The Roses Underneath (10 page)

Anna put her hand to her mouth. “Oskar, what is this place?”

The boy had not moved from his spot in the middle of the room. “They were here when I came. I don’t know anything about it.” He stepped back and knocked over an empty gold frame that leaned against the shelf.

Anna picked up the frame. “These probably all belong to the estate. Someone put them here for safekeeping.”

The door creaked. “Frau Klein, get the boy and let’s go. Or we leave him. Time’s a-wasting.” Cooper took three more steps and froze.

“Holy mother. What the hell is this?” He stared at Oskar and Anna, who
was still holding the frame. “Frau Klein, what are you doing?”

“What? I am helping the boy. He says these paintings have been here the whole time he has.”

Cooper’s head swiveled one direction and then another. He put his hands on hips and chewed on his bottom lip. Anna put her arm around Oskar’s shoulder.

“Well what do you know,” Cooper said. “I mean look at all…Well this is something. This has to be the biggest stash we’ve found so far. Usually it’s been a handful of paintings, but this has got to be hundreds of them.” For several moments, the three of them stood rooted to the spot as if they were waiting for something else to happen.

Cooper looked through the paintings lying on the table. He pulled some out, leaned them upright along the wall and then stepped back to get a full view. “These paintings are the real deal, not some backwater weekend landscape dabbling. Just look at that one.” He pointed at a large painting that showed a pudgy girl in a yellow dress. She stood on a chair to look out a window but had turned her face to gaze out of the painting directly at them, her plump hand under her chin. “Look, it must be something English, don’t you think? Amazing!”

“That’s not English, that’s German.” Anna said. “The English didn’t paint people this way, at least the Romantics didn’t. And this looks Romantic to me.”

Cooper looked at her as if she’d just spoken Chinese.

“In fact I’d say this is probably by Runge. I don’t know his work so well, but he painted children, and he painted them huge, like this one. See how she seems gigantic?
Like a small adult, really. He tended to put them in foreground like this so they dwarf the landscape. The English did it more the other way around, the landscape absorbed the people.”

“Runge? Who is Runge? How the hell do you know all this?” Cooper asked.

“Philipp Otto Runge. I am almost certain it’s him. He was a German Romantic painter. Look at the composition, and the way the light streams through the window and onto her dress. The colors are definitely German, more toward the blue and green. And look,” she waved her hand over the canvas, “the English didn’t render such crisp depictions. They used more impasto—more texture. And there’s a windmill in the background. He worked in Hamburg, I think. They have windmills there. Is there a label on the back?”

Cooper seemed amused. “Well, well,” he said. “You’ve been keeping something from me, Frau Klein. Shame on you.”

“What? Because I can tell an English Romantic from a German one?” she shrugged. “And, all right, my mother’s brother was an art dealer. He let me work for him at his gallery in Salzburg sometimes on my holidays when I was young. He taught me a lot. I enjoyed it.” She raised her hands to deflect Cooper’s next question. “He left for America when the Nazis declared their war on art. He wanted no part of it and said he was too old to fight the bastards. So he left. What?”

“And where is he now? New York?”

“No, he died on the ship on the way to America.”

“Oh. I’m sorry. And his collection?”

“He sold it all before he left to fund his emigration. Since he was, you know, ‘Aryan,’ it was easy for him. The Nazis were such art dilettantes. They bought anything they could get their hands on. But the Jewish dealers suffered terribly. My uncle quietly gave some of his collection to several Jewish colleagues to help them raise funds for their own escape, but the Nazis would force them to sell for ridiculous sums, nothing compared to what the pieces were worth, if they got anything for them at all. It was so terrible.” Anna shrugged. “All because Hitler was obsessed with art. They all wanted to be like him. So, is there a label on the back?”

Cooper turned the painting over. “Just one. It says
Breuer Darmstadt
. Maybe a gallery in Darmstadt? I bet we could find who this belongs to.” He bent down and ran his hands across the surface of the painting. “Why did you never tell any of us about your knowledge of art?”

