Chapter 20

CHAPTER 20

MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1925

F igaro" had been playing in Joe's head ever since Saturday. He hoped he wasn't wearing a grin to go with it now that he was back in uniform. Silencing the music in his head, he entered his boss's office for their weekly meeting.

Garlands and bows festooned a half-sized Christmas tree in the corner. It even had ornaments on it for goodness' sake. A nutcracker on the windowsill was painted in a blue uniform with brass buttons not unlike the NYPD's. Cute.

"So who's the woman in your life?" Joe asked, dropping into a chair.

"Hm?" The inspector glanced up, then at the Christmas decorations. "Ah, that would be my mother's doing. You didn't think I had time for any other dame, did you? Here. Help yourself." Murphy slid a plate of sugar cookies across the desk.

Joe picked up a snowman-shaped treat smeared with yellow frosting, then turned it toward Murphy in question.

"My sister's kids helped decorate this year," Murphy explained. "She couldn't convince them that yellow was for stars. Whaddya gonna do, right?"

Chuckling, Joe finished the cookie in two bites.

"It's like this, Caravello." Murphy leaned back. "I'm reading your reports every week, and I'm not seeing a lot of progress on the forgery front. How do you feel about that?"

Was that a trick question? How did Murphy think Joe felt about that? "Obviously, more progress would be better. But it's a long game. Like most everything else worth doing, it takes time and patience. It took years to take down the Black Hand Society."

"You're not working on anything like the Black Hand Society. No one is being blackmailed or murdered. This is low-profile stuff. It's not the type of crime that makes headlines, and it's certainly not the type city hall funds."

"Crime is crime, right, Inspector? No one is dying in petty theft or parking violations, but we enforce those laws, too. The break will come, we've just got to be ready for it."

"Uh-huh." Murphy opened a folder of Joe's reports. "Let me see if I've got this straight. Here are the forgeries you've found so far. An alabaster ointment jar, belonging to Newell St. John. Found November 14, but determined to be forged in Egypt decades ago. Canopic jars belonging to Thomas Sanderson, found on December 2. Forger at large. Horus statues at Rosenberg's Family Heirlooms, brought in December 7—but Escalante, who brought them to Rosenberg, also remains at large. Then there's a Book of the Dead papyrus belonging to Ray Moretti, found November 23, which he isn't willing to part with." He looked up. "Did I miss anything?"

"The oyster shell Wade Martin had when he was killed."

"Right." But Murphy's expression suggested he wasn't counting that. "Not your case."

"But did anyone follow up with Rosenberg to confirm Martin bought that from his shop?" Maybe it had been Connor, after all, since neither man had confessed ownership. "Maybe whoever bought it mentioned why they would spring for it. A piece like that seems like a conversation starter. Please tell me someone's looking into it. It doesn't have to be me."

"It better not be you, and that's an order." The inspector's jaw hardened. "What is the problem here? Do you not have enough work to keep you busy?"

Joe had plenty. He was interviewing suspects and witnesses for various crimes, starting missing-persons protocols, and doing all the paperwork that came with it.

"Did you ever engage with this art buyer, Daniel Bradford?"

Frustration boiled in Joe's gut. "Not yet. Aaron Tomkins, the art dealer, told me he'd given Bradford a message for me, but that may or may not have been the truth." His neck itched beneath his collar. Decades ago, the boys in blue would have gotten information through the persuasion of brute force. Joe wouldn't resort to those tactics. But he still burned over not being able to track Bradford.

Joe changed the subject. "Did you read my recent report about Peter Braun and Ray Moretti? There's a connection there. At least one of them is dirty, and it's only a matter of time before I find out who, what, and how."

When Murphy didn't contradict him, Joe kept going. "There's something about Moretti that isn't right. His record is abnormally spotless. No one's that clean."

Murphy snorted a laugh. "Last I checked, you can't arrest someone for a spotless background check. He's the victim of a forgery and chooses to hang on to the artifact anyway. He doesn't want to press charges."

"He doesn't want me to do my job. That's what it is. This guy, nobody crosses him. So why would he be okay with a forgery? Something's wrong. We need eyes on both Braun and Moretti." As of right now, he didn't have enough on either for a search warrant, which he needed if he was ever going to get convicting evidence.

"You're reaching, Caravello. Reaching hard." Murphy broke off the head of a gingerbread cookie and popped it in his mouth. "I know you'd hoped that hunting for forgers would lead you to big fish, top dogs in organized crime. That doesn't mean you get to conjure one out of thin air so you can arrest him."

"That's not what I'm doing. Read my report again."

Murphy glowered. "You telling me how to do my job, Detective?"

Joe's lips pressed into a thin line. He knew better than to answer that.

"As for putting man-hours into watching these two, you know as well as I do that we can't spare it until Manhattan dries up or Prohibition ends. I've got a mind to pull you off this wild goose hunt."

Joe knew this was coming. "I only spend a few hours a week on this." Which Murphy could see if he actually read the reports.

"All right." Murphy slapped the folder closed. "Listen, I agreed to let you work on this as long as it isn't a drain on police resources with nothing to show for it."

