The Raphael Affair

by Iain Pears

  The letter then continued with local gossip and politics, complaints about servants and news about the death of some obscure relation’s daughter. Then it got back to her husband, and the writer’s venom began to be given free rein: I have told you many times in the past, dear brother, she continued, about my Lord’s amorous adventures. But less so of late after I threw that scene over the miserable hussy he was disgracing himself with before he left for his tour. I confess, when I told him then that I would cut his throat should he ever humiliate me thus again, the colour drained straight out of his cheeks! My dear brother, I was so convincing even I believed I would indeed do so. But the threat restored him to the way of fidelity. A scrub is ever thus, however. He seems still determined to humiliate our family name. My Lord arrives from London in two days’ time. I leave you to think of the welcome he will receive from, your most affectionate sister, Arabella.

  ‘There,’ said Argyll, triumphantly. ‘What do you think of that, eh?’

  Flavia shrugged. ‘So he was a dirty old sod. What should I think of it?’

  ‘Weren’t paying attention, were you? Look again. “Wretched scene painter” – Mantini. “Air of mystery”, that fits it well. “Seven hundred pounds” – a vast price to pay for a picture then.’

  ‘So she’s talking about the imminent arrival of Elisabetta. What of it?’

  ‘But look at what she says. She says it is a painting of ruins – no doubt in a classical landscape – that is coming.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘The painting of Elisabetta was found under a Repose on the Flight to Egypt. Odd, eh?’ He leaned back in triumph after delivering a statement he evidently considered stunning.

  ‘Well, frankly, no. It isn’t,’ said an unimpressed Flavia. ‘Maybe she was referring to the quality of the picture, not its subject. Besides, we all know it was the wrong one.’

  Argyll had the look of someone who had been expecting dutiful admiration rather than counter-arguments. ‘Oh. Didn’t think of that,’ he said.

  ‘But,’ he said with renewed enthusiasm, lighting another of Flavia’s cigarettes and tossing the match into his empty wineglass. ‘Listen. The common link here is the dealer, Sam Paris. He watched Mantini at work in Rome, and he saw the picture unpacked in London. If a different one had arrived on the boat, he would have noticed. But he evidently didn’t, as Clomorton was still under the impression that everything was going to plan.’

  Flavia nodded thoughtfully, but without conviction. ‘Well, I’ll give you that much.’

  ‘And it seems that no one noticed anything wrong until the painting was cleaned. Therefore Mantini must have painted a picture of ruins over the Raphael. Still OK?’

  Flavia pursed her lips. ‘Well, maybe. But maybe Paris was in it as well, and agreed to send off a different picture. He was an art dealer after all, and if I remember rightly he disappeared afterwards. To any self-respecting policeman that would count as suspicious behaviour. And there is an internationally acclaimed Raphael hanging in the Museo Nazionale, which doesn’t do your argument any good at all. Although I must confess I’m still not sure what your argument is.’

  ‘I don’t really have one, yet. I don’t suppose it’s important. But it will make a nice footnote. Wouldn’t it be splendid if they’d got the wrong Raphael? The very thought has kept me in good humour for weeks.’

  The idea had fully restored Argyll’s good spirits, and he walked along the wet, shiny pavements with a light step, skipping nimbly out of the way of the showers of water thrown up by buses and cars plunging through the deep puddles caused by blocked-up drains. He opened a vast black umbrella, the sort used by professional walkers in the rain, and stuck his elbow out.

  Almost without thinking, Flavia rested her hand gently on the proffered arm. She couldn’t remember that anyone had ever done such a quaint thing to her before. Furtive arms sliding round the waist before moving northwards, yes, in abundance; a cold and deliberate distance from her, which had been her last boyfriend’s way of communicating displeasure, she was used to. But this had a quiet gentleness about it, giving her the opportunity delicately not to notice and shun the offer if she chose. Extraordinarily old-fashioned. But practical, and sweetly charming; it kept them close enough together so that both could keep dry under the awning of the huge umbrella.

  ‘I thought we could go to a Thai restaurant,’ he said. ‘Roman food is very good, but when I was there I found myself craving something with spice in.’

  Flavia made no reply, and barely even heard him as he kept up a steady flow of chatter on inconsequential subjects. At the restaurant, she nodded absent-mindedly as he asked if she wanted anything to drink, and nodded again when he suggested trying some sake, which she had never heard of. Then she applied herself to reading the menu.

  ‘Why do you think it would be nice if the picture was the wrong one? I think it would be dreadful – the department is paying for this, by the way,’ she said, once the waiter had taken the order, delivered a bottle in a vase of hot water, and vanished. It occurred to her that it was the first time she had asked him a question and been properly interested in the reply. His new-found buoyancy had transformed his character into something much more agreeable, although he showed signs of tipping over the edge into smugness. He was, certainly, not quite as dimwitted as he seemed.

