Painter of Time

by Matthew O'Connell

  The nave of the upper basilica was long and spacious. The vaulted ceilings were bordered with patterns of crosses and leaves. Eight vaulted bays ran the length of the nave, four on each side. Each bay was divided into an upper and lower section. The upper portion of each bay contained a stained glass window surrounded on each side by two frescoes depicting a total of thirty-two scenes from the Old and New Testament. Daddi and the rest of the group ambled slowly with heads raised, taking in each of the different scenes.

  Giotto suggested that they make a complete pass of the entire upper basilica before focusing in on any one area so as to get a feel for how the paintings fit into the whole. That made a lot of sense, from Daddi’s perspective. Many of the older churches in Florence were comparatively sparse in their interiors with only a handful of focal paintings. Here he saw that the entirety of the interior was itself a work of art.

  After they made one complete walkthrough, which took the better part of an hour, they returned to the front and focused on the lower portion of each bay. Below the richly decorated dado that separated the upper and lower portions of the bay were three frescoes, side-by-side, which depicted the life of Saint Francis of Assisi. These frescoes, twenty-eight in total, including two in the east galleries beside the entrance and two on the entrance wall, had been painted by Giotto himself between fifteen and twenty years ago.

  For Daddi, the frescoes themselves were stunning. They were clear, simple depictions of the Saint in vivid colors, without additional gilding or iconographic influence that characterized most paintings from that time period. The faces of the people in the scenes were detailed and lifelike. Unlike most of the works that had come before, it these were three-dimensional individuals talking, watching the Saint, engaged in their daily activities. Even the scenery in the background, the buildings, churches and balconies appeared true to life and appropriately proportioned.

  Daddi knew how proud Giotto was of these works because he often talked of them. He could see the fatherly pride that shone in Giotto’s eyes as he looked upon these works, which had occupied a good part of his early life as a painter. He had to grudgingly admit that Giotto was a better artist than he. Even paintings that Giotto had made twenty years earlier looked more realistic and lifelike than Daddi’s most recent works painted the previous month. He was more impressed than he was envious, but nonetheless, his slow burning competitive pilot light never really went out.

  Daddi looked around at the assembled group. All of them had painted and studied with Giotto. He had influenced and guided each and every one of them. Still, it was hard not to be taken aback by the sheer beauty, detail, and realism of these scenes. Without knowing anything about the Saint, one was able to understand his life and truly feel what he was like and why he was canonized so quickly after his death. These were not ornate depictions of an otherworldly being that was too far from this world to touch. This was the life of a man who had given up his wealth and life to serve God, his fellow man and the animals around him. Daddi could see the mixed look of admiration, awe and frustration in each of their eyes. They all knew they were in the presence of a greatness that was beyond their reach.

  “How was it that you were able to paint such masterful frescoes almost twenty years ago?” asked Daddi. Daddi knew that Giotto relished his role as unquestioned master. But he also knew that he was not shy in sharing his approach, his technique and his knowledge with any who were interested.

  As Daddi expected, Giotto obliged without hesitation.

  “You have to understand that there were many artists working in the basilica at that time. I knew some of them but many were from as far away as Rome as well as other parts of Tuscany. I was not sure myself how best to make these paintings. I contemplated using mosaics or painting onto wood panels and affixing them to the walls. But there was an artist here at the time named Pietro Cavallini who was truly revolutionary in his use of this new technique. He had painted other frescoes in the convent of Santa Cecilia and the church of Santa Maria in Rome around 1290. I was, of course, much younger at the time and captivated by his description of this approach. He had already finished a fresco on the life of Isaac and was working on another when I first met him. Let’s take a look at them.” Giotto led the group over to the two frescoes, Isaac Blesses Jacob and Esau in Front of Isaac, in the middle register of the third bay.

  “You can see that these are the works of a true master and definitely influenced me in many ways. There was more realism to them than anything I had painted up until that time. Cavallini was a gracious teacher and showed me how to utilize the fresco technique that I had never seen before. Once I watched him and he explained the logic of the process, it seemed so straightforward. He told me that he actually came upon the technique out of necessity. He had been commissioned with a number of projects in Rome, where he had planned on using traditional mosaics. However, he did not have the time to complete all of his projects using that technique and experimented with just painting on the fresh plaster versus applying the tiles. He said that he was able to cut almost half the time and that he liked the result even better than what he would have been able to achieve with a mosaic. I think you would all agree that the fresco approach is superior.”

  Daddi and the others voiced their agreement en masse. There was really no comparison between the two approaches. Most of the younger men had actually never even completed a mosaic because that approach was largely being overtaken by the faster and less expensive fresco technique. Daddi had completed a number of mosaics, but doubted that he would ever do one again now that this technique was available.

  Giotto continued, happy to be holding court for his loyal subjects. “I spent almost six years working on these frescoes. At the time they were by far my greatest accomplishment, both personally and professionally. I learned more about painting and about myself, what I was capable of achieving as well as my limitations, than in any other works that I have done before or since. I also learned how to delegate to my assistants,” Giotto said, laughing.

