Chapter 29
At 10:40 the following morning Tracy was standing in the long line at the entrance to the Prado Museum. As the doors opened, a uniformed guard operated a turnstile that admitted one visitor at a time.
Tracy purchased a ticket and moved with the crowd going into the large rotunda. Daniel Cooper and Detective Pereira stayed well behind her, and Cooper began to feel a growing excitement. He was certain that Tracy Whitney was not there as a visitor. Whatever her plan was, it was beginning.
Tracy moved from room to room, walking slowly through the salons filled with Rubens paintings and Titians, Tintorettos, Bosches, and paintings by Domenikos Theotokopoulos, who became famous as El Greco. The Goyas were exhibited in a special gallery below, on the ground floor.
Tracy noted that a uniformed guard was stationed at the entrance to each room, and at his elbow was a red alarm button. She knew that the moment the alarm sounded, all entrances and exits to the museum would be sealed off, and there would be no chance of escape.
She sat on the bench in the center of the Muses room, filled with eighteenth-century Flemish masters, and let her gaze wander toward the floor. She could see a round access fixture on each side of the doorway. That would be the infrared beams that were turned on at night. In other museums Tracy had visited, the guards had been sleepy and bored, paying little attention to the stream of chattering tourists, but here the guards were alert. Works of art were being defaced by fanatics in museums around the world, and the Prado was taking no chance that it could happen there.
In a dozen different rooms artists had set up their easels and were assiduously at work copying paintings of the masters. The museum permitted it, but Tracy noticed that the guards kept a close eye even on the copiers.
When Tracy had finished with the rooms on the main floor, she took the stairs to the ground floor, to the Francisco de Goya exhibition.
Detective Pereira said to Cooper, "See, she's not doing anything but looking. She---"
"You're wrong." Cooper started down the stairs in a run.
It seemed to Tracy that the Goya exhibition was more heavily guarded than the others, and it well deserved to be. Wall after wall was filled with an incredible display of timeless beauty, and Tracy moved from canvas to canvas, caught up in the genius of the man. Goya's Self-Portrait, making him look like a middle-aged Pan... the exquisitely colored portrait of The Family of Charles IV... The Clothed Maja and the famed Nude Maja.
And there, next to The Witches' Sabbath, was the Puerto. Tracy stopped and stared at it, her heart beginning to pound. In the foreground of the painting were a dozen beautifully dressed men and women standing in front of a stone wall, while in the background, seen through a luminous mist, were fishing boats in a harbor and a distant lighthouse. In the lower left-hand corner of the picture was Goya's signature.
This was the target. Half a million dollars.
Tracy glanced around. A guard stood at the entrance. Beyond him, through the long corridor leading to other rooms, Tracy could see more guards. She stood there a long time, studying the Puerto. As she started to move away, a group of tourists was coming down the stairs. In the middle of them was Jeff Stevens. Tracy averted her head and hurried out the side entrance before he could see her.
It's going to be a race, Mr. Stevens, and I'm going to win it.
"She's planning to steal a painting from the Prado."
Commandant Ramiro looked at Daniel Cooper incredulously. "Cagajón! No one can steal a painting from the Prado."
Cooper said stubbornly, "She was there all morning."
"There has never been a theft at the Prado, and there never will be. And do you know why? Because it is impossible."
"She's not going to try any of the usual ways. You must have the museum vents protected, in case of a gas attack. If the guards drink coffee on the job, find out where they get it and if it can be drugged. Check the drinking water---"
The limits of Commandant Ramiro's patience were exhausted. It was bad enough that he had had to put up with this rude, unattractive American for the past week, and that he had wasted valuable manpower having Tracy Whitney follow around the clock, when his Policía Nacional was already working under an austerity budget; but now, confronted by pito, telling him how to run his police department, he could stand no more.
"In my opinion, the lady is in Madrid on a holiday. I calling off the surveillance."
Cooper was stunned. "No! You can't do that. Tracy Whitney is---"
Commandant Ramiro rose to his full height. "You will kindly refrain from telling me what I can do, se?or. And now, if you have nothing further to say, I am a very busy man."
Cooper stood there, filled with frustration. "I'd like to continue alone, then."
The commandant smiled. "To keep the Prado Museum safe from the terrible threat of this woman? Of course, Se?or Cooper. Now I can sleep nights."
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