The Black Madonna Page 2

  “Yes, is same.” He wore a rumpled linen jacket, its armpits wet and darkened with sweat. He reached in a pocket and came up with a pack of filterless Gitanes. “You want?”

  “Never learned to use them, thanks.”

  Wadi Haddad lit the cigarette with a gold lighter. The stench of black tobacco encircled the table. “I have much interesting items. Very nice.”

  “I didn’t come to Hebron for nice, Mr. Haddad. I came for exceptional. You understand that word?”

  “Exceptional is also very expensive.”

  “One of a kind,” Harry went on. “Unique. Extremely old. And I have always been partial to gold.”

  Wadi Haddad revealed a lizard’s tongue, far too narrow for his globular face. It flitted in and out several times, tasting the air. “How much money you have?”

  “Not a cent with me.”

  “Then I also have nothing. Business is finished.” But Wadi Haddad did not move.

  “Here’s how it’s going to work,” said Harry. “You show me the item. I photograph it.”

  “No. Photographs absolutely not to happen.”

  “I show the photographs to my clients. If they like, they transfer the money to an escrow account at the Bank of Jordan in Amman. You understand, escrow?”

  “I know.”

  “Good. Then you bring the item to Jerusalem and we make the exchange.”

  “Not Jerusalem. Too much police everyplace.”

  “Okay, Mr. Haddad. Where would you prefer?”

  “Petra.”

  “Too small. I like bright lights, big city.”

  “Then Amman.”

  Which had been Harry’s choice all along. Even so, he pretended to give that some thought. “Okay, Amman. Hotel Inter-Continental. You got an account at the Bank of Jordan?”

  “I make one happen.”

  “Then we’re ready to roll. All we need is the merchandise.”

  “No photographs.”

  “Then no business. Sorry, Charlie.”

  “My name is Wadi.”

  “Whatever. I don’t shoot, I don’t buy.”

  “Photographs cost you a thousand dollars.”

  Suddenly Harry was very tired of this two-step. “Fine. But I take the thousand from the final purchase price. And don’t even think of arguing.”

  Wadi Haddad did not rise so much as bounce from the seat. “Okay, we go. Not your man.” He nodded toward Hassan. “Just you.”

  “Be right with you.” Harry walked to Hassan’s table and squatted down beside the man’s chair. “You find anything?”

  “Hebron is one tense city. People very worried.”

  “Yeah, I caught that too.” Harry liked how the guy never stopped searching the shadows. “Where’d you see action, Hassan?”

  “Nowhere. I see nothing, I do nothing. In the West Bank there is only IDF and terrorists.”

  “Wadi’s taking me to check out the merchandise. He says I’ve got to do this alone. You think maybe you could watch my back?”

  “Is good.” Hassan held to a catlike stillness. “I see something, I whistle. I can whistle very loud.”

  Harry rose to his feet, patted the guy’s shoulder, and said, “You just earned yourself another five bills.”

  WADI HADDAD MOVED SURPRISINGLY FAST on his splayed legs. He led Harry deep into the old city. The West Bank crisis was etched into every Hebron street, every bullet-ridden wall, every building topped by an IDF bunker. The streets were either dimly lit or not at all. But walking behind the wheezing Haddad, Harry had no trouble picking his way through the rubble. Behind him, the mosque and the cave complex shone like beacons. And up ahead loomed the wall.

  The barrier separating the Jewish sector from Hebron’s old city was thirty feet high and topped with razor wire. Searchlights from the guard towers and nearby IDF bunkers serrated the night. The wall gleamed like a massive concrete lantern.

  Somewhere in the distance a truck backfired. Wadi Haddad froze. A searchlight illuminated the man’s trembling jowls. Harry said, “You’re not from here.”

  “My mother’s family only. I live sometimes Damascus, sometimes Aqaba.”

  Aqaba was Jordan’s portal to the Red Sea, a haven for tourists and smugglers’ dhows. “Must be nice.”

  Wadi Haddad started off once more, Harry following close. But when Haddad entered a dark, narrow alley, Harry dug in his heels. “Hold up there.”