  ‘Certainly not. You paid last time. Besides, this is meant to be a sort of apology for boring you to death in Rome. And don’t worry, this is on Sir Edward Byrnes. I got my first cheque yesterday. As for the Raphael, just think of the number of respected authorities who are at this very moment battling with each other to get out their books on the New Raphael first. Think how many have made a fortune writing adulatory articles in magazines and newspapers. Better still, think what wallies they’d look if it was revealed that they had been heaping admiring adjectives upon a dud. You married?’

  ‘No, I’m not.’ She paused and downed the small glass of sake. It tasted of almost nothing, but was warm. She filled her glass again and drank that too. The heat made up somewhat for its evident lack of alcohol. ‘Have you told anyone about this?’

  ‘Not a soul. I learnt my lesson last time.’

  ‘Listen. Restrain yourself and be sensible. I know the whole business upset you, but the Raphael can’t be a dud. Every art historian in the world has written an article about it. Every single one of them agrees that it’s genuine. I know they make mistakes; but they can’t all be wrong. You can’t set up an inconclusive fragment by a woman concentrating mainly on her husband’s sexual peccadilloes against the agreed opinion of the most distinguished art connoisseurs alive.’

  ‘I don’t see why not. As you say, people make mistakes, sometimes whoppers. A sizeable chunk of art history consists of unravelling other people’s errors and substituting your own. All the art galleries in the world are full of things labelled “after Velazquez” or “circle of Titian” which were drooled over for years as fine works from the master’s hand. Boyfriend?’

  Flavia refilled her glass. ‘No. But how do you prove it?’ she asked. ‘If everyone has committed themselves to calling it a Raphael, it would be difficult to persuade them to change their minds. It’s all a matter of opinion. If enough people say it’s genuine, then it is. Besides, I think you’re playing games. You don’t really think it’s a dud at all, do you?’

  ‘Not really,’ he said sadly, ladling out the rice and experimenting with his chopsticks. ‘Wishful thinking, I suppose. I was enjoying fantasising about finding some conclusive fragment. Think of the embarrassment. “New light on Raphael’s Elisabetta.” Short, pithy little article. Bang. Art historians doing the decent thing and jumping out of windows or locking themselves in rooms with loaded pistols. Turmoil in the museum. Red faces in the government. All that taxpayers’ money down the drain. I can almost see the editorials now. Attachment? Cat?’

  He evidently found his train of thought quite delightful. He spooned some more food, and poured some more sake.

&nb
sp; ‘No. What’s that got to do with it?’

  ‘Nothing. It’s just that I like cats.’

  They ate in silence, which Flavia eventually broke. ‘At least I had better tell the General when I get back,’ she said, sipping meditatively. Extraordinary. The whole bottle was empty already. ‘Then he can do with it whatever he wants. Wastepaper bin most likely. But if anything does happen, then at least he won’t be able to complain that he wasn’t warned. I am single, unattached, and intend to stay that way. Men,’ she continued, wondering both why she was saying this and why her head was buzzing slightly, ‘are frightened of me. I dislike them. Generally speaking,’ she added cautiously, squinting at him. ‘So we are all happy. I feel sick.’

  In fact, she was extremely drunk, and remembered thinking very clearly to herself, before such an effort became too difficult, that she would resent her host a great deal when she recovered for not having told her that sake was a good deal stronger than wine, and much more vicious in its effects. ‘My last boyfriend used to tell me…’ she began mournfully, but forgot what it was half-way through. It hadn’t been nice though. He’d been very angry when she’d finally walked out. Thought that was his job. Accused her of being unfaithful. Silly sod. No, that was Clomorton. Not her. It was too much effort. She was probably fast asleep even before Argyll arranged her on his sofa. Must have been asleep, in fact. At least, she hadn’t protested when he dropped her on the stairs.

  Flavia woke in a panic and with a wicked head. She was booked on an Alitalia flight for Rome – all Italian civil servants travel on the national airline as a way of circulating revenue from department to department – which was due to leave at eleven-thirty. Argyll was nowhere around, but a note on the table read, ‘Had to go out. If I’m not back when you wake, coffee in kitchen. Hope your head is OK. You’re a great drunk.’

  She had no time for coffee, despite the fact that she would clearly die without it. She had no time to dress either, so it was just as well she had been deposited on the sofa fully clothed. She reckoned she had about two hours to get back to the hotel, pack, check out and make her way to Heathrow: department accountants always frown on additional costs caused by missing planes.

  The head and the hurry put all thoughts of art out of her mind. Instead, she behaved more like a dogged automaton, the determination not to miss her flight constituting the only flicker of mental activity in an otherwise inoperative brain. She forgot all about Argyll, sake, Thai food and Raphael.

  Flavia made the plane, ran down to the toilets the moment the seatbelt sign flickered off, and did her best to restore herself to human appearance. For the rest of the flight she persecuted the stewardesses unmercifully, demanding cup after cup of thick, strong coffee, aspirins and glasses of orange juice. She had to pay for the orange juice herself, accountants also frowning on self-indulgence, and it wasn’t even much good. But it had some positive effects, and she was recovered enough by the time she arrived back home – grateful, above all, that it was Friday – to check through her accumulated mail before stepping into the bath.

