Chapter Fifteen
‘They’re in the meeting room. Go straight in, Darcy. Hello Mr Lorensen. They’re expecting you both,’ Ida said brightly, half rising in her chair. Darcy noticed how the young woman’s eyes lingered on Max as he passed.
As they approached the door she took a deep breath, flexing her fingers. It was a nervous tic.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked, seeming to notice even as he moved with the comfort of a man in his element, walking beside her with a relaxed stride.
She nodded, but she was nervous. He reached an arm out towards her.
‘You’ll be fine,’ he said quietly, his hand brushing over hers. ‘This is your moment.’ His gaze tangled with hers as he pushed on the open door.
‘Ah, Miss Cotterell. Max,’ the National Gallery director said, looking up as they walked in. Margit and Otto were sitting forward, their elbows on the conference table, as if they’d been deep in conversation. ‘Take a seat. Take a seat.’
‘Apologies for running late, Margit,’ Max said, shaking her hand. ‘...Otto.’
‘Max,’ Otto said, the men shaking hands too. They all seemed very well acquainted with one another.
Margit had taken the chair at the head of the table. Otto was sitting to her right and it seemed politic that Darcy should sit beside him. Max took the empty chair on Margit’s left and Darcy was aware of their splitting into camps.
Darcy smiled at Otto as she settled herself, laying the bag with the wooden carousel by her feet and the folder flat on the table. Viggo had given her a lockable box file for transporting the source material here. It made her feel like a cabinet minister with the classified red box.
‘Helle’s on her way. She said she’d be a couple of minutes behind us,’ Max said, unbuttoning his suit jacket as he took his seat. He didn’t look like a man who, fifteen minutes earlier, had been buying a felted teddy bear Christmas tree decoration.
‘Helle too?’ Margit smiled. ‘This must be an exciting discovery!’
A slight sardonic note rang out in her words. Darcy glanced at Max to see if he’d picked up on it too, but he was sitting with an impassive expression on his face.
‘Well, we’re trying to remain cautious at this point,’ Darcy said, remembering Viggo’s prudence. ‘But it’s great to have some news to share at last.’
‘It has indeed felt like a long couple of weeks.’ Margit’s smile was fixed, merely a formality; there was steel in her voice and Darcy was under no illusion just how much she wanted this mystery to be resolved. Fast. Press releases had been issued and the mystery portrait had led to a surge in ticket bookings.
The door opened. ‘Ah, thank you, Ida,’ Otto murmured. ‘Just set the coffees down there.’
The PA did as she was instructed, sneaking another look at Max as she reluctantly turned to leave again. If he noticed, he gave no sign of it, but Darcy still felt a stab of jealousy. She supposed this must happen to him a lot.
Margit ‘played mother’, though only Otto reached for his cup and saucer on the desk. Darcy was too nervous to drink and Max seemed unbothered, adjusting his cufflinks.
‘I understand you were at the gallery, Max, when the discovery was made?’ Margit asked him.
‘Yes.’
‘What a happy coincidence.’
Darcy fell very still, hearing a buzz of undercurrent to the words. Had word somehow got back of a less-than-professional relationship between them? Had Jens relayed their midnight argument as a lover’s tiff? If it wasn’t right, it also wasn’t wrong.
‘It was,’ he said evenly. ‘I just happened to be looking in at the pertinent moment.’
Darcy kept her gaze down, the tissue-wrapped carousel by her feet. To think a forgotten scarf had led to all this.
‘How is the recovery process coming along?’ he asked back.
‘It’s coming slowly,’ Margit sighed. ‘The bond on the backing is almost like glue. And of course, they mustn’t warp or pull on the board. They think now the portrait went in wet—’
Darcy frowned but, just then, the door opened again and Helle Foss bustled through. She was carrying a leather bag bulging with paperwork. ‘Traffic.’
‘I hope you didn’t put yourself out, Helle,’ Margit said, watching as the short woman took the seat beside Max.
