Art of Murder (46 page)

'I understand, Roland. Don't worry.'

'My God, it's incredible. Well, you'll know that better than me. They have
...
what do they call it
...
they've
primed
her, they've shaved her eyebrows off
...
At first we weren't even allowed to see her
...
then they took us to the Old Atelier and we could watch her through a two-way mirror. She had labels round her neck, her hand and her feet. I thought
...
we thought she looked like a beautiful creature. I think we should be proud, Lothar. But do you know what she's most proud about? The fact that it's her uncle who is protecting her!'

Again his laughter at the far end of the line. Bosch closed his eyes and held the earpiece away from him. He felt a strong urge to break something. But he did not dare cut Roland off.

'Make sure you protect her properly, Uncle Lothar. She's a very valuable work. Can you imagine
...
? No, I don't think you could. Last week they told us what her starting price was. Do you know what I thought when I heard how much
our daughter
was worth? I thought: why on earth did I become a doctor and not a work of art as well?
..
. We've been wasting our time Lothar, wasting our time. Can you believe it? She's only ten years old, but Nielle is going to make more money than you or I could dream of earning in
our whole lives.
I wonder what father would have made of all this. I think he would have understood. In the end, he always gave a lot of importance to the value of things, didn't he? What was it he used to say: "The best possible results from the means available . . ."'

A pause. Bosch was staring at Danielle's portrait on his desk.

'Lothar?' his brother asked.

‘Y
es, Roland.'

'Is anything the matter?'

Of course something's the matter, you idiot. The matter is that you've allowed your daughter to become a painting. The matter is that you've let her be part of this exhibition. The matter is I want to tear you to pieces.

'No, nothing in particular,' he replied.
‘I
wanted to know how you were.'

'We're very nervous. What's happening with Nielle has got Hannah climbing the walls. And that's logical. It's not every day that your ten-year-old daughter becomes an immortal work of art. I've heard that at the end of next week Van Tysch is going to sign her with a tattoo on her thigh. Does that hurt?'

'No more than your tonsil operations
’
Bosch joked half-heartedly. Then he plucked up the courage to say what he had to say. 'Roland, I was wondering
...'

He could see her. He could see her lying back in the garden at Scheveningen, with the shadows from the leaves of an apple tree making a jigsaw pattern on her skin. He saw her stretched out in the sun, or talking to him while she scratched the sole of her foot. He could see her at Christmas, wearing a turtle-neck jersey with her golden curls cascading down her back, her mouth stained with cake. She was a little girl. A ten-year-old girl. But the problem wasn't the almost impossible idea that she should become a painting. It wasn't the dreadful fantasy of finding her naked and immobile in some collector or other's house. Any of this would have been depressing enough, but Lothar would never have protested: after all, he was not her father.

The problem was the Artist.

Be careful. Don't let him suspect that Danielle might be in danger.

'Roland, I was wondering .
..'
he tried to sound as casual as possible. 'This is between just you and me .
..
But I was wondering whether it might not be better to show a copy rather than Nielle.'

'A copy?'

'Yes; let me explain. When a model is underage, the parents or legal guardians always have the last say
...'
'We signed a contract, Lothar.'

'I know, but that doesn't matter. Let me finish. To all intents and purposes, Nielle will still be the original model of the work, but for a short period another girl will replace her. That's what we mean by a copy'

'Another girl?'

Expensive works always have substitutes, Roland. They don't even have to look the same: there are products to disguise them, you know. Nielle would still be the original, and when someone buys her we would make sure it was her who was on show in the buyer's house. But if we substitute her we can avoid her having to be in this exhibition. They are always very difficult. There'll be lots of visitors, and the hours are very tough
...'

Lothar was amazed at himself, at his ability to be so revolt-ingly hypocritical. Above all, he was astonished to realise how little he was concerned about the girl who would stand in for Danielle. He himself recognised how desperate this plan was, but it was a choice between his niece and an unknown girl. People like Hendrickje would have opted for being sincere, and openly revealing what was going on, or accepting that Danielle would have to run the risks, but he was not as perfect as Hendrickje. He was vulgar. And vulgar people, as Bosch saw it, behaved in exactly this way: meanly, in a convoluted fashion. All his life he had preferred silence to words, and now was going to be no exception.

'You mean that as parents we have the authority to withdraw Danielle from the work and get them to use a substitute in her place?' Roland asked after a pause.

'That's right.'

'And why would we want to do that?'

'I've already explained. The exhibition will be tough for her.'

'But she's been preparing for it for three months, Lothar. She's been painted in secret at some farm or other south of Amsterdam, and I. . .'

‘I’
m telling you from experience. This kind of exhibition is very hard
...'

'Oh come on, Lothar.' His brother's voice had taken on a mocking tone. 'There's nothing
b
ad
about what Nielle is doing. If it appeases your Calvinist conscience, Nielle isn't even going to be on show naked. We don't yet know the title of the work or what the figure will be like, but in the contract we signed it stipulates quite clearly that she won't be naked in public. Of course, for all the sketches they made of her she was completely in the nude, but that was in the contract, too
...'

'Listen, Roland.' Bosch was trying to stay cool. He was holding the phone in one hand, while he briskly rubbed his temple with the other. 'It's not a question of how Nielle will be on show or how prepared she is for it. It's simply that the exhibition will be
very tough.
If you agree, a substitute can take her place in the Tunnel. Showing a copy rather than the original is quite common in a lot of exhibitions . ..'

