The Hypnotist

THIRTY-ONE

Los Angeles, California

Expecting the Matisse Monster’s call sometime after nine o’clock, Lucian Glass was showered, shaved and dressed and had ordered a breakfast of orange juice, black coffee, whole-wheat toast and honey by eight. The woman from room service told him his order would arrive within a half hour, but after only eighteen minutes he heard a knock on the door. Looking though the peephole, he saw the waiter.

A young man wheeled the cart into the room, closing the door halfway behind him. “Mr. Ryan, would you sign here?” He held out a black leatherette folder opened to reveal a charge slip.

After signing it and adding a gratuity, Lucian handed it back and watched the waiter walk out. Just as he’d closed the door behind him, right before the lock clicked shut, the door was pushed opened again.

“You can’t walk into a guest’s room,” the waiter shouted from the hall.

“I’m his business partner,” a voice snapped back, and a man stepped inside, slamming the door and drowning out the waiter’s objections.

Lucian looked around for his cell phone, an advanced pocket Taser the local FBI had outfitted him with that could fire two probes up to a distance of fifteen feet, transmitting pulsed energy into the central nervous system of the target, causing him to become immediately incapacitated and immobilized. Unlike a gun, it was legal to carry and something that an art appraiser like James Ryan would have no trouble explaining. But the device was clear across the room on the desk. He couldn’t get to it without being obvious. More important, James Ryan wouldn’t run for a weapon if a stranger walked into his room; he was a civilian and he’d be confused but not worried. Not right away.

“Mr. Ryan, I’m Bill Weller. I’m representing the owner of the paintings you’re here to see.” He was about five foot ten inches tall, dressed casually in khakis and a polo shirt. He had tightly curled black hair, tinted eyeglasses that were too large for his face and a thick mustache. Lucian assessed his features, clothing and appearance, filing the information away, but even as he did he knew it was an exercise in futility: the man was wearing a wig and a false mustache and probably had lifts in his shoes. If Lucian ran into him the next day in the elevator he doubted he’d even recognize him. “Would you come with me?” Weller said, more of a command than a question.

“Where?” Lucian asked with more concern than he was experiencing. To an FBI agent this situation wasn’t at all stressful, but as an art appraiser it should have been making him extremely anxious.

“Just across the hall.”

“I need my phone.” He started to turn.

“Actually, the last thing you need is your phone.”

Weller waited until Lucian had crossed the threshold, followed him out and motioned to room 715, on the opposite side of the corridor, one door up. “It’s a short walk.”

Damn. They’d planned for every contingency but this. All the backup FBI agents were either in the lobby or parked outside ready to follow Lucian to the assignation point. Then, when he was certain the paintings were authentic and that he was with the architect of the plan, he’d give a signal and his team would step in and arrest the Matisse Monster for buying stolen artwork. Once he was in custody they planned to use him to track the men responsible for stealing the five paintings-the criminals they wanted the most.

If Lucian didn’t give a signal, his team would know he was only with an envoy whom they’d need to tail in the hope that he would lead them to the Monster.

If anything went wrong, Lucian would insist on making a phone call to Tyler Weil to report on the paintings. Based on which coded message Lucian used, the FBI, who were monitoring Weil’s calls, would know what kind of help he was requesting.

But if Lucian called now-from up here-they’d step in and blow his cover. That wouldn’t have mattered much if the man with him in the hotel room had been the lynchpin of the operation. But he wasn’t.

It didn’t matter anyway. Lucian didn’t have his phone.

The suite was almost identical to his own. Despite the fact that the curtains were drawn against the daylight and the light was low, it was like seeing the sun after spending days in a dark, dank dungeon. His instinct was to shield his eyes, but he knew from experience the gesture wouldn’t help. This wasn’t sunshine-it was the stunning impact of the artwork.

“These are the paintings,” Weller said unnecessarily.

Lucian knew his immediate visceral impression was as critical as any other test and so, slowly, one by one, he focused on each canvas, concentrating, making a slight clucking sound with his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

The small Renoir of lush pink roses was so evocative he almost sniffed the air for their fragrance. Approaching it, Lucian examined the brushstrokes closely. On Sunday, when he’d been studying these artists’ work, he’d focused on each one’s distinctive patterns and palettes.

Lucian didn’t need to take a sample from the Renoir; he had no doubt who’d painted it. Moving on, he focused on the View of the Sea at Scheveningen by Vincent Van Gogh. In addition to looking closely at the gray-green, stormy sea and shore, Lucian ran his fingertips over it. A Van Gogh’s impasto was part of its identity, Marie Grimshaw had said and told him there were supposed to be actual grains of sand mixed in with the paint in this seascape as well as several others.

Lucian could feel them, grit on his flesh.

