A Magnificent Crime (9 page)

It was a foggy spring day, and mist clung to the old stone buildings on campus. The damp seeped into my bones. I still hadn't decided what to do about the Hope. The tarot card the fortune-teller had given me, the Star, was tucked into my pocket. It was silly, I know, but somehow it made me feel just a little safer.

At any rate, I had something else I needed to do this afternoon: get myself to the library and pick up an essential book so I could finish my French lit paper on
le mal du siècle.

I was getting my master's degree in nineteenth-century French literature at the University of Washington and, admittedly, taking a long time about it. I worried constantly that my supervisor would kick me out, but so far I was hanging on by my fingernails.

I intended to finish my degree. Besides being excellent cover for a professional thief, it was smart to have a career to fall back on. Once my burgling days were over.

Which, given what was happening with me lately, seemed like a closer possibility than ever.

I strode through the leafy campus, along cherry blossom–lined pathways, thankful I had avoided seeing Professor Atworthy when I passed the campus coffee shop—a regular hangout of his. Atworthy was my thesis supervisor, and I had blown off a loosely arranged meeting during his office hours earlier today, and I didn't have a ready explanation for why my assignment was late.

I didn't think “Needed time to plan an emerald heist at the Westin penthouse” would be a particularly acceptable excuse.

I made it to the Suzzallo Library, an imposing Gothic stone building, and climbed the steps to the cathedral-like edifice. I loved this building. Oak bookshelves adorned the walls, and carved friezes and vaulted ceilings decorated the reading rooms. I breathed in the smell of books and ink and a faint note of sweaty student. As much as I would have loved to linger here, I made my way quickly to the graduate desk and signed out my book.

On my way out, down the grand staircase, there was a crush of people entering and climbing upward. As I jostled through the crowd, somebody reached out to catch hold of my arm.

“Catherine, there you are! I missed you at my office hours this morning,” said a pointed voice. I looked up into Professor Atworthy's face.

Crap.

Memo to self:

So there I was, standing on the central staircase of the library, trying to produce an excuse, muttering various old standbys about dogs and computer crashes and lost files and the like.

I could tell he was as convinced as I usually am when the computer sales guy does a pitch for the extended warranty.

Considering Atworthy was one of my younger profs, he certainly had a finely tuned bullshit meter. He looked at me over his sharp nose with extreme skepticism. He seemed tired, pushing a lock of muddy brown hair back from his forehead, glancing out the window, and sighing as I rambled on. Doubtless I was headed toward probation of some sort.

Just then a voice boomed right next to us. “Andre, my goodness!” The man spoke with a heavy French accent. He was standing beside Atworthy, staring directly at him. “I haven't seen you in ages! How have you been
? Comment ça va?
”

Atworthy looked at the man blankly. “I'm sorry, but I don't know you,” he said. “You've got me mistaken for someone else.”

The Frenchman laughed. “Andre, that's ridiculous.”

But Atworthy insisted he didn't know the man. Eventually, the Frenchman gave up and walked angrily away.

“Well, that was weird,” I said, laughing lightly, which I hoped hid the fact that my every hair was standing on end. Coincidences like that always mean something. My every alarm bell was jangling.

I forced a smile as I excused myself and descended the stairs to leave the library.

All the other strange incidents involving Atworthy began stacking up in my mind.

There was the time I'd found a handgun in his desk drawer. And we're not talking about some charming antique professor-ish pistol. This was a Smith & Wesson model 945, a .45 caliber semiautomatic. What I was doing snooping in his desk drawer was another story, of course, but it didn't change the fact that Atworthy, my leather and tweed professor, had been in possession of a concealed weapon.

There was the moment I'd spotted Atworthy in London. He was on a boat on the Thames, watching me silently as I stood on Blackfriars Bridge after the Fabergé job. It was the middle of the night, sure, and the sky was foggy, but I'd been sure it was him.

Then a horrible thought occurred to me. Could he possibly be an undercover cop?

The truly paranoid part of myself then asked, Could he possibly be investigating
me?
Had he been under deep cover all this time? A cold fist gripped my stomach.

Somehow, I was going to have to find out.

 

I arrived at 125 Bay Street and ducked behind the back of Atworthy's house—a two-story clad in cedar shingles. It was twilight, and darkness was closing in all around me. It was a comforting feeling for a thief.

I needed to be very fast. I knew Atworthy was at an evening lecture. Of course, I was supposed to be at that lecture myself, but this was a much more pressing task.

