Golden Icon - The Prequel

by Janet Pywell

  ‘I know, I don’t want to go. You know how badly they treated me there.’

  ‘Then why are you going?’

  ‘Because…’

  ‘It is your life Josephine. You must do as you want but don’t come crying to me when Glorietta is given Tosca. Don’t cry on my shoulder when your ex-husband is ruining your life. Why are you giving up everything for him? Even Glorietta and Cesare don’t understand you–’

  ‘What do you mean? Have you discussed it with them?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ he pauses. ‘Well, Glorietta invited us all for lunch.’

  ‘And you went?’

  ‘Of course, you cannot expect me not to. We are still friends. We were together for over ten years.’

  ‘I think she still loves you,’ I whisper.

  ‘Rubbish! Don’t get jealous Josephine it is not becoming. Besides I am not a young schoolboy.’

  I want to reply that he behaves like one when Glorietta is around but I don’t.

  ‘What did they say?’ My voice sounds pathetically humble and I curse myself for my tone.

  ‘They said that they didn’t understand why you went running off. It doesn’t make sense. No-one understands you. They all know how important this comeback is for you. Yet you are throwing away this opportunity. You need to practice. Glorietta is singing at her best now.’

  ‘How do you know she is singing so well?’

  He hesitates and I wonder if I have lost the connection.

  ‘There were a few people there and she sang.’

  ‘A few people at the lunch?’ My mind is whirling. ‘Who?’

  ‘Nico Vastano and Dino Scrugli.’

  I am handing over my boarding pass to the ground crew and my legs give way. I hear Raffaelle calling my name as the phone falls from my hand. A girl in a green uniform stares at me as I recover the phone and I take the stub of the boarding pass from her. Walking along the airless corridor I am imagining Glorietta’s villa in Bellagio overlooking the Lake, and a select group of admirers clinking Prosecco glasses at the terrace table. They would insist she sang, and she would resist, and then frightened they would not ask again, she would give in gracefully.

  ‘I bet she sang Vissi d’arte,’ I say.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you know Nico and Dino are on the audition panel on Monday?’

  ‘I know, amore mia.’

  ‘And you went to her villa and she sang for them. For all of you.’

  ‘I didn’t know she would sing.’

  I check the numbers and find my seat on the plane. ‘She did. That was the whole point of inviting you there or did you think it was because she was trying out her cooking skills?’

  The man across the aisle stares at me.

  ‘No.’

  ‘She is manipulative.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘She invited you and you gave her your support.’

  ‘It wasn’t like that.’

  ‘You are my partner now.’

  ‘Sì amore.’

  ‘You endorsed her in my absence. How could you?’

  ‘I didn’t think– I’m sorry.’

  ‘Me too.’ I hang up the phone. My head is throbbing. I lean back and close my eyes conscious of my neighbour’s staring eyes. The words from Vissi d’arte revolve in my head, round and round and round. I lived for art. I lived for love. I lived for art. I lived for love.

  And the only face I see belongs to Michael, when we were lovers. I had never know such gentleness or passion.

  3

  Chapter 3

  And I die in desperation! And I never before loved life so much, Loved life so much! - E lucevan le stelle, Tosca

  A German lady sitting beside me on the plane tells me that the train service into Munich city centre is excellent. In my previous life I was ferried by a range of sleek cars, chauffeurs and secretaries, and I have never worried about transport.

  As I leave the rail carriage a surge of hot air surrounds me. The Hauptbahnhoff is busy and noisy. There are a multitude of exits and after consulting the instructions Seán put in the envelope, I find the main road and the Meridian Hotel, opposite the station entrance.

  I take a few minutes to stop, look around and inhale the city air. I stayed here many times, in my past life as an opera singer, and I know it’s a short walk along the Bayerstrasse to the Merienplatz. I remember the old part of the city; the restaurants, the cafes, the beer cellars and the shops. I have strolled through the English Garden, enjoyed coffee in the sunshine in the Karlsplatz and wandered through the farmer’s market buying fresh food and luxuries from the delicatessen. Although my last few months in Germany were difficult I have many happy memories and I take a deep breath. It seems like a good omen and my spirits are lifted.

