Death of an Old Master (10 page)

‘Look at it,’ whispered Piper. ‘The colours, the composition, the way the arch frames the whole so perfectly.’ McCracken seemed impressed. ‘Above all,’ Piper
whispered on, ‘look at the grace, the restrained beauty, the tranquil expression on the Madonna’s face.

‘And,’ Piper went on, ‘think of this, Mr McCracken. The
Ansidei Madonna
is one of the most expensive paintings in the world. The National Gallery paid seventy thousand
pounds for it less than twenty years ago. Seventy thousand pounds.’

‘They wouldn’t take a hundred grand for it now? Cash rather than stock options?’ McCracken asked without much hope. Piper assured him that the Raphael was not for sale. Sadly
he informed the American that not even cash would make the gallery part with it, so popular had it become. But inwardly Piper rejoiced. McCracken, if not completely hooked, had swallowed a fairly
hefty section of bait. It only remained to bring the fish ashore.

And there he was now, in a bright check suit and brightly polished brown brogues, advancing towards the front door of de Courcy and Piper.

‘Mr McCracken, how very kind of you to call upon us in our humble gallery!’ Piper was his normal effusive self.

‘Kind of you to invite me,’ said McCracken, leaving his coat with a porter in the hall.

Piper said he proposed to take his friend round the Venetian exhibition still on show. He had closed the gallery to the public for the morning. And then, said Piper, taking McCracken by the arm
to steer him towards the Italians, then he had something very special to show him in the private viewing area on the top floor. Nothing, Piper assured McCracken, was for sale. All the items on
display were marked down elsewhere.

At first everything went well. William P. McCracken was much taken by the portraits. ‘Seems to me, Mr Piper,’ he said, staring at a
Portrait of a Man
attributed to Titian,
‘that human nature doesn’t change very much over the years. No, sir. Man over there looks rather like a character I came across in business some years ago. Bastard tried to close down
my railroad. Damned near succeeded too.’

Then disaster struck. They had turned a corner and arrived at Piper’s favourite painting in the exhibition, described as the
Sleeping Venus
by Giorgione. The background was an
idyllic Italian landscape, a plain in the centre with some distant mountains. On the right a small town in brown climbed lazily up a hill. Lying across the centre of the picture on a satin sheet
with a dark red pillow was a woman. She was completely naked. Sensuous and sensual, the sleeping Venus looked as though she had dropped down from heaven for a peaceful afternoon nap in the Italian
countryside.

Piper was about to launch himself on another of his panegyrics. Afterwards he thanked God he had waited, as he said to himself, for the beauty of the painting to sink in.

William P. McCracken turned rather red. He moved away from the picture and strode back into the other room. ‘Mr Piper,’ he said, ‘I am deeply shocked. I am, I would have you
know, the senior elder of the Third Presbyterian Church on Lincoln Street in Concord, Massachusetts. Yes, sir. I cannot tell you what the reaction of my fellow elders would be if they knew I was
the possessor of such a painting. The Third Presbyterian would not like it at all. And Mrs McCracken and the Misses McCracken, why sir, they would be shocked to the centre of their being. The Good
Lord did not make woman to lie about the countryside without a stitch on.’

Privately William Alaric Piper was appalled at the hypocrisy of these American millionaires. He felt sure that they broke at least three of the Ten Commandments every day of their working lives.
Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor his railroad lines, nor his steel plant
nor his banks, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s. He wanted to tell McCracken that the same artist who painted the
Sleeping Venus
had painted some of the most beautiful Madonnas in
the world. But he did not. He knew he had no choice but to abase himself before the false gods of the Third Presbyterian of Lincoln Street in Concord, Massachusetts.

‘Forgive me, Mr McCracken, please forgive me. I have no wish, no wish at all, to offend your religious beliefs or those of your family and friends in Concord. Perhaps I should have warned
you beforehand that sometimes these Renaissance artists painted people in the nude. Your customs are different from ours. Your view of what is acceptable is different from ours. We must respect
that. Please forgive me.’

McCracken smiled. ‘No need to apologize, my friend. We shall agree to differ. Maybe times will change and my fellow countrymen will come to adopt the different values of Europe. We shall
see. But come, you have something else to show me on the top floor, I believe.’

