult to fathom which was the insurance broker and which one spent his life in the art world.

Fenston stepped forward and shook hands with a short, balding man in a navy pin-striped suit and crested blue tie, who introduced himself as Bill Jackson. Fenston nodded at Savage, whom he had met at Christie’s on several occasions over the years. He was wearing his trademark bow tie.

“I wish to make it clear from the outset,” began Fenston, “that I only want to insure this one painting,” he said, gesturing toward the Van Gogh, “for twenty million dollars.”

“Despite the fact that it might fetch five times that amount were it to come under the hammer?” queried Savage, who turned to study the picture for the first time.

“That would, of course, mean a far lower premium,” interjected Jackson. “That’s assuming our security boys consider the painting is adequately protected.”

“Just stay where you are, Mr. Jackson, and you can decide for yourself if it’s adequately protected.”

Fenston walked to the door, entered a six-digit code on the keypad next to the light switch, and left the room. The moment the door closed behind him, a metal grille appeared from out of the ceiling and eight seconds later was clamped to the floor, covering the Van Gogh. At the same time, an alarm emitted an ear-piercing sound that would have caused even Quasimodo to seek another vocation.

Jackson quickly pressed the palms of his hands over his ears and turned around to see that a second grille had already barred his exit from the only door in the room. He walked across to the window and looked down at the midgets hurrying along the sidewalk below. A few seconds later, the alarm stopped and the metal grilles slid up into the ceiling. Fenston marched back into the room, looking pleased with himself.