  “Of course my brush touched every one of the frescoes, and the design concept and color scheme were all mine. But when all is said and done, by the time these were finished, I had a team of six competent artists working with me and I was quite adept at teaching others how to follow my lead and do the actual painting. You gentlemen, of all people, should know my skills in delegating. I bet that I actually only painted about thirty percent of these.” He looked around with a conspiratorial smirk. “But do not tell anyone.” The group laughed, albeit somewhat uncomfortably, with Giotto.

  Daddi thought that no one remembered the names of the other six artists who painted almost all of these beautiful frescoes. He also knew that Giotto, while gracious in sharing his knowledge and technique, wasn’t as generous in sharing his fame. Daddi never heard Giotto mention the names of those six artists and imagined that he never would. It was Giotto and Giotto alone who took credit and received the adulation, and the lion’s share of the wealth. These were Giotto’s frescoes, after all.

  He wondered what Gaddi and the others thought about their master. How much of Giotto’s works had they already painted for him, or would in the future? Like it or not, he couldn’t deny that Giotto knew what he was doing. In fact, there was a certain genius to it, which up until this point Daddi had failed to see. Giotto certainly had no problem taking credit and reaping the spoils of his success, whether it was fully earned or not. There was obviously a reason why Giotto was one of the most successful and prolific painters in all of Italy. It was becoming much clearer to Daddi. Being a true artist was one thing. Being a famous and wealthy artist was something entirely different. He had long tried to master the former. He vowed then and there to pursue the latter with abandon.

  Chapter 29

  Whether Mackenzie liked it or not, most mornings started early. Octavius didn’t sleep well in the summer and usually woke Mackenzie up at 5:30 a.m. because he was hungry or hot or both. Either way, he had developed a skill for effi
ciently knocking things off her nightstand one by one until she got up. This morning was no different, although today especially was one in which Mackenzie dreaded the idea of getting out of bed. She wadded up a pair of socks lying by the bed and threw it at Octavius. That gained her about five minutes of respite. As she pulled the covers over her head, trying to squeeze out a few more minutes of rest, he returned and began anew his dismantling of her alarm clock, books, earrings, and reading lamp.

  Cats are one of man’s greatest companions, smart, loving and playful, thought Mackenzie. But they live on their own schedules and have their own agendas. She had learned through experience that when they want to get up and eat, it’s best to just give in and feed them. Otherwise they will taunt you for your stubbornness or for holding onto the misguided illusion that you can impose discipline on their mercurial ways. She realized that her efforts at escaping the day were in vain. Whether she wanted to or not, she had to get out of bed, if for no other reason than to feed the cat.

  Mackenzie had returned to her house the previous night, clearly shaken by what she had seen at Anthony’s apartment. She was confused, frightened, angry, and, more than anything, hurt. How could he have led her on? She had trusted him, looked up to him, admired him, and even found herself growing increasingly attracted to him. She felt like a fool who had just come to the realization that she had been played by a world-class con man. Her father had been up when she came home, but she hadn’t wanted to talk about it with him or anyone at that moment. She went to bed and tried not to cry herself to sleep. She had not been entirely successful.

  As she headed downstairs, her father was already up, reading the paper on the front porch. When the weather was good, he spent a good deal of time sitting on the two-seat glider or one of the rocking chairs. She’d asked him why he hadn’t enclosed the porch like some of their neighbors in order to enjoy it during the winter as well. “Haven’t gotten around to it yet,” was his usual reply.

  After she fed Octavius the canned food delicacy that he had so persistently demanded, she walked out on the porch with a cup of coffee, sat down on the glider, and began to gently rock on its smooth track back and forth. For some reason Octavius didn’t pester her father about food, at least when Mackenzie was home. He saved his personal brand of torture for her, which, in a strange way, she found charming.

  “Hi, Dad. You’re up early.”

  “Yep,” he said, his nose stuck in the paper, which he held open with both hands. “Old habits are hard to break, I guess.” Without looking up, he asked her, “You feeling better this morning? You were pretty shaken up last night.”

  She held her coffee mug in both hands and blew on it to cool the black coffee slightly.

  “Yeah, I feel better than I did last night, but I don’t feel great one way or the other.”

  Without looking away from the paper he asked, “Want to talk about it or do you want to wait a bit?”

  “Let me finish this coffee first and then I’ll tell you what I found.”

  He folded the paper and set it down on the side of his rocker. “Sounds good to me,” he said, standing up. “I’m going to get another cup myself anyway.”

  After he returned from the kitchen with a fresh cup of coffee and the rest of the pot, he refilled Mackenzie’s cup and then set the half filled carafe down on the small side table.

  He sat quietly and listened as she explained her evening with Anthony, from their time at Bemelmans bar to his apartment and what she had found in his studio. He listened attentively without interrupting. She sat with her feet up on the glider’s cushion and her arms wrapped around her knees. When she finished, her cheeks were flushed and her eyes heavy with tears that she tried desperately to hold back.

