A Brilliant Plan

Chapter 42

WE TOOK A short break to refill our refreshments.

Ron sat down again and pointed at the flat box on the coffee table. "Calendar, will you do the honors?"

I carefully lifted the lid of the box, put it aside, one-by-one lifted the items out of the box, and carefully placed them on the table.

"I agree that they are a little dusty, but we had to look for fingerprints first," Ron apologized.

Even so, the Maximilian Set looked stunning. Simple eternal beauty. Ten pieces, each with a unique identity but lying side-by-side they formed a whole. A classic combination of white gold and diamonds formed the basic character, straight lines with only a minimum of ornament and playful rounding. The gold was brushed to give it some understatement and it was engraved with beautiful Aztec ornaments, a string of precious colored stones along the perimeter of the ornaments. The stroke of genius was the combination with sparkles of rubies and emeralds, giving it a European seriousness paired with Latin American joyfulness. The necklace I had seen before was the least spectacular, the most common piece of the group. Maybe the reason why Phoebe Eastman had used it for everyday wear. The other ones, the small crown, the diadem, the two arm-rings and finger-rings were spectacular. Far ahead of anything else from that era.

Even Altward, who had the gems in his possession for some time now, appeared to be moved, still.

In another satin pouch, I uncovered the Montenhaute pieces. In comparison to the Maximilian Jewels, boring.

"Grandma stuff," mumbled Juanita.

"It was some kind of accident, wasn't it, Mr. Altward?" Ron asked in a quiet voice as if not to wake any one of us from our respective reveries.

We all looked at Altward in silence. This was the question we had worked to answer in this whole setup. If Altward were a cool customer, he would simply say, 'What do you mean?' He could still deny any involvement in the death of Wally Eastman. The plan had been to lure him out, surprise him and rattle him. Billy Bounce's spontaneous involvement had definitely worked to our advantage and far surpassed any rattling from us.

Ron didn't push any further; he just sweated him out.

"You know," Altward began, slowly, as if he had to find the right entry point. "I was in shock. After Eastman died, I couldn't think straight." He looked at us. "Imagine, I had just killed a man, whatever the circumstance, and didn't know what to do. What if somebody found out?" He probably meant the police but, on the other hand, he could have meant his customers. "I was thinking about how to get away with it. And the most stupid thing to do came to my mind first: fake a burglary. Such madness."

"You must have known that your safe room is almost impregnable and that suspicions might fall on you. Insurance fraud, most likely," Fowler said.

Altward nodded. "Of course, I was aware of that. After Eastman and I had that... fatal row, I called my partner Paul Faulkner."

"He was traveling at the time," Ron pointed out.

"In Mexico, but I reached him on the cell phone. I told him about the mess in the gallery."

"You seem to have a lot of faith in him. Telling him about a murder and all," Ron tried to coax Altward here and there to get a feel for the story.

"We are close and I was desperate." Altward breathed in and out several times, put his ice bag on the table. "And he had a plan. He gave me the number of a friend of his who would be able to help me fake a break-in to the safe."

"Must have been a wizard to break into such a computer driven safe."

"Yes, it turned out that he was. I finished the call to Paul, closed the door of the safe again and about half hour later his friend came with some fancy electronics and a computer. It was obvious that he knew exactly what he was doing."