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“He’d sure as shit stay away if he was guilty,” Mallory said.
“Maybe,” Szabo said. “And maybe it’s a legit reason.” He filled them in quickly on what Special Agent Shurgin had said.
“A Frog?” Snyder demanded. “You think it was some Frog killed the chief?” He snorted and shook his head.
“Why not? You can get badass Frenchmen,” Tremaine said, looking and sounding injured. “Some of those ole boys in Marseille are badass as they come.”
“Anybody can get the drop on anybody else, you know that,” Szabo said. “The point is, we don’t know. I mean, Miller doesn’t come in today? Yeah, sure. That looks guilty. But we got to consider this other guy.”
“Why?” Mallory asked. “Chief said that thing about the beard, and then the beard plays hooky?”
“FBI don’t fuck around wasting time,” Taylor said. “He says it’s the Frog, he got a reason.”
“Sure,” Mallory said. “We all know how smart and efficient the government is, right?”
“Fuck is wrong with you?” Taylor demanded. “FBI is the best in the world at their shit, and—”
“I’m just saying I want some fucking proof!” Mallory said just as hotly. “You can’t just—”
“Stow it,” Szabo said. The two men went silent. “We can’t do shit about Miller when he’s not here. And we’re gonna look like prize assholes if it is the Frog and we miss him.” He looked around the small circle of faces. “We’re not quitting on Miller,” he said. “Not on anything or anybody. Not until we got the guy that scragged the chief. But Miller isn’t going anywhere—he’s fucking married to an Eberhardt. So right now we focus on this French guy. Okay?”
After a moment’s thought, the others all nodded their heads. “Right,” Szabo said. “Let’s set our action stations.”
CHAPTER
30
It had been the longest day Katrina could remember.
The morning had been bad enough. The phones had not stopped ringing for two minutes, and every call had been a network, or a bureau, or a newspaper—calls had come from all over the world, all wanting the details of what had happened last night at the disastrous gala. And even though Katrina’s plan had been to hand all these calls over to her brother Tim, there had just been too many for him to handle alone, and she’d had to give statements to such unlikely places as Bahrain, Indonesia, and Guiana. She didn’t know what to say, and she stumbled over every phrase, until, in the end, Tim had crafted a general statement, and they had both answered each call by reading it, thanking the caller for their interest, and hanging up.
And then, to have that FBI agent, with his ridiculously thick goggles, sitting in the conference room the entire time, staring at the video monitor and snapping irritably at anyone who interrupted him. His attitude of cranky authority, combined with his creepy appearance, were nearly as intimidating to Katrina as all the phone calls. She had never wanted so badly to have Randall there for moral support.
Katrina had tried to call Randall, to tell him what was happening and that she was staying here and why. But he hadn’t answered his phone. She hoped that meant he was driving home, but she couldn’t stop herself from worrying about him, on top of everything else. It was a long drive; some of the roads were very bad and filled with drunken rednecks—what if he’d had an accident? The way things seemed to be going right now, that made a kind of emotional sense to her, and she couldn’t lose the mental image of a broken Randall lying in a cold upstate ditch. And all for some ridiculous painting that was almost certainly a fake of some kind.
Katrina sat in the office worrying and answering a few more telephone calls. When the museum closed for the day, she switched on the answering machine. With nothing to do now, she passed the hours fretting. She took turns worrying about Randall, then about the museum, then occasionally pausing to wonder if she was in any danger herself. Special Agent Shurgin had asked her to be there to represent the family, but he hadn’t said why he thought that might be necessary, nor what she might be asked to do.
And then, at long last, the FBI man called them all to the conference room.
* * *
—
Right there.” Special Agent Shurgin pointed at the screen. Katrina leaned forward and watched as the video image of a shadowy figure flitted across the museum’s roof and then vanished over the side. “That’s him.”
“Khar too kharé,” the Iranian commander, Iravani, muttered.
Szabo nodded. “Yup.”
“Hervé Coulomb,” Shurgin said with quiet intensity. “And he is not here to look at pictures. He is here to take the jewels.”
Katrina took a ragged breath. So much had happened—was happening—and it was just a little too much to take in all at once. After last night . . . and now this, another attack . . . ? “Are you—I mean, how can you be sure?” she asked. “That it’s—you know. This, this—criminal . . . ?” It sounded terribly feeble, even to her ears, but she didn’t want it to be true, not on top of everything else.
Shurgin pushed back from the screen and looked at her. It was not a friendly or encouraging look. “How many men do you know who can move up walls like that?” he said. “And how many of them would be on the roof of your museum, knowing they could get shot for it?”
Katrina bit her lip and shook her head.
Shurgin nodded, once, and said, “That’s him. Believe me, I know him when I see him.”
