The Icon Thief
PRAISE FOR
THE ICON THIEF
“Alec Nevala-Lee comes roaring out of the gate with a novel that’s as thrilling as it is thought-provoking, as unexpected as it is erudite.
The Icon Thief
is a wild ride through a fascinating and morally complex world, a puzzle Duchamp himself would have applauded. Bravo.”
—national bestselling author Jesse Kellerman
“Alec Nevala-Lee is no debut author; he must have been a thriller writer in some past life. This one has everything: great writing, great characters, great story, great bad guy, and a religious conspiracy to boot.
The Icon Thief
is smart, sophisticated, and has enough fast-paced action to keep anyone up past midnight. I’m jealous.”
—
New York Times
bestselling author Paul Christopher
“Twists and turns aplenty lift this thriller above the rest. From the brutal thugs of the Russian mafia to the affected inhabitants of the American art world, this book introduces a cast of believable and intriguing characters. Add a story line where almost nothing is as it first appears, and where the plot turns around on itself to reveal startling contradictions, and the result is a book that grips and holds the reader like a vise. I devoured it in a single sitting.”
—national bestselling author James Becker
T
HE
ICON
THIEF
ALEC NEVALA-LEE
A SIGNET BOOK
S
IGNET
Published by New American Library, a division of
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,
New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124,
Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park,
New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632,
New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by Signet, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, March 2012
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Copyright © Alec Nevala-Lee, 2012
All rights reserved
ISBN: 978-1-101-57724-0
REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
Printed in the United States of America
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
P
UBLISHER’S
N
OTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
CONTENTS
There is no solution because there is no problem.
—Marcel Duchamp
P
ROLOGUE
In Russia, the outlaw is the only true revolutionary…. The outlaws of the forests, towns, and villages … together with the outlaws confined in the innumerable prisons of the empire… constitute a single, indivisible, tight-knit world…. In this world, and in it alone, there has always been revolutionary conspiracy. Anyone in Russia who seriously wants to conspire, anyone who wants a people’s revolution, must go into this world.
—Mikhail Bakunin
A
ndrey was nearly at the border when he ran into the thieves. By then, he had been on the road for three days. As a rule, he was a careful driver, but at some point in the past hour, his mind had wandered, and as he was coming over a low rise, he almost collided with two cars that were parked in the road ahead.
He braked sharply. The cars were set bumper to bumper, blocking the way. One was empty; the other had been steamed up by the heat of the men inside, who were no more than shadows on the glass. A yellow field stretched to either side of the asphalt, flecked with mounds of debris.
Andrey waited for what he knew was coming, barely aware of the music still pouring from his cassette deck. As he watched, the door of one car opened, disclosing a figure in a fur cap and greatcoat. It was a boy of twelve or so. His rifle, with its wooden buttstock, seemed at least twice as old as he was.
As the boy approached, Andrey reached into a bag on the floor of the van, removing a fifth of vodka and a carton of Bond Street Specials. He rolled down his window, allowing a knife’s edge of cold to squeeze through the gap. As he handed over the tribute, something in the boy’s eyes, which were liquescent and widely spaced, made him think of his own son.
The boy accepted the offering without a word. He was about to turn away, rifle slung across one shoulder, when he seemed to notice the music. With the neck of the bottle, he gestured at the cassette deck. “What band?”
Andrey did his best to smile, painfully aware of the time he was losing. “
Dip Pepl
.”
The boy nodded gravely. Andrey watched as he carried the vodka and cigarettes over to the other car, speaking inaudibly with the man inside. Then the boy turned and headed back to the van again.
Andrey slid a hand into his pocket, already dreading what the thieves might do if they asked to search the vehicle. Withdrawing a wad of bills, he peeled off a pair of twenties and held them out the window. When the boy returned, however, he waved the cash away and pointed to the stereo, which was singing of a fire on the shore of Lake Geneva:
We all came out to Montreux—
“Cassette tape,” the boy said with a grin. “
Dip Pepl
. You give it to me, okay?”
Andrey’s face grew warm, but in the end, he knew that he had no choice. Smiling as gamely as he could, he ejected the cassette, silencing the music, and handed it to the boy, who pocketed the tape and went back to his own car. A second later, the thieves pulled over to the road’s scalloped edge, clearing a space just wide enough for Andrey’s van to slip through.
Easing the van forward, Andrey drove through the gap, keeping an eye on the thieves as he passed. Once they were out of sight, he exhaled and took his hands from the wheel, flexing them against the cold. Reaching up, he lowered the sun visor, glancing at the picture of the woman and child that had been taped to the inside. After a moment, he raised the visor again and turned his eyes back to the road.
The following morning, unwashed and weary, he arrived at a town on the river Tisza. Studying the ranks of buses preparing to cross over to Hungary, he saw a familiar face. The driver seemed pleased to see him, and was especially glad to load a cardboard box from Andrey’s van into the back of his bus.
Andrey followed the bus across the border. At the customs checkpoint, he said that he was a businessman looking for deals in Hungary, which was true enough. Sometimes the officers wanted to chat, but today, after a cursory search, they waved him through without a second glance.
Driving slowly through the countryside, he caught sight of the bus parked at a roadside restaurant. The driver was leaning against the wheel well, smoking a cigar, which he ground out at the van’s approach. The package in the rear was untouched. Handing the driver a carton of cigarettes, Andrey loaded the box into the van
again. Back on the road, his mood brightened, and it grew positively sunny when, in the distance, he saw the city of Budapest.
He drove to a hotel on Rákóczi Road. In his room, he locked the door and set the box on the bed. The lid was secured with tape, which he sliced open. On top, there lay a loaded pistol, which he set aside, and ten rectangular objects wrapped in newspaper. Nine were icons taken from churches and monasteries throughout Russia, depicting the saints of a tradition in which he no longer believed.
The last painting was different. Andrey unwrapped it gently. It was no larger than the icons, perhaps twelve by eighteen inches, but it was painted on canvas, not wood. It depicted a nude woman lying in a field, her head gone, as if the artist had left it deliberately unfinished. Her legs were spread wide, displaying a hairless gash. In one hand, upraised, she held a lamp of tapered glass.
Andrey studied the painting for a long moment, stirred by feelings that he could not fully explain, then wrapped it up again. Casting about for a hiding place, he finally slid it under the bed, in the narrow gap behind the frame, which was just wide enough to accommodate the slender package. He put the gun back in the box, along with the icons, and went, at last, into the bathroom.