The Rescue Artist

?60,000,” says Duddin, “and a gold box that had been stolen from a local museum, worth about ?20,000, and a collection of ivory from a private house, and three silver honeypots stolen from Floors Castle that were made by Paul Storr, who’s recognized as one of the finest silversmiths this country’s ever had, and a walking stick made from the sword that killed Captain Cook.”

Duddin puts down the spare rib he is holding in his surprisingly dainty hands. “You can imagine the pressure I was under, negotiating it all,” he says, as if even now he might collapse under the burden. Cyril Ritchard, playing Captain Hook, never delivered his lines with more gusto. And, he hints darkly, someone wanted to make sure there was no backing out. “In the middle of it all,” Duddin moans, “I got two phone calls threatening to shoot me missus and me little dog if I didn’t do the Rembrandt.”

Duddin gathers himself. “Now it’s fair to say that the judge entirely disregarded that. He didn’t believe a word of it. He didn’t believe I felt threatened at all.” Duddin’s speech has grown slow and sad, as if he were dismayed by the cynicism of some people.

In the end, the police trap worked perfectly. While Duddin counted the ?106,000 the “drug dealers” had paid him (they had negotiated a price of ?70,000 for the Rembrandt, with ?3000 to Duddin for his pains), the police swarmed in. “I had bags full of stuff,” Duddin recalls, “ivory and swords and whatever else, and then a van pulled in the drive to collect it and about ten policemen piled out. There were people on the roof of the garage, which is where me office is, there were people jumping over fences, and God knows where.”

He looks fondly at Mary. “You were back at the house, then, Mary, weren’t you?”

Mary, for once given a turn in the spotlight, gleefully fills in the picture. “I’d helped you to count the money, and I came back here and sat on the sofa, doing a crossword. And I looked out, and there were all these horrible men in the back garden, so I rushed to the front door, and there was this man there with a video camera and this horrible, scruffy, dirty woman, and she said, ‘Mrs. Duddin, you’re under arrest.’ “

Mary was released after two days. “I remember at the end,” she says, “the diamond dealer, Robert—it was Robert who told us about the Rembrandt in the first place—he turned to me and he said, ‘I thought it was too easy’ “

Cackling with laughter, Duddin and Mary signal to the waiter for another drink. For Duddin, the story had only one sad element, though admittedly it was the most important one. Duddin ended up before a judge who, for unfathomable reasons, decided to make an example of him and sentenced him to nine years in prison. (He was released after four and a half.)

Even today, his time served, Duddin is indignant. His beef is not with the conviction but with his sentence. This is a game played with rules, and the judge violated the code out of spite.

30

Traffic Stop

MAY 6, 1994

Charley Hill had run out of patience. He had spent the early afternoon visiting galleries around Oslo with Einar-Tore Ulving, a man he had disliked from the moment they met. The point of the excursion, Hill hoped, was to kill time while Ulving’s colleague, Tor Johnsen, plotted strategy with the thieves who held The Scream. A few hours in Ulving’s company hadn’t done anything to improve Hill’s mood.

Then Ulving had wandered off, too, leaving Hill alone and more restless than ever. The phone finally rang. It was Ulving. Could they meet at Fornebu, the old airport south of the city?

Hill found Walker, and the two men briefed John Butler, in his command post, and set off for Fornebu. The two cops waited an hour, and then an hour and a half. Not a thing stirring. Afternoon gave way to evening. At last, Ulving turned up, ashen-faced and trembling. “The traffic police stopped me,” he said, “and they searched my car.”

Walker and Hill avoided looking at one another, but their hearts sank. What a thing to do!

The police had pulled Ulving over, they told him, for a random safety inspection. Did he have one of the triangular warning signs you put out on the road in case of an accident? It sounded farfetched, and, more unsettling still, the police seemed to be marking time, or perhaps waiting for instructions. Johnsen was in the car, too, and he was badly upset.

After fifteen minutes, Ulving had asked the policemen if they would be done soon.

“Yes, everything seems to be in order. But tell me, aren’t you an art dealer?”

Ulving said he was. The police asked if they could check his car. For forty-five minutes they searched but found nothing. They flipped through the box of art prints in the back of Ulving’s Mercedes, but somehow they missed the woodcuts of The Scream.

When the police finally finished, Johnsen told Ulving to go on to meet Hill and Walker without him. The way the Norwegian cops kept turning up had to be more than just coincidence.

Now Hill and Walker had a shaken Ulving to calm down. Hill guessed at what had happened—when he and Walker had told John Butler about the planned rendezvous at the old airport, the Norwegian police who were with Butler in his improvised headquarters had notified their bosses. They had immediately leapt to the conclusion that Ulving was headed toward Hill and Walker to show them The Scream. Following orders, the local cops had pulled Ulving over. When they failed to find the missing painting, they had sent him on his way.

Hill hid his exasperation with his Norwegian colleagues and tried to convince Ulving to laugh the whole thing off. The Getty wanted The Scream; it had no interest in running around the countryside playing cops and robbers.

“Well, it’s not your lucky day,” Hill told Ulving, “but it’s nothing whatever to do with us. First of all, I’d never be stupid enough to get involved with the police. And, second, it’s not my style of doing business.”

It wasn’t much of an argument, but apparently it didn’t have to be. Ulving wanted reassurance that Hill and Walker weren’t in cahoots with the cops, and Hill batted the suggestion away with convincing indignation.

Then, mission not accomplished, everyone headed irritably back to the hotel. (Hill and Walker could only guess what the airport meeting had been intended to accomplish.) Ulving went off to meet up with Johnsen, and Hill and Walker settled in for yet another debriefing with John Butler.

“Whatever you do,” Hill asked Butler, “can you call off the surveillance? They’re really causing us problems. I’m going to run out of excuses soon, to explain away that we’re nothing to do with all this.”

Butler, every bit as frustrated as Hill and Walker but not as free to act on his own, promised he’d do what he could. But there were limits. “It’s not our operation, it’s a Norwegian police operation,” Butler said. “They can do what they want. We’re just helping them.”

Hill retreated to his room, waiting for the phone to ring. The afternoon’s false start hadn’t dispelled his confidence. Johnsen had ogled the cash in Walker’s bag. He’d be back.

Hill flopped down on his bed, fully dressed except for his shoes, staring at the ceiling. It was nearly midnight. The phone rang. Ulving.

“We’re downstairs. We need you to meet us.”

“Why can’t it wait ‘til morning?”

“It’s got to be done now.”

“Go fuck yourself! I’ll talk to you in the morning.” Hill slammed down the phone.

Hill’s anger was fake. Crooks always made unreasonable demands. Assholes act like assholes. Do it their way, they’d say, or they’d burn the painting or cut it into pieces. And they might. The first thing was to persuade them not to act on their threats. Then, once they were done with that crap, you imposed your personality on them. You’re the guy who’s going to provide them with the money they want.

In negotiating with crooks, Hill had found that belligerence was key. Accommodation was always a mistake. “The minute you start agreeing with people, you’re finished,” Hill once observed, “because you can’t be credible then. That’s the way life works. Life is built around creative tension.”