The Painting

by Alison Booth

  Chapter 29

  The next morning Anika woke up hungover. Not again, she told herself. Really, she had to take more care of her liver. A quick inspection of her reflection was enough to show that her ghostly-white face looked ghastly from every angle. Never again would she touch alcohol, never. And she felt so grouchy; it was only with the greatest effort that she stopped herself from snapping at her blameless mother.

  Not long after breakfast and some paracetamol, she received in the post an airmail envelope from Tabilla. Inside was a brief note from her aunt and an envelope with her name on it and the Rozelle address, handwritten in an elegant script that Anika recognised instantly. This at once resuscitated her thought from last night. All men were hopeless, it was simply not worth bothering with them. Crossly she tore the envelope in half and put it in the garbage bin.

  An hour later, after another cup of coffee, she had second thoughts and retrieved the ripped envelope and its contents. Once she’d brushed off the bacon rind and bits of eggshell, she managed to join up the damp pages along the tear. Some of the ink had smudged but she could just about make out what Daniel had to say.

  Dear Anika,

  I cannot get our last conversation out of my head, and I’m writing to say how sorry I am that we had that misunderstanding about my great-uncle. It never occurred to me that my comments about Jake when we walked near Clifton Gardens might be misinterpreted, and I very much regret that this caused you distress, as it so obviously did.

  An apology from Daniel, she never expected to have this. But here it was, and it was such a sweet thing. The armour she’d constructed around herself shifted a bit.

  But also I can’t help but wonder if, when you get upset about one thing, you immediately start looking for something else you can vent your anger on. You were upset at what I said about looted art that day when we were walking, so you started searching for other things about me that you don’t like, or that you might be able to work yourself up into not liking.

  Probably I shouldn’t be writing this to you tonight, just after our Christmas party when I’ve had too much to drink. But at least now I’ll write what I think and not censor my letter. Perhaps I’ll regret it either way.

  I have become very fond of you, and I think that you might have been growing fond of me in spite of yourself and this is why are you are always on the lookout for things about me that are unsatisfactory. You’re looking for reasons to dislike me.

  I know you are going through a difficult time and I would like to help you in any way I can. Do please give me a chance. We could be friends. I would hate for this not to happen.

  With much love,

  Daniel

  Irritation mounting, Anika read the letter again. OK, it contained an apology but it also contained an accusation. If he really wanted them to be friends, he wasn’t going about it the right way. She ran her finger over his signature and the line above it. With much love. What did that mean?

  She’d felt so close to him that evening they’d spent at the pub at Watson’s Bay, the night the painting had been stolen. The night of that almost-kiss. He’d probably been relieved once Mrs Thornton appeared; he’d moved away quickly. With much love meant nothing special; it must be how he always signed off. She put the letter away, this time in the top drawer of her bedside table rather than in the garbage bin.

  Just before going to sleep, she got it out once more. It stank of bacon fat. She looked at those words ‘With much love.’ Then she reread the whole letter.

  He’d mentioned looted art once more. That was what upset her. OK, that and the insinuation that she didn’t think things through. How could she be a friend to someone so in-your-face? Impossible. And he thought she was fond of him. Such arrogance.

  After this she got into a state: thoughts all over the place, black thoughts mainly that she couldn’t control even by deep breathing. Daniel’s letter on top of Jonno’s words last night had reawakened all her anxieties. ‘I’m just nosing around to get a feel,’ that’s what Jonno had said, and this made her deeply apprehensive. She picked up a book to read but couldn’t get into it. Her anxieties wormed their way on to the page and lined themselves up in neat rows waiting to be confronted.

  The bed covers pulled up to her chin, she began to shiver, not so much with the cold but with her anxiety about Nyenye. The Rocheteau was picked up by a Russian after the siege of Budapest. Somehow Sergei, the officer Nyenye mentioned, had got hold of it; maybe it had simply been abandoned by the retreating Nazis and Sergei had discovered it. Missing his own children and liking the young Tomas, he had given Anika’s uncle a beautiful object whose origins he didn’t know, because he felt sorry for him. And her uncle had kept it for years, perhaps because of the memory of the kindness he’d seen in the officer’s face as well as his love for the picture. Then eventually it ended up in her hands, only to slip away.