‘Of course.’ Piper felt relieved. His eternal optimism returned as he led McCracken up to the private viewing room on the top floor. Piper took a large bunch of keys from his pocket
and opened the door. The room was almost completely dark. Deep red velvet curtains were drawn tightly against the morning sun of Old Bond Street. Piper pressed a switch. It was like a shrine.
Placed at the far end of the room on a large easel draped with velvet was the Hammond-Burke
Holy Family.
The lights played delicately on the curves and the colours of Raphael’s
masterpiece, originally meant to hang on the walls of an Italian church, now waiting patiently in the top floor of a London gallery to captivate American tycoons and separate them from their
dollars.

‘Isn’t it beautiful! Isn’t it divine!’ whispered Piper, praying that the elders of the Third Presbyterian didn’t believe in the commandment about not making any
graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath. The Madonna looked down with a practical, maternal love at the child beneath her. The sheep had
a contemplative air, looking steadily out of the picture to the world outside. Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. The waters of the lake behind the Holy Family
were calm, the trees around the edge casting long shadows across the surface. The horrors of the Agony in the Garden, the hill of Golgotha, the nails being driven into the Cross were far in the
future. Piper waited to see what McCracken would say.

‘Mr Piper,’ he began, ‘you said you had something special up here. Boy, you certainly have. Is this for sale?’

Piper shook his head slowly. He knew he could get a splendid price right here and now. But he needed McCracken to want the painting so much that it hurt. He wanted him to lie in his bed at night
aching to own it, to possess it, to take this European glory back across the Atlantic. It couldn’t be made easy for him. But once he had felt the lure, almost the disease of collecting, he
would come back for more.

‘I am bound to offer it to another,’ said Piper sadly. ‘Believe me, Mr McCracken, if there was any way I could let you have this picture, particularly after the offence I
caused you downstairs, I would do so.’

‘Eighty thousand pounds, Mr Piper. That’s my offer. Eighty thousand pounds. Cash, not stock. You said that Raphael in the National Gallery went for seventy thousand pounds. Let
nobody say that William P. McCracken doesn’t offer a fair price.’

‘All I can do,’ said Piper, wringing his hands, ‘ – how difficult this is, how much I hate to disappoint you – is to speak to the other party and get back to
you.’

‘Can you do that this afternoon?’ Piper shook his head. ‘Tomorrow?’ Piper still shook his head. ‘Two or three days?’ Again William Alaric Piper shook his
head. The longer William P. McCracken was left to wait, the greater would be his desire to possess the Raphael, the greater the possibility of future sales.

‘I shall get back to you as fast as I can. I cannot say when that might be. But I shall make it as quick as I can.’

Piper turned off the lights and led the way downstairs. The lights faded quite slowly. For a long time the Madonna’s features glowed out of the frame. Then her face and her halo slowly
vanished from sight. Raphael’s
Holy Family
waited in the darkness for more pilgrims to pay tribute to their beauty.

Thomas Jenkins of Emmanuel College was waiting for Powerscourt at Oxford railway station. ‘I hope you’re wearing a stout pair of boots, Lord Powerscourt,’ he
said cheerfully, ‘we’re going for a walk.’

Powerscourt remembered Jenkins saying he would take him to Christopher Montague’s favourite place in Oxford. He wondered if he was in for a full tour of the more ancient quadrangles, or an
inspection of some of the spectacular gardens or some old and dusty library.

But Jenkins led him away from the town. They crossed over a railway bridge and there in front of them was a huge open space. Jenkins pointed dramatically to his right towards the buildings of
the city.

‘Over there, Lord Powerscourt, are the walls of Jericho. Here in front of us is Port Meadow, one of the oldest places in Oxford.’

Powerscourt heard no trumpets. But he saw a vast open space of empty land with wild horses and cows roaming about the rich pasture. Two hundred yards away to his left the river snaked its way
beneath the hanging trees.

‘This was Christopher’s favourite place in Oxford, Lord Powerscourt,’ said Jenkins, pointing across Port Meadow. ‘We used to walk along here, over the river there and
along the towpath to an old inn called the Trout for lunch.’

