The Forger (33 page)

“Around here,” Touchard snuffled again, “I am the French government.”

“Exactly,” Dietrich confirmed. “A price for these items is established by the French government, represented here by Monsieur Touchard, and we agree on the amount. That way Count Wolff-Metternich can’t complain. For example.” He spun on his heel. “Today I have been instructed by Reichsmarschall Göring to buy this statue.” He indicated a small statue, about two feet tall, of a man with long hair and a beard, a cape slung over his shoulder and striding forward, arms held out to his sides, as if clearing his way through a crowd. His face was young and fierce. His hands were strong but slightly effeminate. They reminded me of Valya’s. The statue was made of reddish marble or some other stone, almost brick-colored, and its surface was dull. “What would you say this is worth, Monsieur Fleury?” asked Dietrich.

“I don’t know,” said Fleury. He brought his face close to it, raising his glasses. “It looks very fine.”

“Oh, it is. Would it help you if I told you it was made by the Italian sculptor Camillo Rusioni around 1720? It is St. Jacques le Majeur and is a study for a much larger statue in the basilica of St. Jean de Latra or something like that. Anyway, the statue is in Rome and it is very big and important.”

“Well,” said Fleury, his voice drifting with uncertainty, “I saw an early eighteenth-century Italian statue go at Christie’s the other year for what would be about four hundred thousand francs.”

Touchard pursed his lips and nodded. “Close,” he said. “Very close.”

Dietrich, too, was nodding. “Fair,” he said. “And under normal circumstances, I’d say this might be worth about half as much again.”

“Normal circumstances,” repeated Touchard.

“But these are not normal circumstances, are they, Monsieur Touchard?”

“No, Herr Dietrich,” came the reply.

“So, Monsieur Touchard, what would be your best price on the Rusioni sculpture?”

Touchard walked up to it. He reached one finger out and touched it against the statue’s upper lip, as if the man had been about to break from his dusty red shell and speak and declare his own worth, and Touchard committed him again to silence. “Perhaps a hundred thousand?” He asked it. He did not say it.

Even I who had no idea what this statue was worth knew that Dietrich would not pay this price if the man deciding it had spoken so hesitantly.

“It’s worth more than a hundred thousand!” said Fleury. His protest vanished into the huge space of the warehouse.

“I might pay fifty thousand,” said Dietrich casually.

“Done,” barked Touchard.

Fleury turned on him. “What do you mean, ‘done’? You know damn well it’s worth ten times that!”

Touchard shrugged. “I am the government,” he said.

“Who else can make offers on all this?” demanded Fleury. “Is it open to the public?”

“No,” said Touchard. “Only Mr. Dietrich.”

“But look here!” Dietrich called out. “The sculpture is damaged.”

The three of us stepped forward to see where this damage might be.

“Where?” asked Fleury. “I can’t see any damage.”

Then we all watched as Dietrich raised the candlestick over his shoulder and brought it down hard across one of the statue’s delicate hands. He smashed off the fingers. Fragments cartwheeled through the air and rattled to the floor, breaking into even more pieces. “There,” said Dietrich. The candlestick hung heavy in his grip.

Even Touchard looked shocked at this.

“You’re insane,” said Fleury.

Dietrich chose to ignore this. “It’s not worth much of anything now,” he said with mock sadness.

“No, sir.” Touchard’s voice was choked.

“I couldn’t pay more than five thousand francs now.”

“Done,” said Touchard.

“There might even be more damage.” Dietrich’s knuckles grew white as he clenched his fist around the candlestick.

“No!” Touchard called out, raising his hands out to the statue.

Dietrich lowered the candlestick, grinning.

“I’ll draw up the paperwork now.” Touchard set off toward the office.

Dietrich bent down and picked up the fragments of the fingers. Then he put them in the pocket of his coat and stood to face us. “I’ll have this repaired. You’d never know the difference. I brought you here,” he said, “because I have a particular interest in you. You’re both young, capable. That’s what I need. New faces for a new marketplace.”

We walked back out into the rain, heading for the office, where Touchard would be typing up the documents of sale.

Over and over in my mind, I saw the statue’s delicate fingers shattering on the concrete floor of the warehouse.

