by Morris West
‘It seems I have little choice. Perhaps a final public confrontation with the past would be the remedy that would work for me.’
‘How much would you endure to make it work?’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘An exhibition as well publicised as this one would make Madeleine’s murder as much a part of art history as Van Gogh’s ear.’
‘That’s pretty cold-blooded.’
‘It’s the truth. You can accept it or not, as you choose. It’s your life that’s at stake.’
‘And what’s at stake for you?’
‘My career – this exhibition could give it a flying start. But before we get to that, there are still more questions.’
‘Go ahead.’
‘You told me your wife used to sell through Lebrun. Is there any contract or even any courtesy that binds you to him?’
‘None. He has a small, very exclusive gallery from which he moves Impressionists and post-Impressionists out of deceased estates and into the market. His transactions for Madeleine were done as a personal favour and on a picture by picture basis. He wouldn’t know what to do with Madeleine’s collection. He knows it exists but he hasn’t even asked to see it.’
‘Fine. Now, about your wife’s studio…’
‘It’s an old warehouse on West Broadway. Madeleine used the top two floors; the first floor was empty. We were going to redevelop the whole building. When she died I put in a caretaker and tried to forget about the place.’
‘I’ve seen it. I’m sure it can be turned into a gallery. I’m asking you to give me a decent lease at a reasonable rent with an option to buy. I’ll do it up and stage the exhibition where Madeleine created the works. I’ll call it “Liberation”, because that’s what the pictures are about.’
He stared at her in total disbelief. ‘That’s macabre!’
She moved instantly to the attack. ‘Macabre? My God, what could be more macabre than that mausoleum next door, a room you can’t bear to enter? But that’s your business…I think I’d like another drink.’
‘Are you always as brutal as this?’
‘Only when I’m threatened.’
‘And I threaten you?’
‘Yes.’
‘How, for God’s sake?’
‘I think you manipulate people. You’re trying to manipulate me.’
‘That’s the second time you’ve used that word; I begin to find it offensive.’
‘Then give me another. It was you who talked about ground rules and mutual interest. It was you who asked for a dealer’s judgment on your wife’s pictures. I’ve given it to you. I’ve made an open bid to represent them in the market. I’ve offered to take a lease on a property that is presently earning nothing for you. I think it’s up to you to respond.’
‘It seems to me,’ said Bayard deliberately, ‘that what you’re asking me to do is take your talent on trust and endow you with a gallery and an opening exhibition.’
‘Not so.’ There was an edge of anger in her voice. ‘As far as the gallery’s concerned, I’ll pay a fair price for a lease. As for my dealing talents, you gamble on them as you would do with any candidate. With me the risk’s better because I’m educated, eager and hungry.…Think about it, counsellor.’
‘I will, Miss Loredon.’ His taut features relaxed into a grin. ‘And don’t get angry with me. Lawyers are cautious brutes. Which prompts my next question. Let’s presume you’ve got a gallery and you’ve arranged an opening exhibition. Where do you go from there? How do you find artists for future shows?’
‘Travel and correspondence and telephone. I can tell you now what talent is offering in Taos or Toronto or Cleveland. I’m very good at records and cross-indexing and I have correspondents in London, Paris, Florence and Sydney, Australia. I’m not worried about continuity as such, but continuity in high talent is another matter. Anyway, that’s my risk, not yours.’
‘It would be if we were partners.’
She took a few moments to digest the idea, then rejected it emphatically.
‘I have to tell you frankly – I would not consider such an arrangement.’
‘If I made it a condition of our deal?’
‘The answer would still be no. Think a moment. This has always been a bitchy business. With today’s astronomical auction prices, it can be downright lethal. If there’s the slightest rumour of patronage or pay-off between you and me, the exhibition will be still-born; Madeleine’s reputation as an artist will be destroyed and my career will be dead from day one. Besides, we both know the rules of the game. You’re fragile and I’m building a personal career. Let’s not complicate our lives.’
