Chapter 10

The next morning, Diana arrived early at the mansion. She made a detour at a bakery, sure that some fresh croissants would help them reflect on the case. She found Neal and Peter in the garden, along with a steaming Italian coffee maker. If the con man looked tired, the agent seemed to have gone over the jet lag. Diana sat down at the table and poured herself a cup of coffee before speaking.

"Bad news, tracking the emails did not lead us anywhere. The sender covered his trail. It's impossible to reach back to him."

"I'm not surprised," Neal replied. "The good news is that it tends to prove that this man has something to do with the case, otherwise he would have no reason to hide his identity."

Silence fell on the trio. Each of them were deep in their own thoughts, trying to find a way to move forward. Peter was the first to talk.

"Those three heists were performed according to your MO. I think that's what we should use as a start."

The other two watched him, confused.

"The targets were pieces you would choose," he continued, "and the means used were the same that you've used in the course of your career."

"Allegedly."

"Allegedly, if you like." Peter sighed. "What I mean is that we should wonder what you would do if you were the culprit. What would your next target be?"

Neal's eyes lit up. It was obvious. If the criminal copycatted him, they just had to take him at his own game.

"The Louvre." He answered without the slightest hesitation. "That's why I came to Paris in the first place. And it is the safest museum on earth. It would have been my greatest hit if I had not given it up."

"If we want to catch this guy, we'll need to…"

"Think about the best way to rob the Louvre." Neal interrupted.

"Neal Caffrey style." Peter rounded up.

Both friends eyed each other with a smile on their face. Facing such a challenge, their complicity was back at its full strength. Diana seemed a little on the defensive.

"What if it does not lead us anywhere?" she said. "What if our thief committed the three heists that he planned and does not reappear?"

"It is possible, indeed." Peter replied. "You should keep searching on your side while we take care of the Louvre lead."

Even if she was far from convinced, Diana agreed with the plan. She drank the last drop of her coffee and took her leave to go back to her Interpol office.

Once she was gone, Neal and Peter decided to settle inside the mansion. It would be more comfortable to scheme the greatest heist of the century. In the living room stood a long white wall with a painting of the New York skyline. Neal took it down and replaced it with cork board, he had taken from his art studio. That was all the equipment he needed to organize his ideas.

He got the museum blueprints out of a folder, and pinned them up on the board. Every security measures were visible.

"You didn't just think about stealing something there." Peter noticed.

"Not really. I only thought about it, but I thought about it a lot. It kept my mind occupied when I missed New York too much. The blueprints are probably not exactly accurate, but they'll have to do for now."

"We could have asked Diana to find more recent ones."

"It's risky, it could arise suspicion, and scare away our thief."

They set to work with the data they had. Security at the Louvre was totally rethought two years before, just when Neal left the United States. There probably had only been minimal changes since then. Peter asked the first question to cross his mind.

"First, we need to find a way in and a way out, right?"

The reflection made Neal smile.

"Going in and out is not going to be a problem. You see, Museums are open spaces, designed to welcome a lot of people. The Louvre is no exception. Nine million visitors walk thought its doors every year, in both ways. What is tough, is to walk out with a piece of art. But I think we should start from the beginning. What are we targeting?"

"You tell me, you're the one the thief is copycatting."

Neal stood up and disappeared for a little while. He came back with the picture of a painting that he pinned up in the middle of the museum blueprints. It showed a path on which two characters were moving towards each other. The closest one was seen from behind and was riding a donkey. On the other side, a woman was walking. The sky was filled with clouds, opening a perspective on Paris. You could see the city far away, in the mist.

"The road to Sevres. It was painted by Jean-Baptiste Corot between 1855 and 1865."

"Why this piece in particular?"

"It represents a lost time, when Paris was still surrounded by nature. And the brush-stroke is close to perfection. The mist around Paris makes the light unreal, untouchable."

"OK, Mister Thief, how do we do this?"

"Alleged thief," Neal smiled. "Security at the Louvre is unbeatable. There are motion detectors and cameras here, there and here," he showed on the blueprints. "At least during closing hours."

Peter frowned.

"You don't plan to steal that painting in the middle of the day, do you?"

"I don't plan to steal that painting at all, we're working on a theory. As I said earlier, the Louvre welcomes more than nine million visitors each year, which means that about 30'000 people enter the museum every day, six days a week, since it is closed on Tuesdays. But there are six days in the year when it is even more crowded."

"When?"

"The access to the permanent collection is free of charge the first Sunday of each month, from October to March. On these days, the whole city of Paris comes to the Louvre. A thief would go totally unnoticed."

"But… and security?"

"The motion sensors don't work on opening hours. Some rooms don't have surveillance cameras. The installation is in progress, but it takes time because it's expensive. And most pieces are not protected by specific means that could prevent them from being unhooked from the wall."

"If I get this right, your plan would be to walk in the museum in the middle of the day like any other visitor, to wait to be alone in the room, to take the piece off the wall, and to walk out whistling?"

Neal put on his most shining smile.

"Exactly. Simple and effective."

As he finished his sentence, someone knocked hard on the door.

"Police, open the door immediately."

Author's note: If you think Neal's way of stealing a painting at the Louvre is unrealistic, you're wrong. The Road to Sevres was stolen on May 1998 just like he suggests in my story. And it has not been found yet. I don't have the slightest idea as to what the security measures at the Louvre are, but I guess they've been updated since the theft.