Win

Chapter 16

Founded in 1833, Haverford College is a small, elite undergraduate institution located along the tony Main Line of Philadelphia, adjacent to my two favorite exclusive clubs, the Merion Golf Club (I play a lot of golf) and Merion Cricket Club (I play no cricket but very few members do — don’t ask). Fewer than 1,400 students matriculate to Haverford, yet there are over fifty buildings, most made of stone, strewn over 200 manicured acres so glorious that it is technically classified as an arboretum. The Lockwoods have been woven into the rich tapestry that is Haverford College since its conception. Windsor I and II both graduated from Haverford, both remained active, both served as chairman of the board of trustees. All of my male relatives attended (women were not admitted until the 1970s) until — hmm, now that I think of it — Uncle Aldrich was the first to break ranks by choosing New York University in the seventies. I was the second when I elected to go to Duke University in North Carolina. I loved and continue to love Haverford, but for me, it was simply too close to home, too much a known entity for what my eighteen-year-old self craved.

Professor Ian Cornwell’s office in Roberts Hall faces Founders Green and, beyond that, Founders Hall, where the Vermeer and Picasso had been taking up temporary residence when they were stolen. I wonder about that, about Cornwell’s office view of the building where he’d been tied up whilst the two robbers went to work. Does he think about it often or, after a while, does the view simply become the view?

Ian Cornwell tries too hard to look professorial — unruly hair, unkempt beard, tweed jacket, mustard-hued corduroy pants. His office contains half-crumbling stacks of papers on the shelves and floor. In lieu of a proper desk, Cornwell has a large square table that seats twelve, so that he can hold student seminars in an intimate setting.

“So glad you could visit,” Cornwell says to me.

He has me sit in front of brochures related to the political science department. I look up at him. His face is eager, ready to pitch me to support financially some sort of study or class. Kabir has no doubt hinted that I would be interested in funding so as to expedite this appointment. Now that I’m here, I nip this hint in the bud.

“I’m here about the stolen paintings.”

His smile drops from his face like a cartoon anvil. “I was under the impression you’re interested—”

“I might be later,” I say, cutting him off. “But right now, I have some questions about the art heist. You were the night watchman on duty.”

He doesn’t like my abruptness. Few people do.

“It was a long time ago.”

“Yes,” I reply, “I’m well versed in how time works, thank you.”

“I don’t see—”

“You know, of course, that one of the two paintings has been found, correct?”

“I read that in the news.”

“Terrific, so there’s no need to play catch-up. I’ve combed through the FBI file on the heist extensively. As you might imagine, I have a personal interest in this too.”

Cornwell blinks as though dazed, so I continue.

“You were the only security guard on duty that night. According to your testimony, two men disguised as police officers knocked on the door to Founders Hall. They claimed there was a disturbance that needed to be investigated and so you buzzed them in. Once inside, they subdued you. They took you to the basement level, duct-taped your eyes and mouth, and handcuffed you to a radiator. They rummaged through your pockets, pulled out your wallet, checked your ID, and told you that they now know where you live and how to find you. A threat, I assume. Have I got all this correct?”

Ian Cornwell slumps into a chair across the table. “It was a traumatic experience.”

I wait.

“I’d rather not talk about it.”

“Professor Cornwell?”

“Yes.”

“My family lost two priceless masterpieces on your watch.”

“You’re blaming me?”

“I will if you refuse to cooperate.”

“I’m not refusing anything, Mr. Lockwood.”

“Terrific.”

“But I also won’t be bullied.”

I give him a moment or two so as to save face. He will capitulate. They always do.

A few seconds later, he offers up a contrite “I don’t know anything that will help. I told the police everything a hundred times over.”

I continue undaunted: “You estimated that one of the two men was five nineish with a medium build. The other was slightly over six feet tall and heavier set. Both were white men, and you believe that they were wearing fake mustaches.”

“It was dark,” he adds.

“Your point being?”

His eyes go left. “None of this was exact. The height, the weight. I mean, they could be accurate. But it all happened so fast.”

“And you were young,” I add, “and scared.”