  And if the Rocheteau was looted, what about the others that Nyenye had on her walls? OK, they weren’t stolen by Nyenye, but they might have been looted beforehand. And why was Jonno hanging around? Clearly he had a story in mind about stolen artwork turning up in the Eastern and Central European countries now that the Iron Curtain had been lifted. If Nyenye had no documentation for how she and Nagypapa came by the paintings, Anika guessed that Jonno could write any damn thing he liked about them. His story didn’t need to be based on fact; you could get a long way with generalities and a little innuendo.

  * * *

  The next day Anika’s head seemed stuffed with cotton wool and she knew the only way to clear it was to go for a walk. Her parents’ apartment had become too small, its walls were pressing in on her, almost like a prison. She needed to see things in perspective.

  It wasn’t until late afternoon that she got home. Before she’d even had a chance to shut the front door behind her, Mama said, ‘Where have you been?’ She was standing in the hallway, hands on her hips, her face a question mark like it used to be when Anika was years younger and had gone out without telling her mother what she was doing.

  ‘I went for a walk up Gellért Hill and then I met up with my friend Lena. You’d already gone to the shop when I got up this morning, otherwise I would have told you.’

  ‘I was only gone a couple of hours. Nyenye’s been around looking for you. She stayed for ages and I was hoping you’d turn up. I gave her lunch and afternoon tea and I thought she’d never go home. She was just sitting at the kitchen table looking sad and worried and she wouldn’t tell me what the matter was. Do you know anything about it, Anika? In the end she left but she wants you to go and see her. Please do it today. She looked so – oh, I don’t know – so vulnerable and tired and old.’

  It was dark when Anika reached her grandmother’s apartment block. She rang the bell and called out Nyenye’s name so she’d know who it was. Nyenye opened the door slightly and peered through the crack with suspicious beady brown eyes, like she was checking that it wasn’t someone else masquerading as her granddaughter. When she’d made sure, she unfastened the bolts and the chain, and pushed open the door barely wide enough to let Anika through. ‘Quick, help me with the bolts, Anika, we’ve got to get this secure. I don’t want him coming back again.’

  ‘Who?’ Anika slid the top bolt up while Nyenye struggled with the bottom one.

  ‘Your boyfriend.’

  ‘He’s not my boyfriend. So he’s been around again? Is this what you wanted to talk to me about?’

  ‘Yes to both questions.’

  Nyenye was wearing a chunky red cardigan over a black dress and the labels were sticking out of both. When Anika tucked them in, Nyenye swatted her hand away irritably.

  ‘I stupidly opened the door without checking first. But I did have the chain on and managed to get the door shut again before he had a chance to put a foot through the gap. He wanted to talk to me, he said through the door, and there was no harm in that, w
as there? He knocked again several more times and I could hear him striding up and down the landing. After half an hour he went away, clattering down the stairs. I thought that noise might be a ruse, that probably he was biding his time one floor below. So I peered out one of the front windows overlooking the street and there he was, sloping off towards the river.’

  Nyenye hurried into the kitchen and Anika followed more slowly. ‘I wouldn’t believe much of what he tells you. You’re right to be suspicious of him. I do know that he’s a bona fide journalist though. I’ve seen stuff he’s written.’

  Nyenye looked horrified, the blood draining from her face as quickly as water down the plughole. ‘Why would a journalist want to talk to me?’

  ‘It could be your paintings.’

  ‘You shouldn’t have told him about my collection.’

  ‘I’ve told you, I didn’t.’

  ‘Well, how did he find out then?’

