Curse of the Jade Lily: A McKenzie Novel Read online

  “I’ll be seeing you,” she said.

  “Heavenly, I’ll tell you what the guys I play hockey with would say—keep your head up.”

  * * *

  I escorted Heavenly to the front door and watched her drive away before reactivating my security system. I was wondering how much an upgrade would cost when my cell phone rang.

  “Harry,” I said. “What’s going on?”

  “I have some background on your target, but I have to make it quick. The wife is waiting downstairs. We’re going to dinner.”

  “Give her a kiss for me.”

  “Not a chance. Now, McKenzie, I checked a few sources. Your friend Jonathan Hemsted is a Foreign Service specialist attached to the U.S. Commercial Service Office in the Bosnia-Herzegovina Embassy. Before that he was stationed in Haiti.”

  “What does he specialize in?”

  “He’s an economics officer working to expand U.S. trade in the region. This guy Branko Pozderac, he’s involved with the privatization of state-owned entities. That’s probably how they hooked up.”

  “I didn’t know we had any trade in the region.”

  “About forty million worth.”

  “You’re kidding? The Twins’ infield is worth more than that.”

  “Just telling you what they told me.”

  “Would Hemsted have anything to do with recovering stolen artifacts—allegedly stolen artifacts?”

  “I wouldn’t think so,” Harry said. “The State Department might file a report or request assistance, but they’re not going to investigate or recover.”

  “Who would?”

  “The Federal Bureau of Investigation. McKenzie, we have an Art Crime Team. We have an Art Theft Program. We have special prosecutors assigned by the Department of Justice. We sometimes work with other organizations like Homeland Security, Interpol, or even Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Which raises the question, what the hell?”

  I told him that I would explain, but his wife was waiting.

  “Make it fast,” he said.

  I did.

  “I have so much work on my desk,” Harry said. “I think I’ll take a look into this anyway.”

  “How much juice do you think a Foreign Service specialist working in a shit hole like Bosnia has?”

  “That depends on his boss.”

  “His boss is the secretary of state.”

  “I’ll get back to you.”

  “You’re a peach, Harry. Give your wife my love.”

  “Hell no.”

  * * *

  I returned to the kitchen table and finished my coffee. I liked it so much that I had another mug, this one laced with Irish whiskey. And then another. That and the two ales I had earlier weren’t nearly enough to make me drunk, but they did give me an excuse for what I did next. I called Mr. Donatucci.

  “Have you heard from the artnappers?” I asked.

  “Nothing yet. Why do you ask?”

  “You said you could set up a meeting with someone who could give me tips on how to authenticate the Lily. Can you still do that?”

  “You’re going for the Lily after all,” Donatucci said. It wasn’t a question.

  “Yes.”

  “What changed your mind?”

  “Peer pressure.”

  SIX

  Perrin Stewart punched a code into a keypad and hit ENTER. Nothing happened.

  “I hate these things,” she said.

  “Patrick Tarpley didn’t have any trouble,” I said.

  Perrin gave me a hard look and cursed softly—some people don’t appreciate sarcasm. She tried again. This time a tiny green light blinked on top of the keypad, followed by a metallic sound as the door unlocked. She held the door open until I passed through, then closed it tightly behind her. Her heels made a tick-tock sound that echoed off the white walls, white ceiling, and white tile floor of the brightly lit corridor, and I didn’t know which I wanted more, earplugs or sunglasses.

  “I’ve seen hospital operating rooms with less light,” I said.

  “It’s all environmentally responsible, too,” Perrin said. “We earned a LEED Gold designation for the building design. That was partly my doing. I saw it not only as a matter of reducing our carbon footprint but also of saving money. Our energy bills are a third of a typical building this size.”

  “I need to ask a question that might offend you.”

  “All right.”

  “How sure are you of your people?”

  “If you’d asked me last week, I would have vouched for all of them. Now … Why do you ask?”

