by Peter Watson
Then five hands went up together and the next three minutes were the most exhilarating in David’s life. He had never known so many bidders. There was activity in all parts of the room and his assistants were calling out bids he didn’t even see. It seemed at times that everyone wanted to bid, perhaps just to say they had taken part in this historic auction. Quickly the bidding climbed to thirty-eight million pounds. By then the competition was down to six: Berlin, Sydney, the Getty, Tokyo, the Louvre, and the Metropolitan in New York. David held his breath as forty million pounds approached. When he had first discussed numbers with the Holy Father he had known the picture would break all records – but now, as the magic figure of forty million approached, he still couldn’t quite believe it.
But the figure was reached. And still the drama wasn’t over. At forty million pounds Tokyo and Sydney dropped out but – sensation – the Hermitage came in!
Where Ivan Shirikin had got the money from David didn’t know but there he was, lifting his catalogue in an unmistakeable bid. At forty two million pounds Berlin and the Louvre gave up but Shirikin’s presence only seemed a challenge to the Americans. Forty-five million was reached. Then the Russian, as suddenly as he had entered, dropped out. That left just the Getty and the Met.
Or did it? Sitting slightly apart from the other Americans was a small, spare man, who now raised a well-manicured, rather bony finger. David recognized him as Douglas Fillimore, director of the Frick Collection in New York, a wholly private collection which many people in the know regarded as the greatest collection in the world, certainly in America. Founded by Henry Clay Frick, the coke and steel millionaire, the Frick made very few acquisitions but, when it did, they were always the very best. Fillimore’s intervention was a masterstroke, and brilliantly-timed psychologically. By coming in now he had signalled to the other two, the Getty and the Met, that he would fight to the end. The Frick had the funds and did not have other acquisitions to make as they did. The price was already in the stratosphere. Quickly, Jakobson, for the Met, and Small-bone for the Getty, realized that a prolonged battle would be ruinous for all concerned. The Met dropped out first, at forty-six million, with the Getty following one bid later.
David surveyed the room. However clear the situation was, he had to go through the motions. ‘Forty-seven million pounds . . . any more? . . . any more? . . . fair warning at forty-seven million pounds . . . any more? . . . any more at forty-seven million pounds? . . . fair warning . . . forty-seven million . . . forty-seven million pounds . . .’ As the gavel smacked down thunderous applause broke out and not a little cheering. David’s words, ‘The Frick Collection’ were utterly overwhelmed by the noise of shouting and stamping of feet. Fillimore was being surrounded by reporters and television crews.
David did some quick sums. Forty-seven plus twenty-three made seventy million pounds. Eight per cent of that was five point six million pounds. It had taken rather more work than the two minutes Elizabeth Lisle had once accused him of, but, with its ten per cent buyer’s commission on top of that, Hamilton’s was twelve point six million pounds better off now, while the Pope’s relief fund had benefitted by more than fifty million. That felt good. He descended from the rostrum into the mass of people. No one wanted to go home it seemed, the occasion was too special. Sirianni shook his hand. So did Hale. The Earl of Afton gave him the thumbs up from across the room. Jack Pringle, the press officer, raised his arms and clasped his hands together above his head like a victorious boxer. David noticed Elizabeth Lisle beckoning to him, and he fought his way through the crush towards her. As he approached he saw that she was on the phone. She smiled. Her deep voice carried above the general clamour.
‘It’s the Holy Father,’ she said. ‘He wants a word.’
David took the instrument from her.
‘Mr Colwyn, I’ve just been watching you on television. You were magnificent! Congratulations and thank you. You’ve managed everything perfectly. If I can ever repay the favour, don’t hesitate to ask.’
‘Thank you, your Holiness. I’m simply relieved it’s all gone so well, believe me.’
‘I do believe you, Mr Colwyn. I know what it’s like, being exposed the way you were tonight. Well, a marvellous night for us all, the disaster victims especially. I shall sleep very well, ready for a busy day tomorrow – I’m going to Foligno again, as it happens. Goodnight. And God bless you.’
