Red-Hot Ruby (2 page)

“Hello!” he said with great gestures. “I guess you are Richard Spears, the owner?”

“Yes, yes, that’s me. You can call me Dick,” Spears said, putting out his hand.

“Oh it’s a pleasure to meet you, Dick. I’m Pete Harvey. We’re all set for shooting, you just need to go see the make-up artist, she’ll make you irresistible. You too, miss…”

“Taylor,” she quickly answered. “Amy Taylor, the jewelry specialist. I was asked to estimate the value of the ruby.”

Spears and Taylor were shown the way to the make-up artist. They hurried because everyone else was ready to start. When they were ready as well, they joined Harvey who was already sitting next to Duval. Microphones were clipped to their clothes and everyone else in the gallery—people working there to make the museum ready for the day—was asked to remain silent. The ruby, still in the plastic box, was placed on table in front of Duval.

The show started with Harvey introducing Spears Art Gallery, its history, the few past exhibitions, and the owner’s ambition of making it the most famous gallery in New York. Then he addressed Duval who was asked to say more about the ruby.

“Well, the story of the ruby is quite extraordinary,” Duval said in very good English despite his slight French accent. “It was extracted in a mine in Australia, which is usually not the most famous place to extract rubies. We think rather of Burma or Mong Hsu when we speak of rubies. Anyway, this one is Australian. The people who first saw it were impressed by its huge size, but it was soon deemed worthless because of the imperfections. They were giving it away when I put my hands on it. I immediately saw the flower hidden in those imperfections. All I had to do was to cut bits here and there, and it slowly took the shape it has now.”

“The shape of a rose, very beautiful indeed,” Harvey said. “How long did it take to carve it like that?”

“About three years.”

“Three years! Wow!” Harvey sounded falsely impressed. He faced the camera and continued to speak with his TV voice. “Ladies and gents, if you are joining us now, we’re here with Adrien Duval, the one and only, and with his ruby which is probably the most beautiful in the world because of its wonderful flower shape.”

Him

Reese Carter was slumped in his couch. Eyes half closed, feet on the tea table, remote in hand, Carter was watching TV in his own way—that’s to say watching about ten seconds on a channel before skipping to the next. The images changed so fast that one couldn’t possibly understand anything on any channel. Yet Carter didn’t stop his finger from pushing the button with a disconcerting regularity. He had about two hundred channels, but they mingled together in a surprising way. Spanish melted into English as bright costumes turned into green landscapes. The result was a sort of unending song, now soft, now rhythmical, both classical and electronic, amplifying and diminishing in an odd harmony of shattered sentences.

“… the sun will not come back until next Friday…”

“… Patrick! How could you do this to me?”

“… las playas de Lanzarote conocen un gran succeso…”

“… and with his ruby which is probably the most beautiful in the world because…”

Carter jumped up. He suddenly stopped changing channel to admire the precious stone. He cursed himself for having missed the beginning of the show. The animator was speaking about a huge ruby. At the same time, the jewel was exposed on every angle. It was, indeed, beautiful. Both a piece of precious jewelry and a work of art, the ruby glowed under the artificial lighting. It cast a blood red gloom on the white display. Carter didn’t pay much attention to the animator’s speech. He was absorbed by the beauty of the red-hot ruby.

He sat back on the couch, spread his legs in front of him, and started dreaming. He imagined what he could do after selling it. Surely that ruby was worth millions of dollars. Carter could see himself snatching the ruby from its place, and running away right before the police was even told there was a ruby in town.

Then he would take pictures and make sketches of the jewel, and eventually sell it at a good price. With the money he would buy a private jet along with its pilot—something he had always wanted—and he would go to a desert and paradisaic island. Well, maybe not desert. It could only be a paradise if filled with a number of sexy young women. The jet pilot would have to be a woman too. And then he would relax on the island, doing nothing else than having sex with the women and gazing at the pictures of the ruby.

Maybe selling the ruby wasn’t such a good idea after all. Why should he be content with pictures if he could have the solid stone. That, for sure, would make all the women crazy about him. However, he wouldn’t be able to get to them on the paradise island aboard his private jet.

Carter opened his eyes. He sat up to fully come back from his senseless fantasy. The ruby was still on TV, but more people were talking now. A middle-aged man with a mad look on his face was smiling stupidly at the animator and nodding ridiculously as the latter complimented his genius. Carter figured that the madman must be the artist who carved the ruby into a flower. Next to him was a young woman wearing a tight white shirt which momentarily sent Carter back to his fantasy.

Carter got up and started walking from the couch to the door and back again. The space he covered was no bigger than a few square feet, his flat being extraordinarily small. The apartment used to be a garage and was then transformed into a livable space of one bathroom, one bedroom, and a big living room with a fridge, an oven and an electric cooker stuck in a corner.

Quite obviously, Carter lived alone. And he loved it that way. He liked spending time on his own, watching TV or reading a good book—one of the four he owned. He would lie on his couch or sit with his feet on the little table, and stay like that for hours until his back or legs hurt.

Carter hardly ever used the cooker; he didn’t like cooking. However, Carter’s fridge was never empty. Precooked food was piled on the shelves, ready to be eaten. Carter had also managed to squeeze a table and two chairs between his fridge and his couch. At the time he put the table there, he thought he’d use it to eat, but it was actually constantly overloaded with papers of all kinds, and he had to eat sitting on the couch. In the bedroom, space was a luxury as well, his bed filling half of the room. Carter also had a chest of drawers where he kept his trousers and shirts, and a lone shelf on which stood the four books.

The small flat never saw anyone else than Carter, and maybe a woman sometimes (but she wouldn’t stay long). Carter only had two friends: his semi-automatic Glock pistol, and Rafael López the bartender. And he had no girlfriend. They all ran away when they discovered by what means he earned his money. Because, although he lived in a tiny place, Carter did have money. A lot of it. He kept it scattered in a number of banks across the country.

