Stealing the Countess Read online

  “What favor are you going to do for the Maestro?” Erica asked.

  “I’m not sure I’m going to do it yet.”

  “What?”

  “He wants me to retrieve his stolen Stradivarius.”

  “Someone swiped the Countess Borromeo?”

  “How do you know these things?”

  “That’s horrible. For a musician like Paul Duclos, that’s like losing his, his…”

  “Lover?”

  The heads of both women came up; their eyes snapped on me.

  “Just something that popped into my head while I was chatting with him,” I said.

  “Are you going to do it?” Erica asked. “Help him, I mean?”

  “Like I said, I haven’t decided. Although…”

  I handed the card to Nina. She read it silently and then aloud. “If you’re wise, you will not join the hunt for the stolen Stradivarius. Consider this your only warning.”

  “Wait,” Erica said. “What?”

  “It gets better.”

  I handed the envelope to Nina. There was a yellow strip with my current address covering the address that was originally written there with the words FORWARD TO stamped across the top.

  “It was mailed to your house on Hoyt Avenue in St. Paul,” Nina said. “Whoever sent it didn’t know we moved here in January.”

  “The postmark,” I said.

  “Bayfield, Wisconsin.”

  “The Stradivarius was stolen four days ago.” I held up four fingers in case there was any confusion. “In Bayfield. This was mailed on Saturday and delivered on Monday.”

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Erica said. “How could the thieves know you were going after the violin three days before Duclos asked you to?”

  “What makes you think the card was sent by the thieves?”

  “Someone doesn’t want you to chase the Countess.”

  “On the contrary, sweetie. Whoever sent it knows this is exactly the kind of thing that would convince me to do it.”

  “It’s not a warning,” Nina said. She popped another grape into her mouth. “Like I said, it’s an invitation.”

  TWO

  I found Vincent Donatucci kneeling on a foam cushion at the edge of his garden, a three-prong tiller in his hand. There was a small plastic bucket next to him. There were a few weeds inside, but not many.

  “I never thought of you as a gardener,” I said.

  He responded as if he knew I was standing behind him all the time, didn’t even turn his head.

  “A man needs to keep busy,” Donatucci said. “Here.”

  He offered his arm. I moved quickly to his side and helped him to his feet. I was prepared to assist him to a couple of lawn chairs overlooking the garden, but he shoved my arm away.

  “I can walk,” he said.

  Still, I was surprised by how ancient he seemed. I knew he was old when I first met him. That was nearly eight years ago. He had asked many questions, and even though he didn’t like my answers, he eventually handed over a check for $3,128,584.50—my compensation for capturing an astonishingly enterprising embezzler and returning the money he stole to the insurance company.

  I saw him again when he recruited me to help recover the Jade Lily, an artifact stolen from a Minneapolis art museum. Both times I thought that he was far too old for the job—the way he grunted and sighed as he moved, his face so deeply wrinkled that I wondered how he shaved. Now he looked as if he had given up shaving altogether.

  He shuffled to a lawn chair and sat as if he were afraid of breaking something.

  “I take it you’ve spoken to Paul Duclos,” he said. “Else why would you be here?”

  “How do you know him?”

  “Through Midwest. I’m the one who insisted he put a GPS chip in his violin case. I wanted to attach one to the inside of the violin, but he refused. Something about acoustics. Also gave him some rules about carrying the damn thing that he apparently ignored. So?”

  Donatucci looked up at me from the chair and smiled. Both his eyes and voice were clear. I sat in the chair next to him.

  “So?” he repeated. “What do you think?”

  “About what?”

  “Don’t make me work for it, McKenzie. It’s too damn hot. Besides, you wouldn’t be here if you weren’t interested.”

  “I’m told you’re not with Midwest anymore.”

  “Mandatory retirement. Sonsuvbitches look at a man’s age, how much time he spends in the restroom, and completely ignore the quality of his mind, the clarity of his thinking. I was the smartest person in the room. Management didn’t care. All they do is crunch numbers.”

