Chapter 13 Schloss #2
“But never through your eyes,” Josh said earnestly. “It’s so much better listening to you talk about it than it was when I came here in high school with my class.”
“Your class took you to Germany?” Michael said, breathless with surprise.
“Our suburb is really rich,” Josh apologized.
“I mean, the bad part of that is that we take things like Neuschwanstein for granted, and we shouldn’t.
You were there for a couple of hours and look at everything you loved.
That’s really the way to do it, Michael.
Did you take lots of pictures for your kids? ”
Michael’s smile peeked out, revealing teeth that hadn’t been fixed with braces when he’d been a kid but so much heart.
“Oh, I did. I bought them all teddy bears and reproductions of the carvings and the sculptures and the paintings. Carl’s going to post them tomorrow for me, since, you know.
” His smile turned mischievous. “Not supposed to be here and all.”
“I’ve got a package I’ll need you to send to my mom,” Josh told him, thinking about the giant pink diamond Grace had stolen from the Louvre. “I’ll need to get one of those stuffed bears first, though,” he said.
Carl nodded placidly and took a lingering bite of schnitzel.
Carl was forever watching his weight, but Josh noticed he’d slimmed down a lot in the last year and hoped he’d stop watching.
Carl’s placid demeanor and absolute calm turned out to be one of the crew’s biggest cons—Carl was an outstanding boxer and tied for second for their best muscle, and he was nearly as smart as Josh, Grace, and Stirling, knew a number of languages and, best of all, how to navigate foreign legal policy and bureaucracy.
A few extra pounds didn’t detract from his effectiveness in the least.
Now he swallowed and settled back from the table with a replete sigh. “You’re being very good,” he said, “but would you like to know about the security now?”
Josh closed his eyes in gratitude. “You really do love me, don’t you, Uncle Carl?”
“Never doubt it, kid,” Carl said kindly. “Now for starters, the security system around the sparklies is very much the same as it was with the Louvre.”
“Glass case, contact point alarm system—”
“Heat and touch activated,” Carl finished.
“We can freeze the server monitoring the pressure points and the temperature, but it’s still going to take some real speed and sleight of hand to replace the fake with the real one.
There’s a security guard at the entrance and exit to the bedroom where the jewels are showcased, and we need a plan to get their attention.
The problem is….” He sucked air through his teeth, and Michael filled in the missing word.
“Ambience,” he said decisively, his twang sounding more pronounced than usual.
“Ambience?” Josh asked, blinking rapidly. It was a word he hadn’t been expecting.
“That’s the word,” Carl agreed, and he reached into his pocket and pulled out fliers and maps of their target.
“Listen, the Louvre was better guarded and more public. We all know that. And their security system was top notch—that’s why your team was bigger.
But this place isn’t only smaller, it’s less crowded and less noisy.
And there’s not just fewer people, there’s much fewer people.
There were at least five minutes today when Michael and I were the only two people in a room, minus the security guards.
Using Tienne as a shill and Grace as a simultaneous feint was brilliant, but that’s too noisy for this.
There’s a hush around this place. It was built to be a refuge for King Ludwig, and also a fantasy, his own personal mental vacay, but dreamy.
We can’t have art students doing parkour through the hallways. It’s disrespectful.”
Josh grinned at him. “I agree. But while I didn’t know about the extra guards, I do have an idea.” He smiled at Liam. “So, how game is Interpol?”
Liam squinted at him. “Game?”
“Well, we’re not technically taking anything—”
“A rather brilliant fake,” Carl said soberly, “of a casket of enamel painted on silver, surrounded by a king’s ransom—literally—of jewels.” He shuddered. “I can’t believe you put it in your luggage and brought it here.”
Josh grinned and glanced around conspiratorially. “Want to see it?”
Michael’s eyes almost bugged out.
Josh went to his luggage and found the special compartment holding the casket, which was about the length and width of a paperback book, with a depth of about four inches, in an elongated octagon.
And it was exquisite, encrusted with the brightest of jewels: rubies, sapphires, emeralds.
It had been commissioned in the Victorian age by one of the many Rothchild heirs for his daughter and later stolen by the Nazis when they’d plundered Paris.