‘I would like very much to have your friendship.’
‘I would value yours. I simply do not want to complicate a business situation.’
‘Which seems to be more important to you than anything else?’
‘Just at this moment, it is. I’ve worked hard for a long time to prepare myself for a break. From where I sit now it looks like a big red apple right on top of the fruit bowl. I only have to reach out and take it.’
‘What happens,’ asked Bayard deliberately, ‘if I suddenly snatch it away – no lease, no exhibition?’
‘Then I’ll know you’re a cruel destructive man and I’ll want nothing more to do with you. Let’s not play games, Mr Bayard – put up or shut up. Do we have a deal?’
It seemed an age before he answered.
‘We have a deal,’ he told her.
THREE
There was a cold wind and pelting rain as Max Mather drove into Switzerland via the railhead frontier town of Chiasso. The Italians waved him out and the Swiss let him in with a minimum of fuss. He should have been dog-tired, but the adrenalin was pumping at full pressure. He drove straight through to Zurich, checked into the Baur au Lac and slept till noon the next day.
His first call after lunch was to a camera shop to have his photographs of the Raffaello pieces developed and printed in two sets of enlargements.
Next he paid a visit to the Consul-General for Panama, an urbane and elegant gentleman in his mid-forties. Fluent in Spanish, English, French, German and Italian, his expositions were eloquent and admirably clear. He explained to Mather that for a down payment and an annual fee he could acquire, ready made, a legal company registered in Panama, a set of Panamanian directors, a book full of bearer shares which constituted his legal title to the company, a minute book and a document of procuration which would enable him or any other person to act on behalf of the company.
He could choose the company name from an existing list or he could invent one himself – this latter choice would, however, involve an administrative delay. So Mather chose a title from the list – Artifax SPA. As to the functions of the company, it could do whatever he wanted it to do, from oil drilling to making women’s underwear. He paid the Consulate in cash and headed straight to the Union Bank of Switzerland on Bahnhofstrasse. There, having displayed the documents of registration and the bearer shares, he opened an account for the company with the dollar draft from the Palombini bequest. This done, he rented in the name of the company a large safe-deposit box in which he lodged the pictures, the cartoons and the foundation documents of Artifax SPA.
Now he had two identities, one personal and the other corporate. The corporate one was an almost perfect mask, since the true ownership of the company was vested not necessarily in the purchaser but in the holder of the bearer shares. One identity could therefore be completely divorced from the other. To complete the divorcement, he took himself off to a lawyer recommended with careful reluctance by the bank.
‘It is not a thing we usually do, Mr Mather, but in your case – a new client, a stranger in our city – we bend the rules a little . The man is very reputable. His name is Alois Liepert.’
Liepert was a trim forty-year-old with an agreeable smile, a firm handshake and an excellent command of Oxford English. He also had a woman colleague whom he introduced as Dr Gisela Mundt, former lecturer in jurisprud
ence at the University of Zurich. She seemed to be in her early thirties, had an infectious laugh, wore expensive tailored clothes and was fluent in French, Italian, English, High German and her native Schweitzerdeutsch.
Mather presented his introduction from the Union Bank. Alois Liepert agreed – subject to a retainer of five thousand Swiss francs – to act as attorney for Max Mather, while Gisela Mundt would act as procurator for Artifax SPA under a limited delegation of powers. Thus, in the space of fifteen minutes, a fiction had been created whereby Artifax SPA enjoyed an independent legal existence while its ownership was cloaked in almost impenetrable secrecy and its assets – possibly worth tens of millions of dollars – were locked in a bank vault on the Bahnhofstrasse.
Gisela Mundt gave a happy laugh and said, ‘Now you own us, Mr Mather. How do you wish to dispose of our services?’
‘First,’ said Mather, ‘I should like to know how legal privilege works in Switzerland.’
‘Between lawyer and client, it is absolute.’
‘Between Swiss lawyer and foreign client?’