  “What’s the matter, treasure man?”

  The buildings to either side reached across to form a crumbling arch. The windows fronting the street were both barred and dark. The alley was black. Harry had spent a lifetime avoiding alleys like this. Then he saw a cigarette tip gleam. “That your buddy down there?”

  “Is guard, yes. In Hebron, many guards.”

  “Ask him to step out where I can see him.”

  Wadi didn’t like it, but he did as Harry said. The man emerged and flipped on a flashlight. In the dim rays reflected from the walls, Harry could see a face like a parrot, with too-narrow features sliding back from a truly enormous nose. The man’s eyes were set very close together and gleamed with the erratic light of an easy killer.

  “Ask him to light up that alley for us.”

  The man smirked at Harry’s nerves but did not wait for Wadi’s translation. The flashlight showed an empty lane that ended about eighty feet back with double metal doors. “What’s behind the doors, Wadi?”

  “Where we go. My mother’s cousin’s house.”

  Harry motioned to the man holding the light. “Lead on, friend.”

  The guard spoke for the first time. “You have guns?”

  Harry lifted his shirt and turned around. “Make business, not war. That’s my motto.”

  “He can search you?”

  “Sure thing.” Harry gestured at the doors. “Inside.”

  • • •

  THE DOORS RATTLED IN ALARM as the guard pushed them open. Wadi called out and, on hearing no response, stepped into a neglected courtyard with Harry close behind. The dusty compound appeared empty. A pair of plastic chairs sprawled by a rusty outdoor table, their upended legs jutting like broken teeth. From inside the house a dog barked. In the distance Harry both heard and felt the grinding tremor of an IDF tank on road patrol.

  Wadi led Harry to a flat-roofed side building of unfinished concrete blocks and opened a door with flaking paint. The interior was an astonishment. The front room was a well-appointed display chamber about twelve feet square. Two walls were stuccoed a light peach. A third wall was covered by a frieze of mythical birds carved from what Harry suspected was olive wood. The fourth wall held a narrow steel door with a central combination lock.

  “Looks like I found the guy I’ve been looking for,” Harry said.

  Wadi held out his hand. “Thousand dollars.”

  Harry was about to insist he see the item first, then decided there was no reason to get off on the wrong sandal.

  Wadi counted in the Arab fashion, folding the bills over and peeling the oily edges with his thumb and forefinger. He slipped the money into his pocket and motioned with his chin to the guard.

  The steel door swung open on greased hinges. The guard stepped inside and emerged with a black velvet stand shaped like a woman’s neck. What was draped on the stand took Harry’s breath away.

  The concept of women’s ornamentation was as old as civilization itself. The earliest forms were fashioned as temple offerings and were considered to have magical properties. Many ancient cultures revered such jewelry for its talismanic power either to ward off evil or bring good health and prosperity.

  In the very earliest days of Christianity, new believers drawn from Hellenistic temple cults often brought with them such ideas about the powers of jewelry. The necklace dated from the second century AD. The chain was a series of gold tubes, each stamped with a Christian design. It ended in an emerald the size of Harry’s thumb. The gemstone had been sanded flat and carved with the Chi-Rho symbol.

  Without asking,
Wadi handed Harry a pair of white gloves and a jeweler’s loupe. Closer inspection only confirmed Harry’s first impression. This was a museum-quality piece.

  The problem was, Harry could not identify it as a fake. Which was troubling, because Harry knew for a fact the item was not genuine.

  Harry Bennett had nothing against a little smuggling. He would certainly not have helped anyone track down another treasure dog.

  Counterfeiters, though, were a different breed of lice.

  After nearly three years of roiling conflict, the Israeli Antiquities Authority had basically lost control of smuggling in the West Bank. In the past, the IAA had nabbed about ninety thieves each year for pilfering tombs, ruined cities, palaces, and forts. Since the latest political troubles began, however, arrests had slumped to almost nothing. The IAA knew without question that the worst culprits were getting away. The international arts market was being flooded with ancient Hebrew treasure. What was more, a growing number of these items were bogus. Extremely well crafted, their workmanship often able to fool museum directors and other supposed experts, but phony just the same.