  A quiet and relaxing weekend allowed her to recover fully from the effects of oriental brewing. She occupied herself by being utterly domesticated in a way unusual for her – tidying the flat, doing some shopping, taking some clothes to the dry-cleaners. She forgot about work almost entirely until she made the brief walk to the office at eight-thirty the following Monday.

  Paolo, the colleague whom she liked the most, greeted her. She asked what had been going on since she left.

  ‘One case of jewellery, two and a half thousand eighteenth-century books, four paintings, thirty-eight prints. All gone. And the usual threats against that Raphael; somebody or other decided we should deal with them. We’ve had about a hundred sent over from the museum – part of the General’s new committee work. Poor man, it’s driving him to drink…’

  They were settling down for a good and relaxing early morning conversation when Bottando stuck his head round the door. ‘Ah, there you are, my dear. Good trip? Splendid. Come up to my office and tell me about it in five minutes, would you?’

  He vanished again. Paolo looked at the door. ‘He seems very edgy these days. I think he’s still worrying about how to avoid landing in it if anything goes wrong with that damn painting. Don’t know why. In the last few weeks he’s surrounded this department with more defences and bureaucratic outworks than Fort Knox.’

  Flavia shrugged. ‘Maybe. Still, that reminds me of something I wanted to tell him. It might make him relax a bit.’

  She went up the stairs, walked through his door without knocking, as usual, and sat herself on his armchair. She summarised the meeting swiftly, then briefly ran over Argyll’s tale about his researches.

  ‘I thought I’d better tell you,’ she ended lamely. Bottando had his Silly-Little-Woman look on his face. He rarely used it, especially on her. ‘What do you think should be done about it?’ she said.

  ‘Nothing. File it and forget it. Better still, don’t even file it. I’m much too old to go looking for trouble, and the very thought of telling the curator of the National Museum that he might have an old copy on his hands makes my pension start to shrink before my very eyes.’

  ‘But we should do something, surely? A quiet warning, a little suggestion?’

  ‘My dear, if you didn’t have me to protect you you’d be eaten alive. Now be sensible and think. The minister of defence is a Socialist, correct? And the arts minister is a Christian Democrat. And they don’t like each other. Now, an old southern Socialist under this Socialist defence minister lets out the word that the arts minister has goofed in a big way. Do they say “thank you for the warning, good of you to tell us?” Not likely. They suspect a conspiracy by the minority parties in the government to nobble their newly rising star and bring the DCI into disrepute. But they look anyway, discover the picture is genuine, and one ageing general, looking forward to his retirement, is wheeled out on to the scaffold to restore peace and harmony in the coalition. Preceded, I might add, by his very best assistant who is a notorious member of the Communist Party…’

  ‘No I’m not. Membership’s lapsed.’

  ‘Ex-member,’ her boss amended, ‘who is exactly the sort of person who would come up with a naïve plot to undermine the government.’

  ‘But what if it really isn’t genuine?’

  ‘If it isn’t, they have a scandal on their hands. But we keep out of it, stand on the sidelines and watch. Our job is to protect that painting, not to run around causing trouble. And whatever evidence we produce will have to be very, very persuasive. You remember that Watteau that caused all the fuss a few years ago?’

  Flavia nodded.

  ‘Pronounced as genuine by everyone, and sold to the States for a fortune. And what happens? Someone writes an article saying it’s a fake. Says that if you look in the background you can see the word “Merde” written clear as day. I’ve seen it myself, he is quite right. The painting popped up from nowhere, it has no history, no one has ever mentioned it before. It’s ninety-five per cent certain it’s a phoney. But who admits it? Not the museum, which paid three million dollars, not the art dealer who might have to give the money back, and not the critics and historians, who have already said how wonderful it is. So there it stays, despite clear and conclusive evidence that it’s a monstrous hoax.

  ‘Now you come to our Raphael, which cost twenty-five times as much, and has a history that can be traced back to the artist’s brush. If it was a phoney the head of the National Museum would have to resign, and his patron; the minister, would have to go too, because he appropriated this purchase as his idea.’ He walked over to the window and stared out of it onto the façade of San Ignazio opposite.

  ‘And he would have to be replaced, and the Socialists, the Liberals, the Republicans and all of them would demand that they be given his ministry because he had made such a mess. And the Christian Democrats would refuse because even now they only have a majority of one in the cabinet. And th
e government would duly collapse once more.’ He waved an arm in the direction of the Chamber of Deputies, up next to the ice-cream store where Flavia had taken Argyll.

  ‘Can you imagine how much every museum head, politician, academic and newspaper critic would be mobilised to assert that, without any doubt, the picture was genuine? The proof that it was not would have to be three hundred per cent certain, absolutely unassailable and without the slightest glimmering of doubt.

  ‘And what you and this man Argyll have got isn’t. Any academic worth his salt would make mincemeat of it.