The line went dead. David turned as Monsignor Hale, flanked by Sirianni and Elizabeth Lisle, came up. ‘Colwyn, I’m taking the Italian contingent to dinner. Care to join us?’
‘I’d love to,’ said David. ‘Unfortunately, there are things I have to do here. Also, I’ve got to be up early tomorrow.’
Hale held out his hand. ‘Then I’ll say goodnight. What you have accomplished here this evening is truly God’s work. You have all our thanks.’
David shook hands and watched them leave the great hall. Then he went to check on the security of the pictures. It would take the money men at least thirty-six hours to clear the cheques, and in the meantime Hamilton’s would keep the Gauguin and the Raphael in its vaults. He felt rather flat, now that the excitement was all over. One of the attractions of auctioneering he hadn’t mentioned to Elizabeth Lisle was its theatrical atmosphere on great occasions. This evening had been like a first night. He was keyed up and would have loved to go on with Hale and the others. But work had to come first.
His house in Pelham Crescent, when he eventually arrived home after doing all the chores that follow a major sale, was dark and empty. The morning mail always arrived after he’d left for the office, so it was there stacked neatly on the hall table, put there to greet him by his ever-tidy daily woman whom he rarely saw, Mrs Mackeson. One of the letters, however, turned out to be a pretty poor greeting. It was from his wife’s lawyer, and it made a miserable ending to a day that had been the peak of his career as an auctioneer. Sarah had decided to get remarried and so wanted an immediate divorce.
*
David had to be up early next day for the usual reason: he had a plane to catch. As an expert on Roman art, with an expertise that had profited Hamilton’s handsomely, he had, as part of his contract, negotiated a certain number of days a year when he could pursue his scholarly interests. Today and tomorrow were just such a time. The Renaissance Society was meeting in Milan and David was due to give a paper. He would describe his preliminary findings arising from his discovery of new documents in the Vatican archive which concerned Leonardo’s early works.
As he was driven to the airport he flipped through the morning papers. The Daily Mail had a short piece about the Vatican auction on page one, headlined ‘THE MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR MADONNA!’ while the Daily Telegraph had as its second lead, ‘POPE’S PICTURES PULL IN THE PENNIES’. But it was the letter from Sarah’s lawyer which still kept nagging at him. He sighed. Why was it that bad news was always so much more compelling than good? David had met Sarah when he was twenty-five and had just joined Hamilton’s. She was working as a librarian in the House of Commons. He’d had girlfriends in his last years at school, and affairs at Harvard. But Sarah was something else. She’d had poor health as a child but by then she was a forceful young lady and very passionate. They’d married within months, and had been crazily happy, even happier when their son, Ned, arrived. For years they had a marvellous life. The auction business was expanding, David was travelling more and more, Ned was a source of constant amazement and pleasure. Life changed enough each year to keep them fresh. Ironically, looking back, David thought it was the Bernini discovery which had started the rot. It wasn’t only the publicity his discovery had attracted, or the boost it gave to his reputation in the trade. It was the change it had wrought in his appetite for success. With hindsight he now realized that one discovery took some living up to: he had to make another, if possible even more exciting. He’d spent all his free time on the trail of the Swedish Raphael.
Unfortunately, all this had coincided with Ned going away to school. That meant
Sarah had less to do. David was in favour of her going back to work: he liked a wife with her own career. The question whether that was what Sarah wanted didn’t cross his mind. A librarian’s skills don’t become obsolete quite as quickly as some other professions. There were no jobs at the House of Commons but because of her experience in Parliament, she was lucky and got something in the library at the Foreign Office. It was a time when a trade mission was being planned to the Far East. It mainly involved questions of commerce but even so the FO had to be involved. That was how she had met Michael Greener, Member of Parliament for a London constituency, Minister for Overseas Trade and a coming man in the Conservative Party.
