by Karen Swan
She frowned suddenly. Hadn’t there been papers on here when she and Angus had first come in? Or was she imagining that?
She shook her head, unable to remember, and began opening the drawers instead, finding yet more evidence of lost worlds – ink pots and a silver fountain pen; pencils that had been sharpened to a point by a knife; a pamphlet for a carol service in the Sacré-Coeur, December 1939; a single cufflink; a silver cigar cutter; a lighter fashioned from horn. A small gold travel clock had stopped at 11.23. But on which day, she wondered, and which year? When had the life in this place ground to a halt even as a war raged outside the windows?
She moved to the first drawer further down, surprised to find it almost entirely empty. But it hadn’t been. She squinted, noticing the telltale rim of dust in the corner of the drawer which indicated that something had been sitting in it until recently. Very recently.
She checked the other drawers but it was a repeated pattern – dusty outlines where files or papers had sat untouched for so many years, now conspicuous by their new absence. Flora sat back in the chair, bothered by the discovery, knowing her hunch was right about the papers on top of the desk, as well as those in it. Had it been something in here that the initial intruders had been searching for all along? Had she and Angus been so anxious to protect and safeguard the artworks that they’d missed the real target for the break-in?
After all, something had been off with that story from the start – it had rankled with her even if it hadn’t with Angus or the Vermeils, but she didn’t believe that people would go to the trouble of breaking in to an abandoned apartment and then, without touching a thing, simply notify the family of its existence. It was especially difficult to believe that they had somehow overlooked the intrinsic fortune tied up in the haul of artworks scattered around the place. No, it only made sense if it wasn’t the artworks they were after, but something in these drawers . . .
But what? And who? And most of all – why?
Either the desk was exceptionally large or Monsieur Travers was far smaller than she had recalled; regardless, there was no mistaking the distance or difference of perspectives between them. The notary’s demeanour throughout this meeting had been cool, to say the least, and Flora was beginning to feel it would be easier to gain access to the legal documentation for his house than the Montparnasse apartment.
‘Madame Vermeil assured me she would arrange this with you, monsieur.’
Monsieur Travers merely cocked his head to the side slightly, as though he couldn’t quite understand what she was saying.
‘All I require is access to the instructions that were left to you by her husband’s father regarding the apartment.’
He cocked his head to the other side.
‘It would also be helpful,’ she continued, ‘to see if there were any letters or correspondence in which Monsieur Vermeil’s father revealed or detailed any purchases he might have made, before he closed up the apartment and left the city.’
There was a long silence but when he spoke, it was with the air of his patience having been stretched very thin. ‘There are no letters between Monsieur Vermeil’s father and my own, mam’selle. My father was a notary, not a penpal. He had only the deeds to the apartment and the codicil which specified the apartment should not be touched or opened before the death of his wife. That is all.’
‘Apartments,’ she said, correcting him. But his error piqued her interest. ‘Which reminds me – why wasn’t it mentioned in the initial meeting that there were two apartments?’
‘I did not think it necessary. The purpose of that meeting was to authorize you to enter the property and conduct an evaluation of the contents inside. There is nothing in the second apartment, therefore we did not need to discuss it.’
‘Except there was something in there – a painting.’
Monsieur Travers looked at her, unblinking, before pushing his glasses up his nose and looking away again, moving a few papers around on his desk, keeping his hands busy. ‘Well, I did not know that, but I’m sure it is of no consequence. What is one more painting, given the hundreds found upstairs?’
‘But why were there two apartments? Why have two properties in the same building? It’s very odd.’
‘Not at all. The Vermeils are a wealthy family. They own many properties.’
‘Not back then they weren’t – at least, not to the degree they are now. And the quatorzième wasn’t a prosperous neighbourhood back then. It seems unlikely that if you could afford to buy multiple properties, you would buy another in the same building. You’d upgrade surely? Buy somewhere bigger, somewhere more fashionable?’