  Checking the paper in my hand I turn away from the city centre and follow a maze of grey streets. Although it is almost dark I know it isn’t the most attractive part of town. Shop fronts have seen better days, cafes are run down and the few bars that are open seem subdued and seedy.

  I walk for almost ten minutes stopping at the traffic lights, checking the names of the streets and looking constantly over my shoulder. Since I talked to Karl Blakey I have felt a shiver of fear, tugging at my nerves and pulling at my conscience. Painful memories, lost opportunities, words regretted and destructible actions all add to my feeling of revulsion and disgust. No-one could imagine my utter shame. No-one must find out about my secret.

  Who was I? Who am I?

  Tosca.

  The grey apartment block has chipped brickwork, paint peeling from grubby window frames and a steel gated door. I press the buzzer and wait.

  I glance into the neighbouring bicycle repair shop. Although it is late it is still open and a single bulb dangles from a high ceiling. The floor is stained with oil puddles and strewn with mismatched saddles, wheels, inner tubes and bolts, screws and nuts. A bald, well-muscled man in a soiled vest stands wiping his greasy fingers on a dirty rag watching me.

  A trickle of perspiration slides down my spine and I look over my shoulder. A couple holding hands cross the street and a young boy with a rucksack at a bus stop chews gum with his mouth open. No sign of Karl Blakey. Would Seán have sent Karl to follow me? I stab the buzzer again. It is past ten o’clock. Perhaps the old man is asleep? After my third attempt a muffled voice grunts in German.

  ‘Herr Dieter Guzman?’ I shout into the intercom.

  ‘Come up. Third floor,’ he says. ‘There’s no lift.’

  The stairs reek of cheap disinfectant which irritates my throat. I don’t touch the handrail and on the second floor I stop to take a bottle of water from my bag. I cough, wipe my mouth and hope there is no damage done to my trachea, so delicate and strong an instrument, my precious organ. I replace the water in my bag, walk up the one remaining flight of stairs and the lights go out. Suddenly I am plunged into blackness. I search for the glow of a red light on the wall. I think I hear footsteps. My heart is racing. I smack the button on the wall and the corridor is suddenly illuminated. There is no-one. Only two brown doors facing me. My heart continues beating rapidly. My palms are perspiring.

  3B.

  I ring the bell and wait.

  There is shuffling and the door clicks open.

  ‘Herr Guzman?’ I ask.

  An old man stands behind a Zimmer frame. His mouth is too big for his face and he has patches of white stubble on his chin. He nods his head to one side inviting me into the dark corridor of his home and a few strands of dirty hair dangle over his shoulder.

  ‘Go through to the room at the end.’ His voice is rough and, when he slams the door behind me, I believe I am imprisoned.

  The living room is ill-lit. The walls are lined with shelves and bookcases covered with an inch of dust. Scattered on the threadbare carpet are untidy piles of used paperbacks all shapes and sizes, and thumbed magazines; cars, antiques, sculptures, paintings and naked women.

  I sneeze, pull a tissue from my pocket and cover my nose. />
  His shuffling footsteps and laboured breath comes from behind me. ‘Don’t bring your germs in here,’ he says.

  The once blue sofa is faded grey and patterned with dubious stains. An armchair is stuffed with an assortment of ill-matched cushions showing pictures of cart horses and cats. A dining table is covered with debris; plates, cutlery, and glasses. Tin cans and wrappers have been thrown toward an overflowing bin in the corner of the room.

  At the window, wooden plastic blinds are half drawn against the night sky. They are covered in dust, cobwebs and red spider’s nests.

  ‘Seán telephoned you,’ I say. ‘He told me you were expecting me. I’ve come to collect the painting.’

  ‘Sit down.’ He struggles into an armchair. His lean frame is fragile.

  ‘You look familiar.’ His rheumy brown eyes undress me.

  I square my shoulders and stare back down at him. ‘Do you have the painting? I’m in a hurry,’ I speak in German.

  He scratches his chest in a slow easy manner and I look away. I gaze out of the soiled window and see lights in another similar block across the street, and another beside that; all housing built after the last world war.