It had all been very civilized. She had told David about the affair one night about thirty minutes before Greener was to arrive at Pelham Crescent. David supposed that Greener had been really quite brave. He had come to support Sarah in what was bound to be a difficult scene. He was with her, which was more than David had been in the preceding months. Everything had gone off as calmly as these things can be expected to – but maybe that had been the problem. At no time during the break-up had there been any show of emotion. As a result his grief had found no outlet but had festered. Now, twenty months later, he supposed he was beginning to come round. All the same, reminders like yesterday’s letter still had the power to set him back.
Yet neither Sarah nor Greener was being unreasonable. Greener had now been promised a seat in the cabinet but first the Prime Minister wanted him to put his private life in order. Was he going to marry Sarah Colwyn or not? To be a cabinet minister one needed a regular private life. One could lose the party votes otherwise.
The letter was considerate in its tone. But David was still upset. He wondered how Ned was. So thoughtful had Sarah been that she had initially told David about Greener only a week after Ned had gone back to school. In this way they had both had almost a term to adjust to the new situation, to get their feelings under control before facing their son. Greener had kept tactfully in the background and things had begun to settle down. Ned spent his holidays with his mother, of course, but David could see him when he wanted. They remained close.
David gazed out at the dirty sky above the M4. Even the clouds looked soaked in diesel.
Ned was a delight and a puzzle. Half the time he seemed much older than thirteen, his actual age. His jokes, his thoughtfulness, his understanding, made his company second to none. Then, unpredictably, he would retreat into himself, regress into solitary, childish games. He was like a lighthouse whose beam only came round when you were least expecting it.
David would give Sarah the divorce, of course. But it only emphasized what he had told Elizabeth Lisle: he felt hopelessly beached. What was that Elizabeth had said about his situation? That the Pope would be making changes, but it all depended on the Raphael sale? Well, that had gone off splendidly enough so maybe something would happen to ease his situation. He felt he had earned it now.
If anything could lift David’s spirits it was the company of fellow scholars or a few days spent under the warm skies and amid the dusty colours of Italy. The Renaissance Society meeting in Milan, therefore, was perfect. His paper, too, was a success. The Secret Archives of the Vatican are notoriously badly organized; no one knows exactly what is contained in them, nor, since there is so much, can anyone be sure exactly what is where. It had been a hunch of David’s to search in them for documents relating to Leonardo da Vinci. A lot was known about him, of course, except for that missing year: 1482.
David’s paper to the conference was entitled, dryly, ‘Leonardo’s missing year: some documentary discoveries’. His talk was to the point. All he had done, he said, was look at certain papers that might throw light on the problem. First, he had drawn up a list of events in Italy around 1482 which could, by some stretch of the imagination, be said to be relevant. These events included the contract for some frescoes in the Sistine Chapel (1481/82), the death of the painter, Luca Della Robbia (1482), the death of Pope Sixtus IV, Francesco della Rovere, the death of the Duke of Urbino (1482) and the accession to power as Duke of Mantua of Francesco Gonzaga (1484). These last three, David reminded the meeting, were all well-known patrons of the arts. He had, he said, visited libraries in Florence and Mantua and Naples to check out some of the events, but it had been in the Vatican that he had first come across something of significance. This was in a long note to Pope Sixtus IV from the papal nuncio at the court in Urbino, notifying His Holiness of the death of Frederigo da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino. The letter included a brief list of the people who had been in Urbino for Montefeltro’s funeral, and mentioned one ‘Leonardo the engineer’, who had been trying to interest the Duke of Urbino, before his death, in a new kind of bridge.
That was all he had found so far, David admitted. Yet it was known that, a year later, Leonardo da Vinci had tried to interest the Duke of Milan in some designs for military fortifications, when he had again described himself as an engineer. It wasn’t much, concluded David, but it was a start. His discoveries clearly showed that in 1482 Leonardo spent some time in Urbino, and he was continuing to plough through the reports of the papal nuncio at Urbino, to see if Leonardo was mentioned again.
The paper attracted considerable scholarly attention. It was hardly front-page news, but in its way it was important and the others at the conference appreciated it. David was approached and congratulated by academics from as far away as Moscow and Montreal.