There was a silence. Bosch felt almost like praying. When Roland spoke again, his tone of voice had altered: it was more serious, harsher.

'I could never play a trick like that on Nielle, Lothar. She's very excited. I go hot and cold just thinking about her and the amazing opportunity she's got. Do you know what Stein told us? That he had never seen such a young and yet so professional canvas. That's what he called her: a canvas
...
And he also said that with time, our daughter might even become a new Annek Hollech! .
..
Can you imagine our own Nielle being the
Annek Hollech of the future?
Just think of that!'

The outside world disappeared for Bosch. All that was left was this excited voice scratching at his eardrums.

'I have to admit it cost me a lot to imagine my daughter this way, but now I'm fully behind it, and Hannah agrees with me. We want Nielle to be on show and admired. I think that's the secret dream of all fathers. I can understand that the experience may be tough, but it can't be any worse than being in a film or play, can it? You'd be surprised how many children are famous works of art nowadays
...
Lothar?
...
are you still there?
...'

'Yes,' said Bosch, 'I'm still here.'

For the first time, Roland's voice sounded hesitant.

'Lothar, is there some problem you're not telling me about?'

Ten cuts, eight of them in crosses. The bones were splintered and the inner organs reduced to dust, to cigarette ash. How about that for a problem, Roland? How about me telling you the story of a madman called the Artist?

'No, Roland, there's no problem. I think the exhibition will be fine, and Danielle magnificent. Bye.'

After he hung up, he got to his feet and went over to the window. A golden sun hung heavily over the small buildings and the green space of Vondelpark. He recalled that a weather forecast had said there would be rain in the week of the opening. Perhaps God would bring down a flood on those damned curtains and 'Rembrandt' would be postponed.

But Bosch knew he would have no such luck: history showed that God protected the arts.

*

Benoit occasionally liked to give the impression he hid nothing from the works of art. In his velvety office on the seventh floor of the New Atelier there were eight of them, and two at least were sufficiently expensive for the Conservation director to show as often as he could that he treated them with more respect than human beings. This of course included holding conversations with his guests in front of them without getting them to put on ear protectors.

His office was tranquil and comfortable, cushioned in blue. The light sparkled intense
ly on the shoulders of the painti
ng by Philip Brennan, who was only fourteen years old, and was situated behind Benoit. Bosch noticed him blink from time to time. Hanging from the ceiling in a glass cage with breathing holes was an authorised copy of
Claustrophilia 17
by Buncher. Behind Bosch, an Ashtray by Jan Mann was bent over holding its ankles, with the tray on its rump. In the window, the splendid anatomy of a blonde Curtain by Schobber stood in a ballet pose awaiting the order to be drawn. The food was served by two utensils created by Lockhead: a boy and a girl who moved with gentle, perfumed, catlike gestures. The Table was by Patrice Flemard: a rectangular board perched on the back of a shaven figure painted manganese blue, which in turn was balanced on the back of another similar figure. They were tied to each other by their hands and ankles. The bottom one was a girl. Bosch suspected the top one might be as well, but it was impossible to tell for sure.

The lunch was in fact a small feast. Benoit had not missed a trick: eel and dill soup with strands of seaweed, hock of venison done in nutmeg with vine leaves and a herb and chicory salad, followed by a dessert that looked like the clues from a recent crime: a bilberry and raspberry
mousse
in a buttermilk sauce, all of it prepared by a catering company that supplied the Atelier daily. Before and after the meal, Benoit carried out the ritual of his medicines. In total he took six red-and-white capsules and four emerald-coloured pills. He complained about his ulcer, claimed he could not eat anything at all, and that when he did he had to take all the medicines as a precaution. Despite this, he also tried the Chablis and the Lafitte that the Lockhead figures elegantly placed before him on the Table. As it breathed gently, the
Table made the wine bottles sway. Bosch ate little and hardly touched the wine. He found the atmosphere in the office stifling.

They talked of all they could mention out loud in a room full of a dozen people besides themselves (even though the silence made it seem there were just the two of them): about 'Rembrandt' and the discussion with the mayor of Amsterdam about installing the curtain structure in the Museumplein; about the guest list for the opening; about the increasingly likely possibility that the Dutch royal family would visit the Tunnel before the official opening.

When the conversation languished, Benoit stretched out his hand to the Ashtray's inverted backside and took a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from the big golden dish balanced between the buttocks. The Ashtray was obviously masculine and was painted a matt turquoise colour, with black stripes running down his shaven legs.

'Let's go to the other room,' Benoit said. 'Smoke isn't good for paintings or ornaments.'

You're a master of hypocrisy, Grandad Paul, thought Bosch. He knew Benoit had decided from the outset they would have a further talk in private, but wanted his works of art to think he was doing it so as not to bother them while he smoked.

They went into the next room. As Benoit shut the heavy oak door, he began to speak almost without a pause.

'Lothar, it's chaos out there. This morning I met Saskia Stoffels and Jacob Stein. The North Americans want to suspend things. Financing for the new season is at a halt. They're worried about the Artist, and they don't like the massive withdrawal of Van Tysch works. We've been trying to sell them the idea that the Artist is a European problem, a local question. We've explained that the Artist is not for export. He operates in Europe and only in Europe. But they reply: "Yes, yes that's fine, but have you caught him yet?'"