  The Israeli government had needed somebody with Harry Bennett’s credentials, known throughout the world as a dedicated treasure dog. Somebody capable of infiltrating the system and identifying the source of the fake artifacts.

  Only when Harry looked up did he realize he had been holding his breath. He handed the loupe and gloves back to Wadi and unsnapped the case of his pocket camera. “Okay if I shoot a few?”

  Wadi smirked as he pulled the cigarettes from his pocket. The man knew a buyer’s lust when he saw it. “Sure, sure, many as you like. You want tea?”

  DICKERING OVER PRICE TOOK UNTIL well after midnight. Even so, when Harry stepped through the compound’s steel door, the city remained noisily alive. Such was the manner of every Middle Eastern city Harry had ever visited, and it was one of the reasons why he relished the Arab world. These lands were full of pirates and their love of dark hours.

  Wadi Haddad wore his sourest done-in-by-the-deal frown. “You give me no profit. My daughters starve.”

  Harry clamped down on his first thought, which was that this guy definitely hadn’t missed a lot of meals. “Phone you in four days, right?”

  “Four, maybe five. These days the border is very tight.”

  “Then maybe you ought to bring out the other items you’re holding here for sale.”

  “You buy more?”

  “If they’re as fine as what you just showed me, sure, I think I can find buyers.”

  “Not same price,” Wadi complained. “Too much hard bargain.”

  Harry was about to say what he thought of Wadi’s poor-boy tactic when, from the distance, he heard a shrill whistle pierce the night.

  The guard stood at the alley’s mouth, searching in all directions. Wadi remained intent upon business, sucking on his cigarette and grumbling through the smoke as he walked past where Harry stood tense and rooted to the dusty earth. “Next time your price plus thirty percent. You pay or I go find—”

  Harry leaned forward and gripped Wadi’s shoulder and pulled him back. He slammed Wadi onto the alley wall, placing himself between the trader and the road. Wadi’s breath whooshed out in a fetid cloud. His eyes registered surprise and rising protest. But Harry kept him pinned where he was.

  Then the world of Hebron roared in rage and flames.

  TWO

  PALM BEACH REVEALED A NEW fashion statement that season. Storm Syrrell called it Bankruptcy Bleak.

  Ever since the Madoff scandal had struck Palm Beach like a medieval plague, conservative suits and muted tones had been in vogue. Which was why Storm wore her bleakest outfit to the bankruptcy auction.

  Storm actually had no business attending that day’s event. She was still arguing with her aunt as she crossed the causeway and headed north. Storm told Claudia, “All I’ll do is offer the vultures another carcass to swoop over.”

  “Pass out a few cards. See if anyone is hiring.”

  “Like I’m packing the perfect résumé for hard times. Girl for hire, good at only one thing. Pretending to run an arts and treasures business.”

  “There is no one on earth who is less of a pretender than you.”

  “Which is why I’ve managed to run Syrrell’s Palm Beach into the ground. Twice. This after burying the founder of our fine company. Not to mention sending my own father to jail.”

  Claudia went silent. Storm’s aunt had never fully recovered from the previous season’s strain. Claudia had walked the family antiques business through bankruptcy, discovered her father had been murdered, and then was kidnapped by her own brother. Storm’s elegant aunt tended to become somewhat frayed around the edges whenever confronted by those memories.

  Storm blinked through the sheen of Florida sunshine on her windshield and said as an apology, “I had another conversation with our banker this morning.”

  “I overheard your side of that little chat, remember?”

  “He is not advancing us any more credit.”

  “I assumed as much, given the way you hammered down the receiver and then blistered the ceiling.”

  “I don’t know if we can manage—” A click on her earpiece freed her from needing to finish that thought. “I’ve got another call.”

  “It’s not your fault, Storm.”

  The fact that her own head said the same thing, only to be drowned out by the wash of repeated guilt, left Storm greeting the new caller with a choked hello.