‘Equally so,’ replied Alois Liepert. ‘We are a neutral country, a safety-valve for the world. Secrecy is our most valuable asset. Without it, I doubt we could survive.’
‘In that case,’ Mather announced deliberately, ‘I wish to make a deposition which you will notarise and keep in a safe-deposit. I wish to make it in as formal a fashion as possible so that you, as my attorneys, may be able to respond in good faith to any questions which may arise in future about me or my affairs. You may make whatever inquiries you wish to verify my statements, but once you have verified them I shall hold you most rigidly to advise and act in my best interests. You will keep me always well within the law and you will neither propose nor permit me to drift into risky or ill-defined areas. Do I make myself clear?’
‘You do,’ said Dr Mundt. ‘We should incorporate the statement you have just made into a formal briefing instruction which you will sign later. Now if you’d like to begin dictating…the machine is running.’
‘My name is Maxwell Mather. I am an American citizen. My passport number is 9378567. I am unmarried. By profession, I am an academic. I hold a doctorate in palaeography from Princeton University and a master’s degree in the History of European Art. For the past four years I have been employed as archivist to the Palombini family at their villa called Tor Merla, near Florence. I was also, during the whole of this period, the acknowledged lover of the Signora Pia Palombini, mistress of the estate and head of the family. Some six weeks ago she died after a long fight against motor neurone disease, during most of which I nursed her night and day. Her legacies to me, recorded in her holograph will – of which I tender a copy with this deposition – were as follows: two years’ salary paid in US dollars, all the personal gifts she had made me, the automobile which she had bought for my use and a memento of my own choosing from the archive on which I had been working. The family raised no objection to these legacies. The executor of the estate, Claudio Palombini, was lavish in his praise for my care of his aunt. On my advice, he dedicated the archive to the National Library in Florence and he asked me to stay on to complete the negotiations for the transfer. We parted amicably and with mutual respect. It is my intention to set up business in Europe and America as a dealer and consultant in the fine arts. I am adequately supplied with funds and I look to you, Dr Liepert and you, Dr Mundt, for such legal counsel as I may need from time to time. End of deposition.’
‘That’s admirably clear.’ Liepert sounded puzzled.
‘But what is not clear,’ said Gisela Mundt tartly, ‘is what prompted you to make such a vacuous statement.’
‘Because,’ said Mather blandly, ‘the gift I chose from the archive was a canvas envelope sewn with cobbler’s thread and sealed with beeswax. It had been lying buried under a pile of papers ever since I had begun work on the archive…I am the only person in the world who knows of the existence of the envelope or its contents.’
‘Which are, precisely…?’ It was Liepert’s question.
‘Which may be – I repeat may be – two Raffaello portraits on wood and a complete set of cartoons for an altar-piece. The provenance of all the pieces goes back to 1505.’
‘So,’ said Gisela quietly, ‘you could be a very rich man. Did no one ask you what it was you had chosen as a memento from the archive?’
‘No one. Neither the attorneys for the estate nor Claudio Palombini himself, with whom I was in regular contact.’
‘Didn’t that seem strange to you?’
‘It did. Then on reflection I realised that they had no further interest in the archive; it was already being passed to the Library. The family was no longer concerned with it.’
Liepert and Mundt looked at each other, then he turned to Mather and asked:
‘Is it your intention to retain this legacy?’
‘It is.’
‘Would you be prepared to litigate about it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where are the pictures now?’
‘In a safe-deposit here in Zurich.’
‘How did you get them out of Italy?’
‘I carried them out, quite legally.’
‘It is illegal to export historic works of value without a permit,’ Gisela pointed out.
‘I am aware of the law, Dr Mundt. I submit – and can prove – that there exists at this moment a very grave doubt as to the authenticity of the works and that therefore no infraction has been committed.’
‘What is the doubt that hangs over the pieces, Mr Mather?’ Once again it was Gisela Mundt who was pursuing him.