‘I’m not sure what you’re trying to imply, mam’selle.’
‘I’m not trying to imply anything, I’m trying to understand. Why was the apartment upstairs bursting at the seams with artworks and the one downstairs empty, save for one?’
Monsieur Travers gave a Gallic shrug. ‘That I cannot answer. I am only the notary.’
More like the gatekeeper, Flora thought, watching him closely. What had she learned from him today? Precisely nothing. She took a moment to consider. ‘Do you have the deeds for Apartment six?’
‘Apartment six?’ he repeated.
‘The apartment downstairs,’ she replied briskly. He was just playing games, wasting her time. ‘The one we’ve just been talking about.’
He inhaled and held the breath. ‘Oh. Yes, of course,’ he replied finally. ‘Would you like to see them? I would have to ask for them to be retrieved from storage, if you can wait. It should only take an hour or two.’
Flora blinked, knowing exactly what he was doing, wanting to call his bluff and have them search, but in truth she didn’t see how property deeds were going to be helpful in her search for provenance. It wasn’t the ownership of the apartment that was in question but that of the paintings. She shook her head. ‘But I’d like to see the codicil, please.’
Monsieur Travers flicked through the thin file of papers before him and handed it to her.
‘This is the codicil?’ she asked in surprise, flapping the torn piece of paper in the air. It had been ripped from a larger sheaf, the writing written on a slope and very hurried. Even the two signatures at the bottom were illegible.
Monsieur Travers nodded patiently.
‘It doesn’t look like a legal and binding document to me.’
‘It was written in difficult circumstances, during the war, you recall. I agree, it would not necessarily stand up if contested in court but . . .’ He shrugged. ‘It never has been contested, so it stands. Monsieur Vermeil and my father had worked together for many years. It was my father’s true belief that the instructions written therein were Monsieur Vermeil’s most deeply held wishes, and he acted according to that belief.’
‘And what were his wishes exactly?’ She frowned, trying to read the elaborate script. ‘Apart from no one entering the apartment before his and Magda’s deaths, I mean?’
‘Just that.’
She frowned deeper. ‘Is this in German?’ She looked up.
‘It is.’
‘But I don’t read German.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
‘Do you speak German?’
‘No.’
Flora glowered at him. The man was maddening. ‘Then I’d like a copy of this, please, so that I can get it translated.’
Monsieur Travers looked apologetic. ‘For that, I would require Monsieur Vermeil’s express written permission.’
‘But Madame Vermeil has already authorized you to give me full disclosure.’
‘It would need to be Monsieur Vermeil. I am sorry.’
He was not, and they both knew it.
She stared at the unintelligible directive in her hand, knowing this was another dead end. She didn’t need to be able to read German to know it said no one was to enter the property before François’ and Magda’s deaths. Lilian Vermeil had already told her that.
She pushed the scrap of paper back towa
rds him with a sigh. ‘Well, can you tell me how the family came to know about the existence of the apartments, if not from you?’
‘A note was sent to our offices by the intruders – I was on vacation at the time and it was forwarded on by a junior associate. He felt obliged to act promptly and notify the clients that this new asset had come to light as he felt there was a suggestion of a threat in its tone.’
She leaned forward. ‘What kind of a threat?’
Travers pulled out a photocopy of a letter from the pile of papers. The writing was neat, small, as though care had been taken with it.
She translated it from the French: Be careful what you leave lying around. Finders can be keepers. Attached to it was a photograph of the apartment taken at night, shot from the street, the road sign visible in the corner.
‘Squatters?’
‘That is what my associate assumed. He was unaware of the codicil or else he never would have forwarded it without checking with me first.’
She turned the paper over. ‘Which apartment are they referring to – six or eight? They could have been in either. Or both, surely?’
‘It was Apartment Eight.’
‘Because . . . ?’
Monsieur Travers suppressed a sigh. Just. ‘Because the envelope the letter came in was addressed, “To the owners of Apartment Eight”, care of this company.’