‘Not at all. Not at all,’ she replied, appearing to miss Margit’s sardonic tone.
‘...Right,’ Margit said finally, pulling back. ‘Well, seeing as we are now all here...over to you, Darcy.’
Darcy took a steadying breath as everyone’s gazes settled upon her, trying to ignore the one that carried more weight than the rest. ‘This morning, I came upon this necklace.’ She unlocked the box file and lifted it out. ‘It was in an envelope with no distinguishing notes or records at all. At first, I thought it must have been a gift Trier had intended to give to someone – or that he himself had, perhaps as a memento. But this gold bead in the centre seemed distinctive. It reminded me of this.’
She held up the printout of the portrait taken under ultraviolet light. ‘Obviously, we can’t yet gauge colours in this image – but we can clearly see the contrast in tone on this one bead, suggesting a different material or colour. In and of itself, that probably wouldn’t be enough to go by, but when I showed the necklace and the printout to Viggo Rask, he was reminded of this photograph in the Madsen Heritage room.’
Darcy then held up a printout of the black-and-white photograph of the Madsens playing croquet. She pointed to Lilja in the picture: delicate and defiant all at once. ‘Again, we have no colour to go by – just differing shades of light and dark – but we can clearly see she’s wearing a dainty bead necklace with a contrast bead at the throat. Now, by virtue of this being a photograph and not a painting, this is not a likeness but an actual representation of the necklace so we can accurately assess the shape, size and even the number of the beads; we can identify the singular gold bead in the centre, and we can definitively conclude that the necklace I’m holding is the same one in the photograph.’
Margit Kinberg’s knuckles were blanched as she interlaced her fingers, listening hard. ‘So, then, who is that girl?’
‘Her name is Lilja. She was the wife of Frederik Madsen’s younger brother, Casper.’
Margit stiffened. ‘She’s a Madsen?’
Darcy glanced at Helle, who was listening intently too, her eyes narrowed in concentration. She seemed pleased.
‘Yes. However, at this stage it’s too early to be certain that she is also the woman in the painting.’
‘Well, it’s obvious, surely, if they’re wearing the same necklace?’ Helle pushed.
‘It’s certainly likely. They both have long dark hair, but we can’t get an exact facial match from such a low-grade black-and-white image and a portrait currently buried under board. We have to be mindful of other scenarios that might alter the findings.’
‘Such as?’ Helle frowned.
‘She could have borrowed the necklace she is seen wearing in the photograph. It may not be hers.’ Darcy held up the images of the painting and the photo. ‘Or it could be that the necklace is hers and she loaned it to the woman in the portrait. A dash of colour as a finishing touch, perhaps...A prop. It may be that there’s one necklace, but two women. Or two necklaces...’ She looked at her audience, all of them listening, rapt. ‘But I agree the odds would suggest Lilja Madsen is our girl.’
Helle and Max looked at one another. Margit sat back in her chair with an inscrutable expression; she had her elbows splayed and her hands locked together as she ruminated on the news. ‘Well, that really is something.’ She was quiet for a moment, deep in contemplation. ‘So – Lilja Madsen. One of yours,’ she said, looking at Helle. ‘Perhaps you can shed some light on her for us, seeing as we’re all here?’
‘Oh, very little really, I’m afraid,’ Helle said with surprising dismissiveness. ‘Only the broad strokes. As Miss Cotterell rightly says, she was the wife of Casper, the younger Madsen brother, who was something of a renegade and...an outlier in the family, I suppose you would say. He made his own small fortune during the Great War, but...’ She let the sentence trail away, as if there was nothing more of significance to add.
‘How did he make his fortune?’ Darcy asked, her interest piqued by the way the woman’s nose had started to wrinkle with disdain.
Helle looked irritated by the question. ‘He was a goulash baron,’ she said, as if it were a dirty word. ‘But of course, it was Frederik who set up the Foundation in ’61 and really drove the family’s philanthropy and patronage of the arts. Casper was long dead by then, so we’ve never paid too much attention to him – or his wife. They both died young.’
