Chapter Eight
"What are you doing?" Haley asked Nathan for the third time. Yet again, he didn't reply. Haley folded her arms and waited impatiently for Nathan to stop watching one of the guards and explain what was going on to her. Finally the guard came out from behind the area that was roped off to the public and out of the room. "Well?"
Nathan just made a 'shush' sound before he checked that no one was looking at them in the dim corner of the room where the Chellini Venus was on display and stepped over the rope.
"Nathan, you can't go there; it's employees only," Haley said in a hushed tone.
"We're also not supposed to steal, yet that's why we're here. Now stand guard and turn around."
Haley humphed but did as told. Nathan had agreed to help her on Sunday, but he said he needed time to formulate a plan. He had called her the next day and so, here she was spending her Tuesday lunch break at the art museum. She was glad he was helping her, but she wished he would tell her his plan. A part of her wondered whether he was planning on stealing the sculpture and running off with it himself. It would benefit her father as they wouldn't have to deal with the messy issue of getting rid of it and Nathan would never be able to show it to anyone so the James' would be safe, but it also meant that she would never see Nathan again. For reasons she still couldn't understand she did not like that idea.
"Okay, I'm done," Nathan said and came out from behind the rope.
"What were you doing back there?"
"Just checking on some things. When do you have to get back to work?"
Haley glanced at her watch. "Well, if I'm going to get back in time I have to leave here in about five minutes."
"Okay, then let's go." Nathan and Haley began to walk away from the rope, but Nathan suddenly stopped when they got to the centre of the room.
"What is it?" Haley asked, stopping also.
"The Venus…" He grabbed a pair of miniature binoculars from the woman standing next to him and used them to look at the Chellini Venus.
Haley was too busy worrying that Nathan had seen something wrong with the sculpture to apologize to the lady for him. "What about it?" she asked softly.
He handed back the binoculars to the lady nonchalantly, and she replied by turning on her heel and curtly walking out of the room. "She looks like you."
"That old lady?"
"No, the Venus."
"What?" Haley scoffed. "Of course she doesn't."
"I swear she looks like you," Nathan repeated as they walked out of the room, and then the museum. "Are you sure that one of your ancestors wasn't around in Chellini's time?"
Haley gulped. All her father's relations told her that she looked just like her grandmother, who had modeled for Haley's grandfather when he made the Venus. How could Nathan – who was clearly no art expert – see a similarity which others could not? "Yes, I'm sure."
Nathan merely shrugged and observed their surroundings. They were in the car park now, and you could see the buildings around them. "You had to choose to rob a building whose neighbours are a councilman and the town Mayor?"
"It's not my fault they live on either side of the museum. Anyway you do have a plan, right?"
"Just meet me in my hotel room when you finish work today."
……………
It was nearly four o'clock when Haley knocked on the door to Nathan's hotel room. He answered it soon, and she walked inside, "So…what have you been doing?"
"Just taking care of some details," he said, noncommittal.
Haley frowned at the way he wasn't giving her any details, but she still felt that he was a somewhat trustworthy, if not very good, burglar. She looked around the room, and noticed that all his things were just strewn around the room. She picked a boomerang up off the bed and played with it in her hands as she watched him look through a bag on the other side of the room. "Why did you ask me to meet you here?"
"So you could try on this." He took out some clothes from the bag and handed them to her. "The bathroom's over there."
She raised her eyebrows at him questioningly, but he offered no further explanation, so she put the boomerang back on the bed, took the clothes from him and went to the bathroom. She changed out of her clothes, and into the dark blouse and long skirt. Haley observed her appearance in the bathroom mirror and wondered why he gave them to her; the clothes weren't anything special. After attempting to resist the urge to sneak a look at Nathan's toiletries and identify his cologne – and failing miserably – Haley walked out of the bathroom with her hands on her hips. "What exactly am I supposed to look like?"
"One of the cleaners," Nathan told her.
"The cleaners?"
"Yeah; remember what the man at the museum told us this morning after I complained about a frame being really dusty? The cleaners come in to the museum every night after midnight. And now," he said, giving her a bucket with a dusting rag and some cleaning spray, "the outfit is complete."
As Haley looked through the bucket, she couldn't help but smile. 'He did have a plan!'
"Maybe you should practice, just to look the part."
Haley rolled her eyes. "I have dusted before; just because my father has money I don't use it as an excuse to make other people do everything for me."
"Of course not, that's what I do, isn't it?" Nathan commented.
Haley immediately regretted her words. Truth be told, she had been implying him, but she felt bad about it. He was helping her when he didn't have to, especially since he could go to jail for it. "I didn't mean you –"
"Yeah, you did." Nathan said it like it meant nothing, but obviously it did. He turned away from her and moved towards the balcony, staring out the open doors.
"Nathan…" Haley was worried. She'd never seen him this still before.
"What's the reason for doing this?"
The million-dollar question. One she very well knew the answer too, but couldn't tell him. "But, you know, I told you –"
"No, I don't know, Haley," he was facing her again, and his height meant she had to look up to meet his gaze, "I don't know because you didn't tell me."
"But I told you that I can't tell you." Her voice was becoming high-pitched in that school-girlish way she hated, but she was powerless to stop it.
"Well, then I can't help you."
Haley felt her heart sink, but she couldn't be angry with him. She didn't even know why she thought he would help in the first place. "Of course…you're right. If I were you, I'd say the same thing." Her eyes were growing heavy and a slightly watery. "I'll just go change –"
"Are you crying?"
"No!" Haley protested loudly, even as the tears welling up in her eyes were threatening to spill.
"You're crying! You're trying to soften me up so I'll help you! Well, it won't work!" he said determinedly.
"I'm not trying to do anything!" A tear streamed down her face and she wiped it away hastily. She started to run back to the bathroom, "I'll just go and change."
"Well, you do that," Nathan said. "And meet me at tomorrow at five at the museum." Haley sharply turned around at this statement. The evident happiness in her face made Nathan grow angry at his own clear weakness. "And don't be late," he shouted at her.
Haley grinned, "Yes, sir," as she giddily returned to the bathroom.
When she closed the door behind her Nathan let out a long sigh. He then proceeded to bang his head against the wall.