Into the Lion's Den (41 page)

“Antonov will start on Monday. You will like him and he will stay in the red bedroom, next to yours. He
is Russian too and speaks English very well. Former KGB.” I paled there. I know those guys; many work for
Constantin and they're efficient, cold and deadly. “He's fine to have around and also likes art. He can drive you to a
Museum if you want. He also has medical training, but I hope we don't need it.”

Lintorff went for the main entrance and I followed him, zipping up the jacket. Friederich was already
there and opened the door for him and gave me a brief smile. We crossed the pebbled courtyard and I gaped like the
idiot I am at the tree with the white flowers, not knowing what it was and to the other two standing in the middle.

“That one is a cherry tree, the other is an apple tree and the last one is an oak. To plant them was a
good idea. It takes away the fortress ambiance.” He told me as a matter of fact as he was going to the exit toward the
garden I've seen from the library. I think it's English but I don't know. Must be nice in the summer and the ivy around
the walls is also nice. He walked away from the castle, using a small path that crossed what originally were the
stables, now transformed into a garage, a pond with some ducks. “Its intended use was washing the horses, but now it
belongs to the ducks. They come and go. The water comes from the stream I spoke about. I use to read here in the
summer, but it's very rare that I have some free time.”

“I understand you run many companies.”

“One private bank, two hedge funds, some insurance and industries in Europe. I try to stay in Zurich as
much as I can but travelling is unavoidable. You look different since you spoke with Pater Bruno.” He observed as he
walked and I trotted after him. Being a giant allows him to be much faster than I.

“I feel better after speaking with him. He was very understanding and helpful.”

“I'm glad. You should trust us, Guntram.”

“Could I speak with Constantin today?”

“After we walk a little. You can't be the whole day in the house.”

“I see.”

“Tell me about your life with him. How did you meet him?”

“I know nothing about his deals.” I stopped him. “I don't want to know.”

“I'm aware of that. I'm not making intelligence on him through you.” He laughed with all his heart. “I
just wanted to start a conversation,” he added. “You should be less nervous around people. Not everybody plans to
hurt you, Guntram. All right, let's change the subject. Why did you study Social Work in Argentina?”

He took me by surprise. Forget it Guntram, he's playing the “good cop”, nothing else. “I thought it was
a way to help people, but I'm no saint because I started Economics too and I was more interested in finishing that one.

I used to help in a poor people's area, in the communal kitchen or taking care of the children.”

“You never considered becoming a painter?”

“Never. I like to paint but it becomes too much sometimes. I forget the rest of the world.” I shrugged and
nearly bumped into him because he stopped without further notice. I was going to apologise when he shushed me and
his hand quickly caught something on a log covered with moss.

“Look, it's one of the first to be out this year. We might have a hot summer.” He opened his huge hand to
show me a brown-greenish grey toad. It was no bigger than 8 cm, and sat still on his palm. “Give me your hand, you
can have it and then, we put it back on the tree. It's an Erdkröte, common toad. They emerge from hibernation late
February and return to their original pond.” Very delicately he coaxed the toad to jump into my open palm so I could
take a good look at it. It was very nice and I looked at it for a long time, trying to memorize its every detail so I could
draw it later. I put it back in the moss and it jumped away.

“Did you love him?”

“What?” I asked totally lost. I was in my own nirvana and he had pushed me out just like that.

“Repin. Do you love him?”

“I'm not the best collateral if that's what you want to know, sir.”

“Konrad and I don't need a guarantor to persuade Repin to pay me back. It's a simple question.”

“It's none of your business.” He looked at me and I knew that I had to answer him or face his wrath.

“Constantin was very keen on me. He loves me and does the best he can.”

“That's not what I asked. Do you love him?”

“We were together for two years!”

“Still not the answer I'm looking for. Yes or no, Guntram.

“I loved him, yes. He's my best friend.”

“I don't go to bed with my best friend. In fact, I would kill myself before kissing Ferdinand.”

“I love him if that's what you want to hear.”

“You lie very poorly. You're very young and still have to learn. Why does he love you?”

“Would you mind your own business?”

“There must be a reason. Repin was always changing lovers like he changes shirts. I'm just surprised
that you lasted for so long. Two years must be a record, especially if we consider that you have been out of business
for the past six months.”

“Constantin enjoyed my painting and my company. I also did.” I huffed wishing that he would stop his
prodding.

“You remind me of someone from my past. Physically because you're not at all like him,” he said out of
the blue and I just stared at him. “He was much older than you when I met him. More than twenty-seven years old. We
were lovers for almost seven years.” I could have died from the shock. Lintorff was gay? No way, Mikhail told me he
was the whole time screwing around girls. I was rendered mute.

“I would like to have your friendship Guntram,” he told me softly and I didn't know what to say or think.

“This is impossible Konrad. You are my enemy.”

“I am not. I want to look after you, exactly as I promised your father I would. He was a good man. You
look very pale. Perhaps we should return to the house. The doctor says you need to rest as much as you can.”

“I feel fine,” I answered perhaps drier than necessary. I'm tired that everybody thinks I'm a cripple.

“Where did you go to school?” He switched again topics to something more amiable.

“A private boarding school outside Buenos Aires, St. Peter's. All boys.”

“You were studying Art History at UCL?”

“Yes, I finished the first year and started the second. I also took painting lessons with a private teacher
in London, but I was not achieving much. I have not much talent, contrary to what people say.”