I could count on at least another thirty minutes, but beyond that, anything could happen. I hadn't had much chance to plan this break-in, so it wasn't ideal, but I had to figure this out right away. I picked the doorknob lock with little difficulty. The doorknob turned, I pushed, but the door held fast.
Fine.
There had to be another lock. I got through that in another few seconds.

But then there was another latch. And a lock at the top of the door.
Jesus.
This was not a high break-in neighborhood. Atworthy had to be hiding some secrets. Finally, I opened the door.

An alarm wailed like a banshee.

Shit.
My heart was in my throat as I located the security panel just inside the door. I identified the manufacturer in an instant and knew it was one I could hack into and disable. After several seconds of manipulating the circuits, there was a sudden, single beep and the siren cut abruptly. I exhaled steadily into the silence. I hoped I could count on neighborly apathy—that tendency to assume everything was fine once an alarm shut off by itself—and that nobody would come to investigate.

Now to find what I needed.

This, typically, was a task made easier by knowing what one was looking for. Which I didn't. I began skulking through the darkness of Atworthy's creaky old house. The small bright circle of my penlight bobbed ahead of me and slid over walls, carpeted floors, the TV. An office or den might be useful, if I could locate such a thing. Or a bedroom. Typically full of personal information.

Wait.
There was the kitchen. Beyond a doorway I saw dishes piled in the sink and smelled the faint aroma of burnt food. The kitchen could be useful—maybe I'd find some phone messages or bills. I tiptoed that way. I was relaxing into the job now. And I was pleased because, if nothing else, I was giving my new soft-soled black shoes a dry run. So far, they were definitely working well. Except for one irritating little spot by my left heel—

Just then, the cold blade of a sizable knife pressed against my throat.

The hand holding the knife was Atworthy's. I knew because a sharp voice in my ear said, “Do not move,” and it was unmistakably his. I'd heard it in the lecture hall often enough.

I was frozen, mentally calculating my chances of getting out of this ambush with my carotid arteries still intact.

Then there was a sharp intake of breath, and Atworthy said, “Catherine? Is that you?” He withdrew the blade and spun me around. “Jesus, Catherine, I could have killed you.” He was angry but clearly relieved. “What are you doing here?”

As he flipped the knife closed, I stared at it. The weapon was a balisong, which was no kitchen knife. A balisong is an illegal blade, a classic choice for crooks.

My professor. With the weapon of a criminal.

“Well . . . I . . .” I struggled to find a suitable pretext. I decided to lob the ball back to him and buy a little time. I planted a hand on my hip.

“You know, Professor, I might ask you what you're doing with a balisong. And how did you learn how to subdue an intruder like that?”

“That does not answer the question, my dear.”

“Right. Well, I really wanted to know my grade on my last paper . . . and I thought you might have it here. . . .”

“Catherine,” he said, holding up a hand, “just stop. I know you're a thief. I've known for a long time, in fact.”

My heart stopped for a second. He knew? Did he think I was breaking in to steal from him? His tone suggested he wasn't about to clap handcuffs on my wrists or place an imminent 911 call. It also suggested that denying things, at this stage, would be pointless.

“I wasn't robbing your house,” I blurted.

“I believe you.”

“Are you a cop?” I asked. Truthfully, I didn't want to hear the answer to this question. I was getting ready to bolt. I'd already assessed the exits. The answer to this question was going to dictate a lot.

“No.”

“No?” I squinted at his face in the darkened kitchen, trying to read his expression and figure out what was going on. Was he lying? I had an uneasy, fun-house feeling of standing on an unsteady floor that was about to tip at an awkward angle. “Let's say I believe you. How do you know about me, then?”

He scrubbed his face, looking at me uncertainly. Then he sighed and took a seat at the round oak kitchen table.

“Catherine, I think it's time I told you the full story.”

“Please do.”

“Atworthy isn't my real name,” he began, loosening the navy rep stripe tie he'd worn to class that day. “It's Andre Gaston. I've been using Atworthy as an alias. It's a name that was given to me for protection.”

I scraped a chair out from under the table and joined him. “Protection from what?”

I leaned my arms on the table, and a few sharp crumbs stuck into my elbows. A clock on the wall ticked softly, and the refrigerator gave a click and began humming in the corner.

“My old life.”

“And that was?”

He hesitated. He raked a hand through his thick hair peppered with several strands of gray. “I was a hired killer, Catherine. An assassin.”

My mouth dropped open in full cartoon style.

“I grew up in Paris,” he continued. “And that's where I trained to be a killer.”

