The Girl With the Botticelli Eyes (3 page)

In the pursuit of his duties, he was tireless. He would travel anywhere to see a newly discovered Verrocchio, Piero, or Titian. A brilliant administrator, idolized by those who worked beneath him, he was one-of the first curators empowered to bid at auctions and private sales on multi-million-dollar works of art, a privilege entrusted to few of his peers.

In something just under five years of his appointment, he had transformed the museum’s Renaissance wing from an indifferent melange of second-rate Italian works into one of the most stunning and cohesive collections of Quattrocento painting in the world.

There was no doubt he had done well. Articles were written about him. He was photographed at thousand-dollar-a-plate fund-raisers and power restaurants, dining with society ladies all with three names. He loathed that side of the job, but that was the bread and butter. That’s what kept the museum’s doors open over three hundred days a year.

Certainly he had enemies. Any man in as powerful and as coveted a position was bound to. But he also had friends in high places and knew how and when to use them. His future was bright, and after the autumn opening of the Botticelli extravaganza (depending on its outcome, of course), it should be many times brighter. A seat on the board could not be far behind.

Over the past months, he’d wheedled and cajoled and bullied the bulk of the paintings and drawings for the exhibit out of estates and from professional dealers all highly experienced at the art of extracting valuable concessions from ambitious curators. Assembling all thirteen drawings of the Chigi series for the show would be the topmost feather in Manship’s cap.

Still, three of the full series defied detection. Manship had already exhausted all of his sources, save one, as well as a small fortune trying to track them down. Nearly a million dollars had already been expended on that aspect of the show alone. That afternoon at Sotheby’s, bidders had forced the price of one of the drawings into the stratosphere. Manship had gone well over his budget and would undoubtedly have to go back to his superiors for additional funding. The prospect didn’t please him, since begging was not Manship’s strong suit. He’d already had several scorching wires from Osgood expressing the “dismay” of the trustees over his “reckless extravagance.”

Well, what did they expect? They wanted the whole series, insisted upon it. Did they think the world was made up of philanthropists and do-gooders all just panting for a chance to lay their priceless works of art at the exalted feet of the Metropolitan? And for what? A smile? A pat on the back? A pair of complimentary passes to the big show and a letter of commendation from William Osgood III? Not even a little something you could send to the Internal Revenue Service at tax time in the hope of a much-needed deduction was that enticing.

He laughed bitterly, suds sliding down the length of his long, bony frame as he rose from the tub.

“I
’VE BEEN WATCHING YOU
for several days now.”

“I know you have.”

“You do? Was I that obvious?”

“Yes. I kept wondering when you’d finally get up the nerve to approach.”

He laughed at her bluntness and watched her drain her coffee.

“Do you come here every day?”

“I like the coffee here.”

“Can I buy you another?” he asked.

“If you like. And I could use a roll and butter while you’re at it.” She spoke without looking at him.

Pointing to an assortment of baked goods, he signaled the counterman. A scratchy announcement sounded over the PA system, totally garbled in the vast, high-ceilinged hall. All the same, people rose hastily from their stools, dropping coins on the countertop, and scurried off to various passenger gates where buses, idling their engines, spewed diesel fumes into the air and waited to carry them off to their destinations.

He watched her pounce on her food with ravenous hunger. He was certain she hadn’t eaten for days. She was pathetically thin and her clothes were not all that fresh. She could be no more than twenty-four or twenty-five, he judged, though she looked closer to forty; she was still attractive, but in a tired, badly used way, and with that sullen look of availability.

“You know why I’ve been watching you?” he asked.

She stared straight ahead, dabbing a napkin at her heavily painted lips with an almost laughable elegance. “No. But I can imagine.”

He caught the world-weary note in her voice.

“I mean it. Seriously.”

“Yes, of course you do.”

“Your eyes.”

“My eyes?”

“Yes. They’re Botticelli eyes.”

“Who?”

“Botticelli—the painter. You have the very same eyes as his Venus and his Primavera.”