  “You say that as if it comes as a surprise. It was an insurance company, for God’s sake. What did you expect?”

  “I expected better, especially considering the amount of money I’ve saved them over the years. Tens of millions. I’m gonna save ’em some more, too. Or I should say, you are.”

  “I am? Why?”

  “Cuz it’s the right thing to do.”

  “C’mon.”

  “What they’re doing—I’ve never wanted to negotiate with criminals. I wanted to see them go to jail. Every mother’s son. Believe me.”

  “Oh, I believe you.”

  “How much time did Teachwell do for embezzling all that cash?”

  “Many years.”

  “Arrest them all, I say. But first—do you think it’s some kind of moral victory to refuse to negotiate with criminals? ‘Look at us. Aren’t we virtuous?’ That’s what Midwest was saying when they made the announcement that they wouldn’t pay a reward for the Stradivarius unless there was a conviction. Think that’ll deter the thieves? Think they’ll throw their hands in the air and admit defeat? Give back the violin and go straight? Puhleez.

  “The Stradivarius should come first. That’s what matters. Dammit, McKenzie, it’s irreplaceable. Priceless. You want to see it burned in someone’s fireplace? Dammit. They don’t even seem to care if they get it back, happy to write a four-million-dollar check to the Peyroux Foundation to cover their loss. In my day that was the last thing we wanted to do. Instead, we did whatever was necessary to recover what was stolen. Sometimes that meant making deals with crooks. I told them, too. Called Midwest when they went public with their refusal to negotiate. Spoke to my replacement. They wouldn’t listen. I’m just an old man. Why listen to me? You, though…”

  “What about me?”

  “Millionaire ex-cop philanthropist tryin’ to make the world a better place. Isn’t that what you do with your time these days? Isn’t that why you helped me go after the Jade Lily? You’re a do-gooder, McKenzie. Here’s your chance to do some more.”

  “Do what exactly?”

  “Duclos didn’t say? He’s desperate to get the violin back. He thinks of it as a living thing.”

  “I got that impression.”

  “He’s willing to pay. He’s going to match the reward Midwest Farmers is offering, $250,000. Only with him, it’ll be no questions asked. All he needs is a go-between. Someone to take the money up to Bayfield, let it be known that he’s willing to deal, wait for the thieves to come forward.”

  “Do you really believe the thieves are still in Bayfield?”

  “No, but it’s the logical place to start.”

  “I don’t know. Seems to me a guy could get into a lot of trouble doing this sort of thing.”

  “When did you start worrying about a little trouble?”

  “A lot, Mr. Donatucci. I said ‘a lot of trouble.’ You still haven’t explained why you care.”

  “The youngster they replaced me with, she’s … she’s not ready.”

  “She?”

  “A girl, McKenzie. They replaced me with a girl.”

  Outrageous, my inner voice said.

  “I’m surprised you feel that way,” I said aloud.

  “You don’t get it.”

  I’ve known an awful lot of very smart women in my time, including the one I sleep with, so he was right, I
didn’t get it.

  “What bothers me isn’t that she’s a female,” Donatucci said. “It’s that she’s so damn…”

  “Young?”

  “Exactly.”

  “You want to show her up.”

  “No, no, no, McKenzie. I like her. Maryanne Altavilla. I hired her; gave her a job right out of college. Trained her, too. It’s the fucking number crunchers who think that I’m too old to do the job but that a young girl can—they’re the ones I want to show up.”

  “Do you think you’ll accomplish that by returning the Strad to its rightful owner?”

  “They’ll look awfully dumb, won’t they, standin’ there with idiot expressions on their faces when we hand the violin back to Duclos? The world might not hear of it, the media, but the people in the industry, they’ll get the word and they’ll laugh.”

  “That’ll teach ’em.”

  “Damn right,” Donatucci said.

  “Strike a blow for the AARP generation.”

  “Why not?”

  Why not, indeed? my inner voice asked. You’re never going to get old, and neither will Nina, but all your friends will.

