Also by Santa Montefiore
Meet Me Under the Ombu Tree
The Butterfly Box
The Forget-Me-Not Sonata
The Swallow and the Hummingbird
Last Voyage of the Valentina
TOUCHSTONE
Rockefeller Center
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2006 by Santa Montefiore
All rights reserved,
including the right of reproduction
in whole or in part in any form.
TOUCHSTONE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.
Originally published in Great Britain in 2006 by Hodder and Stoughton
Designed by Elliott Beard
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Montefiore, Santa.
The Gypsy Madonna / Santa Montefiore.
p. cm.
1. Stepfathers — Fiction. 2. Fathers and sons — Fiction 3. Bordeaux (France) — Fiction. 4. Lost works of art — Fiction. I. Title
PR6113.O544G97 2007
823’.92 — dc22 2006050071
ISBN: 1-4165-3913-1
Visit us on the World Wide Web:
http://www.SimonSays.com
For my sister, Tara,
with love
Contents
Acknowledgments
The Gypsy Madonna
Part I
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Part II
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Part III
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Touchstone Reading Group Guide
Questions & Topics for Discussion
A Conversation with Santa Montefiore
Enhance Your Book Club
Acknowledgments
Out of all the books I have written, this one has posed the greatest challenge. However, thanks to my husband, Sebag, my trusty partner in crime, who helped me plot the adventure over a glass of rosé on our annual holiday in France, it turned out to be the most enjoyable. Two minds are better than one and I couldn’t have written it without him.
When faced with the prospect of researching Bordeaux in the war, I turned to my dear friends Sue and Alan Johnson-Hill, who live in the most beautiful château and were incredibly kind to share their experiences, though I hasten to add that neither is old enough to have lived through the war! Alan was quick to correct my French and Sue was in constant touch by e-mail, making suggestions and answering my lists of questions. I thank them both.
I also want to thank my friend Eric Villain, who grew up in Bordeaux. I needed a child’s perspective so I took him out to lunch, poured him a large glass of wine — French, of course — and took out my notebook while he reminisced about his childhood. He was a deep well of information and very entertaining too. Thank you, Eric.
The book took me not only to Bordeaux, but to New York and Virginia as well. Naturally, I picked the most handsome American I know to help me with my research, Gordon Rainey. I thank you, Gordon, for all your help and amusing e-mails that have made doing business with you such fun.
Writing about the sudden appearance of a painting by Titian, I sought help from the highest echelons of the National Gallery. I cannot thank enough both Colin McKenzie, Head of Development, and David Jaffé, Senior Curator, for their advice, anecdotes, support, wit and exceedingly good company while I was researching The Gypsy Madonna. A part of the book I dreaded was made one of the most enjoyable thanks to them.
A girl must stay in shape while spending most of the day slumped in a chair in front of her laptop! Therefore, I would also like to thank my kickboxing trainer Stewart Taylor from Bodyarchitecture.co.uk, who has not only jabbed and ducked with me about the gym, but also been a good listener and sounding board as I shared the plot and its various characters in between punches.
I thank my parents, Charlie and Patty Palmer-Tomkinson, for their constant support and encouragement, especially my mother, who read the first draft and made very useful additions. My parents-in-law, Stephen and April Sebag-Montefiore, who take such an interest in my books, their enthusiasm and praise giving me the impetus to write on.
Kate Rock always deserves my thanks for getting me started five years ago as does Jo Frank for selling my first book to Hodder & Stoughton. Hodder & Stoughton deserve an enormous thank-you for now publishing my sixth and for signing me up for four more! God bless you!
Thank you Linda Shaughnessy, for selling my books all over the world.
Sheila Crowley, my literary agent, is the most dynamic, capable, positive person I know. Nothing is too great a challenge for her. Thank you so much for representing me and please stick around for the next four!
My gratitude also goes to my UK editor, Susan Fletcher, for working so hard and for being so patient. Your criticism is invaluable and your praise the fuel with which I am able to continue writing. Long may our very productive partnership continue.
I’m thrilled to be published in the United States and would like to thank all those at Touchstone who have been so enthusiastic, especially my editor, Trish Todd, who is not only vigorous and formidable but a good friend too. I had a blast touring the country last March and met some wonderful booksellers. I thank them too for their invaluable support and for making my tour a delightfully colorful experience.
The Gypsy Madonna
The Virgin and Child (also The Gypsy Madonna)
About 1511
Oil on panel, 65.8 x 83. 8 cm
Metropolitan Museum, New York
Titian’s young Virgin has traditionally been called the “Gypsy” Madonna on account of her dusky complexion and her dark hair and eyes. Mary, little more than a child herself, supports her infant son as he stands unsteadily on a parapet. Both mother and son seem lost in thought. However, their communication goes beyond words; with his left hand, in what is a very natural and engaging attitude for a young child, Christ plays with his mother’s fingers while with his right, He toys with the gold-green fabric lining of her mantle.