  Which, given it was the banker who was threatening to cut off their financial air, would on any other day have been good for a laugh. “Gerald Geldorf here, Ms. Syrrell. I thought you should know a significant deposit just arrived in your account.”

  Storm had been promising as much for six months, hoping against all economic logic for a moneyed buyer to take some of their dusty wares off her hands. But a frantic search of her mental inventory did not reveal any such genie.

  “Hello? Are you there, Ms. Syrrell?”

  She cleared her throat. “Which deposit would that be, Mr. Geldorf?”

  “Four hundred thousand dollars.”

  “Say again, please.”

  He did so. “May I take some of these funds to write down your overdraft?”

  “I’ll have to get back to you on that.”

  “I must remind you, Ms. Syrrell, your company is currently operating in very dangerous territory, and unless there is a swift balancing of your corporate books, we may be forced to—”

  Whoever chose that moment to phone her deserved a commission, if only she could afford to offer one. “Sorry, Mr. Geldorf. Another call is coming in.”

  “I will be expecting your response, Ms. Syrrell. Today.”

  She cradled the phone, hunted for a decent breath, then hit the button for the new call. “This is Storm Syrrell.”

  A male voice said, “I assume that you have received the deposit of funds.”

  “Who is speaking, please?”

  “I am faxing through instructions for you to bid on my behalf. An oil by Pokhitonov is coming up in today’s auction. Do you know the name?”

  “Of course, but—”

  “I want you to obtain it.”

  Storm pulled up to a stoplight and checked the phone’s readout. The incoming call showed a British prefix. She asked, “Is there any reason I should not know your name?”

  “Unless you are successful today, Ms. Syrrell, the only thing you will need to know about me is the account to which you must return my money.”

  THE REGION OF MANALAPAN WAS, in Storm’s opinion, about as seriously strange as rich people would ever want to get. The peninsula below South Palm Beach was eleven miles long and eleven hundred feet wide, but had a maximum elevation of ten inches. One decent blow and the island would vanish beneath the storm surge.

  Storm Syrrell figured the inhabitants were so rich, they assumed they could order hurricanes north.

  In the midst of the worst economic downturn si
nce the Great Depression, the last remaining strip of Manalapan sand went on the market. Nineteen hundred feet wide, eleven hundred deep.

  Fourteen million dollars.

  Storm’s destination that day was a palace that occupied Manalapan’s southern tip. She parked outside the gates for a quick getaway, showed her ID to the security, accepted her catalogue and bidding paddle, passed through a foyer of Jerusalem granite, and entered a parlor that could have swallowed the Miami Dolphins’ stadium. Despite having seen her share of interiors on the block, this place was good for a gawk.

  Not even Manalapan’s superrich had managed to escape the Madoff plague. Bernard Madoff had wintered in Palm Beach. His clientele had included many of Palm Beach’s finest. There were some streets on Palm Beach Island where every family faced bankruptcy, every multimillion-dollar home awaited the auctioneer’s hammer, every bank account was wiped clean. The locals called these areas Bernievilles, after the Depression-era Hoovervilles that had infested U.S. cities.

  Needless to say, it was not ideal timing for a lady to establish herself in the Palm Beach antiques and treasures trade.

  As Storm slipped through the vultures clustered at the back of the room, someone softly called her name. She waved without seeing who it was. They might smile, they might wish her well. But her financial woes had the same effect as an arterial wound.

  She found a seat, checked her catalogue, and saw the Pokhitonov oil would not come up for at least another hour. Then a man slipped into the adjacent chair and whispered, “I’ve been trying to contact you. Might I say, my dear, that is a most becoming outfit.”

  “Until this spring, the only time I wore it was for Sean’s funeral.”

  “Then it fits the season.” Jacob Rausch lifted his paddle, bidding on a pair of Rodin marbles. “I am truly sorry to hear of your troubles. You deserve better. As does Syrrell’s.”

  Jacob Rausch’s family was considered nobility within the New York antiques trade. Rausch was in his early fifties and was known for his polished manners and his Savile Row suits. His expression of sympathy might have been genuine. But for the right commission he would have eaten his own young.