  “I need to know more about the theft,” I said.

  “I should hope so. Here.”

  Donatucci offered me his arm again, and I helped him up.

  I followed him inside his house. Donatucci had been married, but his wife had passed before we met, and whatever housekeeping skills she instilled in him had dissipated over the years for lack of use. Which isn’t to suggest the man was sloppy. He merely lived the bachelor life, always asking why he should find a drawer for something when he could pile it near at hand should he need it. Like the tourist handouts he must have acquired in Philadelphia that were strewn across his dining room table; an expired admission ticket told me he took a tour of Independence Hall at 10:00 A.M. nine days ago. He saw me looking at it.

  “Wanted to see where it all began,” Donatucci said. “Liberty Bell is a lot smaller than I thought it’d be.” He dismissed the literature with a gesture. “Shoulda done it years ago. When I was young.”

  I might have said something consolatory about age and never being too old, only he was gazing at a photograph of his wife at the time, and I let it slide.

  Instead of in the dining room, Donatucci sat me at his empty kitchen table. His age and employment status notwithstanding, he must have maintained his contacts, because he was able to carefully stack copies of reports from the Bayfield Police Department, the Bayfield Sheriff’s Department, the Wisconsin Division of Criminal Investigation, and even the FBI in a neat pile in front of me. He also had a detailed statement given by Duclos to the investigators at Midwest Farmers. Taken together, they formed the basis of the story he told me …

  Twelve years ago, Duclos received a curious e-mail. A woman named Renée Peyroux wrote that the foundation she represented—that her family had established decades earlier—was in the process of purchasing a newly discovered Stradivarius violin known as the Countess Borromeo. She asked if he would be interested in playing it.

  This was not unusual. Two or three times a year, the Maestro received e-mails from people and organizations about the discovery of a Stradivarius. It was typical of someone who had achieved his status: two degrees from Juilliard, first violin and concertmaster with the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C., founding member of the Dresden Quartet, and sought-after soloist appearing with symphonies around the world. Most of the e-mails were wishful thinking if not utter nonsense. The exceptional genius and workaholic Antonio Stradivari created 540 violins—that the world has been able to catalog—of such notable and dazzling quality that they’re still considered to be the finest musical instruments ever built 280 years following his death. People have been discovering them in the dusty corners of attics and at flea markets ever since.

  Yet Renée’s e-mail was legitimate. The Georges and Adrienne Peyroux Foundation for the Arts did acquire the Countess Borromeo, it did loan her to Duclos with virtually no conditions amid much fanfare, and he did play her on many of the world’s greatest stages. He actually won a Grammy for the classical music album Songs of the Countess. At the same time, he was busy wooing the fabulously wealthy Renée Marie Peyroux. Two years after they met, Duclos and Renée married. They were in their early fifties at the time, and it was the first marriage for both of them; she kept her maiden name. When Georges and Adrienne passed within six months of each other, the couple settled in the Twin Cities, where Renée grew up, and she took control of the foundation. A couple of years later, Duclos became a soloist and artistic partner with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

  The SPCO was the only full-time professional chamber orchestra in the country, performing 130 concerts a year and enjoying two million weekly radio listeners. It was in the middle of its summer tour when the Maestro received a call. Would Bayfield, Wisconsin’s favorite son consider playing in the city’s Concert in the Park Series? Duclos happily accepted the invitation. It sounded like fun.

  “That’s what he told me, too,” I said. “That it was supposed to be fun.”

  Donatucci ignored my interruption and was about to continue reciting his story when I stopped him again.

  “When was the call made?” I asked.

  “Two weeks before the concert. The scheduled act had to cancel, and someone said, ‘Hey, why don’t we call the great Maestro? What could it hurt?’”

  The Bayfield appearance had fit neatly into Duclos’s calendar. The SPCO had a performance scheduled at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts in Milwaukee on Tuesday night. He would drive to Bayfield, arriving on Wednesday afternoon, play the concert Thursday evening, and drive the two hours to Duluth, Minnesota, Friday morning, arriving with plenty of time to rejoin the SPCO and rehearse for that evening’s performance at Symphony Hall.