Part I
As I walked out on the streets of Laredo
As I walked out on Laredo one day
I spied a young cowboy
A handsome young cowboy
All dressed in white linen
As cold as the clay.
“I see by your outfit
That you are a cowboy” —
These words he did say As I boldly stepped by.
“Come sit down beside me
And hear my sad story
For I’m shot in the breast
And now I must die.”
Pro
logue
New York, 1985
I was as surprised as anyone when, shortly before her death, my mother gave away the Titian. At first it seemed the action of a woman not in control of her mind. My mother had grown increasingly stubborn with age. She gave the painting to the Metropolitan and flatly refused to talk about what she had done, even to me. That was my mother. She could be cold and brisk. She had that air of self-control, of haughtiness, so often associated with the French. But, if one persevered and won her trust, beneath the thorns she was a rare and fragile flower, like a briar rose. In spite of all their efforts, though, every journalist who approached her was rebuffed. Pressure mounted but she would not bend, not for a moment.
She was not mad, however, but maddened. I recognized, in those shiny, restless eyes, a deep and urgent need way beyond my comprehension. She was dying. She knew she had little time. The dying are often beset with the desire to tie up loose ends so they can die in peace, with a clear conscience. But my mother’s desire was far greater than the simple sorting of one’s affairs before embarking on a voyage. “You don’t understand, Mischa,” she had said and her voice had been strangely anguished. “I have to give this painting back.” She was right, I didn’t understand. How could I?
I was angry. We had shared everything, my mother and I. We were closer than other sons and mothers because we had lived through so much together, just the two of us. It was us against the world, Maman and her little chevalier. And, as a child, I had dreamed of wielding a sword powerful enough to slay all her enemies. But she had never told me about the Titian.
Now she is dead, her lips forever sealed, her breath taken by the wind, her words whispers that come to me in dreams. One night she slipped away, taking with her all her secrets; or so I thought. It was only later that I discovered those secrets, one by one, as I walked back down the path of memory to my childhood; they were all there for me to find if I could only bear to walk through fire to reach them. On my journey I suffered both pain and joy but, most often, surprise. As a small boy I interpreted everything with my young, innocent mind. Now that I am a man in my forties, with the wisdom gained from years of experience, I can see things as they really were. I expected to find the provenance of the Titian; I never expected to find myself.
1
It all began on a snowy January day. January is bleak in New York. The trees are bare, the festivities over, the Christmas tree lights taken down for another year. The wind that races down the streets is edged with ice. I walked briskly with my hands in my coat pockets. Head down, eyes to the ground, lost in thought: nothing particular, just the business of the day. I tried not to think of my mother. I am an avoider. If something gives me pain I don’t think about it. If I don’t think about it, it isn’t happening. If I can’t see it, it isn’t there, right? My mother had been dead a week. The funeral was over. Only the journalists pestered like flies, determined to find out why an uncatalogued, unknown Titian of such importance had only now come to light. Didn’t they understand that I knew as little as they did? If they were grappling in the dark, I was floundering in space.
I reached my office. A redbrick building in the West Village with an antique shop on the ground floor. Zebedee Hapstein, the eccentric clockmaker, toiled against a discordant orchestra of ticking in his workshop next door. I fumbled in my pocket for the key. My fingers were numb. I had forgotten to wear gloves. For a moment I looked at my reflection in the glass. The haunted face of a man old beyond his years stared grimly back at me. I shook off my grief and walked inside, brushing the snow from my shoulders. Stanley wasn’t in yet, nor was Esther who answered the shop telephone and cleaned the place. With leaden feet I climbed the stairs. The building was dim and smelled of old wood and furniture polish. I opened the door to my office and stepped inside. There, sitting quietly on a chair, was a tramp.
I nearly jumped out of my skin. Angrily, I demanded to know what he was doing there and how he had got in. The window was closed and the front door had been locked. For an instant I was afraid. Then he turned to me, his mouth curling into a half smile. I was at once struck by the extraordinary color of his eyes that shone out from his cracked and bearded face, like aquamarine set in rock. I had a sudden sense of déjà vu but it was gone as quickly as it had come. He wore a felt hat and sat hunched in a heavy coat. I noticed his shoes were dirty and scuffed with a hole wearing through at one toe. He looked me up and down appraisingly and I felt my fury mount at his impertinence.
“You’ve grown into a fine young man,” he mused, nodding appreciatively. I frowned at him, not knowing how to respond. “You don’t know who I am?” he asked and, behind his smile, I noticed a shadow of sorrow.
“Of course I don’t. I think you should leave,” I replied.
He nodded and shrugged. “Hell, there’s no reason why you should remember. I hoped…Well, what does it matter? Do you mind if I have a smoke? It’s mighty cold out there.” His accent was southern and there was something about it that caused my skin to goose-bump.