On his last night in Milan, David had dinner at Casa Fontana with Edward Townshend, from the Fogg Library at Harvard, Jean-Claude Sapper of the Louvre, and Ivan Shirikin of the Hermitage in Leningrad. It was a truly international gathering and, over three bottles of Trebbiano, the wine the house recommended, the conversation ranged from Veronese to vodka, Boston to Bramante and Pope Thomas to Trotsky. On the flight back to London David reflected that it had almost taken his mind off his divorce.
Almost, but not quite.
*
Roberto Vizzini was a handsome man and, for a Sicilian, exceptionally tall. Wherever he was he stood out, not a bad attribute for a priest. He certainly stood out now, among all these school children. He looked down on them seated in rows in St Agatha’s school hall in front of him. This was work he enjoyed, giving prizes to the successful pupils, telling a few simple jokes, then sitting with the headmaster as focus for the school photograph.
He enjoyed other kinds of work also. And in consequence there were some people in Sicily who called Father Vizzini a saint. It was not often a priest went ‘undercover’ and acted like a policeman or an investigative journalist. But Vizzini had done just that. First, in the remote Burgio area of Sicily, high in the mountains, by making use of information obtained possibly through the confessional, he had succeeded, about a year before, in exposing a heroin processing plant run by the Mafia.
Then three months later, he had exposed a Mafia racket at Punta Raisi, Palermo airport. One evening, after dark, a spiked chain had been drawn across the main runway, ripping open the tyres of a small plane that was landing. Unbalanced by the blown-out tyres, the plane had crashed and burst into flames, killing the two aircrew and three occupants. This ‘accident’ had been caused because the airport authorities had refused to pay protection money. After it the local underworld had got what they wanted – until Vizzini, again using the confessional, was able to give the police some names.
More recently he had had a third spectacular success. In a disconcerting move the Mafia in Palermo had, about three months before, stolen all the blood in the city’s blood bank. It was an easy theft since blood was hardly something the hospital authorities had imagined anyone would want to steal. And in any case the stocks could be replenished by new donors . . . Except that the Mafia then let it be known that anyone offering to give blood would be ‘dealt with’ – maimed or murdered. The number of donors dwindled and after two people had their feet shattered with bullets, dried up completely. Within a matter of days the hospital system was in crisis. Blood co
uld only be obtained from the Mafia, inevitably at astronomical prices. The state hospital system refused to pay and so only rich patients in private hospitals could afford transfusions. After several people in the state hospitals in Palermo and Messina had died because there was no blood for them, Vizzini had set to work. Again his methods were probably doubtful. Almost certainly he got a lead in the confessional from the wife of one of the black market dealers. In any case, something put him on to the Mafia link man and a raid by Sicilian police on a warehouse in Trapani uncovered the blood bank.
The island was jubilant and, when it was revealed that Vizzini had once again been instrumental in outwitting the Mafia, he was fêted as no other priest in Sicily. The Archbishop of Palermo invited him to preach in his cathedral there and thousands pleaded for a visit from this unconventional man of God.
St Agatha’s School was one of many which had begged him to honour them at their prize-giving. He had accepted for two reasons. St Agatha’s was in a pitifully poor region, Mussomeli, and one of the policemen wounded in the raid on the warehouse in Trapani had originally come from here.
When the prize-giving itself was at an end the school trooped outside for the photograph. A number of chairs had been arranged in a curving line in the broad sunshine: this was where the staff would sit with the headmaster and Fr Vizzini in the centre. The younger pupils would be cross-legged on the ground in front of the staff, others would stand behind the chairs, and still others would stand on benches behind them to make up four rows. The school’s headgirl, who looked as though she might one day be as tall as Vizzini, showed the priest to his seat. She, he remembered, had won the prize for art and had been given a book on Caravaggio. He noticed that she was still holding it.
Vizzini sat down. As the other children milled around, getting into place, several of the prizewinners came up to him, shyly, and asked him to sign their books. As he scribbled his name and a short inscription, wishing them luck and God’s protection, he noticed a number of proud mothers standing against the wall of the school, watching the show. ‘Why don’t you get the mothers in the shot?’ he said to the headmaster, who had just taken his seat.