Colette and the children had been hysterical. They’d taken shelter in a hut in the garden and called the emergency services. After that, things really had gone crazy. Police, security, fire brigade, television and press had all descended on this quiet mountain valley. Aragon had got his family away from the place as quickly as he could get the private plane in the air.
He had said nothing to anyone about the phone call. Time had passed. He’d waited until the results from the investigation, but they’d turned up nothing except signs of a gas leak.
He’d tried and tried to contact Roger Bazin. He didn’t know what to think. He needed to talk to him. How had he known about the explosion?
But Roger seemed to have disappeared. Days went by and there was still no answer on his phone. Philippe left messages, and none were returned. He’d been just about to get on a train to visit Bazin personally at his home in Geneva when he got another call.
The old Alfa Romeo Spider had gone out of control in an empty tunnel and hit a pillar at a hundred and twenty kilometres an hour. The sports car had been pulverized and the flaming wreckage had blocked the tunnel for hours. By the time the fire crews could get inside, there had been little left of Roger Bazin. There were no witnesses to the crash, the only testimony the gruesome photographs that the paparazzi had rushed to print in the glossy gutter press.
The distraught Bazin family testified that the old man had been suffering from stress for some weeks before the accident. He’d seemed depressed and agitated, frightened of something. Nobody knew what. His doctor had prescribed antidepressants, and they knew he was drinking, washing the pills down with brandy. There hadn’t been enough left of Roger to run tests, but the medical people all agreed on the obvious conclusion. The coroner’s verdict was death by misadventure.
For six months afterwards, the private firm hired by Philippe put in thousands of man-hours of investigation into Bazin’s death. Aragon baited the hook with a million-euro reward for anyone who could come up with information that would reveal the truth. They found no sign of anything suspicious.
Car accidents happened. So did gas explosions.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Milan, Italy
The Museo Visconti closed for lunch at 1 p.m. Visitors filed quietly out through the portico entrance. When the last ones had left, old Domenico Turchi the security guard pushed the entrance door shut behind them. With a shaky hand he reached for a jangling ring of keys on his belt and locked it, then threw the heavy iron bolt. He was sharing a joke with Signora Bellavista the receptionist as he hung his uniform jacket and cap on a hook behind the desk. They headed through a side door leading to the staff exit. He flipped open a panel on the wall and punched numbers to activate the alarm system, and he and Signora Bellavista left the building still laughing. Luca and Bepe had already left the workshop downstairs and Domenico knew he’d find the two men sitting drinking Peroni beers over lunch in the café around the corner where they all congregated every day.
The rooms of the museum were still and quiet. Down in the basement, among the honeycomb of gloomy passageways and corridors, there was the sound of a door creaking open.
Ben peered out, listening, then stepped quietly out of the disused store cupboard.
Leigh followed. Her legs were cramped after the long wait in the darkness. They made their way through a door and up some shadowy steps, tracing their way back to the main part of the building.
Ben recognized the workshop where they’d sneaked past the two men earlier. It was empty now, tools left in a disordered pile on a restoring bench. An old violin lay on a chisel-scarred table with its face removed. Two frameless oil paintings were propped up against the wall awaiting restoration. The workshop smelled strongly of wood glue, wax polish and varnish.
Ben picked up a hand-saw. He ran his eye along the sharp blade and nodded to himself. Leigh gave it a puzzled look. She didn’t even want to think what he was planning to do with it.
There was still no sign of anyone around. Ben pushed softly through another doorway and found what he was looking for. The main fuse-box was an ancient Bakelite affair with big clunky switches. He pushed them all to OFF, then flipped off the master switch. He pulled out all the fuses and hid them in a crate under a pile of packaging material.
They emerged from a staff-only doorway into the main hall. Dull sunshine filtered in through the windows. All the lights were dead, and the blinking red LEDs on the security cameras had gone dark.
They made their way back through the long corridor where the violins were displayed. The keyboard instruments exhibit was just around the corner.
Germana Bianchi had been dusting the frames upstairs in the portrait gallery and listening to Mina on her battery radio when the lights cut and her vacuum cleaner died. She was a heavy, ponderous woman and it took her a moment to register what had happened. She reached down with a fat hand to switch the vacuum cleaner off and on several times. ‘Cazzo,’ she swore. The power had cut out once before. She’d been alone in the building just like today, doing her lunchtime cleaning, when the fuses had tripped and she’d had to make her way down to the basement to flip the switch on the box. It was a long way down for her, and she didn’t like the empty feeling of the place when it was closed.
She munched on her sandwich for a moment or two, hoping the electricity would come on again on its own. It didn’t. She heaved a sigh, picked up her radio and started towards the stairs.
Ben examined the piano and decided on his plan of action. The front right leg had to come off as quickly and cleanly as possible. He might not have a lot of time. A member of staff might be back any minute. If he could lift the right corner of the piano an inch or two and jam something underneath the lip of the keyboard to keep the leg raised up long enough to saw it off…He grabbed a double piano stool, flipped it up on end, but it was too high.
He stepped up on the plinth, laid the saw down on the piano and tested the instrument’s weight. He could barely move it quarter of an inch, and he didn’t think that Leigh’s extra strength would make the difference. He gazed at the saw, then down at the leg. It was going to take a good fifteen minutes to cut through the solid wood. He might not have fifteen minutes.
Think of something, Hope.
Leigh tensed. ‘Ben, there’s someone in the building.’
Ben heard it too. Footsteps, slow and heavy, on the creaky stairs leading down to the main hall. In the quiet building the echo carried softly but clearly. There was another sound too. It was music, growing steadily louder. Someone with a radio was coming down towards them.
This wouldn’t do. It was now or never. He looked around him desperately.
The rope cordon around the piano was supported by six brass pedestals, three feet high on broad circular bases. Yes, that was the only answer. He used the saw to cut the rope, then picked up one of the pedestals. It was solid and heavy. He turned it upside down and held it like an axe. The brass was cold in his hand.
‘Fuck it,’ he muttered. He caught Leigh’s horrified look as he swung the pedestal back over his shoulder and then smashed it sideways into the piano leg with all his strength.
The crashing noise shattered the stillness of the room. There was a huge crunch of splintering wood. The piano gave a juddering groan, strings vibrating in unison. The leg gave a little, and the front end of the instrument sagged, creaked. Then stopped.
Halfway down the stairs and puffing with the exertion, Germana heard the terrible sound over her music. She turned the radio off. What the hell was that? Her heart gave a flutter. She grasped the banister rail and started walking faster.