She listened, not bothering to conceal the smirk, merely wondering why a gentleman like that, well dressed, urbane, obviously educated and wellborn, would resort to such a pitiful pretext to pick up a woman. In all of her years haunting boulevards, hotel lobbies, and now, sadly, bus stations, she’d never heard anything quite so naive.

“So what exactly is it you want?” she asked, eager to get to the point.

“I want you to model for me.”

“You’re an artist?”

“Yes. There was a pause, which gave heightened emphasis to the words that followed. “I’m an artist.”

How many times had she heard that before? Men identifying themselves as artists, photographers, talent agents, one man who had even described himself as an internationally renowned couturier—all seeking a special look that she had precisely. Such elaborate, absurdly transparent schemes just to achieve such a simple, uncomplicated end. It was all so unnecessary. Why couldn’t men just say what they wanted?

“And you want me to pose in the nude, no doubt?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“But that’s what you have in mind, right?”

“No. You can wear your clothes. What you have on is fine. All I’m interested in are your eyes.”

“My eyes. How romantic.” She unleashed a high, shattering cackle that brought nearby heads around. He could see in the lines suddenly creasing her face that she was older than he’d first guessed.

“It’s only for a few hours,” he said. “I’ll pay you well.”

“How much?” She turned suddenly to stare into his eyes. Her own eyes danced flirtingly. They had about them an edge of ridicule, possibly even contempt.

He mentioned a sum.

She was impressed. “Just to paint my eyes? Nothing more?”

“Nothing more. Just the eyes. It will take only a few hours.”

She appeared to consider, all the while her eyes appraising him up and down.

“You’re not one of those, crazy people with strange tastes?”

“No.” He laughed. “No. I assure you, I’m not one of those.”

“Let’s see your money.”

He removed a billfold from his inner pocket and withdrew a pair of 100,000-lire notes, then placed them before her on the counter.

She seemed to catch her breath and the tip of her tongue slid along her lower lip.

“Where is your studio, Mr. Artiste?”

“Over in Parioli. Just a few minutes from here by cab. Come, I’ll show you.” He dropped a handful of coins on the counter, then smiled and took her arm.

TORSO OF UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN FOUND IN T
IB
ER

The body of a young woman between the ages of thirty and thirty-five was discovered by fishermen in the Tiber today. In the vicinity of the Hospital de la Infanta, the body was naked and appeared to have been dead several days.

Pathologists are checking local dentists for charts in an attempt to make a positive identification. “It’s not unusual for bodies to be found in the river,” said Chief Inspector Mario Buonofaccio. Unusual in this case was the fact that the eyes of the young woman had been excised from the skull, making this the sixth such cadaver to be discovered over the past twenty-four months. All have exhibited the same disfigurement.

—
Il Repubblico
, Roma

I
T WAS 9:00 A.M.
and Rome’s Galleria Pallavicini had just opened. Given that it was a Tuesday morning following a long holiday weekend, not many people were expected—at least not at that hour. Perhaps around noon, a lunch-hour crowd might wander in from the stifling alleyways to linger in the air conditioning and stroll about for a few idle minutes before returning to their offices.

The few guards on duty, scattered here and there in the different galleries, were still having coffee and paid little attention to the solitary figure moving through the labyrinth of corridors. A large, somewhat ungainly man, he shambled rather than walked, giving the impression of someone in the early stages of some neurological disorder. Although the day outside was brilliant and clear, the man carried an umbrella and wore a badly rumpled raincoat. He was virtually alone on the upper gallery, and the sound of his cork-soled shoes squeaked like a sponge on the parquet floors.

A short time later, an unfamiliar sound reached the ears of a drowsy attendant lingering over a morning cigarette in one of the small alcoves off the main gallery. At first, he scarcely attached any significance to it. It was only a short time later, when the disturbance persisted, that he realized it was the sound of cloth ripping.

Even then the attendant was slow to respond. Perhaps that’s what saved his life. Had he arrived a few moments earlier, he would have come face-to-face with a large, menacing individual, arms threshing back and forth in a kind of scything motion, a low growling sound rising from him as he went about his work. When he had finished, long strips of canvas dangled from inside the frame of the painting, still quivering, like the entrails of something living that had just been eviscerated.