  ‘You speak good German,’ he says. ‘But you’re foreign, American?’ His shirt is buttoned wrong revealing white hairs on his stomach. His English is good.

  I cover my nose with the tissue and nod.

  ‘Who are you?’ he says.

  ‘Josephine Lavelle.’

  ‘Nein, nein nein!’ He waves his arm impatiently. ‘He wouldn’t just send anyone.’

  ‘Seán asked me to come. He’s Michael’s eldest son.’

  ‘The property-man, the one that phoned me. Ja, but who are you? Why you? Sit. Sit!’ He waves his hand.

  I perch on the edge of the sofa conscious of the discoloured patches and damp stains on the floor at my feet. ‘I’m a friend of the family.’

  He coughs and continues to stare at me, and in that instance I realise, this man is probably the same age as Michael. Until now I have only thought of Michael as a fit and handsome sixty year old, the man whom I loved, not as an ill old man before he died. I blink attempting to remove the image I have of Michael with this man’s frail body. How were they ever friends?

  ‘It was Michael’s funeral today,’ I venture. ‘There were lots of people there. He will be missed. He was a gentleman.’

  Guzman snorts. ‘We are all going to die. I’m surprised he lasted this long.’

  Rebuffed I reply, ‘I’m in a hurry, Herr Guzman. Do you have the painting?’

  ‘I am not in a hurry. I have nowhere to go and besides it’s not often I have a pretty face to look at.’ He smiles with yellow rotting teeth, and taps thin fingers on the arm of his chair, and I begin to wonder if I have been sent on a false mission.

  I take out the bottle of water. My throat is parched and I am developing a headache. Under normal circumstances I would get up and leave but the thought of Karl Blakey digging into my past, and the explicit letter I wrote thirty years ago, leaves me with no option.

  ‘May I open a window?’

  He nods, so I tug the window and a stream of warm air rushes into the room causing me to cough. I am tired and my patience is ebbing. My head is also throbbing.

  ‘I really need the painting, Mr Guzman.’

  ‘Call me Dieter.’

  ‘Dieter. The painting - please?’

  ‘Michael was no gentleman. He was a scoundrel and a thief.’ His eyes glaze over and he stares past me. ‘All four of us were bad, but we were only boys and we’ve paid the price.

  ‘He killed Terry. Seven years after the war was over. He shot him dead and he took his share of the treasure.’ Dieter leans forward. ‘But he wasn’t going to kill me.’

  ‘Michael?’

  ‘We thought we would outlive him. We waited. What’s the point of having a fortune if you can’t spend it? He was a coward just like he was in the war. We all were.’

  ‘D–Did Michael kill someone?’

  ‘Maximilian.’

  ‘Michael killed Maximilian? In the war?’

  ‘Nein! Nein!’ Dieter heaves himself to his feet and shuffles to a wooden cabinet. He opens a drawer, pulls out a creased photograph, and shambles over to sit with me on the sofa. Automatically I shift my knees away from him. His bony finger stabs the black and white snapshot of four men.

  ‘That’s me,’ he says, pointing at a skinny boy in uniform.

  He is tall, thin faced with a sharp nose.

  ‘You were in the British army, but you’re…’

  ‘Yes, I am a German. A Jew. But my mother was English. That’s Terry. He worked with the red cross.’ He points to a boy with short dark hair. Then points to a smiling face squinting at the sunlight.

  I say, ‘Michael?’

  He nods. ‘He was a medic.’ Dieter’s breath is putrid and I lean away.

  There is a fourth boy crouched below the others. He is small and wiry by comparison and has a mop of curly hair hanging over his forehead. ‘That is Maximilian Strong,’ he says.

  I am holding the picture of the four young men, tilting it toward the lamp light to see their expressions.

  ‘Have you heard of the Monuments Men?’ He coughs phlegm and wipes his hands on a dirty tissue from his pocket.

  ‘Yes, I think so. Weren’t they a team of art experts who were assigned to the allied forces? Didn’t they protect and record damage done to churches and monasteries in Italy during the war?’