  ‘He’s probably been pumping your neighbours, sussing out what they know. A bit of flattery and a few dollars can get people to blurt out all sorts of stuff they might regret later. You know how it goes. Journalists are really skilled at that.’

  ‘Like the secret police.’

  ‘I know you keep the curtains to that room drawn all the time but there are bound to be rumours. And some of your neighbours might even remember you acquiring the paintings. They might have seen them being carried into your apartment.’

  ‘I doubt it. None of the paintings are big. And if they had been seen, an informer would surely have snitched on us years ago.’ Nyenye’s face was pale, the age spots more noticeable than ever against that blanched skin.

  ‘But you never invite anyone in.’

  ‘No one invites anyone in. You’ve got to stop that man bothering me, Anika.’

  ‘I’m not sure that I can do that.’

  In an apartment block like Nyenye’s, and like Anika’s parents’ too, where the flats were distributed over five floors and arranged around a central courtyard, it was easy for neighbour to keep an eye on neighbour. Anika could imagine the whispers. Why does Mrs Molnar keep the front curtains drawn? Why does Mrs Molnar still never allow visitors beyond the entrance hall? It would have been straightforward for a charming man like Jonno to gossip in German with a resident or two; easy as well for him to drop a few hints to provoke some reaction, and a handful of dollars to get more detailed information.

  ‘Maybe I’ll have a glass of water now, Anika.’ A pulse was beating too fast at the base of Nyenye’s throat. Anika got ready to catch her; she looked as if she were about to keel over.

  ‘Water and a touch of palinka,’ Nyenye said. ‘There is some in the cupboard next to the sink.’

  ‘You sit down first.’ Anika guided her into a chair before filling two glasses with water.

  She found the palinka at the very back of the cupboard, behind some containers of cleaning products that were so neatly arranged they might have been up for sale in a grocery shop. Resting upside down on the top of the palinka bottle was a small shot glass. When Nyenye had taken a sip of water and a swig or two of brandy, a little colour returned to her cheeks. Anika stood opposite, watching carefully, and wondering if it would be too much to ask what she needed to know. Only another two days in Budapest and who knew what other opportunities there’d be for a tête-à-tête like this. Probably none, she thought. Once you were close to something like a departure, time passed at an accelerating rate, confounding the laws of physics. People would be dropping by, old friends inviting her for drinks, her parents’ friends turning up for a chat. Even Miklos was tearing himself away from his beloved at the University of Szeged and catching the train up for a farewell dinner tomorrow evening.

  The palinka in Nyenye’s glass had almost gone when Anika blurted out, ‘There’s something else I need to find out, Nyenye.’

  Her grandmother’s cheeks were rosy pink as she drained the last of her drink. ‘You’re a great one for questions. You’d better get it off your chest.’

  Anika had a couple of sips of water before asking, her words as hesitant as a trickle of water from a leaky tap, ‘Do you have any documentation for your paintings?’

  There was a pause that she couldn’t decipher. Nyenye was now studying the label on the palinka bottle as if she would find inspiration there. The pulse at the base of her throat was no longer visible and her voice was steady when at last she spoke. ‘Of course I have, szeretet. Your grandfather and I were always very careful about that.’

  ‘That’s wonderful, Nyenye. Just wonderful.’ If Anika hadn’t had the back of a chair to grab hold of, she might have keeled over with the shock. ‘Can I see them?’

  ‘Not at the moment. Later maybe, but not when I’ve drunk too much palinka.’

  ‘Every man and his dog wanted to know where the provenance for Tomas’s painting was,’ Anika told her, ‘once they thought it was by Antoine Rocheteau.’

  ‘Tomas wouldn’t have known the provenance. It was a gift in wartime when the city was in ruins and people had lost everything, or nearly everything. But your grandfather and I made sure we had documentation for all the artworks we bought.’