“No one ever asked, and I wasn’t going to volunteer anything. We’ve learned not to talk much.”

“You didn’t think it would be helpful, your knowledge about art?” Cooper was incredulous.

“Helpful to whom exactly, Captain? To the Americans?”

“Yes, to the Americans, Frau Klein. It would have been good to know there was a knowledgeable person in our midst.”

“I would think the Americans
can send their own experts to do this work. Why do you need our help?”

Cooper sighed. “We need all the help we can get. What I want to know is why was this art never registered or documented under Paragraph 51? All valuable property must be registered and inventoried, so we know what all is floating around out here. That should have been done ages ago. Who is hiding it? And why?”

Anna laughed. “I imagine the owners would like to keep their collection, not have you send it to America.”

“America? Who says it’s going to America?”

Anna paused. “Captain, everyone knows you are taking the art back to America. The spoils of war. Everything is yours now, isn’t it?”

Cooper’s eyes flashed and Anna was taken aback. She had expected a chuckle and a smart reply.

“Who says that?” he growled. “Tell me.”

Anna rolled her eyes and repeated herself, speaking deliberately as if talking to a small child. “We all know that’s what you are doing, you Monuments Men.” She made a grandiose gesture like an emcee introducing the star of the show. “Why else would you even get involved in these details? “

Cooper took a step toward her, finger wagging. “Listen to me, Frau Klein, very carefully. You and I need to straighten a few things out. I have tolerated your attitude—hell, I can even understand it—but now I am going to say something so we can clear the air. Here goes: We are not like you, like the Nazis. We do not take things that are not ours just because they are shiny and pretty and we think we are entitled. This is cultural property that belongs to the people of Germany. I am here to see that it gets back to the people who are the rightful owners.”

Anna held her ground but her blood simmered. She knew this moment had been coming and the words flew out of her. “Like us? No, you are not like us, Captain! You are the saviors. We are the sinners. We will pay for what we have done, what was done in our name when we looked the other way.” She waved an arm in Oskar’s direction. “Look at that. Look at our future. Look at what we did to our own children. No, you are not like us at all. And I hope you never will be.” She turned her back to him and pretended to sort through the canvases on the shelf. “And just to be clear, Captain, I am not a Nazi and I never was.” Her hands shook.

Cooper sighed and looked at Oskar, who shrank behind a cabinet. “Don’t you see Frau Klein? That’s why we are here. To put back the things that are beautiful. To give them back to you. To Germany. That’s a start isn’t it? I am not here to take anything.” He shook his head and slumped his shoulders. “Do people really think we are here to take the art?”

“Can you blame us?” asked Anna. “After everything that’s happened?” She smiled at the boy. “Everything’s all right, Oskar,” she whispered. “He’s just yelling at me. Don’t worry.” She winked.

“Look, Frau Klein. We are not taking the art. But this is a major find. We have to get this back to the Collecting Point, prepare an inventory, and find out where it belongs. For sure this doesn’t belong to this little old villa. There’s something else going on here.” He looked at his watch. “Damn, it’s too late to get a truck out here today, so we’ll have to lock up and be back first thing in the morning. We’ll take the boy to the DP camp on the way back to town. Tell him to get his things. I’ll get the camera and take some pictures in the meantime.”

Once Cooper was gone, Oskar came out from behind the frame and scowled at Anna. “So what happens to me now?” he sniffed.

“We are going to take you to the camp where they will take care of you.”

“I am not going to any camp.”

“You’ll have a bed and a nice meal and there will be other children there too. They will help you find a place to go.”

Oskar shook his head, his eyes big as chestnuts. “I like it fine here. I won’t leave.”

“No, you can’t stay here, who will take care of you?”

“I can take of myself already. I am all right. I can get a job.”

Anna laughed. “What will your job be? Supreme Commander?”