  ‘Not just Italy and not just buildings. The MFAA - Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives section also located missing movable works of art; all the stolen Nazi treasures from France, Holland and Belgium. The priceless paintings, sculptures, silverware, gilt-edged books and manuscripts, everything that was stolen from churches, museums or private collections and from the wealthy Jews.

  ‘Hitler had plans to build a Führermuseum in his home town of Linz in Austria and he put Goering in charge of collating all the artwork in Europe for his collection, but Goering was also a collector and he stored most of the stolen art at his estate in Carinhall, his hunting-lodge outside Berlin.’ He scratches his chest. ‘Goering supervised the removal of these artefacts. Many were stored in salt mines like the one in Austria in Altaussee because the temperatures in the mines kept the paintings relatively undamaged. But then, in the last months of the war, everything changed. When the Nazis started retreating they were determined to destroy the art and everything else, rather than let it be found by the British, Americans or the Russians.

  ‘Hitler’s Nero Decree listed facilities and sites for destruction. There were orders to destroy bridges and major sites of importance that I can’t remember now, but when Hitler sent orders that the mines were to be blown up with the artwork inside, some of Hitler’s Generals weren’t in agreement with him, so they began dumping consignments in lakes, or hiding them in repositories hidden in the countryside.

  ‘The Monuments Men had no real authority. They only had the help of officers and enlisted men but they managed to save and categorise a large amount of art and much of it, after the war, was eventually repatriated to the rightful owners.

  ‘They found hoards of treasures in rural areas, in schools, cafes and houses where they had been stored for safekeeping, but hundreds of people were involved in the plundering; art experts, guards, packers, it was impossible to control. There were art dealers in Berlin and Switzerland trading in looted artwork. Some went missing, some were destroyed, some simply disappeared.’

  He turns to look at me and scratches his chest.

  ‘We found a cartload of treasure. It was the day after the big discovery in Siegen. I remember it was the second of April. The experts were so excited they had found works by Rembrandt, Gauguin, Renoir and Rubens that they didn’t take much notice of four uniformed men including two medics. I had the advantage of speaking German which gave me more authority and credibility with the locals and so it was easy. It was stored in crates. We confiscated it and foun
d a secure lockup then we swore each other to secrecy.’ Dieter rises to his feet. He holds on to the back of furniture and shuffles to another room that I hadn’t noticed before.

  It has gone eleven o’clock. I am exhausted. I yawn. It doesn’t seem possible that I left my home only this morning and flew to Dublin. Michael’s funeral seems weeks ago. My neck aches and my head hurts. I pick up the photograph and study the faces of the four young soldiers. Terry the boy with freckles was killed. Michael is dead, Dieter is old and ill, and I am wondering about the wiry boy with the mop of hair across his forehead when Dieter returns carrying a tray.

  ‘Tea?’ His mouth hangs open in concentration and, with a determined thrust, he slides the tray onto a small table. Milk spills on the floor and a drop of tea sloshes from the spout of the flowery teapot over the bone china mugs.

  ‘I told you my mother was English,’ Dieter smiles.

  ‘Is the painting…’

  He ignores me, pours tea, licks his lips and blows into the mug. ‘We were boys. We didn’t know each other that well. We had only been deployed for six weeks but it turned out we were all opportunists. We all had that in common. We couldn’t believe our luck; silver-gilt busts; altarpieces, decorations, sculptures and a couple of paintings.’

  ‘You stole them.’

  ‘They had been stolen from the Jews,’ he replies sternly.

  ‘But they didn’t belong to you.’

  ‘So?’ He blows and sips. ‘A few days later all the packers, movers, trucks and an armed guard from the infantry division were sent to another repository near Merkers where they found paintings by Rubens, Goya and Cranach. They even found gold bars and foreign currency including stamping plates to print Reichmarks.’ He chuckles and wipes his eyes. ‘They were so busy with the big hoards they forgot about the smaller stashes.

  ‘After the war historians, art scholars, conservationists, curators from all the countries claimed their rights to the missing pieces; legally, morally and emotionally. It’s complicated. They were all going to fight over them. So we kept them.’

  ‘It was wrong.’ I am horrified but he seems proud of his heist.