‘What happened to them?’ Darcy asked.
‘Well, she drowned.’
‘Oh!’ Darcy startled. It felt tragic somehow to discover that this young woman had perished in such an untimely, distressing manner, when she had only just found her.
Helle, and Max, looked surprised by her emotional response. ‘...Yes. A tragedy made even sadder by the fact that Casper himself died three days later. Broken heart syndrome. He’d been besotted with her.’ Helle gave a shrug. ‘But that’s really about all I can tell you about that side of the family. This all happened forty-odd years before the Foundation was set up and, as I say, it was Frederik who was the driving force behind it. Casper’s really only a footnote in our operations.’
‘Not to worry,’ Otto said, in his usual placid tone. ‘It’s Darcy’s job to find the details. She’s an exceptional researcher. Sometimes I think she could be a detective.’
Darcy shot him a puzzled smile. If she was flattered by the compliment, she was also bewildered by it; he wasn’t usually prone to high praise. She suspected this had more to do with communicating a point to Foss, rather than espousing her virtues.
‘Well, thank you for that overview,’ Darcy said, looking back at Helle. ‘I’ll make Lilja the focus of my attentions from here and hopefully, now that we have an identity to work with, we can get confirmation quickly and a full bio worked up.’
‘Great.’ Margit pushed back into her chair as if that was that. She appeared keen to bring the meeting to a close. Unlike Max and Helle, she hadn’t seemed pleased by the reveal.
Max cleared his throat. ‘Of course, if it should prove to be the case that Lilja Madsen is the woman in the portrait...’ His attention was focused on Margit. ‘This would only strengthen the Foundation’s claim upon Her Children .’
His words were met with a confounded silence.
‘Claim?’ Margit’s voice was hollow.
‘Yes. You know we’ve made no secret of our ambition to buy Her Children, but new information has since come to light and we intend to file for restitution in the coming weeks.’
What? Darcy’s head whipped round. He had made no mention of any legal case in the car just now. Max was still looking directly at Margit.
‘Darcy’s discovery today means the hidden portrait is now of great interest to us, as a separate acquisition of course – it is a Johan Trier and the subject, we are now given to believe, is a Madsen family member. If we must proceed under the assumption that the portrait cannot be successfully extricated from Children , then we will argue in court that these two paintings should come back into the Madsen Foundation fold.’
‘Back?’ Margit countered with a scoff. ‘ Her Children never belonged to the Madsens. You surely don’t need me to remind you Trier refused to sell it to your benefactor?’
‘Of course not,’ Helle said, interceding. ‘But artists are temperamental sorts; highly irrational, as we all know. Trier had a tantrum and sold it to a passing stranger because he wanted to prove to himself that he wasn’t Bertram Madsen’s puppet.’ She shrugged. ‘He made his point – but at what cost? He sold the painting out of the country, not knowing at the time that he would never surpass it; that it would prove to be his greatest work and masterpiece.’ Her mouth tipped at the side. ‘We believe tempers have cooled since then and that he would have wanted Her Children to sit alongside the rest of his body of work.’
‘Well, whatever you believe he would have wanted is immaterial, I’m afraid,’ Margit said dismissively. ‘As I have made plain to you on countless occasions – and no matter which politicians you lobby – Her Children is not for sale. And as for this assertion of restitution...’
Helle reached for some paperwork in her bag as Max rested one arm on the table. He looked incredibly calm. Too calm.
‘I’ve just returned from some meetings in Zurich,’ he said.
Zurich? Was that where he’d been at the beginning of the week? Darcy watched him, listening to his strategy unfold and feeling as if she were underwater – breath held, her perspective skewed. She had thought he was closer to her than he ever really had been.
‘We’ve had a forensic specialist looking into the provenance of Her Children .’
‘The provenance?’ Otto asked, looking disbelieving. ‘But that’s been well established for years.’
‘To an extent.’
