The Icon Thief (11 page)

Tanya took the letter back. “Exactly. In the eighteenth century, in towns where there were cases of cholera, vinegar was used to disinfect correspondence. A graduate student I know is assembling a map of outbreaks using
letters at the Frick. He goes through our archives and smells the pages one by one. You can’t get that kind of information from a scanned file.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Maddy said. “So what exactly do you have for me?”

Tanya handed her a sheaf of photocopies. “A lot of the material is vague or contradictory, but as far as I can tell, the Rosicrucians first appear in two pamphlets printed in Germany in the early seventeenth century.”

Maddy found the title pages. “The
Fama Fraternitatis
and
Confessio Fraternitatis
.”

“That’s right. They tell the story of Christian Rosencreutz, who, two centuries earlier, had traveled through the Middle East to study alchemy and magic. When he returned to Europe, he founded a secret brotherhood of learned men. At first, there were eight members, all bachelors who took an oath of celibacy. Later, their numbers increased to thirty-six. They were called the college of invisibles.”

“Okay. So we’re talking about a secret society. But what were they trying to do?”

“Nobody knows. The manifestoes hint at a great secret, but they don’t say what it is. The usual explanation is that they wanted to reform the state using alchemical methods. The goal of the alchemist isn’t to transmute base metals into gold, but to transmute himself into a higher level of being. That’s one possible meaning of the rose and the cross—life arising from lifelessness. The Rosicrucians, if they existed, may have been trying to do something similar for all of Europe.”

“So it’s a political organization,” Maddy said. “They’re trying to start a revolution.”

“But not in the usual sense. Remember, this is only a century after Luther, whose coat of arms, incidentally, was a rose and a cross. People are disillusioned by wars of politics and religion, so the Rosicrucians propose an alternative reformation. A secret one. Which is ultimately the only kind that works. Revolutions, like Saturn, tend to devour their own children.”

Maddy saw this quotation scrawled in the margin. “Let me see if I understand. Most revolutions end up repeating the mistakes of the regime they try to bring down. But a secret revolution—”

“—is harder to corrupt. Yes, that’s one possibility. And there are precedents for this. There was a real vigilante group, the Vehmgericht, that operated in Germany in the years before the manifestoes appeared, conducting secret tribunals and executions. It was based on the premise that underground justice is the only kind that won’t become compromised. And its symbol was a red cross.”

“But that’s what I don’t get. If secrecy was so important, why did they go public?”

Tanya slid closer, the metal legs of her chair leaving grooves in the gravel. “I agree. It’s strange. And no one knows why the manifestoes, if they were real, were published in the first place. Some think that they were meant to introduce certain ideas into public discourse. If so, it worked. Rosicrucian fraternities were founded in every country. And they had a real influence on the history of art.”

“This is what I’m especially curious about,” Maddy said, recalling her conversation with Lermontov. “I know that Joséphin Péladan, the founder of the Rosicrucians in Paris, commissioned paintings with mystical themes—”

“Which isn’t even the most interesting part. André Breton, the founder of Surrealism, repeatedly mentions what he calls the great invisibles, a secret society that has shaped the course of history while hiding in plain sight. The Surrealists, it seems, required an existing grammar of myths for their paintings and poetry, and these stories offered exactly the kind of system they needed.”

“And what about Duchamp?” Maddy asked. “Where does he fit into all of this?”

“He’s right in the middle of it. We already know that he was friends with Erik Satie, the chapel master of the Rosicrucians in Paris, but his connection with these movements goes back even further. Look here.”

Tanya turned to a reproduction of
The Large Glass
, Duchamp’s first mature work, which looked like a freestanding window that had acquired a web of cracks and ominous encrustations. “You have two vertical panes of glass, one above the other. In the upper pane, there’s the bride, like an angelic insect, and in the lower pane, the bachelors, nine cylindrical forms surrounded by alchemical pumps, grinders, and tubes. Remind you of anything?”

“The original members of the Rosicrucians. But weren’t there eight bachelors?”

