JACK DELANEY ARRIVED at his office at 26 Federal Plaza just after seven that morning. He felt depressed as he stared down at the countless files that littered his desk. Every one of them connected with his investigation of Bryce Fenston, and a year later he was no nearer to presenting his boss with enough evidence to ask a judge to issue an arrest warrant.
Jack opened Fenston’s personal file in the vain hope that he might stumble across some tiny clue, some personal trait, or just a mistake that would finally link Fenston directly to the three vicious murders that had taken place in Marseille, Los Angeles, and Rio de Janeiro.
In 1984, the thirty-two-year-old Nicu Munteanu had presented himself at the American Embassy in Bucharest, claiming that he could identify two spies working in the heart of Washington, information he was willing to trade in exchange for an American passport. A dozen such claims were handled by the embassy every week and almost all proved groundless, but in Munteanu’s case the information stood up. Within a month, two well-placed officials found themselves on a flight back to Moscow, and Munteanu was issued an American passport.
Nicu Munteanu landed in New York on February 17, 1985. Jack had been able to find little intelligence on Munteanu’s activities during the following year, but he suddenly reemerged with enough money to take over Fenston Finance, a small, ailing bank in Manhattan. Nicu Munteanu changed his name to Bryce Fenston—not a crime in itself—but no one could identify his backers, despite the fact that during the next few years the bank began to accept large deposits from unlisted companies across Eastern Europe. Then in 1989 the cash flow suddenly dried up, the same year Ceauşescu and his wife, Elena, fled from Bucharest following the uprising. Within days they were captured, tried, and executed.
Jack looked out of his window over lower Manhattan and recalled the FBI maxim: never believe in coincidences, but never dismiss them.
Following Ceauşescu’s death, the bank appeared to go through a couple of lean years until Fenston met up with Karl Leapman, a disbarred lawyer who had recently been released from prison for fraud. It was not too long before the bank resumed its profitable ways.
Jack stared down at several photographs of Bryce Fenston, who regularly appeared in the gossip columns with one of New York’s most fashionable women on his arm. He was variously described as a brilliant banker, a leading financier, even a generous benefactor, and with almost every mention of his name there was a reference to his magnificent art collection. Jack pushed the photographs to one side. He hadn’t yet come to terms with a man who wore an earring, and he was even more puzzled why someone who had a full head of hair when he first came to America would choose to shave himself bald. Who was he hiding from?
Jack closed the Munteanu/Fenston personal file and turned his attention to Pierre de Rochelle, the first of the victims.
Rochelle required seventy million francs to pay for his share in a vineyard. His only previous experience of the wine industry seemed to have come from draining the bottles on a regular basis. Even a cursory inspection would have revealed that his investment plan didn’t appear to fulfill the banking maxim of being “sound.” However, what caught Fenston’s attention when he perused the application was that the young man had recently inherited a château in the Dordogne, in which every wall was graced with fine Impressionist paintings, including a Degas, two Pissarros, and a Monet of Argenteuil.
The vineyard failed to show a return for four fruitless years, during which time the château began to render up its assets, leaving only outline shapes where the pictures had once hung. By the time Fenston had shipped the last painting back to New York to join his private collection, Pierre’s original loan had, with accumulated interest, more than doubled. When his château was finally placed on the market, Pierre took up residence in a small flat in Marseille, where each night he would drink himself into a senseless stupor. That was until a bright young lady, just out of law school, suggested to Pierre, in one of his sober moments, that were Fenston Finance to sell his Degas, the Monet, and the two Pissarros, he could not only pay off his debt but take the château off the market and reclaim the rest of his collection. This suggestion did not fit in with Fenston’s long-term plans.
A week later, the drunken body of Pierre de Rochelle was found slumped in a Marseille alley, his throat sliced open.
Four years later, the Marseille police closed the file, with the words NON RESOLU stamped on the cover.
When the estate was finally settled, Fenston had sold off all the works, with the exception of the Renoir, the Monet, and the two Pissarros; and after compound interest, bank charges, and lawyers’ fees, Pierre’s younger brother, Simon de Rochelle, inherited the flat in Marseille.
Jack rose from behind his desk, stretched his cramped limbs, and yawned wearily before he considered tackling Chris Adams, Jr., although he knew Adams’s case history almost by heart.
Chris Adams, Sr., had operated a highly successful fine art gallery on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles. He specialized in the American School so admired by the Hollywood glitterati. His untimely death in a car crash left his son Chris, Jr., with a collection of Rothkos, Pollocks, Jasper Johnses, Rauschenbergs, and several Warhol acrylics, including a Black Marilyn.
An old school friend advised Chris that the way to double his money would be to invest in the dot.com revolution. Chris, Jr., pointed out that he didn’t have any ready cash, just the gallery, the paintings, and Christina, his father’s old yacht—and even that was half owned by his younger sister. Fenston Finance stepped in and advanced him a loan of twelve million dollars on their usual terms. As in so many revolutions, several bodies ended up on the battlefield: among them, Chris, Jr.’s.
Fenston Finance had allowed the debt to continue mounting without ever troubling their client. That was until Chris, Jr., read in the Los Angeles Times that Warhol’s Shot Red Marilyn had recently sold for over four million dollars. He immediately contacted Christie’s in L.A., who assured him that he could expect an equally good return for his Rothkos, Pollocks, and Jasper Johnses. Three months later, Leapman rushed into the chairman’s office bearing the latest copy of a Christie’s sale catalogue. He had placed yellow Post-It notes against seven different lots that were due to come under the hammer. Fenston made one phone call, then booked himself on the next flight to Rome.
Three days later, Chris, Jr., was discovered in the lavatory of a gay bar with his throat cut.
Fenston was on holiday in Italy at the time, and Jack had a copy of his hotel bill, plane tickets, and even his credit-card purchases from several shops and restaurants.
The paintings were immediately withdrawn from the Christie’s sale while the L.A. police carried out their investigations. After eighteen months of no new evidence and dead-ends, the file joined the other LAPD cold cases stored in the basement. All Chris’s sister ended up with was a model of Christina, her father’s much-loved yacht.
Jack tossed Chris, Jr.’s, file to one side and stared down at the name of Maria Vasconcellos, a Brazilian widow who had inherited a house and a lawn full of statues—and not of the garden-center variety. Moore, Giacometti, Remington, Botero, and Calder were among Señora Vasconcellos’s husband’s bequest. Unfortunately, she fell in love with a gigolo, and when he suggested—The phone rang on Jack’s desk.
“Our London Embassy is on line two,” his secretary informed him.
“Thanks, Sally,” said Jack, knowing it could only be his friend Tom Crasanti, who had joined the FBI on the same day as he had.
“Hi, Tom, how are you?” he asked even before he heard a voice.
“In good shape,” Tom replied. “Still running every day, even if I’m not as fit as you.”
“And my godson?”
“He’s learning to play cricket.”
“The traitor. Got any good news?”
“No,” said Tom. “That’s why I’m calling. You’re going to have to open another file.”
Jack felt a cold shiver run through his body. “Who is it this time?” he asked quietly.
“The lady’s name, and Lady she was, is Victoria Wentworth.”
“How did she die?”
“In exactly the same manner as the other three, throat cut, almost certainly with a kitchen knife.”
“What makes you think Fenston was involved?”
“She owed the bank over thirty million.”
“And what was he after this time?”
“A Van Gogh self-portrait.”
“Value?”
“Sixty, possibly seventy million dollars.”
“I’ll be on the next plane to London.”