Ian Cornwell grabs hold of these arguments as a drowning man does a life preserver. “Yes, exactly.”

“You were just an intern hoping to make a few extra dollars.”

“It was part of my financial aid requirement, yes.”

“Your training was minimal.”

“Not to pass the buck,” Cornwell says, “but the school should have provided your family with better security.”

True enough, though many things about the case and the investigation bothered me. The painting had only been scheduled to be on loan for a short time, and the dates were fixed only a few weeks in advance. We had indeed added security cameras, but this was before the days of storing digital video in the cloud, and so the recordings were kept on a hard drive on the second floor behind the president’s office.

“How did the thieves know where to find the hard drive?” I ask.

His eyes close. “Please don’t.”

“Pardon?”

“You don’t think the FBI asked me all these questions a thousand times back then? They interrogated me for hours. Denied me legal counsel even.”

“They thought you were in on it.”

“I don’t know. But they sure acted like it. So I’ll tell you what I told them — I don’t know. I was duct-taped and cuffed in the basement. I had no idea what they’d done. I spent eight hours down there — until someone came looking to replace me in the morning.”

I know this, of course. Ian Cornwell had been cleared for a lot of reasons, the biggest being that he was only a twenty-two-year-old research intern with no record. He simply didn’t have the brains or experience to pull off this heist. Still, the FBI kept surveillance on him. I, too, had Kabir go through his bank records to see whether a late windfall came into his life. I found none. He seems clean. And yet.

“I want you to take a look at these photographs.”

I slide the four photographs across the table toward him. The first two are blown up from the famous photograph of the Jane Street Six. One is of Ry Strauss. The other is Arlo Sugarman. The next two are the same photographs but using a new age-progression software program, so both Strauss and Sugarman look some twenty years older — in their early forties — as they would have at the time of the art heist.

Ian Cornwell looks at the images. Then he looks up at me. “Are you kidding?”

“What?”

“That’s Ry Strauss and Arlo Sugarman,” he says. “You think they—”

“Do you?”

Ian Cornwell looks back down and seems to be studying the photographs with renewed vigor. I watch him closely. I need to gauge a reaction, and despite what you may read, no man is an open book. Still, I see something going on behind the eyes — or at least I imagine that I do.

“Hold on a second,” he says.

He reaches into a cabinet near the bookshelf and pulls out a black Sharpie pen. He gestures toward the photographs. “Do you mind?”

“Be my guest.”

He carefully draws mustaches on the male faces. When he’s satisfied, he straightens up and then tilts his head, as though he is an artist studying his handiwork. I don’t look at the photographs. I keep my focus on his face.

I don’t like what I see.

“I couldn’t swear one way or the other,” he pronounces after he’s taken some more time, “but it is certainly possible.”

I say nothing.

“Is there anything else, Mr. Lockwood?”

“Just the statute of limitations,” I say.

“Pardon?”

“It’s up.”

“I don’t understand—”

“So if you had something to do with the robbery, you couldn’t be prosecuted. If you, for example, gave the thieves some inside information — if you were an accessory of some sort — it’s been over twenty years. The statute of limitations for this type of offense in Pennsylvania is only five years. In short, you’re in the clear, Professor Cornwell.”

He frowns. “Clear for what?”

“For the Lincoln assassination,” I say.

“What?”

I shake my head. “Now do you see my issue with you?”

“What are you talking—?”

“You just said ‘clear for what?’ when it is so obvious that I am referring to the art heist.” I mimic him and repeat: “‘Clear for what?’ It’s overkill, Ian. It’s suspicious behavior. Come to think of it, everything about your testimony is suspicious.”

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

“For example, the two robbers disguised as police officers.”

“What about them?”

“That’s precisely what happened in Boston during the Gardner Museum heist. Two men, same heights you describe, same build, same fake mustaches, same claim of needing to investigate a disturbance.”

“You find that odd?” he counters.

“I do, yes.”

“But the FBI believed that it was the same MO.”

“MO?”

“Method of Operation.”

“Yes, I’m aware what the term means, thank you.”

