The Venice Sketchbook(49)

We laughed, but as Franz moved off again, Henry touched my arm. “Be careful of that one,” he whispered. “I think he’s a German plant.”

“A Nazi spy?” I was shocked.

Henry nodded. “I just have a feeling. They all say they are Austrian, don’t they, and there is something about him that’s not quite right. I can’t put my finger on it, but . . .”

“So when do we see this acquisition of yours?” Bibi, the Spanish woman, demanded. “We are dying with anticipation.”

“Very well,” Contessa Fiorito replied. “Follow me, my darlings.”

And she led us through French doors into a tasteful room with a white marble floor, pale-blue silk sofas and low gilded tables. On an easel in the middle of the room was a large painting, concealed under a sheet.

“Vittorio, my precious, would you do the honours?” she said. “Since you were clever enough to find it for me, and what’s more, to get it to me.”

Vittorio gave her a little bow of appreciation, then crossed the room and whipped off the cover in one fluid movement. There was a gasp from those present. The painting was starkly modern—great shafts of colour, what looked like a bloody hand piercing one of the shafts, and ethereal faces peering through in the darker spaces between, their mouths open in silent protest. It was highly disturbing but, I had to admit, rather brilliant in its form and design.

“Spectacular, Gabriella,” Professor Corsetti said. “Don’t you think so, Arturo?”

“I do. And this was the painting you had to smuggle out of Germany?”

“It was.” The contessa was looking pleased and excited. “I heard about it through the grapevine, and Vittorio managed to meet with the artist and bring it out under a perfectly horrible pastoral scene by a Nazi-approved painter.”

“So this artist is not a Nazi favourite, I suppose?” Mr Sinclair asked.

“Not only is he not a Nazi favourite, but he is Jewish,” she said. “We have begged him to leave while he can, but he has aged parents and they won’t go anywhere, and so he stays. I have told him I’ll put them up here, but he stays and he paints. Asking for trouble, I’m afraid.”

“In which city does he live?” Franz asked.

“In Stuttgart. By day he is an engineer at the Mercedes-Benz plant. He thinks he is safe because his division is making armoured cars and he is a valued member of the team. His paintings are signed under his pseudonym, and nobody knows he paints but his friends outside of Germany.”

“He is running a big risk, I’m afraid,” Mr Sinclair said.

“Yes. There are many like him, who keep on with their small, defiant protests, against all odds. Brave boys and girls.”

Imelda touched my hand. “We should probably leave soon if we want to take the ten o’clock vaporetto. If we miss that, we have to wait until eleven thirty, and the last one is always so crowded.”

“Good idea. Thank you,” I said and went to round up Henry.

“So you really think this is the future of art, do you, Gabriella?” I heard Count Da Rossi say. “No more beauty? For me, I would have preferred the Nazi pastoral scene.”

“But you have no soul, Massimo. I’ve always known that.”

Franz was examining the painting carefully, and I wondered if he was looking for a signature. Was it possible that Henry was right and he was a German spy? I was glad the artist was signing his pictures with a pseudonym.

I went up to the contessa and thanked her for the lovely evening, saying we had to catch our vaporetto.

“Of course, my darling,” she said. “But you are welcome at any time. To all my soirées. And come to tea one day, just you and me and a good British tea party, eh?”

“Don’t tell me you have real British tea,” I said, laughing. “All the tea I have had here is so pale and tasteless.”

“But my dear, I import mine from Harrods,” she said. “Where else?”

She reached forward and gave me a little kiss on my cheek. I’m afraid I blushed. I wasn’t used to being kissed by countesses. We took our farewells and started down the boulevard and back to the dock. A sizeable crowd was there, waiting for the vaporetto.

“I hope we can all get on,” Henry said. “We’ll be squashed like sardines.”

“I hope they do not let us all on,” Imelda said. “With such a crowd on board, we are liable to end up at the bottom of the lagoon.”

“I certainly do not want to wait until eleven thirty,” Gaston said. “Shall we see if we can work our way through the crowd to the front?”

This did not look to be at all possible. There were families with picnic baskets, chairs, umbrellas barring our way forward, and fierce-looking grandmothers ready to fight for their spot. Besides, I could not push myself aboard in front of grandmothers and babies. Franz obviously agreed with me. “That would not be the correct thing to do, I think,” he said.

Before we could act, we were joined by Count Da Rossi. “Ah, my young friends. You also escape from Gabriella’s soirée? Me, I am easily bored with modern art, and I cannot pretend to appreciate it the way others do.” Then he noticed the full extent of the crowd already standing on the jetty. “Dio mio,” he said. “I do not think all these people will fit into one small boat. You will not get on to this one, I can assure you.”