Michael Gruber - The Book of Air and Shadows

“In a way, although I think Carolyn is pretty much always working for Carolyn. But my sense is they have a relationship too.”

“As do you, I presume.”

“Yeah. I thought we were pretty close, but who knows? Have you heard anything about your kids?”

“No. I have a number to call when I have what they want.”

“Which you now have. Are you going to call them? Obviously, Shvanov is going to find out pretty soon if he hasn’t already.”

“Yes, but I’m not sure it’s Shvanov who has the children.”

“Who else could it be?”

“As I said, I’m not sure, but I’ve thought for some time that there are other players involved.” Mishkin picked up the title page and stared at it, as if the ability to read the strange handwriting might thereby flow into his head.

Crosetti said, “You don’t seem very concerned.”

“Oh, I’m concerned. I’m just not frantic.” He turned and faced Crosetti. “You probably don’t think I’m a very good father. I would agree: I’m not. I wasn’t trained by my own father, which I understand is required. How about you, Crosetti? Did you have a good father?”

“Yeah, I did. I thought he was the greatest man on the planet.”

“Lucky you. Deceased, I understand.”

“Yeah. He was driving down the street, coming home from the office, when he spotted a couple of cops chasing a mutt. He got out of the car and joined in and he popped an artery. DOA. I was twelve.”

“Yes. Well, this seems to conclude our business. We didn’t discuss payment for your time. What would you consider fair?”

Crosetti suddenly wanted to get far away from this man and far from the tangled plot he represented. He couldn’t help thinking that Carolyn had a point about the exciting life. The right movie line would have been “You don’t owe me anything,” followed by a slamming exit, but what Crosetti said in real life was, “How about a round ten grand now, and another forty if it proves out?”

Mishkin nodded. “I’ll send you a check.”

It’s snowing now, a heavy wet snow such as they get in the Northeast when the temperature is just cold enough for snow to form. I am back at the keyboard after a bracing trip in the chill. I visited the boathouse again and checked out the old mahogany speedboat. It is a seventeen-foot 1947 Chris-Craft Deluxe Runabout, with a ninety-five horsepower six, and it looks in mint condition. I filled its tank from a fifty-five-gallon gasoline drum with a hand pump on it. The key was in the ignition and I started it up. After a little coughing it roared nicely and filled the boathouse with a pungent cloud of blue smoke. The other thing I did was to stow my pistol under the cushion of the driver’s seat. Do I have a plan? Not really. I am preparing for various contingencies. If you are expecting a visit from a number of armed men and you have a weapon yourself, you can either start shooting as soon as they arrive, since if you don’t they will come in and take it away from you, or you can hide the thing and hope you can get to it at need. I was not prepared for a firefight with an unknown number of bad guys and so that is what I did. I wonder whether the snow will interfere with my visitors.

To return to this account (and I expect it will be closing soon, as time past rushes toward its rendezvous with time present): after I spoke with Crosetti in Zurich there passed some days of waiting, a dead period, as I had nothing to occupy my time. I really can’t recall what I did except I called Amalie several times a day, to reassure her that things were actually going quite well and to inquire whether she had heard from the kidnappers. Yes, she had. Each morning a video would arrive by e-mail showing an apparently unstressed Niko and Imogen, the latter smiling as at a secret joke, with a copy of that day’s paper, and the message spoken by both of them, always the same: “Hi, Mommy, we’re fine, don’t worry, see you soon.” Fade to black. No warnings, no threats, no clue as to where they were being held or by whom. Beyond that there was nothing for us to talk about, and I believe both of us were happy to break the connection.

Then the call from Crosetti that they actually had the thing and a further day of waiting, during which I left at least six messages with my brother and with my sister. My sister never replied, but late that night my brother called me.

I asked him where he was and he said he was in Zurich with Amalie and updated me on the status of his plan. He said a package would arrive at my house by air express the following morning which would give me what I needed, and I asked him again if he had identified the other players in this game, the ones besides Shvanov, and he said he had not, but his sense was that they were heavily connected to the people who did big-time art heists in Europe, not the kind who stole to sell or to ransom but the ones who supplied very rich immoral people with the odd Titian or Rembrandt for private contemplation. I said that I thought that those people were concocted by writers of cheap fictions and he assured me that they were not, that sinister forces were definitely involved in the affair and that his plan was the only way he could think of to extricate us all from their grip. I sensed that he was hiding something from me but I had no leverage on him then to make him come clean, or perhaps it was my native paranoia with respect to my family.

The next day I received an international FedEx package from Paul, and somewhat later Omar called from the airport saying that Crosetti was off the plane. An hour later Crosetti walked into my loft and handed it over. Of course, I had given Omar, who was armed, instructions to watch the man like a hawk from the second he left the customs shed, but still…I’m not sure I could have done it myself, turning over something he believed was worth tens of millions at least, of uncertain ownership, to rescue two kids he barely knew. A decent man, clearly, and a reproach to all my kind, and I think it speaks badly of me that I could not like him. Like many of his type, he was also something of a schmuck-this Carolyn Rolly apparently had put him through the wringer, and I was not entirely surprised to learn that she was and had always been an agent of Shvanov. I suppose I should have asked him if he had heard anything of Miranda, but I decided that the fewer people who knew about my continuing interest in her the better. In any case, we were not best buddies. He made his feelings about me quite clear as well, and we completed our business quickly.

Shortly after Crosetti left, my phone rang and it was Shvanov. He congratulated me on having recovered a great cultural treasure and told me he would be by shortly to pick it up. I inquired about my missing children. A considerable pause on the line and then he said, “Jake, you are always accusing me of kidnapping people from your life and I have told you sincerely that I do not do such things. This is now becoming boring, you know?”

“Nevertheless, Osip, you see that I can’t release the manuscript to you, as that is what the kidnappers demand for the return of my children. If you don’t have them.”

He said, “Jake, believe me, you have my greatest sympathy and I would be happy to help you in any way, but that does not affect our business relationship. That manuscript was located through means of Professor Bulstrode’s information, which is my property, and so the manuscript is also my property.”

“I think you would have a hard time with that argument in a court of law.”

Another longish pause and then in a voice some decibels quieter he said, “And are you going to take me to court, Jake?” Here a mirthless chuckle. “Maybe I should take you to court.”