  The Maestro arrived early Wednesday afternoon as scheduled, stopping at City Hall as requested, where he was welcomed as a conquering hero. “Those were his words, not mine,” Donatucci said.

  The mayor was there to greet him, as were members of the common council, the chamber of commerce, and the visitors’ bureau that had arranged the concert. He was led to the New Queen Anne Victorian Mansion Bed and Breakfast, where he was installed in the Queen Anne Suite on the third floor, the best room in the house, with a splendid view of the city. Afterward, he was treated to dinner at the Hill House Restaurant, where he was reacquainted with several old friends.

  “Where was the violin during all of this?” I asked.

  “Locked in his room at the B&B.”

  Thursday afternoon, Duclos met with Geoff Pascoe, the man who would accompany him during the concert. Pascoe was also a local boy, born and raised in Superior, Wisconsin. Duclos liked him, said he had nice technique. After the rehearsal, Duclos left Bayfield to clear his head. “His words, again.”

  “The Countess?” I asked.

  “He took her with him.”

  “People never saw him carrying it around on the street, then.”

  “If they did, it was only briefly.”

  Eventually, Duclos returned to Bayfield, and without much ado, the concert began. It was played from a large gazebo in the corner of Memorial Park between downtown Bayfield and the marina, with Lake Superior glistening beyond. It began at seven and lasted until after sunset, about nine. Several thousand people were there; there’s no way of knowing the exact number. Everyone was convinced, though, that it was the largest turnout ever for a Concert in the Park, and the biggest crowd to hit the city with the exception of its annual Apple Festival.

  Afterward, Duclos, Pascoe, and just about everyone who was anyone in Bayfield retired to the Hill House for an after-concert party. Duclos stayed until about eleven. He reminded his guests that he had to get up early the next day and drive to Duluth but thanked one and all for their kindness and generosity.

  Duclos and the Countess Borromeo returned to the Queen Anne. He went to bed. The next morning he rose early. He said he took a
walk through the mostly empty streets of Bayfield. He returned to the B&B for breakfast at eight, went to his room, began to pack for his trip, and that’s when he discovered that the Stradivarius was missing.

  “Was it there before he took his walk?” I asked.

  “He said he didn’t notice.”

  Duclos panicked. He called Connor Rasmussen, the owner of the Queen Anne, and together they called the police. Unfortunately, the Bayfield police officer who responded to the complaint was unimpressed, as indicated by the questions he asked. “How do you spell Stradivarius? What the fuck is a Stradivarius? How could a violin, I don’t care what it’s called, be worth four million dollars?”

  Fortunately, Rasmussen made a call to the Bayfield County sheriff, a man he knew personally, and explained what happened. The sheriff called the Bayfield chief of police. The Bayfield chief of police—his name was Jeremy Neville—called the officer on his cell phone. The conversation went something like this:

  “Officer, this is Chief Neville. What do you have?”

  “Got a guy here says someone stole his fiddle.”

  “Listen to me very carefully. This is not a fiddle. This is a fucking multimillion-dollar musical instrument. Secure the crime scene; don’t touch anything.”

  The investigation gained a little momentum after that. Within twenty minutes both the chief and the Bayfield County sheriff were at the scene. Ninety minutes later, investigators from the Wisconsin DCI arrived, and the FBI was notified. A bulletin was issued, searches were made, guests were interviewed, the crime scene was processed.

  “What did they come up with?” I asked.

  Donatucci tapped the reports in front of me.

  “A lot of paper,” he said.

  “I’d be approaching the case four days late, five if I start tomorrow. Do you honestly believe I’ll find anything that they missed?”

  “It’s possible. Fresh eyes. People in town settling down, not as cautious. Besides, the cops carry badges. Most people are nervous if not downright afraid to talk to them, including the innocent. You’ll be carrying something that’ll make them much more willing to cooperate.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”