He told her at length and in detail of his encounters with Niccoló Tolentino and the copies he had executed for Luca Palombini the Swindler. At the end of his narrative he made a gesture of appeal.
‘So tell me, either of you, do I have right on my side or not?’
‘Given that everything you have told us is true,’ said Alois Liepert deliberately, ‘then without a doubt you have the law on your side.’
‘Whether you have right on your side…’ Gisela Mundt smiled disarmingly as she spoke. ‘That’s another question which you have to answer yourself. We deal only with the law; so you could say, Mr Mather, that you’re a very lucky man. You could be worth a mint of money and you’ve just hired two of the best advocates in Zurich to make sure you keep it.’
‘In which case,’ said Mather happily, ‘I’ll call in tomorrow to sign the statement. Here’s a copy of the will, which is registered at the Anagrafe in Florence. I’ll also deposit with you tomorrow the negatives and a set of photographs of the art works. I suggest we complete your education by a private viewing in the strong-room of the Union Bank. If it’s convenient, we can do that immediately after I sign the deposition.’
‘And after that,’ Gisela asked, ‘how do you wish us to proceed?’
‘By masterly inactivity,’ said Mather agreeably. ‘Do nothing until you have instructions from me. I’m going to give myself a month’s holiday. After that, we’ll see…. Thank you both for your courtesy. Until tomorrow.’
When he had left, Liepert and Mundt looked at each other; Mundt asked the first question: ‘Well, what do you think of him, Alois?’
‘I think he’s telling the truth. What’s your notion?’
Gisela looked thoughtful. ‘He interests me. I’d read him as an academic who’s never taken a risk in his life. He’s a house-martin, always nesting under the shelter of the eaves. Now he’s free and flying with the falcons. He’s enjoying it. I just hope he doesn’t get torn to pieces!’
Max Mather arrived in New York trim and tanned after a month on the ski slopes. He booked into a serviced apartment on the upper East side, laid out his books and papers, made enough telephone calls to plug himself back into the Manhattan circuits and began to plot the next stage of his campaign, which was to prepare at long range a buyers’ market for the treasures which he believed he held. He himself would not be involved in the sale. That would
be negotiated by Artifax SPA. However, he could with perfect propriety and safety prime the public interest with some scholarly revelations and speculations. He had learned a great deal about the art market from Niccoló Tolentino, the dealers and connoisseurs of Florence and his own travels with Pia.
Another and equally important part of the exercise was to enable him to proceed without challenge to his ownership, or civil litigation which would inhibit a sale of the pieces.
The whole operation appealed to his sense of humour. He was acting out a fantasy that wasn’t a fantasy any more but a fantasquerie, a fly-away whim like that of a gambler playing with the house’s money, win, lose or draw.
His opening gambit was a lunch with Harmon Seldes, editor-in-chief of Belvedere magazine; one of the recognised Brahmins of the art world. Seldes had been a hard fish to hook. He cultivated a reputation for elegance, aloofness and Olympian authority. In the end, however, Mather’s well-practised charm – and the fact that he, too, had graduated from Princeton – carried the day and the luncheon was arranged.
Seldes understood patronage and preferment. Something of a snob himself, he was intrigued by the notion of a private archivist to a noble family. An indefatigable fund-raiser, he was impressed by the fact that Mather had stage-managed the donation of the Palombini archive to a public institution. He was curious to know why Mather had sought him out. With careful modesty Mather explained.
‘I’m doing a study on “Domestic Economics in Florence” in the early sixteenth century, working from a set of account books of the period. I have them on loan from the Palombini archive.’
‘It sounds interesting.’ Seldes was polite but non-committal.
‘A lot of it is drudgery, but at the end I think I’ll have something valuable. However, that’s not the reason I wanted to see you. The fact is that I’ve stumbled on something quite curious and I don’t know where to go with it – or if, indeed, I should go anywhere. I thought that with your long experience and all your connections in the arts, you might be willing to advise me.’
‘This curious something – what is it precisely?’