The object of that savage act was Botticelli’s
Transfiguration.
As stunning today as when first painted five hundred years ago, it now hung in ruins.

When the guard finally did arrive, the worst had already been done. Rounding a corner and turning into the gallery, he stopped abruptly, watching the last of those long, sweeping strokes, a bemused expression on his face, as though he couldn’t quite grasp what he was seeing.

Just then, the arm shot straight out and the guard glimpsed something bright and metallic at the end of it. It was a thick, short blade, hooked at the end like a kris. The police later identified it as a “knife of the sort used by carpet installers.”

When the raincoated figure had stopped flailing his arm, he stood still for a moment, breathing heavily, staring up at the canvas, as if appalled at the destruction he’d wrought. Sensing someone approaching from behind, he wheeled in time to see a figure bearing down on him. The guard came fast, slightly stooped, in position to tackle. Just before impact, the knife wielder stepped neatly aside. Off balance, the guard lumbered past as the hooked end of the blade flashed forward, scooping a gout of flesh the size of a golf ball from the man’s cheek. A hole opened just beneath the eye and in seconds a jagged red circle began to widen across the floor. Attempting to recover his balance, the guard slid and went down in his own fluids.

From an adjoining gallery, another guard heard the scuffle and came running. He arrived in time to see his fellow worker floundering on the floor, one hand to his face. Blood spouted from between the injured man’s fingers as he tried to stanch the flow. Turning, the guard saw a figure fleeing headlong through the main corridor to a stairwell. He watched him start down the stair, the tails of what appeared to be a raincoat flying behind him.

The guard never gave chase. What he saw on the floor at his feet must have been that unnerving—a fellow worker and close friend, arterial blood fountaining from a crescent-shaped gash that left most of his right cheek hanging in a flap. Bone from beneath the cheek and eye socket gaped outward from the wound. The guard used a handkerchief and later his own tie as a tourniquet to stanch the blood until help could arrive.

Several blocks away from the museum, in an alleyway between two large office buildings, the fleeing figure scrambled out of the oversized raincoat, its inner lining padded with a series of small cushions to provide an illusion of bulkiness to its wearer. This illusion became more apparent when moments later the individual slipping off the coat and a wig turned out to be a slight, wiry fellow with closely cropped gray hair. He was short as well, an impression confirmed when he stepped out of a pair of high-ankled shoes and stood on the cold alley pavement in his socks. The shoes were custom-built, so engineered that it was impossible to tell from a casual glance that the person wearing them was walking on four inches of cork lining concealed in the vamp and inner sole of the shoe.

Despite the fact that the immediate area of the Pallavicini was already filled with the whoop of police sirens, the man carefully packed the coat and elevated shoes into a small overnight bag he carried.

As a final touch, he removed from his mouth a dental bridge comprised of large, protruding yellow incisors, revealing beneath them perfectly normal ones. Then, crisply neat, about him an air of brisk composure, he exited the alleyway and boarded a streetcar heading out along the Via Appia Antica on the way to Ostia.

MASTERPIECE DESECRATED AT THE PALLAVICINI

Guard at Museum Slashed Trying to Rescue a Botticelli from the Razor of a Madman.

A museum guard lies in critical condition at the Hospital delta Sorella Misericordia, the victim of a vicious attack at the hands of a razor-wielding madman. Guido Ponsorotti lost the sight of his right eye when the optic nerve was severed during a deadly struggle with a man discovered in an upstairs gallery slashing at Botticelli’s
Transfiguration.

According to experts from the Vatican Museum, the painting can be restored, but damage done to the eyes of the Virgin in what appears to be an unsuccessful attempt to have removed them from the canvas may well make it impossible to restore the work to its original glory.

Police authorities here have noted a rash of similar mutilations of masterpieces over the past several years and are now coordinating information with Interpol investigators in St. Cloud, France.

The
Transfiguration
was due to travel to New York, one of the paintings selected by the Metropolitan Museum of Art for its upcoming Botticelli exhibition in September.

—
Quotidiano,
Venezia