I did, but I wasn't going to say so. She obviously wanted very much to believe-did believe-that Peter was above anything so sordid, and I had no great desire to disenchant her. Or to differ with her, for that matter. Actually, I was grateful to her for wanting to think the best of Peter. I wanted to think the best of him, too, but the difference between us was that she was an innocent, happily unaware of the essential baseness of men, while I, more seasoned and more tolerant, knew that all men were pretty much alike when it got down to essential baseness.
So I thought, in the full radiance of my ignorance and condescension. Anne was a naive young female, Harry was a typically paranoid cop, and I alone was worldly-wise enough to accept things for what they were.
"I'm not sure what I believe," I temporized cleverly. "What did Mark say when you talked to him?"
"You know Colonel Robey," she said wryly. "You're never sure what wave length he's on. He listened, nodded very gravely, said 'Hmm, yes, well, I can see where you're coming from,' but his mind was somewhere else. I could tell he thought the same thing you do: that Peter was out-playing around-and got mixed up with a rough crowd, and… that's what happened."
"Anne, I didn't say I believed that."
"But you do." She shook her head, a jerk of frustration. "You do, don't you?"
"Well, I don't rule it out."
"But how can you think that? Peter was so decent, so clean. You knew him better than any of us; do you really believe he could… a prostitute with a tattoo on her behind… a horrible, filthy hotel room?" She shivered.
"Anne, listen. I really liked Peter, and I respected him. But deep down I didn't know him any better than you did. Look, just because a man seems to be decent- is decent- doesn't mean that there aren't some pretty dark things going on below the surface. It's not something a man can help, you know-"
Understandably, she laughed at this vapid pedantry. "That's what Colonel Robey said, and that's just the way he said it. Chris, do you really think I'm that wet behind the ears?" She laughed again, this time with exasperation. "I've been in the U.S. Air Force for six years, you know."
As a matter of fact, it was exactly what I thought, but I warmed to her on account of it; because she liked Peter, because she thought more of him than I did. Nevertheless, it seemed like a good time to change the subject.
"Well, maybe you're right," I said. "Anyway, will you let Mark know I'll get a plane to Florence as early as I can tomorrow?"
"Sure. And thanks again." She glanced at the Dortmunder Bier wall clock above us. "Seven o'clock. No wonder my stomach's growling."
Invite her to dinner, dope, I told myself. She practically asked you to. Instead I said, "I've stuffed myself with hors d'oeuvres from the bar, so I think I'll pass up dinner tonight. I'm still catching up on my sleep."
"Oh."
"Maybe we can have dinner one night when I get back."
"Mm-hm," she said noncommittally. Which was all the answer I deserved. She pushed her chair back from the table. "Good luck with Bolzano. And thank you for the wine."
I watched her go with conflicting feelings. One part of me wanted to chase after her and tell her I really wasn't the jerk I seemed to be, that jet lag, concussion, and codeine had combined to throw me off form, and would she like to go to Kranzler's, or the Cafe Wintergarten, or maybe go for a schnitzel at nearest Wienerwald after all?
The other part of me won. I sat awhile in morbid solitude, finished my wine, and got up to leave. I really wasn't hungry, and I really was tired. And thinking again about Peter's wretched ending had gotten me down; no question about that. On my way out I passed directly beneath the television set.
"But what can it awr mean, mahstah?" a sloe-eyed young man was asking earnestly. So it was English. Of a sort, anyway; the mushily orientalized version dear to the dubbers of Oriental films. I paused to hear the response.
"It means, my impetuous young flen," a sagacious robed figure replied, "that you may be heading for gleat… difficurty."
I took the elevator up and went to bed.
Chapter 8
I called Florence from my room the next morning and spoke with Lorenzo Bolzano, the collector's son. The elder Bolzano, Claudio, was in the hospital for a twenty-four-hour checkup, so I arranged with Lorenzo to come the following day. Thus, with a free day I flew to Frankfurt to talk to the Kunstmuseum's director for administration, to see if I could resolve the insurance question that had come up on the El Greco. That was the matter that had taken Peter to Frankfurt in the first place, but of course he hadn't lived to make his appointment.
Emanuel Traben was a quiet, worried-looking man of fifty with a sparse little gray goatee, a round red spot on each sallow cheek so unnaturally bright it might have been rouged, and digestive difficulties that kept his fingertips hovering discreetly near his mouth during most of the time we talked.
"You understand," he said apologetically, "that we're most anxious to cooperate, but signor Bolzano has entrusted the care of his magnificent painting to us and"-there was a pause while he winced and belched gently behind his hand-"excuse me-we feel we cannot release it to another party, even at signor Bolzano's request, unless we are fully protected against liability."
I nodded. The Kunstmuseum was insisting that we reimburse them for taking out an extraordinary policy on the painting, one that would cover them in case of any conceivable (or inconceivable) damage to it-natural disaster, act of God, act of war, anything. Such policies come very high, and this one would cost thirty cents per hundred dollars' valued worth per month. On the two-million-dollar El Greco, that would be six thousand dollars a month for the four remaining months of the exhibition, a substantial chunk of the insurance budget.
Peter had resisted. The standard museum policy insures against theft, fire, and the like, at a cost of about three cents per hundred dollars, and he'd felt that ought to be sufficient. Herr Traben, however, was terrified by the possibility of the Kunstmuseum's having to come up with the two million dollars to repay Bolzano if something happened to the painting while it was sub-lent to us. There was a simple way out, of course, and that was to call Bolzano and ask him to formally approve a standard policy-which he would certainly do, because it was the same coverage we had on the rest of The Plundered Past, which had come directly from his personal collection in Florence.
Nobody, however, had wanted to bring it up with the touchy, sick Bolzano, so Peter and Traben had been negotiating for months. But I had new instructions from the open-handed Robey.
"I understand," I said, "and I agree. We'll reimburse you."
He was so astonished he forgot to cover his mouth, and a soft burp bellied his cheeks and emerged unrestrained. "You-excuse me-you're empowered to authorize this?"
I assured him I was, to his obvious relief, but that was only the beginning. Herr Traben was a very conscientious man, and there were other delicate questions. At what point would the museum formally relinquish responsibility for the painting to the U.S. Defense Department? When it was picked up at the museum? When it reached Rhein-Main Air Base, the American compound outside of Frankfurt from which it would be flown to Berlin? Who would be responsible for it during transit through Frankfurt? What exact mode of transportation to the air base would be used? Who would provide it? How would…?
I told him we would be happy to agree to anything reasonable, as long as we had the painting in time for the Berlin opening. Much soothed, he promised to call me in Florence the next day as soon as he had thoroughly discussed matters with the museum's counsel. He was sure things could be worked out.
And that was as resolved as things were going to get. I left the museum with almost three hours before my Lufthansa flight to Florence, and took a bus to the central railroad station, from which I could catch one of the gleaming subway trains that ran out to the airport. I alighted at the train station at noon and immediately realized I was hungry.