Argyll summarized first, talking about Rouxel and Rouxels granddaughter. He downplayed her charms, and instead concentrated on the factual material hed garnered.
It was odd, he said musingly. She was so insistent that I should understand that Rouxel was really such a doting grandfather. I wouldnt have bothered. I mean, it was no business of mine.
Family pride, Flavia said, as she gazed enraptured at the plate of escalope de foie gras that the unusually amiable waiter delivered. No one likes those little cracks in the edifice to be shown to the public. You try to cover them over. Common enough, isnt it? Think how embarrassed you get when we have a fight in a restaurant.
Thats different.
Not really. Are you sure we can afford this?
The meal? he asked, dragging his mind off Jeanne Armand. Of course we cant. Im relying on your expense account to race to the rescue at the last moment. Do you want to tell me what youve been doing as well?
Naturally, she said after a long pause to allow a slice of foie gras to dissolve like butter on her tongue.
Who knows? If we glue our two stories together we might come up with some obvious conclusion. Wouldnt that be nice? Then we could go home.
The statement stemmed from his eternal optimism that good times were just around the corner. Even he, when Flavia had finished, was forced to concede that by joining the two together, all they now had was more information which still didnt make much sense.
What do you reckon, then?
I reckon, firstly, that I have to go and do the decent thing tomorrow. That is, go and see Janet. I really should not have gone out to Roissy to talk to Ellman without telling Janet first. Bad manners. He wont mind, but Im sure hell be a little upset if I dont go and pay my compliments. Next, we should do a little work on Besson; he might know why Muller wanted that picture, or at least how he came to the conclusion that the picture was the one he wanted.
Splendid. What about me?
You can dig around with this picture. Find out how it got into Rouxels hands. And why Muller had it stolen.
Thats easy. Wrong picture.
So, you find the right one.
Not so easy.
No, but it will give your brain cells a bit of exercise. Is there any chance?
Maybe. There was an old dealers label on the back of the frame. Rosier, in the Rue de Rivoli. Theres not much likelihood hes still there, but Ill see.
Good. And Ill talk to Bottando to see if any dribbles of information have come in from the Swiss or from Fabriano. I also want him to check out this Schmidt/Ellman a bit more closely. And finally
Whoa. I think thats quite enough, Argyll said. Your food will get cold. Eat up. Then we should have an early night.
I slept all afternoon. I dont feel in the slightest bit tired.
Oh, good.
No doubt about it. He was acting most peculiar these days.
However distinguished a purveyor of art the Rue de Rivoli might have been seventy years ago, it was so no longer. Apart from the excessively expensive galeries slipped in where once there had been one of the finest hotels in Europe, the nearest thing to a decent antique you can buy there nowadays is a luminous model of the Eiffel Tower. The broad Imperial thoroughfare has gone down in the world a little in the past century. Rosier Frères had vanished as well. Even on a sunny morning, the tawdry lines of foreign-exchange booths, postcard stands and souvenir shops are less than appealing. Thinking over what to do next, Argyll sipped his coffee disgusting weak stuff they sold in France compared to the real Italian brew. Flavia had vanished on her errands, he had decided to start on the great picture hunt.
How do you do that? Eliminate the impossible, so the great man had said. Or, to translate that into more acceptable terms, start with the easy bits. Which, in this case, suggested finding out as much as possible about this picture.
There wasnt much to go on here. Really famous pictures have pedigrees that can be traced back through the generations; with many, you can tell where they were at any moment during the past five hundred years. Frequently you can even say a picture was hanging on this wall, in this room, in this house, on this day, in this year. But that is the élite minority. Most pictures bumble about the world hopping from owner to owner and it is impossible to find out where theyve been unless you are really lucky.
In the case of Socrates, all he had was the faded label on the back of the frame. The more he thought about it, the more he was certain it was his only real chance. It was impossible to say with any accuracy how old it was, but from the typeface he placed it somewhere in the inter-war period.
Phone book? he thought. A long shot, certainly, but think how pleasant if it worked. So he borrowed an old, dog-eared copy of the phone book and started hunting. And there it was. Family businesses are wonderful things. Rosier Frères still existed. Perhaps not at the same address, but a gallery of that name had an address in the Faubourg St-Honoré, with a little logo saying Established 1882. Bingo. He looked at his map, decided it was an easy walk and set off.