  “I feel like such an idiot for trusting him as long as I did. No matter what you told me, I didn’t want it to be true. Despite what we found, deep down I just couldn’t let myself believe that Anthony, or whoever he is, was doing anything wrong,” she said, holding her knees even tighter. It was hard for her to even voice these words without tears welling in her eyes.

  Her father waited patiently as she slowly rocked back and forth. Finally he broke the silence.

  “I know how you feel. I’ve been in the same position many times myself.” He poured her another cup of coffee and then poured himself one as well. “I don’t want you to stop trusting people, Mackenzie. It’s something that happens to us cops over time and it’s a terrible way to go through life, whether it’s justified or not. Most people are who they say they are, and sometimes when they’re not, it’s for no other reason than they’re trying to hide something that they don’t want to know about themselves. The other thing to know is that if you’re dealing with a true master criminal or psychopath or whatever you want to call them, you probably have no chance anyway. They’ll fool everyone, even the cops. They’re the toughest ones to catch, but if you’re lucky they eventually screw up and that’s when you get ‘em.” He paused before continuing. “I’m not sure what Anthony Bataglia’s gig is, but it’s clear that there’s something more than what appears on the surface. He’s not just some restorer from Italy that happens to work at the Cloisters. There’s a lot more to it than that.”

  He reached to his side and pulled up a plastic Ziploc bag that was lying underneath his folded newspaper. He held it up and then passed it over to her.

  “Found this little ditty stuck in the front porch this morning.”

  She grabbed the plastic bag in the top corner with her thumb and index finger, holding it out in front of her. In the bag was a short dagger with a six-inch stainless steel blade and a black wooden handle. There was also a rectangular index card, impaled halfway up the shaft of the blade. On the card in bright red lettering were the words, “LEAVE IT ALONE!”

  She looked at it for a minute, not sure what to say, and then handed it back to her father.

  “Jesus, Dad, that’s a pretty scary message! Do you think it came from Anthony?”

  “Well, I’m not sure,” replied her father, setting the bag on the side table. “My guess is that it’s not from Mayor Bloomberg. Whether it’s from Anthony or not, it’s definitely from someone telling us that they don’t like us poking around in their business. It’s also a pretty real threat because they are showing us that they know where we live and that they can make it to our front doorstep without us knowing. I’m going to send it down to get some prints off it, but my guess is that whoever did this is smart enough not to leave any. But you never know. Always good to check.”

  She couldn’t believe that Anthony would resort to this type of threat. Then again, she wasn’t sure about anything anymore, at least as it related to the man known as Anthony Bataglia.

  “I don’t know about you, but getting daggers stuck in my front porch tends to make me hungry,” said her father trying to break the tension. “I’m going to brew another pot and then cook us up a decent breakfast. We can talk about our next steps after that.”

  Chapter 30

  On Saturday evening, Mackenzie called Anthony and asked if he would be able to meet her for breakfast at a small diner on 55th. When he asked what it was about, she told him that she couldn’t tell him over the phone but that she wanted to talk with him before Monday. After a long discussion with her father over the pros and cons of various approaches, Mackenzie finally insisted that she would meet him one-on-one and tell him what she had found. In fact, she would show him what she and her father had found, and ask him to explain himself. Though her father wanted to question Anthony with her, he had acquiesced at the end. All the same, he’d insisted that they meet in a public place and that he would also be there, just not at the same table. If Anthony was indeed involved in an international forgery, art fraud and money laundering organization, then he may very well be dangerous, or at the very least his partners would be. The dagger with the blood red message helped him win his argument. He would just be there for insurance.

  Mackenzie was sitting in a booth against the wa
ll with a fresh cup of black coffee on the table when Anthony walked in the door, two minutes before their agreed upon meeting time of 8 a.m. He’s punctual, you have to give him that, she thought. Her father was sitting in one of the round, swivel seats with the red vinyl covers that had been the hallmark of diners since the 1920s. Like many of his fellow breakfast-goers, he read the newspaper and drank coffee.

  Anthony’s face lit up when he saw her and came to the table. “Good morning Mackenzie, I was glad you called because you certainly left in such a hurry the other night. I was hoping that it was not something I said.” He paused and then looked at the seat across from her. “May I?”

  “Of course,” she forced herself to smile. “I was the one who invited you here. Thanks for coming on such short notice.”

  A waitress passed with a pot of coffee and asked if Anthony wanted a cup, which he did.

  “I’m sorry I left so suddenly the other night,” she hesitated. “I really enjoyed listening to music at the bar. But,” she paused trying to decide what to say, “I, ah, I guess I became very disoriented all of a sudden.”

  Anthony looked at her. “I hope everything is fine now.”

  “Better, yes, but I don’t know if everything is fine.” This is awkward, she thought. There’s no use playing around at this point. She and her father had agreed that the best approach would be to overwhelm him with the evidence they had and then let him respond. They would learn a lot from his response.

  “Before we order breakfast, there are some things I need to share with you. I’d like you to listen to all that I have to say before you respond. It will be easier that way. After that you can ask as many questions as you like, or just tell me to go to hell and walk out. It’s up to you.”