I raised the photograph to the light. ‘You’re right. The late Venetian treatment is different, far more pagan, but it’s quite obvious. You know, Georg, it’s a remarkable likeness.’
‘Agreed. But it’s not only the likeness. Look at the pose and characterization.’
Identified again by his black robes and crossed sandal-straps, the figure of Ahasuerus stood among the throng on the crowded canvas. The unusual feature was not so much that the pose was again that of the retouched Leonardo, with Ahasuerus now looking with an expression of deep compassion at the dying Christ — an altogether meaningless interpretation — but the remarkable likeness between the two faces, almost as if they had been painted from the same model. The beard was perhaps a little fuller, in the Venetian manner, but the planes of the face, the flaring of the temples, the handsome coarseness of the mouth and jaw, the wise resignation in the eyes, that of some well-travelled physician witnessing an act of barbaric beauty and power, all these were exactly echoed from the Leonardo.
I gestured helplessly. ‘It’s an amazing coincidence.’
Georg nodded. ‘Another is that this painting, like the Leonardo, was stolen shortly after being extensively cleaned. When it was recovered in Florence two years later it was slightly damaged, and no further attempts were made to restore the painting.’ Georg paused. ‘Do you see my point, Charles?’
‘More or less. I take it you suspect that if the Veronese were now cleaned a rather different version of Ahasuerus would be found. Veronese’s original depiction.’
‘Exactly. After all, the present treatment makes no sense. If you’re still sceptical, look at these others.’
Standing up, we began to go through the remainder of the photographs. In each of the others, the Poussin, Holbein, Goya and Rubens, the same figure was to be found, the same dark saturnine face regarding the cross with an expression of compassionate understanding. In view of the very different styles of the artists, the degree of similarity was remarkable. In each, as well, the pose was meaningless, the characterization completely at odds with the legendary role of Ahasuerus.
By now the intensity of Georg’s conviction was communicating itself to me physically. He drummed the desk with the palm of one hand. ‘In each case, Charles, all six paintings were stolen shortly after they had been cleaned — even the Holbein was looted from the Herman Goering collection by some renegade SS after being repaired by concentration camp inmates. As you yourself said, it’s almost as if the thief was unwilling for the world to see the true image of Ahasuerus’s character exposed and deliberately painted in these apologies.’
‘But Georg, you’re making a large assumption there. Can you prove that in each case, apart from the Leonardo, there is an original version below the present one?’
‘Not yet. Naturally galleries are reluctant to give anyone the opportunity to show that their works are not entirely genuine. I know all this is still hypothesis, but what other explanation can you find?’
Shaking my head, I went over to the window, letting the noise and movement of Bond Street cut through Georg’s heady speculations. ‘Are you seriously suggesting, Georg, that the black-robed figure of Ahasuerus is promenading somewhere on those pavements below us now, and that all through the centuries he’s been stealing and retouching paintings that represent him spurning Jesus? The idea’s ludicrous!’
‘No more ludicrous than the theft of the painting. Everyone agrees it could not have been stolen by anyone bounded by the laws of the physical universe.’
For a moment we stared at each other across the desk. ‘All right,’ I temporized, not wishing to offend him. The intensity of his ide fixe had alarmed me. ‘But isn’t our best plan simply to sit back and wait for the Leonardo to turn up again?’
‘Not necessarily. Most of the stolen paintings remained lost for ten or twenty years. Perhaps the effort of stepping outside the bounds of space and time exhausts him, or perhaps the sight of the original paintings terrifies him so — ‘ He broke off as I began to come forward towards him. ‘Look, Charles, it is fantastic, but there’s a slim chance it may be true. This is where I need your help. It’s obvious this man must be a great patron of the arts, drawn by an irresistible compulsion, by unassuageable feelings of guilt, towards those artists painting crucifixions. We must begin to watch the sale rooms and galleries. That face, those black eyes and that haunted profile — sooner or later we’ll see him, searching for another Crucifixion or Pieta. Cast your mind back, do you recognize that face?’
I looked down at the carpet, the image of the dark-eyed wanderer before me. Go quicker, he had taunted Jesus as he passed bearing the cross towards Golgotha, and Jesus had replied: I go, but thou shalt wait until I return. I was about to say ‘no’, but something restrained me, some reflex pause of recognition stirred through my mind. That handsome Levantine profile, in a different costume, of course, a smart dark-striped lounge suit, gold-topped cane and spats, bidding through an agent ‘You have seen him?’ Georg came over to me. ‘Charles, I think I have too.’
I gestured him away. ‘I’m not sure, Georg, but… I almost wonder.’ Curiously it was the retouched portrait of Ahasuerus, rather than Leonardo’s original, which seemed more real, closer to the face I felt sure I had actually seen. Suddenly I pivoted on my heel. ‘Confound it, Georg, do you realize that if this incredible idea of yours is true this man must have spoken to Leonardo? To Michelangelo, and Titian and Rembrandt?’
Georg nodded. ‘And someone else too,’ he added pensively.
For the next month, after Georg’s return to Paris, I spent less time in my office and more in the sale rooms, watching for that familiar profile which something convinced me I had seen before. But for this undeniable conviction I would have dismissed Georg’s hypothesis as obsessive fantasy. I made a few tactful enquiries of my assistants, and to my annoyance two of them also vaguely remembered such a person. After this I found myself unable to drive George de Stael’s fancies from my mind. No further news was heard of the missing Leonardo — the complete absence of any clues mystified the police and the art world alike.
Consequently, it was with an immense feeling of relief, as much as of excitement, that I received five weeks later the following telegram: CHARLES. COME IMMEDIATELY. I HAVE SEEN HIM. GEORGDE STAEL.
This time, as my taxi carried me from Orly Airport to the Madeleine, it was no idle amusement that made me watch the Tuileries Gardens for any sight of a tall man in a black slouch hat sneaking through the trees with a rolled-up canvas under his arm. Was Georg de Stael finally and irretrievably out of his mind, or had he in fact seen the phantom Ahasuerus?
When he greeted me at the doorway of Normande et Cie his handshake was as firm as ever, his face composed and relaxed. In his office he sat back and regarded me quizzically over the tips of his fingers, evidently so sure of himself that he could let his news bide its time.
‘He’s here, Charles,’ he said at last. ‘In Paris, staying at the Ritz. He’s been attending the sales here of 19th and 20th century masters. With luck you’ll see him this afternoon.’
For once my incredulity returned, but before I could stutter my objections Georg silenced me.
‘He’s just as we expected, Charles. Tall and powerfully built, with a kind of statuesque grace, the sort of man who moves easily among the rich and nobility. Leonardo and Holbein caught him exactly, that strange haunted intensity about his eyes, the wind of deserts and great ravines.’
‘When did you first see him?’
‘Yesterday afternoon. We had almost completed the 19th century sales when a small Van Gogh — an inferior copy by the painter of The Good Samaritan — came up. One of those painted during his last madness, full of turbulent spirals, the figures like tormented beasts. For some reason the Samaritan’s face reminded me of Ahasuerus. Just then I looked up across the crowded auction room.’ Georg sat forward. ‘To my amazement there he was, sitting not three feet away in the front row of seats, staring me straight in the face. I could hardly take my eyes off him. As soon as the bidding started he came in hard, going up in two thousands of francs.’