Deadlight Hall (Nell West/Michael Flint #5)(3)
He explained that Michael had suggested she might take care of the selling of something for him.
‘Of course I will. Michael said you might look in. I’ll be very happy to help if I can.’
‘I’m having a kind of mental Spring cleaning,’ said the professor confidingly, and with extreme care placed on the desk a small wrapped object. As he unfolded the soft dark cloth around it, Nell felt a sudden prickling of anticipation. This is going to be something good. Something really unusual. He folded back the wrappings, and there it was. A figure fashioned in what looked like solid silver – a chunky man-shaped outline about eight or nine inches high. There was a rudimentary face with a markedly benign appearance.
Nell lifted it from its cocoon, and turned it over in her hands, loving the smooth, cool feel of the surface.
‘It’s what is called a golem,’ said Professor Rosendale.
‘I’ve heard of them, but only in a very general way, and I’ve never seen one. I’m not very knowledgeable in this area, but it’s from Jewish mythology, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. The Hebrew word g?lem means formless. So a golem is a figure supposedly created from inanimate matter – you can see how this one has been crafted to represent the legend of the being hewn from clay or fashioned from mud. The legend tells how at times it could be activated by mystical force. It’s usually regarded as a force for good, but some of the tales relate times when it was harnessed for malevolence.’ He smiled. ‘People will always find a darker side to any story, won’t they?’
‘Sadly, yes.’ Nell went on studying the figure, which was attractive and endearing.
‘All the stories about golem figures animating are myth, of course. But interesting to hear and pass down – and analyse. There’s said to have been a sixteenth-century figure – the Golem of Prague – created by a rabbi of the day to protect the Jewish people. It’s supposed to have been stored in an attic or entombed in a graveyard in Prague’s Zizkov district. All good tales, but no provenance for any of them.’
‘Is there any kind of provenance for this figure?’ asked Nell.
‘I’m afraid not. Nothing written down, that is. It’s also said to be from Prague, but I suspect that’s said of all golems, in homage to the famous one. What I do know is that this figure came from the synagogue in my home – it was there for a great many years. I used to see it as a boy. It’s one of the few things I brought with me to England.’
Nell reached for a magnifying glass to inspect the figure in more detail, and the professor waited, leaving her to concentrate. After a few moments, Nell said, ‘I think this is very valuable, and I think that, offered in the right way, it might attract a good deal of interest. But I’m not an expert in this kind of antique. There’s a hallmark just here under the feet which should identify where it was made, although I’d need to look in the reference books on that.’
‘Would that mean leaving the figure with you, though?’
He sounded unsure, so Nell said, ‘Not if you’d rather not. I could take some photos right away. Some close-ups of the hallmark, particularly. Then you can keep the figure until we know a bit more about it.’
‘That would be very acceptable. And you could arrange its sale?’
‘Yes, certainly I could, in fact I’d love to handle the selling of something so unusual and beautiful, but, Professor, are you sure you want to part with this? It’s such a wonderful heirloom, and it’s obviously part of your family’s history – and of your religion.’
She hoped this was not a tactless remark, but Rosendale only said, ‘I am quite sure. It’s very nice of you to ask, though.’ He smiled at her.
It was a strange thing, thought Nell, that Leo Rosendale was not a particularly good-looking man, apart from his eyes, which were very nearly mesmerizing. But when he smiled, such extraordinary sweetness touched his face that you wanted to keep looking at him.
He said, ‘It has, you see, rather mixed memories for me, and sometimes one can carry memories around for too long. I believe it’s time to put those memories away for good.’
‘Then I’ll very happily deal with it for you. I think, though, that it would do better at auction. Would you be all right with that?’ He nodded. ‘Good. Then what I’d like to do is sound out an auction house where I’ve got a couple of good contacts. They’re called Ashby’s. They aren’t quite Christie’s or Sotheby’s, but I think they’d do a good job of selling and their commission is very reasonable.’
‘I regard you as my agent,’ he said, and the smile came again.
TWO
Michael spent the first half of the morning with a first-year student who was wrestling with the intricacies of prosody, and the second half rescuing Wilberforce from an attic. Investigation indicated that Wilberforce had got into the attic by means of a decorator’s ladder, from which he had prowled curiously through a hatch inadvertently left open by them. He appeared to have spent a pleasant interval diligently ripping some roofing felt to shreds, most of which fell on still-wet paintwork, then discovered, to his indignation, that the ladder had been carried away, by a tidily inclined painter.
It was unfortunate that Wilberforce’s vociferous demands for assistance reached the ears of the Bursar who had looked in to check the progress of the painting, and who investigated the banshee-like caterwauling. Michael, abruptly dragged out of the world of Elizabethan word-rhythms, reinstated the ladder, and spent ten minutes coaxing an indignant Wilberforce down. He then spent a further fifteen minutes placating the ruffled Bursar, who said Michael should remember that decorators were (a) expensive, (b) booked up for months ahead, and (c) apt to take umbrage if their handiwork was plastered with roofing detritus. He added crossly that the entire wall would have to be sanded down and done again, and demanded to know what use Wet Paint signs were if people paid them no attention.