“Duchamp’s original proposal had eight. He added the ninth later, to represent himself. Some critics even believe that the readymades are alchemical symbols. The urinal, the bicycle wheel, and the hanging shovel stand for the alembic, the wheel of life, and the pendulum. Duchamp was also fascinated by the alchemical concept of the androgyne. He posed in drag for his friend Man Ray, and signed his works with the name of a female alter ego. You know what that name was?”

“Rrose Sélavy,” Maddy said, struck by the coincidence. “What about
Étant Donnés
?”

“This is the strangest part. According to the manifestoes, when Christian Rosencreutz died, the location of his tomb was lost. A hundred and twenty years later, the Rosicrucians were renovating their palace when they uncovered a secret door behind a wall. Inside, they found a vault lit by an artificial sun, as well as Rosencreutz’s miraculously preserved body.”

“So you’re saying that the installation is a reference to the tomb of Christian Rosencreutz.” Maddy weighed this for a moment. “But it doesn’t fit Duchamp’s personality. He was a skeptic. He wasn’t part of any movement. He’s the last person who would buy into any form of mysticism.”

“I know. And his own statements on the subject are inconsistent. Sometimes, in passing, he seems to admit an interest in alchemy, but when the topic is raised in more formal interviews, he denies it. Which, of course, is exactly what you’d expect a real Rosicrucian to say.”

Maddy flipped through the rest of the file. “What about the stuff involving Russia?”

“Here, for once, we’re dealing with verifiable facts,” Tanya said. “Russia has always been mad for secret societies. The Rosicrucian order in Moscow was the first such group to use code names and systems of confession, which were later imitated by the Bolsheviks. In the end, they were crushed by the Soviets, although there are rumors that they only went underground. And the rose remained a symbol of revolution.” In the margin of the page, Tanya quickly sketched a fist with a rose. “You know what happened in Georgia, right?”

“So what are you saying? The Rose Revolution was influenced by the Rosicrucians?”

“I don’t know. But if I wanted to start a revolution in that part of the world, I’d take a long hard look at what had been tried before.” Tanya glanced at her watch. “Listen, I’m going to be late. Are we good?”

“Very good.” Maddy handed her an envelope. It contained a hundred dollars in cash, leaving her with something less than seventy in her checking account. “For your trouble. Buy yourself a real bike.”

Tanya accepted the honorarium with a smile. They parted ways at the corner, where Tanya climbed onto a fixed gear bicycle and Maddy took the train back to work. As she rode, she turned her friend’s argument over in her head, concluding that it was highly unlikely. Collectors didn’t buy art for political reasons. They bought it out of vanity, greed, and, occasionally, genuine aesthetic pleasure. The idea that anyone would pay eleven million dollars for a painting because of a secret revolutionary tradition struck her as inherently absurd.

Back at the office, she turned to a more promising line of research. A few phone calls had established that Archvadze was indeed throwing a party for his girlfriend’s birthday. As she dialed the first number on her list of possible guests, she reminded herself that she was acting for the fund. She would see Archvadze and take a few photos of his collection. That was all. If she had yet to tell Reynard, it was only because she didn’t want to oversell herself. Or so, at least, she tried to believe.

Her first two conversations were dead ends. The third was with the editor of an art journal in which the fund occasionally planted stories to influence the value of its
portfolio. In response to a leading question and a few tidbits about an upcoming sale, the editor revealed that Griffin Wainwright, one of the journal’s senior critics, was attending the party at Archvadze’s mansion that weekend.

Maddy pumped a fist in the air. Griffin was unfailingly savage in his opinions, single, and painfully shy. Hanging up, she checked a few details on her computer, then dialed the critic’s direct line.

Griffin seemed pleased to hear her voice. “How’s life among the money changers?”

“Same job, better view,” Maddy said, one eye out her office window. “In fact, there’s something I’d like to talk to you about. The fund is looking into some pieces at the Vered Gallery in East Hampton, but we need an expert’s opinion, and so of course I thought of you. I know that you’re going to be up there this week, and was wondering if you’d like to have a drink on Saturday.”

She paused, knowing that Griffin, like all art critics, had a somewhat inflated impression of his own usefulness. While critics could influence attendance at galleries, they rarely had any impact on the market, but it was still necessary to flatter their sense of importance from time to time.