"Understood, sir. I will continue to be as careful with resources as ever. I'm committed to seeing this through."

Inspector Murphy leaned forward, lowered his voice. "I get it. You're committed. No one doubts that, least of all me. It's your strength, but it's also your weakness. You don't know when to let go."

Joe held his gaze without speaking. Outside, tires squealed, and car horns blared, followed by two men shouting.

A knock pulled Joe's attention toward the door, where Oscar McCormick held up one hand. "I'm sorry to interrupt, sirs, but this is urgent. Your phone kept ringing, Caravello, so I answered it. It was Mr. Rosenberg. He said Vincent Escalante will be at his shop in twenty minutes."

Joe stood, the chair scraping the floor in his haste. "Merry Christmas," he told Murphy, and scrammed.

———

Eighteen minutes later, Joe parked an unmarked police car outside Rosenberg Family Heirlooms. Right on time, a man got out of his truck half a block away and pulled a dolly from the bed. After stacking three crates onto it, he rolled it toward the shop. Rosenberg opened the door for him as he neared.

Another fifteen minutes passed before Escalante emerged, his dolly and crates rolling much lighter over the slushy sidewalk this time. Patiently, Joe waited for him to pack up his truck and drive away.

Judging by Escalante's unhurried pace and his proper use of turn signals, he had no idea he had a tail.

Escalante led Joe into the Bronx, to a brick townhouse with black iron railings flanking the cracked cement front steps. Islands of snow dotted the sidewalk. Joe parked the car and strolled up to Escalante, who was unloading the crates from the back of the truck.

"Need a hand with that?" Joe asked him.

Escalante glanced at him, then past him at the stairs leading to the front door. "Yeah, sure. These aren't heavy. They're just awkward, you know? Those broken steps aren't friendly to my dolly, either."

"I figured. Load me up."

Escalante stacked two empty crates in his arms. Taking the third crate himself, he led the way up the stairs and unlocked the door. "Come on in. Set them down on the floor over there, thanks."

"You sure? Where do they really go?" Joe brushed past him, bypassed the living room, and strode down a hallway until he found a room that smelled more like a workshop than a home, with hints of paint or varnish and plaster of paris. Bingo. "This looks right." He set the boxes down. The curtains were pulled shut, but daylight seeped between the cracks. "Vincent Escalante, right?"

The man's face darkened as he stood in the doorway. "Who are you?"

"We have a mutual friend in Mr. Rosenberg. You're Vincent Escalante, correct?" He picked up a copy of National Geographic from one of the tables. A golden coffin mask shone from the cover. "Says here that's your name. Pleased to meet you. Thanks for inviting me in." He dropped the magazine and walked farther into the space.

"Excuse me, but I'd like you to leave now."

"Detective Sergeant Joe Caravello, NYPD." He showed him his identification wallet, then pulled one of the fake deity statuettes from his pocket. "Recognize this?"

He barely looked at it. "Never seen it."

"You might want to reconsider lying to a cop, Vinnie. Mr. Rosenberg tells me you tried to sell this through his shop. Your asking price is a little high for a fake."

"That's not a fake!"

"Yeah? How can you tell, since you've never seen it before? Don't worry, I'll enlighten you." By now, he'd memorized Lauren's notes on the subject. "This Horus statuette from the eighteenth dynasty looks pretty good, but the weight of it tells me it's all wrong. This should be made of wood, which weighs less than plaster. If it were made of wood, it would be dark brown all the way through. It shouldn't show white when scratched on the bottom." He showed him the scratch. "This faint line here, though, that's just sloppy. It looks like a seam. Wood carvings don't have seams. You could have at least had the self-respect to file that down."

"You need a search warrant to be in here!"

"You let me in yourself, Vin. Anything I see in plain sight is fair game. Know what I see?" Joe clucked his tongue and shook his head. On the table was an exact replica of the Horus statuette he'd brought with him, except for the fact that the details hadn't been painted on. He picked it up, held it next to the one he'd brought.

Escalante's face grew redder, but he seemed to have lost his power of speech. And mobility.

Joe deposited the unfinished figure back onto a layer of newspaper, then spied the plaster mold that had been used to form it. He placed the Horus he'd brought with him into the mold and closed the two halves over it. A perfect fit. The seam Joe had pointed out earlier marked where the halves came together.

"See, Vinnie, where I come from, we call this proof."

"You can't prove anything." He folded his arms in a last-ditch effort to look defiant. Confident. It wasn't working.

On a shelf behind him, another Horus stood as if looking down upon the entire scene. Joe walked over to it and picked it up. This one felt lighter. It was made of wood. There were no seams along the edges. If this was the genuine artifact, Escalante was using it as a model for the fakes.

"Do you have a provenance for this?" Joe asked.

He made a break for the door.

Joe grabbed Escalante's arm and twisted it behind him. "I'll take that as a no. You're under arrest for forgery and possession of goods stolen from a foreign country. Don't add resisting arrest to your charges." Handcuffs clicked into place.

At last.

Merry Christmas, indeed.