Carter was forty-four and for the last twenty years or so, he had been collecting—his word to say stealing—rare and precious works of art. From those he made the most perfect forgeries and then sold them at incredible prices. When the buyer noticed that their purchase was fake, Carter was long gone and impossible to find. He moved from town to city, from motel rooms to tiny apartments, from one woman to the next.

Carter wasn’t the kind of person who’d get attached to anyone or anything. He was cold, almost emotionless, and had smiled maybe twelve times in his entire life. He was materialistic. Objects you see, they can’t trick you, they can’t manipulate or defeat you; you’ll always be master of them. Whereas people, they’re mean and wicked. People, mostly women, are mischief in a likable shape. And for all those reasons, Carter was a proud lover of things. However, he still liked trying his charm on a young woman now and then. He wasn’t especially handsome, but there was something in his blue eyes that seemed to make him irresistible. That is, until he opened his mouth to let out a flow of sexist comments.

The TV show finally ended with the animator announcing the date of the grand exhibition which would put the ruby at the center of all interest for two days. And those two days were only a week away. Which gave but little time to Carter if he was to plan any ruby theft.

He sat down once more in front of the TV. There was now a show about veterinarians in Australia, but Carter wasn’t paying attention. He was blankly staring at the moving images without even noticing they were moving. His thoughts wandered from the ruby to the exhibition date to the young lady in the white shirt. He’d been living in New York for quite a while now, but he’d never visited Spears Art Gallery. His flat was situated in a little street in Lower Manhattan, while Spears Art Gallery was near Fort Green in Brooklyn. Carter had been through enough robberies to know that every possible door of the museum would be closely guarded at any hour of day and night.

Carter got up and went to his fridge. He opened it, walked back to the couch. He really wanted that beautiful ruby. But he could hardly imagine how he would get his hands on it by himself in an unknown place. Carter always worked alone. Were he to ask for help, he would strongly go against his principles. He walked to the fridge and closed the door. Then he opened it again, got a beer out, closed it. He picked up the remote and switched to another channel, and another, and another. Sipping on his beer, he pondered. The art gallery looked pretty big on TV. He would need to get the plans of the building.

Carter liked drinking. But not everywhere. His best friend—a Spanish guy who’d come to New York for some God-forsaken reason—worked as a bartender in the little pub just next to his place. Carter drank only dry whiskey, only at that bar, only served by his friend. Anything else tasted like shit.

Carter pushed the door. There were a few people leaning on the counter, and there was a couple kissing at a table in the dark. Carter looked at his watch; a bit less than half past nine, still early. He walked toward the counter and waited. He sat at his usual place, near the door, leaning on his left elbow with his chin resting on his cupped hand. He saw Rafael López at the far end of the pub and winked at him. In less than a minute, his friend was pouring the whiskey.

“Hi there,” he said while handing the drink. “Long time no see, what’s up?”

“What do you know about Spears Art Gallery?” Carter asked.

“Ah someone’s been watching TV…”

“Guilty as charged.” Carter sipped on his whiskey. López was looking at him through his round glasses with a large smile on his face. “What?” Carter said.

“I knew you’d come to ask me.”

“Good. Then you can help me, right?”

“Maybe. What exactly do you want?”

“I—” Carter stopped when he saw a group of young men walking in his direction. They passed him and sat at a table behind him. He cleared his throat and said in a low voice, “I need the plans of the gallery.”

López laughed. “Will you ever ask for an
easy
favor?”

Carter half smiled and sipped a mouthful of whiskey. It was now almost ten o’clock. People were invading the pub. Carter liked being near the door because he could get out in a minute without having to walk through the crowd. López served a few drinks and came back to him.

“I might be able to get what you ask, but not before a few days. I guess you’ll shorten the exhibition at the gallery. Right?”

“I dunno. The ruby, that magnificent baby…” Carter said, half dreaming. “It might be less closely guarded after the exhibition.”

“Might be too late by then.”

Carter raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“You’re not the only one in New York who likes jewels.” López turned away to attend newly arrived customers.

A moment later, he was back with a second whiskey. Carter was staring at him in a interrogative way. López laughed when he thought that if they’d been in a cartoon, a huge interrogation mark would be hanging above his friend’s face.

“What are you laughing at?” Carter said, falsely offended.

“Nothing.”

“Someone else has been asking you about the Spears exhibition?”

The bartender shook his head. “No. Well, at least not yet. But I know she likes—”

“She?” Carter interrupted.

“Yes. She likes jewels of all kinds. And, like you, she’s not a very good friend of the NYPD.”

“And you think I’ll be outrun by a woman?”

“Oh don’t be so self-confident, she’s good and—”

A strong voice shouted the bartender’s name. He mumbled some inaudible insult toward his boss and got back to work. When he turned back, Carter was gone.

Three days later, the plans of the museum were stretched on Carter’s table. The gallery was actually smaller than he had imagined. There were three doors: the south main entrance, a second important entrance on the east side, and a back door. Carter wondered if the back door would be guarded. It looked as if it lead to nowhere. The main hall where the ruby would be displayed was accessible through the eastern door and the main entrance, though both doors were separated from the main room by a little hall. At the far end of the hall, a small door and a flight of stairs lead presumably to some offices upstairs. But the back door seemed to lead only into a corridor of relative unimportance, which was parallel to the big hall.

“What’s in that corridor?” Carter said out loud. Private bathrooms for the employees, or lockers maybe. In any case, a vulnerable part of the museum. Yet, how could one know if the door was watched or not? Carter decided he wouldn’t take any chances. His plan was to walk in through the main door, hide somewhere—maybe in that small corridor—and get into action at night.