He was speaking in Italian, which he spoke with some fluency. Not perfect by any means, and heavily accented, but more than acceptable. Flavia always believed in speaking Italian to foreigners if possible. Not many of them could, and those who tried could usually only manage phrases culled from guidebooks and street signs, but she felt she should make them practise. She herself had spent years learning English, and saw no reason why others shouldnt make a similar effort.
But now we have one very unhappy parish priest, an even more unhappy Vatican, Byrnes with the picture, and your career very far from made, she pointed out. Youre sure that theres something under it?
I wasnt at all sure, thats why I wasted so much money to come here and check. It took me months to get enough to buy the ticket. And I couldnt check it because it wasnt there any more. I was just standing around wondering what to do next. And before I could make up my mind, those flatfooted policemen of yours saw the door was open and collared me. But, he added, Im sure there is now. Someone like Byrnes wouldnt pull off a stunt like this unless he knew it was worthwhile.
What I dont understand is why you didnt just write to the priest months ago, tell him your idea, and get permission to have the painting examined. Then he wouldnt have sold it until it had all been cleared up.
Oh, thats simple. Im an idiot. And an apprentice academic as well, which is worse. Argyll looked gloomy, put his fork down, the idea clearly having made him lose his appetite. Art history, as you probably know, is a nasty, vicious profession. I reckoned that if I said a word to anyone in Italy, some big shot in the Museo Nazionale would get there first and take the credit. Thats happened before, and who could resist the temptation? It wouldve been the greatest find for years.
It still will be, added Flavia a little unnecessarily, dealing a further savage blow to his appetite.
Thank you, he replied.
Flavia looked at him sympathetically. By all accounts all hed wanted was a little bit of fame, a small boost to a career in a desperately overcrowded profession. And even that had been snatched from his grasp by Byrness desperate desire for even more money than he already had. Cant you just write the article anyway? And why tell Byrnes in the first place? You havent exactly been playing the master tactician through all this, but that seems the daftest course you could possibly have taken.
I didnt tell him, Argyll said indignantly. I may be dim, but Im not that bad. I havent told a soul. Well, except my supervisor. I had to tell him. But hes awfully discreet, hates art dealers and has been incommunicado in Tuscany ever since. Cant possibly have been Tramerton. Nice man really, he continued, going off at a conversational tangent. I suppose I should send him a letter about all this. Going to jail to forward historical knowledge should impress even him.
As for my article...Well, I will write one. But Ill have to do something a bit faster to stake my claim. It takes months to get a piece in a decent journal. By the time it came out, everybody would be sick of hearing about bloody Raphael. The moment Byrnes is sure hes got the right picture, the press will be called in. Sensational discovery, the works. His tame academics will write glowing articles about translucent masterpieces. And when the enthusiasm reaches its peak, the damn thing will move to Christies.
Argyll paused as the waiter brought the next course, which he looked at with distaste. And every museum, every loony millionaire in the world, will be there to bid, he went on. Something like the Getty would mortgage its grandmother to have it. Can you imagine what sort of price it will fetch? It will make a bunch of sunflowers by Van Gogh seem bargain basement.
Why so much? Its not as if Raphaels are thin on the ground. He churned out dozens of pictures.
I know, and theyre all in museums or painted on the walls of the Vatican. There hasnt been a real one on the market for decades. Let alone a new one discovered. Its all supply and demand. Even if it doesnt turn out to be very good, itll still fetch a fortune. Especially with a story like this attached to it.
Not a bad return on a ten million-lire investment.
Thats what he paid? Argyll paused to consider the iniquities of the world. That makes it even worse. Even I could have raised that much. Well, almost, anyway.
He had a well developed, if somewhat morbid, sense of humour, Flavia noted. He was also self-deprecating and appeared to be intelligent, despite apparently deliberate attempts to hide the fact. From being a simple business venture, the meal was turning into a moderately enjoyable occasion.
Tell me, began her guest in an ostentatious attempt to change the subject, and demonstrate that he wasnt entirely obsessed with errant masterpieces, Whats your job like? Plenty of work? Job satisfaction?
She grimaced. Certainly plenty of work. Its like living under a permanent avalanche. Someone or other calculated that one work disappears every ten minutes. Its amazing theres anything left to steal.
Argyll observed that, so far, Italy seemed to have plenty left.