Every art student identified with Van Gogh’s yearning and longing-and his madness and failure were their nightmare. He remembered how Solange had been angry with one of their teachers who’d said dying young would be worth it if your work would live on for so long after your death. That’s anti-life, she’d said in retort. How could it be worth it to reach the greatest peak of renown if you’re not alive to experience it?

The Beach at Pourville, painted by Claude Monet, was as peaceful a seascape as the Van Gogh was violent and Lucian reacted to the exuberance of the scene, despite his circumstances.

The contemplative Gustav Klimt portrait was disturbing and dark. One of the artist’s less decorative works, it had no shining gold or silver, only a mysterious black-haired woman in a yellow dress, standing against a forest-green-blue background.

After only ten minutes, Lucian was willing to stake his reputation that all of these paintings were authentic. It was an astonishing treasure trove, a find to rock the art world. The Renoir and Klimt were each worth at least five million, the Monet approximately forty and the Van Gogh could go for over one hundred million. Why would anyone want to exchange close to two hundred million dollars’ worth of paintings for a minor sculpture of the Greek god of sleep?

“Do you need cotton swabs and cleaning solution? Magnifying glass? Black light?” Weller asked, waving his arm at a table covered with paraphernalia.

“No, that won’t be necessary. I’m doing okay.” Lucian hoped he sounded apprehensive; this would be a strange position for a man like Ryan to be in. He wouldn’t quite know what to make of it.

“You don’t need any supplies?”

“No, just a phone,” Lucian said. “I need to call the museum.”

“Not yet.” Weller gestured to the gray-and-white couch. “Have a seat. There’s some business we have to discuss first.” The words might have been polite, but the tone was threatening. Lucian was about to insist he either be allowed to make the call from here or return to his room to make it when the suite’s inner door opened and a second man strode in. He had long, greasy brown hair and a scraggly beard and wore stained blue jeans and a tight, ripped, black T-shirt. Lucian figured that only the man’s muscles were real.

Without acknowledging that there was anyone in the room, the grubby man lifted the Van Gogh off its easel and took it into the bedroom.

“I want to make my call now,” Lucian insisted.

“I told you, not yet.”

“Are you holding me hostage here?”

The second man returned and this time took the Klimt.

Lucian never should have left his room without his cell, but they’d caught him off guard…and these headaches had him off his game. If he slipped up now and Comley thought he was under too much pressure he could force him to take a leave of absence. And Lucian couldn’t let that happen. Not now. Not while Malachai was still a free man and Solange’s killer was on the prowl.

“It’s imperative I make that call now.”

“I know, you told me, twice. Just sit tight.” Pulling out his own cell, Weller turned his back on Lucian and punched in a number. “Mr. Ryan’s here,” he said when the call went through. While he listened to whoever was on the other end, the muscle-bound mover returned, took the Monet in one hand and the Renoir in the other and left again, shutting the door behind him.

Weller’s conversation was innocuous. Obviously stalling, he was describing the hotel to the man on the other end. “Yeah, you’d like it. Very simple. They have Internet, but you have to pay for it.”

Lucian strained to hear noise coming from the room beyond this one, where the paintings were being deposited, but he couldn’t hear over Weller’s inane conversation. Was anyone else in there? How long would they keep the paintings there before trying to leave the hotel with them? How would they pack them? Would anyone in the lobby spot them? Did they have a car waiting downstairs? There were too many unknowns. He desperately needed to get back to his own room so he could alert his team.

He stood. “This is silly. I did what I came to do. If your boss needs to reach me he has my number.”

Weller moved in front of him, blocking him from the exit. “Mr. Ryan, I asked you nicely. Now I’m telling you to sit the fuck back down, you understand?”

Lucian, thinking like Ryan, shook his head and raised his hands in the air.

“Hey, take it easy. What’s going on? I’m just an appraiser. I’ve done my job. I authenticated the paintings, so why are you holding me here?”

“I have to go,” Weller said into the phone, and clicked off. “I’m not holding you here. Sorry, man, I didn’t mean to give you that impression. Now, what paintings are you talking about?”

“The paintings I came here to look at.”

Weller frowned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Lucian spun around, took three steps toward the suite’s inner door, flung it open and peered into a semidark room. A bed, a bureau, a chair, lamps. No personal accoutrements and certainly no paintings. He flung open the closet. Checked the bathroom. There was no point in looking under the bed. Lucian knew what had happened without having to ask. During the time he’d been sitting on the couch, waiting for Weller to get off the phone, the paintings had been packed up and taken out of the hotel, each one probably inside its own suitcase, and whisked through the front doors right under the watchful gaze of the FBI agents.

“Where are the paintings?”

“Mr. Ryan, I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. There are no paintings here.”