Cold War - Jerome Preisler [67]
Morgan felt his tongue heavy in his mouth. His enthusiasm was a weapon that could easily be turned against him—how many times had he used such enthusiasm in others as his own tool in negotiations? The beauty of the paintings was nothing. Art was merely a statement of desire; a forger worked the equation backwards, intensifying the latter to provoke the former. A lover was very easily cuckolded.
He was a true lover now. Sitting at the small cafe table across from the blue-green waters of Lake Lucerne, he was as emphatically in love as any fifteen-year-old who had lost his cherry a half hour before. His hands were sweaty. He couldn’t speak. He tried to hide his enthusiasm with a frown, but knew it appeared phony.
And he didn’t care.
“I can deliver within a few days, a week at most,” said the Italian. “Once the financial arrangements are made.”
Morgan folded the photocopies as deliberately as he could manage, then slowly placed them into the pocket of his jacket. He fixed his gaze on a swan in the lake’s cold water about thirty meters away.
The terror of the bull—the sharp line and bold color—the perception of soul . . .
Before such genius, what was he? What was anyone?
“The possessors realize that there are difficulties involved with pieces of such magnitude,” ventured the Italian, attempting to open negotiations.
“Mmmm, yes,” Morgan said, continuing to gaze at the water. He had spent considerable resources examining the possibility that the paintings were indeed valid. The governing rumor was that they had been given by Picasso to a friend of Dora’s soon after the exhibit closed; the reason was obscure and varied according to the teller, although the favorite was that they were used to buy the freedom of fourteen Jews—a romantic tale that Morgan necessarily discounted. In any event, all agreed the works had been spirited off to Bavaria by an art-loving colonel, then sold in 1945 to a Russian general, who met with an unfortunate accident in Hungary during the 1950’s. At that point, the rumors ceased completely.
Morgan had hired a private detective from Bonn with certain heartfelt beliefs that solidified important connections to the past. After considerable effort, the detective produced two letters mentioning the paintings. A historical consultant had found hints in other documentary evidence, including two unpublished photos that seemed to show portions of them at the sides of Guernica as it was being completed. The consultant had also supplied certain hints that could be used to authenticate them, including the letter found in the Musée Picasso in Paris. But even if this sketchy evidence, taken together, convinced him that the paintings had indeed been done, nothing he had found so far meant that the works in the Italian’s possession were the paintings. Even if the Italian was not known to deal in forgeries, even he could be fooled.
Two art historians had been retained for their opinion. They would examine the works before any deal was consummated. Elata would be the pièce de résistance—the master forger’s eye looking for signs of his craft.
But first, a price had to be settled on. Morgan reached into his pocket and took out his reading glasses, fitting them deliberately around his ears as a sign that he was now negotiating.
“The price,” he told the Italian gently.
“The figure fifty million has been suggested.”
Morgan folded his arms and sat back in his seat. The Swiss waiter, as discreet as any in the breed, caught his eye across the tables and ducked back into the restaurant for another bottle of mineral water.
“But of course, thirty might be more realistic,” said the Italian.
At an open auction, with documentation proving they were real, it was conceivable that bidding on each work alone would begin at ten million and quickly escalate; as a set their worth was simply incalculable. But there would be no open auction, at least not in Morgan’s lifetime.
He almost didn’t want to buy them, for if he did he would inevitably have to part