After it had been returned by the famed Monuments Men, American soldiers whose job it was to save the treasures of the world from the predation of monsters, the Rothchild family had gifted it to Neuschwanstein so it could belong to the public.
It was part of many treasures in the castle from the same bequest.
Except Danny had stolen it fifteen years ago as a present for Julia, who had been—by her own account—blue.
Josh was old enough to start school (although they’d pull him out in a year or two), and while their household was warm and happy and full of laughter, it was also not what a young wife and mother dreamed of as a child.
And according to Danny, it had started to hit the three of them that they’d signed onto this grift for life.
Danny had apparently been in and out of the mansion at Glencoe at this time.
Julia and Felix had been busy building Felix’s empire out of the crumbs Julia’s father threw her, and Phyllis was there for Josh if Danny warned them he was going to be gone.
Josh remembered that—Danny sneaking into his nursery, giving him a hug, and promising to bring back a gift.
He never went back on those promises, Josh remembered, until the time he’d left for good.
One night he’d gone into Josh’s room, said he’d be back in two weeks, and had returned with a gift for Julia and a science kit for Josh.
Josh never knew what he’d brought back for Felix, but this had been the period when they’d always reunited happily, before Danny’s drinking had begun to infect the family like a scotch-scented plague over the sun.
“It’s beautiful,” Michael said reverently, gazing at it as it sat on the table in a puddle of silk. “What made Julia decide to give it back?”
Josh shrugged, remembering the moment she and Danny had shared.
“She said it was never really hers in the first place. It’s one of the few things Danny ever stole that he felt bad about. It had been saved from the Nazis and bequeathed to the public—but look at the pictures painted on it.”
He held up his phone to use as a magnifying glass so they could get a good look at the etchings on the tiny silver panels and Carl and Michael gasped first, then Liam, who had done the same with his phone.
“Oh,” he said, glancing at Josh.
The pictures, to a one, were of a lovely woman, dressed in full Victorian regalia, and her child.
Whether walking hand in hand under almond blossoms or playing on a swing or eating dinner, the little boy wore bloomers, and the woman had the elaborate coif of the age, but they were obviously very happy in each other’s company.
“For his daughter and grandson,” Josh said. “Unfortunately, the daughter died in childbirth with her second child, so the casket has always been in public circulation, but Danny—well, he said that you grew less self-centered with age.”
“Back then, what mattered was I saw a pretty thing for my loved one, and I wanted it,” he said.
“But this one haunted me. This treasure truly belonged to the world, and I stole it for my own. This isn’t a rope of jewels shoved in the back of a museum that will never be shown again.
This one is haunting. I found a replica—a good one—and replaced it, but I think the world should have the real thing again, don’t you? ”
“And this was a good time to replace the thing,” Carl murmured. “How very Danny.”
“Yes,” Josh agreed with a little smile. He glanced at Liam and then at Carl. “So since we’re going to advertise the return after I’m out of there―”
“Wait,” Michael said. “So this isn’t a switch?”
Josh grimaced. “Well, this one doesn’t work unless they realize it happened. So we’re going to have to simply put this one side by side with the other one, close the case, leave a marker that says ‘Lightfingers was here,’ and get away scot-free.”
“Well, why don’t we just set the casket down and run?” Michael asked, looking at everybody.
Carl snorted, the sound pure offense. “Because that’s a terrible thing to do to Danny’s reputation!
No, this thing was stolen, and the replica has sat, pretty as a baby’s first smile, on a green velvet cushion under a glass box for the last fifteen years.
We need there to be both a subtlety and a flair here. ”
“Okay, then,” Michael said slowly. “So we need to set the two boxes side by side and have somebody come in to… whatzit?”
“Authenticate it,” Josh said, nodding. “Ideally, yes. So Carl’s right. It can’t be a smash and grab or art students doing parkour. It’s got to be a ‘now you don’t see it, now you do,’ sort of thing.”
“So,” Liam asked speculatively, “why did you ask me how game Interpol is?”
“Well,” Josh said, giving him a kind glance, “how about we do this—and I know it’s terrifying for all of us—but partly on the up-and-up. Liam and Carl distract the guards with some—”