Before I could refuse his request he pulled out a Gauloise and struck a match to light it. The sudden smell of smoke sent my head into a spin. There was no way I could avoid the sudden arousal of memory. I gave him a long stare before dismissing the idea as preposterous. I took off my coat and hung it on the back of the door to hide my face and play for time, then sat down at my desk. The old man relaxed as he inhaled but he never took his eyes off me. Not for a moment.
“Who are you?” I asked, bracing myself for the answer. It can’t be, I thought. Not after all this time. I didn’t want it to be, not like this, not smelling of stale tobacco and sweat. He smiled, blowing the smoke out of the side of his mouth.
“Does the name Jack Magellan mean anything to you?”
I hesitated, my mouth dry.
He raised a feathery eyebrow and leaned across the desk. “Then perhaps the name Coyote might be more familiar, Junior?”
I felt my jaw loosen and fall. I searched his features for the man who had once held my love in the palm of his hand, but saw only a dark beard fringed with gray and deep crevices in thick, weatherbeaten skin. There was no evidence of his youth or his magic. The handsome American who had promised us the world had died long ago. Surely he had died; why else would he not have come back?
“What do you want?”
“I read about your mother in the papers. I came to see her.”
“She’s dead,” I said brutally, watching for his reaction. I wanted to hurt him. I hoped he’d be sorry. I owed him nothing — he owed me an explanation and thirty years. I was glad to see his eyes fill with tears and sink into his head with sadness. He stared at me, horrified. I watched him watching me. I didn’t endeavor to ignore his emotion. I simply left him like a fish struggling on the beach, gasping for air.
“Dead,” he said finally, and his voice cracked. “When?”
“Last week.”
“Last week,” he repeated, shaking his head. “If only…”
He inhaled and the smoke that he blew out enveloped me once again in a miasma of memory. I fought it off with a scowl and turned away. In my mind’s eye I saw long, green rows of vines, cypress trees, and the sun-drenched, sandy stone of those château walls that had once been my home. The pale blue shutters were open, the scents of pine and jasmine blew in on the breeze, and somewhere, at the very back of my thoughts, I heard a voice singing “Streets of Laredo.”
“Your mother was a unique woman,” he said sadly. “I wish I had seen her before she died.”
I wanted to tell him that she had long clung to the hope that he would one day return. That, in the three decades since he had left, she had never doubted him. Only finally, when she reached the end of the road, had she resigned herself to the truth — that he was never coming back. I wanted to shout at him and haul him off the ground by the collar of his coat. But I did not. I remained calm. I simply stared back at him, my face devoid of expression.
“How did you find me?” I asked.
“I read about the Titian,” he replied. Ah, the Titian, I thought. That’s what he’s after. He stubbed out his cigarette and chuckled. “I see she gave it to the city.”
“What’s it to you?”
He shrugged. “Worth a fortune that painting.”
“So that’s why you’re here. Money.”
Once again he leaned forward and fixed me with those hypnotic blue eyes of his. “I’m not coming asking for money. I’m not looking for anything.” His voice was gruff with indignation. “In fact, I’m an old fool. There’s nothing left for me here.”
“Then why did you come?”
Now he smiled, revealing teeth blackened with decay. I felt uneasy, however, because his smile was more like the grimace of a man in pain. “I’m chasing a rainbow, Junior, that’s what it is. That’s what it’s always been, a rainbow. But you wouldn’t understand.”
From the window I watched him limp down the street, his shoulders hunched against the cold, his hat pulled low over his head. I scratched my chin and felt bristles against my fingers. For a moment I was sure I heard him singing, his voice carried on the wind: “As I walked out on the streets of Laredo.”
It was all too much. I grabbed my coat and hurried down the stairs. As I reached the door, it opened and Stanley walked in. He looked surprised to see me. “I’m going out,” I said and left without further explanation.
I ran into the street. The snow was now falling thick and heavy. I set off along the trail his footprints had made. I didn’t know what I was going to say to him when I caught up with him. But I did know why my anger had been overridden by something almost visceral. You see, it’s hard to explain, but he had given me a gift, a very special gift. A gift no one else could give me, not even my mother. And, in spite of all the pain he brought, ours was a bond that could never break.
I was able to follow his footprints for a while, but soon the track was lost among the millions of faceless inhabitants of New York. I felt a sudden ache deep within my soul, a regret for something lost. I scanned the pavements, searching for the old man with the limp, but my heart yearned for someone different. He had been handsome, with sandy hair and piercing blue eyes, the color of a tropical sea. When he smiled those eyes had twinkled with mischief, extending into long white crows’-feet accentuated against the weathered brown of his skin. His mouth had turned up at the corners, even when he was solemn, as if a smile was his natural expression and it cost him to be serious. He bounced when he walked, his chin high, his shoulders square, exuding a wild and raffish charm powerful enough to soften the heart of the most determined cynic. That was the Coyote I knew. Not this old, malodorous vagabond who’d come like a vulture to peck at the remains of the woman who had loved him.
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