‘Let us do the same,’ said Powerscourt. ‘But why is it still wild? Why has nobody built on it?’ Powerscourt’s historical curiosity had temporarily won out over the
interests of his investigation. A couple of wild horses drew near to the two men. The horses looked at them carefully and trotted off into the meadow.

‘The freemen of Oxford have had the right to graze their animals on this stretch of land since the tenth century,’ said Jenkins proudly. ‘They’ve held on to it ever
since. The right is recorded in the Domesday Book. Before that they say that Bronze Age people used to bury their dead here.’

Jenkins and Powerscourt were crossing the river on an ancient bridge. Small sailing boats were lined up in neat rows, waiting for their masters.

‘In a couple of months,’ Jenkins went on, ‘when winter really sets in, almost all of the meadow is flooded. It’s like a huge marsh or bog.’

‘Mr Jenkins,’ said Powerscourt, stepping smartly out of the way of an approaching trio of cyclists, ‘I do not believe you told me the whole truth when we spoke the other day in
London.’ He looked at his companion severely. Jenkins blushed slightly and stared down at his feet.

‘What do you mean, Lord Powerscourt? In what particular?’

Powerscourt smiled at the precise academic usage of ‘in what particular’. They were past the trees now. The late October sun was surprisingly warm. ‘It may be, of course, that
you simply do not know the answers to my questions. But I think you do. There are two particulars. The first is whether Christopher Montague was going to start a new magazine dealing with the fine
arts. The second is whether or not he was having an affair with a married woman in London. I suggest, Mr Jenkins . . .’ Powerscourt paused to retie his bootlaces. ‘I suggest that you
consider your answers. We can discuss them more fully when we reach the Trout.’

With that Powerscourt strode ahead up the towpath, overtaking a leisurely canal boat as he went. Ahead was a ruined abbey, the walls covered in ivy, the fading red of the bricks blending in with
the landscape.

‘Twelfth-century foundation called Godstow Abbey,’ said Jenkins grumpily, ‘sort of finishing school for the daughters of the nobility. Henry the Second’s mistress was a
pupil here and met a mysterious death. Maybe that would be a good subject for one of your investigations.’

Powerscourt laughed. ‘It’s difficult enough investigating mysterious deaths today without asking questions about the past.’ He looked back across Port Meadow. The river swirled
its tortuous trail through the weeping willows. Far in the distance the spires of Oxford stood out against the sky. An improbable campanile rose above the walls of Jericho. Powerscourt could see
why the place had such an appeal.

The beer tasted fruity. Jenkins and Powerscourt were seated by the water’s edge in the garden of the Trout. Powerscourt wondered if Johnny Fitzgerald, not quite such a connoisseur of beer
as he was of wine, would approve.

‘To business, Mr Jenkins,’ said Powerscourt. ‘I have given you fair warning. You told me you had no idea what he was working on at the time of his death. I think he was writing
an article about forgery. It was for a new magazine he was going to found. Surely you must have known something of that?’

Thomas Jenkins took a large mouthful of his beer. ‘Well,’ he said, and paused. Powerscourt thought he could tell from the look in Jenkins’ brown eyes that he had been
concealing something, ‘Christopher was always talking about founding new magazines. Nothing ever seemed to come of it.’

‘With whom? Was it always the same partner?’

‘Well, it was always the same chap, actually,’ replied Jenkins, ‘a man called Lockhart, Jason Lockhart. He’s a junior partner in a firm of art dealers called Clarke.
They’re great rivals of Capaldi’s and that new firm of de Courcy and Piper.’

Powerscourt filed the names away. He would write to the President of the Royal Academy on his return. The garden of the Trout was full now, the tables packed, visitors admiring the swirling
waters of the mill pond by the bridge.

‘And the article on forgers,’ Powerscourt went on. ‘Did you know anything about that?’

‘He might have mentioned something about it,’ said Jenkins, taking another swig of his beer. His glass was almost empty. ‘But I didn’t think it worth telling you about.
It was like the magazine. Christopher always had hundreds of schemes in his head at any one time. I didn’t mean to mislead you, Lord Powerscourt. There were so many things Christopher talks
about.’ He stopped. ‘Used to talk about.’

‘And what about the married woman?’ said Powerscourt, raising his voice above the noise. ‘Did you think that might be misleading too?’