I leaned back in the seat with a thud. Atworthy then spun the tale of how this all came to be. A shadowy agency, in the business of seeking out promising subjects, had recruited him at a young age. He came to their attention when he showed an early skill at sport shooting while out hunting every Sunday with his father. He was shipped off to boarding school—which turned out to be a school in the covert arts, training contract killers. After graduating, the agency took him on as an assassin.

I looked down, shaking my head slowly in disbelief. “I had no idea.” I looked up at him again. “So, you actually killed people?”

He suddenly looked very old, like he'd lived a thousand lives. His shoulders sloped under an invisible burden.

“Catherine, you need to understand that the people I killed were marked men. They were dead, anyway. Whether I pulled the trigger or someone else. It's not an excuse, but—”

“So what happened? Why did you stop?”

He spread his hands out on the table before him. “I had doubts. As I grew older and saw more of the world, I started to see things differently. And then I got an assignment that changed everything.”

“In what way?”

“It was something I just couldn't do. The target was a woman. And . . . she was pregnant.”

“Oh. So you refused.”

Atworthy's face was grim and pale. “There is no turning down an assignment. No, I did it.” I stared at him in horror. “After that I couldn't live with myself anymore. I wasn't sleeping. I wasn't eating. I couldn't go on.” His eyes looked haunted. It was an expression I'd never seen on my professor's face before. Streetlights shone in through the window of the breakfast nook, illuminating a row of kitchen knives hanging on the wall.

“So you quit?” I asked.

He laughed without humor. “Quitting wasn't an option. People
own
you. Instead, I turned myself in.”

“To the police?” I asked slowly, the very idea of this causing an involuntary physical repulsion in the pit of my stomach.

“I struck a deal. I provided names. And I was placed into witness protection. The only skill I had other than killing was in French literature. Strings were pulled, calls were made, and I ended up being placed as a professor in this little corner of the Pacific Northwest, here at the University of Washington.”

“Okay, but how did you find out what
I
do for a living?” I asked, leaning forward. Crumbs crunched under my forearms again.

“I still retain some underground connections, and they told me when a professional thief enrolled in my department. Criminals under protection need to know about the movements of other professionals in the area. It wasn't an accident that I became your academic advisor. I specifically requested it. I thought . . . maybe the time would come when I could help you.”

“Help me? In what way?”

“Oh, I don't know. Maybe I could help you understand the choice ahead of you. Maybe help you choose a less illegal life. Or help you deal with the emotional repercussions of the path you've chosen.”

I was quiet a moment. I thought of the Star tarot card I had tucked into the waistband of my black Lycra pants before coming here.

“And was that you . . . in London? Did you follow me there?” I asked.

“I thought you might be in over your head.”

He was right about that. I had been in over my head. And I still was—just now with Faulkner and the Hope Diamond.

“All this time, why didn't you tell me?” I asked.

“I've been afraid of openly mingling the two sides of my life. It's one thing when it's all covert, but quite another when they mix. I was afraid of falling back into—”

“The dark side?”

He smiled. “I guess you could put it like that.”

I squirmed in the uncomfortable kitchen chair, thinking about whether I should bring it up.

“Well, since you mentioned helping me,” I said at length, “maybe you're in the mood for providing some advice? I'm in the market a little bit.”

“Go on.”

This was familiar territory. Since he was my thesis supervisor, I often consulted with him about thorny problems. In the past they'd revolved a little more around Alexandre Dumas and Victor Hugo, and somewhat less around committing major felonies, but this might work, too.

I told him about my trouble with Faulkner. I told him about the deal I'd made about the Hope Diamond. And I told him about my panic attacks, the fear that would make it impossible for me to actually do the job.

Throughout, he listened intently, frowning.

“So, can you help me?” I asked. I held my breath.

Atworthy sat back in his chair. “No.”

I stared. “No? Just no?” I stammered with disappointment. That was it?

“I can't help you, Cat. Only
you
can help you. And the way you can do it? You have to do this job. You have to take the Hope Diamond job. If you want to get over this fear, that's the only way to do it.”

“But I thought maybe it would be better to lay low for a bit. Stay safe. No?”

“That is the opposite of what you need to do,” Atworthy said. “Running away from fear is the quickest route straight into its arms.”

I said nothing.

“Your brain will, over time, figure out that you can do this, that you'll be fine,” he said. “And the panic attacks will subside.”

Now that it was said, that it was out there, I knew he was right. I'd been tossed to sea from a sailboat, knocked overboard by a flailing boom. If I didn't get back in the boat now, I would never be able to.

“Catherine, I have every confidence you will find your way. But right now you need to embrace the fear. You need to do exactly what your instincts are telling you not to.”