“Why did you study Art History when the logical choice would have been to register you in St, Martins
or something similar?”

“Constantin thought that it was the best because I had such an old approach to things. I was fighting
non stop with the other students at the studio. They didn't like what I paint and I thought that they were wasting
canvases and oil tubes with their “experimentation”. I can't do it. Why deform nature when it's so perfect?”

“You don't deform nature, you give an interpretation of it. I saw Oblomov's wife portraits and even if
they show her features very accurately, you can see much more than the physical aspect. The other one, a naked
woman combing her hair was truly beautiful, almost hypnotic in its simplicity and delicacy. I still don't understand
what it was doing there.”

“I threw it to the trashcan and Constantin rescued it.”

“Why?”

“I didn't like it. I dislike most of what I paint and I still don't know why I keep doing it.”

“That happens since your encounter with Olga Fedorovna?”

“Could be, I don't know. Mikhail counts the pages so I don't destroy them and takes them away.

Constantin ordered him to do so, but it's no good.”

“We should look for a teacher for you so you don't loose your practice, besides idle youths are bent to
get into trouble.”

“It's a waste of money and time.”

“All right, I'll take the pencils away from you.” He said very seriously and I felt as if I've lost another
part of me. “Exactly what I thought.” He chuckled. “I'll ask Monika to look for one. She's my private secretary… and
we will also count the paper so you stop destroying everything. Should I be concerned about my own art collection in
the house? You were looking very carefully at the Madonna in the altar.”

“No, I only destroy my things,” I whispered.

“She's from Riemenschneider. It's funny that you like it, perhaps there's more in the genes than we
think.”

“I don't understand.”

“Riemenschneider was very active in Würzburg, Franken. The Guttenberg Sachsen comes from there
and they were mostly into wine production and farming. They still have their residence there. Your grandmother was
one of them and you take many of their features. That family married twice a Griffin since the Order was established
and several times more in the past. From my line even. Perhaps it's in the genes.” He smirked a bit but not in a
derogatory way. I didn't know what to say because the conversation was taking a very strange twist once again.

“I don't know much about my family. I only met my father and very briefly as he was always travelling,
coming once per month to visit me.”

“I think I have a photo of him with me. I'm not sure. He was our head of legal affairs in Paris and
Geneva. Excellent lawyer. I think the ones who replaced him still copy from his work. He told me you were going to be
an artist, like your mother and I didn't believe him because at that time you should have been six or seven years old.

Jerôme was more intelligent than I estimated.”

“Could I have that photo, if you find it? My family album is still in Russia.”

“Of course. Must be in the safe box with my personal papers. I can look for it after coffee.”

“Thank you.”

Thank God he decided to leave me alone for the rest of the walk. I enjoyed the forest very much, lost in
the trees and the light over them. They were truly beautiful; glistening with the water left from this morning's and you
could hear the birds singing. I was so distracted that I failed to notice when he had started to study me again, gauging
me and realising the kind of idiot I am. Nothing comparable with the boys he usually plays with, like Constantin,
Oblomov or Malchenko just to name a few. I blushed and started to walk faster when I felt his piercing gaze fixed on
me. If he's gay, no bisexual, he must have no problems in getting anyone in his bed. He certainly looks very well for
his age. He must be around Constantin's age or perhaps a bit older. His eyes are something and that dangerous-commanding aura around him makes him also sexy. Shit! Guntram what are you thinking now? He's the man who
killed your whole family and you find him sexy? You're crazier than you thought.

“Normally Sundays are a stress free day. I don't work and stay in the house reading or watching a film. I
wanted to be a historian but the family business got in the way and I studied Business Administration here in Zurich
and made my PhD. at the London School of Economics when I was already managing the bank at twenty-eight. I had
to move for two years to the London house so I could work and study at the same time. It was hard to keep my identity
secret because most of the teachers dreamed to get a job with us.”

“Must have been hard,” I smiled softly.

“The only good think about it was to go to Eric Hobswann's lectures even if he's a Marxist. He has a
very broad approach on times. Almost like Toynbee.

“I only read the book about the Bourgeois Revolutions in the University.”

“He has many more. You can take them from the library and read them. I also like Art History a lot, but I
must confess that if I buy something Modern is only as an investment and because my adviser has driven me mad for
several weeks about buying it. I reached the Impressionists and the rest was too much for my taste. I refuse to pay
several millions for a Coca Cola can or a comic illustration.”

“Those are icons of our culture. Perhaps is the culture what you don't like.”

“True. I'm forced to live these times, but I would have preferred to be in Early Middle Ages.” He
confessed, looking at me more carefully than before. “Perhaps you have your father's intelligence too. Not many
understand me so well after one talk.”

We returned to the castle and he camped in his library with a book, totally engulfed in it as I found my
graphite pencils box and a sketch pad left there. At some point he left the room and came back much later.

“Here, I found it,” he showed me an old picture with my father, Ferdinand von Kleist, Lintorff and a
man who would look very much like me if I ever turn thirty-five. My father was looking very serious and formal with
his tuxedo and the place looked like an elegant hotel restaurant.

“It was taken in Paris, at the Ritz. We used to have the bank's annual party there. The other man is your
uncle, Roger Armand de Lisle. Do you know him?”

“No, I never saw him in my life. Only a photo of him with my father when they were children. He never
cared about me.”