“Well, that’s why there are similarities, Mr. Lockwood. The theory is that the robberies were done by the same team.”

“Or,” I say, “that someone, perhaps you, wanted us to believe that. And a ‘disturbance’? Really? Late at night in that closed building across the green? You were working there. Did you hear a disturbance?”

“Well, no.”

“No,” I repeat. “Did you report one? Also: no. Yet you just unlocked the door to these two men with fake mustaches. Don’t you think that’s odd?”

“I thought they were police officers.”

“Did they have a police car?”

“Not that I saw.”

“And that’s another thing. There was working CCTV on the campus entrance and exits. Yet no one saw two men dressed as police officers that night.”

This is a lie — the campus didn’t have that kind of surveillance back then — but it’s a lie that draws blood.

“I’ve had enough,” Ian Cornwell snaps, rising to his feet. “I don’t care who you are—”

“Shh.”

“Excuse me? Did you just...?”

I stare him down. If you want to change someone’s behavior, remember this and this only: Human beings always do what is in their self-interest. Always. That’s the sole motivator. People only do the “right thing” when it suits those interests. Yes, that is cynical, but it is also true. If you want to change minds, the secret is not being thoughtful or respectful or conciliatory or presenting cogent indisputable facts to show that said mind is wrong. And for those truly in the naïve camp, the secret is not trying to appeal to our better angels or “humanity.” None of that works. The only way to change someone’s opinion is to make them believe that siding with you is in their best interest. Period. The end.

I know what you’re thinking: I’m too lovely a creature to be this cynical. But stay with me on this.

“Here is my proposal,” I say to Professor Cornwell. “You tell me the truth about what happened that night—”

“I have told—”

“Shh.” I put my index finger to my lips. “Listen and save yourself. You tell me the truth. The full truth. Just me. In return, I promise that it never leaves this room. I will tell no one. Not a soul. There will be no repercussions. I don’t care whether the Picasso is hanging above your toilet or if you burned it for kindling. I don’t care if you were the mastermind or a pawn. Do you see what I’m offering you, Professor? The beauty of it? The chance at freedom? You simply tell me the truth — and suddenly the burden is gone. Not only that, but you have an ally for life. A grateful, powerful ally. An ally who can get you promoted or fund whatever academic — and I mean that word in two ways — dream project you have set your heart upon.”

Carrot done. Now it’s stick time. I lower my voice, so he has to strain to hear. Strain he does.

“But if you choose not to accept my generous offer, I begin to dig into your life. Really dig. You probably feel confident. After all, the FBI turned up nothing twenty-four years ago. You feel secure in your lie. But that security is now an illusion. The Vermeer is back. There is at least one dead body connected to it. The FBI will revisit the theft now with vigor, yes, but more important to your world, I will do what law enforcement cannot. I will build upon what they do, and using my resources, I will raise that intensity — aimed in your direction — to the tenth power. Do you understand?”

He says nothing.

Time to toss the lifeline.

“This is your chance, Professor Cornwell — your chance to end the turmoil and deceptions that have haunted you for over twenty years. This is your chance to unburden yourself. This is your chance, Professor, and if you don’t take it, I pity you and all those Cornwells who have come before and after you.”

I don’t bow as I finish, though I feel perhaps that I should.

As I wait for his reply, as I gaze out the window and onto the green where my father, grandfather, and great-grandfather all roamed as young men, a curious thought enters my brain, distracting me, pulling me out of this moment.

I’m thinking about Uncle Aldrich bucking family tradition by not coming here.

Why am I thinking about that? I don’t know. But it’s niggling at me.

I hear a chime and turn toward the sound. There is a grandfather clock in the far corner signaling the quarter hour. The door to the office bursts open, and students flow in with backpacks and expected post-lunch cacophony. Ian Cornwell says to me, “You’re wrong about me. There is nothing.”

He shakes off the stunned look and gives the entering students a beatific smile. I can see that he is at home here. I can see that he is happy and that he is a beloved teacher. I can see that he is good at his job.

But mostly, I can see that he is lying to me.