Whirligig

To keep his wife in furs, a smuggler sneaks a painting across the Spanish frontier

It is 1948, and few in Belgium live comfortably enough to haggle over payment – particularly those who make their living outside the law. Kek Huuygens is an exception. As far as his wife knows, this dapper gentleman is an art appraiser who moves in the finest circles. But although Kek knows all there is to know about art, he does not appraise it. He moves it – from one thief to another. Kek is the finest smuggler in Europe, and he charges accordingly.

A miniature masterpiece by the Dutchman Frans Hals has gone missing from Sotheby's. Kek has twenty-four hours to move it from Brussels to Madrid. The job will make him a fortune – if he survives long enough to collect it.