Cat O'Nine Tales and Other Stories - Jeffrey Archer [89]
Over dinner that night, it was Paolo who confirmed that it was his little angels desire to build a great collection in memory of her late father.
“But where to begin?” asked Paolo, stretching a hand across the table to take his wife’s hand.
“Canaletto, perhaps?” suggested Gian Lorenzo.
Gian Lorenzo spent the next five years commuting between Rome and Venice as he continued to coax pictures out of the Contessa, before rehanging them in the Villa Rosa. But as each new gem appeared, Angelinas appetite only became more voracious. Gian Lorenzo found himself having to travel as far afield as America, Russia and even Colombia, so that he could keep Paolo’s “little angel” satisfied. She seemed determined to outdo Catherine the Great.
Angelina became more and more captivated by each new masterpiece Gian Lorenzo put before her—Canaletto, Caravaggio, Tintoretto, Bellini and Da Vinci were among the natives. Not only did Gian Lorenzo begin to fill up the few remaining places on the walls of the villa, but he also had statues crated and sent from every quarter of the globe to be sited alongside other immigrants on the vast lawn—Moore, Brancusi, Epstein, Miró, Giacometti and, Angelina’s favorite, Botero.
With every new purchase she made, Gian Lorenzo presented her with a book about the artist. Angelina would devour them in one sitting and immediately demand more. Gian Lorenzo had to acknowledge that she had become not only the gallery’s most important client but also his most ardent student—what had begun as a flirtation with Canaletto was fast turning into a promiscuous affair with almost all the great masters of Europe. And it was Gian Lorenzo who was expected to continually supply new lovers. Something else Angelina had in common with Catherine the Great.
Gian Lorenzo was visiting a client in Barcelona, who for tax reasons had to dispose of a Murillo, The Birth of Christ, when he heard the news. He considered that the asking price for the painting was too high, even though he knew that Angelina would be willing to pay it. He was in the middle of haggling when his secretary called. Gian Lorenzo took the next available flight back to Rome.
Every paper reported, some in great detail, the death of Angelina Castelli. A massive heart attack while she was in her garden trying to move one of the statues.
The tabloids, unwilling to mourn the lady for a single day, went on to inform their readers in the second paragraph that she had left her entire fortune to her husband. A photograph of a smiling Paolo—taken long before her death—ran alongside the story.
Four days later Gian Lorenzo flew to Venice to attend the funeral.
The little chapel in the grounds of the Villa Rosa was packed with Angelinas family and friends, some of whom Gian Lorenzo hadn’t seen since the wedding celebration, a generation before.
When the six pallbearers carried the coffin into the chapel, and lowered it gently on a bier in front of the altar, Paolo broke down and sobbed. After the service was over, Gian Lorenzo offered his condolences, and Paolo assured him that he had enriched Angelinas life beyond recompense. He went on to say that he intended to continue building the collection in her memory. “It is no more than my little angel would have wanted,” he explained, “so it must be done.”
Paolo didn’t get in touch with him again.
Gian Lorenzo was about to dip a spoon into a pot of Oxford marmalade—another habit he had acquired from his father—when he saw the headline. The spoon remained lodged in the marmalade while he read the words a second time. He wanted to be sure that he hadn’t misunderstood the headline. Paolo was back on the front page, declaring it was “love at first sight—turn to page 22 for details.”
Gian Lorenzo quickly flicked through the pages to a column he rarely troubled himself with. “Gossip Roma, we give you the truth behind the stories.” Paolo Castelli, former captain of Roma,