“Don’t be stupid,” he snarled. “I can do things. I can stay here and guard the art.”

Anna laughed. “No you can’t. That’s the
Amis’
job now. You are relieved of duty.” She paused. “Is that why you are here? To guard the art for someone?”

Oskar kicked at the ground. “No, of course not. Who cares about some stupid pictures anyway?” He shoved his hands into his pockets and kicked at the dirt on the floor. Anna took him by the shoulders and pushed him to the door. “Go get your things. We have to go soon.”

Cooper came back holding an ancient camera with an oversized flashbulb. “I think this might be okay,” he said as he loaded the film into the chamber. He saw Anna’s blank stare. “What? Something happen?”

“No. Everything’s fine. Do you think maybe this is some kind of storage place for the black market?”

Cooper shrugged. “Could be. All this stuff is technically contraband. Not allowed to change hands under Paragraph 51. You think the kid is involved?”

Anna shook her head, but she was not convinced.

“Well, we’ll get to the bottom of it. Right now I really need to get back.” He pointed the camera at the shelf and clicked the shutter. In the brightness of the flash, the room with its camouflaged treasures was frozen for a moment in time. He turned and took several more photos in each direction. When he was done, she tugged the cord on the light and followed him to the door.

They found Oskar sitting on the front steps. “Where are your things?” asked Anna impatiently.

Oskar stood up and dug his hands into the pockets of his pants. He pulled out a pocket knife, a bottle opener and a pencil and showed them to her on the flat of his hand. “Here,” he said. “But look, you can just leave me here. I’ll watch out for the paintings for the
Ami
. Really. Tell him.” He fiddled with the bottle opener before putting it back in his pocket and looking at Anna with expectation.

“No, I’m sorry,” said Anna. “Let’s go.” She pushed him into the back of the jeep and took her seat on the passenger side. She half expected the boy to make another run for the house, but instead he stared at his lap, as if waiting for a verdict to be handed down. Cooper threw the camera on Anna’s lap and climbed in behind the wheel. As the jeep bounced down the lane toward the main road, Anna grabbed the dashboard and turned to smile at Oskar. He sat sideways on the back seat, bony knees pulled to his chest, just as he had been when she found him. Tears spilled from his eyes and washed his dirty cheeks as he stared back toward the house
.

The ride was not long but every moment seemed taut and stretched to its limit.

“Will they really take good care of him at the camp?” Anna shouted over the noise of the engine.

“Oh, sure. There are doctors there, and other kids too. Really, I promise—he will be fine.” Cooper smiled.

“But you told me how grim the camp is.”

The American looked at her. “Well, it’s not the Ritz, but being there beats him living out at the villa by himself, don’t you think?”

On the outskirts of the city, the camp’s endless barbed wire fence rose up and lined the street on the right, and Anna could understand the boy’s reluctance. Cooper turned the jeep down the main entry road and then onto an alley between two rows of plain stone barracks. People were everywhere, civilians and soldiers, children and old people. It seemed like a very organized town unto itself. A makeshift playground had been set up on a small patch of green with a swing made from an old jeep tire hanging from a tree. Children played happily, chasing a ball and then each other around the tree. The women who sat nearby stopped their chatter and turned to watch the jeep approach, their heads swiveling as if following a tennis ball across an invisible net.

“Who runs this place?” Anna asked.

“This is UNRRA’s territory. United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. He’ll be just fine here. As you can see, he’s not alone.” He sighed and Anna thought she saw a mournful shadow cross his face.

“See if you can find someone to keep an eye on him,” Cooper said. “I’ll deal with the paperwork.”

Anna nodded and reminded him of the boy’s name and age. She scanned the faces of the women on the bench and chose the one at the end, who looked about the same age as she, with wiry brown hair framing large, watery eyes and a sharp blade of a nose. She wore a tattered brown cotton dress and men’s shoes. She looked weathered, but sat straight and tall, as if defying a weight bearing down on her shoulders.