‘That’s a very specific thing for you to know, given that you said you didn’t see the letter yourself.’
‘My associate made a grave error acting without full authority but he made photocopies of the documents before he sent them on. Be assured I interrogated him fully on the matter on my return and there is now nothing I do not know about it. It is my job to notice the details.’ He stared at her. ‘Forgive me, mam’selle, but I sense you are trying to . . . trick me in some way. We are on the same side, are we not?’
‘Yes, of course.’ She sighed, feeling defeated.
‘I do not understand what all these questions about the legal papers of the apartment and the intricacies of the anonymous letter have to do with your job of making an inventory of the artworks?’
Flora stared at him, wondering if she could trust him. He was right, after all – they were on the same side. ‘What I’m looking for, Monsieur Travers, is paperwork that can show how all those paintings came to be in Monsieur Vermeil’s possession. Without provenance, those artworks can’t realize their full market value. In fact, without it, they’re pretty much unsaleable – no reputable auction house or dealer would touch them – and it appears that some papers, which may or may not have been relevant to this research, have recently been taken from the desk in the study in Apartment Eight.’
Travers frowned. ‘Oh, I see.’
‘I was rather hoping you were going to tell me the intruders had broken into the apartment downstairs – it would make a lot more sense of things. It just seems odd to me that whoever broke into Apartment Eight would steal some papers and not the small fortune in fine art sitting a few metres away.’
‘I agree. That does sound odd. Do you know what these papers were, that are missing?’
‘I have no idea. All I know is the drawers are now empty. They may have held vital evidence for my research, or they may not, but whatever was in them was important to someone – even more important than the paintings.’
Travers looked troubled by this. ‘I’m sorry I cannot be of more help.’
She gathered her bag and rose to her feet. ‘It was a long shot, anyway.’
‘Your job is an interesting one, mam’selle,’ he said, walking her to the door. ‘You have to be almost a detective, no?’
‘Well, a better one than me,’ she replied, shaking his hand. ‘Right now I’m not sure I could find my way out of a paper bag.’
She was climbing into a taxi to head back to the office, wondering if three o’clock on a Friday afternoon counted as the weekend yet, when her phone rang.
‘I’ve got a name,’ Angus shouted down the line and Flora wondered if he was in a lift, for the connection kept rattling and hissing between them.
‘A name for what?’ she shouted back.
‘The Renoir companion. Last-known owner. It’s a chap called – have you got a pen?’
‘That’s a funny name,’ Flora quipped, prompting sarcastic laughter down the line as she clamped the phone to her ear and rifled in her bag. ‘Just a sec . . . Right, go on.’
‘OK. It’s a chap called Noah Haas.’
‘Noah Haas,’ Flora repeated as she wrote it down. ‘And what did he say?’
‘Nothing yet. He’s a New Yorker but guess what?’
‘What?’
‘He’s the only guy in Manhattan not spending his summer in the Hamptons.’
‘So where is he then?’ But even as she asked the question, she had an inkling of what he was going to say next. Paris.
‘Vienna. I need you to go over there.’
‘Vienna? But Angus, I’m up to my eyes over here!’
‘And? Any joy? Did you speak to Lilian?’
She sighed. ‘Yes and her mother-in-law won’t talk to us and there’s no family records from before the war. They lost everything. I’ve just spoken to the family lawyers and they have nothing helpful to add either. But one thing I did find out yesterday – the historic records for Von Taschelt’s Paris gallery are now held in another gallery in Provence. I put a call in with them this morning asking for details of sales of any Renoirs made from 1943 onwards but they’ve insisted I send a letter, can you believe it, as everything’s archived.’
‘Jesus. How long’s that going to take?’
‘Piece of string, isn’t it? But I marked it as urgent. I’ll chase them up on Monday.’