  “There’s a leak. Maybe more than one. There are people who seem to know my every move in this matter even before I do. I think they’re getting intel from someone within your building.”

  Perrin suddenly stopped walking and leaned back against the wall of the corridor. Her head was bent toward the floor, so I couldn’t see her face, but the sound of her voice told me what I could easily have guessed—this had not been the best week of her life, and it was probably going to get worse.

  “I no longer trust the people around me,” she said.

  “I can appreciate that. You look up sometimes and discover that life has you surrounded and there’s no way out unless you’re willing to accept casualties.”

  Perrin snickered at that. “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah. That’s one way of looking at it. McKenzie, I haven’t thanked you for changing your mind about the Lily.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  Perrin shook her head. “All of my life I wanted to do this, run a truly great art museum,” she said. “City of Lakes isn’t great. Not yet. If you take a small, unknown museum and make it a bigger, better-known museum, though, the biggest, best-known museums take notice and … You know how it works.”

  “Sure.”

  “I have a master’s degree in art history. I have a bachelor’s degree in museum studies. I’ve studied marketing, public relations, fund-raising, and business administration to get here. I have over a hundred and thirty thousand dollars in student loans to pay off. I don’t care. I make only twelve hundred a week. I don’t care. I don’t care because I love being here. It’s the best job—do you know that the average museum director lasts only four years? The pressure from boards of directors, constant fund-raising, and the demands on their personal life eat them alive. Yet it’s just the opposite with me. I thrive on this. The Derek Andersons of the world, those pompous, self-aggrandizing men who spend the money and put in the time so they can be seen, so they can pretend they’re important, I can play them like a flute. Unfortunately, if the Lily isn’t returned…”

  “The theft isn’t your fault.”

  “I’m afraid Mr. Fiegen doesn’t see it that way.”

  “He seems like a reasonable man.”

  Perrin shook her head again. “Fiegen’s not in it for the attention. He’s not pretending to be anything other than what he is. He genuinely wants to build a museum that’s equal to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, that’s equal to the Walker, that’s equal to the Art Institute of Chicago. If he thinks I’m not the woman for the job … You know what my greatest fear is, McKenzie? What keeps me awake at night? That one day I’ll end up being just another art major making mochas in a coffeehouse.”

  It was at that moment that I made a somewhat impulsive decision. I decided I liked Perrin, all two hundred pounds of her.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll get it back.”

  Perrin smiled. “Please,” she said.

  * * *

  Perrin escorted me through an unmarked door into a storage room the size of a high school cafeteria. It, too, was very brightly lit and consisted of many tables, shelves, racks, and drawers filled with works of art—paintings, sculptures, even furniture—that, for some reason, were not exhibited to the public. There was a woman sitting at a workstation and examining a spinach green brooch through a mounted magnifying glass. She smiled when she saw us coming and stood up. At a distance she looked like the standard m
ovie cliché—the sexy female scientist hiding her beauty behind a white lab coat, black-rimmed glasses, and hair that was worn in a ponytail. Unfortunately, I soon discovered that she needed the glasses, her hair was pulled back because she didn’t have time to wash it that morning, and the lab coat hid a body that looked like it hadn’t consumed a carbohydrate in months. Oh, well.

  She and Perrin hugged in a way that was meant to give comfort and not just say hello. While Perrin was large, tall, and fair-skinned, the other woman was thin and short, with a dark complexion. When they hugged they reminded me of a female version of Laurel and Hardy.

  “You look like hell, Stewart,” the woman said.

  In that moment I knew they were the best of friends, because instead of being insulted, Perrin said, “I feel like hell.”

  “Did you get any sleep at all?”

  “Not much.”

  Perrin directed her friend’s attention toward me.

  “This is McKenzie,” she said. “McKenzie, India Cooper.”

  We shook hands, and Perrin said, “Cooper is the curator in charge of our Asian Art Collection.”

  “Stewart is right,” India said. “You are cute.”