  Nyenye’s face grew dreamy as she continued. ‘We came to learn quite a bit about art, your grandfather and I. To begin with we knew nothing, or next to nothing. Our education started the day we got chatting to one of the regular customers, Mrs Szabo was her name, about a picture. It was just a reproduction of a Dutch still life of pheasants that we had hanging near the cash register. Customers often made comments about it. Everyone was hungry, you see, and it was hard to get good quality meat then. Just the sight of those pheasants was enough to make your mouth water. It turned out that this customer was an art historian, and that’s how our collecting began. She gave us some good tips. Who was selling what, which paintings were good, which were pastiches, that was a word she often used.’

  Anika imagined Nyenye and Nagypapa in their shop, both in the white coats that Anika had seen them wearing in a photo in one of their albums. She could see Nyenye with a scarf over her head, the walls of the shop covered in white tiles as they still were, and the art historian attired in a rather shabby fur coat and well-worn shoes, advising her grandparents about art.

  Nyenye continued, ‘When we took her advice and made a purchase, we always gave her a commission. In kind, that’s what she wanted. We usually gave her prime cuts of beef rather than pork – she was very happy with that – and sometimes a jar of my pickles. And she was a real expert, she could tell a forgery right away. There were quite a few of those about.’

  She reached for the palinka bottle and tipped a little more into her glass before continuing. ‘It wasn’t just collectors we bought from; we had another source at BAV, the state auction house. We got to know a lovely man there, Sigmond Andor was his name. Poor thing, he was always so thin and hungry looking. He’d been in Mauthausen concentration camp and lost all his family. He and your grandfather became really close friends and we had him over for dinner sometimes. They’d talk for hours about art and everything else. He was a real carnivore, loved his beef and talked up my pickles too.’

  ‘Nagypapa was a great talker. I remember how he was interested in so many things.’ Anika swallowed too large a sip of brandy and gasped as the fiery liquid hit her throat. Once the coughing was over, she asked, ‘Do you have the provenance for all your paintings, Nyenye?’

  ‘Of course. Weren’t you listening properly, Anika?’

  ‘I just wanted to make sure. Where do you keep the documents?’

  ‘Well hidden.’ Nyenye’s voice had suddenly become sharp. ‘And I’m not going to tell you where, not with that friend of yours hanging about all the time. Who knows if he really is a journalist. He could just be after my art collection.’

  ‘I think he simply wants to know how you came by them. I checked him up before I
left Australia. He really is a journalist, and he’s published some good articles.’

  Nyenye looked at her intently, as if wondering what to believe. Anika held her gaze for what seemed a minute before her grandmother visibly relaxed.

  ‘Do you keep your documents in a safe?’ Anika asked.

  ‘As good as.’

  ‘Does anyone else know?’

  ‘I’m planning to tell your father.’

  ‘You mean he doesn’t know yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But if anything happened to you…?’

  ‘Don’t think I haven’t thought of that, Anika.’

  ‘Papa’s a bit of a worrier, is that why you haven’t told him?’

  ‘It’s more that I’ve learned over the years that the fewer people know something, the safer things are. I keep only essential things and I keep them very well hidden.’

  Again Nyenye reached for the palinka bottle but hesitated, hand held mid-air for an instant. Sighing, she returned her hand to her lap and laced her fingers together, while her thumbs began to worry at each other as she stared vacantly at the kitchen sink. Anika kept very still. As she observed her grandmother, she began to feel an immense sadness. Something had changed between them tonight and she wasn’t sure quite what that was. For a long moment they sat on in silence, until Nyenye said, her voice hoarse, ‘I think you’d better come with me now, szeretet. Maybe I should show you something.’

  Chapter 30

  Nyenye flicked on the light switch to her bedroom. Three bracket lights feebly illuminated what was the ugliest room in Nyenye’s apartment and Anika couldn’t understand how her grandmother could live with it. She loved beautiful things and this room certainly couldn’t be described as pleasing let alone beautiful, although the faded crimson velvet curtains would once have been splendid. They covered the large window in one wall, and the rest of the space was crowded with enormous pieces of furniture.