The guy looks up, eyes blinking like a dying light bulb. “What…what do you want?”

“Your boss. His name.”

“Don’t…know it. Never did. Never met the guy. You know how it works.” His hands are pressed against his belly, blood leaching between his fingers.

“A phone number then.”

“He will have me killed.”

The Russian leans over, fumbles a cell phone out of the middleman’s pocket. “Do not worry,” he says and cocks his gun. “He will not have to.” He shoots the guy twice, just to be sure. Then swipes his hat off the ground, turns his coat inside out to hide any blood, and steps out of the alley.

He scrolls through the middleman’s cell as he makes his way down the deserted street with one thought in his mind: to find the man who ordered this hit and kill him.

84

It was only a day later that Jonathan Teivel’s secretary called back to say her boss would see me. I was surprised, thought about not going, then I did.

Fiftysomething, hair combed back from a high forehead, Teivel looped his thumbs under striped suspenders. “Remind me again why you think I own this Titian painting?”

“A curator friend,” I said, “in Europe gave me a list of paintings and collectors who he thought owned Titians.”

“Your friend is mistaken. I own some art but no paintings by Titian.” Teivel glanced at the wall of windows that flooded his office with bright morning light, a view of the Hudson River, the Statue of Liberty, the New Jersey coastline. “Your friend works at which museum did you say?”

I hadn’t said, but I did now. “The Louvre.”

“Really? What’s his name?”

“Gingembre,” I said, doubting he would check with the Louvre curator, particularly if he dabbled in stolen art.

“Well, I’m afraid your friend has wasted your time.”

If so, I couldn’t help but wonder why Teivel had bothered to meet me. I told him it was okay, that I had time.

He offered up a wolfish smile. “My secretary says you’re an art historian, writing about Titian.”

“About Renaissance art in general.”

“I see. And for what publication did you say?”

Again, I hadn’t. “An academic journal,” I said. “If not Titian, who do you collect?”

“This and that, some Renaissance, some contemporary.”

“Which Renaissance artists?”

“Raphael and Giorgione. Drawings only, of course. I’m afraid paintings are out of my league.”

I looked over his grand corner office, the impressive view. I’d done a little homework, knew Teivel was a founding partner in the investment firm, one of the biggest and most prestigious in the city. I doubted there was much out of his league. The sun caught the gold on his wrist.

“I see you’re admiring my watch. Vacheron Constantin…Traditionnelle…perpetual calendar…open-worked.” He enunciated every word, pushed his cuff up to show it off. It looked like a sundial, actually four miniature sundials, all the inner mechanics on display.

“Rose-gold case and sapphire crystal glass,” he said, raising his wrist to my face. “Two hundred and seventy-six parts. Thirty-six jewels. Days of the week, forty-eight-month calendar, including leap year, and of course phases of the moon.”