Thats just the trouble. There seems to be an almost infinite amount kept in tumbledown country churches and half-abandoned houses. It keeps vanishing, and often as not the thefts arent even reported.
Argyll discovered to his delight that Flavia smoked, so fished out his own crumpled packet and lit up. Why not? Whats the objection to reporting a theft?
She counted the points off on her fingers as she spoke. One: basic distrust of the police. Two: conviction that we wont get it back anyway. Three: desire to stop the authorities knowing what else they have in case it gets taxed. Four: threats. What do you think? If I had to choose between a painting and my ears, I think Id also choose to wave goodbye to the painting.
It was not a bad evening. Argyll listened with every appearance of genuine interest in what she had to say, which made a nice change from the usual sort of meal where she was expected to listen with open-mouthed admiration as her date for the evening demonstrated his great qualities. He also had a fund of miscellaneous anecdotes and kept his end of the conversation going. There was only one minor incident after she had paid the bill in the restaurant when, with his hands between his knees, and rocking forward and backward slightly in an agonised fit of embarrassment, Argyll had squinted at the ceiling and said, I dont suppose... and then paused, and smiled foolishly.
By Italian standards it scarcely counted as an advance: one ardent suitor had only been stopped when Flavia smacked him in the face with a handy frying pan. But she had met enough Englishmen to realise what was intended, even if the technique was so reticent as to make the suggestion almost unnoticeable. Fortunately, dealing with the problem was easy: she had smiled back, and suggested an ice-cream. It seemed to be a more than suitable alternative, and the offer was accepted with evident relief.
They finished off the evening by taking a turn twice round the Piazza Montecitorio before heading for Giolittis. Flavia was Italian and Argyll had spent enough time in the country to accept that a day without an ice-cream was a day wasted. And slowly eating it while walking the streets along with the rest of the population was a good way of restoring faith that the world was an essentially benevolent place, despite all the recent evidence to the contrary.
3
Argyll swung in through a door in the via Condotti and mounted the stairs. He walked quickly past the janitor at the bottom, waving in a familiar sort of style. He should, properly, have shown the card which proved he was entitled to visit Romes foreign press club. As he didnt have one, that was difficult. Janitors in Rome, anyway, dont often care too much about minor details.
He headed for the bar, an unattractive, tubular steel and artificial wood affair, sat down and ordered an aperitif. Then he looked around and spotted his quarry. Rudolf Beckett could be seen in the next room, alone at a table, eating a late lunch. A large glass of whisky rested in front of him. Argyll walked over and sat down.
Jonathan. What brings you back to Rome? Beckett thumped him on the shoulder with one hand, and shook his hand vigorously with the other. He had become one of Argylls closest friends during his stay in Rome a year or so back. They had run into each other at a minor diplomatic party on the via Giulia. Both had felt out of place, so had naturally spent much of the evening drinking their hosts alcohol and being rude about the guests. Afterwards they had gone on to a bar nearby and drunk some more. It had cemented the friendship.
Not that they had anything in common. Argyll was a quiet and somewhat introverted Englishman, Beckett an aggressive workaholic with a permanent shake derived from too much drink, too little sleep, and all-consuming neuroses about the next story, the next cheque and whether anybody really liked him. As Argyll clearly did, he had never borne the brunt of one of the tumultuous outbursts of rage that made Becketts colleagues a little wary of his company.
Wild geese, he replied to the greeting. Ive just been let out of jail.
Beckett suppressed a smirk.
No jokes, please, he continued, to head off the quip that the journalist was obviously on the verge of uttering. Im not resilient enough yet. I was wondering if you wanted a nice story.
Is the Pope Catholic? Course I do. Depending on what it is. As long as you remember I cant pay anything for it.
I dont want anything like that. To see it in print would be enough.
Argyll then retold the story of his discovery and the incursion of Sir Edward Byrnes, ending with his night in the cell. My discovery. Pinched. Just like that. Could you write something so everyone knows what really happened? Otherwise Byrnes will get all the credit as well as all the money.
Nice story, commented Beckett, finishing off another whisky and moving straight on to a large grappa. But the lead is the Raphael, not your being diddled. However, an expert hack like myself will be able to do it. Great discovery, famous artist, etc., etc. Then a bit of stuff about you further down, undermining the whole thing and making Byrnes out to be a proper toad. Easy.