Margit gave a bark of disagreement. ‘To the full extent! Trier sold it directly to Walter Fleishman, a German banker, in August 1922. It remained in his possession until it was sold in 1940. It was then held in a private collection for twelve years before selling again at auction in Dusseldorf in 1952, where we repurchased it on behalf of the Danish state.’
‘That’s right.’
‘And there’s a paper trail to prove all of that.’
‘I agree.’
Margit blinked, perturbed. ‘So, then, I’m afraid I don’t understand what your issue is.’
He took his time replying, in no rush to explain himself. ‘It has long been our belief that the transaction in 1940 was a forced sale. That Walter Fleishman was “obliged” by the Nazis to trade the painting for travel permits to Switzerland.’
‘What?’ Otto interrupted, looking outraged. But Max only slid his eyes briefly in his direction; Margit was his target. ‘The paperwork was fudged to make it look like a legal sale – but to all intents and purposes, Fleishman had a gun to his head. Under those circumstances, and under the auspices of the Washington Principles, we believe the transaction should be considered null and void.’
‘Absolutely not,’ Margit said flatly. ‘That is a hypothesis at most.’
‘Our specialist has put together a very persuasive – we would say convincing – case for this scenario.’
‘How?’ Otto demanded again. ‘Nothing of this nature has ever been suggested before.’
This time, Max looked at him. ‘He has been able to establish that the SS officer who oversaw the sale was implicated in at least two other forced sales, around the same time.’
‘ Implicated is still not proven,’ Otto said coldly.
There was a silence as everyone considered his words. Margit was staring at Max like a lion assessing a tiger. ‘Even if it were proven that the sale was forced, the Madsen Foundation would be no more entitled to the painting than we are. In that scenario, it should be returned to Fleishman’s heirs.’
Max gave a single blink. ‘Our thoughts exactly. Which is why I’ve already met with them,’ he said, as if he had been hoping she would say exactly that. He looked to be relishing every point scored. ‘ They’re ready to file a claim for restitution.’
Margit sat back in her chair with a hard look as his meaning became apparent. This was a fait accompli . ‘Ah. And if they get it, they’re prepared to sell it on to you’ She didn’t take her eyes off him, as if she could read his every thought. ‘The deal is already done. You’ve agreed a price.’
Max gave a minuscule shrug. He was half Margit’s age, but Darcy sensed they were seasoned adversaries.
For several moments, no one stirred at all, the tension in the room as thick as paint.
‘Of course, it would make for far better optics if this claim didn’t have to be filed at all,’ Helle said into the silence, setting down the papers she had pulled from her bag onto the table. ‘We would all be tied up in expensive litigation for years, which would only benefit the lawyers. A terrible wrong was committed against an innocent man, even if everyone further down the provenance chain traded in good faith. But now the injustice has come to light, wouldn’t it be better if everyone did the right thing, rather than having their hand forced?’
‘ Her Children belongs to the Danish people,’ Margit said firmly.
‘That is nationalist romanticism, Margit.’
‘Says the capitalist advocate of the Foundation of the artist’s patron’s family,’ Margit snapped.
Helle blinked slowly, like a cat deliberating whether to sleep or strike. ‘Ethically, it still belongs to the family of the man who bought it directly from the artist with honest coin. And I don’t believe the Danish people would support you choosing to go into a costly and lengthy court battle for something that you know to have been sold under duress, threats of violence and even death. Is that who we are? Surely to choose to uphold that corruption would mean becoming corrupt ourselves? Let’s right the wrong and do the right thing.’
‘This has nothing to do with right and wrong!’ Margit spat. ‘That’s spin for the press release you want to put out! You know, I might find this all rather more palatable if you hadn’t already agreed your price with the Fleishmans.’
‘They will finally get the compensation they are due, after all this time,’ Max said simply. As if this was simple.
‘Think about it in real terms, Margit,’ Helle said. ‘Ownership is just paperwork. All it really means is that the painting will hang a mile down the road from where it is now, still in the public domain. Isn’t that better than it going back into a private collection in Germany?’