  I glanced at Perrin, who quickly turned a light shade of red. She closed her eyes, and I thought I heard her whisper, “C’mon, Cooper, not today.”

  “I take it you two are BFFs,” I said.

  “We met in school—Syracuse University,” India said. “I’m from Arizona, and she’s from Southern California. We shared a blanket at a football game one day when the wind was waffling off Lake Ontario at about a thousand miles an hour. Huddling together to keep warm, neither of us could believe that it could get that cold for that length of time. I’ve been trying to get her hooked up ever since.”

  “Cooper,” Perrin said. Her face was now scarlet.

  She was saved from further embarrassment by the ringing of her cell phone. She answered it, pivoting away from us at the same time. A moment later, she turned back.

  “Mr. Gillard is here,” Perrin said. “So is Mr. Donatucci. I’ll leave you two alone. McKenzie, I’ll…”

  She brought her hand to her temple as if she were suddenly experiencing brain freeze.

  “I’ll bring him back to your office,” India said.

  Perrin gave her a waning smile and nodded. She quickly retreated from the room. India watched her go, actually took a couple of steps as if she meant to follow her.

  “McKenzie?” India said.

  “Yes?”

  “Can you help her?”

  “I can try to retrieve the Lily. Beyond that…”

  “Rumor has it that Derek Anderson wants the board to replace Stewart with some blond bimbo he’s been seeing. Losing the Lily might be just the excuse he’s looking for.”

  “That’s what I heard, but the board can’t blame her for the theft, can it?”

  “She hired Patrick Tarpley when no one else would, so yeah, I bet they can.”

  “I thought his credentials were impeccable.”

  “No one’s credentials are impeccable. I would think you of all people would know that.”

  “I suppose I do.”

  “Something else—Stewart genuinely cared about Tarpley. The fact he stole from her hurt. The fact he was killed, I think, hurt even more.”

  “There’s nothing we can do about that.”

  “What can we do?” India turned toward me. “What can I do?”

  “Let’s say, for argument’s sake, that I’m walking down the street and a guy comes up to me and says, ‘Psst, buddy? Wanna buy a jade lily?’ How can I tell if it’s the real thing and not a counterfeit?”

  “There are a number of tests we can perform—Mohs Scale of Hardness, microscopic test, density test, calcification test, patina test. We can examine the workmanship such as the carving technique and the depth of incised and relief lines, tools and abrasion signatures, art style—”

  “India?”

  “Yes?”

  “Let’s assume I’ll have a couple of minutes with it tops. Let’s also assume that I’m as dumb as brick.”

  “Oh, McKenzie.” A shy light flickered in her eyes as she gave my wrist a squeeze, and I felt a sudden surge of electricity that traveled up my arm and then down through my legs. “I’m sure you’re at least as smart as Carrara marble.”

  Where did that come from? my inner voice asked. And then, Maybe if she did take off her glasses and let down her hair …

  India’s eyes darted across her work area as if she were searching for an answer. She found it in the form of a 10-power magnifying glass.

  “Here,” she said.

  I took the glass. India reached for the spinach green brooch she’d been examining before.

  “Here,” she said again.

  I took the brooch.

  “Hold it up to the light and look at it through the magnifier,” she said. “Imperial jade is somewhat translucent. See those little veins, almost feltlike fibers that seem intertwined?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s a good sign. If you see anything resembling layers, then you’re looking at jadeite that’s been doubled or even tripled.”

  “I don’t get—”

  “That means the thin layers of jadeite were glued together.”

  “Okay.”

  “If you see air bubbles, that means it’s counterfeit.”

  “Okay.”

  “Something else—notice how the jade feels smooth and soaplike to the touch? That’s a good sign, too. What else? True jade will scratch glass, even metal.”

  “Do you want me to scrape it across a windowpane?”

  “God, no! McKenzie. Are you kidding?”

  “What, then?”

  “It’s a frickin’ work of art!”