When Griffin spoke again, a slight stammer had appeared in his voice. “I’m damned sorry, but I’m attending an important event that night. Natalia Onegina is opening a gallery in London, and her oligarch boyfriend is bankrolling the entire thing. I don’t know if you’re going to be there—”

“Oh, is that this weekend?” Maddy said carefully. “It completely slipped my mind.”

“It’s a bore, I know, but I don’t have a choice. We could meet up earlier, if you like. How does six sound?”

“I’m afraid I’m booked through nine. It’s really all right. I can bring in someone from
Artforum
instead—”

This was a low blow, but it had the necessary effect. Griffin was silent for a moment. At last, he said, speaking slowly, “You know, if you’d be willing to come out to Gin Lane, I suppose that I could add you to the list. The only trouble is that I’ve already responded for—”

He broke off.
For one
, he had been about to say. Sensing a moment of vulnerability, Maddy went in for the kill. “Well, it’s out of my way, and I wouldn’t want to impose. But it’s been too long since we’ve talked, and I’d love to see you again. If it isn’t any trouble, I could drop by the house.”

“Not at all,” Griffin said gallantly. “I have the number right here. I’ll call them now.”

“Wonderful,” Maddy said, putting rather more honey into her voice than necessary. Outside her window, it was growing dark. In the glass, she could see herself suspended in midair, as if she were floating high above the city. Turning from the view, she smiled into the phone. “I promise to make it worth your while.”

L
ouis Barlow, the assistant special agent in charge of the criminal division, had the build of a quarterback who had succumbed to a desk job, his heaviness not quite concealing the fact that he had once been a man of wicked handsomeness. As his office door opened, he glanced up. “What the fuck do you want?”

“We’ve narrowed down the window for the dead girl,” Powell said, tossing a printout onto the conference table. “Weather records suggest she was buried just over two years ago, probably in early May.” He sensed a distinct lack of interest in this information. “You want to tell me what the matter is?”

It was Friday afternoon. At the conference table, Barlow was seated with Mark Kandinsky, an agent from the wire room. Kandinsky was a pale slip of a redhead whose job, until recently, had consisted primarily of moving Barlow’s car from one parking space to another, and although he was clearly pleased to have been assigned to such an important case, the strain was already showing.

Kandinsky removed his headphones, which were plugged into his laptop. “The good news is that we have hours of calls on Sharkovsky’s phone. The bad news is
that when he calls Misha, Zhenya, or a third phone belonging to our guy from overseas, half the time it’s in a language that none of our linguists can understand. And these are pertinent communications. He’ll start in Russian, then switch over to this other language, and rarely talks for more than thirty seconds.”

Powell considered this in silence. An idea began to form at the back of his mind, knocking faintly against something that he had heard before. “Can you give me one of the audio files?”

Barlow turned slowly to face him. “Why? You know something that we don’t?”

“I don’t know anything,” Powell said, not yet ready to show his hand. “I’m not even on the wire. So if you just want me to piss off—”

Barlow broke in. “Kandinsky, send him a file. Twenty seconds should be enough.”

“Thanks,” Powell said, already out the door. When he arrived at his desk, a message in his email account included the file as an attachment. He opened it. Two voices. Twenty seconds. He played it twice, then picked up his phone and dialed the switchboard operator.

An hour later, as afternoon was shading into evening, Powell led a stranger into Barlow’s office at the Javits Building. He was a slender kid in loafers and jeans, a visitor’s pass stuck to the front of his shirt. As they approached, Barlow looked up from the stack of line sheets on his desk. The wall behind him was covered in scores of his children’s crayoned drawings. “Who the hell is this?”

The stranger stuck out his hand. “Eric George. I’m a graduate student at Columbia.”

Barlow studied the hand, as if unsure what it was, then gave it a perfunctory shake. “A pleasure. What do you want?”

“It’s the recording,” the student said, glancing at Powell. “I know what language they were speaking. It’s Assyrian.”

When Barlow heard this, he went to the door and shouted down the hallway. A minute later, Kandinsky reappeared, along with Wolfe. Once they were all in the office, Barlow turned back to the student. “All right. Assyrian. But don’t tell me they’re discussing the
Epic of Gilgamesh
—”