“What I would like,” said Dietrich, “is for you both to work exclusively for me from now on. I saw that Cranach you found for Abetz. He gloated about it for an entire week. Cranach happens to be a particular favorite of the Reichsmarschall. You obviously have the means to satisfy a discerning palate.” He set his hand on Fleury’s shoulder and squeezed. “This is your great opportunity. You should take it. Besides, considering what Abetz tried to do with you, and considering that I am the only reason you’re still here, I’d have thought you might show me a little consideration for my trouble.”

“And what would you have us do about Abetz?” asked Fleury.

“I’m glad you asked about Abetz. He can be very persuasive in a bullying sort of way. He’s an ambitious man. This is the greatest moment of his diplomatic career and he’s chosen to add to his laurels a collection of the finest art in France. But it’s really just a hobby for him. He’s got too much else on his plate. He has to run the embassy, after all. And what with Hitler’s visit to Paris in June and other dignitaries flooding in, it’s all he can do to get any sleep at night. That’s why he’s palmed you off with that man Behr, who shouldn’t even be on the embassy staff.”

“Well, why is he there?” I asked.

“His mother had an affair with a man who is now one of the regional governors of Austria. A
Gauleiter.
I expect she reminded him of their past, and probably offered to remind everyone else as well, unless her son found himself out of harm’s way. Of course, Behr has no idea about this. He just thinks it’s all some bureaucratic foul-up.”

We had reached the office. Dietrich opened the door for us and we filed in.

Inside, Touchard was typing out the documents. His glasses were balanced on the tip of his hooked, Roman nose and his lips moved as he spelled out the words.

“Aren’t you ready yet?” Dietrich asked.

“Almost.” Touchard did not look up from his typing.

In the room adjacent to Touchard’s office was a man with short dark hair combed straight back on his head. He had his back to us and was brandishing an antique sword around a coat stand, on which hung a gabardine raincoat and a soft hat. The man was pretending to sword-fight with the coat, flicking up the arms with the end of the sword. He shuffled around on his feet as if the empty coat were fighting back and he were dodging sword thrusts.

“Hey!” Touchard called out. “Be careful with my coat!”

The young man turned and grinned.

My eyes widened with surprise. It was Tombeau. “Oh,” I said.

He caught my eye, warning me. Then he looked away.

“What is it?” asked Dietrich.

I choked a little before I came up with a reply. “That sword he’s playing with. It’s an antique, isn’t it?”

“Christ almighty! So it is. You!” bellowed Dietrich, his shout boxing our ears in the cramped space of the office.

Tombeau stopped dueling with the coat. “It’s just a blade,” he said.

Dietrich strode across the space between them. He snatched the sword out of Tombeau’s hand and turned to us, smiling. “This is one of my associates. From the firm of Fabry et Georges.”

Tombeau made a short, sarcastic bow.

I remembered what Pankratov had said about the Fabry-Georges hiring themselves out for any dirty jobs that paid good money. It made perfect sense to me that Dietrich and the Fabry-Georges would find themselves working together.

Dietrich turned back to Tombeau. “Do you know what this is?” He held the sword blade up between them and glared past the damascus-patterned iron at Tombeau’s insolent smile.

“Of course I know,” replied Tombeau.

“No, you don’t,” Dietrich snapped. “This is a seventeenth-century French saber, made by Ferdinand de Thézy for the comte de Barzilay. It’s worth a lot of money, and I don’t want you chipping the blade.”

“Sorry,” said Tombeau, without sincerity.

“Besides,” said Dietrich, “if you’re going to use the thing, use it properly.” Dietrich balanced himself in a swordsman’s pose. Then with a movement so fast and precise that I barely saw it, he sliced off one of the sleeves of Touchard’s coat. The sleeve fell to the floor and lay there in a heap.

“My coat!” shouted Touchard.

Dietrich handed the sword back to Tombeau, who peered at the blade with new respect.

“What about my coat?” asked Touchard, his voice high-pitched with frustration.

“Get a new one,” said Dietrich. “Or lose an arm. Or something.”

Touchard shook his head slowly and went back to his typing. He jabbed at the keys with his bony fingers, muttering to himself.

“I want that sculpture on the train to Germany tonight,” said Dietrich.