‘Well then, that’s even more reason why you need to go to Vienna. We can’t afford to wait around – if we want to get the Renoir in for that sale next month, we need to get this tied up. Haas could know something that gives us crucial information about his family’s sale to Von Taschelt, and in turn the Vermeils.’
Flora sighed. She knew he was right; they couldn’t just sit around hoping for good news, they had to check every lead. Travers was right too; she did have to be something of a detective. ‘Fine. I’ll fly out in the next few days.’
‘Already done. You’re on the seven-fifty out of Charles de Gaulle tomorrow morning. Haas is expecting you at one p.m. I’ve texted the address.’
She slapped a hand over her forehead. That meant a 5 a.m. start, on a Saturday, and she was out tonight (not that she was in any position to start quibbling over details like that right now). Would she ever get any rest?
‘I’ve gotta go, but call me when you’re out, OK?’ And he hung up.
Flora sighed and stared out of the window, Paris flashing past her eyes in a blur. Much like her life.
Chapter Eleven
‘I don’t know how you can watch!’ Flora groaned, covering her eyes with her hands.
Ines patted her leg. ‘Faith,’ she smiled, her beer bottle clasped loosely in her hand as she watched her boyfriend twist in the air, two metres above them.
The skate park was rammed, hip-hop blaring from the sound system, the day-glo colours of the graffiti sprayed on the walls and sides of the ramps tinged an acid yellow under the spotlights. From the other side of the space, the wall where they were sitting overlooking the vert ramp appeared to be fringed with legs, heads bobbing to the dubstep as the riders shredded before them.
Tonight was a pro showcase and Hawk competition, and Bruno, as Hawk’s new star signing and home-grown Paris boy, was the local hero. It wasn’t just the riders risking injury on the course either; the photographers too seemed to have a death wish, swarming between the jumps and leaning over the edges in the split seconds after the skaters sped past, all wanting the perfect, ‘most rad’ shot.
Bruno was soaring again, his hands clutching the board to his feet as he performed a perfect 360-degree aerial turn, landing backwards and zooming straight down the nigh
-on vertical ramp and back up the other side.
Ines laughed and drummed her heels loudly on the wall. ‘He did that for me! I love goofy foot. He knows it’s my favourite,’ she shrieked, before cupping her mouth with her hands and whooping for him.
Flora turned to Stefan sitting beside her. ‘Do you love goofy foot?’ she asked wryly, taking a swig of her beer.
He looked up at her from his iPad. ‘I don’t know what the hell it means.’
‘Riding with the wrong foot forwards.’
‘Oh.’ He frowned. ‘I thought that was fakie.’
‘No. Fakie’s riding backwards.’
‘Agh, shit, forwards, backwards, I dunno. It’s all crazy to me.’ He shot her a rare smile.
She glanced down at his iPad. ‘What are you looking at, anyway?’
‘An idea for a feature that we’re working on. I’m just checking out a few websites for the visuals.’
‘You’re working at a skate competition?’ she asked. ‘Oh, come on, Stefan! Even I’ve switched off!’
He shrugged. ‘Yeah, but we just had to pull a piece last minute and we need a filler, quickly. I’ve got a call in with New York at midnight. We go to the printers at six in the morning and I need something we can use fast.’
‘So what are you thinking? Skateboarding’s the new yoga? Graffiti is the new wallpaper?’
‘Urban explorers.’
‘Urban what? What are they looking for? Lost polar bears on the Champs-Élysées?’
He laughed. ‘Yeah, you’d think! Actually, it’s an underground movement. They find old abandoned and disused spaces in cities – so, like, closed-down metro stations or derelict gas works.’
‘Why?’
He shrugged. ‘They’re explorers but not all frontiers are new. Going back to the past can be like stepping into a new world. Past lives, past stories . . . They never know what they’re going to come across.’
‘How brilliant!’ Flora said sarcastically. ‘Oh look, a bunch of old pipes!’ She sipped her beer again and watched as another rider kickflipped past them.