A very long street, the Rue du Faubourg St-Honoré, about five kilometres long, with galleries stretched out all along it. He should have taken a cab, and he was hot and tired by the time he finally stood outside Rosier Frères, having previously nipped round the corner, straightened his tie, run his fingers through his hair and tried to adopt the air of a successful dealer calling on a colleague in the trade.
He rang the bell, heard the click of the electric lock opening and went in. There were no customers. Really up-market galleries dont encourage them.
Good morning, he said to the woman who came forward to greet him with a formal, chilly smile. He handed her his card he rarely got the chance to do that and generally when someone wanted one hed left them at home and asked if the owner was in. He wished to consult him about a picture hed bought which once passed through their hands.
So far so good. Such a request, if rarely made in person, is not so rare. Art dealers spend quite a lot of their time trying to work out where their pictures have been in the past. Realizing that she was dealing with a colleague and not with a client, the woman became almost welcoming; asked him to wait a moment, disappeared through a curtain at the back then reappeared to ask him to go through.
Despite the name, Rosier Frères was now run by a dapper little fellow called Gentilly, who brushed aside Argylls apologies for interrupting with a sweep of the hand. Nonsense. Bored to tears this morning. Glad for the distraction. Who are you?
The aesthetic mating game interrupted business while Argyll laid out his credentials and Gentilly inspected them to see how seriously he should treat the young stranger. This is a standard routine, the artistic equivalent of dogs sniffing each others bottom before deciding whether to chase balls together or bury a fang or two into each others necks. What makes dogs decide to be friends rather than enemies is unclear; but no more obscure than what makes dealers decide to be co-operative or not to colleagues. In this case it was the former connection with Edward Byrnes that did the trick. Gentilly had, apparently, once done some business with Argylls former employer, and got on well with him.
So they talked about Argylls old boss awhile, swapped gossip, then commiserated with each other about the parlous state of the market, all by way of building up mutual trust and understanding. Then, all the preliminaries disposed of, they settled down to business. What, exactly, did Argyll want?
Leaving out some of the more interesting details, Argyll explained. He had acquired a picture which, judging by a label on the back, had probably passed through the gallerys hands. Unfortunately it was many years ago. But he wanted to find out as much as possible.
How long ago?
He said that it was probably sixty or seventy years. Certainly pre-war.
Oh, dear. I dont know if Ill be of much help, then. The Rosier family threw most of the records away when they sold up, and that was thirty years ago.
Hed half expected that. Some dealers, the very old, very established ones, keep records of every work of art that passes through. Most run out of space to store the mountains of paper and sooner or later throw them out. At the very best they donate their records to archives or something; few keep such things hanging around the gallery to gather dust.
Gentilly was politely interested, at least, but Argyll had little else to tell him. He described the Socrates in as much detail as he could remember, but without seeing it for himself there was nothing the other man could usefully say. The only further thing he knew about it, Argyll said, was that it might have been owned by a man called Hartung. But even this was doubtful.
Hartung? Gentilly said, perking up. Why didnt you say so?
Youve heard of him?
Good lord, of course. Before he fell from grace he was quite a big Paris collector. An industrialist, I think.
This gallery may well have sold stuff to him, then?
More than likely. From what Ive heard and it was well before my time, remember he bought widely, and judiciously. Whats more, I may well be able to tell you. Like most dealers were extraordinarily snobbish in this firm. Ordinary clients pouf. We throw away the records. Important ones, rich ones ah, now thats another matter. We like to remember them. You never know when we might be able to drop their names into the conversation. Hartung, you might know, is not the sort of person one likes to remember as a client, because of his subsequent career... None the less, hell be in our old Golden Book of the distinguished. Just one moment.
And he disappeared to emerge a few moments later with a ledger-book. He thumped it down on the desk in a cloud of dust and opened it up with both hands, then sneezed loudly.
Not opened this for some time. Now then. H for Hartung. Let me see. Um.
And with much frowning and grunting, little reading-glasses perched on the end of his nose, he laboriously turned the pages.
There we are, he said. Jules Hartung, 18 Avenue Montaigne. First became a customer in 1921, last purchase in 1939. In all bought eleven pictures from us. Not one of our most lavish clients, but a nice selection. Very nice, I may say. Except for some mediocre wallpaper pictures.