Touchard stopped typing. His face twitched. “Tonight? There’s no one here but me. How am I supposed to crate it up and get it to the station?”

“Make some calls. Get some Fabry-Georges people to do it. They don’t mind hard work.”

“You’d trust one of those thugs with that statue?” asked Touchard.

“It’s already broken,” said Dietrich. Then he turned to me and Fleury. “The car will take you home.”

The car was out there in the rain, Grimm at the wheel, engine running, exhaust leaking silver from its tailpipe.

“What are we supposed to do when Abetz calls?” I asked. “Because he is going to call, sooner or later.”

“If he gives you any trouble,” said Dietrich, “just let me know. You’ll only have to do it once, I guarantee.”

On the ride back, I was afraid to say anything to Fleury because I worried that Grimm would eavesdrop. I asked Grimm to drop us off a block away from the apartment, so that no one would see the car pull up in front of our place. Grimm nodded at my request, no expression on his face, the way a person does who has made a life’s work out of following orders.

*   *   *

W
HEN
I
REACHED MY
apartment, I found Pankratov sitting at my kitchen table. He was hunched like an old circus bear over a loaf of bread, a slab of white-flecked salami and the remains of a bottle of red wine.

“How did you get in here,” I asked, “and where did you get all that stuff to eat?”

Pankratov’s mouth was too full to talk. He held something up between his thumb and first two fingers. It was a straightened-out paper clip. Then he dropped the clip, picked up the bottle, the muscles in his neck straining as he forced a mouthful down his throat. He shook his head and finally spoke. “Valya. Came to see me. Brought food.”

I walked to the window and looked at the windows of the Postillon. These days, I always had the feeling I was being watched.

“There’s no one out there,” said Pankratov, forcing down a mouthful of sausage, bread and cheese which he had stacked one on top of the other and then compressed with the flat of his hand before packing it into his mouth.

“I don’t understand why they don’t follow us everywhere we go,” I said.

“So they could find out our sources and grab them for themselves?” he asked.

“Exactly.” I leaned forward and breathed on the glass, fogging it with condensation.

Pankratov knocked back some wine, swished it through his teeth, then swallowed. “Because there is no single source. At least not as far as they know. Half of the great paintings in France are tucked away in root cellars, chicken coops, and behind walls three feet thick. The Germans know perfectly well that they’d have no hope of tracking them down. Sure, they could grab us and dig out whatever little treasure trove we happened to be raiding, but what about the thousand other hiding places? They know that the best thing for them is to leave us be. As long as we keep handing them paintings, and since they’re trading what they don’t want for what they do, how can they lose?”

“They can lose because what we’re giving them is a lie.”

Pankratov held up one finger, commanding me to silence. “It’s not a lie if they don’t think it’s a lie. Besides, I’ve persuaded Madame Pontier to part with some originals to make us more credible,” he said. “I told her she owed us that much.”

*   *   *

T
HE FOLLOWING WEEK
, M
ADAME
Pontier delivered to us an original drawing of a kneeling angel by Gianfrancesco Penni.

“Take it,” she said, her teeth gritted, “and don’t expect me do to this very often.”

Each time I met her, I became more convinced that she wouldn’t lift a finger to help us if we were caught. In everything she did, the way she looked and spoke and in the doll’s-eye flatness of her gaze, she was the coldest person I had ever met.

That same day, we brought the drawing to Dietrich.

Dietrich was no great lover of art. He had been chosen for this job because he was a businessman. He was not particularly pleased with the drawing. The irony of this did not escape me, seeing as it was original. Penni, who worked in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, was not high on Dietrich’s procurement list. Dietrich knew as well as we did that if the artist was not a huge name, the subject matter needed, at least, to be appealing. An angel was not as choice as a picture of a young woman, or a cat or a dog, or a classical Greek or Roman location, all of which moved very quickly through Dietrich’s warehouse on the outskirts of Paris. The main problem with this angel was that the drawing had been perforated, or “pounced,” along most of the lines. This was so that the drawing could be laid out over a blank piece of paper and, if sprinkled with charcoal dust, would provide the layout of an identical drawing underneath. After several uses, the original drawing would start to get a little dirty. The one we gave Dietrich had been used several times.