  “Sorry.”

  “Here.” India took the jade brooch from my hand, turned it over, and picked up a pair of scissors. “Gently take the blunt end of a scissors or a knife and gently, gently now, draw a line. Please, McKenzie, at the bottom of the piece, at the base of the Lily. Do it there. You’ll get what looks like a scratch, a white line. See?” She showed me the back of the brooch. “Gently wipe it off. It should be—the white line should be residue from the knife. If it comes off, it’s real jade. If the scratch remains, it’s a fake.”

  I took the brooch and repeated India’s experiment. It worked just as it had with her.

  “Cool,” I said. “But…”

  “What?”

  “How will I know if it’s the actual Lily and not a fake made of real jade?”

  “It would cost tens of thousands of dollars to make a fake Lily out of real imperial jade.”

  “Nonetheless.”

  India took a deep breath and searched her workstation again. I could see the wheels turning behind her glasses. “Okay,” she said, more to herself than to me, and opened a drawer. She thumbed through a few files, grabbed the one she liked, and dropped it on the tabletop.

  “This is the Jade Lily,” she said.

  She opened the file and started spreading out photographs. Heavenly Petryk was right—it was exquisite. The photographs showed two stalks extending from the base. One held eight blossoms with impossibly thin petals and the other had ten. There was a tiny cuplike flower in the center of each blossom.

  “Wow,” I said.

  “It’s a carving of a flower called the Chinese Sacred Lily,” India said. “Botanical name Narcissus tazetta v. orientalis. In real life the stems are green, almost as green as the jade. The blossoms are white, and the flowers in the center are the color of gold.”

  “Wow,” I repeated.

  “The odd thing is, it’s neither Chinese nor a lily. The flower, I mean. It’s actually a daffodil, and it originated in Egypt, of all places. But the Chinese have used it as a part of their New Year’s celebrations for God knows how many generations, hence the name.”

  “I’m impressed.”

  “Haven’t you ever seen the Lily before?”

  �
��No.”

  “It’s more impressive in person.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  “Anyway, here.” India chose a photograph and slid it in front of me. She took the magnifying glass and held it over the photograph where one of the stalks met the base. “Take a look.”

  I took the glass from her hand and bent to the task.

  “See where the stalk sprouts from the ground?” India said. “You’ll notice some imperfections from the carving process. There’s a tiny nick that resembles the letter M. M for McKenzie. I can’t imagine anyone carving a reproduction of the Jade Lily—especially out of imperial jade. I certainly can’t imagine anyone adding an M.”

  I stared at the M for a while and then moved the glass around, looking for other telltale imperfections.

  “Did you appraise the Lily?” I asked.

  “No. We don’t do that here.”

  “Who did?”

  “I have no idea. You’ll have to ask Mr. Gillard about that.”

  “Have you met him?”

  “Gillard? No, but I’m sure he can tell you who put a value on the Lily. There are a lot of private companies that do that sort of thing, although usually they get it wrong.”

  “Value, no, that’s not what I meant. I meant, ahh, what’s the word?”

  “Authenticate?”

  “Authenticate. Did you authenticate the Lily?”

  “Yes. When it came in. That was two weeks ago. There wasn’t much work to do. I didn’t need to perform any tests. The provenance was intact. We could follow the chain of custody back far enough that we were sure we were exhibiting what we said we were exhibiting. I spent a lot of time with it, though. God, it’s beautiful.”

  “How did it arrive?”

  “A delivery company that specializes in shipping expensive artwork brought it in. Dublin Pack and Ship. We’ve used them before. They provide what they call ‘white glove pickup and delivery.’ In this case they went to Gillard’s place in Chicago, packed the Lily in cushioning foam and an ISPM-15 certified crate, brought it here, and unpacked it. There were always at least three people with the Lily every step of the process. They charged eleven thousand dollars. Do you believe that? That’s a quarter of my yearly salary. I am definitely in the wrong end of this business.”