‘Don’t pass this off as public service,’ Otto said coldly. ‘This is about you getting your full flush.’
Max spread his hands appeasingly. ‘I don’t deny it – our founder’s mission would be accomplished, to have Trier’s greatest work restored to his namesake collection. But that doesn’t make us villains. It’s every artist’s dream and every patron’s ambition.’
Margit gave a small scoff of disgust. ‘You’ve been lining up your backers for years, waiting for precisely this moment.’
‘I’ve never made any secret of our hopes, Margit, but this particular moment – with the link to Lilja Madsen – could not have been foreseen. In that, we have simply been lucky.’
His head inclined fractionally towards Darcy, acknowledging her unwitting role in all this. He’d been in the right place at the right time because of her – returning a scarf, apologizing for a kiss, just as she made the discovery that toppled the dominoes.
‘I would like us to resolve this amicably, Margit, but you should know the Fleishman heirs would like to see Her Children within the Johan Trier collection at the Madsen Foundation. They are prepared to engage their lawyers to file the claim against the state as soon as next week.’
‘Next week?’ Margit almost barked the words.
Darcy looked between them all in dismay, feeling like a child in the middle of an adults’ argument. She watched as Otto ran his hands down his face. They were hemmed in from every side, and she realized that while she had been calling her advisor to excitedly tell him about her discovery, Max must have been calling not just Helle, but his syndicate of backers. He had their approval to issue his threats with full sanction. They had check-mated the museum’s queen.
She stared at him in dismay. ‘This is your moment,’ he had said to her as they were walking in – knowing full well it was about to be his.
Helle leaned forward and patted the papers on the table. ‘Read this, and then let’s talk, Margit,’ she said in a quiet voice. ‘I do believe we can reach a mutually satisfactory resolution.’
Margit gave her a hostile look. ‘I beg to differ.’
‘The evidence is compelling,’ Helle said, undeterred, closing up her bag again. ‘In the meantime, while this is all under review, we wish to be involved with all further developments in this project.’
‘Absolutely not!’ Margit snapped. ‘It’s not your painting yet.’
‘No – but it is our archives you are using for research,’ Max said coolly. ‘Not to mention we are generously loaning you a very substantial number of paintings for the retrospective.’
Darcy gasped. Was he seriously threatening, on top of everything else, to forbid her access? To pull their loans for the exhibition? She saw Max flinch at her stunned response, but he didn’t look her way.
Margit’s eyes narrowed. ‘Are you blackmailing us, Max?’
‘I’m simply reminding you that this project is a collaboration. Work with us and we’ll work with you. Whatever Darcy discovers, she must share. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable request, given we all have our vested interests.’
Darcy stared at his profile as she understood now what it was she had read in his eyes at the market. He had known exactly what he was coming over here to do. Viggo had warned that he was bullish; bullying was more like it. She had thought she’d caught glimpses of the real man, the softer flesh and blood beneath the veneer – but she saw now that he was hard all the way through, his soul shellacked. He had betrayed her trust and she felt awash with guilt that she had brought him here with her today. She had brought the wolf into the sheep’s pen.
‘As Helle said, let’s talk again when you’ve had a chance to read the file.’ He pulled his feet in and readied himself to stand. ‘Darcy, you’ve got my details. I’ll expect to hear from you,’ he said, meeting her gaze briefly. But she couldn’t hide her feelings the way he could and she watched, silent and pale, as he got up with his colleague and left the room.
She saw Ida in the corridor trying to catch his eye again as he left and this time, his head turned slightly in her direction. The girl blushed, throwing an excited, wide-eyed look at his back in his wake.
Darcy looked away.
Known entities. Managed outcomes. She looked down at the carousel in the bag by her feet. It hadn’t been an apology for what had already passed, but for what was to come. I don’t want you to hate me. He couldn’t do his job until she did hers.
We’re not friends , she had said to him that night on his steps. But until now, she hadn’t realized they were enemies.